The Dead Letter Read Online Free PDF Page B

drop in her outer office.
    Anne scooped up the small pile of mail. She was hoping for a cheque from a previous job. Instead, she fingered through several direct mail advertisements, three bills, and a postcard invitation to a grand opening, and something else. It looked like a piece of litter, but it wasn’t. It was an envelope.
    The envelope was small. It had been made from good stock and intended for quality personal correspondence when it had been purchased but, somewhere in its journey, it had become mangled and crushed and grimy. The handwriting was barely legible, but, when she looked closely, she saw that it had been addressed to her dead uncle, Mr. Bill Darby, Darby Investigations and Security . Anne opened the envelope, unfolded the letter, and began to read:
    My dear Mr. Darby,
    I can scarcely put these words down because, as I do, I feel as though I am walking through a terrible dream, and putting ink to paper will make it all come true, something I truly dread. Nonetheless, I must do this.
    I was nearby when a murder took place. I believe I know who the killer is, and I believe that an innocent man will suffer for it if I do not speak out. I could not bear to let that happen.
    I can’t go to the police. Please, if you can help me, call 367-0051.
    Sincerely yours,
    Carolyn Jollimore
    The letter was dated October 18 th , 2001. Anne stared at it in astonished disbelief.
    Oh my god , Anne thought. That was ten…no, eleven years ago.

10.
    The apprehension that had troubled Anne that morning crept into her bones again. If she were superstitious, she might have attributed her unease to a forerunner, but Anne scoffed at such things as products of ignorance and dim thinking.
    Anyway, this restlessness was different. She knew what caused it, or part of it, anyway. It was the suppressed tone of desperation in Carolyn Jollimore’s letter, a letter that no one received and that no one had read until today.
    Anne tried to imagine how Carolyn must have felt, waiting hours, and days, and weeks, and not receiving a reply. She must have been frantic. Perhaps terrified. And what would she have done then? Given up? Gone to the police? Kept the secret locked away in her memory for years?
    And what did she imagine could have kept Bill Darby from contacting her? Did she believe he could be so callous as to ignore her? Did she think he dismissed her as some lunatic?
    And how did all this reflect on her uncle? Anne fretted about that, too. Bill Darby had been a man who took pride in his work, someone who worked for next to nothing if he believed in a client’s cause. Anne would have been appalled if anyone had thought him cavalier and insensitive when in truth he had been entirely unaware of Carolyn’s dilemma. Perhaps that letter had lain, chewed up, in the belly of a mail-sorting machine for the last decade. Or maybe some disgruntled postal worker had dumped it with other undelivered mail on the floor of his woodshed until somebody finally stumbled upon it.
    Anne tried, but she couldn’t let go of the ideas that churned in her head. They circled like the seamless parade of wooden ponies on a merry-go-round, and they repeated like the never-ending song of a carousel. Carolyn Jollimore’s letter had taken a firm hold on her. As a result, she was getting no work done, and she making no progress with her unanswered questions.
    Jogging or walking might put her mind at ease, she thought. It had helped in the past. So Anne tied up her running shoes, strode out of her office, and headed up the street along the edge of the business district. She passed a vagrant dozing on a park bench. His cardboard sign read “Will Work for Food.” She walked north and east through mixed-class residential and small business neighbourhoods with no special purpose in mind and followed her curiosity into quiet cul-de-sacs, narrow alleys, and dead-end streets. Eventually, she tired, her head cleared of its clutter, and she