The Heart Remembers Read Online Free PDF Page B

with a pallid smile.
    â€œI probably sound very rude and inquisitive,” she made herself say with the polite courtesy demanded of the laws of hospitality, by which one may never be rude to a guest beneath one’s own roof. “It was just that I was so surprised to know that anyone at all remembered there had been a newspaper in Harbour Pines. It’s such a small, forgotten place.”
    Jim said, in an obvious effort to loosen the tension of the moment, “It’s no use trying to discourage her, Aunt Selena. I’ve been trying to do that ever since I first set eyes on her. But she doesn’t discourage easily.”
    â€œI can’t afford to.” Shelley made her voice light and gay. “I’ve already paid for the paper and all its assets, including good will.”
    Selena’s little gasp was almost a snort. “Good will? There
was
no good will! How could there be for a paper owned and published by a man who died in prison?”
    Shelley caught her breath and once more her hands were gripped tightly beneath the table’s edge. But she had been mentally braced for this moment and dimly she was proud of the steadiness of her voice.
    â€œOh, really? I didn’t know that. The real estate men didn’t mention it.”
    â€œNo, I’m sure they didn’t. Naturally not. They would have been afraid of spoiling the sale by frightening you off.”
    â€œI suppose so.” Shelley’s voice, in her own ears,sounded merely politely interested, with just the amount of concern that was natural under the circumstances. “What did the former publisher do to get himself sent to prison? A libel suit, I suppose?”
    â€œHe robbed the bank,” said Selena between her teeth; her tone ugly and harsh.
    â€œOh, now, wait a minute.” That was Jim, of course.
    â€œThere’s no possible doubt of his guilt. He was seen lurking about the bank at midnight. In the morning the bank vault was open and fifteen thousand dollars was gone. And the money was found later hidden under a loose board in th
e Journal
office.”
    Selena’s tone was vicious and her color was feverish.
    Shelley set her teeth hard and knew that her own color was fading. She dared not look at either of them, lest she cry out in sharp, bitter protest and express the fury that boiled within her. She had thought herself braced to hear the ugly story as she knew she must, with a pretense of hearing it for the first time. She had thought that she could listen, pretend a polite interest, ask questions that would make it possible for her to get every tiny detail; but for a moment she was so blind with anger and protest that she dared not allow herself to speak.
    â€œGood grief, do we have to have all this rehashed again? I’ve heard the painful story until I could recite it backward,” protested Jim wearily.
    Shelley was greateful for the moment that gave her the strength to say quietly, “The evidence
does
sound rather convincing, doesn’t it? Did the man offer any denial?”
    â€œOver and over again, and then some more,” Jim took up his aunt’s story as though anxious to get it over with. “But he refused to say what he was doing lurking around the bank at such an hour; he hadbeen seen and identified beyond any possible doubt. And when the money was found in his place all he could say was that he had been ‘framed.’ ”
    â€œCouldn’t he have been?” Shelley managed to ask.
    â€œBy whom? After all, the money was in his own place.”
    â€œYes, that seems a bit odd, doesn’t it? I mean that he should have taken it there and hidden it so carelessly on his own premises. Doesn’t that seem silly—that he couldn’t find a place farther away?”
    â€œTime, my dear Miss Kimbrough,” Jim told her as though painfully bored with the subject, “was of the essence! He couldn’t go very far away if he expected