The New Magic - The Revelation of Jonah McAllister - Landon Wark (bill gates best books TXT) 📗

years back, had since given up on the property, relegating it to the area of his portfolio (getting larger every year) which would never turn a profit. He had regarded the inquiry about it with some doubt, believing that he would show up, clean out the inside of the building, cover any holes made by rats and mice and then wait for a few hours before giving up and going home to his wife, wait a few more hours and then give up on her too. He took a nervous swig of his can of orange juice (which at this time of week would normally be substituted with a beer) as the minute hand of his cheap watch reached the top of the hour.

He nearly spit the juice on the ground as the car drove up the dirt path that served as the road.

It was old, square and beat up, rocking on bad suspension. The paint was fading and spiderwebbed with rust, the antenna was bent and for a moment Henderson considered going home anyway.

“What have we got here?” he muttered under his breath. “More looky-loos, out bargain hunting?”

The car slowed to a stop behind the over-priced, fuel guzzling truck that he had bought to look more like a rural Southerner and out swung what had to be the fattest woman he had ever laid eyes on. The idea of going home redoubled in his mind; no fat women were ever in the market. If she hadn’t parked behind his truck he might have gotten in and driven off immediately.

From out of the passenger’s side hopped a young man dressed in jeans and T-shirt. The idea that they were a couple flashed once in Henderson’s head and then was gone. Brother and sister maybe, cousins maybe, business partners… Not by the way they dressed.

Mentally Henderson scratched his head.

“Hey there, folks.” Despite the fact he had not been born in this state Henderson found use of the local accent profitable. The ‘down home’ (whatever that meant, he could no more understand being ‘down home’ than he could being ‘out back’) air relaxed people to the point where they were willing to part with a few more dollars. “What kin I do ya for?”

“We’d like to see the property,” the woman replied, shouldering her purse protectively. Her accent, while not as thick as his own phony one was local and he wondered for a moment if she saw through him. None of the others had.

The man did not even make eye contact. He busied himself with surveying the vista of the hill from beside the car, seemingly content to let her do the talking.

Henpecked. A ‘cuck’ those guys online would call him.

“Well, I can cert-ly do that. Cum’on up to the house. We’ll start there.”

He walked with an adopted mosey and she followed heavily after him. The man looked at the cover of the trees, absently gauging the thickness of the foliage, the spacing of the trees, even the whistling of the wind through them. From time to time he would lean this way and that, trying to catch a view of one of the houses on neighboring hills, miles off in the distance.

“So this here house was started, oh, ‘bout ten years ‘go. Son of some oil magnate was gonna raise some deer or something up here. Still get some wild ones these days, if you’re int’rested in huntin’.”

“We’re not,” the woman said. The man was testing the firmness of the ground.

“Well, they stopped building the house ‘bout six months after startin’ it. Turns out his daddy was takin’ the money his comp’ny earned and sinking it into another comp’ny he owned to get the stock price to go up, or some such thing. Don’t know how it worked myself. Anyways his daddy’s in jail now, money dried up and he just skipped out on the mortgage. Bank auctioned it off, couldn’t find any buyers, still can’t, not with things being the way they are.”

The woman absorbed this without a word. She was eyeing the house intently as they approached, taking mental note of the plastic hanging off of the walls and roof. Henderson edged in front of her, ashamed of the state the place was in.

“House comes as is. You can choose your own color I guess. Kind of nice.”

“What about privacy? If any of the neighbors are loud does it carry?”

“Privacy? Well, I guess neighbors are a relative thing. You got neighbors in the same sense that Canada is our neighbor. Nice folk to have by for supper, but far ‘nough ‘way that you don’t feel bad for not invitin' 'em. I suppose if the wind were just right, and they had the stereo cranked all the way up. Trees absorb most of the sound, and the light too.”

“How many rooms.”

“Six bedrooms, two bathrooms and a half bath. There’s also a little cabin out back if you don’t want guests stayin’ in the main house. Couple hundred feet if you wanna go see it.”

“And besides the siding and shingling everything works?”

Henderson kicked at the gravel a little. “Plumbing’s all in. There’s a septic tank down the hill a little ways. You’ll have to get someone to pump it every once in a while. ‘lectricity’s ready to go, just need to tell the power comp’ny to turn on the juice. Phone, in'ernet and cable connects need to be finished up.”

The woman stopped walking. Her enormous bulk seemed to be stuck in a pensive thick spot in the air. She mused at the house while the man seemed to be listening for sounds on the wind.

“Any you said you want how much?”

“Starting price was a million five when she was at auction. I’ve been authorized to go as low as eight hundred.” It was a lie; seven hundred thousand was the asking price, but she