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Софи Райан: The Whole Cat Аnd Caboodle

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Софи Райан The Whole Cat Аnd Caboodle

The Whole Cat Аnd Caboodle: краткое содержание, описание и аннотация

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Sarah Grayson is the happy proprietor of Second Chance, a charming shop in the oceanfront town of North Harbor, Maine. At the shop, she sells used items that she has lovingly refurbished and repurposed. But her favorite pet project so far has been adopting a stray cat she names Elvis. Elvis has seen nine lives—and then some. The big black cat with a scar across his nose turned up at a local bar when the band was playing the King of Rock and Roll’s music and hopped in Sarah’s truck. Since then, he has been her constant companion and the furry favorite of everyone who comes into the store. And a helpful sleuth to boot! When Sarah’s elderly friend Maddie is found with the body of a dead man in her garden, the kindly old lady becomes the prime suspect in the murder. Even Sarah’s old high school flame, investigator Nick Elliot, seems convinced that Maddie was up to no good. So it’s up to Sarah and Elvis to clear her friend’s name and make sure the real murderer doesn’t get a second chance.

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I exhaled slowly, sent up a silent prayer—Please don’t let me see anything—and headed across the floor, keeping my gaze locked on the old man’s blue eyes.

“Good afternoon, Sarah,” he said with a slight dip of his head as I got close to the center of the room where he had . . . arranged himself. “What are you doing here?”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Peterson,” I said. “I’m doing a workshop. What, ah . . . are you doing?”

“I’m posing, my dear.”

I could see that. I was fairly certain he was trying to imitate the Farnese Atlas, a marble sculpture in which Atlas is partly down on one knee, holding the world on his shoulders, except Mr. Peterson was holding a red-and-white-striped beach ball with the logo of a beer company instead of the world, and he had two pillows under his bent knee. I was pretty sure he was sitting on a cardboard box, but I wasn’t going to look behind him to find out for sure.

I gave him what I hoped looked like a sincere smile. “But why exactly are you . . . here . . . like this?”

“Sammy called. There’s a busload of tourists down at the pub and they’re running behind schedule, so he’s not going to get here, and I thought, Why don’t I just take his place instead?” He frowned. “I though Sammy said Eric was teaching the class, though.”

Eric was one of Sam’s bandmates. The rest of the time he was an artist.

“Alfred Peterson, where on earth are your pants?” a voice said behind me. It was Charlotte coming from the small kitchen at the end of the main hallway, where she’d gone to put the kettle on for tea. The room rental came with access to the communal kitchen.

“In the gentleman’s lavatory,” Mr. P. said with a slight superior edge to his voice.

“Apparently you left your common sense in there, as well,” Charlotte retorted. She frowned at him, hands on her hips. Even in flats she was an inch taller than I was, and she had the posture and steely glare of a high school principal, which is what she’d been. “What on earth are you doing in the middle of Sarah’s class as naked as the day you were born?”

“This is Eric’s art class, ‘Sketching the Human Form.’” The old man held his head high, chin stuck out. “Sammy couldn’t make it so I’m the model. I may not be a spring chicken but I’ve still got it.”

Charlotte’s mouth twitched and I realized she was trying not to laugh. “Be that as it may,” she said. “There’s no reason to be putting it all on display for the rest of us. And didn’t Sam tell you? Eric’s class is in the small room next door today, and they’re drawing hands.”

“Hands?”

“Hands.”

“But the class is called ‘Sketching the Human Form,’” Mr. P. said stubbornly.

It seemed pretty clear to me that getting him back into his clothes wasn’t going to be easy.

“And hands are part of the human form.” Charlotte made a move-along gesture with hers. “So that’s all we need to see. Go put your pants on before the class gets here and the mystery’s gone.”

Mr. Peterson seemed deflated. He handed me the beach ball, while Charlotte headed back to the kitchen down the hall. “Hands? Really?” he asked me.

I had no idea but I nodded, anyway.

The old man slowly straightened up, and I realized that the washrooms were off the outside hallway, too. I thrust the beach ball back into his grasp. “Why don’t you take this with you?” I said. It at least made the front view G-rated as he headed for the door. I couldn’t exactly say the same for what was bringing up the rear.

Avery and her grandmother, Liz French, came in just as Mr. P. got to the door. He nodded as they passed. The two women crossed the floor to join me, Liz’s high heels echoing on the wooden floor. As usual Liz was elegantly dressed, in a lavender tunic over navy pants. Her soft blond hair curled around her face.

“Hello, Sarah,” she said. She handed me a cardboard box and leaned in to kiss my cheek. “I baked.”

That really meant she’d been to Lily’s Bakery.

Liz had a gleam in her blue eyes and I knew she’d have some comment about Mr. Peterson’s attire—or lack of. “Was Alfred naked, or did his suit just really need ironing?”

Beside her Avery made a face. “Geez, Nonna,” she said. “That joke’s older than I am.” She turned to me. “Why was Mr. P. . . .” She paused and gestured with one hand.

“Naked as a jaybird?” Liz interjected. “Hanging the moon?”

“Sam got held up with a busload of tourists at the pub,” I said. “Apparently he was supposed to be the model for an art class. Mr. Peterson decided he’d help out by taking Sam’s place. He just got the room and the dress code wrong.”

Avery rolled her eyes and folded her arms over her chest. “You guys do get that right now Mr. P. is walking all the way down the hall to the men’s bathroom, past that whole big wall of windows?” She paused, probably for effect. “You know, windows that overlook the parking lot?”

Liz gave me a sweet—and fake—smile. “Given all the cars in the lot, half the town’s probably seen Alfred’s as—”

“Assets,” I said, raising my voice to drown her out. I held out my keys to Avery. “Would you start unloading the truck, please?”

“No problem,” she said. “It’s probably not a good idea for me to stay here. I’m young and impressionable.” She headed for the door.

Liz shook her head. “She’s impressionable, and this is my original hair color.”

“It’s not even close.”

Liz and I turned.

Rose was standing in the doorway. “Do you want to know what your original hair color was?” she asked.

Liz made a dismissive gesture with one hand. “No, I do not. Like my real age, some things should not be discussed in public.”

Rose came across the floor to us. She was barely five feet tall, with cropped white hair and warm gray eyes. She was dwarfed by the neon orange tote bag over her shoulder. Rose’s bags reminded me of Mary Poppins’s carpetbag. I never knew what she was going to pull out of one of them.

“Hello, sweetie bug,” she said with a smile, reaching up to pat my cheek. “Welcome to Shady Pines.”

“Shady Pines?” I asked.

“Don’t encourage her,” Charlotte said. She’d come from the kitchen again, carrying a tray loaded with teacups, napkins and a small glass bowl filled with sugar cubes.

I hurried over to take it from her, setting Liz’s cookies on a stack of napkins, and immediately realized I had nowhere to put the whole thing down.

“She’s not encouraging me,” Rose said. “She just asked a question.” She looked at me. “I call this place Shady Pines because it’s just like living in an old folks’ home. All anyone wants to talk about is how many pills they’re taking and when they last had a bowel movement.”

Liz smirked at me. “You were warned,” she said. She turned to Rose. “Will you please come and live with Avery and me so we don’t have to listen to you talk about other people’s ailments and bodily functions?”

Rose crossed her hands primly in front of her. “Have you actually forgotten Vermont?” She looked over at me. “Liz and I shared a room when we went on a bus tour to Vermont. I seriously considered smothering her with a pillow while she slept.”

“I’m not suggesting we share a room,” Liz said, making a sweeping gesture with her hands. “I have that big house. We could probably go for a day or two and not even see each other.”

“No.” Rose shook her head vigorously. “The key to us having been friends for the past fifty years is never spending that much time together. I’m not about to ruin a beautiful friendship now.” She gestured at the long, multipaned windows on the side wall of the room. “We should open a couple of these. It’s going to get stuffy in here.”

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