Sweet and Deadly Read Online Free PDF

need for house numbers. The street her house faced had been named for her great-grandfather, when the town was bustling and the river was close. Now the river was two miles away, held in check by the levee, and Lowfield’s population had not fluctuated appreciably in her father’s lifetime.
    â€œOn the morning of July 11, what did you do?”
    â€œI went out to some land I own, north of Lowfield.”
    â€œFor what purpose?”
    â€œTo practice target shooting…”

4
    S HE CAME IN the side door from the garage. Her coffee cup and the empty percolator still stood on the counter, waiting to be washed. The hands of the kitchen clock glided electrically smooth on their course.
    She was almost surprised that the house was the same, so much had passed since she had left it that morning.
    She stood in the middle of the bright tiled floor and listened. She had never done that before.
    Catherine shook herself when she realized what she was doing, and started down the long hallway that divided the house, beginning at the kitchen and ending at a bathroom.
    But she looked quickly into each doorway as she passed. She saw only the big familiar lifeless rooms, lovingly (and lavishly) redecorated by her mother. She paused in the doorway of the formal living room, where her parents had entertained, and suddenly recalled her father half-ruefully telling guests, “Rachel’s rebuilt this old house from the inside out.” It was the only room Catherine had changed.
    At the end of the hall Catherine almost went right into her old bedroom. It’s been months since I did that, she thought.
    She went straight through the master bedroom to its cool tiled bathroom and shed everything she had on. She stepped into the shower, but not before self-consciously locking the bathroom door.
    She had never done that before, either.
    The shower was bliss. With cool water shooting over her, washing off the layers of dust and sweat, she was able to forget the shack for a few minutes.
    She dried herself and combed out her wet hair slowly. She lay down on the big bed and hoped for sleep, but her body hummed with tension like a telephone line. Finally she quit hoping and got up, padding across the heavy carpeting to the closet and folding back a mirrored door to pull out a long loose lounging dress, pale gray and scattered with red poppies. She yanked it over her head and went down the hall to the kitchen, where she began searching the refrigerator.
    Good. Beer. With one of those in me, I bet I can sleep. I’m glad Tom left some.
    Armed with the beer and a fresh pack of cigarettes, Catherine wandered into the living room. She settled in her favorite chair, which she had pulled out of its original spot so she could look out the bay window. She had arranged beside it a heavy round table, and, some time later, another chair to keep the first one company. It was her own little base in a house too big for one person; a house still echoing with loss.
    The old home across the street had been renovated into the town library. It closed at eleven on Saturday, so Catherine was just in time to see Mrs. Weilenmann, the librarian, lock the front door. Mrs. Weilenmann was the town wonder: an educated northern black woman, who spoke with no trace of the heavy accent white Southerners associated with blacks. And, rumor had it, Mrs. Weilenmann, a widow, had acquired her name by marrying a white man. It was a bandage to Catherine’s conscience that Mrs. Weilenmann had gotten the librarian’s job. The only wonder, as Catherine saw it, was that she wanted it.
    I meant to go to the library today when I got back, Catherine recalled, glancing down at the heap of books on the floor as Mrs. Weilenmann maneuvered her Toyota out of the library parking lot.
    Catherine reckoned she had enough to read to last until Monday. And took a swallow of beer to celebrate that minor goodness.
    A possible diversion occurred to her. She craned forward to