pursed lips. “I’m not dim-witted and I’m not a liar. I told you I’d take Joe.”
“Speaking of dim-witted, here’s a little something you might want to know. When Ross calls me up—every day—he lets me know exactly why he thinks he should be your bodyguard, and not Joe.”
“And his reason would be…”
“He doesn’t think Joe’s smart enough.”
Faye leaned back in the chair and crossed her arms. “I’d like to see Mr. High-falutin’ Lawyer shoot a rabbit with an arrow he made himself. Shot from a bow that he’d also made himself. I’d like to see him track that rabbit all the way across Joyeuse Island. I’d like to see him tell time by the sun and predict the weather by the sounds the birds make. I’d—”
“I hear you, Faye. I know what Joe can do, and I know what he can’t do. I just thought you might want to know what’s going on.”
“I thank you. And when the time is right, I’m planning to explain to Ross Donnelly exactly what’s going on, too.”
Chapter Ten
Faye woke up with three goals driving her. She liked it when she had goals. She could control her approach to reaching those milestones. Focusing on concrete goals distracted her from those messy elements of her life where she had no control.
She couldn’t bring her friends back from the dead, but she could by God do all she could to help the sheriff track down their killers.
Her conversation with the sheriff had solidified in her mind the three things she needed to do. She needed to continue sifting through Bachelder’s letters, trying to find the information Wally had wanted her to have. She couldn’t say why, but she also felt like she needed to go to Bachelder’s homestead, just to get a feel for the man. And, though the search might prove fruitless, she burned to go back to the spot where she found the emerald.
Maybe there were more priceless jewels waiting for her there. Or maybe Jedediah Bachelder had left a letter buried with the emerald, conveniently explaining why his name kept cropping up in connection to murders committed a hundred years after his death. Of course, he’d have had to write it in waterproof ink on paper capable of staying underground for a century without rotting, but hey…stranger things had happened.
So which of these windmills was she tilting at today? Or rather, which of these windmills were she and Joe tilting at today? Because the sheriff had made her promise to keep Joe around as a bodyguard, and Faye kept her promises.
The library kept short hours. The drive to Tallahassee made book research a lot less efficient on Saturday and Sunday. It made more sense to wait until Monday to go to the library. So should she strike out into the unknown and pursue Bachelder’s homeplace today, or should she dig for buried treasure in her own back yard? Faye knew from soggy experience that the weather in April could be iffy, but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky today.
She stuck her head out the window and squinted at the clear blue dome above her. There was always a chance in this climate that a roiling black thundercloud would blow in and drench her world in rain, but that prospect was as unlikely today as it ever would be. It made sense to attack the goal that would require her to venture farthest from home on this cloudless morning. If she had to, she could dig for an emerald in her back yard on any old blustery day.
Faye had a long history of working frenetically while a thunderhead loomed on the horizon, only dashing indoors when the deluge hit, and she hadn’t been struck by lightning yet. When she thought about being caught in a deluge in the swamp in a metal johnboat under a forest of trees shaped like lightning rods—and she had been in just that precarious situation on many occasions—Faye considered working at home, even in bad weather, a comparative piece of cake.
Having come to her decision rationally, Faye started gathering her maps of the area around Jedediah Bachelder’s
“Speaking of dim-witted, here’s a little something you might want to know. When Ross calls me up—every day—he lets me know exactly why he thinks he should be your bodyguard, and not Joe.”
“And his reason would be…”
“He doesn’t think Joe’s smart enough.”
Faye leaned back in the chair and crossed her arms. “I’d like to see Mr. High-falutin’ Lawyer shoot a rabbit with an arrow he made himself. Shot from a bow that he’d also made himself. I’d like to see him track that rabbit all the way across Joyeuse Island. I’d like to see him tell time by the sun and predict the weather by the sounds the birds make. I’d—”
“I hear you, Faye. I know what Joe can do, and I know what he can’t do. I just thought you might want to know what’s going on.”
“I thank you. And when the time is right, I’m planning to explain to Ross Donnelly exactly what’s going on, too.”
Chapter Ten
Faye woke up with three goals driving her. She liked it when she had goals. She could control her approach to reaching those milestones. Focusing on concrete goals distracted her from those messy elements of her life where she had no control.
She couldn’t bring her friends back from the dead, but she could by God do all she could to help the sheriff track down their killers.
Her conversation with the sheriff had solidified in her mind the three things she needed to do. She needed to continue sifting through Bachelder’s letters, trying to find the information Wally had wanted her to have. She couldn’t say why, but she also felt like she needed to go to Bachelder’s homestead, just to get a feel for the man. And, though the search might prove fruitless, she burned to go back to the spot where she found the emerald.
Maybe there were more priceless jewels waiting for her there. Or maybe Jedediah Bachelder had left a letter buried with the emerald, conveniently explaining why his name kept cropping up in connection to murders committed a hundred years after his death. Of course, he’d have had to write it in waterproof ink on paper capable of staying underground for a century without rotting, but hey…stranger things had happened.
So which of these windmills was she tilting at today? Or rather, which of these windmills were she and Joe tilting at today? Because the sheriff had made her promise to keep Joe around as a bodyguard, and Faye kept her promises.
The library kept short hours. The drive to Tallahassee made book research a lot less efficient on Saturday and Sunday. It made more sense to wait until Monday to go to the library. So should she strike out into the unknown and pursue Bachelder’s homeplace today, or should she dig for buried treasure in her own back yard? Faye knew from soggy experience that the weather in April could be iffy, but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky today.
She stuck her head out the window and squinted at the clear blue dome above her. There was always a chance in this climate that a roiling black thundercloud would blow in and drench her world in rain, but that prospect was as unlikely today as it ever would be. It made sense to attack the goal that would require her to venture farthest from home on this cloudless morning. If she had to, she could dig for an emerald in her back yard on any old blustery day.
Faye had a long history of working frenetically while a thunderhead loomed on the horizon, only dashing indoors when the deluge hit, and she hadn’t been struck by lightning yet. When she thought about being caught in a deluge in the swamp in a metal johnboat under a forest of trees shaped like lightning rods—and she had been in just that precarious situation on many occasions—Faye considered working at home, even in bad weather, a comparative piece of cake.
Having come to her decision rationally, Faye started gathering her maps of the area around Jedediah Bachelder’s
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