Footprints Read Online Free Page A

smiling. “So you did, bless you.”
    They’d sneaked down at night and hung a banner across the front of the café:
Guess Who’s A Sexy Sixty
. Then they skipped school in the afternoon so they could take in a cake that Isora made.
    Al repeats, shaking her head, “So you did.” Harper is afraid she’s going to cry, but she goes on, as she places their tea on the counter, “Well, here I am not getting any younger and nearing sixty-three now, and I think it’s time for me to sell up and take things easy.”
    â€œWill someone buy the café?” Harper asks.
    Al looks at him sadly. “Who’s going to buy anything here, dear, business or home or whatever? Back River’s a dying town.”
    Harper protests, “It’s not dying.”
    â€œNo? With the mill closing?”
    â€œThat’s just rumours.”
    â€œWhat does your dad say? He’s on the union executive, isn’t he?”
    â€œHe says Mr. Anderson’s probably going to buy it and keep it going, but it’s a tough decision for him because the market’s down right now.”
    Drumgold scoffs, “Friggin’ Anderson. What does he care about Back River? As long as he’s got his fancy cottage and his beach – our beach – he doesn’t give a shit about the Back River mill.”
    â€œHe needs the mill to make a living,” Harper points out.
    â€œHe needs the mill about as much as I need another couple of pounds round my middle,” says Al. “He’s got Eastern Oil to keep him rich. The mill’s small potatoes to him. It’ll be like a hobby if he does buy it. It’ll be some kind of tax dodge, or to get him a few government grants. Then, bye-bye mill and bye-bye Back River. He’ll close it after a few months, you’ll see. Best thing I can hope for with the café is for someone to do mea favour and blow it up. Like someone tried to do to Eastern Oil today.”
    Harper’s head jerks upwards from his cup. “Wha..?”
    Drumgold and Isora are staring at Al, who says, “They found a bomb at Eastern Oil. Don’t you kids ever listen to the news? When I was at school we used to go over the news in current affairs every day and we had a test on it at the end of every week and if we didn’t pass we got–”
    Drumgold interrupts. “The bomb...”
    â€œRight,” says Al. “They didn’t say a bomb, they said a powerful incendiary device, but what they mean is a bomb. What else would it be? Security guards found it in an elevator at Eastern Oil in Saint-Leonard.”
    â€œWhy would someone want to blow up Eastern Oil?” Harper wonders.
    â€œBecause Eastern Oil is going to build the liquefied natural gas terminal just up the coast from here, dummy,” says Drumgold. “I guess someone’s decided the signs you see all over saying ‘Stop LNG’ aren’t going to do the job.”
    The door jangles open, revealing a thick-set man in a checked woolen jacket, hair the colour of muddy sand hanging lankly over his ears and to his eyes.
    Al calls, “Come on in, Ed.”
    Ed shuffles to the counter, his eyes on the floor, and stands beside Isora.
    She says, “Hi, Ed.”
    His eyes flicker briefly upwards in her direction as he mumbles, “Hi,” followed carefully by, “Is-ora.”
    He’s agitated, snuffling and snorting, and looking back at the door as if expecting someone to follow him in.
    Al puts coffee in front of him and says, “What’s up, Ed? Youhaven’t got the voices, have you? Did you take your medication this morning?”
    â€œHim,” says Ed, gesturing behind him.
    Al looks at the door. “There’s no-one there, Ed.”
    Ed repeats, “Him,” putting one hand to his forehead like a salute and holding the other straight down his leg.
    â€œThe security guard,” says Isora, recognizing the pantomime of