ebook2mail.com

---

Paranoia (051 of 170) Posted: 15 Aug 2011 09:30 PM PDT 051 —of — 170 Paranoia by Joseph Finder A Message from our Sponsor: Macmillan | Become a Sponsor COPYRIGHT Paranoia by Joseph Finder. Copyright 2004 by Joseph Finder. All Rights Reserved. Sharing not permitted. 26 Saturday afternoon, dressed in tennis whites (which I'd bought that morning—normally I play tennis in ragged cutoffs and a T-shirt) and wearing a ridiculously expensive Italian diver's watch I'd recently splurged on, I arrived at a very hoity-toity, very exclusive place called the Tennis and Racquet Club. Alana Jennings was a member, and according to the dossier she played here most Saturdays. I confirmed her court time by calling the day before, saying I was supposed to play her tomorrow and forgot the time, couldn't reach her, when was that again? Easy. She had a four-thirty doubles game. Half an hour before her scheduled game I had a meeting with the club's membership director to get a quick tour of the place. That took a little doing, because it was a private club; you couldn't just walk in off the street. I had Arnold Meacham ask Wyatt to arrange to have some rich guy, a club member—a friend of a friend of a friend, a couple of degrees removed from Wyatt—contact the club about sponsoring me. The guy was on the membership committee, and his name obviously pulled some weight at the club, because the membership director, Josh, seemed thrilled to take me around. He even gave me a guest pass for the day so I could check out the courts (clay, indoor and out), maybe pick up a game. The place was a sprawling Shingle Style mansion that looked like one of those Newport "cottages." It sat in the middle of an emerald-green sea of perfectly manicured lawn. I finally shook Josh at the café by pretending to wave at someone I knew. He offered to arrange a game for me, but I told him I was cool, I knew people here, I'd be fine. A couple of minutes later I saw her. You couldn't miss this babe. She was wearing a Fred Perry shirt and she had (for some reason the surveillance photos didn't really show this) bodacious ta-tas. Her blue eyes were dazzling. She came into the cafe with another woman around her age, and both of them ordered Pellegrinos. I found a table close to hers, but not too close, and behind her, out of her line of sight. The point was to observe, watch, listen, and most of all not be seen. If she noticed me, I'd have a major problem next time I tried to loiter nearby. It's not like I'm Brad Pitt, but I'm not exactly butt-ugly either; women do tend to notice me. I'd have to be careful. I couldn't tell if the woman Alana Jennings was with was a neighbor or a college friend or what, but they clearly weren't talking business. It was a fair guess that they didn't work together on the AURORA team. This was unfortunate—I wasn't going to overhear anything juicy. But then her cell phone rang. "This is Alana," she said. She had a velvety-smooth, private-school voice, cultured without being too affected. "You did?" she said. "Well, it sounds like you've solved it." My ears pricked up. "Keith, you've just slashed the time to fab in half, that's incredible." She was definitely talking business. I moved a little closer toward her so I could hear more clearly. There was a lot of laughter and the clinking of dishes and the thop thop of tennis balls, which was making it hard to hear much of what she was saying. Someone squeezed by my table, a big guy with a huge gut that jostled my Coke glass. He was laughing loudly, obliterating Alana's conversation. Move, asshole. He waddled by, and I heard another snatch of her conversation. She was now talking in a hushed voice, and only random bits floated my way. I heard her say: "... Well, that's the sixty-four-billion-dollar question, isn't it? I wish I knew." Then, a little louder: "Thanks for letting me know—great stuff." A little beep tone, and she ended the call. "Work," she said apologetically to the other woman. "Sorry. I wish I could keep this thing off, but these days I'm supposed to be on call 'round the clock. There's Drew!" A tall, studly guy came up to her—early thirties, bronzed, the broad and flat body of a rower—and gave her a kiss on the cheek. I noticed he didn't kiss the other woman. "Hey, babe," he said. Great, I thought. So Wyatt's goons didn't pick up on the fact that she was seeing someone after all. "Hey, Drew," she said. "Where's George?" "He didn't call you?" Drew said. "That space shot. He forgot he's got his daughter for the weekend." "So we don't have a fourth?" the other woman said. "We can pick someone up," said Drew. "I can't believe he didn't call you. What a wuss." A lightbulb went on over my head. Jettisoning suddenly my carefully worked-out plan of anonymous observation, I made a bold split-second decision. I stood up and said, "Excuse me." They looked over at me. "You guys need a fourth?" I said. --- A Message from our Sponsor: Macmillan | Become a Sponsor Message from DailyLit Question of the Week: What does your perfect day look like? Click here to share. Want more? Get the next installment right now. Ideas or questions? Discuss in our forums Need a break? Suspend delivery of this book. Want to adjust your reading schedule or make other changes? Manage all your settings.

Robin Hood (51 of 79) Posted: 15 Aug 2011 09:30 PM PDT 51 —of — 79 Robin Hood by J. Walker Mcspadden A Message from DailyLit Buy this book--or others--from Amazon and help support DailyLit SHARING We encourage sharing--forward to a friend! Chapter XV: How Robin Hood Was Tanned of the Tanner In Nottingham there lived a jolly tanner, With a hey down, down, a down down! His name was Arthur-a-Bland, There was ne'er a squire in Nottinghamshire Dare bid bold Arthur stand. And as he went forth, in a summer's morning, With a hey down, down, a down down! To the forest of merrie Sherwood, To view the red deer, that range here and there, There met he with bold Robin Hood. The Sheriff's daughter bided for several days in the faint hope that she might hear tidings of the prattling tinker. But never a word heard she, and she was forced to the conclusion that her messenger had not so much as laid eyes upon the outlaw. Little recked she that he was, even then, grinding sword-points and sharpening arrows out in the good greenwood, while whistling blithely or chatting merrily with the good Friar Tuck. Then she bethought herself of another good man, one Arthur-a-Bland, a tanner who dwelt in Nottingham town and was far-famed in the tourneys round about. He had done some pretty tricks at archery, but was strongest at wrestling and the quarter-staff. For three years he had cast all comers to the earth in wrestling until the famous Eric o' Lincoln broke a rib for him in a mighty tussle. Howsoever, at quarter-staff he had never yet met his match; so that there was never a squire in Nottinghamshire dare bid bold Arthur stand. With a long pike-staff on his shoulder, So well he could clear his way That by two and three he made men flee And none of them could stay. Thus at least runs the old song which tells of his might. "This is just the man for me!" thought the Sheriff's daughter to herself; and she forthwith summoned him to the Mansion House and commissioned him to seek out Robin Hood. The warrant was quite to Arthur's liking, for he was happiest when out in the forest taking a sly peep at the King's deer; and now he reckoned that he could look at them boldly, instead of by the rays of the moon. He could say to any King's Forester who made bold to stop him: "I am here on the King's business!" "Gramercy! No more oak-bark and ditch-water and the smell of half-tanned hides to-day!" quoth he, gaily. "I shall e'en see what the free air of heaven tastes like, when it sweeps through the open wood." So the tanner departed joyfully upon his errand, but much more interested in the dun deer of the forest than in any two-legged rovers therein. This interest had, in fact, caused the Foresters to keep a shrewd eye upon him in the past, for his tannery was apt to have plenty of meat in it that was more like venison than the law allowed. As for the outlaws, Arthur bore them no ill-will; indeed he had felt a secret envy in his heart at their free life; but he was not afraid to meet any two men who might come against him. Nathless, the Sheriff's daughter did not choose a very good messenger, as you shall presently see. Away sped the tanner, a piece of bread and some wine in his wallet, a good longbow and arrows slung across his shoulder, his stout quarter-staff in his hand, and on his head a cap of trebled raw-hide so tough that it would turn the edge of a broadsword. He lost no time in getting out of the hot sun and into the welcome shade of the forest, where he stalked cautiously about seeking some sign of the dun deer. Now it so chanced that upon that very morning Robin Hood had sent Little John to a neighboring village to buy some cloth of Lincoln green for new suits for all the band. Some of the money recently won of the King was being spent in this fashion, 'gainst the approach of winter. Will Scarlet had been sent on a similar errand to Barnesdale some time before, if you remember, only to be chased up the hill without his purchase. So to-day Little John was chosen, and for sweet company's sake Robin went with him a part of the way until they came to the "Seven Does," the inn where Robin had recently played his prank upon Middle the tinker. Here they drank a glass of ale to refresh themselves withal, and for good luck; and Robin tarried a bit while Little John went on his errand. Presently Robin entered the edge of the wood, when whom should he see but Arthur-a-Bland, busily creeping after a graceful deer that browsed alone down the glade. "Now by Saint George and the Dragon!" quoth Robin to himself. "I much fear that yon same fellow is a rascally poacher come after our own and the King's meat!" For you must know, by a curious process of reasoning, Robin and his men had hunted in the royal preserves so long that they had come to consider themselves joint owners to every animal which roamed therein. "Nay!" he added, "this must be looked into! That cow-skin cap in sooth must hide a scurvy varlet!" And forthwith he crept behind a tree, and thence to another, stalking our friend Arthur as busily as Arthur was stalking the deer. A Message from DailyLit Buy this book--or others--from Amazon and help support DailyLit Message from DailyLit Question of the Week: What does your perfect day look like? Click here to share. Want more? Get the next installment right now. Ideas or questions? Discuss in our forums Need a break? Suspend delivery of this book. Want to adjust your reading schedule or make other changes? Manage all your settings.

You are subscribed to email updates from ebook2mail.com To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610