The Student Body (Susan Henshaw Book 12) by Valerie Wolzien

Author:Valerie Wolzien [Wolzien, Valerie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lume Books
Published: 2020-01-16T05:00:00+00:00

NINETEEN

Susan had planned to study at home over the weekend. Jed was going to be busy doing errands—closing up the pool; cleaning out the gutters; putting away all the expensive gardening equipment, which had provided them with sixteen tomatoes, three green peppers, and five or six salad bowls of mesclun over the summer; and running the mower around the lawn one last time. She knew he would spend as much time at Hancock Hardware as working. And if the weather held, he planned to golf on Sunday.

But Susan couldn’t concentrate. When she sat down in Jed’s study, her eyes wandered from Italian irregular verbs toward the pile of Christmas catalogs accumulating on top of the VCR. Hoping fresh air would revive her, she bundled up in an old wool sweater, grabbed Middlemarch, and plopped down on a lounge on the patio. But the falling leaves, Clue, and the crisp air all conspired to make her daydream of long walks in the woods rather than Dorothea’s naïve choices.

Finally she gave up and, filling her pack to the brim, headed off to the local library.

Hancock Public Library was one of Susan’s favorite places in town. A historic church and three modern wings made it a warm and friendly place, especially since she had had a hand in solving the one murder to take place within its walls. She loved the stacks overflowing with current and classic fiction, its extensive collection of cookbooks and shelter magazines, the comfortable chairs provided for browsers. And since she started school, she had come to appreciate the lone row of carrels tucked in behind the biographies. They were quiet, private, and situated right over a line of heating vents set in the floor. Susan headed for them after greeting the librarian who was manning the checkout desk.

There were seven desks and four were already occupied. Susan, inwardly sighing (she was, after all, in a library), chose the empty one between two long-haired readers. Determined to work and not chat, she piled her study materials up and opened a notebook without even glancing at her fellow workers. First Italian. Then reread the piece she had to turn in to her creative writing professor this week. Then a quick review of Middlemarch and three of Elizabeth Gaskell’s novels. Then Italian, Italian, Italian.

First those irregular verbs. Then nouns. Lots and lots of nouns. For some reason she had little trouble remembering the words for boot, shoe, and sweater, possibly because she could imagine herself walking down the Via Tornabuoni in Florence, dropping into the elegant boutiques, and trying on clothing. “Gli stivali rossi, per favore.” She could almost say it. But was rosso red or pink? Did she mean verdi? Wasn’t that green? Not that it wouldn’t be nice to have green boots, but her favorite winter coat was black and she sort of had her heart set on red boots. On the other hand, she certainly did not want pink boots.…

This was getting her nowhere! She pushed her notecards and textbook to the back of the desk and pulled out the folder marked cw.

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