Murder at the Art & Craft Fair Read Online Free PDF Page B

be long until the leaves began to fall from my
trees, and I knew what that meant. It was time to call the yard boy and give
him an opportunity to earn a few bucks. I’d planned to spend the rest of the
week reading. When I checked with Lou, I found out that he didn’t know anything
about Jennifer coming until an hour or so before he called me, which meant he
didn’t know before he and I went to Scene of the Crime to bulk up on our fall
reading material. It was still a few days until Saturday, so I’d have time to
read a couple more of my purchases before Jennifer arrived. But first, it was
time to head to the computer and see what I could find out about this blasted
art and craft fair.
     
    +++
     
    A few minutes later I returned to my recliner, only a
little more knowledgeable about what lay before me than I was before I Googled
the upcoming art and craft fair. I knew the hours of the event. 9:00-7:00 on
Saturday, 11:00-4:00 on Sunday. I saw a few pictures on the website, some of
people looked vaguely familiar, spineless men whose wives had dragged them to
some woman thing. And I was soon to become one of those spineless men. At least
I was doing it for love. Most of the guys in the picture weren’t in love. They
were already married.
    While I was at the computer I started a file to keep
track of the books I read. Not only would I be able to keep track of them, but
now that I was venturing out and reading more authors I would rate each book on
a scale of 1-4, with ratings in tenths. I would make it a point to buy another
book by any author whose book I read that I rated at least a 3.1. I’d run to
the bookstore to buy another book by any author I rated a 3.5 or better. Well,
maybe not run. I can’t get carried away with this exercise thing. Thankful that
I’d already done an hour of exercising in the morning I was free to read the
rest of the day. When I got hungry I ate a small snack. Then, when I got hungry
again I planned to fix myself a salmon and spinach salad. Before I left the
computer, I headed to the website http://www.fastastic.fiction.co.uk and printed a list of books written by every author I
planned to read. I hadn’t stuck to this yet, but from now on I planned to read
each author’s books in order. I hadn’t decided what to do if an author wrote
more than one series. I’d probably read the books in order within a series, and
then go on to another series. I’d either begin with his or her most popular
series or the one that debuted first.
    I hadn’t decided in which order to read the books I’d
purchased a few days before, and Lou hadn’t either, so I called him back. He
too had finished Tripwire by Lee Child. Both of us enjoyed the book,
wanted to kill the bad guy early in the book, and liked Jack Reacher as a hero.
Since neither of us had any book we were itching to read over any of the
others, I opted for the simplest thing. I selected the book on top, David
Baldacci’s Hour Game . Less than two minutes later both Lou and I were
settled down, entertained by one of the best mystery-thriller authors today.

 
    Chapter Six
     
     
    Other than get a haircut on Friday to look my best for
my Jennifer, I didn’t do much the rest of the week except read. When I returned
home from getting a haircut, that woman, Heloise Humphert, my next-door
neighbor,was standing in her yard with a rake in her hand, waiting for
the first leaves of the year to fall. Her varmint, Twinkle Toes, was poised
next to her, eager to do something to those leaves. Her Ugliness didn’t see me until
the last minute, which caused her to panic and step on her rake, which conked
her on the noggin. She stumbled back and fell down, but was soon given CPR by
an eager French poodle. What made everything even more hilarious was that
Heloise Humphert doesn’t even have any trees in her front yard. But then I’d
never thought of her as the smartest apple in the fruit bowl. I made a mental
note to tell my yard boy to rake my leaves into