Purrfect Obsession

We said our goodbyes, and just as we left the room, Odelia and Chase entered. From behind us, Ringo asked, “And who are these people? Should I bark? Alert my master?”

“No, Ringo,” I said. “These are the humans I was talking about. They’re looking for your master’s phone.”

“On the nightstand. See ya, guys.”

“See ya, buddy.” To Odelia, as she entered, I said, “the phone is on the nightstand.” She gave me a wink in return.

“I have to say, Max,” said Dooley as we descended the stairs. “I may just have had a change of heart about dogs. They may not be as horrible and nasty as I always thought.”

“We met nice dogs before, remember?”

“Yeah, but I always figured they were the exception that proved the rule. Now I’m not so sure.”

“I’m not so sure either.”

“When Odelia gets a dog, I sure hope it’s a nice one like Ringo.”

And I sure hoped she wouldn’t get a dog. Nice or not, frankly speaking I was having enough trouble navigating the complicated relationships in Odelia’s menagerie as it was.

Chapter 25

Odelia snuck over to the nightstand, and grabbed Wolf’s phone. So the stories of the director sleeping with his phone under his pillow were greatly exaggerated.

“Hello, little one,” she whispered as she turned over the phone in her hand.

Next to her, Wolf stirred in his sleep, muttered something, then turned to his other side and went right back to snoring softly.

Meanwhile, the Chihuahua sat studying her every move. He’d clearly been briefed by Max, or else he would have barked his little head off.

She tiptoed back to where Chase was checking the pockets of Wolf’s jacket and together they clicked the phone to life. The screen lock was one of those password patterns.

She glanced at the doggie, which sat staring at her unblinkingly. Too bad she didn’t speak a dog’s language. And too bad Max and Dooley had already left, for they could talk to any animal in existence, apparently, and then relate what they told them to her. Her finger hovered over the phone, but Chase shook his head.

“Three attempts and the phone will be locked. Better not risk it.”

They hadn’t really thought this through, had they?

Just then, the little doggie softly barked once.

She turned to him and saw he was still eyeing her intently. He then did the most amazing thing. He slashed the air like Zorro used to do with his sword, creating the letter Z.

Both Chase and Odelia stared at the dog, who seemed to roll his eyes, then repeated the gesture. Slash. Yep. Just like Zorro.

She glanced down at the phone in her hand. Could it be?

Chase shook his head and mouthed, ‘No! Don’t do it!’

She decided to throw caution to the wind and traced the letter Z across the small panel, connecting the dots. Instantly the phone unlocked and she made a little fist pump.

‘Omigod,’ Chase mouthed. He couldn’t believe it either.

Odelia turned to the Chihuahua and nodded her thanks. And she could have sworn the dog actually smiled!

She immediately called up the email app and scrolled through Wolf’s emails. When she saw he had a hundred unread ones, she typed Dany into the search window. Nothing. She thought for a moment, then brought up the WhatsApp app. And immediately hit the motherlode. She scrolled through Dany and Wolf’s chats. It was all pretty saucy stuff.

“Mamma mia,” Chase muttered as they read a few excerpts together. “EL James should turn this into a book.”

It confirmed that Wolf and Dany had been in a relationship, but nothing more. Odelia idly read through a few of the more recent exchanges while Chase dug through Wolf’s closet, in search of something to tie the director to the murder.

Dany had been worried about Wolf’s wife Emily, apparently, repeatedly asking Wolf how far along he was in his divorce procedure. Wolf kept assuring her he was going to file for divorce any day now, and she kept asking him to talk to his wife soon.

Finally, in the last message she’d sent him, she’d said, ‘I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to keep quiet. Each time I meet Emily I’m afraid I’m going to just blab it out!’

Odelia frowned. Wolf might have construed this as a threat. He might never have had any intention of divorcing his wife, who apparently was the source of his wealth and an important part of his business. So maybe he’d killed Dany before she could ‘blab it out?’

Suddenly, she noticed Chase was wildly gesturing at her from the closet he was digging through. She hurried over, Wolf’s phone still in her hand. When Chase stepped aside, she saw it: a yellow parka, tucked away in the far corner of his packed closet.

Chase gave her a meaningful look and took it out by the clothes hanger, careful not to touch the jacket itself. And the moment he did, she saw the tiny red dots that were spattered all across the front of the parka.

Blood.

Dany’s blood.

Dooley and I were walking back to the car when Harriet came walking up to us. Head hanging down, she didn’t look like her usual feisty self.

“Hey, Max. Hey, Dooley,”’ she said, and even sounded downcast.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Where is Brutus?”

“Oh, around, I guess,” she said, sounding as cheerful as a zombie who hasn’t had their daily portion of brains.

Just then, there was a yelp followed by a scream, and then we were running towards the source of the sound. I’d recognized the yelp as coming from Brutus, the scream as human in origin.

When we rounded the house, we discovered the scream had come from a small duck pond. What was it with duck ponds today? The pond itself was dwarfed by a rock wall that rose up like some jagged-edged monstrosity. The front was outfitted with climbing holds but the top hovered over that pond like a giant black beak.

When we arrived on the scene, a potbellied man was sitting on a bench, right beneath the promontory, looking dazed, with Brutus positioned squarely on his stomach.

“Brutus!” I cried. “What happened?”

“He-he saved me,” said Brutus, staring at the man with some incredulity, as the man, equally flustered, was staring right back at him. “He just saved my life.”

“Good thing you landed on my tummy, little buddy,” said the man now. “Otherwise you’d have been nothing but a grease spot on this bench.”

“See?” said Dooley. “My analogy was right on the money.”

“Oh, shut up, Dooley,” said Harriet. “Brutus?” she said croakily. “Are you all right?”

“I am now,” he said. He looked shaken, not stirred, but otherwise in excellent fettle. The man, on the other hand, now pushed the black cat from his belly and rubbed it. He looked a little winded. Being hit by a falling Brutus would do that to a person, of course.

We all looked up, at the promontory thirty feet over our heads. It wouldn’t have killed Brutus, and then again it might have.

“How the hell did you get up there?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I was wandering, thinking, and suddenly… I was falling.”

“The back of the wall must be a gentle slope down. Probably there’s some kind of path leading from the top, so climbers can walk down once they’ve reached there,” I said.

“This makes it the third time I almost died today,” said Brutus with an uncharacteristic tremor in his voice. “Maybe I should just lock myself up in the house from now on, and stay put.”

“Hey, that reminds me of those movies,” said Dooley.

“What movies?” I said.

“Those Final Destination movies. A group of teenagers cheats death, and then death comes after them, killing them in increasingly freaky and horrible ways, one by one, until they’re all dead, except for the token survivor, who gets it in the next movie.”

“Dooley,” I said, shaking my head. “Not now.”

“But it’s exactly the same thing!” He turned to Brutus. “Did you cheat death by any chance in the past couple of weeks?”

“I cheated death three times today,” he said. He could have been white around the nostrils. It’s hard to tell with a cat, what with all the fur.

“Mh,” said Dooley, pensive. “In the movies death eventually gets them for sure. So maybe this is not your typical Final Destination case. Or maybe it is. In which case you’ll die in a most excruciating but very cinematic and elaborate way in the next couple of hours.”

“Oh, shut up, Dooley!” Harriet cried suddenly. “Why don’t you just shut up for once!” And after this sudden outburst she ran off at a brisk pace, leaving us all a little puzzled.

“I guess she doesn’t like movies,” said Dooley.

Just then, all hell broke loose: the lights in the manor all lit up, and loud sirens of police cars on approach ripped through the nocturnal silence.

“Uh-oh,” said Brutus. “I hope they’re not here for me.”

Chapter 26

Odelia watched on as Wolf Langdon was led from the house and into a waiting squad car. He’d already professed his innocence several times, but it was hard to argue with the yellow parka covered in Dany’s blood. When they’d finally woken him up and confronted him with the evidence, he’d been flabbergasted and had exclaimed, “That’s not mine. That’s not mine, I’m telling you! Someone put it there!” Even now, as he was being pushed into the car, he was screaming, “I’m being framed! You have to believe me! This is a setup!”

“Fat chance,” said Chase. “Framed. Yeah, right.” He bumped Odelia’s fist. “Well done, babe. Your hunch paid off in spades.” And then he walked off, to accompany Wolf to the station house for questioning.

Uncle Alec came waddling up to her. “I see my advice to stay out of this investigation was followed to the letter, huh?”

“I’m sorry, uncle. You know as well as I do it’s hard to stay away from a case like this—especially when it involves someone I knew personally.”

He nodded. “I guess I shouldn’t have warned you off. I should have known you’d ignore me. But what the hell were you and Chase doing in the man’s bedroom?”

“Following a lead,” she said. She explained about the message she’d seen on Wolf’s phone, and how she’d decided to follow up on it.

“And a good thing you did.” He scratched his scalp. “Now how am I going to explain your presence at the manor? You didn’t happen to have a search warrant, did you?”

“Um…”

“Didn’t think so,” he muttered, then walked off after Chase, shaking his head and muttering something about meddling nieces under his breath.

Odelia just hoped the evidence wouldn’t be thrown out of court because of this search warrant thingie.

At her feet, Max and Dooley had arrived, along with Brutus. Of Harriet no trace.

She squatted down and scratched her cats behind the ears. “You did well, guys. We caught the killer. This must be some kind of new record. Dany was killed this afternoon, and less than twelve hours later her killer is in police custody.”

“I don’t think he did it, though,” said Max, surprising Odelia.

“What? What are you talking about?”

“Not what, who. We talked to Ringo.”

“Who?”

“Ringo? Wolf’s Chihuahua?”

“And a very nice doggie he is,” Dooley added. “Just like you said.”

“He told us Wolf was right by his side when Dany was killed.”

“He witnessed the murder?”

“He did. He didn’t see the killer’s face, though.”

“He did tell us to talk to Mr. Owl,” said Dooley.

“Mr. Owl,” she said dubiously.

“It’s an owl that lives in the tree Dany was killed under,” Max explained. “He must have seen the whole thing. We’re hoping he’ll give us a description of the killer.”

“Can you take us to the park?” Dooley asked. “Owls are nocturnal creatures. Tomorrow he’ll probably be asleep.”

She threw up her hands. “I guess so.” Sometimes she felt more like a taxi service for her cats than anything else. Then again, if Ringo was right, Wolf couldn’t be the killer.

“But we found the yellow parka hanging in his closet. It still had Dany’s blood all over it.”

“The killer could have put it there,” said Max.

“Or maybe Ringo is lying,” she offered. “Have you considered that? He could be lying to protect Wolf.” Max and Dooley surprised her by bursting out laughing. “What’s so funny?”

“If you knew Ringo like we know him, you’d know he’s incapable of lying.”

“He’s very naive,” said Dooley. “Unlike us cats, dogs are very naive, trusting creatures.”

Odelia turned to Brutus, who looked shell-shocked. “What’s wrong with him?”

“Brutus had a near-death experience again,” said Max. “The third in a row.”

“I told him it’s just like those Final Destination movies,” said Dooley.

“Dooley,” said Max warningly. “Not now.”

“But it’s true!”

“I fell to my death again,” said Brutus, as if waking up from a stupor. “I was falling and falling and then I landed on something soft and squishy.”

“A fat human,” Dooley said.

“We don’t call people fat, Dooley,” said Odelia. “It’s not a nice word.”

“So what do we call them then?”

“Big-boned,” said Odelia with a mischievous glance at Max.

Max frowned. “I’m big-boned. But would you call me fat?”

“You do tend to overindulge from time to time, Max,” she said.

“Just like the guy who saved my life, and a good thing he does,” said Brutus. He glanced around. “Um, where’s Harriet?”

“I think she left,” said Dooley.

“I saw her before she took off,” said Max. “She said she was going for a walk. She needed to think and put some things into perspective.”

“Perspective?” said Brutus. “Is that the word she used?”

Max nodded.

“Huh.”

“Okay, you guys,” said Odelia. “Let’s go and see this Mr. Owl. It’s late and I really need to catch some Z’s.”

Chapter 27

Odelia parked her car near the entrance to the park, we all hopped out, and then were on our way to the notorious tree for our interview with an owl. I’d never talked to an owl before, and I was really looking forward to a tête-à-tête with one of these wise old birds.

There’s just something about owls that tickles my imagination. They’re fascinating creatures. Apart from that, they’re also birds, of course, and for some reason cats are intrigued by birds as a rule. Not to eat them, mind you—though there are those amongst my species who will do anything to get their claws on a feathered friend—but to watch as they flit to and fro. In fact I can watch birds twitter and frolic in a tree for hours. I guess where humans love to people-watch, cats love to bird-watch. And we don’t even need binoculars.

I’d told Odelia not to wait—that we’d find our own way home, and judging from the rattling sound her muffler made as she took off, she’d taken this advice to heart.

Parks, and perhaps other public places too, are quite different at night than during the day. Apart from the fact that lovers seem to flock to parks in the middle of the night—I’m referring to Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts in Notting Hill—there’s a preternatural quiet that descends over a park once the sun decides to call it a night. A hush that lies over the area like a blanket. In jungles, nocturnal animals crawl out of their hiding places and create a symphony of sound. In parks? Nothing. Not even the hiss of a snake or the chirp of a cricket.

It’s almost as if all of nature sleeps. Except cats, of course. We gather in the park for cat choir. And already, as we set paw for the tree where only hours before a young woman had met her tragic end, meows and screeches rent the air, and it was obvious that Shanille, cat choir’s director, had gathered her troops and they were all giving of their best.

“Too bad we’re missing cat choir because of this murder investigation,” said Dooley, voicing my own thoughts exactly.

“That can’t be a coincidence, can it?” said Brutus.

“What are you talking about, Brutus?” I asked.

“Perspective! She said she needed to get a little perspective. And all this time I’ve been telling her this whole thing is a matter of perspective. One big misunderstanding. Maybe she’s finally starting to see things my way?”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” I said dryly. “Harriet sees things strictly her own way.”

“But why would she use that particular word? Perspective?”

“Because that’s what people do when they’re faced with a personal crisis: they take a walk to get some perspective.”

“Mh,” said Brutus, not convinced.

It was obvious he’d started to hope against hope that Harriet would take him back. I could have told him this was a waste of time. Harriet was not one to be convinced by an argument. If Brutus wanted to win her back, he’d have to make a grand gesture. And since this was essentially the biggest crisis their relationship had faced since its inception, the grander the gesture the better. What gesture he should perform? I had no idea. I’m not an expert on feline love. And frankly I had other things on my mind. Like finding this owl.

We’d arrived at the old oak tree and stood gazing up at its majestic branches.

“Yoo-hoo,” I hooted. “Mr. Owl? Could we please have a word? It’s important.”

No response. Not even a hoo-hoo-hoooooooo.

“I don’t think he’s home,” said Dooley after we’d waited some more.

Cats have pretty sharp eyes, and I was inclined to agree with Dooley. I didn’t detect any owl in this particular tree. It was, in other words, an owl-less tree.

“But where can he be? Ringo said he was sitting in this tree this afternoon—that this tree was his home.”

“And how would Ringo know what tree Mr. Owl calls home?” Dooley argued. “Maybe he was just taking a little break from his usual tree and decided to try out this tree for size. And when this woman was murdered, he decided the tree was no good and he flew off again to sit in his own tree. Owls do fly, don’t they?”

“They do,” I said, still gazing up. I was getting a crick in the neck but I wasn’t giving up. “Yoo-hoo,” I tried again. “We’re friends of Ringo. The Chihuahua who was here this afternoon? He says you saw the murder that took place under your tree. He also says you probably saw the killer’s face. The thing is, we’re not just your regular garden-variety cats. We’re cat detectives. We detect. And right now we’re detecting the murder of that poor young woman. So if you could help us out here, we’d be very much obliged.”