In the Night Room Read Online Free

guy?
she wondered.
    His hand tightened on hers. —Please excuse me for what I’m about to say, Mrs. Patrick. I knew your husband. At times, our work brought us into contact. He was a fine, fine man.
    For a moment, Willy’s vision went grainy, and her heart hovered between beats. Ordinary conversation hummed on around her. She blinked and raised her napkin to her mouth, buying time.
    —I’m sorry, the man said. I did that very badly.
    —Not at all. I was just a bit startled. Do you work for the Baltic Group?
    —From time to time, they call me in to make murky issues even murkier.
    —I’m sure you bring clarity wherever you go, she said, and, in a way she hoped brought the conversation to a neat conclusion, thanked him for having approached her.
    Mitchell Faber leaned in and patted her hand. —Mill Basin, the village in your book. Is it based on Millhaven? I understand that’s where you’re from.
    Mitchell Faber was chockablock with little astonishments.
    Flattered, puzzled, she smiled back at him. —You must know Millhaven very well. Are you from there, too?
    The question was absurd: Faber did not look, sound, or behave like a Millhaven native. Nor was he a product of the East Coast privilege-hatcheries responsible for Lankford Harper.
    —Sometimes when I’m in Chicago I like to drive up to Millhaven, check in to the Pforzheimer for a night or two, wander along the river walk, have a drink in the old Green Woman. Do you know the Green Woman Taproom?
    She had never heard of the Green Woman Taproom.
    —Lovely old bar, fascinating history. Ought to be in encyclopedias. It has an interesting connection to criminal lore.
    Criminal lore? She had no idea what he was talking about, and no intention of finding out. As far as Willy was concerned, the murders of her husband and daughter were more than enough crime for the rest of her life. The very idea of “criminal lore” struck her as a bad idea.
    Mitchell Faber could have struck her the same way, but Willy found that she had not made up her mind so quickly. Calling Molly the next day to thank her, she found herself asking her friend about the man who had spoken to her about the Newbery and Millhaven. Molly knew very little about him.
    A day later, Willy called to report that the unknown dinner guest had asked if they might get together for a cup of coffee or a drink, or anything.
    —I’d go straight for the anything, Molly told her. What have you got to lose? I thought he was pretty cute. Besides, he isn’t a hundred years old.
    —I don’t know anything about him, Willy said. And I don’t think I’m ready to start dating. I’m not even close.
    —Willy, how long has it been?
    —Two years. That’s nothing.
    —So’s a cup of coffee.
    —I’d have to tell him everything.
    —If he works with Lanky, he knows everything already. These guys can find out whatever they want to, they can dig up
anything.
Lanky told me they’re better than the CIA, and they should be! They have about ten times the money!
    —Ah, Willy said. So that’s how Mr. Faber found out about
In the Night Room
and Millhaven.
    —He had Lanky!
    —Lanky knows I won the Newbery? Excuse me, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.
    Molly was laughing. —Of course Lanky knows. He even read
Night Room.
    Now Willy was stunned. —Lanky read my book? It’s a YA!
    —YA novels are Lanky’s secret passion. When he was twenty-five years old, he read
The Greengage Summer,
and it changed his life. Now he’s an expert on Rumer Godden.
    Willy tried to picture Molly’s gaunt, secretive, gray-haired husband in his blue pin-striped suit and gold watch, bending, in the light of a library lamp, over a copy of
Miss Happiness and Miss Flower.
    —He has a fabulous collection, Molly said. We’re talking about Lankford Harper now, remember. There’s a special vault with huge metal bookshelves. When you push this little button, they revolve.
Thousands
of books, most of them in great condition. When he gets