Himalayan Hazard

Chapter Five

The continuous song of the rain and the unexpected bliss of kitty cuddles lulled me to sleep right where I sat. I dreamed I was Anne of Green Gables taking that first fated train ride that would deliver her to the Cuthberts. A nice dream, considering Anne was one of my all-time favorite heroines.

The lovely dream came to an abrupt end, however, when a horrible shriek rent the air and four sets of claws dug deep into my lap.

“Ouch, careful!” I cried, shooting to my feet so fast that Octo-Cat fell to the ground.

He immediately popped back to all four feet and stood with his tail drooping toward the ground and his neck stretching toward the roof. “It’s my Grizabella!” he said, his ears twitching like satellite receptors. “She is in trouble. We must go to her.”

The shriek shattered the night once more, and I realized then the scream was, in fact, feline and not human. That didn’t make it less frightening, but it probably meant that most other passengers would choose to ignore it.

“It’s this way,” Octo-Cat cried, pouncing toward the door that led the opposite direction from whence we’d come. I assumed this led to the fancy sleeper cars, the ones we couldn’t quite afford but that I had no doubt Rhonda Lou Ella Smith could.

My cat was too worked up now to stuff him back in his carrier, so I grabbed it and ran after him.

He stopped at the door and shouted, “I’m coming, my darling! I’m coming!”

The shriek sounded again. This time it was accompanied by the words, “Hurry!”

I had no idea what we were walking—or rather running—into, but it definitely sounded urgent. We passed through two sleeper cars, then opened the door to the third. When we entered, we found the wailing Himalayan pacing the hall.

She ran straight up to us and nuzzled Octo-Cat’s face. “Thank you for coming so fast. My mistress… She—Oh, gosh. It’s too horrible to even say!”

Octo-Cat appeared momentarily tongue-tied, so I took the lead.

“Can you show us?” I asked, holding my hand out to show her I meant no harm.

Grizabella took a quick sniff and then turned, her poofy tail held high while the rest of her quivered with fright.

The tabby and I followed her into one of the private rooms. The door was already cracked open, and inside our new friend Rhonda lay in a creeping puddle of blood, her flawless cream suit stained almost beyond recognition.

I brought both hands over my mouth to keep from crying aloud when I noticed one of the steak knives from the dining car sticking straight out of her stomach, where she had apparently been stabbed multiple times. But why hadn’t she cried out? Surely, she would have screamed loud enough to awaken me from my dreams.

On shaky feet, I tiptoed across the soiled carpet, careful to avoid the encroaching red stain, and bent down to feel for a pulse. When I couldn’t find one on Rhonda’s wrist, I tried her neck, hoping beyond hope…

Her lovely pearl necklace with the gold pendant was gone. Had the murderer taken it? Did they kill this poor, kind woman just so they could rob her? The thought made me blindingly mad.

I shook my head as I turned back toward the cats. “I’m so sorry,” I told the distraught Himalayan.

“Oh, why? Why?” she ground out. “Why musts humans only have one life? And why must Rhonda’s have come to an end so suddenly?”

Oct-Cat pushed his face against hers, and the kindly nuzzle did appear to offer some comfort. Poor, poor Grizabella.

Even though she was still shrieking and asking various permutations of the question Why? I knew I needed to find out what she’d seen and if she had any idea who could have done this… and yes, why.

“C’mon. Let’s go out into the hall,” I said, not wanting to hang out around a dead body any longer than we had to. I made sure the door wasn’t locked, and then shut it gently behind us. “Grizabella, did you see what happened?”

She shook her head and squeezed her blue eyes shut tight. “Only after. Not during.”

“Where were you when she was attacked?” I pressed, already seeing she would be a difficult witness to question. It was to be expected for a cat, especially one in the throes of an emotional meltdown.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she sniffed.

Well, that direct refusal raised more than one red flag. I’d investigated cats as possible suspects before. Would Grizabella prove to be the culprit in her owner’s murder, too?

“Please,” Octo-Cat chimed in, finding his voice acting the role of my partner once more. “We’re here to get justice for your human, not to judge.”

“Promise not to tell anyone?” Grizabella asked with a sad sniff.

“Of course we won’t tell,” I assured her, and not just because anyone else I talked to about this case would immediately dismiss me as a quack if I started sharing the cat’s alibi.

“I was in the little kitty’s room, using my box. I heard someone enter and speak with Mistress just as I was in the middle of… Well, you know. The sounds were muffled, I didn’t know what she said. I waited in the other room until I heard the stranger leave, not wanting to have to play nice with any other humans for the night. No offense, but you were already more than enough for one evening.” She turned toward me and crinkled her nose. Ugh, cats were so rude sometimes.

“Go on,” Octo-Cat urged with a tenderness he never assumed when speaking with me. “What happened next?”

Grizabella gasped, remembering. “When I came out, Mistress was covered in blood and her skin had already started to turn cold.”

I briefly wondered if I should pet the Himalayan to try to calm her down, but that didn’t seem like the best idea, considering she’d barely tolerated her beloved human’s touch.

“Wow, that’s a lot to take in,” I said instead. “If you don’t mind, let me ask a few follow-up questions. First, didn’t you hear Rhonda—I mean, Mistress—scream?”

“No, she did not scream or even sound upset.” The set of her jaw and the firmness in her eyes told me she had no doubt about this.

“Okay. You referred to the stranger as a she. Does that mean the person who entered was a woman?”

“Oh, darling, I don’t know. All humans look and sound the same to me.” At least I’d been upgraded to darling, although I suspect she might use the same pet name for the help as well—well, if she could. She did seem to understand that I wanted to help and had begun to cooperate a bit better.

“That’s what I always said, too,” Octo-Cat said with a hum. “Until I got to know them a bit better.”

“Yes, I did notice your human can talk,” Grizabella said gracefully lowering herself into a sitting position. “Why is that? And don’t you think it’s just a tad suspicious?”

He shook his head, immediately coming to my defense. “She’s here to help. We both are. Is there anything else you can tell us that might help us figure out what happened to your human?”

“Well, I know what happened. She’s dead.”

Great. We had a dead body that so far only I had discovered, and the only witness was a spoiled purebred who couldn’t really tell us anything, anyway. This case would be almost impossible to solve before the train arrived at the next station and the proper authorities had a chance to take over. Should I still try, or should I quietly alert the staff and do my best to secure the scene until help arrived onboard?

Our train passed through a tunnel, turning the night sky even darker than before. I caught sight of heavy stone walls from the hall window and shuddered. It felt like we were passing through a tomb.

How fitting.

I pulled out my phone to check the time. Just past four in the morning. We didn’t have any stops scheduled until seven thirty. Could we make it three and a half hours with a fresh corpse on board? And who should I tell given that the entire train seemed to be fast asleep?

The light flickered overhead and then blinked off with a startling pop. Oh, great, electrical problems were exactly what we needed now. Well, at least things couldn’t get much worse, right?

This was always a bad question, whether or not I asked it aloud.

Because at that exact moment, the train grinded to a stop right in the middle of that dark, tomb-like tunnel. We were stuck in the countryside with a murderer—a violent murderer—on the loose, and I couldn’t even see the hand in front of my face.

How very perfect.