Read The Ellsworth Case (A Markham Sisters Cozy Mystery Novella Book 5) for Free Online

finishing clearing and cleaning the last set of
shelves.   With that job out of the
way, now she could start thinking about reordering the books.
    Sinking down into the comfortable leather
chair in one corner of the room, Janet looked happily at the rows and rows of
books.   They were hers to do as she
pleased with and she couldn’t wait to get started.   Before she could do anything, though,
she had to figure out exactly how she wanted to arrange things.   There were several different “library
classification” systems that she could use, but Janet felt as if she wanted to
create her own system.  
    How I do it doesn’t matter, she told
herself.   What she needed to be able
to do was to know exactly what they had and exactly where each book was on the
shelves.   The more she thought about
it, the more she was tempted to develop a scheme that let her classify the
books by how much she liked or disliked them.   Of course she didn’t have time to read
every single book, but she could at least sort the genres by how much she liked
each one.   She laughed to
herself.   She’d never be able to
tell Joan what system she was using.   Joan simply wouldn’t approve.
    With paper and pencil in hand, Janet spent
the last few minutes until dinner working through her plans.   She’d start with her favourite genres in the corner by the very comfortable chair.   That way, when she was curled up in it,
they’d be close to hand.   Within
genres, it made the most sense for her to arrange the titles by the author’s
last name.   She thought briefly
about sorting by the author’s first names, just to be different, but then realised that such a method would put Agatha Christie’s
books on the very top shelf in the mystery section.   As they were among her favourites , she decided she’d much rather have them closer
to eye level.
    She was just about to start looking at book
titles when Joan stuck her head into the room.
    “Dinner’s ready,” Joan announced.
    Janet sighed.   “It was just about to get interesting,”
she complained.
    “I made apple crumble,” Joan replied.
    Janet grinned.   Apple crumble was her favourite pudding.   It was just about worth leaving the book sorting for apple crumble.   She followed her sister to the kitchen,
hoping Joan sister had made something she wasn’t overly fond of for dinner so
she could leave lots of room for crumble.
    After a slightly smaller than usual serving
of delicious shepherd’s pie, Janet was pleased when Joan served her a very
generous plate of pudding, with a scoop of ice cream as an added bonus.   As she took the first bite, she started
to get suspicious.
    “So, what’s on your mind?” she asked her
sister.
    “What do you mean?” Joan replied.  
    Janet stared at her, but Joan didn’t meet
her eyes.   Janet sighed and sat back
in her chair.   Her favourite pudding was a bribe, then, of some sort.
    “What do you want from me?” Janet clarified
the question.
    Joan flushed.   “Nothing, really,” she said.   “Is William coming over this evening?”
    “He is, around half seven,” Janet replied.
    Joan nodded.   “It’s just that Michael invited me
around, you see.   There something on
the telly that we were going to watch together,
that’s all.”
    “So you’re leaving me on my own with
William,” Janet said resignedly.
    “I don’t have to go,” Joan replied.   “I’ll ring Michael and tell him I
can’t.”
    “No, you go,” Janet said firmly.   Joan had never dated
when the sisters were younger.   Now
that Joan and Michael were becoming a couple, Janet
was determined to do what she could to help the relationship grow.   “I can show the tantalus to William and see what he says,” she continued.   “If I need you, I can always ring you.”
    Janet watched the smile that spread across
her sister’s face.   It was clear
that Joan really wanted to spend the evening with Michael.   Janet was glad she’d told her to