Meeting at Midnight by Eileen Wilks Page A

we wouldn’t be able to do much with the wood until we’d cleared the place out. The room I used for a home office used to be a bedroom—my parents’ bedroom, actually. I’d taken their bed out about a month after they died, unable to stand seeing it there, all made up and waiting for them. Eventually Annie had claimed their dresser. Somehow I’d never gotten around to clearing everything else out, though.
    My two favorite spots in the store were the tool aisles and the lumber section. Tools are always interesting, and being surrounded by all that wood hits me viscerally. I think it’s the smell—cut wood, sawdust, a whiff of sap.
    Ed noticed my sling and the walking stick, so of course he had to hear the whole story, then felt obligated to spend some time assuring me I was lucky to be alive before he could put my order together. I arranged to have it picked up in a couple days. “That will give me a chance to clear the room out,” I told Seely as we headed for the front of the store with the ticket. Our slow speed wasn’t just due to my pace this time—she kept stopping to look at paint chips and light fixtures.
    â€œUs,” she said. “It’s not as if I have much else to do. And we don’t have to remove everything. You have some good pieces in there, like that occasional table with the Queen Anne legs.”
    â€œYeah?” I smiled, pleased. “I made that when I was sixteen.”
    â€œYou’re kidding!”
    â€œShop class. It was a Christmas gift for my mom. I was trying to copy a picture I found in a magazine. Put in a lot of extra hours on it…had a lot of help, too.” As I spoke I saw Mr. Nelson’s face. He’d been the soul of patience, often staying late so I could work in the shop. “Lord, I hadn’t thought of Mr. Nelson in years.”
    â€œYour teacher?”
    â€œYeah. He retired while I was away at college, moved to Albuquerque to be near his sister. He was an old bachelor, you see. I stopped in to see him once when I was there on business…” My voice trailed away as I remembered that visit. How sorry I’d felt for the old man, living alone, no one but a sister nearby. All of a sudden I could see my own future, and it didn’t look much different.
    I had Zach, I reminded myself. Some of the time, at least.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?”
    â€œNothing.” We’d reached the front of the store. I headed for the nearest checkout. “I’m amazed that you let me get up here without buying anything else. Why is someone who calls herself a wanderer so interested in everything to do with houses?”
    She shrugged. “The fascination of the exotic, perhaps. I’ve never rooted anywhere long enough to do much in the way of home improvement, so it seems novel and exciting. Does your interest in construction go back to that woodworking class?”
    â€œPartly. Do you do that on purpose?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œTurn the conversation away from yourself and back on me. Annie tells me that all a woman has to do to appear fascinating to a man is to get him to talk about himself. Maybe that’s true. But I’d like to hear about you sometimes.”
    A flush climbed the crest of her cheekbones. She gave mea teasing smile. “Does that mean it’s working? You think I’m fascinating?”
    I’d have enjoyed her flirting a lot more if I hadn’t thought she was using it to duck the question. “Look, I don’t know—what is it?”
    She’d gone dead pale. She was staring over my shoulder. I turned.
    Someone was staring back. An old woman, every inch as tall as Seely but skinnier, like a dried-out string bean, had stopped a few feet away. She had a real lost-in-the-fifties look going, right down to the low heels and pearls. Her coat was dark-blue wool. Her gray hair had been permed, teased and sprayed into submission.
    And her