Scouting for the Reaper by Jacob M Appel

Author:Jacob M Appel
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: Humorous, General, Family Life, Short Stories (Single Author), Fiction
ISBN: 9781937854959
Publisher: Black Lawrence Press
Published: 2014-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

But recalling George as he clambered over the railing of his father’s pleasure boat, presenting that soaked sunhat to her like a prince

98

Scouting for the reaper

offering a glass slipper, she understood what she must do. One way or another, she needed to know the truth about Felix Ingersoll.

The next morning, Greta climbed up onto the wooden stepstool in the pantry and retrieved the previous year’s binder of photocopied receipts. George had taken great care to preserve the docu-ments, as though he was looking after a friend’s album of priceless stamps. That’s how her husband had always been: forward-looking, painstaking. After he’d died, she’d discovered that even the perpetual care on his cemetery plot had been prepaid. All she’d had to do was sign the forms and gather the receipts. So when Greta lugged the heavy, overstuffed binder down the street to the H&R Block office, she knew that, for better or for worse, their every last credit and expenditure was thoroughly accounted for.

She had walked past this lowslung structure thousands of times, but she’d never before been inside. The lobby boasted a row of immaculately-tended purple tradescantia plants running along the window sill; only on closer inspection did Greta realize that the sleek, silky leaves were made of plastic. A rack of glossy brochures pitched a wide assortment of financial planning services and high-interest annuities, but the spry, graying couples in the photographs looked indistinguishable from the spry, graying couples who pitched cos-metic implants from brochures in her dentist’s lobby. Greta filled out a one-page form attached to a clipboard, and waited nearly an hour.

The woman who finally assisted her—more of a girl, really, with thick-framed glasses and hair frizzled like hemp—didn’t understand what she wanted, at least not initially. “So you still haven’t filed a return for last year?” the girl asked. “You photocopied your receipts, but you didn’t file a return?”

“I did file a return,” Greta explained—for the third time. “What I’d like for you to do is to recalculate what I owe. The photocopies of the receipts are so you can figure out my business deductions.”

Jacob M. Appel

99

The girl shot Greta a look of intense displeasure. “That’s a special order,” she snapped. “Same-day service doesn’t apply to special orders.”

“Could you have it done by Thursday?”

“Friday at noon,” said the girl.

“Thursday would be much better,” pleaded Greta. “If there’s a surcharge of some sort, that’s really not a problem.”

The girl frowned indignantly, as though she’d been offered a bribe, and when she once again said, “Friday at noon,” her words actually sounded like a threat.

“Okay, Friday at noon,” agreed Greta. “I’ll be here at twelve-oh-one.”

Ingersoll phoned the following evening to confirm their weekend plans. He reminded her to bring along a sweater, because the open water could prove breezy. Again, she thought of George and her drenched sunhat.

“I should have your tax returns completed by then,” Ingersoll added—sounding quite pleased with himself. “I’ve saved you far more than I ever anticipated. Compared to the last few years, you’re practically making a profit.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.