“Anyway, I’m very glad you decided to listen to me,” she said, getting up. “It’s nice to have someone to chat with.”
“Oh, any time,” said Dooley. “We’re on strike right now, you see, so we have all the time in the world to listen to all of your gripes and thoughts.”
“Thanks,” she said softly. “So what are your names?”
“Max,” I said.
“Dooley,” said Dooley.
“Very nice to meet you, Max and Dooley,” she said with a smile.
“Likewise,” I said.
“Stick around. I have a feeling Samson isn’t coming back, so this pen is yours.”
“Thanks for the offer, but we actually have a home.”
“Not for long,” said Dooley with a sad glance at me.
“Yeah, not for long,” I said. “Our human is getting married soon, and we have reason to believe she’s going to chuck us out when she does.”
“Oh, that’s terrible,” said Pussy. “It seems to draw us even closer together, doesn’t it? I’m without a human right now, and soon you two will be, too.”
We thought about this for a moment, and I had to swallow away a lump. I’ve never been without a human before, and the prospect didn’t appeal to me.
“Maybe we will stay here,” said Dooley. “At least for the time being, until Odelia figures out what she wants to do with us.”
I nodded my agreement. “We’ll hang around,” I told Pussy. “We’re in the same boat now, and we might as well stick together.”
“That’s so nice of you,” she said, and I could see that the prospect of having a friend in this, her hour of need, greatly bucked her up.
And as she returned to the house, a nice swing in her walk, I thought about the things she’d said.
“Do you really think she’ll inherit the Flake fortune?” asked Dooley.
“I doubt it,” I said. “Humans may be crazy, but no human is as crazy as that. No, he’ll probably have set up some kind of trust fund with Pussy as the beneficiary as long as she lives. She’ll be well-provided for.”
“Unlike us,” said Dooley sadly.
“Unlike us,” I agreed.
And as we placed our heads on our paws again, enjoying the hospitality of the absent Samson the chicken, the thought occurred to me that maybe whoever Pussy’s new owners were going to be, they might be induced to adopt Dooley and myself and Harriet and Brutus. Unless Marge and Tex and Gran were up to the task, of course. Then again, maybe they weren’t. Taking care of one cat is one thing, or even two, but four? Not many humans were prepared to take their love of pets to such an extreme.
And as I drifted off to sleep, the words of Tank came back to me: your reign is over. It very well might be, whatever a reign was.
Chapter 11
Lauren Klepfisch had been watching the house from afar for the better part of the morning, when her trained eye spotted a van arriving and being let through the gate. “Film this,” she told her cameraman Zak Kowalski. Zak had been standing slumped against their news van, checking his phone.
He immediately hoisted the camera onto his shoulder and directed it to where Lauren was pointing.
The van carried a decal indicating it belonged to Christopher Cross, Pet Detective, and had a logo of a mean-looking Siamese cat as an added bonus.
Lauren’s eyes sparkled as she watched the van drive up to the house, the gate swinging closed behind it. She was a vivacious blonde, and very photogenic, too, which had earned her this job as a correspondent for WLBC-9, Long Island’s premier news network—all the news that’s fit to broadcast.
Zak put his camera down again. “Pet detective?” he asked. “What the hell is a pet detective?”
“Technically a pet detective is a detective who hunts down missing pets,” she said. “But get this. Chris Cross claims he can actually talk to his cat, and has enlisted him in helping find the pets they’re looking for. The cat talks to other pets, and relays the information to Cross. They’ve been at it for years.”
“A load of crock, of course.”
“I’m not so sure. He does get great results from time to time. He found Lady Delilah’s pet canary last month. Silly bird got itself stuck in a chimney.”
“Lady Delilah? The pop star?”
“The one and only.”
“Lucky for her the cat didn’t eat the canary, instead of returning it to its owner.”
The gate swung open again and a car came pulling out. Lauren recognized its occupants as Odelia Poole and her grandmother.
“There’s a rumor that Odelia Poole can talk to her cat,” she said as she watched Odelia drive past without acknowledging her.
“She’s the big cheese in town, isn’t she? This Odelia Poole?”
“Yeah, she is. Or at least she thinks she is.”
“I read her stuff from time to time,” said Zak. “Not too shabby.”
“Print is a dying medium,” said Lauren. “Everybody knows that. And the Gazette’s editor is old, so there’s no future for an ambitious reporter.”
Lauren had built up quite a career as a roving reporter. Burying herself in a town like Hampton Cove the way Odelia Poole had done was not her thing.
“Local news channels are a dying breed too,” said Zak. “Online is the future.”
“People will always watch local news,” she said. “Who else brings the kind of stories that we do? But that doesn’t mean I need to stay local, too.”
“Ah? Big plans? Do tell.”
She smiled. “Not a chance.” She liked to play her cards close to her chest. And a notorious blabbermouth like Zak Kowalski was the last person she’d confide in. She had her eye on an anchor position, but as long as no contracts were signed, her lips were sealed. She didn’t want to jinx her big break.
“Fine,” he said. “So don’t tell me.” And he went back to playing Tetris on his phone, the only thing he was good at, apart from blabbing.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said. “The person we need to talk to isn’t here anyway.”
“So where are they?”
“In jail. And I know just the way we can land ourselves an exclusive.”
Odelia and Gran had arrived back in town, and Gran parked the car in front of the doctor’s office. “Are you sure you don’t need me anymore?” asked Gran as they got out. There was a touch of wistfulness in her voice.
“Yeah, I’m good,” said Odelia. “I’ll just pop in at the office to write my article and then we can forget all about this nasty murder business.”
“Too bad,” said Gran with a sigh as she directed a reluctant glance at the door to the doctor’s office. “I like a juicy murder mystery from time to time.”
“Well, you shouldn’t,” said Odelia. “Murder mysteries are not meant to be enjoyed, Gran. They’re meant to be mourned.”
“Oh, but I’m mourning Leonidas Flake,” said Gran. “I’m mourning the hell out of that poor man.”
After another pregnant pause, in which Odelia kept her tongue, she finally walked up to the door to the office and disappeared inside. Obviously taking down appointments from people suffering the flu or hemorrhoids was a lot less exciting than hunting down clues and chasing down murderers. Still, Tex needed his receptionist, and Odelia needed her paycheck, so the moment Gran was safely back where she belonged, she walked down the street to the headquarters of the Hampton Cove Gazette.
She hadn’t lied when she told her grandmother she needed to write her article. What she hadn’t mentioned was that she had no intention of dropping the case. Not yet, anyway. Until Leonidas Flake’s boyfriend had confessed to the crime of murdering his partner, there was still a chance that new developments might swing the case in a different direction altogether. Chances of that happening were very slim, of course, but she’d investigated enough crimes by now to know that things are not always what they seem.
Though in this case it looked very bad for Gabriel Crier. Very bad indeed.