Monica Ferris_Needlecraft Mysteries_01 Read Online Free PDF Page B

wetland across the street had been filled in and a condominium built on the site.
    The price of a condo must be very high if it never occurred to Margot to buy one.
    Betsy sat at the small round table in the dining nook drinking a glass of orange juice with her sweet roll, and thinking.
    She’d been here three days, if you counted her day of arrival as one, rather than the less-than-half it was. She wasn’t sure what she had expected, but Excelsior wasn’t a disappointment, yet. If this were still the fifties, Excelsior would be positively typical of a Midwestern country town, down to the lack of used-car lots and warehouse shopping outlets siphoning shoppers from the little downtown. They must have draconian zoning laws around here, she thought.
    The people in Excelsior she had met so far were friendly, and the worst teenager she had seen had not been scary, only very oddly dressed. Thoroughly pierced, of course, with hair colored Kool-Aid red. But even he had offered a halfhearted wave.
    Crewel World was a going concern, so far as Betsy could tell. Who would have guessed one could make a living selling embroidery floss, hand-spun wool, and bamboo knitting needles? But there had been a steady trickle of customers yesterday while Betsy watched. Two of them had spent lavishly, buying “canvases,” stiff white fabric woven so loosely the holes showed, with paintings of dolls, Christmas stockings, cute animals, woodland scenes, or whatever on them. That the customers then also bought yarn and flosses so they could carefully cover every inch of the paintings with wool or cotton or silk only made Betsy sure that they were crazy, especially since the artists who painted the pictures charged so much for their work.
    Of course, there was a trick to the store as well, Betsy had learned. Margot had somehow wrangled a lease at an extraordinary rent, even at upper Midwest prices. With the rent so low, it was easier to show a profit. Certainly the furniture in the apartment was of a quality to indicate the opposite of poverty.
    There was, of course, a fly in the ointment, and it was, not surprisingly, the landlord. Shelly, who turned out to be friendly and kind, also loved to gossip. She had told Betsy all about him. He was the brother of the original landlord, who had died a year ago, she reported. This brother was by no means the saint the original had been. The new landlord wanted to take advantage of the soaring land values. He proposed tearing down the old brick building and putting up something bigger.
    But Margot, bless her kind but stubborn heart, wanted to stay where she was, where people anxious to buy just the right shade of green silk to complete their counted cross-stitch pattern knew where to find her. And Margot had four years to go on that extraordinary lease.
    Shelly had described with awe the one visit she had had from the new landlord, whose name was a very prosaic Joe. He had come into the shop last Monday, she had said, with fire in his eyes, looking for Margot. Fortunately, Margot had been at the post office and he’d gone away again breathing threats and tucking some kind of paper back into his pocket.
    Earlier today, over an incredibly delicious fruit salad bought at the sandwich shop next door, Margot had chuckled at Betsy’s alarmed query as to what Joe Mickels was up to.
    â€œOh, it was probably just another summons.”
    â€œAnother what ?”
    â€œSummons. It’s a tactic he’s come up with. Unlawful detainer of rent, possibly, or some other clause of the lease he’s trying to invoke against me. He figures a new one up every few weeks, he’s been doing it for the last four or five months. But I have James Penberthy on my side, he’s been wonderful.” Margot had smiled at Betsy’s inquiring face and explained, “He’s my attorney. He just laughs and says he’ll handle it. And he does. But it’s annoying, especially when I have to