Death in Her Hands

On a morning in early May, about a year after she moved to the Levant area, Vesta takes a dawn walk with her dog, Charlie, a retriever/Labrador-Weimaraner mix, through the open birch woods on her 12-acre property. Vesta lives an isolated life in a former Girl Scout camp cabin, with her main social outing being weekly grocery trips to the neighboring town of Bethsmame. On the path, she discovers a handwritten note held down by small black rocks. The note, written on a clean-edged page from a spiral notebook, reads, “Her name was Magda. Nobody will ever know who killed her. It wasn’t me. Here is her dead body” (1). Vesta observes no body, blood, or any signs of a struggle nearby. She also notes that Charlie, who is normally drawn to dead things, ignores the site.

Initially dismissing the note as a prank or a discarded story idea, Vesta soon begins to vividly imagine a graphic murder scene for the victim, an invented woman she calls Magda. This fantasy includes specific details like a locket. When she stands up, she experiences a dizzy spell, which makes her worry about her health and isolation.