The Wolfe Widow (A Book Collector Mystery) Read Online Free PDF Page B

was something bigger going on. And why would Vera even listen to her? Vera Van Alst was the least likely person in the world to tolerate a large imposing woman giving her orders and changing the comfortable facts of her existence. Perhaps Vera owed a debt to this woman and was too ashamed to share that with anyone.
    From under the Care Bear lamp, I grabbed a Hello Kitty notepad with renewed purpose. I had to find out three things: Who was Muriel Delgado? What did Muriel Delgado want from Vera and Van Alst House? And why did she want me out of the way?
    I felt Uncle Mick’s presence as he loomed in the door.
    “You don’t mind so much being back here?” he said.
    I got up and gave him a hug. “Never.” His flannel shirt smelled like Old Spice and Irish whiskey.
    “You deserved better treatment. There’s reasons everyone hates that woman,” he said, darkly.
    “I do deserve better treatment. But I don’t hate Vera. I think this woman who came to the house last night is the reason I was fired.”
    “Sounds like it. But why would she want the Van Alst female to fire you?”
    I shrugged. “I really have no idea. But I guarantee you, there’s something there. And I’ll make it my business to find out.”
    It was taking Mick a while to get Vera out of his system. “I thought I’d come to like her or at least respect her over the past year and a bit, but this, this makes me think my original opinion of her was right.”
    “I don’t want to judge her, Uncle Mick. I’d like to find out what’s going on before I make up my mind about it all.”
    “Anything I can do to help?”
    “Thanks. In fact, there is something—”
    “Anything in the world. But it’ll have to be later, my girl. I’m on my way out. Pressing business elsewhere, as they say. A bit of business is bubbling up. Your lunch is on the table. Keep your strength up for the battle.”
    With Uncle Mick gone, I let Walter and Cobain feast on the Alphagetti. They licked tomato sauce off each other’s whiskers after cleaning their plates. I guess this was my team of associates now. I reheated the signora’s cutlets and pasta alfredo. I did hang on to the marshmallow cookies. I’m sentimental about them. But for some reason, everything I ate tasted like sawdust.
    There’s nothing like a good walk to clear your head if you’ve been fired and evicted on the same day. And there were two dogs to encourage me in this kind of thinking. I bundled up in my nineteen-sixties red wool, hooded cape, a vintage find that made me feel like a streetwise Red Riding Hood. I headed downtown to stomp out my frustrations on the sidewalks of Harrison Falls. It didn’t help that signs of Thanksgiving were everywhere. If it wasn’t a pumpkin, it was a sheaf of dried corn. If it wasn’t a Pilgrim hat, it was a cornucopia. If it wasn’t a turkey, it was a . . . well, there were lots of turkeys, none of them real, thank heavens. Never mind that Harrison Falls was done up à la Norman Rockwell, I wasn’t feeling thankful in the least. I did realize that it could have been worse. I could have been arrested or dead or . . . but it wasn’t a situation suitable for celebrating.
    I needed to find a way to make a living again and quickly. For sure, the uncles wouldn’t toss me out, but I would need a place of my own before long if I wanted to retain my sanity. I had to keep saving too. That part might prove to be tricky. What could I do to make a bit of money?
    On Main Street I stepped into Betty’s Boutique, a vintage clothing shop, to check it out. The fifties and sixties fashions in the window showed well against the backdrop: a framed poster of Norman Rockwell’s famous
Freedom from Want
, the archetypal Thanksgiving image. I decided not to think about my own Thanksgiving, which was probably going to consist of beans and franks, with Uncle Mick’s signature Heinz ketchup.
    I had to find the bright side. I probably had plenty of vintage I could sell on consignment to