Dorothy Garlock Read Online Free PDF Page B

has that much power.” “I’m glad he got voted out. Roosevelt even
looks
smarter. But then, he’s probably crooked as a snake’s back. He’ll look after his rich cronies, and to heck with the rest of us.”
    Fred Hazelton was pessimism personified. If there was a dark side to any subject, Fred would find it. It was probably the reason he had never married. He had come to Fertile eleven years earlier to help his sister, Shirley Poole, run the hardware store after her husband was killed.
    “Sister has a room to let,” Fred said. “Does the nurse have a place to stay?”
    “I’m not sure. Her car is stuck in the mud out near my place.”
    “I’ll tell Sister to call Doc Forbes.”
    Joe sank the last ball in the pocket and held out a hand to That to collect his nickel.
    “Come on, Jack. Let’s call it a night.”
    “Go ahead. I’ll be along.” Jack took a drink out of the bottle he brought from under the pool table.
    “If the law catches you drinking in here, it will go hard for Mr. Dewey,” Fred said.
    Jack glared at the shopkeeper. “I suggest that you tend to your own damn business.”
    Joe saw the sign. Jack was spoiling for a fight. He wouldn’t fight a soft, sissified man like Fred, but he’d cut him down verbally.
    “Fred’s right, Jack. We don’t want to cause Mr. Dewey any trouble. He’s hanging on here by the skin of his teeth, trying to support his family.”
    “I know that. I just don’t want some prissy-ass store clerk telling me what to do.”
    “Let’s go. My horse is out back.”
    “I suppose you’re going to stay till I do.” “You got it right, Brother.”
    “Sheee-it. Let’s go. I’m out of booze anyway.”
    Fred waited until the Jones boys and the Humphrey twins left the pool hall, then went out into the light drizzle and down the street to the house he shared with his sister.
    “Sister,” he called excitedly as soon as he opened the door. “What is it?” The woman who hurried from the back of the house was tall and thin with a heavily lined face. Long gray-streaked brown hair was pulled tightly back, twisted and pinned in a knot on the back of her neck. She looked much older than her thirty-five years.
    “The new nurse is here. You’ve got to go tell Doc Forbes about the room.”
    “I’ve already told him. He said that he’d tell her about it. That’s all I can do.”
    “You promised that we’d get a lady roomer!”
    “I’m doing the best I can.”
    “Joe Jones says that she’s not pretty. But that doesn’t matter.”
    “Where did you see him?”
    “In the pool hall. Her car is stuck in the mud out by his place.”
    “I’ll talk to the doctor again in the morning.”
    “Go early.”
    “Why are you so anxious for us to get a lady roomer?” Fred started up the stairs to his room and turned back. “Because you need someone here in case something happens to me.”
    “Nothing is going to happen to you. You’re as strong as a horse. Aren’t you?”
    Fred continued on up the stairs without answering. With a furrowed brow Shirley watched him until he turned at the landing.
Why was he so concerned about her being alone all of a sudden?

Chapter 3
    A CROWING ROOSTER AWAKENED A PRIL . She lay for a long moment relishing the comfort of the soft bed and remembering the big red rooster her grandmother had when she was a little girl. Her grandpa had claimed him to be almost as old as he was himself and declared that only because he would be tough as boot leather kept him from lopping off the bird’s head and putting him in the cook pot. Grandma had just smiled and warned Grandpa to keep his hands off that rooster. She cautioned that it was not wise of him to irritate the cook lest he leave the table with a bellyache and a running off of the bowels.
    April had been weary the night before when Mrs. Jones had brought her to the room at the top of the stairs. The long drive, the trudge through the mud to reach the small house set in the pasture and the horseback