The Body in the Birches by Katherine Hall Page

Author:Katherine Hall Page
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-03-27T00:00:00+00:00

“Okay, make my hair curl,” Faith said. She’d run into Ed Ricks at the bank. He suggested they get iced coffee to go from the new coffee roasting place and sit by the millpond behind it. The young women had scavenged some lawn furniture from the dump, painted it, put it out, and now “meet you at the millpond” was a popular invitation.

Faith was tempted to tell Ed about Ben’s altercation Saturday night. He didn’t treat adolescents, but she was sure he could give her some insights. Pix’s suggestion was hard to follow. Faith wasn’t used to doing “nothing.” Yet it didn’t seem fair to ask Ed. Enough people seemed to be taking advantage of his expertise without Faith adding to his load.

“What was the worst family feud?” she said.

“Hmm, there are a lot of contenders. And I’m eliminating the ones where everyone stops talking to each other. Those are pretty mild, but hurtful. Very hurtful.”

“And punitive. Like the whole Amish shunning thing,” Faith said.

“Exactly, especially when it’s parents and children. Adult children, that is. Siblings not talking doesn’t have the same sting.”

Faith could not think of anything her children would ever do that would cause her to stop speaking to them. An image of Ben’s angry face flashed into mind and she repeated to herself, nothing they could do . . . She might yell, but she’d communicate.

“I suppose the winner would have to be the two Rogers brothers, mainly because it lasted so long and was so public they might as well have taken space in the Bangor Daily News for updates,” Ed said. “They were flatlanders, originally from someplace near Chicago. Understand, we’re not talking about kids here. Grown men in their forties. Their parents bought a whole point jutting out into Toothacker Bay sometime in the 1950s.”

He paused.

“With you so far.” Faith smiled. “I know what a flatlander is and wonder why Sanperers use that term when it’s not mountainous here, but back to the story. Oh, and I know the bay and it’s named after a family, not an unpleasant dental emergency.”

“Back in that day,” Ed said, “you could get a whole point of land for next to nothing, but this family wasn’t hurting in that department. Some sort of business in the Midwest. They clear-cut for the view—you could do that then, too, although I’m sure you know some people do it now and pay the ridiculously low fine. They built a real nice year-round house smack on the shore—again, no setback regulations. The boys grew up there, every summer. The father died first. Mother lived to a ripe old age. People round here speak highly of her still.”

“Even if she was from away.”

“Ayuh. She left the whole thing to the two of them, which did cause some comment, as those brothers were chalk and cheese from the moment they got old enough to be possessive about their toys.”

What with all the folksy expressions, Ed was certainly going native, Faith thought.

“The mother did have

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.