White Colander Crime Read Online Free Page A

trim, too. There were long evergreen garlands strung across the street at the main intersection and to the small village green where the information booth for Dickens Days was going to be set up.
    All they needed was snow to make the Dickens Days festivities perfect. She sighed. “I guess I’d better get moving.”
    â€œYou let me know when you get the rest of the pamphlets. Or do you want me to pick them up in Wolverhampton when they’re ready? Seems you do a whole lot of driving with no one paying your mileage.”
    â€œI don’t mind.” She hesitated, but then asked, “Did you know Nan Goodenough had a son who’s staying with her right now?”
    His head snapped up and he stared at her, his mouth turned down. “I know him. He come around here asking for a job. Told him I got no use for those who don’t treat women right.”
    She sighed. “You saw it, too? The way he treated his girlfriend?”
    He nodded, tight-lipped. “Whacked her upside of the head.”
    â€œSounds like the same incident I saw. Don’t say anything to anyone, but I think he shoved his mom this morning.” She explained what she had heard at the newspaper office.
    He shook his head. “Don’t like him. Don’t like any man treats a woman with less than respect.” He finished scraping the last bit of paint and grabbed a dirty rag, wiping some of the chemical off the oak door with a splash of mineral spirits, the pungent scent wafting on the fresh December breeze. But his dour look lightened and he winked at her. “There are some fellows out there who know a good woman when he’s found her. Like the Müller’s youngest, Jakob. Heard he’s sweet on a real nice girl.”
    She felt her color heighten and she buffeted him on the arm. “You stop! Enough of that. We’re just friends.”
    â€œSure you are. You say hello to him for me, and that I’ll be out to The Junk Stops Here tomorrow to pick up that antique sleigh we talked about. I’m thinking about fixing it up and giving sleigh rides through the village.”
    She was enchanted, and clapped, jumping up and down. “Could we maybe plan that for next year’s Dickens Days? Maybe we could even do rides out to the manor house.”
    â€œOne step at a time, Jaymie. There isn’t always snow this time of year, like now. You go on. I’ve got to finish this door for a very particular customer.”
    She knew he meant Becca and chuckled. Light-headed with hope and relief—it was good to share her worries about Nan and Cody with someone who understood, someone as steady and trustworthy as Bill—she drove her rickety white van out to Queensville Historic Manor, where she would deliver a stack of pamphlets, place her centerpiece creation on the Hoosier and make sure her kitchen had survived the ins and outs of the various heritage committee members, some of whom preferred to enter though the kitchen door rather than circle all the way to the front.
    In the slanting late afternoon light, she drove up the lane and around behind the garage, where some parking spaces had been delineated for committee volunteers, grabbed her white colander centerpiece and stack of pamphlets, locked the van and circled the house to the front to get the full view. The former Dumpe Manor, now Queensville Historic Manor, looked wonderful. A massive Queen Anne–style home, with copious gingerbread and clapboard siding, bound on two sides with forest and the other with open fields, the house had been painted a lovely soft blue and the gingerbread a sparkling white. The broad porch and steps had been repaired by Bill and were now safe to mount. The whole was fronted by a lighted sign announcing the name and hours.
    She stood near the road and gazed at it, biting her lip and grimacing at the huge blow-up gingerbread man cookie that waved and waggled in the wind, the generator groaning and