Read Online Muller, Marcia - [McCone 02] - Ask the Cards a Question 3S(v1)(html) - Free Book Online

luck with the ladies, though,” she muttered, more to herself than to me. “How could he, sleeping on the floor in the basement of that old church?”
    “He lives in the old church at the Blind Center?”
    She nodded. “And, after all he’s done, you must think I’m a fool to worry about him. But it’s damp and drafty there, and he catches cold so easily. Why he chooses to stay…” She paused, eyes swimming. “Yeah, I still love him. Dumb, isn’t it?”
    “Not really,” I said, feeling uncomfortable in my new role of confidante.
    “Well, I do, honey. I do.” She sighed heavily and blew her nose on a lace-bordered handkerchief.
    I asked, “How did Jeffrey get his job at the Center?”
    She sniffed disdainfully. “I don’t know as you can call it a job. He never does a lick of real work. Jeffrey met Herb Clemente when he got out of prison. Clemente gave him some counseling, but it didn’t take. Jeffrey still didn’t have a job when Clemente and the Blind Center moved in over there on Twenty-fourth Street, so he looked Clemente up. Clemente let him run some errands. Then, two months ago, Jeffrey up and informed me he was leaving, to go live there in the church.”
    “Why was he in prison?”
    Her long jaw became set. “Jeffrey used to be a trucker. He made good money, was even going to start his own company. But, no, he couldn’t be satisfied with that. He stole stuff from the loads he hauled, and they caught him. He went to prison for two years, and I stood by him the whole time. A lot of good it did me—look at the reward I got!”
    I didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry.”
    “Oh, honey, that’s life. That’s life.” She rose heavily. “But it won’t go on much longer. I’m going to get him back soon. I have a plan. You just wait and see if I don’t get him back.” She held the door open for me. “You let me know about those candles on Friday, all right?”
    I said I would and started downstairs.
    On the dim third-floor landing, I remembered the lima beans in my purse. The package was wet and soggy, in spite of whatever insulation my thin macrame bag provided. I looked at my watch: nine-thirty, only three and a half hours since I had bought them. I hurried downstairs and outside.
    The windows of the Albatross Superette were dark. Mr. Moe must have closed up early. I peered at the second story, where the grocer lived. No light showed there either.
    My momentum fizzled out, and I stood still. What to do now? The night was relatively young.
    Well, Mr. Moe wasn’t available, but maybe Sebastian could use some company. Even though the brush man was blind, I suspected he knew more of what went on in the neighborhood than those of us who could see. I dumped the soggy lima beans in a waste receptacle and started off for Twenty-fourth Street.
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Nine
    « ^ »
    Even at nine-thirty, Twenty-fourth Street was well populated. People wandered along the sidewalks, in and out of the bars and hole-in-the-wall cafes. I walked along more purposefully.
    The Sunrise Blind Center sat back from the sidewalk in shadow, its grounds surrounded by an iron fence. I was about to cross the street toward it when two figures came through the gate. Clemente and Linnea. They turned onto the sidewalk, walking close together, Clemente’s arm draped across Linnea’s shoulders. The Center’s director was a fast worker. For that matter, so was my friend.
    I watched them walk away, then crossed and pushed through the creaking gate. A cement path led toward the floodlit front of the old church. All was quiet.
    The church was adobe, its dark-timbered roof meeting in a peak over the front entry. The cross that had once adorned the peak was gone, and a brilliantly-hued, primitive mural of a sunrise spread across the triangular space below the roof line. Above the door, a crudely lettered inscription read:
    “Sunrise, Beginning of New Life and Hope.”
    Odd, for a blind center, I thought. None of the patients—or residents,