Diamond Duo Read Online Free PDF Page A

general store? I’ve got a hankering for something sweet.”
    Magda looked relieved to change the subject. “Sure we can, considering we spend a good deal of our time there. I have a right demanding sweet tooth myself on occasion.”
    Annie leaned closer to Bertha and dropped her voice to a whisper. “The truth is, I could use a stiff drink”–she cast a nervous glance over her shoulder–“but Abe wouldn’t like it. He don’t like me drinking alone.” She straightened and gave Bertha a wink. “So a sweet will have to do for now.”
    Bertha swallowed hard and nodded then squared around and pointed down the street. “Stilley’s is just over there a ways, on Dallas Street. We can take you, if you like.”
    Annie tucked her velvet reticule inside her yellow sash and linked arms with them. “If I like? Well, I certainly do like, ladies. Lead the way.”
H
    “Whoa, mule,” Henry called, pulling back on Dandy’s reins.
    Sarah looked up to find herself in front of the last possible place she’d reckoned on going. She glanced over at Henry, but his purposeful blank expression offered not a clue. After securing the wagon, he hopped to the ground and came around to lift her down.
    “Stilley’s?” she asked, ignoring his outstretched arms.
    He nodded.
    The general store wasn’t a likely setting for the caliber of surprise Sarah expected. She’d spent a fair amount of time inside those walls engaged in commonplace things such as sorting through floursacks to find one without weevils or picking over packets of seed. To the best of her knowing, there wasn’t a blessed thing behind those doors that would set a woman’s tender heart to pounding. This made Henry’s behavior quite a poser.
    “Why can’t you tell me what it is you might be needing in there?” Without waiting for an answer, she stood up on the seat and leaned into her husband’s outstretched arms.
    He swung her up and out of the wagon, set her down on the boardwalk, and reached to straighten her hat. “Girl, I guess you must be the nosiest woman in Marion County.” He tweaked her nose and then tapped the end of it with his index finger. “It’s a wonder this thing is still cute as a button and not stretched all out like a corncob.”
    Sarah slapped away his hand. “Curiosity ain’t the same as nosy. Considering how hard you’ve worked to stir mine up, you have only yourself to blame.”
    Henry enjoyed a hearty laugh at her expense. “Funny, though, how it’s always my business you get curious about, ain’t it?”
    She crossed her arms over her chest. “You reckon you’re funny, don’t you?”
    He pulled her close for a hug. “Don’t fret, now, Mrs. King. You gon’ find out everything directly–that is, if I can get you to hush long enough to go inside.”
    She allowed him to nudge her across the boardwalk to the door. They passed beneath the sign reading W. F. S TILLEY & C O . and stepped inside. Sarah stood blinking while her eyes grew accustomed to the dim light and her nose to the acrid odor of animal skins and cut tobacco, not a pleasant mix. She held her breath as they passed the racks hung with stiffened fox and coon-shaped furs and a shelf laden with bags and tins of chaw, the source of the cloying smell.
    Barrels littered the floor, some filled with corn, some with wheat. Large sacks of flour and sugar were stacked on one side of the room, bags of beans on the other. On the counter, tall jars filled with licorice, peppermint sticks, and assorted penny candies werearranged in a lively display.
    Sarah’s inventory of the familiar room uncovered something new. Against the back wall, a row of bright colors caught her eye. Two steps closer revealed the only thing in the store she might be itching to get her hands on.
    “Mr. Stilley! Why, looky here. You done got in a shipment since I was here last, ain’t you?”
    Behind the counter, the clerk smiled and nodded.
    Sarah crossed the room and ran her fingers over the new bolts of