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“I know, that’s why I’m here. To see if I can help. May I come in?” she asked again.
Gross stepped back. “I hope you can help me, too. I haven’t found another housekeeper job yet. And the money is running low.”
“I quite understand.”
She was led into a small room off the kitchen. The place was decorated with what seemed to be spare parts from lots of different homes and decades. Clarisse assumed the woman had accumulated all this over the years and kept using it, since new items never came in to replace what was clearly worn out.
“Now exactly when did Mr. Pottinger let you go?”
“It was three weeks ago yesterday.”
“And the reason given?”
“He didn’t give no reason. Just told me and the others to get out.”
“My goodness. How rude.”
“That’s what I thought. And he owed me wages, a week’s worth. Never seen a dime and that big house he lived in, I know he had the money. Now he’s dead. Doubt I’ll be getting anything.” She paused. “I filed for unemployment. Is that why you’re here, Miss?”
“It’s one of the reasons, yes,” said Clarisse, keying some items in on her iPad. “How many staff did he have?”
“Four inside, three outside. All locals, hardworking. And he left them high and dry, too. Seems like the more money someone has, the less they care.”
“Yes, it does, doesn’t it. So he owed you a week’s worth of wages. How much was that?”
“I got ten dollars an hour times forty-five hours for the week.”
“So four hundred and fifty dollars then?”
“Yeah. Backbreaking work, it was. That place was huge. And he wanted the floors scrubbed and the marble to gleam.”
“A difficult employer, then?”
“You could say that. You could say a lot more than that. The thing was the man was almost never there. He’d talk to me on the computer. Made me walk around with it, show him the state of the place. He’d read me the riot act if the least thing was out of place or something wasn’t done to his liking, or if he didn’t think we were working hard enough. It was a real bitch.”
“And you mean to say he was almost never at Stormfield?”
“I could count the times he was there on one hand with fingers left over.”
“Very interesting.”
“And the few times he did show up he never gave me any notice. He was just there. Almost like the man was afraid to be in his own house.”
Clarisse thought about Nathan Trask and knew the woman had unknowingly hit the nail right on the head with that one. “And how long did you work for him?”
“Nearly four years.”
“Your annual income from that job would have been, around twenty-three thousand?”
“About that.”
“Any paid vacation or health care?”
Gross smiled bitterly. “I asked for it, he never gave it. Said if I wanted a vacation why should he pay for it. And then he told me it was my fault if I got sick. Not his problem.”
Clarisse looked around at the small space. “Could you live off that income?”
“Got one adult child and two grandbabies living with me, so the short answer is no. I work another job at night. Cleaning some buildings over in Smithfield. On the weekends I waitress at the local diner.”
