Louisa and the Country Bachelor : A Louisa May Alcott Mystery (9781101547564) Read Free Page B

while. Then: “I feel quite fatigued from the responsibilities. But it is nicely stated, Louy. Very nicely said.”
    A knock sounded on the front door, which caused us both to sit up straighter, alert, since we were expecting no one until the arrival of the omnibus. The front door creaked open. A man’s voice boomed down the hall to where we sat.
    â€œIs anyone at home?”
    â€œIn here!” I called back, wondering.
    Dr. Peterson Burroughs stuck his long, red nose into the doorway.
    â€œAh,” he said. “The two young ladies are at home. I have come to see that all is well. Two women alone often encounter difficulties, you know, without a man for guidance and protection. Have you overexerted yourselves? Do you need salts?”
    Sylvia’s face was so screwed up with displeasure I almost laughed. She had met Dr. Burroughs once before, in the town square, when he had stopped us with similar statements about the dangers of two young ladies shopping alone, unescorted.
    I had more knowledge of the man, as he had been my accidental companion during the train journey from Boston to the depot south of Walpole where the train tracks ended, since the railroad company had not yet finished the line that would connect Walpole with the more southerly cities. Dr. Burroughs was a tall gentleman of some seventy years, dressed in the stern black suit and white stockings of an earlier generation. A shock of white hair sprang out from under his hat, and during that journey his hair had trembled with constant disapproval. “Don’t see why we need trains t’all, t’all; coach do just fine,” he had said over and over.
    During that trip, I had restrained from asking why he had journeyed by train, if such were his feelings, and had surmised that his Boston daughter-in-law (the topic of most of his conversation, for according to him she was lazy, ambitious, slatternly, and overly refined, all at once) had wished him a hasty removal to his Walpole daughter-in-law.
    He had one wonderful saving grace—many years of experience as a medical examiner. He had assisted in piecing together the dismembered remains of Dr. George Parkman, who had been murdered by his debtor, Professor John Webster of Harvard Medical College, some nine years before. “I myself found the right thigh,” Dr. Burroughs had told me. “Skinny, you know. The professors at Harvard don’t eat enough to put meat on their bones. These colleges will turn out paupers.”
    Dr. Burroughs had talked at great length about the process of reconstructing a corpse as part of the process of finding the murderer, and I had found this even more interesting than the scenery.
    We had met in the Walpole town square several times since our concurrent arrivals in that pleasant village, and I had learned to feel some affection for the man, since it seemed no one else cared for his company. He wandered the town square for most hours of the day seeking conversation and rarely finding it.
    â€œCome in, Dr. Burroughs,” I said. “Have a chair and make yourself at home. Would you like a glass of water? I can’t offer tea; we haven’t purchased any yet.”
    I hadn’t told Dr. Burroughs that I was moving from Uncle Benjamin Willis’s house to his cottage, to live there with my own family. Yet I should have known Dr. Burroughs would know. Such men—old, unwanted, but still filled with vigor and curiosity—are better at garnering news than the best newspaper reporters.
    â€œAh.” He took a package from behind his back. “A housewarming.”
    I opened the brown paper–wrapped parcel. It contained a box of Ceylon tea, a tin of biscuits, and a cone of sugar.
    â€œWell,” said Sylvia, smiling. “Now we can offer tea.”
    â€œOffer accepted. May I?” He stepped over the threshold into the parlor, making a pantomime of stepping highly as if over a fence, and wobbled a bit, having