Leftover Dead by JIMMIE RUTH EVANS Read Free Book Online Page A

of readers on the tables in there. If you need help with anything, you just come and let me know.”
    “Thank you, we will,” Wanda Nell said. She followed Jack down the hall to the room the librarian had indicated. Jack flipped the light switch on, and he and Wanda Nell stared for a moment at the wall of cabinets.
    Stepping closer, they began examining the labels on the drawers, looking for the local paper. “I guess I never realized just how much they have in here,” Wanda Nell said. “They’ve got the Commercial Appeal from Memphis, and the Clarion-Ledger from Jackson, too.”
    “That reminds me, we should probably check those papers, too, just in case,” Jack said. “It might have made one of them before the cover-up started.”
    “How about I start with the Memphis paper, while you look at the Tullahoma one?” Wanda Nell asked. She started hunting for the drawer with the right dates on it.
    “Good idea,” Jack said. He wandered away from her. “Here’s the Tullahoma paper.” He bent to peer more closely at the labels.
    Wanda Nell found the drawer she needed and pulled it open. Inside were several rows of boxes containing microfilms. Using one finger, she skimmed over the labels, looking for the correct month. “Got it,” she said, extracting the box from the drawer.
    “I’m not having any luck yet,” Jack said.
    Wanda Nell was only half-listening. She took her box to one of the readers and sat down at the table. There was a diagram that explained how to load the film on the machine, and she examined it closely. “That looks easy enough,” she muttered. She extracted the roll of microfilm from the box and began to load it. Behind her she could hear Jack opening and closing drawers.
    Once the microfilm was properly loaded, Wanda Nell started going through it, looking for the right date to start. “Honey,” she called, “did Elmer Lee say anything about a date on that file?”
    “No, he didn’t, but I’ve got the copy right here.”
    Wanda Nell turned to watch as he pulled the folded papers from his jeans pocket. He unfolded them and scanned them quickly. “Looks like the body was found on April twenty-third.”
    “Thanks.” Wanda Nell got to that date on her roll of film and began carefully going forward. She was dimly aware of Jack’s continuing to open and shut drawers while she worked.
    She had made her way through April twenty-fifth without finding any reference to a murder in Tullahoma, when the increasingly loud sounds of frustration coming from behind her broke through her concentration.
    Wanda Nell turned in her chair, staring at her husband in concern. “Honey, what’s going on?”
    “It’s missing,” Jack said, frowning. “I’ve looked through most of the drawers now, thinking it might simply be misfiled. But it’s just not here. The box we need just isn’t here.”

Six
    Jack cursed, and Wanda Nell shook a finger at him. “Honey, don’t forget you’re in the library. Don’t be talking like that.”
    “Sorry,” Jack muttered. “I guess I should have expected this.”
    Wanda Nell got up and went over to him, slipping a consoling arm around his waist. “Well, if we had any doubts about somebody trying to cover the whole thing up, I guess we don’t anymore.”
    “We sure don’t.”
    “But it does tell us something,” Wanda Nell added in a more encouraging tone. “There must be something in the paper that would help us, if someone went to all the trouble of stealing the microfilm from the library.”
    “Good point.” Jack’s face brightened for a moment. “But where are we going to find other copies of the paper?”
    “First, let’s make sure there’s not something in the Memphis or Jackson papers,” Wanda Nell said. She nodded in the direction of the microfilm reader she had been using. “I’ve been through the twenty-fifth in the Commercial Appeal , and I haven’t found anything so far.”
    “I’ll check out the Clarion-Ledger .” Jack moved