Read Online The Widows of Eden by George Shaffner - Free Book Online Page A

arrived, but he was as dry as desert sand. I looked up from my cutting board, where I was preparing vegetables for a pot roast, and observed, “You have a high tolerance for the swelter, Mr. Moore.”
    â€œIt’s hot, Wilma, but I’ve been in worse, and for a lot longer. Loretta told me about dinner. I’m sorry that Calvin and Laverne can’t come.”
    â€œThey have a night to themselves every week,” I fibbed. “It’s a bonding thing.” Calvin had called to say that he would be late, so Lo was dropping Laverne off at Virginia Allen’s until he got home. “How was your afternoon with my perfect goddaughter?”
    â€œWonderful! We played checkers; we watched cartoons on TV; we shared some cookies and juice — but don’t tell Loretta about the cookies. Laverne is very good at checkers.”
    Mr. Moore is a renowned game player himself. “Did you let her win?” I asked.
    â€œNo, but she grasped the principles quickly. Is that a pot roast?”
    â€œIt is.” I pointed to the two apple pies sitting on a grate at the other end of the counter and added, “You can do me a favor, though. One of those pies is for dessert; the other is for Beryl Williams. It should be delivered while it’s fresh, but I don’t have any time. Would it be a terrible imposition if you took it over?”
    Asking a lodger to take care of a chore is a violation of B & B protocol, but Mr. Moore is not your average, everyday lodger, is he? “I have to warn you,” I added. “Beryl knows you by reputation. She dropped by earlier today to see if you might help her son.”
    Mr. Moore eyed my pies, which were in clear glass dishes and stacked high with apple slices and my mother’s crumbly crust. “What kind of help does he need?”
    I stopped chopping carrots long enough to recount the whole sorry tale about Beryl and her boy. When I was done, he said, “I’d be happy to deliver an apple pie for you, Wilma. Where do they live?”
    I gave him directions to her house, which is on the south end of town near the old railroad tracks. It may be a cliché, but that’s where it is. I thought he would come straight home but he was gone for hours. At first, I figured that he had been waylaid by townsfolk wanting rain and whatnot, but the usual reports of Mr. Moore sightings failed to accumulate in my voicemail. Later on, I learned that he had spent the rest of the afternoon with Beryl and Flathead. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I was.
    In the meantime, John Smith stopped at the bank to see Buford Pickett. Like Clem, Buford preferred to do his suffering in the dark. The curtains were drawn in his office and the ceiling lights were turned off. The only illumination came from his desktop computer which, according to John, gave his facean eerie, yellow-green glow. Directly behind him and partially concealed by shadow, there was a long list of places and dates written in blue marker on a whiteboard.
    John said, “His highness Lord Clem has instructed me to help you with an investigation into Mr. Moore’s background.”
    â€œSo I was told. Shut the door and take a seat. I’ll have a list of places for you to start in a few minutes.”
    â€œAre you searching the Internet?”
    â€œYeah. I’m on my seventh search engine. The dates and locations on the whiteboard refer to one Vernon Moore or another.”
    My son-in-law looked the list over as well as he could in the dark. “Those are all Vernon Moores?” Coming from a man named John Smith, that was a pretty odd question.
    â€œEvery one.”
    â€œOkay, but a few of the dates you have up there are a hundred years old. What does the ‘d’ mean?”
    â€œDeceased.”
    â€œThe date Vernon died?”
    â€œThe date a Vernon died; that’s right.”
    â€œI take it that you’re eliminating the dead Vernons from