Jane Carter Investigates: Episode Fifty-Two
I leaned indolently against the
edge of the kitchen table and watched Mrs. Timms, our housekeeper, stem the
last of the strawberries from our kitchen garden into a bright green bowl.
Already, we’d had a few light frosts, and the berries had only survived because
Mrs. Timms was vigilant about covering them every evening before the sun went down.
“Tempting bait for Dad’s jaded
appetite,” I said, helping myself to the largest berry in the dish. “If he
can’t eat them, I will.”
“I do wish you’d leave those
berries alone,” our housekeeper protested in an exasperated tone. “They haven’t
even been washed yet.”
“Oh, I don’t mind a few germs.” I
laughed. “I just toss them off like a duck shedding water. Shall I take the
breakfast tray up to Dad?”
“Yes, I wish you would, Jane,”
said Mrs. Timms. “I’m right tired on my feet this morning. Rainy fall days always
did sap my energy.”
She washed the berries and then
offered the tray of food to me. I started off with it toward the kitchen
vestibule.
“Now, where are you going, Jane
Carter?” Mrs. Timms demanded suspiciously.
“Oh, just to the automatic lift,”
I said, giving her the blue-eyed innocent act.
“Don’t you dare try to ride in
that contraption again!” Mrs. Timms scolded. “It was never built to carry human
freight.”
“I’m not exactly freight,” I said
with an injured sniff. “It’s strong enough to carry me. I know because I tried
it last week.”
Mrs. Timms may be our
housekeeper, but she’s also been like a mother to me ever since I lost my own
fourteen years ago. I keep hoping that she and Dad will light a fire under a
pot together someday, but so far, if they are working up to a rolling boil,
they’re certainly keeping the lid on it.
“You walk up the stairs like a
lady, or I’ll take the tray myself,” Mrs. Timms threatened. “I declare, you may
be twenty-four years old already, but I don’t know when you’ll grow up.”
Mrs. Timms and Dad have something
in common: they are both disappointed in me. Dad is disappointed because I
refuse to become a reporter on his newspaper, the Greenville Examiner, instead of squandering my literary talents on
writing melodramatic serials for Pittman’s
All-Story Weekly Magazine under
the nom de plume of Miss Hortencia Higgins. Mrs. Timms is disappointed in me
because she’s never managed to turn me into a proper lady who remembers to
check her stockings for snags before she goes out and doesn’t let her shoes run
down at the heel before relegating them to the rubbish bin.
Poor Mrs. Timms. Her one
consolation is that she did manage to marry me off once—to a lovely
newspaperman named Timothy Carter. Unfortunately, a year into our marriage, Timothy
went down a dark Chicago alley in search of a scoop and came between a mafia
hitman’s bullet and its intended victim. That’s how I came to be a widow at
twenty-one. I still miss Timothy, even after three years. I have no intention
of ever marrying again, and if I ever do, it will certainly not be to another
newspaperman.
“Oh, all right, Mrs. Timms,” I
grumbled. “I’ll use the stairs, but I do maintain it’s a shameful waste of
energy.”
Balancing the tray precariously
on the palm of my hand, I tripped up the stairs and tapped on the door of my
father’s bedroom.
“Come in,” he called in a muffled voice.
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