A Grid For Murder by Casey Mayes Read Free Book Online

need to do a little digging. Can you wait here for a few minutes?”
    “Hey, you’re doing me a favor, remember? I can stay here as long as you’d like,” I said.
    As I waited in Barbara’s cramped office, I wondered if what she’d said was true. I’d been under the impression that the folks in Parson’s Valley had accepted Zach and me as one of their own since we’d moved there a few years before, but maybe I’d been mistaken. Was there still a basic mistrust of newcomers in this day and age? I couldn’t believe it. I’d made some wonderful friends since we’d arrived, and I couldn’t imagine any of them turning their backs on me. Then again, I’d never before been tied to a murder so close to the town where we lived. There was a mob mentality that mistrusted the outsider. The question was how many folks still considered me to be a stranger, and not a friend?
    That line of thought would just drive me crazy. To distract myself from my problems, I looked around Barbara’s tiny office. It was amazing that the woman could get any work done there at all. Papers were stacked four inches high on her desktop, and the few free spaces there were on the floor were covered with books. Barbara was well-known around town as a big reader, and she had a constant battle going on with Nancy Jenkins, the town’s librarian. It seemed that Barbara believed due dates were merely suggestions, and Nancy kept threatening to cut off her supply until she started returning books on a more regular basis. The two had endured a silent feud for a few weeks until they reached a compromise. Barbara could continueto disregard her due dates, but Nancy would keep track of the amounts, billing Barbara every month for her accumulated fines. I was shocked that Barbara had been willing to pay that way, since she was notoriously tight with her money, but she claimed that it didn’t bother her at all. She considered the bills as leasing fees, though she could have had the books for free if she’d just been a little more diligent about returning them. I started going through the titles, curious about what would attract her fancy, and maybe I’d even find something to read while I waited. If I was going to be there awhile, I didn’t plan to be idle, and creating a new puzzle with all that was on my mind was out of the question.
    I scanned through the titles, hoping to find anything that was interesting to me. I hadn’t realized just how eclectic Barbara’s reading tastes were until I started reading through her stacks. Titles like
The Great Gatsby
,
War and Peace
,
Modern Jazz Composition
,
Advanced Loom Weaving
,
Native North Carolina Plants
,
Mythical Creatures of Ireland
, and
The Dead Sea Scrolls
were mixed in with
Where the Wild Things Are
,
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
, and
’Salem’s Lot
.
    I still hadn’t picked one to read when Barbara abruptly came back in. “What on earth are you doing, Savannah?”
    I got up from my crouching position. “I was looking for something to read,” I admitted.
    “Well, you’re not going to find anything there. Those are books that I’ve checked out. The library has plenty more, believe me.”
    I glanced at the piles. “I doubt they have many more than you do.”
    Barbara grinned. “Hey, I pay for the privilege every month.”
    “May I ask you something?”
    “Sure.”
    “Do you actually read all of these?” I asked as I pointed to the books.
    She laughed at the question. “Parts of most of them. What can I say, I’m easily distracted. Now, did you come here to discuss my reading habits, or do you want to know about Joanne Clayton?”
    “I’d love to hear what you’ve discovered,” I said, forgetting all about the books and focusing on Barbara.
    She looked pleased by the comment. “It appears that there are seven people who might have wanted her dead.”
    “Seven? That many?”
    “There may be more,” Barbara acknowledged, “but I phoned a few friends in town, and those were all