Previously Loved Treasures (Serendipity #2)(42)

With great delight Caroline watched and listened. When the music stopped, she said, “I don’t recognize this song.”

Peter laughed. “In time you will. In time.”

Before she left the store he asked if she’d hung the picture.

“Yes, I have,” Caroline answered, but as she spoke the bitterness of the lie tripled in size and stung her throat.

“Good.” Peter nodded. “Very good.”

On the drive home Caroline made a mental note to hang the picture. She thought it charming that Peter Pennington believed it might inspire her; unrealistic perhaps, but charming. Obviously he had no knowledge of her schedule. From early morning until near bedtime she rushed around cooking, cleaning, buying groceries, running errands, paying bills, and a dozen other things. Writing a novel had been a foolish idea to start with.

“Maybe someday,” she told herself. “Maybe someday.”

~

When she arrived home Caroline slipped into Wilbur’s room, left the watch on his nightstand, and said nothing. At supper that evening he wore a grin so wide it almost swallowed up his nose. He waited until everyone was seated, then pulled the watch from his pocket.

“I found my watch,” he announced. “It was right where I’d left it.” He looked at Max. “I’m afraid I owe you an apology.”

Max, who had grown suspicious of everyone, asked, “For what?”

“I thought you’d taken it,” Wilbur admitted.

“Gimme a break,” Max grumbled. He looked down at the plate of food in front of him and shoveled in a large chunk of potato.

Max avoided looking at Wilbur throughout the remainder of the meal. Before the others finished eating, he stood and walked away from the table. Minutes later he left the house and headed for the Owl’s Nest.

Seeing the watch had shocked Max. The pawnshop where he had sold it was more than six miles away. Not only was it in another town, but it was also a place you wouldn’t go to unless you had good reason. Wilbur couldn’t possibly have found the watch, yet there it was back in his pocket.

“It’s a trick,” Max muttered. It had to be a trick. As he walked, he convinced himself they were all working together, plotting against him. Trying to force him out. “That’s what this is about,” he said. Before he pushed through the door of the Owl’s Nest, he’d decided they weren’t going to get away with it.

When Max returned home, the house was dark. He bypassed the kitchen, stumbled to his room, and fell fast asleep.

~

The next day was Wednesday, the day Caroline stripped the beds and washed all the sheets and towels. That morning she rapped on Max’s door several times asking for the bedclothes that needed laundering. The first two times there was no answer, so believing him still asleep, she waited. It was near noon when he finally answered with a gruff, “Go away!”

Waiting for Max meant washday got off to a late start. It was nearing three-thirty when Caroline pulled the first load of sheets from the washer and placed them in the dryer and after four when the buzzer sounded for the second load. Returning to the laundry room, Caroline opened the dryer and found the first load still damp. She reset the dryer, switched it from warm to hot, and went back to the kitchen.

Moments after she’d put a tray of biscuits in to bake, Caroline smelled smoke. She opened the oven and eyed the biscuits. Nope, they were still balls of white dough. She sniffed the air and followed the scent. It led to the laundry room. When she opened the door, flames shot up from behind the dryer.

“Fire!” she screamed and yanked the plug from the wall.

Louie, who’d moments earlier sat to read the newspaper, jumped up and came running. He pushed past Caroline, grabbed a sopping wet towel from the washer, and threw it over the flames. The fire spit and sputtered for a minute, then died out. Louie shook his head as he watched a cloud of steamy smoke rise from beneath the towel.

“I wouldn’t try using that dryer again.”

Caroline had to agree. She glanced at the pile of wet laundry. “Is there a Laundromat around here?”

“Not close by,” Louie answered. “I think there’s one over in Mackinaw.”

Mackinaw was forty-five miles east of Rose Hill, a nothing town, a truck-stop place with little to offer other than gas stations, motels, and a Laundromat. Caroline thought of Mackinaw and the dingy Laundromat she’d passed on the trip to Rose Hill; then she looked back at the dryer. “Maybe it can be repaired.”

“I doubt it,” Louie replied.

~

Thinking the Laundromat would be less crowded later in the evening, Caroline went back to preparing supper. Delaying the inevitable, she sat down and ate with the residents.

“Sorry about the dryer,” Laricka said sympathetically. “Do you think it’s still under warranty?”

“That dryer?” Louie replied skeptically. “It’s fifteen years old, if it’s a day.”

Caroline nodded. “I’m pretty sure it has to be replaced.” Her bank account had dwindled to a little more than one hundred dollars, and the thought poked at her like a sharp needle.

“Since we all use the washer and dryer,” Wilbur said, “why don’t we each chip in twenty bucks towards a new one?”

“Good idea,” Doctor Payne said, and all but one agreed.