Murder, She Barked

Thirty-one

Trixie? Where was she? The pitch of her barks was enough to wake the proverbial dead and most certainly the sleeping guests.

Ginger and I followed her excited yaps to the door. She waited on the front porch, yipping and jumping up to peer through the glass. When I opened the door, she dashed inside, her entire body wriggling with joy. She planted her front paws on my knees, and I bent over to hug her. Her tail whipped back and forth so fast I warned her that it might fly right off.

When I straightened up, she pranced around my feet, never taking those devoted eyes off of me. Mr. Luciano’s words came back to me. Unconditional love.

I crouched to hug her again. She couldn’t get enough affection. But my joy at her return quickly dampened and morphed into horror.

Her new Halloween collar and dog tags were gone. The Sugar Maple Inn collar with GPS was also missing. She wore a simple brown collar attached to a yellow leash.

Someone had taken her.

Trixie might have been able to back out of her collars somehow, but no matter how I tried to rationalize the situation, she could not possibly have put on the brown collar or the unfamiliar leash.

My hands shook when I removed them. Could they be fingerprinted? Even if they could, no one would bother with two murders to be solved. They’d think I was a nut if I asked.

But someone had taken my little Trixie on purpose. Why would anyone want her? “You’re such a good girl to come back. Who took you, sweetie? Did you escape from that horrible person? C’mon.”

She and Gingersnap launched ahead of me down the hallway to the reception area. She pranced with joy at seeing Casey, too.

I slammed the strange collar and leash on the reception desk. “Look at this! Someone took her.”

He stroked her back and stared at her neck. “Where’s the GPS collar?”

“Gone!” I spoke louder than I should have.

His eyebrows dived into a worried V, and he chewed on his upper lip.

A voice with a charming German accent accosted us from above. “What’s going on? What are all these blankets doing here?”

I turned my gaze upward to Oma. Clad in flannel pajamas and a fuzzy white bathrobe, she peered down at us. Gingersnap raced up the stairs to her.

“Did you see her come in?” I whispered to Casey.

“Sure didn’t. And I haven’t left this general area for even a minute.”

There were other doors, of course, and Oma had the keys to all of them. “I think we need to talk.”

“Liebling, it’s so late. Go to bed.” She hastily returned to her room and closed the door.

“I just don’t know what to think.” I pulled out another inn collar with GPS, as well as a leash.

“Is there any reason your grandmother would have, um, taken Trixie?” asked Casey.

I wanted to scream no! But the same thought had crossed my mind. The timing was too coincidental. “Not that I know of. Now that she’s back, I guess I’ll skip the coffee and curl up outside her door. Is that okay with you?”

“Yeah. You might as well go up to bed, though. She managed to leave and come back without either one of us seeing her.”

“To tell you the truth, I’m more worried about someone getting into her apartment.”

Maybe he had a point. I was so exhausted that someone could probably step on me without waking me. I said good night, and with the leash firmly around my wrist, I collected the pillow and blankets. We walked along the hallway to the stairs. I thought I heard a cat cry. “Twinkletoes?”

Tired as I was, I headed downstairs again to be sure she was all right. We discovered her in the darkened library, on the window seat facing the plaza. She sat hunched, ready to pounce, peering out into the night, emitting an occasional complaining yowl.

We hopped up on the window seat with her. “What do you see?” I whispered. “A bunny? A raccoon?”

If she did, I didn’t notice, because my attention went straight to the lone figure in the shadows just to the side of the plaza. I couldn’t make out anything about him or her, but I knew that person was watching the inn.

I dropped the blankets and rushed to the phone in the entrance. I dialed Dave’s home number. After I told him the situation, he said, “Holly, it’s not illegal to stand on the plaza, even at this ungodly hour.”

“Are you kidding me? With all that has happened, you’re not going to check to see who it is?”

Silence. “Okay, yeah.”

I hung up and returned to the window seat. The person had left.

I collected the blankets again, stopped by the phone to call Dave and tell him to go back to bed, and then headed straight back to Oma’s apartment, where I slept by her door until she opened it and said, “Ja, what is this?”

My sleep-deprived brain convinced me to imagine Oma would be fine. Shelley and the cook had arrived. Early-bird guests were stirring, and Casey was awake. I dragged upstairs, with poor Trixie on a leash so she couldn’t make any mad dashes. Twinkletoes scurried along in front of us. When we reached the top, Trixie sniffed the floor and turned to the left. “Wrong way, cutie!”

She faced me, wagging her tail but not budging, as though she expected me to let her into the storage area.

“This way, silly!” I was too tired to think clearly. I’d look in there later, after some sleep.

We fell into bed. I remembered to take off Trixie’s GPS collar since we were safely inside, and the three of us slept in.

• • •

I woke at eleven, mainly because Twinkletoes was sitting on my chest, touching my face with a soft paw. Either she wanted food or she was trying to figure out if I was still alive. The former, I decided. When I rose and staggered into the kitchen to serve her shredded chicken in gravy with minced egg for cats, Trixie stayed behind in bed, upside down with all four paws in the air.

After showering, I realized that the only garments that didn’t need washing were the dresses. I chose the least dressy one. Made of cotton, it had a white background printed with occasional peach, pink, and yellow flowers that increased over the length of the dress until they ended in a colorful pile at the hemline. Sort of like fall leaves, only for summer. I liked the square neckline, but it might be getting too late in the year for sleeveless garments.

Starved, I roused Trixie and put the GPS collar back on her. The second I opened the door, she ran to the storage area door. She pawed and tried to wedge her nose underneath it.

“What do you want in there?” Twinkletoes and I started down the main stairs. “Come on, Trixie.” She gave up on the storage room and raced ahead of me with the kind of energy I wished I had.

Oma happened to see us and came to the bottom of the stairs. She held out her arms and hugged me. “Casey told me what happened last night.” She placed one hand on my shoulder. “I cannot believe that you would sleep on the floor to protect your Oma.”

“I’m worried about you.”

She held my hand between both of hers. “We will make it through this together. You and me, Holly. Now, go have some brunch. You’re going to freeze in that dress.”

She bustled off, and I turned to the dining area. And who had the nerve to wave me over to his table? Ben. Mister I-hereby-rescind.