K. J. McCall Livres

In June, 1953, after my freshman year at Stapleton College, a twenty-minute drive was all it took to go from there to Roanoke, Virginia and a summer job with Piedmont Investigations. Looking back, it’s hard to believe what all happened in those twelve short weeks away. And I didn’t have to wait long for it to start. I mean, in the first hour of walking in the door I was smack in the middle of a blackmail investigation. High-octane stuff, and more to follow. We sniffed out the guilty in a bank robbery and later took an undercover job that started out harmless (just watching out a window, they said) before it plowed straight into espionage.Confidentially, the summer of ’53 was more than I bargained for in the dark-alley department. By the end of it, though, I’d developed a liking for boarding-house meals and landladies, grown full of my own opinions, rethought the law as a career. And you’ll think this is a form of folly, but I could see where my life was going. Maybe not the whole puzzle but a great, big piece.

Aunt Clara always had the saddest face. She never married, lived alone, rarely left the house except to teach a bunch of kids. Nobody understood her including me, Grace Dawson, and I was her only niece. That's how it was until a curious day in the spring of 1951 when Aunt Clara lay dying in the hospital with secrets still to tell and chose me to hear them. What she said was downright shocking and hard to believe, and I just couldn't rest until I figured it all out. Then, I wanted to fix things, make everything right, but that meant getting the police chief involved, which was a different thing altogether, and only the beginning. I think most people will sympathize with her. Some might even give her a pass. I'd like to say I fully accept what she did. But I don't, not completely.