Free How Loveta Got Her Baby by Nicholas Ruddock Page B

you got one of them drip rags? Throw it down.”
    â€œThen in we go with the old lady, we ask for a glass of water.”
    â€œThirsty? Us?”
    â€œNo no, up we go to the second floor, by the window where Clyde’s at. We throw the water from the cup, up against the ceiling. Mrs. Ferris, Mrs. Ferris, look at this, we cry out. It’s leaking wet.”
    â€œFour thousand dollars? Five thousand? she says, is there no end?”
    â€œCheap for the price, Ma’am, look, already the rain from last night is come creeping through the roof. Look at the floor now, there’s a wet spot.”
    â€œShe tries to look up but she gets dizzy.”
    â€œThat’s right. Those old necks, they can’t look up.”
    â€œArthritis, it pinches off the blood.”
    â€œThat’s sixteen thousand dollars now, she says, I don’t know, I don’t know.”
    â€œA lot of them old people, seniors, that’s all they got. A few thousand.”
    â€œNow you sound like Clyde.”
    â€œHow old’s the roof, Mrs. Ferris? How many years you had that roof? She says, I thinks it’s just three years old, the roof.”
    â€œThree years! Oh no! Clyde out there, the boy on the ladder? He says twenty years from the look of it, the roof. It’s covered with green moss and there’s holes in it.”
    â€œClyde won’t hear, he won’t find out?”
    â€œNot Clyde. His head’s in the clouds.”
    â€œHey wait a minute. We set Clyde up with the ladder, the hat and the outfit.”
    â€œWell?”
    â€œClyde can’t do the roof.”
    â€œClyde won’t do the roof. Clyde paints. We do the roof.”
    â€œWe never done a roof.”
    â€œClyde’s down there now at the bottom, he does the mailbox with the tiny brush. He’d like that. The exact same time, we goes up the ladder, just the two of us, we bang on the roof with hammers for a bit, then down we come.”
    â€œThat’s it?”
    â€œThat’s it.”
    â€œMrs. Ferris, we says, there’s your roof now. No leaks, guaranteed.” “The way you said that, that’s not even a lie. There’s your roof, you said. That’s all.”
    â€œThat’s the truth all right.”
    â€œEighty percent for us? Of the money?”
    â€œThat’s right. At least.”
    â€œThen we go back in. Hey, smell that bad odour, Mrs. Ferris, that oil smell?”
    â€œOh my no, she says, not the furnace.”
    â€œMight just be a faulty burner, we seen that lots. The fuel oil puddles up.”
    â€œOh my, she says.”
    â€œTrouble with the fuel oil when it puddles, Ma’am, it leads to fumes. Toxic fumes. Die in your sleep fumes. Maybe that’s what happened to Mr. Ferris, when he woke up all dead? There there, my dear, the snuffles.”
    â€œLucky thing, we know oil furnaces.”
    â€œLet’s go down, we says to her, Mrs. Ferrris, we’ll have a look. Oh my. Look at the puddling there. Smell them fumes.”
    â€œThat you, Clyde? Stay out till you got the wall done and finished, we’re fine down here.”
    â€œPowerful fumes, Mrs. Ferris, you could have a fire.”
    â€œYou could die in your sleep, Mrs. Ferris, I promise you that, you got no sense of smell left over. Your nose is gone, the nerve endings in your nose.”
    â€œOne spark, the whole downtown goes up, like 1892 all over again for the second time. Whoosh.”
    â€œWe can fix that burner easy, got a spare in the truck. Thousand dollars is all.”
    â€œOh my oh my, I do not know, she says.”
    â€œBy the by, that’s a real nice old chest of drawers you got here, Mrs Ferris. Shame you tuck it away down here, in the basement. Too damp, it should be up in the dry air.”
    â€œWe could take that old chest up, get it checked out for value.”
    â€œToo heavy for the two of us. She’s no help, she’s useless for