The Book with the Beacon Lights

Beacon Lights of Literature. The book holds these treasures: a tiny page from a dance book half-filled out, two wedding newspaper clippings from ‘47, a piece of red ribbon fading page 304 of Homer’s Odyssey, a note to Mildred on lined paper, and a crumpled receipt for Lantern Red Lipstick, 29 cents, from Andrews Drug & Variety Store. These are the clues Perry has to go on. In the past, she made a case with less. Perhaps there is nothing to investigate this time, but she hopes that Mildred was not a typical teenage girl in the post-war Plains, dull as dry land with no beacon in sight.