by Laurie Cass
“Perfect,” she said, scanning the list. “I bet you’ll see them next week.”
“Them?” Julia and I had asked.
The waitress had just laughed and told us that we’d know them when we saw them.
And we did. No question about it.
The waitress’s mother-in-law happened to be the pitcher and coach of a local softball team, and the entire team, with the exception of one player, had been playing together since they were in high school. How they’d managed to stay a healthy team was a mystery of immense proportions, but their fifty years of experience—each, not total—pushed them to the top of their league every year. Only the catcher was a newcomer, and that was because the original catcher and her husband had retired to Arizona.
“Still playing ball, though,” Corky Grigsby had said that first day, nodding. “What about you ladies?” She flicked an experienced glance over Julia and me. “No time like the present to join a team. Do you play?”
I’d smiled and said I was more the swimming/hiking/bicycling type, but Julia had looked interested.
Now I looked at her as she unlocked the door and pushed it open. “You know Corky’s going to ask if you’ve joined a softball team.”
“And I have,” she said. “You are looking at the new right fielder for the Chilson Swingers.”
“Really? Did you have to try out or anything?”
“They asked how much I’d played, and I told them.” Julia pulled down an imaginary baseball cap and pounded her fist into an imaginary glove.
“Which was how much?” I asked.
“Gym class, back in high school.” She looked at me and grinned. “I’m going to be horrible, but I’m going to have fun.”
Of that, I was sure. If I hadn’t known that Julia was a world-class actor famous in theatrical circles around the world, I would have thought she was a fun-loving party girl who’d never grown up. Of course, it seemed as if there was a lot of overlap between those two things.
Corky and her crew came up the steps into the bookmobile. In a line, they went straight to the front to give Eddie his morning greeting, then came back and stood around Julia and me in a semicircle.
“What do you have for us today?” Corky asked. “And, for crying out loud, don’t give us anything that’ll make us think. It’s summer, you know.”
“Horror,” I said promptly.
The first time the softball team had visited the bookmobile—all nine of them, and I was glad they hadn’t brought any of the backup players, because I wasn’t sure the vehicle could take it—they’d requested that we give them books they’d never read, or books their mothers would have warned them about, or books that would shock their children. All three, if possible. They’d read Fifty Shades of Grey a few weeks ago, and the left fielder said she’d learned only two things, which she thought was pretty good for an old lady.
“Horror? Excellent!” the shortstop said, rubbing her hands together. “This is going to be fun. Give me something that will keep me awake all night. I don’t sleep for beans these days. At least this way I’ll have a good reason.” She elbowed the center fielder in the ribs. “And maybe I’ll wake up Joe and tell him I need comforting. What do you think?”
The ladies laughed, and I told Julia to get the bag of books I’d stashed behind the back desk. She opened the bag, peered in, and looked puzzled. “Lord of the Flies?”
“Wait a minute,” Corky said, frowning. “My kids read this book in school. You’re not trying to educate us, are you?”
“My kids read this, too,” the catcher said. “It can’t be that scary.”
I smiled. “Read the first few chapters late at night when no one else is awake. Then come back and tell me how you felt.”
Squinting with doubt, they took the books as I reassured them they wouldn’t be learning a thing. And they probably wouldn’t; they’d all lived long enough to know what people could do to each other.
I pushed away the chill of remembered fear that I’d felt upon first reading the book and turned to greet the person who’d arrived while Julia and I had been busy with the team. He was browsing the natural-history books, and was thirtyish, with long hair pulled back into a tidy ponytail. Though I’d never seen him on the bookmobile before, he looked familiar.
“Hi,” I said, stepping forward. “I’m Minnie Hamilton. Is this your first visit to the bookmobile?” Odds were high that it was, but it was also possible that I’d forgotten one face among the hundreds.
“What’s that?” The guy looked across the top of my head, then looked down. “Oh. Hi. Yeah. It is. Nice bus you got here.”
He smiled, and I got the itchy feeling that he was trying to flirt with me.
“Thank you,” I said politely. “Is there anything in which you’re interested?” Nothing like perfect grammar to turn off a prospective suitor.
His smile went wider. “My name is Jared Moyle,” he said.
The name meant nothing to me, but I nodded. “Nice to meet you, Jared. If you need a library card, either Julia or I can help you with the paperwork. Let me know if you need any help finding a book,” I said, stressing the “book” part ever so slightly.
“Mrr.” Eddie waltzed past me and thumped Jared on the back of the knees.
In the dog stories I’d read, the narrators often gave their canine friends credit for knowing, at a single doggy sniff, whether or not a newcomer was trustworthy. I did not attribute that power of discernment to Eddie. He was mostly likely after one of two things: either Jared smelled like a cat treat or Jared was wearing pants that looked like something Eddie wanted to shed upon.
“Hey, you guys have a cat.” Jared dropped into a crouch and held out his knuckles for sniffing purposes.
“His name is Eddie,” I said.
“We could use a cat at the store.” Jared scratched Eddie on the side of his neck, eliciting a low but steady purr.
“What store is that?”
“I co-own the used-book store in Chilson.” He glanced up. “You been in?”
So that was why the guy looked familiar. “Nice thriller section,” I said. “How are things going?”
“Oh, you know.” He shrugged. “Not great; not horrible. I’m not going to get rich, but it’s a way for me to read a lot without spending a ton of money. Plus, I do caretaking for a bunch of summer people. I get by.” He gave Eddie a last pat, stood, and smiled at me.
“My boyfriend does some of that.” This was loosely true, since his neighbors were seasonal. Ash gave them a neighborly hand with their cottage-opening and cottage-closing chores, and kept an eye on the place through the winter.
Jared nodded. “Lots of that work around these days. Even high school kids are getting into it.” He grinned. “Probably pays a lot better than working at Benton’s did. After a couple of summers of that, you’d think I’d stay away from retail, but here I am with my own store.”
I’d been starting to slide away, but stopped. “Jared, I have a strange question for you. Have you had anyone in looking for old books on flowers?”
His forehead crinkled a little. “Not that I can think of. Of course, I’m not there all the time.”
I was about to warn him about the book-related break-ins—after all, if I’d warned Rianne, I was obligated to warn him, and probably should already have done so, if Ash or Detective Inwood hadn’t—but I noticed that he wasn’t really paying attention to me. No, he was surreptitiously eyeing the bookmobile’s natural-history selection. The part that included wildflowers.
Stooping to pick up Eddie, I said, “We’ve had some recent interest in books about flowers. I just wondered if you were getting the same thing.”
Jared said they hadn’t, at least as far as he knew. He kept talking, and I tried to listen, but what I kept thinking, as I inched farther and farther away, was that I’d just added one more person to the suspect list, b
ecause who better than a used-book store owner would know the value of Wildflowers?
* * *
A few hours later, a different man was smiling at me, and the grin on his face was decades younger than the eighty-five I knew him to be. “Now, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” he asked.
I smiled back. Age and wheelchair notwithstanding, Max Compton was ten times the flirt Jared Moyle had tried to be, and was more than ten times as appealing. “Hey there, Mr. Compton. If I’m looking that good, you need to get out more.” It had been a long day, and I knew I was looking like something Eddie had dragged in.
He gave me a look of mock horror. “Mr. Compton? That’s my dad—God rest his soul. You call me Max, or I’ll start calling you Missy.”
“You have a deal.” I held out my hand and we shook on it, me being careful not to grip too tightly around the elderly man’s arthritis. “Ready for the next couple of chapters?”
Last summer, Cade had spent some time at Lake View Medical Care Facility while recovering from a stroke, and I’d visited often enough that the staff learned what I did for a living. One thing led to another, and in addition to dropping off a rotating selection of large-print books, I’d also ended up promising to stop by Lake View once a month to read aloud to a group of residents. Other volunteers did the same thing, and between us we could read through a book in three weeks. The residents chose the book, and I was curious to see the current selection.
Max pulled a volume from underneath the crocheted blanket that lay across his rickety legs. “Looking forward to hearing you do the voices.”
There was a smirk in his own voice, and when I saw the title, I knew why. “Animal Farm? Are you serious?”
“No, he’s not.”
I turned. Heather, a nurse’s aide, walked into the sunroom and handed me a copy of Jan Karon’s These High, Green Hills. “They finished the fifth chapter yesterday—don’t let him tell you any different.”
Max fell against the back of his wheelchair, clutching at his shirt. “I’m having a heart attack!” he croaked. “I can only be saved by hearing a John Sandford book read to me.”
“That’s your stomach,” Heather said, winking at me, “not your heart. And you know darn well that you got outvoted for John Sandford. Better luck next time.”
“Oooh,” Max groaned in fake agony. “My heart . . .”
“Is everything all right?” someone asked from the doorway.
“We’re fine,” Heather said, taking the George Orwell novel from me. “Just a little discussion of book selection, that’s all.”
I glanced over and saw the lawyer I’d met in Rianne’s office, and the guy I’d seen while out running the other morning. “Hi,” I said. “Nice to see you again.” And then, because he wasn’t leaving and I didn’t know what else to say, I asked, “Are you here visiting relatives?”
Heather made a very soft but very rude noise in the back of her throat. He smiled and said, “No, not yet. My parents are hale and hearty. But I have a number of clients here, and I like to check on them every week or two.”
“Well, it was nice seeing you again,” I said.
“Likewise. Say, you still have my card?” He didn’t wait for my reply, but fished one from his pocket and handed it over. “You never know when you might need an attorney.” Laughing, he turned his hand into a pistol and fired off a quick shot at me. “Catch you later.”
As soon as he was gone, Max said, “Now, Heather, you be nice.”
“Is it being mean to state an opinion?” she asked. “Because I can’t stand that guy. He trolls the halls, looking to sign up clients, but when I ask management to toss him out, they say he’s here visiting clients and there’s nothing we can do.”
I looked at the card. Paul Utley. “Why would anyone here need an attorney?”
“Wouldn’t,” Max said succinctly. “Not ninety-nine-point-nine percent of them, anyway. Legal affairs are pretty much wrapped up before you check in.”
“So . . . ?” I gestured after Paul.
“He’s chasing after clients,” Heather said savagely. “Convincing them to sign up for services they don’t need and pay a retainer they can’t afford.”
Max smiled. “Tell us what you really think, Heather.”
“I think he’s the kind of lawyer who gives ambulance chasers a bad name,” she snapped.
“If you weren’t already married,” Max said, “I’d propose to you here and now.”
“And if you did it on one knee, I’d agree, husband or no.” She grinned at the two of us, her lawyer-inspired anger gone as fast as it had come. “Minnie, I’ll go round up the rest of the readers group. Be back in a flash.”
Max and I watched her go. “Is Paul really that awful?” I asked.
“He’s not what I’d call a force for good,” Max said, “but I wouldn’t say he was evil personified, either. In spite of what Heather says, he does help some of the folks here. And not always with legal issues.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, his two-day whiskers making a scratchy noise against his hand.
This happened to be a noise that, to me, was the equivalent of fingernails on a chalkboard, so I quickly said, “What kind of help would he be giving if it wasn’t legal? Do you have a ‘for instance’?”
Max took his hand off his face and pointed down the hall. “Paul’s the one who noticed that Mary what’s-her-name in that room over there can’t breathe right if the closet door isn’t shut tight. He’s the one who realized that Talia DeKeyser was giving away everything she owned to kids she didn’t even know. And without Paul, I’m not sure anyone would ever have known that the reason old Robert Smith was so upset—the poor man hasn’t had his wits about him in years—was because the picture on his wall was hanging crooked.”
Heather bustled in, pushing a woman in a wheelchair, and half a dozen other folks trailed in after her, and I settled down to read about the doings of the day in Mitford.
But even as I read, my mind kept circling around what I’d learned.
So Paul noticed things.
Interesting.
* * *
After I finished reading, leaving the group—and myself—a little on edge on how Father Tim was going to fix things in Mitford, I got back onto my bicycle and headed over to see what Aunt Frances was doing. The traffic was heavy, which, outside of downtown, meant I had to wait for cars at stop signs and had cars passing me on a regular basis. It seemed that one particular sedan passed me more than once, but since I hadn’t been paying that much attention, I couldn’t have sworn to it. But the third time it passed me, I was sure it was the same one. Unfortunately, the windows were tinted and the license plate was covered with mud.
Though there was undoubtedly a reasonable explanation for that, I cut down a side street, then went through an alley and rolled up to my aunt’s place a little out of breath. I leaned my bike up against a handy tree. “Hey, there. Do you want some help?”
My aunt was half buried in the boardinghouse’s foundation shrubs, her front end working hard at pulling out leaves and sticks and who knew what else. I called again, and again she didn’t hear me, so I walked up next to her and tapped the small of her back.
“Yahh!”
She erupted from the bush, eyes wild and arms flailing. It was then that I noticed the earbuds inserted into her ears and the iPod tucked into the pocket of her oversized gardening shirt.
“Minnie!” She pulled the buds from her ears. “You scared me!”
“Sorry,” I said. And I was. It was also a little funny, but I knew how it felt to be startled like that and it wasn’t much fun. “I didn’t realize you were wired up.” I touched my ears.
“Oh. Yes.” Aunt Frances poked at the iPod, turning it off. “It’s Otto’s. Did you know you can download audio books from the library on these things? It’s wonderful! Like having someone read you a story. I don’t know tha
t I’ll ever wash windows again without this little gadget. Talk about taking away the tedium.”
I laughed. “Audio books as an aid to housework. I’ll have to spread the word.”
My aunt smiled. “Of course you know about borrowing audio books. What was I thinking? You have a silly old woman for an aunt.”
“Don’t you talk that way about her,” I said, giving her a quick hug. “She’s the best.”
“And you’re a silly girl.” She returned my hug briefly, then eased away. “Getting this close to someone who’s been doing yard work all afternoon isn’t the best way to keep your clothes clean.”
I looked down at myself. Small clods of dirt and specks of leaves covered my front. “Not only is my aunt the best aunt in the world, but she might also be the dirtiest aunt ever.”
“Not anymore.” She grinned. “I transferred half of it. Now you can’t say I never gave you anything.”
As I did my best to brush off my clothes, I gave Aunt Frances a thorough but secret visual examination. Fatigue was making her shoulders sag and adding some vertical lines around her mouth.
“Say, what do you think about hiring some help?” I asked. “I bet you could get a high school kid. I could ask Thessie to recommend someone.” Thessie, just graduated from high school, had volunteered on the bookmobile last summer. “You don’t need to work so hard.”
“Minerva Joy Hamilton, you are the best niece in the world, but please do not presume to tell me what to do. I am almost double your age, and I know what’s best for me.”
Knocking off the last of the dirt from my shirt, I said, “I was just trying to help.” It came out sounding sulky, so I added, “And you’re not double my age. Just almost.”
“I rounded up.”
For some reason, I found her firm statement funny enough that, despite my best efforts to stay serious, laughter burbled up and out of me. “You’re horrible. Does Otto know what he’s getting into?”
“Probably not.” The expression on my aunt’s face, which had been a smile, faded into a wistful glance across the street. “I just wish . . .”