J Stanley - The Battered Body

The fifth book in the Supper Club Mystery series, 2009

“It’s how much?” Librarian James Henry turned pale as he glanced back at the real estate listing on his lap.

The real estate agent, a prim blonde with purple-tinted lipstick and calculating blue eyes, reached over her polished mahogany desk and removed the listing from her client’s soft lap. “I’m sorry,” she smiled icily. “I’m sure we can find you something in your price range that would suit you just perfectly.” She uncapped a ballpoint pen and held it poised over a blank sheet of paper. “What would you say your price range is , Mr. Henry?”

“About half of that one.” James gestured at the listing that his Realtor was tucking into a blue folder, and his eyes slid toward the shiny brass plaque on her desk. Apparently, Joan Beechnut had been the area’s leader in home sales for the last three years.

Seeing that her client had noticed her laurels, Joan smiled proudly, revealing small, ferretlike teeth coated by a thin line of purple.

“I’m planning to win again this year,” she stated haughtily, and then she began flipping through her binder of house listings. “It’s too bad you didn’t call me earlier in the fall,” she chided him as her fingers raked through listing after listing. “If you had, you would have had so much more to choose from. As it stands, well, most folks don’t put their houses up for sale right after Thanksgiving. They’ve got Christmas shopping on their minds and no one likes to move over the holidays.”

“Well, I have to,” James replied rather testily. “My father is getting married on Christmas Eve, and I’m sure Pa would rather not carry his new bride over the threshold only to remember that his adult son is sleeping in the bedroom down the hall.”

Joan’s brown eyes, hidden beneath an expensive pair of aquamarine contacts, twinkled at the thought of some interesting gossip. “A second marriage, eh? Did your parents get divorced?”

“My mother died a few years ago,” James stated flatly. “That’s how I ended up as Shenandoah’s head librarian. I used to be a professor at William & Mary. That’s why lots of folks in Quincy’s Gap call me Professor,” he added with pride.

Blue Ridge Realty wasn’t in James’s hometown of Quincy’s Gap, however, and Joan was unimpressed by James’s title. “And what about you?” She gestured at his left hand. “No wedding ring, I see? Will you be living all alone in the three-bedroom, two-bathroom house you’d like to purchase?”

James squirmed in his chair. He didn’t appreciate the “all” Joan had placed before the “alone” for emphasis. “Yes, it’ll just be me.”

Joan flipped through more listings. “No pets?”

“No.”

“Hmm, then you don’t need a big yard.” She turned back several pages.

“But I like to garden,” James piped up before the Realtor restricted him to a yard that could be mowed with a pair of barber’s clippers. “In fact, I’d like an excuse to buy a riding mower, and if the house had a deck or a patio, that would be great too. Decks are perfect for growing tomatoes.”

“Tomatoes, huh?” Joan stared at James for a moment and then removed a listing from the binder and placed it in front of him with a flourish.

James gazed at the image of a sad-looking ranch with a flat and treeless expanse of front lawn. Even though the photo was black and white, James could see that the roof was stained, the front stoop appeared to be sagging, and chips of paint the size of dinner plates were missing from the wooden siding.

“It’s a perfect fixer-upper for a handy guy,” Joan said enthusiastically, as though the house were a valuable gemstone that only required some simple polishing in order to make it sparkle. “A new coat of paint, a bush planted here and there, and you’re good to go.”

“And a new roof, replaced stoop, and who knows what else inside.” James handed the listing back to her. “And I’m rather a novice with power tools, so I’d prefer not to buy something that needs this kind of overhaul.”

Shoving the rejected home back into the binder, Joan laced her fingers together and leaned forward on her desk. “You know, I have some lovely apartment rentals over at Mountain Valley Woods. They’re just starting to lease Building F. Why don’t I take you to view a few of them? You could move into a brand new two-bedroom apartment and relax while waiting for the perfect house to come onto the market.”

James thought about the idea of living in Building F of Mountain Valley Woods. He could easily visualize the crisp, white walls, pristine carpeting, and sparkling kitchen. He could also imagine the lifelessness of such a dwelling. Even if he filled it with his books and bought some prints to hang on the unscathed walls, he knew that an apartment would never feel like home. Even the decrepit ranch Joan had shown him had more character than four square rooms that had never witnessed a moment of human history. Besides, how could he possibly live in a place with the ridiculous title of Mountain Valley Woods? It was as if the developers strung together every geographic noun they could think of to use as the complex’s name.

All they needed was to add River, Brook, or Stream and they’d have listed all the things on a Shenandoah County map, James thought with a wry grin, and he stood. “I’ve got some time, Ms. Beechnut, so I’d rather keep looking at houses, if that’s okay. But right now, I’ve got to get back to work.”

Doing her best to disguise her frown, Joan rose as well and vigorously pumped James’s hand in farewell. “Don’t worry, we’ll find you something. But even if the perfect house just fell into my lap today, it would take at least thirty days to close, so you may want to go ahead and make plans to stay someplace else on your father’s wedding night.”

Ruffled by the smirk in her voice, James pivoted. “I’ve got friends who will put me up as long as I need,” he declared with feeling.

“Well, those must be some nice friends,” Joan replied and closed the door to her office.

“They’re the best,” James mumbled happily to himself as he got into his old Bronco and headed back to work.

At the library, James realized that he had used his entire lunch hour at the Realtor’s and hadn’t had the chance to eat anything. He dug through the staff fridge for any enticing leftovers, but was disappointed to find only an assortment of condiments and a piece of string cheese that had turned hard enough to double as a cudgel.

“I come bearing dessert.” Scott Fitzgerald, one of the twenty-four-year-old twin brothers who formed James’s full-time staff, breezed into the kitchen. He dumped a covered cake plate onto the counter, shoved a wave of his unkempt hair behind his ear, and removed the Tupperware lid with a flourish. “Yum, yum! It’s Mrs. Hurley’s famous chocolate angel food cake. She brought it in ’cause Francis and I helped her design and print out her own Christmas cards using our computers. She told us we were magicians and that she was going to make us a dessert every week ’til Christmas.” He smiled. “We’ve got the best job, Professor.”