No Regrets

baths.”
    There was a music room, a library, sundecks, and a “magnificent view of Alec Bay.” The pool that Rolf hadonce hoped to have completed in time for his siblings’ visit was now finished, still another attraction at Ruth’s new enterprise. Those guests who enjoyed the outdoors could look for driftwood on the Neslund home’s private beach, or explore “the lovely pastoral surroundings.”
    Ruth knew what tourists sought; she had visited a number of similar establishments in picturesque settings around Washington. Every successful bed-and-breakfast had some kind of signature, or a “gimmick” to make it stand out. Ruth announced that she was featuring rare antique furniture in every room. She was considering adding an antiques store later on so that her guests could purchase items that would remind them of their visit to Lopez Island.
    “I’ve always loved to cook,” she told the reporter, Betty Horne. “This project seems a natural for me, giving me an income and utilizing the things I like to do best.”
    Rather than the token coffee, rolls, and fruit that many bed-and-breakfast homes served, Ruth offered a complete meal: “Eggs, hash browns, sausage, cereal, fruit or juice, homemade biscuits and bread, coffee or tea.”
    In the first month after she opened her home to guests, Ruth Neslund seldom had vacancies. People came from all over the Northwest, California, and even England to enjoy the serenity and hospitality of the Alec Bay Inn.
    Whether the notoriety of what was rumored to have happened in the huge home drew visitors, who could say? The house that was once home to Lizzie Borden has been a successful bed-and-breakfast. Some said that Ruth’s “gimmick” was not her antiques at all, but the possibility that a grotesque murder had occurred on the premises. Ruth Neslund was beginning to need a larger income. Her legal expenses were substantial.

Sixteen
    By March 7, 1983, the witnesses, physical evidence, and circumstantial evidence that made up the case against Nettie Ruth Neslund were all in place. At long last, she was charged with first-degree murder, with a trial date yet to come. At her arraignment, Ruth looked like someone’s grandmother in her navy blue patterned blouse, slacks, and a dark jacket, her heavily lined face solemn as Fred Weedon helped her up the courthouse steps at the county seat in Friday Harbor.
    At her arraignment, Ruth quickly entered a plea of not guilty. Fred Weedon asked to have her bail lowered from $50,000 to $10,000—to no avail. Ruth posted a property bond to cover the $50,000.
    Finally, the macabre secrets that the prosecution team and the investigators had been forced to hold close to their vests for so long were public knowledge. Not only the San Juan County papers, but both the
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
and the
Seattle Times
featured front-page coverage, quoting the affidavit of probable cause.
    What gossips had been whispering about for almost three years was apparently not that far from the truth as the prosecution saw it. Both Joy Stroup and Paul Myers had given statements alleging that they had conversations withRuth and Robert Myers about the events of August 8, 1980.
    The Neslunds had had yet another violent argument that day. The impetus for their last quarrel would have been Rolf’s discovery that Ruth had taken control of all his financial assets and was preparing to mortgage the home he loved. Ruth had claimed to Paul and Joy that Rolf had hit her. Robert Myers, their summer visitor, had pulled Rolf off his sister.
    At that point, the state maintained, Ruth had grabbed one of her many guns and shot Rolf twice in the head as Myers held him.
    The brother and sister were then alleged to have set about to get rid of his body and to hide all evidence of the crime. How they reportedly did that was allegedly far more gruesome than even the darkest speculations that had circled San Juan County for three years.
    Despite island gossip, however, no meat-grinder had been involved.
    Even so, to many, Rolf Neslund’s disappearance and the way the case was playing out was too bizarre to be true. And there were more T-shirts and more dark humor. John Saul, the bestselling Lopez Island thriller author, penned an epic limerick about the Neslund mystery. Read aloud at one of Saul’s frequent gatherings for Northwest writers, it was hilarious because the case had become almost mythic.
    Saul has a keen wit, and he is especially good at satire. His humor