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for his golf match with Denny and most likely wouldn’t be home until the late afternoon. Since I was in complete agreement with Matt’s wish for JR to do less, I reached for the phone and called Mary.
    “Hey, Mar, it’s Jean. How would you like it if I treated you to the all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet at Farmer John’s?”
    “My stars, I’d love it, but knowing you,” Mary said with a giggle, “I’d say that you have an ulterior motive. Does it have anything to do with sleuthing? I hope not, otherwise our husbands will have our heads on platters, and I don’t even want to think about what Matt will do to us.”
    Even though she would have denied it, I could tell that Mary was disappointed upon learning my ulterior motive involved nothing more dangerous or exciting than a short side trip to Dona’s cottage on Old Railway Road. With both the cottage and the restaurant located near the same interstate, the drive from one place to the other would be a relatively short one.
    “But why this morning?” asked Mary. “I thought you and Dona had a date to go to the cottage after the book signing today at Lowell’s. What did she do? Change her mind?”
    Before I could answer, Mary prattled on. “Did you read Hilly Murrow’s review of Dona’s new book in this morning’s edition of the Seville Sentinel ? If Peter Parker was upset over Be Thin and Win , he’ll probably go ballistic over Dump Your Doctor . According to Hilly, the new book is chock-full of home remedies that can cure just about everything from athlete’s foot to zits. She gave it four stars so I guess she really likes it.”
    “Yeah, whatever,” I said, anxious to move the conversation away from local reporter Hilly Murrow’s critique of Dona’s latest book and back to the reason for my phone call. “Mary, even though we probably won’t be able to get inside the cottage, I need to at least take a look at the outside before meeting with Dona. It may very well be in such a state of disrepair that I won’t even want the job.”
    “My stars, I’ve never known you to be so nervous about doing an initial walk-through. What’s your problem?”
    I wasn’t about to admit to Mary that my inherited Irish intuition was acting up again. Along with fraying my nerves, it had also cost me a good night’s sleep.
    “Hey, no problem,” I said with forced gaiety, “it’s just that I don’t want to be surprised if it turns out the place needs a structural engineering firm more than it needs Designer Jeans. What we find out there might end up killing the whole deal.”
    At the time, I hadn’t the slightest inkling that my words would turn out to be so prophetic.

Chapter
six
    A cool front had crept down from the north the previous night, bringing with it a small measure of relief from the normally hot, humid summer weather. With an expected high temperature of only seventy-five degrees, a northern breeze, and partially cloudy skies, it was a suitable day to invite Pesty along for the ride.
    Spurred on by the prospect of being with Mary, who is known to keep a supply of cookies in her purse, and with hopes of being the recipient of a Farmer John’s doggy bag, the short-legged Kees made the leap from driveway to van in a single bound. Exhausted by the Superman-like feat, Pesty settled down for a morning nap.
    Ever the optimist, Mary put Herbie Waddlemeyer in charge of England’s Fine Furniture and was waiting for me at the store’s delivery entrance. In spite of making a few wrong turns (unlike Charlie, I don’t have a compass in my nose or in my vehicle) Mary and I were soon truckin’ on down Old Railway Road.
    While I concentrated on avoiding an endless series of potholes, Mary drank in the scenery, which consisted of not much more than some tumbledown fences, fallow fields, groves of leafy trees, and large patches of prairie grass.
    “You know something, Gin,” Mary remarked as I maneuvered the van around a particularly nasty pothole, “I can’t