Fay Risner's Blog, page 22
March 23, 2014
Latest Book Release-Christmas With Hover Hill
Elizabeth Winston grew up not caring about Christmas. This Christmas is going to be much worse than the holidays she and her brother, Scott, spent with her divorced parents. Her former boyfriend, Steven Mitchell, showed up to pester her about renewing their relationship now that his marriage has ended. Elizabeth always looks forward to sharing Christmas with her brother, but he says he has a business trip during Christmas. His present for her is an expensive and obnoxious robot man by the mane of Hover Hill. Just her luck to be stuck with a mechanical man to share the holidays with. Elizabeth is fit to be tied when she figures out the robot was planted by Steven to brainwash her into taking him back. She slipped out of town with the robot, leaving her old life behind and walked into a new set problems. She wanted to hide but that isn’t easy in a small town like Wickenburg, Iowa. Gossip about her flew faster than the rumors that came out of the Silver Dollar Tavern. Susie, at the Maidrite Diner, bragged she got a look at the handsome man that Elizabeth is shacking up with. The minister’s wife complained a local farmer, Bud Carter, hasn’t been to church in a month of Sundays. Holly, from the Antique Store, said the reason why is Bud’s spending more time at the newcomer’s house that he is his place. The grocery store checker said Elizabeth acts like she’s hiding out from someone. If Steven comes looking, with all the attention Elizabeth is getting, all he has to do is ask and get directions from anyone in town to the old Carter house.
The paperback book can be found in Amazon, Smashwords or B&N. The ebooks can be found in Nook and Kindle.
This is my first post on this site. In January, our transformer blew one cold night and a surge damaged my computer. So I was without for a few weeks while my computer was in the shop and again when I had to buy a new computer. Now that I am ready to blog I found my blog at Blogger is gone. You can still see my posts but I can’t use the blog now. So here I am.


February 11, 2014
The Courting Buggy-Number 6 in the Nurse Hal Among The Amish series book reviews


January 16, 2014
The Courting Buggy-Book 6-Chapter 1

January 7, 2014
It's Just A Picture



January 1, 2014
The Courting Buggy - Book 6 in Nurse Hal series ready soon

December 4, 2013
National November Writing Contest Is Over


November 19, 2013
Holiday book-Leona's Christmas Bucket List


November 12, 2013
A Veteran's Book About The Vietnam War

My posts will be far and in between this month while I work on a book in the National Novel Writing Month Contest or known as NaNoWriMo. This is my fourth year of entering the contest and I am a little over the half way mark for my 50,000 words finish line, but I spend my time writing for the contest and have only that on my mind. My focus right now is to come up with a full book which I can later edit and publish at Create Space Self Publishing.
That doesn't stop me from thinking about all the veterans that served our country. We can't imagine what they went through in battle with their lives in danger or those that lost their lives and what their families have gone through since as they sorrow from the loss of a loved one.
Books from veterans are on the market. We need read them and educate ourselves to what it was like for those brave military Americans. One such book has been written by Mickey M. Bright about his three tours of duty in Vietnam. He battled not only the enemy but the substance abuse vises of the day along with many of his comrades in arms. His is a honest look at life under fire. You can buy his paperback book on Amazon or through Smashwords.com. The ebook version is in Nook Store, Kindle Store and on Smashwords.com.
Whether I make it over the finish line with this book or not, it will be published sometime next year. This is another in the Amish series titled Nurse Hal Among the Amish. The book is Noah's Courting Buggy.


October 27, 2013
Rememering Childhood Westerns & Combined Stringbean Hooper Westerns book
First we listened to the radio programs my parents liked. John and I turned our chairs around at the table and stared up at the small ledge the radio perched on. A ledge too high for us to reach without standing on a chair. The radio was one in a list of do not touch items. During the day while Mom worked she listened to soap operas. At night after Dad and Mom came in from milking, we listened to westerns such as The Lone Ranger and Cisco Kid. Fiber McGee and Amos and Andy were all right, but more for laughs then cowboy and Indian stuff. As soon as those programs were over Dad shut the radio off.
There were times Mom had the quilting frame spread across the living room floor, and we all had to quilt. Other times, we put together a puzzle on a card table. If we'd acquired any books new to us we read only western paperbacks. Usually written by Zane Gray and Louis L'Amour. John and I had comic books about super heroes, too. In the parking lot next to the A&P Grocery Store in Nevada, Missouri was a one room shack filled with used books and comic books. The man traded two for one or you buy the books. We traded our comics back in and then bought a few.
So everyone picked up a book and settled in on those cold winter evenings. In the late fifties, my Uncle Sam gave us a black and white television. Wouldn't you know Dad found all the western programs that were so popular like Rawhide and Wagon Train. Not that we minded.

She grinned as she said, “Now look on the front and see who wrote it.”
One western wasn't enough. I sent Stringbean and his wife, Theo, on an adventure across the country to California in Small Feet's Many Moon Journey.
Now I've put the two books together and am selling them for the price of one book in Amazon, kindle store and nook store. So if you are the fan of westerns here is your chance to get a bargain. Below is an excerpt from The Dark Wind Howls Over Mary.
Sheriff Stringbean Hooper figured there couldn’t be any other place much prettier in the middle of summer than this portion of the state of Montana. That’s what he would say if anyone bothered to ask his opinion which he didn’t expect to happen. No one else much cared what he thought.
The sky, a vast, robin egg blue, was dotted with a few, wispy, cotton mounds, lazily drifting from one horizon to the other. Circling high in a graceful arc over the sheriff’s head, an eagle screeched, breaking the silence. The waist high, prairie grass, as bright a green as it was going to get all summer, stretched out as far as the eye could see, waving gracefully back and forth in the breeze. Velvety, purple smudged foothills rose in the distance. The elusive, jagged, snow capped Rocky Mountain range towered behind them.
The countryside looked peaceful, but looks could be and were often deceiving. If he ever let his guard down in this wild country, he might wind up dead. The events of this morning made Stringbean more sure of that than he had ever been before. He felt trouble brewing way down deep in his gut.
Stringbean let his black and white, appaloosa horse, Freckles, pick his careful, skillful way through the grass. The horse tromped through a field of pink, bitterroot blossoms cupped skyward. The sheriff thought those flowers was extremely pretty. Ever so far along the trail, tall spikes, bursting all the way to the top with yellow blooms, shot up from the middle of large, wide, fuzzy, dull green leaves. He couldn’t put a name to that plant, but he liked the looks of it just the same. A village of prairie dogs perked up and scolded with sharp chatter, warning him not to ride any closer. He did just for orneriness to watch the dogs dived into their dens.
Happy to be alive, meadow larks trilled from the leafy cover of the aspen trees. Mourning doves cooed softly to their partners and were answered in the shimmering, hazy distance. A flock of chortling prairie chickens ignored the rider passing by, preoccupied with strutting their mating dances.
By mid morning, Stringbean breathed deep, inhaling the crisp, clean air filtering down from the mountain tops off the thawing snow. White patches still glistened on the highest peaks just above the purple haze that hung over the mountain’s cover of yellow pine. The ever present wind funneled through the valley, battering Stringbean’s black hat brim as he rode directly into it. He tipped his brim down to keep the wind from whipping his hat off. That helped keep the bright sun out of his keen eyes too so he could see where he was headed. Still in all, he figured he didn’t see a reason to complain. The snow cooled gusts, moaning over the prairie, made for a brief relief from the summer sun that beat down on him with an increased intensity.
Nearly forty years old, Stringbean earned his nickname back home in Missouri because of his tall, rawboned features. Brown hair and dark brown eyes ran in the Hooper family, and according to what most women told him he was easy on the eyes. He took their word for it. Listening to the rhythmic clip clop of his horse’s hooves on the hard packed trail relaxed him as he cantered along with one hand resting on his hip. It didn’t matter to him if he wasn’t going but a few miles. The ride relieved a little of the wanderlust in him that he had been born with. Trouble was, he knew down deep in his gut that this would have been a better day to be out for a ride if it hadn’t been for where he was headed. Very few places he dreaded going as Sheriff of Sully Town, but this sure was one of them.
Swiping the sweat beads that popped up on his suntanned forehead with his shirt sleeve, he hoped by the time the afternoon grew unbearably hot he’d be headed back down the trail toward the office. He cleared his throat and spit. It would have been nice to have a cool drink of water now and then to settle the dust, but he wasn’t about to ask for one where he had to stop. He mentally kicked himself for not thinking to fill a canteen for the ride. It was his own fault that he got in such a big hurry and forgot that little detail.
Just never know each morning when a fellow got out of bed how the day was going to turn out. Stringbean’s plan had been to laze around with his feet up on the desk, drinking as much coffee as he could before the pot cooled off. In the summer, it heated up the office way too much to stoke the stove just to keep the coffee warm.
He had figured to take it easy most of the day, watching the comings and goings on Sully Town’s Main Street from the sheriff office’s large, front window. On Mondays, town stayed pretty quiet. He didn’t figure he received enough wages to walk up and down the street, showing himself all day long when no trouble was brewing. Early in the week, ranch folks tended to stay home to work, having just been in town for church on Sunday. Toward the end of the week, women showed up in wagons or buggies to do their trading. On Saturday, farmers crowded Main Street, walking along side dust covered drifters and cowhands, headed straight to the Silver Dollar saloon. That was when he had to be on the alert for trouble way into the night. Once the cowhands got liquored up, no telling what kind of a ruckus he would have to break up. So on Monday morning, he generally figured he would stay put in the office and take it easy. Since his routine hadn’t changed in two years if anyone needed him, they knew where to find him. Sure enough, that was what happened.
After tossing the stack of newly arrived wanted posters he just went through out of his way, he relaxed back in his chair with his feet, propped on his desk, crossed at the ankles. He had just taken a sip out of a full cup of coffee when the town doctor, Doctor Clarence Strummer, burst through the door with such force it slammed against the wall. He looked as wild eyed as a spooked bronc. Startled by the sudden interruption to his quiet time, Stringbean dropped his feet off the desk and sat up fast, slopping coffee all over his clean, gray, cotton shirt. He groaned, but not from the coffee being hot. Since that was his third cup, the thick, black brew had cooled down considerably which was a good thing. Problem was, Stringbean only had two shirts. They happened to be just alike, but the other one was at the laundress, Ginny Holstead, getting washed.
“Tarnation, what’s got yer pants on fire?” Stringbean snapped. Jerking his red handkerchief out of his back pocket, he rubbed the numerous, dark stains spreading across his chest.
The doctor stalked across the room. “Sorry about that, Stringbean. I got a problem. I can’t find my wife anywhere. She’s missing,” he cried, wringing his hands together.
At the distressed sound in his voice, the sheriff stopped rubbing the stains to give Doc a good once over. Usually, he was neatly dressed with his thick, black hair combed back from his high forehead and slicked down to his ear lobes. Not this time. His hair spiked out every which way like he had just crawled out of bed. Without his suit jacket on, he looked a fright in a wrinkled, not so white shirt. Looked as though he had slept in it. No sir, Doc didn’t look his dudie self at all.
“Just settle down yer horses. Tell me what happened,” Stringbean ordered, pointing to a ladder back chair in front of the desk. “Let me get you a cup of coffee. Looks to me like you could use one.”
The tall man plopped down and rubbed his forehead like he had a headache. “Last evening, Mary Alice said she was walking over to the Sullivan ranch to visit her folks before dark. She intended to spend the night. I had to go out on a call at the Bar M to check Slim
Stevens’s broken leg I set last week.”
“I’ll be dern. Slim Stevens broke his leg?” That was the first time Stringbean had heard that news. He handed Doc the coffee.
“Yes, but he’s getting along fine.” Doc’s dark brown eyes narrow as he gave the sheriff an irritated glance for interrupting him. “Anyway when I came back home last night, my wife had already left. This morning, I rode over to the Sullivan ranch in the buggy to pick her up like I told her I would. Her father says she never showed up. So I don’t know where she is.” Doc combed his fingers through his hair, frazzling it even worse in every direction. He took a drink out of the cup and made a face.”
“All right. Take it easy. What’s your problem now?”
“You call this brew coffee. Why, it’s worse than any medicine I give out,” complained Doc as he set the unfinished coffee on the desk. “What you going to do about my wife?”
“Never claimed it was good coffee. Don’t hurt me, and I drink it all the time,” Stringbean said, defensively. “Now about your wife, I’ll start checkin’ with the neighbors out yer way and see if she stopped at one of their places to visit. Chances are that’s just what she did. Which of
the neighbors would she be most likely to visit?”
Doc growled, “The old Indian witch that lives behind me. Never have seen what Mary Alice finds about that old woman to like. She visits Maggie Dawson on a regular basis, too.”
“Kind of agree with you where Matilda Vinci is concerned. I’m not lookin’ forward to visitin’ her. She’s just a little bit too spooky for me, but I’ll go see both them women. You best head back home. If she just decided to visit somewhere besides her folks, she might already be home by now,” Stringbean reasoned to calm Doc down.
“Sure thing, Stringbean. I hope you’re right. Mac’s having a fit, because I don’t know where Mary Alice is. He’s not one to have mad at you, if you know what I mean.” With that Doc left out the door, leaving a trail of dried, clay chunks from his shoes.
Stringbean frowned when he saw the mess. He had already used floor sweep that morning. He considered once a day his quota for cleaning the office. While he swept the mess out the door, he wondered where the doctor tracked in clay. Then it came back to him, Doc said he had been to the Bar M ranch. That red dirt must have come from there.
The neighbor back of Doc Strummer’s place was Matilda Vinci, a middle aged, medicine woman. That’s where Stringbean headed when he left the office. Captured by the Sioux when she was a youngun, Matilda became a member of the tribe. After her brave was killed in the Little Big Horn fracas, Matilda showed up in Sully Town, sprouting amber braids and dressed in a beaded, rawhide gown. Folks distrusted her for the first while. It didn’t take long for Matilda to get herself some store bought clothes so she looked like other white folks. A loner, she settled down on the prairie to homestead forty acres.
One thing led to another, and soon folks learned that gruff, old woman, using her Indian
shaman ways, was better than no doctor at all. That reasoning didn’t make being around Matilda
Vinci any easier as far as Stringbean was concerned. Depending on her mood, some days she acted like a medicine woman. Other days, he would swear she seemed to be instilled with witch’s powers.
Only way to get to her place on horseback was down a cow path near Doc’s house that wound back into the timber that joined Doc and Matilda’s place. If he didn’t count her wolf dog, Matilda lived alone. She liked it that way. Her log cabin was right in the middle of a large clearing. With that sassy dog to warn her when someone rode in, not much chance that anyone would ever be able to sneak up on the old woman. Her mutt heard Stringbean’s horse a quarter a mile away. The dog yapped to tell Matilda that Stringbean was riding in long before he reached the clearing. The sharp barks echoed against the bluffs along Mulberry Creek on the far side the timber and right back at Stringbean, unnerving him even more.
The sheriff moseyed across the clearing, pretending a confidence he didn’t feel. Growing increasingly jittery, he neared the front of the cabin, not knowing if a rifle was pointed at him or not. The door stood wide open. The interior of the cabin was pitch black. No way to see, but he suspected Matilda was probably leaned against a back wall with a rifle aimed at him.
The mangy, gray-black dog, his neck hairs standing on end, pranced back and forth on the lean-to porch, barking roughly. No one would make it through that cabin door if Matilda didn’t call the dog off unless they shot that mean mutt first. Stringbean considered doing just that for the pleasure of putting that yapping hound out of his misery, but a gut feeling warned him, he would be the next one shot if he tried a fool trick like that.
As he studied the watch dog, he came to the conclusion that Matilda and that wolf dog made a good pair. He had the same kind of glittering, black eyes and snaggle tooth sneer as her, but at least, a fellow knew where you stood with the hound. Beat never knowing what the lady of the house’s mood would be from one moment to the next. Her best mood was cranky, and her worse was down right dangerous.
“Hello, the house,” the sheriff called.
Dark gray smoke chugged fast and thick out the cabin’s rock chimney. He got a whiff of something bitter stinky on the breeze. It made him wrinkled up his nose. The medicine woman was brewing up potions for her putrid smelling poultices. Some folks swore by what she handed out for cures. They thought she had better healing skills than an educated doctor. Just the smell was enough to make Stringbean glad he stayed healthy around her. For sure, he wasn’t curious what Matilda's medicine tasted like. He didn’t even want to find out what ailment a potion that rotten smelling would be used for.
Looked like he guessed right. The wrinkled, leather skinned woman edged slowly out onto the porch, carrying an infantry carbine aimed right at Stringbean’s gut. It passed through his mind that she might have picked that old carbine up at the Little Big Horn when she went to find her brave’s body. Not that he considered asking her. He figured getting nosy about her past with the Indians held a certain, death wish.
With restless eyes, Matilda checked around the clearing to see if the sheriff came alone. She lowered the weapon slightly. “Hush, dog!” She yelled. Pointing to the end of the porch, she ordered, “Get away.”
With his scruffy tail between his legs, the dog cowered. He slinked to the end of the porch and leaped down into the grass. He sniffed the ground and turned in a circle three times. When he had found the best place, he slowly laid down and curled up in a ball with his chin on his front legs. One eye shut, but the other stayed open, aimed right at the sheriff.
Stringbean vowed silently that just the harsh sound of that old healer’s threatening
command would have been enough to make him turn tail. She wouldn’t have to shoot at him. The scowl on her face was added incentive. Sweat beads from the edge of her braided, amber streaked, gray hair dripped down Matilda’s cheeks. The top of her faded, calico dress darkened with a spreading, sweaty wetness across her chest. Evidence that she had been standing over the cookstove for some time, stirring a kettle of boiling who knows what. The foul, steamy smell floating out the door grew stronger by the minute. His stomach turned over. Being up right close made Stringbean positive, he didn’t want to ever use the old woman’s medicinal services. Matilda reached into a pocket on her skirt. Stringbean tensed. He didn’t know what would be in her hand when it came back out. Turned out to be a large, red handkerchief. She made a swipe across her glistening face. If he had been in the presence of anyone else, he might have felt a little sheepish -- no a lot foolish -- at acting so skittish all the while that old woman gave him the evil eye.
The sheriff tried to take a deep breath, slow and easy like, so the cross, old healer wouldn’t notice how uneasy he felt. He wanted to put up a good bluff. “Howdy, Miss Matildie. You know me, I reckon?”
“Sure, I know you, Sheriff Stringbean Hooper,” snorted Matilda, propping herself against
her porch wall. She glared down her beak shaped nose at him like a hawk sizing up her prey.
Leaning forward in the saddle, he rested his right arm across the pommel. Putting forth as good a front as he could muster, he looked her right in the eye. He was determined not to act as though this cranky, old woman scared the bejeezus out of him even though she did.
“You expectin’ someone in particular?” Stringbean asked, nodding toward her rifle. Seemed to him she was being a might over cautious for a woman who should be used to having folks stop all the time for her potions.
Matilda lowered the rifle even more. “Reckon not. What you want here? Look plenty healthy to me.” She leaned her head to one side and studied Stringbean like she could see right through him.
“I wondered if you had seen anything of your neighbor, Mary Alice Strummer, in the past couple days?” He asked, trying keep his voice easy going.
Matilda paused to think back. “Not since a couple weeks ago. I came across her in the timber while I was gathering woody nightshade leaves to make an extract. Mary Alice was picking raspberries.” Her eyes narrowed. “Why you ask?”
Stringbean scratched an itchy bump on the side of his head where a mosquito nailed him in the timber. “Seems Mrs. Strummer has been missin’ since last night. The good doctor is worried about his wife so I’m out asking around.”
“The good doctor is worried, is he?” She squawked sarcastically in her harsh voice and snorted.
She sounded full of sour grapes to the sheriff. The way he heard tell when he first came to town, that old woman had a good business as a healer until Doctor Clarence Strummer showed up in Sully Town a few years back. Since then Matilda had been reduced to mostly midwife duties which cut her income considerably. Stringbean didn’t have all day or the patience to listen to her complain about Doc Strummer. Besides something about the way she sized him up had him feeling mighty skittish. She looked like she was ready to put a curse on him for talking favorable about Doc. With the way Matilda looked at him, Stringbean wanted to get down to business and get the heck out of there. “You didn’t see Doc’s wife yesterday?”
“I just told you I haven’t seen her for days,” Matilda bristled. Then she changed her mind and added, “You might ride over east of Doc’s place to the Dawson ranch. Talk to Maggie
Dawson. Mary Alice visits with her on a regular basis I hear.”
“Much oblige, ma’am.” Stringbean touched his hat brim, clicked to Freckles and turned to leave.
“Oh, Sheriff Hooper,” Matilda called, walking to the edge of her porch.
Stringbean pulled up on the reins. He twisted at the waist to look back at her rather than turn his horse around in case Matilda had that carbine pointed at him again. At least if he had to leave in a hurry, he figured he ought to be headed in the right direction.
“If I were you I’d find Mary Alice real soon,” she said, giving an uneasy glimpse toward the timber between her cabin and Doc’s house. “Yesterday I knew something was wrong. I felt the dark wind howl over Mary Alice.”
With that said, she whirled and disappeared through the open door which signaled the hound the sheriff’s visit was for sure over. He rose up and came back to his post on the edge of the porch. The mangy, gray hair on the back of his neck stood up. He started a growl that rumbled deep in his throat, slipped through his bared, snaggled teeth and out his snarling lips.
As far as the sheriff was concerned, the mutt shouldn’t have bothered to get that worked up. Stringbean couldn’t have been more ready to leave on his own. That dog didn’t need to tell him twice.
Still watching the cabin, the creeps soaked through Stringbean when the old woman faded into the darkness beyond her door just like she disappeared in thin air. Stringbean consider himself a fair to middling smart man. He knew it was the darkness of the room that made her hard to see. At least, he wanted to think that was it. He supposed Matilda counted on the fact that most folks weren’t smart enough to figure that out. She liked keeping everyone off guard about her spooky powers, whatever they be.

October 22, 2013
Apples & More Apples & Excerpt from Poor Defenseless Addie-Mystery series book 7
We waited for what seemed forever to see fruit on our trees. The old fashion apple trees had grown tall before they bore apples. The dwarf trees didn't take as long. So after all these years and two spring freezes that took away the fruit, this year we have a bumper crop of apple, pears, plums and just a few peaches. Give it time. We have two young trees growing fast. We didn't miss a bumper crop of peaches off the old tree in the garden. Harold's mother gave us all we could pick at her house.
I've canned since I was old enough to help my mother. It was just part of what I was brought up to do. We plant a garden that has a variety of vegetables so I can what we can't eat fresh and the extra fruit, too. What's different about this year? An over load of fruit on each tree. Some limbs leaned to the ground and others broke off. Harold climbed a ladder with his fruit picker with a determination to get every pear or apple. On the extension ladder he could reacher higher, but the wind blew the limb. The ladder slid. Harold landed on the ground. Thankfully, he wasn't hurt, and after that he used the step ladder.
I managed to keep up with Harold's efforts and can all the pears. Then the first tree of apples were ready. Harold picks the downfalls up. He lined up buckets of apples on the small back porch leaving just enough walkway for us to get into the house. Then he started placing buckets on the front porch.
After days of canning 5 or 6 hours a day, I suggested we take my 93 year old Aunt Liddie in Centerville, Iowa apples. She puts them in the freezer for winter. We needed the break anyway and had a fun visit with her and my cousin Lawrence. She said a bushel would be enough. I slipped her three bushels in the feed sacks.
I mentioned to my aunt the amount of fruit I'd canned and had more to go. I may have sounded like I was complaining. She smiled at me. “I always loved to can. I thought it was fun.” Well, sure. I think I thought it was fun about 50 bushel of fruit ago.
Someone else said canning always gave her a sense of accomplishment when she was done. I agreed with that. I felt like I had accomplished something about the time I had all the apples canned on the back porch. That feeling only lasted until Harold reminded me daily of the bucket count on the front porch which kept increasing.
Still I'm plugging away at this fun endevor which is giving me a sense of accomplishment until I run out of jars or can lids. One thing is for sure, I can look at my filled shelves in the basement and know that we're going to eat well this winter.
I wrote book seven in my Amazing Gracie series “Poor Defenseless Addie” last November in the Nanowrimo contest. I had six months to edit the book and publish it through Create Space. All I had to do was write 50,000 words in that month. I've done it successfully two years in a row, but a holiday in November makes it a little more difficult.

The story is about an elderly woman in Locked Rock, Iowa. Her son comes to visit, and each time Gracie Evans and the other residents come to visit Addie she has bruises on her. They suspect elder abuse from Addie's son and worry about Addie.
Here is an excerpt from that book.
Gracie came to Addie's rescue. “Now seems to me, I remember my father saying anyone can count the seeds in an apple. No one can count the apples in a seed until you plant it and grow the trees.” Addie put on a big smile as she nodded she agreed. Madeline and Melinda grew quiet, pondering the saying while Gracie changed the subject. “How long does your son plan on staying with you?”
Addie shrugged her shoulders. “He didn't say.”
“You know you would save us a lot of trouble coming here to visit you if you would just move into the mansion with us,” Gracie said bluntly.
Addie stretched up to glare at Gracie. “Leave my home! I never want to do that. I was born here, and I figure to die here.”
“Gracie!” Melinda scolded. “What a thing to say to her.”
Madeline patted Addie's arm and tried to rephrase Gracie's suggestion. “What Gracie so crudely meant was you would like living with us. You can have all the tea you want and three good meals a day. You wouldn't have to work anymore.”
“Or, wait on that good for nothing son,” mumbled Gracie.
“I read lips, Gracie. That wasn't a nice thing to say about my kin,” Addie complained.
“She's sorry if she hurt your feelings,” Melinda said and looked sharply at Gracie. “Tell her you're sorry, Gracie.”
“I'm sorry. I know you cain't help what kind of kin you get,” Gracie said loudly.
Addie made a clucking sound with her tongue. “I'm not sure that's much better of an apology,” Addie said, looking at Madeline. “But knowing Gracie Evans, I best take what I can get.”
“I'm afraid we have all learned that about Gracie in so many ways. You do know that we all are worry about you, including Gracie,” Madeline said.
“I thank you for that, but don't worry.” Addie paused then said in a strained voice, “Wonder where Homer went?”
“He's picking apples. We saw him from the kitchen window when we fixed the tea,” Melinda said.
“Perhaps, you better leave before he comes back in. When he's tired after he's been standing on that ladder, he can be really grouchy,” Addie said.
“How does she tell the difference when he isn't grouchy?” Gracie mumbled.
Melinda said, “Careful now. Don't make Addie mad again. Come over here and help me out of this chair.”
“Addie, we'll go now. About the apple cake recipe, we can come back for it again some other time when you're feeling better,” Madeline said.
“Sure. Any time,” Addie said. “Maybe next time you come back, like I said, I'll feel like baking another apple cake to share with you.”
As soon as they were out of the house, Melinda gave a heavy sigh. “I hate to say it, but I am so glad to be out of there before Homer came back.”
“So am I,” agreed Madeline. “What a difference in attitude Addie has now.”
“How so?” Gracie asked.
“Before she always hated to see us go, and today she was asking us to leave,” Madeline said. “What does that tell you?”
“That she's trying to protect us from that man,” Gracie said in frustration.
“We have to help poor defenseless Addie before something happens to her,” Melinda said woefully, looking over her shoulder at Homer on the ladder.
Gracie stopped walking and turned to stare at Homer. “We should just march over there to that man and demand he get out of town right away before we turn him into the law for harming his mother.”
“Oh, I don't know about that, Gracie,” Melinda said.
“That sounds dangerous to me,” Madeline agreed.
“Not so much if we all stick together. We have to act like we aren't afraid of him,” Gracie blustered. “Let's go do it before we lose our nerve.” She marched back across Addie's lawn toward the trees with Melinda and Madeline behind her.
Melinda whispered to Madeline, “This isn't a good idea. I'd lost my nerve the minute Gracie told us what she wanted to do.”
“I did, too,” gulped Madeline.
Gracie stopped abruptly not too far from Homer's ladder. Madeline and Melinda bumped into her, causing her to give them a stern look. The three of them put on their best I mean what I say faces as they looked up at the large man on the ladder. He was so busy he didn't have a clue they were around.
Finally, Gracie said gruffly, “We want to talk to you, Mr. Homer.”
He looked down. His face, outlined by his mop of greasy, black hair, turned fire engine red at the sight of them. “What do you want?”
“Like I said, we want to talk to you. Come down off that ladder,” Gracie commanded, pointing a stiff finger at the ground.
Homer tromped down the ladder faster than any fat man has the right to move and stalked toward them. When he came out of the shade of the apple tree, the west sun struck him in the face. His dark eyes turned an evil fiery red in the sun's reflection as he focused on the women.
Behind Gracie, Melinda muffled a frightened eek. Madeline mumbled a quick prayer. Gracie looked straight ahead with her hands on her hips, but the closer the man came and the more threatening his size appeared, the weaker her resolve grew.
Homer towered over all three of them huddled together like mice cornered by a mountain lion. “I thought I made it clear you aren't wanted around here.”
“You did,” Gracie said.
“Why don't you three old hags head back where you came from and leave us alone,” he stormed.
“I said we had something to say to you,” Gracie allowed. “And we figure on saying it.”
“Mr. Homer is busy now. We're interrupting him, Gracie. Maybe we better wait until another time when he isn't busy,” Melinda whispered in one ear.
Madeline whispered in the other, “This isn't working. Please change the subject quick.”
Gracie didn't take long to decide with Homer glowering down at her. “Spit it out so I can go back to work.”
“We --- we were wondering if we could buy a pail of apples from you,” Gracie managed to get out.
Homer snorted. “You were, were you? That's what this is all about? You got a quarter on you.”
Gracie dug in her skirt pocket and pulled out a quarter. She held it out to him. Homer snatched it and turned to leave. “One more thing.”
Homer twisted and gave Gracie a dangerous glare of exasperation. “What is it now?”
“Gracie, no,” Melinda whimpered.
Madeline elbowed Gracie in the ribs.
“All right,” Gracie whispered out of the side of her mouth. She focused on Homer, paused a minute to think and asked, “Do you have to pick out the pail we take or can we do it?”
“Just get a pail and get out of here. Don't even bother bringing the pail back. I don't want to see you again,” he stormed.
Gracie grabbed a five gallon bucket of apples. As she lugged it to the end of the lawn, she groused, “You two each owe me eight cents. I'm not going to get stuck with the whole cost of this bucket, because you two don't have any backbone.” She set the pail down. “Another thing. You two are going to take turns carrying this bucket home, too. I can't get it all the way there as heavy as it is.”
“Aunt Pearlbee isn't going to be happy with more apples,” Melinda said. “She hasn't cooked up the others Addie gave us.”
“Now is a fine time to tell me that. What did you expect me to say?” Gracie asked. “I could tell the two of you weren't going to stand up to that man with me. Melinda, I'm sure Homer heard that weak screeching noise you made when he came at us.”
“That was a sneeze,” Melinda defended. “I can't help it if I had to sneeze.”
“How about you, Madeline. Last thing that sounded like we could stand up to that man was you breaking into prayer,” Gracie said. “Lot of good that was going to do to protect us again a man without a religious bone in his body if he was going to beat us up.”
“Oh, brother! I was scared. I knew right away we were in trouble if we said what you wanted to about him leaving,” Madeline said. “Are you going to tell me you weren't scared, Gracie?”
“Nope, I cain't do that. To tell the truth, I darn near wet myself when that man got so close I could see his nose hairs.” Gracie conceded softly, “Reckon that plan was a bad idea.”

