Smarty Bones Read Online Free PDF

right to be her own person, her family had disowned her. This would all be grist for the mill of Dr. Twist’s book. Cece had lived through this once. She shouldn’t have to confront it again.
    “I don’t like this one little bit.” Tinkie snatched clothes out of the closet without even looking. “Where is this person staying?”
    “The Gardens B and B. I’ve already been there and tried to talk to her. All she did was run up a bar tab and thumb her nose at me.”
    “One call to Gertrude and Miss Sassy Britches will be out on her ear.” She slid into a cute pair of capris and sandals. “You’ve seen her. What’s she like?”
    “Really skinny. Like a number two pencil. And glamorous with a peculiar sense of fashion. And mean as a pit viper. She enjoys upsetting people. She disrupted the meeting of the Daughters of the Supreme Confederacy. That’s how I got on to her. Frances Malone came by Dahlia House and asked me to speak to her, for all the good it did.”
    “Then I guess I’ll have to take a swing at her. I’ll cancel my appointment.”
    That was exactly what I feared Tinkie might do. “First, let’s go out to the Egypt Plantation and see what we can find out. Maybe if we talk to the folks there we can find a reason to make Olive Twist go away.”
    *   *   *
    The drive to Holmes County was beautiful. Fall temperatures wouldn’t arrive in the Deep South for another four weeks, but I could see hints of approaching cooler weather in the quality of light. The sun was still brutal, but the pale yellow of approaching October edged the horizon and seemed to linger in the green leaves of the trees. I loved this time of year, the last, lingering days of summer’s heat. When I was a child, September had meant excitement. A new school year filled with potential and fun—though everyone wore shorts to the Friday-night football games.
    I wasn’t a geek or a bookworm, but I liked school. I loved the workbooks in which language and math problems could be solved with a sharpened pencil. September included the dizzying smell of a new box of crayons, opened for the first time. It was as if each color had its own special scent. Recess was kickball and jumping rope.
    If I could go back in time for a week, or even a day, I would halt life and step into the past. I’d had no cares, no worries, no guilt, and no regrets. What a shame we grew out of utopia and into adulthood.
    Tinkie’s manicured fingers touched my shoulder. “You’re far, far away, aren’t you?”
    “The past.” I could confess such things to Tinkie. She had a kind and understanding heart.
    “Not a bad place to visit, but don’t put down roots. People who live in the past are doomed to unhappiness. You have me, Graf, and all your friends anchoring you right here in the present.”
    “Thanks.” With so little effort, she’d pulled me into the moment. “I think we’re almost there.”
    The little town of Cruger, population under five hundred, was really only a blink. Holmes County had the lowest life expectancy of any county in the United States. The soil grows excellent cotton and soybeans, but the people struggle.
    I’d driven my antique roadster, and we tooled down a two-lane road bordered by fields and kudzu. The kudzu vine, originally introduced to halt erosion, had taken to the Southern states like a tick to a dog. The vines could grow twelve inches in twenty-four hours. They wrapped around fences, trees, lampposts, buildings—anything that couldn’t move away. Some farmers considered it good fodder for cattle, but most did everything they could to eliminate it because of its propensity to take over.
    “That looks like a dragon,” Tinkie said, pointing to several trees and possibly a billboard buried under kudzu. “I wish I could breath fire. I’d toast Olive Twist’s hair.”
    I caught the incredible scent of the purple kudzu flowers in bloom. It was so intense I could almost taste grape. “They’ve virtually eradicated