Crossing the Lion (a Reigning Cats and Dog) (2010) by Cynthia Baxter Read Free Book Online

was more Yippie than yuppie. Perched at the end of his slender, almost delicate nose was a pair of wire-rimmed glasses similar in style to the ones John Lennon favored.
    Given Brock’s taste in eyewear, it wasn’t surprising that his duds consisted of jeans that bordered on scruffy and a white tunic-style shirt embellished with tiny white beads and elaborate embroidery. And even though the calendar read November, his toes peeked out from the ends of a pair of well-worn Birkenstock sandals.
    Charlotte beamed as she said, “Everyone, I’d like you to meet my baby—that is, my youngest. Brock, this is Winston Farnsworth and his wife, Betty …”
    Once all the introductions were done, Brock lowered himself onto an ottoman. But it was Townie who got the conversation moving once again.
    “Brock recently launched a new enterprise,” he said, addressing Betty and me. “He just went into the bead business.”
    “It’s a jewelry business, actually,” Brock replied coldly.
    “Yes, but it’s beaded jewelry, right?” Missy countered. In a strained voice, she added, “My baby brother is one of those artsy-craftsy people. You know, the kind who like to
make
things.”
    “At least I work,” Brock shot back.
    “I don’t have time to have a job!” Missy insisted. “I’m too busy with all my charity work, which I can assure you adds up to more hours than most people put in at their office!”
    “What Missy meant to say is that Brock has always been extremely artistic,” Charlotte explained, ignoring her children’s bickering. There was pride in her voice as she added, “Brockton was never interested in the family business. He always found it so cold and dry. There’s nothing the least bit creative about all those bits of metal being turned into such practical things, and Brock thrives on creativity.”
    “Much to Linus’s dismay,” Townie commented in a voice so soft I wondered if anyone besides Missy was meant to hear him.
    “Poor Daddy,” Missy said with a loud sigh. “We’ll all miss him so much.”
    “Everyone misses him already,” Townie added. “Not only was he phenomenally successful, he was also universally loved. Now, that’s a pairing you don’t see every day.”
    A silence fell over the room as all of us remembered why we were here. But I was already learning that silence was as rare in this house as a dust-free surface.Once again, Gwennie’s brash voice cut through the room like the proverbial fingernails on a chalkboard.
    “’Scuse me,” she said, bustling into the room. “If y’ don’t moind, dinner is served. ’At’s wot Cook told me to say.”
    “Oh, good,” Charlotte said. “Gwennie, would you take the dogs into the mudroom and give them their dinner?”
    Can I go with them?
I thought mournfully as I stood up, along with everyone else in the room.
    Here I’d been on Solitude Island for less than an hour, yet I was already pining for the one thing I suspected I’d get very little of while I was here: solitude.

Chapter 3
    “We should look for someone to eat and drink with before looking for something to eat and drink, for dining alone is leading the life of a lion or wolf.”
    —Epicurus
    L ike every room I’d seen so far in the Merrywood mansion, the large dining room was decorated in a grand manner—at least by nineteenth-century standards. The walls were covered in ornate dark-green wallpaper that appeared to be made of silk. The windows along one wall were framed by velvet drapes in the same somber hue. Hanging on the walls were more huge oil paintings of people who, from the expressions on their faces, looked as if whatever they’d last eaten hadn’t agreed with them.
    Also like the rest of the house, this room was shrouded in darkness. The rain beat mercilesslyagainst the windows, the slightly alarming sound punctuated by the occasional clap of thunder. Aside from periodic flashes of lightning, what little light there was came from another chandelier. It was just