The Evening Spider Read Online Free PDF

hi to the little one?”
    I pulled the hood of the stroller open slightly and peeked in. “She’s asleep,” I said.
    â€œThe movement puts them to sleep real good, huh?”
    â€œYeah,” I agreed. “She’s in la-la land.”
    I considered my house for a moment, trying to take in its antique charm as I had the first time I’d laid eyes on it: its unusually steep roof, its cozy blue solidity as it perched on its high stone steps. When you faced it from the street, it had perfect square symmetry—like a child’s drawing of a house. There was a single black shuttered window on each side of its perky evergreen door.
    â€œPatty . . .” I said slowly, “you’ve lived here in this neighborhood quite a few years, haven’t you?”
    â€œAlmost twenty, yes.”
    â€œYou knew the previous owner of my house pretty well?”
    â€œJanelle? No. She only lived here a year or so. I don’t thinkit was ever her plan to stay very long. Just to fix it up nice and flip it.”
    â€œOh, I didn’t mean her. I meant before that.”
    â€œShirley, you mean? The Barnetts? You know, before Janelle, the Barnetts owned this house going way way back. Like, more than a hundred years, I think.”
    â€œI know.” The real estate agent told us the basic story. The house had been in the Barnett family for generations. Shirley Barnett—a Barnett by marriage—had been in her eighties, living in the place alone, when she’d broken her hip and her family had decided to move her out and sell the place. Shirley had died in a nursing home soon after that. “Lately, I’ve just been curious about the house’s history.”
    Patty nodded knowingly. “You’re a history teacher, aren’t you?”
    â€œYeah,” I said. If I blamed it on that, this conversation didn’t have to be creepy at all. “I’m a history nerd.”
    Patty looked offended on my behalf. “You don’t need to be a nerd to be interested in history. Like, I’m all into Marie Antoinette. Or at least, I was at one time. Do you know much about her?”
    â€œUh . . . just the basics,” I admitted.
    â€œAnyway,” Patty waved the subject away. “You were talking about your house. Yeah, Shirley and Eddie were real proud the house had been in his family so long. Shame no one in the family wanted it when she had to move out. But she had just the niece and nephew left. Nephew has a house . . . in Southington, I think. And the niece . . . not sure about her. Just didn’t want it. They split the money from the sale, I guess. I don’t know the details.”
    Patty shook her head, then tugged thoughtfully at a thick tuft of dark hair by her ear.
    â€œIt was a shame,” she said, “how they had to move Shirley out of here like they did. She didn’t want to leave. But it was obvious she couldn’t take care of herself anymore. It was the hip that did it, finally. But even before that I think there was a little dementia setting in, or something. Her nephew Gerard was telling me, the day they moved her out, she was crying, ‘Please don’t take me away! Who is going to take care of the baby?’ She never even had kids. So figure that one out. Poor thing!”
    â€œUmm.” I stared at my hands as they tightened around the stroller handle. They’d grown bright pink from the cold. “Maybe she was talking about a pet, or something?”
    â€œI don’t think so. I’m pretty sure Shirley disliked cats, and I’m certain she didn’t have a dog.”
    â€œMaybe she meant the house,” I suggested. “Maybe she thought of the house as her baby.”
    Patty scrunched up her sculpted eyebrows. “You know, I never thought of it that way before. Not sure that makes it any less sad. Huh. But hey—speaking of her nephew Gerard, you might want to talk to him. He’s the one