Joan Hess - Arly Hanks 03 by Much Ado in Maggody Read Free Book Online Page A

the gospel truth and you know it. Man was made out of your common variety of dirt."
    That didn't sit well. I could see we were on the verge of a tagteam event, so I took Johnna Mae's arm and got her into the police car before the actual violence broke out. She was sniveling by this time, and big, plump tears rolled down her cheeks to plop into her lap. As I turned around in the bank parking lot, I saw a tableau that did nothing to ease my conscience one bit: Putter Nookim, a blackhaired scarecrow in faded denim overalls, stood in the shade, a blanketed bundle in his arm. Behind him were two small figures, clutching his legs and peering out from either side. I hated my job.
    -- ==+== --
    Lottie Estes sat behind her desk in the home ec room, rereading the letter for the tenth or maybe the twelfth time. No matter how much she squinted at the words, they still seemed ominous. Lottie Estes had never been late in her life. She'd been born on schedule, and she wasn't the sort who'd ever missed the previews at the picture show, the opening hymn at the Assembly Hall, or even the very first notes of the theme songs of her favorite television shows. Never once in her thirty years of teaching had she not been the first in the classroom or the first in the cafeteria for a teachers meeting. Whenever a friend had a baby shower or a small gathering, Lottie was there in time to help set the food out while the hostess finished dressing.
    But now this letter was telling her that she was late. What's more, she couldn't have avoided this accusation because she didn't know she'd ever borrowed money from some bank in Farberville, much less missed a payment. It didn't make one whit of sense.
    "Miss Estes?" said a timid voice from the doorway. "We're ready to start the Future Homemakers of America meeting. Heather wants to know if we should go ahead and read the minutes or wait for you.
    Lottie Estes stuffed the letter in a drawer and hastily rose. "Please tell Heather I am on my way, Grace Ellen. I have never arrived late to a meeting, and I do not intend to do so today."
    "No, ma'am -- I mean, yes, ma'am," Grace Ellen murmured, properly abashed.
    -- ==+== --
    Carolyn McCoy-Grunders threw down the file and picked up another from the stack. Except for her inner sanctum, the office was dark and quiet, which was the way she preferred it when she was not in a good mood. Carolyn was in a foul mood. And it wasn't her fault: Monty had had the nerve to take his wife to Las Vegas and had made sure everyone in the county bar association heard about it at the last luncheon. He'd known Carolyn would be there, of course, and that certain bitches would be sure to tell her the news. And just when she was trying to be mature about her ex-husband's marriage to that little slut young enough to be his daughter. Or kid sister, anyway. Carolyn dearly hoped the newlyweds drank the water in Acapulco and got their just deserts. And she didn't mean tortillas dipped in brown sugar.
    She tossed aside the file and snatched up the next. Maybe Monty would lose his BMW at the blackjack table; God knew he had trouble counting to twenty-one unless he took off his shoes and socks and dropped his pants. She glanced at the complaint form.
    "So we think we were passed up for promotion, do we?" she said, dropping the file on the floor and taking yet another. "Maybe we ought to stop whining and expecting people to rush over and wipe our noses."
    She almost threw the last file in the pile. The handwriting was laborious, almost illegible, and in pencil. Carolyn preferred forms written in ink, if not typed neatly and with a minimum of corrections. This one was smudgy. The spelling was atrocious. The complainant had managed to cover almost every bit of the white space with her long, tedious gripe about maternity leave and demotion and how much the baby weighed, for pity's sake. Carolyn had no use for babies. Or crybabies, for that matter.
    With a martyred sigh she settled her glasses on her