Part 80 (1/2)

then grinned.

”Or maybe we should try to be a little more open-minded

to this new development.”

Clyde groaned. ”I can't believe you're giving up, Maggie.

I thought you were such a fighter.”

”I'm not giving up. I'll keep investigating the whole thing.

I just need to find out if this Byers fellow is really who he says

he is or not. And if it turns out that he's really on the up-and-

up, we'll be open to this whole thing, right?”

”And if he's not, will we slap his sorry story all across the

front page?”

She couldn't help laughing. ”You bet we will!”

Barbara Harris arrived in Pine Mountain a day earlier

than she had planned, and Maggie met her at the hotel for Looking for You All My Life127

tea the following afternoon. Barbara was a fragile and

refined-looking woman, and though probably only a little

older than Audrey, in some ways she seemed to come from

a generation long past. With her perfectly coifed snow-white

hair, soft powdery face, and pastel blue woolen dress com-

plete with a single strand of pearls, she reminded Maggie of

someone from the Victorian era, especially by the way she

held her teacup so daintily with her little finger gracefully

pointing down.

”I'm still so amazed to be back here in Pine Mountain,”

she said as she set the fine porcelain teacup carefully back

into its saucer. ”Everything looks so wonderful. Much nicer