Owls Well That Ends Well by Donna Andrews Read Free Book Online

there, and put it back out for anyone who wanted it.
    Unfortunately, every time I set out toward the barn, some new crisis intervened. A lost child. A lost purse. More scuffles between overeager Grouchos and Nixons.
    I caught Eric and one of his little cousins charging admission to the portable toilets and ordered the young entrepreneurs to exercise their capitalistic instincts by helping Cousin Horace at the hamburger stand.
    “You’d be amazed what you can find at yard sales,” I overheard one woman telling another. “On Antiques Road Show, people are always bringing bits of junk they bought at yard sales and finding out they’re worth thousands of dollars.”
    “That’s true,” the second woman said. Just then they spotted my shadow. They hunched protectively over the table in front of them and glared at me until I moved on. I fought back a smile. Would it reassure them to know that I was not a competitor? That I had no intention of buying anything at the yard sale, and particularly not from that table, which was filled with some of the worst junk I’d cleared out of Mrs. Sprocket’s attic? Probably not. And I certainly didn’t want to discourage them by mentioning that seventeen keen-eyed antique appraisers had already turned up their noses at the contents of that particular table. For all I know, if I’d called an eighteenth dealer he might have spotted a hidden treasure among the clutter. Perhaps the cracked chamber pot had once stood in the servants’ quarters in Monticello, or perhaps Eleanor Roosevelt had crocheted the toilet paper roll covers as part of the war effort. I wished them luck.
    Cousin Deirdre, the animal rights activist, had begun splashing paint on every moth-eaten fur coat and taxidermied mongoose in sight. I confiscated her paint and explained to the unhappy fur owners that she only used nontoxic washable paint, but most of them didn’t calm down until Mother promised to see that Deirdre reimbursed their cleaning costs.
    “Meg, we’re out of Spike’s dog food!” Rob exclaimed, appearing at my elbow while I was trying to calm an elderly lady whose sense of decency had been violated by her discovery that one of the booths was selling back issues of Playboy .
    “Get him a hamburger from Horace,” I said.
    “Okay,” Rob said. “How does he like them?”
    “Ask him,” I said.
    “Roger,” Rob said, turning to go.
    “While you’re going that way,” I called after him, “Could you tell that man with the grandfather clock that he doesn’t have to carry it around the whole time he’s shopping; we’d be happy to keep it behind the checkout counter for him.”
    “I’ve already told him that, twice,” Rob said. “He says he doesn’t mind carrying it.”
    “Let me rephrase that. Tell him if he whacks one more person in the head with the clock, I’ll take it away from him and kick him out of the yard sale.”
    “Roger.”
    I returned to my irate customer.
    “I’m sorry, ma’am,” I said. “I’m not sure we have the right to keep someone from selling his Playboy magazines, but if you can point out the booth, I’ll ask him to keep them out of sight.”
    “Hmph,” the woman snorted, as she turned and marched away. After a few feet, she stopped and turned back, hands on her hips.
    “And don’t let me catch you selling any of that trash to that worthless husband of mine!” she shouted.
    I turned to the checkout counter. The white rabbit and the ballerina looked stricken. Michael, standing nearby, wore the intensely solemn look that always meant he was trying not to crack up.
    “And does anyone have any idea who she is, and what her worthless husband looks like?”
    “No,” Michael said. “But I know who’s selling the Playboys . Your cousin Everett.”
    “Can you talk to him?”
    “Sure,” Michael said. “I’ll tell him to keep his Playboys under the counter with the Penthouses and Hustlers .”
    “Good grief,” I said. “I thought all he had was forty