Dead Guy's Stuff Read Free Page B

the one collecting the tape. "Mary said she was going to send it through the church to some places where they'd take anything, you know, any kind of medical supplies."
    "Was the owner a visiting nurse?" asked Jane, breaking two of her rules— asking a question and getting distracted by the owner's history instead of the owner's stuff.
    Both women looked at Jane, not surprised at all that someone might want to chat during the feeding frenzy of a house sale. Yes, they were Mary's friends and neighbors, amateurs, not dealers or professionals.
    "No, not Mary. She was a nurse a long time ago, but it's her granddaughter who's a visiting nurse, gets these supplies. Mary just wanted them not to go to waste."
    Jane nodded, enjoying the contact with Mary through these two old friends.
    "Mary saved all of everybody's things. Her husband's stuff is in that other room, and he's been dead for nearly thirty years."
    Jane tried to keep an appropriately sympathetic expression— after all, Mary's husband had been dead for thirty years— and not show the callous joy she felt when she pictured some of the vintage clothes and office supplies that might be in the adjoining room.
    "Was Mary's husband a doctor?" asked Jane, spotting and seizing a buttery leather doctor's bag on the floor.
    Both women laughed and the one who seemed to be in charge of talking for the pair said, "Oh no, dear. Bateman owned the Shangri-La."
    When Jane shook her head and shrugged, the silent partner whispered, "It was a tavern. Bateman was a saloon keeper."
    Jane hoped the women didn't think her rude, but she turned away almost immediately. She couldn't move quickly enough into the "Bateman" corner of the basement. A saloon keeper! Eureka! Pay dirt! Gold in them thar hills. If she had the flexibility of an animated cartoon character, she would have kicked up her heels and leapt into the next room. She sighed with pure rapture when she saw the similarly organized and shelved remnants of thirty years in the tavern business, all of it clean, boxed, folded, and tagged.
    Jane wiped the corners of her mouth with her sleeve, just in case she had inadvertently drooled.
    Don and Nellie, Jane's parents, had operated the EZ Way Inn in Kankakee for forty years. A ramshackle building across from the now-closed stove factory that had given the town so much employment, so much prosperity, the EZ Way Inn was as charming on the inside as it was tacky on the outside. Don had never been able to talk Gustavus Duncan, the owner, into selling the building.
    For forty years, Don had paid rent on the flimsy shack, shoring up and improving the interior, praying that a heavy wind wouldn't blow it all into kindling overnight. Don always called himself a "saloon keeper," considering that to be the most honest description of what he did. He never gave up though. Each first of the month, along with his rent check, he extended the offer to buy. Four hundred and eighty offers finally worked their magic. Last month Gus Duncan had finally caved.
    Don had called her, his deep voice trembling with excitement.
    "I'm buying the place, honey," he said. "I guess now that the factory's been closed for twenty-five years, old Gus decided nobody's going to give a million to mow down the EZ Way and make it into a parking lot."
    Jane hadn't asked if it was still a worthwhile investment since her father had lately talked about retiring at least once a week. She didn't want to do anything that would temper his excitement about this deal, this sale that would give him so much joy. She would leave that up to her mother, Nellie, who had been throwing cold water on Don's plans for thirty years.
    "Now I'll be a tavern owner instead of a saloon keeper."
    "Pay raise?" Jane asked.
    "Pay cut, but I get a bigger office," Don said, describing the building improvements he was planning.
    The improvements were scaled down considerably when Don realized that no credible carpenter would guarantee that the building wouldn't collapse