Purrfect Idol (Max 93) Preview

Raise the Dead!

When the body of famous pop star Polly Parker is discovered at the bottom of a pool, it’s all paws and deck to find out what happened, especially since the murder was a particularly gruesome one. But then Uncle Alec tells Odelia’s cats to stand down and not to get involved in the investigation. Easier said than done, especially since we hit upon a brilliant idea to solve the murder: resurrect Polly Parker!

Unfortunately our attempt at reviving the star hits a snag when our brilliant idea leads to all kinds of unexpected consequences. And when a second murder is committed, things take a turn for the worse.

Prologue

God, how I hate this. People are always crowding me. I can’t even walk into a hotel without the whole thing turning into a circus. I have to be transported from the airport to the hotel in an SUV with blacked-out windows, and even then there’s a crowd waiting for me. I have no idea how they found out I’ll be staying at this particular hotel, but they do. There are easily dozens and dozens of them, and they’re all screaming and shouting.

So the driver announces there’s a change of plan: he’ll go around the back and smuggle me in. But when we arrive, there’s a crowd just as big as the one out front.

It’s impossible to enter the frickin’ hotel!

So we have to get creative. The SUV drives off again, and after a couple of phone calls, we head to a nearby warehouse. A nondescript white van is parked there, and I quickly change vehicles. The van belongs to the hotel’s laundry delivery service. It’s full of fresh sheets, towels and housekeeping uniforms, and I hide in one of the big hampers. My sister places some sheets on top of me, so I’m completely hidden from view.

“How’s that?” she asks.

“How do you think it is?” I grumble.

“You’ll be out of there soon,” she assures me.

“I’d better.” I know it’s not her fault, but she’s the only person I can complain to, so I vent. “Why can’t they just go away and leave me in peace?”

“They’re your fans, Polly,” she says. “They love you.”

They sure have a strange way of showing it—preventing me from walking into my hotel, from leading a normal life. No restaurants for me, no visits to the local McDonald’s, no cinemas or football games. And of course, no shopping trips to the local mall. Normal life was over the moment I scored my first big hit and became an overnight success. It’s been seven years, and the thrill of being famous has worn off. Now it’s just a big drag.

The van arrives at the hotel, the same back entrance. Two burly men carry the laundry hamper from the van inside, nearly dropping me. I’m not heavy—only five foot two and a hundred-and-twenty pounds—but still heavier than a load of clean linen.

They manage to smuggle me inside, and once we reach the laundry room, they free me from my predicament. They lift me out of the hamper like a girl emerging from a cake, and I’m so happy to have made it in one piece that I give them my best smile. Of course, they want autographs, but that’s a small price to pay for escaping a baying mob.

Once I’m upstairs in my suite, I finally relax for the first time since we set out from the airport. I briefly glance out of the window, making sure I’m not seen. The moment they spot me, they won’t stop screaming—day and night. I know the drill, so I keep well back.

There are hundreds of them now, and they all want a piece of me. God, when did my life turn into such a nightmare? Maybe I should just end it and be done with it.

I settle down on the settee, grab my diary, and start writing—entrusting all of my dark thoughts to the page.

Jackie hovers nearby. I wave her away. I don’t need her fussing over me, and I don’t need the nervous energy that comes off her in waves. I have enough of that already.

And so I write: ‘I had the same nightmare again last night. That horrible man was in my room. I know he wants to kill me. But before he gets the chance, I wake up. But you know the worst part? I want him to go through with it. I actually want him to kill me.’

Chapter One

Frankly, I had never felt this good in my entire life. And if you don’t mind me saying so, I think you would probably have felt exactly the same way if you had been in my shoes. Though of course since cats rarely wear shoes if they can help it, that statement isn’t entirely as accurate as it could have been. But I think you catch my drift. Odelia had fed us, cleaned out our litter box, and, to top it all off, she had even decided to groom us by dragging a comb through my wild mane—if my mane can be described as wild. I like to think it’s pretty tame, but then she keeps referring to it as wild and untangled, so I guess she’s either prone to exaggeration or in urgent need of a pair of reading glasses.

I was lying on the deck, having decided to celebrate the happy occasion—that post-grooming moment of bliss—by taking a prolonged nap, when a pigeon flew by overhead, took up its position on the gutter, and did its business... right on top of my head!

And that wasn’t even the worst part. The pigeon then laughed its pigeon-y little head off, as if the whole thing was the most hilarious thing it had ever encountered!

“Hey, you!” I said in response, shaking a fist at the bird in question. “Come down here and laugh in my face, if you dare!”

“Oh, this is just too rich!” the pigeon guffawed, laughing it up. “Right on target! Whammo! I didn’t know I had it in me!”

“Are you trying to tell me you did that on purpose?” I asked, my sense of grievance warring with surprise.

“Of course I did it on purpose!” the bird cried as it practically rolled around in that gutter with laughter. “I saw a big fat target and thought, what are the chances? And turns out the chances were pretty good! Which means this must be my lucky day.”

“My human just groomed me,” I said, not hiding my sense of disappointment at my day being ruined in this way. I have nothing against birds, but at that moment I was prepared to revise my position and consider this particular bird a despicable creature.

“Well, she’ll just have to do it again,” said the pigeon. “Bullseye!” he cackled.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I said, not at all pleased with being laughed at on top of being used as a bird’s personal litter box.

“You know what you should do?” asked the bird, who still hadn’t done me the honor of revealing its name.

“No, what?” I said, not hiding my rancor.

“You should try and catch me,” said the bird, adding insult to injury. “You know, climb up to the gutter and try to punish me for what I just did to you. I mean, isn’t that what cats usually do? Make sure that no bird behaves this way towards them?”

I momentarily eyed the drainpipe and considered the wisdom of such an endeavor, but finally decided against it. I’d only get even more soiled, even if I made it all the way up to the roof. And besides, birds have wings, so by the time I’d have reached the miscreant to mete out its punishment, it would take off and make even more fun of me.

“I’ll pass, thank you,” I said.

“You’re a chicken, aren’t you?” said the bird. “A fat orange chicken.”

“I’ll have you know I’m blorange,” I said with as much indignation as I could muster under the circumstances. “And I’m not fat, I’m big-boned. It runs in the family.”

“Oh, so all of your relatives are fat orange chickens, are they?” asked the bird, continuing to taunt me.

“Just go away,” I said as I got up to inform Odelia of my misfortune. I hoped she would be able to remedy this tragedy that had befallen me. Maybe she could use a wipe or something. Or—God forbid—a soapy washcloth. What I wasn’t prepared to do was clean myself. The last thing I needed was to get a lot of bird poop in my mouth.

“Yeah, run to mommy!” said the bird as I entered the house. “You chicken!”

I took the abuse in stride, knowing the wise cat is the one who doesn’t let anyone get a rise out of him. Though I have to admit, I came very close to losing my temper at that moment. I may be one of the more placid and peaceable cats on the block, but even I have my limits, and this bird had done everything in its power to make me lose my cool.

When Odelia saw me, she actually clasped a hand to her mouth.

“Max!” she cried. “What happened to you?”

“A bird pooped on me,” I said sadly.

“Oh, dear,” said my human. Much to her credit, she didn’t laugh at me or make fun of me. Instead, she got busy wiping off the detritus, and before long, I was as clean as I had been before my unfortunate run-in with this foul winged creature.

When I left the house again, I fully expected to find the pigeon still perched on the gutter, but instead it had flown the coop, so to speak. I searched around, scanning the tree, the lawn, the fence that lines the backyard, but of my horrible foe there was no trace. And a good thing, too. For even though I had politely declined to take it up on its offer to be chased by yours truly, now that I was feeling thoroughly clean again, I was starting to think maybe I should have done exactly that: given that bird a piece of my mind.

Dooley, who had been using our newly refreshed litter box, joined me on the deck.

“I don’t get it, Max,” he told me.

“What don’t you get?” I asked, still scanning the horizon for a sign of the bird.

“The new litter. It smells so nice, you know. But it’s definitely… weird.”

Odelia, upon the advice of a friend, had recently decided to exchange our usual litter for a new variety. It was made of pine and did indeed smell a lot nicer than the old variety. The principle was that you peed on it, and the compressed pine dissolved and formed sawdust that was easily sifted out. The advantages were myriad: no tracking clumps of clay all around the house—with Chase complaining when he found it on his pillow—no sticky stuff stuck between our paws, and much less waste to dispose of.

“What don’t you understand about it?” I asked.

“Well, it feels funny to my paws, you know. Those little pellets? Are you sure it’s safe, Max?”

“Of course it’s safe, Dooley,” I said.

“No, but what if we get splinters?”

“Impossible. It’s compressed sawdust.”

“But it’s wood, isn’t it? And wood splinters, we all know that. And splinters are very painful, Max. Tex once got a splinter in his finger and he cried like a baby. Marge had to get it out with tweezers and he was whining and whimpering the entire time.”

“Trust me, Dooley. There are no splinters.”

He gave me a curious look. “Are you feeling all right, Max? You seem a little… preoccupied.”

“A bird just pooped on my head,” I told him. “And I guess it’s got me rankled.”

His eyes slid to the top of my head, and I knew what he was thinking: that my head is so big it offers a perfect mark for any bird who likes to engage in some target practice. But instead, he said, “It happened to me, too.”

“A bird pooped on you?”

Dooley nodded sadly. “And then he laughed and said I should come after him. Chase him around, you know. And I did, but in the end I couldn’t catch him. I mean, it’s a bird. They have this big advantage in the form of a pair of wings. It’s not fair, and he knew it.”

I stared at my friend. “When was this?”

“Oh, a couple of days ago, maybe? I would have told you, but I guess I forgot.”

Harriet and Brutus now also joined us. They had been enjoying a leisurely time underneath the rose bushes and seemed relaxed and happy, as they often are after engaging in what is commonly termed as nookie.

“We saw the whole thing,” said Harriet as she and Brutus took up position next to me on the deck.

“If it had been me, I would have chased that bird,” said Brutus, “and I would have caught him. You can be sure about that. No bird takes a dump on my head and gets away with it. No, sirree. The wrath of Brutus would have been upon him—big time!”

“Take a lesson from Brutus, Max,” said Harriet. “Listen to him very carefully, so that next time this happens, you can punish this bird and make him regret his actions.”

I had my doubts that Brutus would have caught the bird, so the last thing I needed was for him to teach me how to respond to being pooped upon. And so I respectfully declined to take his correspondence course.

“Suit yourself,” he said with a shrug. “But when it happens again, don’t come crying to me.”

“It won’t happen again,” I assured him.

“Oh, but it will. You let this bird go off unpunished. Now it thinks that you’re a pussy, and it will feel emboldened.”

“I am a pussy,” I reminded him. “I mean, literally.”

“You know what I mean, Maxie baby,” he said with an indulgent smile.

Unfortunately, I did know exactly what he meant. I may be a clever kitty, but I’m not exactly an action hero. I don’t go chasing after bad guys or start beating them up when I have the chance. Then again, I guess that’s more something a dog would do. Or Brutus.

“Look, if you don’t set an example, they will keep doing this to you,” Brutus said, really rubbing it in.

“I went after the bird,” said Dooley, “but I couldn’t catch him. Does that mean he will feel unfolded, too?”

“Emboldened,” I murmured.

“Of course he will!” Harriet cried. “You have to make sure that he learns his lesson. That when he comes after you, he will feel the pain. That’s the only way to handle a rogue element like that bird. So next time this happens,” she added as she fixed us both with a stern look, “you call Brutus, and he will take care of this for you. Understood?”

“Understood,” said Dooley as he regarded Brutus like one would regard a true action hero. “You would do that for us, Brutus? Really?”

“Of course,” said Brutus with a shrug. “It’s the only way to keep this neighborhood clean of the criminal element. A sort of neighborhood watch, if you will.”

“A cat watch?” asked Dooley.

“Hey, that’s a great idea!” said Harriet. “We should totally start a neighborhood watch consisting only of cats. Send a message, you know. No pasaran!”

“Passer-who?” asked Dooley.

“No pasaran. It’s Italian,” said Harriet.

“Spanish,” I interjected.

“Whatever. It means: they shall not pass.”

“I’ll be the first leader,” Brutus suggested as he thrust out his chest. “I mean, I’m the obvious choice, right?”

“Absolutely, pookie,” said Harriet as she sidled up to her mate and rubbed herself against him in an overt display of affection. “Oh, isn’t this exciting? The first-ever cat watch. This is going to make all the difference, don’t you think?”

“We should invite Fifi,” said Dooley. “And Rufus.”

“No,” said Brutus. “Out of the question. I’m putting my paw down on that. No dogs in the cat watch. And that’s non-negotiable,” he added when Dooley opened his mouth to protest. “This is a cat watch. No dogs allowed.”

“But—”

“Cats!” he hissed, thumping his chest.

“Oh, all right,” said Dooley meekly. “Cats, not dogs.”

For a moment, Brutus scanned the skies, possibly looking for the bird who had used both me and Dooley as target practice. He had a sort of resolute look on his face, like the great heroes of yesteryear, and I imagined that the first people to climb Mount Everest or traverse the rainforest had worn much the same look: a look of determination, strength, and courage. That devil-may-care attitude that marks your true action hero.

In other words: we were in for some serious trouble!

Chapter Two

Odelia glanced out of the window. When she saw the four cats seated together on the deck, she immediately relaxed. For some reason, this whole business with Max being the target of an attack by a bird had spooked her. It was probably silly of her, but for the last week or so, she had increasingly felt that she was being watched. It manifested as a tingle that raced up and down her spine or the hairs at the back of her neck standing at attention. When she glanced behind her, there was nothing and no one she could see who would be following her around or spying on her, yet she couldn’t shake the feeling.

She hadn’t told her husband, not wanting him to worry on her behalf, but she had mentioned it to her boss, Dan Goory. The aged editor, a fount of wisdom on almost every conceivable topic under the sun, owing to his years-long experience as a seasoned reporter, had told her that it was entirely possible that she was being followed.

“You are very much in the public eye, Odelia,” he had told her. “I mean, you sign your articles with your own name, and so do I, so it’s not hard to imagine that someone out there develops an interest in finding out who the person behind the byline could be.”

“But should I worry?” she asked. “I mean, what if this person has bad intentions? What if it’s someone I wrote negatively about and they want to take revenge?”

Dan had smiled and placed his hands on his desk. “If I had to worry about every single person I painted in an unfavorable light, I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night. It’s the nature of our profession, isn’t it? And if people can’t take a joke, then that’s on them, not us.” But then he turned serious. “Maybe you should tell Chase. He could organize some kind of discreet surveillance. Make sure you aren’t being followed.”

“I don’t want to worry him,” said Odelia. “He’s got enough on his plate as it is.” She hadn’t mentioned that Chase was going to a conference on policing methods in New York later that month. He was due to deliver a presentation at the conference and had been working hard on it. She didn’t want to spoil his big moment by complaining about some imagined person following her around, which she was fairly convinced this was. She might be a reporter, and she may have written some bad things about some bad people in the past, but in all honesty, it wasn’t as if she was writing for one of the big papers. She was a reporter for the Hampton Cove Gazette, for crying out loud, not the New York Times.

And so she had decided that the whole thing was probably a figment of an overactive imagination and not to get overly alarmed.

Still, she had been incapable of shaking the feeling, and it had persisted all week. Even during her interview with Polly Parker, the pop sensation who was doing a try-out of her new world tour at the Seabreeze Music Center and staying at the Star Hotel, she had felt the same prickly sensation at the back of her neck. Glancing around the bar which she and the pop star had selected for the interview, she hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary. Yet, it still gave her a sense of unease that she couldn’t shake, and she felt she hadn’t done as good a job on that exclusive interview as her reputation warranted.

Polly must have sensed that the reporter was off her game, as she had asked if everything was all right, displaying a level of concern that was touching.

As Odelia started unloading the dishwasher, she wondered if she should set up a follow-up interview and maybe ask the questions she really wanted to ask. She was just putting the cups in the cupboard over the sink when her phone belted out its tune.

She picked it up and saw that her husband was trying to reach her.

“Hey, babe,” she said. “What’s up?”

“I think you better get down here,” he said.

“And ‘here’ is…?”

“The Star Hotel. There’s been an incident.”

Her heart skipped a beat. If Chase called, that could only mean… “Not… Polly?”

“I’m afraid so. She was found half an hour ago.”

“Oh, God,” she said as she closed her eyes.

“You did an interview with her?”

“I did.”

“How did she seem to you?”

“Perfectly fine,” Odelia said, flashing back to the lively and sparkling pop star who had totally won her over with her easy charm. “Why, you don’t think it was an accident?”

“The medical examiner hasn’t arrived yet, but from what I can tell, it definitely wasn’t an accident. There’s… something very peculiar going on with the body.”

Her heart sank. “What is it?”

“I think you better see for yourself.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” she said, grabbing her bag from the dining table. “Should I bring the cats?”

“I’m not sure,” he said. “She was found in the pool. They hate pools, don’t they?”

“They do, but they might still be able to glean something we overlook.”

“Bring them,” he said.

She glanced out of the window and saw that the cats were still right where they had been the last time she looked. Once again, she had that strange feeling that something was amiss—the kind of sensation that makes you check and double-check if all of your loved ones are where they should be. She shook it off. She was in her own home, and if someone was watching her, she would have noticed. Not to mention the cats.

She opened the glass sliding door and said, “There’s been an incident at the Star Hotel. You guys wanna join me while I check it out?”

They didn’t need to be told twice, and soon they were all hopping into her old pickup.

Chapter Three

We arrived at the Star Hotel, and I got a very powerful sense of déjà vu.

“Why do practically all of the murders that ever take place in Hampton Cove happen here at this hotel, Max?” asked Dooley, taking the words right out of my mind.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “Maybe there’s something in the water?”

“This hotel is a death trap,” said Brutus. “And if I were on the tourist board, I’d make sure word never got out about the number of killings this hotel has seen over the years.”

“I think it’s because the hotel staff aren’t always nice to people,” said Harriet.

I stared at her. “How do you figure that?”

“Killers appreciate a five-star service just like any other person, and when they come here and people aren’t very nice to them, they get triggered and go on a killing spree.”

“So it’s actually the fault of the hotel staff that so many murders take place here?”

“It stands to reason, Max. If only the hotel would do something to improve their service levels, things would be different. I mean, it doesn’t take a genius to see that if you advertise yourself as a five-star hotel and deliver one-star service, stuff will happen.”

“I don’t think that’s the problem,” said Brutus. “I think it’s because a lot of the people staying at the Star Hotel are, well, stars. And we all know that stars attract crazy people who want to do them harm. Success breeds envy, and envy often leads to murder.”

“Just because someone is famous doesn’t mean people are out to kill them, Brutus,” I said.

He made an excellent point, though. After all, the Star Hotel did attract a certain clientele, and it couldn’t be good for the hotel’s reputation that so many people had been slain in their rooms or fallen off their balconies. Any regular hotel in any regular town would have had to close its doors by now. But since Hampton Cove wasn’t exactly tourist destination number one along the South Fork, they had been spared that particular fate until now. Unless the death of Polly Parker was the final nail in their coffin, of course.

When we entered the hotel, the hotel manager was the first person to greet us. Since the last time we had been there, they had changed management—the main reason being that the previous manager was now a guest of the state prison system, always a good excuse to leave one’s post.

The new manager was a mousy little fellow with a wisp of a mustache and a thinning mane of sandy hair. He looked panicky, wringing his hands as he met us in the lobby.

“This is a tragedy!” he announced, then glanced down at the four of us and did a sort of double take. “Cats!” he squealed. “Cats in my hotel!”

“They’re mine,” said Odelia.

“But they’re cats!” he cried, bringing his hands to his head and managing to look even more panicked than before. “We don’t allow pets in the hotel.”

“Is this a new rule?” asked Odelia. “There was never any problem before.”

“We’ve had complaints,” said the manager. “Some people don’t like cats—or dogs, for that matter. Allergies, you know,” he added in a quieter tone, glancing around to make sure we weren’t being overheard by any of the people milling about in the lobby. “Can you…” He swallowed with some difficulty, his Adam’s apple jumping up and down like an overactive toddler. “Can you maybe be discreet about the presence of your cats?”

“I’ll head straight down,” Odelia assured him. “Your guests won’t even see them.”

“Oh, thank God,” he said, clasping his hands together and directing a look of relief at the heavens, as if all of his prayers had been answered. As he led us toward the staircase that led down to the pool and spa area, located in the hotel’s basement, he explained, “We’ve had a lot of difficult guests lately. One complaint after another. It doesn’t stop.”

“What kind of complaints?” asked Odelia sympathetically. If there’s one person who understands how upsetting it can be to receive complaints, it’s her. As a reporter and columnist for the Hampton Cove Gazette, she gets her fair share on a daily basis. People who don’t like something she’s written and send a complaint to her editor-in-chief, Dan Goory. Or people who don’t agree with a point of view she’s expressed in one of her columns, even if it’s about something mundane like the weather, and already they’re peppering her with comments. Sometimes I feel for her and the job she’s chosen to do.

“Well, there’s this one person who keeps complaining about noise,” he said as he opened the door to the stairwell. “Even though, as far as we can tell, there is absolutely no noise on her floor—the rooms are very well insulated, you see. And also, she occupies the only suite that’s booked, so she doesn’t even have any neighbors who could possibly be making any of the noise she’s always complaining about. And then there’s Polly.”

“Polly Parker?” asked Odelia. Stories like this are her bread and butter.

“It’s not Polly I have a problem with. That young lady has been a dream to work with. It’s her fans. The moment word got out that Polly would be staying here, they started showing up in droves. Dozens and dozens of them. Staking out the front entrance. Singing and chanting and harassing the other guests. Trying to catch a glimpse of their beloved singer. I had to hire extra security to keep them from squatting in the lobby.”

We had arrived at the spa area, and when I caught a whiff of that typical pool and spa scent, I remembered why I hate pools so much, and wondered if maybe Odelia had done us a disservice by inviting us to join her here. But since essentially we’re peaceable and easygoing cats, I didn’t think it wise to lodge a formal protest at this juncture.

Chase met us in the changing area, where the spa and pool visitors can divest themselves of their clothes, put them in lockers and don their bathing costumes.

“It’s bad,” he announced, his face displaying a grave expression.

We could see that several people were dressed in those typical white outfits that looked like they were about to start excavating an ancient city from underneath the rubble. I could also see Abe Cornwall, the county medical examiner, milling about. His frizzy hair stood on end, as it often does, but even more than usual, which told me that Chase was probably right. The worse the situation is, the happier Abe seems to get.

“I think you better prepare yourself for a big shock,” said Chase, building up the suspense. “I mean…” He shook his head. “Frankly, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“You’re scaring me, babe,” said Odelia with a nervous laugh. “I mean, how bad is it, on a scale of one to ten?”

“Eleven,” he said curtly, then gestured in the direction of the door that led to the pool area. He glanced down at the four of us. “Maybe they shouldn’t join us in there.”

“You think we shouldn’t bring the cats?”

He grimaced. “I’m not sure they should see this.”

Odelia hesitated and shared his look of concern as she glanced down at us. “Can you guys wait here? I’ll go and look, and if it’s as bad as Chase is saying it is…”

“But if we don’t look, then how are we supposed to start our investigation?” asked Harriet, who had become quite curious by Chase’s unveiled warnings.

“Just wait here,” said Odelia. “All right? Don’t move from this spot.”

And so we did as we were told. After all, if it really was as bad as all that, I didn’t even want to see. It could only lead to nightmares, and being as sensitive as we are, that was probably not a good thing. Especially Dooley, who’s more sensitive than the rest of us.

Harriet didn’t agree, and made it known by pouting, which is a facial expression she has perfected and turned into an art form. “It’s not fair,” she announced. “I mean, first she drags us all the way out here, and then we can’t even look? What’s that all about?”

“It’s traumatizing,” I explained. “And we don’t want to become traumatized, do we?”

“I guess,” she said with a shrug. “But it’s not as if it’s the first time that we would be looking at a dead body.”

“No, but this dead body probably doesn’t look like most dead bodies we’ve seen,” said Brutus.

“A dead body is a dead body,” said Harriet stubbornly. “If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. So I don’t see what the big deal is.” Then her eyes widened. “Oh, you guys! I know what this is!”

“What?” asked Brutus.

“Odelia doesn’t want us to look because this time she wants to solve this case all by herself!”

“Surely that’s not it,” I said.

“Just think about it! Every time we solve a case, it makes Odelia look foolish. So this time, she must have figured that she wants to solve the case all by herself, with no involvement from the four of us whatsoever. I mean, it makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?”

I could have told her that it made as much sense as a fly serving as an active detective. But since we actually had a fly helping us out on an investigation on more than one occasion, that explanation probably wouldn’t fly, so I dropped it.

“Okay, so now I’m more determined than ever to take a look at the crime scene,” Harriet said as she took a step in the direction of the pool area.

“Stop!” said Brutus as he held up his paw. But when Harriet gave both the paw and her boyfriend a dirty look, he quickly dropped the paw. “I mean, Odelia told us to stay put, didn’t she?”

“Because she’s trying to hog this investigation!” said Harriet. “And you being the leader of the cat watch shouldn’t allow her to do that, you know.”

It gave Brutus some food for thought, and after a moment he had to admit that Harriet made an excellent point. “I guess you’re right. I mean, I am the leader of the cat watch, so I should be involved in any investigation that takes place on my territory.”

“Absolutely,” said Harriet. “And since we’re all part of the same watch, it’s our duty to look at that crime scene and make sure that we don’t miss any detail that will lead us to the killer of that poor pop star. And since we’re cats, and therefore well-versed in looking at the minutiae of things, we’re best placed to carry this investigation to a satisfying conclusion for all concerned—except, of course, the killer.”

“Of course,” said Brutus. He shrugged. “Okay, so let’s take a look, shall we?”

And so he and Harriet proceeded in the direction of the pool area. When Dooley and I didn’t follow suit, they looked back. “Aren’t you guys coming?” asked Brutus.

I shook my head. “Odelia told us to stay put, so I’m staying put.”

“I don’t think I want to see the dead person,” said Dooley, a look of fear written all over his features. “Especially if it’s as bad as Chase says it is. I might get moisturized.”

“Traumatized,” I corrected him.

“But you’re part of the cat watch, Dooley,” said Brutus. “You have to look at the body.”

“But… what if I don’t want to?”

“Then I guess you’ve officially put yourself outside of the circle of trust of the leader of the watch—which is me. And you no longer are part of my neighborhood watch.”

Dooley glanced up at me. “What do you think, Max?”

“I think we should do what Odelia told us to do.”

Brutus gave us a dirty look. “I should have known. You’re both pussies.”

“Well, that’s a given,” I told him. “But so are you.”

“Smart-ass,” he grumbled, and then followed Harriet’s lead and traipsed where Odelia had told us not to traipse.

Two minutes later, they both returned, looking extremely upset and not as excited as they had before about checking out that crime scene.

“What’s wrong?” asked Dooley. “What did you see?”

Harriet didn’t speak, but merely shook her head. Finally, Brutus was the one to voice what she was probably thinking. “Do not go in there!” he said.

“Is it bad?” I asked.

He nodded fervently. “It’s very bad!”

And to prove that he wasn’t kidding, both he and Harriet threw up on the floor.

Oh dear.