Part 24 (1/2)
”I'll get some ziplocks.”
When I returned from the kitchen, Harry was sitting cross-legged on my bed. Reversing each baggie over my hand, I removed the can, then the tissues from Harry's purse.
”You've done some doggie-p.o.o.p scooping,” Harry observed.
”I'm mult.i.talented.”
”I've got something else.”
Reclaiming her purse, Harry pulled an object from the side pocket and laid it on the bed.
The significance didn't register at first. I picked the thing up.
And felt a buzz of excitement.
”Where did you get this?”
”Obeline's bedside table.”
19.
I WAS HOLDING A SMALL BOOK WITH A DELICATE GREEN RIBBON WAS HOLDING A SMALL BOOK WITH A DELICATE GREEN RIBBON curling from the binding. The cover was red. The lettering was black. curling from the binding. The cover was red. The lettering was black.
Bones to Ashes: An Exultation of Poems.
”Looks like one of those sixties things quoting Mao,” Harry said.
”You stole this?”
”I liberated it.” Sanctimonious. ”Mao would approve.”
I turned back the cover. The pages were grainy and yellow, the same cheap paper used in comic books. The print was faded and fuzzy.
No author. No date. No ISBN number. Besides the t.i.tle, the volume's only identifier was the name of the publisher. O'Connor House.
I flipped to the last page. Sixty-eight. Blank.
I opened to the ribbon. It was marking a poem t.i.tled the same as the collection.
”It's poetry, Tempe.” Harry's body language told me she was pumped.
”I've never heard of O'Connor House. Could be a vanity press.”
”What's that?”
”A vanity press charges the author for printing and binding.”
Harry looked confused.
”A commercial publisher's intended market is the general public. A vanity press's intended market is the author him-or herself.”
The heavily mascaraed eyes widened.
”OK. That computes. Evangeline wanted to be a poet, right?”
”Right.”
”What if she's the author?”
I looked at Harry's excited face.
”We have absolutely no reason to believe that's so,” I said, knowing I was about to hear one of my sister's imaginative but virtually baseless hypotheses.
”Any guess why I snitched this particular little volume?”
I shook my head.
”Did you notice the books in that parlor?” She didn't wait for my answer. ”'Course not. You were parlay-voo-ing. But I did. There were dozens. Scores. Every last one in French. Same in the bedroom. Which, don't get your gizzard twirling, I had to traverse to get to the loo. The one and only English book in that whole place was this one. And it was lying right by Obeline's bed.”
”What's your point?”
”One lonely little English paperback? Right there at her bedside?”
”That hardly means-”
”Maybe Obeline rounded up Evangeline's poetry and had it printed. Like a memorial. You know? Her sister's dream made real?”
”I suppose it's a possibility. In that case it was very wrong of us to take it from her.”
Harry leaned forward, eager. ”We'll return it. It's a clue. We run this publisher to ground, maybe we learn something about Evangeline. Maybe we tank. So what? It won't hurt the book.”
I couldn't argue with her reasoning.
”My thinking, it's worth a look-see.”
”I have to help Ryan tomorrow. And I need to reexamine the skeleton.”
Harry scrambled from the bed, tossed her hair over her shoulders.
”Leave it all to baby sister.”