Cat On The Scent

28

Mrs. Murphy watched a bejeweled hand reach into the post-office box. Playfully she swatted.

Big Mim withdrew her hand. “Murphy, stop it.”

“Hee-hee.”

“Harry, your cat is interfering with federal property again.” Mim reached in once more.

“Murphy, behave.” Harry walked over to the postboxes. She peered through the brass box as Mim peered in from the other side. “Peekaboo.”

“Back at you!” Mim was in a good mood.

Aunt Tally, however, was not. “A sixty-two-year-old woman acting like a silly schoolgirl.”

“I am not sixty-two.”

“And I'm not ninety-three. Or is it ninety-one?” She sighed. “I've lied about my age for so many years, I can't remember how old I really am. But I remember exactly how old you are, Mimsy.” A light hint of malice floated through her voice. “My sister said you kicked in the womb so hard you gave her a hernia.”

The turned-up collar of Mim's expensive English-tailored shirt seemed to stiffen. “Harry and Miranda aren't interested in that.”

“Oh yes we are,” came the chorus, the animals included.

Tally leaned across the divider. “Urquharts conceive with no difficulty at all, of course.” She called over her shoulder to Mim, sorting her mail, “And Little Mim gave you a couple of whacks.” Mim ignored her, so she continued. “I never had children myself but I've spent a lifetime observing them—from birth to death sometimes. I've outlived everyone except my imperious niece and her daughter.”

“I'm not imperious, Aunt Tally. That honor belongs to you.”

“Oh la!” Tally's eyebrows rose, as did her voice.

Pewter, sound asleep on the table, was missing the exchange but Murphy and Tucker drank in every word.

“I never knew your mother,” Miranda Hogendobber told Tally, “but everyone says she was beautiful.”

“She was. Jamie got her looks and I got Daddy's brains. We'd have all been better off if that genetic package had been reversed.” Jamie Urquhart was Tally's deceased brother. “Maybe not these days, but certainly in mine.”

“You're fishing for compliments.” Mim joined her at the wooden divider. “You looked good then and you look good now.”

“Ha. Every plastic surgeon in America could work on me and I'd still look two years older than God.” Her bright eyes darted to Miranda. “Sorry.”

“That's quite all right.”

“You're still a religious nut, I take it.” Tally's smile was crooked and funny.

Miranda opened her mouth but nothing came out.

“This is getting good.” Tucker giggled. “Think we should wake up Pewter?”

“No, let her suffer. We can tell her every syllable and she'll scream that we made it up.” Mrs. Murphy ducked her head and rubbed it under Tucker's ruff. The cat had jumped off the eight-inch wooden divider behind the mailboxes to sit with the dog.

“Tally!” Mim admonished her.

“She is. She quotes the Scriptures more often and more accurately than those jackleg TV preachers. Ought to get your own TV show, Miranda. Make a bloody fortune.” She threw back her head and laughed. “‘This moment of Jesus brought to you by General Motors. If the Good Lord were with us today he'd drive a Chevy. Trade in your sandals on a V-8.'”

All eyes fixed upon Tally, her red beret tilted at a rakish angle. Her eyes were merry, her lipstick disappearing into the crevices above her still-full lips.

“Think Mrs. H. will pitch a hissy?” Tucker took a step backward.

“No. She'll chalk it up to advanced age, then go pray for her.” Murphy leapt onto the counter. “Mim's face is crimson, though. Whoo-ee.”

“We'd better be going now.” Mim put her hand under Tally's bony elbow.

“I'm not going anywhere until I hear what Miranda has to say. You were the cutest little girl in Crozet.”

Harry looked at Miranda with new eyes. It had never occurred to her that her friend might have once been cute, although she wasn't unattractive now—just plump.

Miranda cleared her throat. “I attend the Church of the Holy Light, from which I draw great comfort, Tally, but I don't think I'm a religious nut.”

“You weren't like this while George lived. It's a substitute.”

“Aunt Tally, that really is going too far.” Mim stamped her Gucci-shod foot.

“I can say what I want, when I want. That's a benefit of advanced age. Not that you'll listen. Like Sir H. Vane getting shot. If you ask me, it's a wonder nobody shot that warthog earlier. All this drivel about being knighted. He hasn't done a damn thing. Probably made his money selling drugs to British rock stars.”

“He was knighted. Susan and I got on the Internet to the library of the British Museum in London and searched through peers of the realm. Then we went to the London Times and pulled up a bio.”

“You didn't tell me.” Miranda was more upset by this omission than Tally's assault.

“Slipped my mind. Anyway, we did it over lunch hour.”

“Well, what did you find out?” Mim demanded.

“He built airports throughout Africa in the countries formerly part of the British commonwealth. He built other things, too, but he made the millions building these airports. He is the genuine article.”

“Oh, hell. I liked believing he was a fake.” Tally pouted.

Susan screeched up in her Audi station wagon and hopped out, forgetting to close the door. She was in her spandex workout clothes. She threw open the door to the post office.

“They found Tommy Van Allen!”

“Pewter, wake up!” Murphy jumped on the table to pat Pewter's face.

Grumbling, the fat kitty opened her eyes.

Tucker hopped up and down, trying to get closer to the humans. Harry opened the divider door for her to go out front as she and Miranda walked out to Susan.

“He was hanging in the big freezer room at Good Foods.”

“What? Why hasn't Rick Shaw informed me?” Mim believed herself to be the first citizen of Crozet. And her husband was the mayor to boot.

“Mim, even Jim doesn't know,” Susan breathlessly said.

“Then how do you come by this unsettling knowledge?” Tally asked.

“I dropped by Ned's office just as the phone rang. Dabney Shiflett was fired by his boss for drinking on the job. It was Dabney who found Tommy. He'd snuck into a meat locker for a quick nip and he found Tommy Van Allen hanging from a meathook by a pair of handcuffs. Frozen. Just totally frozen.”

“My God.” Mim couldn't believe it.

“Did Dabney tell Ned how he was killed?” Harry kept a cool head, as always.

“Yes. Shot straight through the temple. ‘Neat as a pin,' Dabney said, ‘neat as a pin.' Can you imagine?”

“People've been shot around here since gunpowder. Before that the Indians used bows and arrows, clubs and knives. Killing is one of our favorite pastimes,” Tally flatly stated.

“She's got a point there.” Pewter, riveted by the news, agreed with the old lady.

“Yeah, but this is—” Tucker was interrupted by Susan continuing.

“The only good thing is, he wasn't pinned on the meathook. At least he was hanging by handcuffs.”

“It's the handcuffs that worry me.” Murphy paced the counter.

“Why?” Tucker's pink tongue contrasted with her white fangs.

“This was thought out. I wonder how long Tommy was alive wearing those handcuffs before he was killed?”

Pewter flattened her ears, then swept them forward again. “Torture?”

“Physical or psychological . . . or even sexual. Those handcuffs bother me.”