No Nest for the Wicket Read Online Free PDF

Pruitt is typical of the membership, it sounds remarkably sensible to me,” she said. “Joining the country club won’t help Michael’s career?”
    I shook my head.
    “I wish you’d told me that earlier,” she said with a sigh. “The time I wasted being nice to that woman.”
    “You can relax,” I said. “You don’t have to be nice to her at all on our account.”
    “That doesn’t mean we should be gratuitously rude to her,” Mother said.
    “No, but isn’t it a relief to know we don’t have to be gratuitously chummy with her?”
    “Dreadful woman,” Mother murmured, and I suddenly felt more cheerful. Mother knew more ways to cause someone trouble without actually being rude than anyone I’d ever met. Mrs. Pruitt didn’t stand a chance.
    “I hope Burke knows what he’s doing,” Dad said, shaking his head as he helped himself to the tea. “He hasn’t told us anything.”
    “Is that a hint?” I said. Dad’s face brightened,
and after Mother left to cajole someone into brewing more coffee, I cheered Dad up by telling him what I knew.
    Dad approved of everything I’d done—especially the things I’d glossed over when I told my story to the chief, like scanning the gully for Jane Doe’s purse and matching the croquet mallet to the wound. But I should have known he’d find something I should have done differently. Dad read mysteries by the hundred and fancied himself quite an expert on detection.
    “You got some good photos of the body?” he asked.
    “Photos? I didn’t have a camera.”
    “You had your cell phone,” Dad said. “Doesn’t it take photos?
    “I have no idea,” I said.
    “You have the same model Rob has,” he said. “His can take pictures.”
    “Does Rob actually take pictures with it?” I asked. I was genuinely curious. Only a week before, Rob had sought my help fixing his phone, and it turned out that he’d activated the keyguard during a game of Tetris and couldn’t make calls for three days. Not that I’d tell Dad—Rob still owed me a large, as-yet-unspecified favor in return for not telling anyone else in the family.
    “I don’t expect him to,” Dad said. “But I thought you’d have figured it out.”
    “Don’t worry,” I said. “Horace took photos. And they may need help identifying the victim, so I’m sure you’ll get to look at them eventually.”
    I could tell this wasn’t a satisfactory answer. He
wanted photos he could pore over, looking for clues. Not just a full-face photo but detailed close-ups of the wound, as well. He wandered off after giving me a reproachful look most parents wouldn’t inflict on their kids unless they’d done something illegal or immoral.
    Mother and Minerva Burke returned bearing plates of cookies, and we all stood back as the crowd descended on them like a flock of ravenous seagulls.
    “What were you planning to do about dinner?” Mother asked, in a stage whisper.
    “Nothing special,” I said. “Michael will be tired from the faculty meeting, so I thought we’d stay in.”
    “I meant for your guests,” Mother said.
    “You mean the croquet players and the construction workers?” I said. “Send the locals home to find their own dinners, and give the students directions to Luigi’s.”
    Mother shook her head. She should have realized by now that as a hostess, I’d never live up to her expectations. I usually exceeded her worst fears.
    “Some of your guests aren’t getting along,” she murmured. I glanced up hastily. The last time she’d said that, I’d had to break up a fistfight between two cousins. This time, to my relief, no actual combat had begun. Mrs. Pruitt and the other Dames had gathered at one end of the room, pointedly not looking at Mrs. Briggs and the clones, who had clustered at the other end, ostentatiously ignoring Mrs. Pruitt and the Dames.
    “Perhaps if you introduced them?” Mother suggested. “Drew them into conversation together?”

    “Mother, it’s a police investigation, not