Read Online Breaking Ground by William Andrews - Free Book Online Page B

little children entranced by history, bored husbands accompanying their wives with a passionate interest in painted furniture, slow-moving seniors with time on their hands, the occasional buff who used to live in town before retiring to Florida and eager to point out that the old pair of ice skates on display looked exactly like the ones he had lost at the pond thirty years ago. Because of the challenge they represented—the need they created for Julie to range widely and find interesting things to say to people with such varied interests, or lack of interests—she actually liked them best.
    Today’s ten o’clock group was definitely “Triple A” material: several grandmothers, two middle-aged couples, one young couple with an unruly four-year-old, and two boys with their caps reversed whose age Julie placed at thirteen or fourteen. Tickets for the tours were sold in the society’s gift shop at the front of Holder House, an example of shameless commerce Julie strongly supported since it meant the gathering group had time to examine possible purchases in the shop while they waited for the tour to begin. She assembled them there and led them to the orientation room, where glass displays and wall hangings illustrated periods of Ryland’s past. After welcoming them, Julie followed her custom of asking where they were from—all, in this case, were what Julie, adopting local custom, had already come to label “fromaway”—not from Maine. She gave an overview of the society, previewed what they would see in each building, and did an abbreviated town history. She liked to conclude the orientation by asking if anyone had a special interest so she could make a point of satisfying it as they proceeded through the buildings. One of the grandmothers, not unexpectedly, mentioned quilts, and one of the middle-aged men, also not unexpectedly, said “guns.” Julie knew exactly how she would address their interests. But when one of the adolescents asked to see the murder site, Julie was momentarily flustered.
    â€œYou know,” he prodded, “where the lady was killed. Can we see that?” The boy was quickly muffled by his embarrassed father, but Julie realized she was going to have to have a line of patter to address the issue.
    â€œWe did have a very unfortunate accident here on Tuesday,” she said, “but the area is being excavated this morning to begin the construction of our new building. I’ll point it out when we go over to the crafts shed.”
    â€œAccident?” she heard the boy say to his peer. “They chopped her up, that’s what I heard.” Julie was happy to see the father step forward again and place a strong arm around the two boys and speak sternly to them.
    Despite the inauspicious beginning, the tour was a success, something Julie gauged by the way she held people’s attention during the tour and by the number and quality of questions both during and afterwards. In this case, what was planned as a fifty-minute tour extended to over an hour and a quarter, and at the end the group was generous in its thanks. The two adolescents had been held in check by the father; the middle-aged man’s interest in guns and the grandmother’s in quilts had been satisfied; and the four-year-old had actually stopped running and babbling when Julie had shown him the collection of antique toys—his surprise that there were no Tonkas amused her.
    Back in her office, Julie learned from Mrs. Detweiller that Luke Dyer had stopped by to say the work was under way and that Henry had called. She phoned Henry at once.
    â€œI figured I should get ahold of you since you know I was talking to Mike Barlow at the picnic yesterday,” the attorney said.
    â€œSorry I interrupted.”
    â€œNo problem. Mike and I talked last night. Some interesting things have developed. You have time to talk now?”
    â€œSure.”
    â€œMaybe