Free After Life by Andrew Neiderman Page A

over a year. Know what you're thinking, buddy, Baker said. I
    didn't get it on a teacher's salary.
     
    We had a little money and I invested in an enterprise that's rapidly
    becoming rather successful. A few of us at the school have, thanks to
    the wise Dr. Beezly. Maybe we'll get you into it, too.
     
    Oh? What is it exactly?
     
    Baker leaned toward him.
     
    A corporation that owns and operates cemeteries, he said in a loud
    whisper.
     
    Cemeteries? Jessie instinctively brought her hands to the base of her
    throat.
     
    Yes, but let's not stand here and talk. Tracy and Dr. Beezly are in
    the den. We've already- started our cocktail hour, he said, lifting his
    glass. Know who else is coming? He gestured for Lee and Jessie to
    follow him. He brought his mouth close to Lee's ear.
     
    Henry and Marjorie Young. You'll be able to make some quick brownie
    points tonight, he added in a coy whisper.
     
    Lee didn't reply. He was never able to kiss ass. It was his Overstreet
    pride. Although he was the first college graduate in the family, his
    father and his grandfather had both been very skilled cabinet makers.
    They traced their family lineage back to the Elizabethan age and had
    documented evidence that their ancestors had built beds and chests as
    well as chairs and cabinets for the queen.
     
    His grandfather had made most of the trick cabinets for Houdini. They
    never thought of themselves as simple carpenters. They were skilled
    artisans. If anything, there was a sense of disappointment when Lee
    decided to pursue a career in athletics and attend college. The
    Overstreets weren't arrogant, but they never suffered a sense of
    inferiority. As a result, neither Lee nor his two married sisters were
    the kind of people who could suck up to anyone.
     
    Growing up with it all around him, Lee had an eye for quality
    craftsmanship.
     
    That's a beautiful mahogany balustrade, he said, looking ahead at the
    stairway. The hand-carved railing curved upward.
     
    And we never had to do a thing with it. That's the way it was when we
    first bought the house. To your left, Baker said. Lee turned Jessie
    gently and they entered the den.
     
    It was a large, cherry wood-paneled room with an oval Persian rug in
    front of the long, vermilion leather sofa that faced a matching settee.
    Streams of ruby ran through the rug's design. Like the wall paneling,
    the side tables and the matching long oval coffee table were cherry
    wood. The same was true for the bookcases on the rear wall. In fact,
    the only wood that didn't have some shade of red in it was that used to
    frame some of the oil paintings, all prints of famous nudes like
    Botticelli's Venus and Ingres's nudes.
     
    There were replicas of nude statues as well, including Maillol's Three
    Graces. All expressed a fascination with the human body, depicted for
    the most part in a sensual manner, except for an expressionistic
    painting above the fireplace: Edward Munch's horrendous rendition of a
    woman in some agony, her hands on her ears, her mouth a narrow oval as
    she obviously screamed.
     
    You can see why we call this the Red Room, Baker quipped. Lee will
    explain it to you, he added for Jessie's benefit.
     
    As soon as he spoke, Tracy and Dr. Beezly, who were standing by the
    fireplace with their backs to the door, turned. Lee was immediately
    surprised by how young Dr. Beezly appeared. From all he had heard
    about the man, he had just assumed he was along in his years. But he
    looked like a man barely in his late forties, perhaps in his early
    fifties.
     
    More important, Dr. Beezly was physically unimpressive He didn't stand
    more than five feet five at the most, with features that were so small
    as to make him seem almost gnomelike. His black eyes were beady and his
    mouth was thin and somewhat feminine. He had rather long, thin black
    hair brushed back on the sides and down his neck with strands
    disappearing under his collar. Lee thought the man looked like he was
    drowning in