Past Malice by Dana Cameron Read Free Book Online Page B

with the other leaders in the town. We know something of where his commercial interests were and I suspect that they not only paid their taxes on time but also ate off some fairly high-falutin’ dishes too. I don’t know for sure, but maybe we’ll find out.”
    I pulled onto the main street by the common and made the last turn onto the road for the site. I noticed that most of the houses were typical New England colors: gray, white, and yellow clapboards, with the occasional brick house thrown in for good measure. There was one, however, on the far side of the common, that always caught my attention. That was because it was striped with every color you could see on the other houses, and then some. I shook my head and resumed my lecture.
    “But we don’t know much about his wife, Margaret. She had, like, nearly a dozen kids who survived. Think about that, in a time when the leading cause of death for women was childbirth. We know she died when she was eighty-six, a tremendous age for anyone at the time. There’s a chance she was literate: The town library has a book with her name in it. But what else? Was she a decent person? How did she use her position in town? Was she a hostess of renown or a shoddy housekeeper? Was she religious, how did she treat her servants, did she like living in Stone Harbor or did she wish she was back in England every day of her life? There are so many questions I could ask, and yes, it is important to know these things.”
    We made it down the long, tree-lined avenue, heading for the large colonial house at the end of the road, and I turned into the parking lot off at one side in the front and killed the engine. If I’d rolled down the window and listened carefully, I could have heard the waves crashing on the other side of the property.
    “The best reason I can give you, Bucky, is that when you are studying anything, I don’t care if it is history or archaeology or chemistry or whatever, you don’t ignore more than half the population. You can’t only look in the light for your lost keys, you have to forage a little further afield than that. What you don’t know is going to shape what you do know. You see what I mean?”
    She didn’t. Bucky was fast asleep, her head against the passenger side window.
    I thought about waking her, even thought about whispering “Ma’s here” in her ear—that was always good for a reaction—but decided to let her sleep. I got out, got my stuff, and, after a moment’s hesitation, shut the door quietly behind me.
    I crunched down the gravel of the parking lot toward the house, waving to Fee as I walked by the window to her office. She didn’t notice me at first, and I saw that she was talking on the phone; she looked distinctly worried. I paused, wondering whether anything was wrong, and then she saw me and a huge, false smile split her face. It was like watching a curtain rapidly descend as another set magically transformed the stage. I waved again and walked around the right side of the house, unlatching the gate and letting myself in.
    This was one of the perks of the ungodly early hours that archaeology demands: seeing the site before everyone else arrived, being on the property when it was still quiet and largely deserted. I took a sip out of my travel mug and took it all in: the back of the house, with its small ornamental garden directly outside it, a slight drop-off, following the natural slope of the ground, cut by a short, wide staircase that led to the lawn below. The lawn was mown and well-trampled by the visitors who wanted to get the great view of Stone Harbor’s harbor, to my right, and Sheep’s Head Island, a little lump of rock and scrubby bushes, about a half mile from the shore and directly in front of us. I was pleased to see that the Chandler House people had put a sturdy picket fence well in from the bluff’s edge, to keep visitors from straying too close to the edge. To my left, looking northwest up the coast, was a bit of