Elvis jumped up another level and looked around rather like a monarch surveying his kingdom. “Mrrr,” he said again, clearly pleased.
“You’re welcome, Elvis,” Mr. P. said. He patted my arm. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I showed him to the door and after he left turned back around to find Elvis at the top of the tower. “You’re so spoiled,” I said.
He gave me an unblinking green-eyed stare that told me he wasn’t going to dignify my remark with a comment.
I reached up and lifted him down, which got me a lot of cat grumbling. “I’m just going to move it over by the window.” The tower was heavy, but I managed to get it across the floor so it was just to the right of the window. I held out a hand. “Go ahead,” I said to Elvis once it was in place.
He made his way up two levels and settled himself with an exhalation that sounded a lot like a sigh of contentment. I folded the two blankets, which I recognized as belonging to Sam, and put them and the bungee cords in an empty grocery bag. I hung it on the front doorknob so I wouldn’t forget to return everything to him.
I remembered then that I hadn’t put any towels in the bathroom. I went to the storage closet to grab some clean ones. The back wall of the closet was the only wall I’d be sharing with Rose when she moved in, and I knew that Liam and Dad had used sound-muffling drywall and insulation when it had been built, so I felt confident Rose wouldn’t be able to hear me and I wouldn’t be able to hear her, either.
Elvis had jumped down from his perch and followed me because he was nosy that way. He poked his head into the closet the way he usually did, so we both heard the noise at the same time. It was a scratching, scrabbling sound.
I scowled and swiveled my head to look at the cat. He eyed the wall and then looked at me.
“If that damn squirrel got back in, we will be having squirrel stew for supper tomorrow night,” I said forcefully. I swear the cat made a face.
“Okay, so I don’t actually know how to make squirrel stew,” I hissed. “I’m trying to make a point.”
The sound stopped. We waited, both of us warily watching the closet wall. Less than a minute later it started again.
Late in the fall my dad had replaced the bedroom window in the back apartment. A squirrel had jumped in through the opening. Dad had chased it all around the small bedroom, but it was Mom who had saved the day by putting a piece of bread spread with peanut butter on a chair outside the window. Once the squirrel had taken off with its treat, she’d stood guard with a leaf rake until the new window was in place.
Elvis was sniffing the closet wall. He pawed at it and looked at me. “I don’t know how it got in,” I said in answer to what I imagined was his unspoken question. “Maybe while Mac and I were carrying in the ladder yesterday.” I turned and headed for the kitchen and my shoes, the cat on my heels. He followed me out into the entryway. There was a small pile of long boards, trim pieces we hadn’t needed for the cupboards stacked in the hallway. I took a section about three feet long from the top of the stack. I didn’t really want to hurt the squirrel, but when I saw it, I was going to swing that plank like I was Big Papi swinging for the Green Monster in Fenway. Elvis looked at me and licked his lips. He was in.
I unlocked the apartment door and eased it open, trying to be as quiet as I could. The sound was even louder in the apartment. It sounded like the squirrel—or whatever it was—was trying to dig its way out of the closet. I motioned to Elvis to go ahead of me, which he did, creeping across the kitchen like a furry black ninja. My plan was for Elvis to spook the squirrel into running and then I would chase it down the hall and out the front door, which I’d already opened.
The scratching sound seemed to be getting louder. It occurred to me that maybe it wasn’t a squirrel back there. But as long as it wasn’t a black bear, my money was still on Elvis. I eased my way over to the living room doorway and nodded at the cat. He darted around the corner to the bedroom doorway. I waited. No squirrel shot out of the bedroom with a cat in hot pursuit. The scratching sound began again. I crossed my fingers—figuratively since I was holding the length of wood with both hands—that Elvis didn’t have a skunk cornered in there, and I launched myself into the bedroom swinging the board in front of me—narrowly avoiding taking off the top of Rose’s head.
She turned and smiled at me. “Oh, hello dear,” she said.
Chapter 10
My heart was pounding so hard it took a few seconds for me to get my breath. I’d come way too close to actually walloping Rose with my makeshift squirrel eliminator. “Rose!” I exclaimed. “You almost gave me a heart attack. What are you doing in here?”
“I’m trying to get this dang-blasted curtain rod out of the closet,” she said. The rod was the long wrought-iron one that belonged over the living room window.
“Merow!” Elvis said sharply.
“I’m sorry, Elvis,” Rose said, inclining her head toward him. “Excuse my language.”
“Let me see,” I said. I poked my head around the closet door for a closer look. Each end of the rod had a pointed finial, and one of the points was wedged in the back corner of the space.
I twisted and maneuvered and in a couple of minutes I had the curtain rod free.
“You are a darling girl and very, very smart,” Rose exclaimed, clapping her hands together.
I blew my hair back off my face. “How did you get in here?” I asked. Elvis had gone into the closet, maybe to make sure for himself that there weren’t any squirrels in there.
“I borrowed the extra set of keys that Isabel keeps at Charlotte’s,” she said.
“And does my grandmother know you borrowed the keys?”
“Well, of course not,” Rose said, giving me a slightly condescending look. “She isn’t even in town.” She started patting her coat pockets.
“What did you lose?” I asked, brushing a dust bunny off the knee of my leggings.
“Nothing,” she said. “I’m just looking for—” She found something in her left pocket. “Never mind, dear. Here it is.” She pulled out a tape measure. “Hold this end for me, please.”
I took the end of the metal tape, and Rose went to the other end of the curtain rod. She peered at the numbers and her lips moved, although no sound came out. Then she smiled. “That’s going to work just fine,” she said.
I looked blankly at her.
“I have some panels that I was hoping would work in the living room window. And they will.” For the first time she noticed the board I’d been carrying. “Oh my goodness,” she said, her eyes widening. “Did you think I was someone breaking in?”
I bent down to pick up the plank. “I thought you were a squirrel.”
Her eyes darted around the room. “A squirrel?”
“One got in this room last fall when Dad put in the new window. I thought maybe it had gotten in again on the weekend when Mac and I were bringing in the paint and the ladder.”
Rose looked at the piece of cupboard trim in my hand.
“You weren’t going to hurt a little squirrel—were you, Sarah?”
The length of wood—which had seemed so small in the hallway when I was headed to confront a vicious rodent—suddenly felt like an oversized club now that I was standing here with Rose.
“I . . . I wasn’t going to hurt it,” I stammered. “I was only going to herd it outside again.” I made the motion with the piece of wood and noticed that Elvis had already slipped out of the room.
“Well, I’m glad to hear that,” she said, putting the tape measure back in her pocket. “Squirrels are environmentalists, you know.”
She leaned over to pick up one end of the curtain rod.
“I, uh, didn’t know that,” I said, taking it from her and following her out to the living room, where Elvis was sitting under the window, not looking at all like a cat who a few minutes ago was licking his whiskers at the thought of squirrel kebobs for a little evening snack.