The Alpine Obituary Read Online Free PDF

my bets.
    “Oh.” Milo shrugged. Like other natives, he wasn’t interested in outsiders.
    “Why are you working tonight?” The sheriff pulled night duty only during the investigation of a serious crime.
    He gave me a sheepish grin. “Because of the holiday.” Which he’d forgotten. “Jack Mullins took last week and most of this one as his vacation, and Dustin Fong took an extra day to visit his folks in Seattle. Believe it or not, we were shorthanded over the weekend.”
    My reaction was to speak sharply to the sheriff. “You didn’t tell me that? It’s a story, dammit.”
    Milo looked surprised. “It is?”
    “Of course it is,” I said, glaring at him. I turned in the direction of the door to the back-shop. “It beats the hell out of Ethel Pike’s crappy lottery ticket.”
    “Hunh.” Milo gazed at me through a puff of smoke. “Well, I wouldn’t want it all over the county that we were at half-speed during a major holiday.”
    “But it’s over,” I countered. “The news is that you got through it without any problems. It makes you look like a . . .” I winced at the next word. “Genius.”
    “Hunh,” Milo repeated.
    “I’m going to run the damned thing, front page,” I declared. “Give me a quote.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like . . .” I booted up Leo’s computer, then started typing. “It speaks well of the community and our law enforcement agency in Skykomish County that even though we operated at less than full manpower over the Labor Day weekend, our deputies and staff members were able to meet all the challenges that a national holiday presents.”
    Milo frowned. “That doesn’t sound like me. I’d never say that.”
    “How about if I put in a couple of ‘duhs’ and an ‘awschucks’?”
    Milo glowered down at me from his impressive height of six-foot-five. “You’re making fun of me, Emma. Don’t piss me off.”
    “I’m making fun of you,” I said in a cross tone, “because you and the rest of population don’t understand what’s news around here. For one thing, names make news. After we get the law enforcement information out of the way, we can get personal. Dustin’s visit to his parents. You, having to work an extra shift. And where did Jack go on his vacation?”
    “Salmon fishing, up at Glacier Bay,” Milo replied, looking only slightly assuaged. “The run’s still on, from what we hear.”
    “Ah.” I gave Milo a bogus smile. “That, too, is news in these parts. All of it. Now go away and let me finish the damned story.”
    With a shake of his head, Milo started to lope out of the newsroom. But at the door to the front office, he turned around. “By the way, Nina Mullins went with Jack. She bought the Alaska trip at some Catholic auction in Seattle last spring, but she kept it a secret from Jack until now. Sunday was their fifteenth anniversary.”
    I gave Milo a bleak look. “Thanks,” I said with a straight face. “I can use that, too.”
    I didn’t add that I could also use more sources who could figure out a news story from a nail file.
    I abandoned my research project that night, having been required to help Kip redo the front page. Ethel Pike was now below the fold, which was just as well, since the photo showing her holding up the twenty-seven-dollar lottery ticket bonanza also revealed that one of her front teeth was missing. Scott had begged her not to smile, but happy old Ethel couldn’t resist.
    By the time Kip and I finished, it was going on nine o’clock. I was tired, so I went home. Alone. As usual.
    Since it was two hours earlier in the part of Alaska where Adam was now residing, I thought about calling him. But phoning to such a remote site as Mary’s Igloo involved many obstacles, including the call itself, which was transmitted on some kind of radio relay and caused frustrating delays at both ends of the conversation.
    Instead, I dialed Marsha Foster-Klein’s number. When she answered, she sounded worse than she had a few hours