Broke: Read Online Free PDF Page A

Case of The Body in the Bathtub? The Haunted House Murder? She ' d have to give that some thought.
    " You hear what I said? " Dewey asked.
    " No, I was thinking . "
    " You ' ll do it for free? Investigate for me? We ' re family. "
    " Oh , sure. " No one had ever paid her for a case before. Why start now? " Sure, you ' re family. " She whipped out the notebook and pen she always carried , in case she needed to jot down license numbers. " I ' ll need some background. "
    He gave her his name, Dwight Duckworthy, and his birth date. He was the youngest of the three brothers by about five years, which made him fifty-seven. Her parents had been in their forties when she ' d been born.
    " Address? "
    He gave a mirthless chuckle. " This is it for now. "
    She wrote " Homeless " .
    " Any family, besides your brothers? "
    He turned his face toward the ceiling and closed his eyes for a moment. After a deep breath, he said, " No, no family. "
    " Are you sure? "
    " They won ' t claim me. I have an ex-wife and a son I haven ' t seen in, I guess about twenty years. "
    " A son? I have a cousin? "
    " Ye ah , I reckon you do. How old are you, Imogene? "
    " Everybody calls me Immy. I ' m twenty-two, almost twenty-three. "
    " And you ' re a private eye? I thought you needed a training period of a few years or something. "
    " I ' m not quite full-fledged. "
    He laughed , sounding a little like a barking seal .
    " But I can take cases, " she hurried to add. " I ' ve taken lots of cases. Solved most of them, too. What ' s my cousin ' s name? "
    " Junior. Dwight Junior. Fr ie da had high hopes. For me, and for him . That we ' d both turn out okay. "
    " Did he? Turn out okay? "
    " I don ' t know. He was twelve when I last saw him. "
    " Do you call him Junior? "
    " I did. I reckon Fr ie da might have changed his name by now. Or he might have. "
    Immy took notes as Dewey told her what he remembered of the night before. He and Lyle Cisneros had been looking for a place to crash. They ' d been cellmates at the Allblue Unit, but he wouldn ' t say what they ' d been in for. Probably swindling. Her mother had said he swindled people. Dewey had been released three nights ago , two nights after Lyle had been let out, and they had been crashing wherever they could find a space . They'd spent o ne night in the apartment of a woman they met in a bar, the next night in a park. Then Lyle had run into a guy he ' d known on the outside years ago, name of Abe. Dewey didn ' t know Abe ' s last name , but Lyle called him Grunt. Grunt said he knew the owner of an empty house and they could all stay there.
    They ' d separated for awhile during the day, then Abe, aka Grunt, had let them in the back door and they ' d all three dr u nk rotgut liquor until Dewey passed out. He didn ' t remember going upstairs and getting into bed, but he didn ' t think that was surprising, or even unusual.
    " It ' s been a long time since my last toot. Can ' t hold my liquor, seems like. I ' ll get the hang of it again pretty soon, if I get outta here. "
    Immy wondered if it would be a good idea for him to be out of jail.
    ***
    It was a good thing this was Saturday. Immy wouldn't have been able to sit still to concentrate at work. She wished she were there so she could use the computer, though. The library was open Saturday morning, so she decided to research her cousin there. The timing couldn't be better. She was studying to be a PI. The online course she was being tested on next week was called Missing Persons. She'd study for the test and find her cousin at the same time. She grabbed her course book and walked to the library.
    A brisk wind whipped a tumbleweed down the middle of Second Street, the main thoroughfare of Saltlick , past the blinking yellow light, the only traffic light in town, and out to the rangeland that surrounded the small town. Saltlick was a town whose time had come and gone with the oil boom , but it was full of tough people who didn't give up easily.
    The rather grand