BINGO BAILEY - ARTHUR DAVIS Martha Bailey tightened her grip on her walker, cursed her failing seventy-six-
three bingo cards across the table. about you, Martha?”
year-old bones, and pressed on to her favorite chair in the rec room where Andrea
“I’ll take three,” she said, carefully watching Andrea arrange her cards.
Connitti had already taken her seat next to Sam Lepre. Andrea Connitti was a heavyset
“What
Since coming to the Royal Regent a year ago, Andrea had become a sometimes winner. It was only in the last few months,
woman in her late seventies who wore a
since she began to win with alarming
bulky garnet pendant like a religious
regularity, that Martha’s suspicions mounted.
talisman. There was speculation about whether it was authentic, or something she
“Bernie,” Martha called, without moving her lips, “how’s the old dog doing it?”
picked up in a discount store and wore simply to make herself feel important. Her Bernie, as Martha referred to her recently deceased husband, would have little
There was no answer, only continued frustration, until one day it came to her. Armed with the revelation she marched into the assistant Director’s Office.
to do with an old gossip like Andrea. “Probably push the old windbag in front of an oncoming truck,” she mused.
“There, what do you think of that.” Connie Jenkins, always one to
Sam Lepre, who had been at the Royal
overthink an issue, considered her options.
Regent the longest, started the bingo game
“You know this for sure?”
early if it suited him, or waited until one of
“What other answer can there be?”
his friends arrived late to begin, and talked
“If you’re right, how can we prove it?
incessantly between games about his
I mean I can’t stop the game and examine her
experiences in World War II.
card right before she passes it to Sam?”
“I want three cards,” Andrea said. “Three for the pretty lady in the bright floral dress,” Sam Lepre said and slid
Martha thought a while as the anger overwhelmed realization. “Well, we have to do something!”
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