Nine Lives To Die

Outside, snow fell steadily as Mrs. Murphy sat in the hayloft with Simon the possum. Although it was early Saturday morning, the sky remained dark. The horses slept in their stalls. Tomahawk, the old gray Thoroughbred, sprawled on his side snoring, his blanket keeping him snug. The others slept standing up. When Harry opened the barn door, they’d open their eyes, whinny “Hello,” and begin banging their stalls. That sweet feed dumped into their buckets made every morning an exciting time.

The two friends sat side by side, Simon on his haunches as he played with a broken browbrand from a bridle.

“Doesn’t it smell good?”

“Does.” The cat knew to praise his treasures.

“I wish they made blankets for possums.” Simon’s obsidian eyes glittered. “I can keep really warm in my nest, but I’m not going outside.”

“Fortunately, you don’t have to. There’s enough dropped sweet feed in this barn to feed a mess of possums,” the cat remarked.

“Wouldn’t go out anyway. There’s a coyote coming round, especially now that it’s snowy and cold.”

“A male? Medium-sized? Youngish?”

“You’ve seen him, too?” The gray fellow swung his rat tail around his feet.

“For the first time, almost a week ago. He was running across the far pastures. Had a human arm in his mouth. All bones. He didn’t drop the bones, but a bracelet slipped off the wrist when some little bones broke off.”

“All the coyote had to do was turn. He could have killed you all in a flash. And sometimes he comes in here,” Simon added in a dark voice.

“Ah, so that’s the smell. Tucker’s mentioned it, but we weren’t really sure and it doesn’t seem to happen often. The scent.” Mrs. Murphy thought about this. “We’ve never had coyotes before.”

“We’ve got them now. I have to be very careful. They’ll kill and eat anything.”

“Does he try to get you?”

“No. He eats whatever’s dropped on the center aisle. He can’t get into the stalls, so he can’t eat my pickings. He takes anything Tucker drops, too. He only comes when the back door is open, so he won’t be in here in the bitter cold.”

“Have you ever talked to him?” the tiger cat asked.

“No. I just watch. He’ll keep coming close until spring. Game is hard to find now, but he must be a successful hunter, because he’s not ribby.”

“Smart.” The cat half closed her eyes. “Not as smart as a fox, but smart.”

“Pewter ever make up with the fox in the west pasture?” Simon had heard from Pewter all about the torrent of insults the cat had endured last fall.

“Pewter hasn’t even made up with Tucker.” Mrs. Murphy laughed.

Simon, laughing as well, said, “Pewter always has to be the center of attention. Good or bad.”

“Our very own diva.”

Later, back in the house, everyone now awake, Mrs. Murphy told her two companions what Simon saw.

“Tucker, go over the garbage after breakfast, take anything that smells good, you know, like eggshells or a package meat has been in, especially if she makes sausages. That odor really carries.”

“She’ll pitch a fit.” Tucker was not convinced.

“Well, don’t do it when she’s in the house.” Pewter waited to hear what else Mrs. Murphy was thinking.

“I’ll still get it because you all can’t pull over the garbage cylinder,” said Tucker. “I can.”

The three animals eyed the cylindrical garbage can with the swinging lid.

“True,” Mrs. Murphy agreed.

Harry put down their breakfast, which halted the conversation. She did indeed fry up sausages for herself and Fair along with eggs and corn bread. After the table was cleared, the two left for the barn.

“Okay, now! Knock it over,” Mrs. Murphy urged the corgi.

“You still haven’t told me why I should do this,” Tucker balked.

“We’re going to take whatever is best and put it behind the back barn doors, off to the side a little. It’ll bring in that coyote. I want to talk to him.”

“Murphy, he’s not going to smell it from far away. It’s too cold.” Tucker sat immobile.

“No, but as he comes close to the barn he will. You canines have amazing powers that way.”

“I don’t know,” Tucker stalled.

“Bother!” Pewter, on her hind legs, reached up, just hooked her claws under the bottom of the swinging lid and hung on.

Mrs. Murphy jumped up and helped Pewter. The garbage can began to totter.

“I’ll be blamed anyway!” the dog cried.

Mrs. Murphy raised her voice. “Right. Help us out.”

Tucker reluctantly trotted over, stood on her hind legs to push over the can. It fell with a crash, the lip popping off.

“Pewter, you take the sausage package. Tucker, you and I will carry the eggshells. I can do two, I think.”

The three animals wedged themselves out of the animal door in the kitchen door and the outside glassed-in porch door. Carting these treasures over the new fallen snow wasn’t too bad, as the snow below had become hard.

“Here.” Mrs. Murphy dropped her shells to the left of the big barn doors in the back.

Her two friends followed suit.

“I really don’t see the point.” Tucker again doubted Mrs. Murphy’s plan.

“Trust me,” advised the cat, fur fluffed out to help ward off the cold.

That night, December 14, the sky was clear. Three days from a full moon, the animals hurried to the barn, slipping through the small animal door in the big barn doors. Tucker really had to squish and squeeze through.

The two cats climbed the ladder up to the hayloft while Tucker waited in the toasty tack room. Clever, both cats opened the hayloft’s small doors just a crack. Usually Harry kept them open unless it was very cold, as she liked air to circulate over the stored hay. Horses need clean air, too. Building a too-tight barn was a typical mistake of someone who did not grow up with horses, the result being respiratory problems. Fair dealt with this all the time. He often felt that he was teaching Horse Care 101.

Simon snuggled in his nest, a tidy deep hole in a back hay bale.

“Here he comes,” Mrs. Murphy whispered to Pewter. “Go get Tucker.”

Excited at the espionage, Pewter climbed backward down the ladder, raced into the tack room, woke up the corgi, who then hurried to the back doors to listen while Pewter clawed her way back up the hayloft ladder.

Mrs. Murphy, eyes focused on the coyote, listened to the eggshells crack. She figured the young fellow must be about fifty pounds, quite a bit more than he would weigh if he were in Wyoming or Utah, anywhere in the West.

“Coyote,” she called down.

Swallowing a pulverized eggshell, he looked up. “Who are you?”

“I could ask you the same thing. You’re on my farm.”

“Odin,” came his reply.

“Mrs. Murphy.”

“Pewter.” The gray cat raised her voice.

“Who’s the dog behind the door?” Odin could smell the corgi.

“Tucker. She can’t get out that way. She’s listening,” the tiger cat said. “We’re the animals who chased you last week when you carried the bony human arm.”

“How’d you lose your tail?” Odin called mockingly at Tucker through the closed barn door.

Incensed, Tucker barked back, “I didn’t lose it. We’re bred to herd cattle and we have no tails.”

Knowing he was safe, Odin asked, “So you three live with the humans in the white house? I see them sometimes when I hunt here. They never see me.”

“Be grateful,” Tucker warned.

Mrs. Murphy got to the point. “Can you tell us where you found the arm?”

“Up in the huge walnut grove, not too far. A tree blew over in that bad windstorm. The bones were buried under the tree. Now the skeleton is tangled in the roots. It’s easy to see. No meat, but bones are good for you.” Odin stood on his hind legs, front paws on the barn door. “Been there a long, long time.”

“When Tucker and I chased you, a bracelet fell off.” Mrs. Murphy leaned farther out the hayloft doors, opened a crack, and a blast of cold air hit her. “Did you notice anything else, like a watch?”

“Maybe there’s stuff, but I wasn’t looking. I just wanted bones to gnaw.”

“If you leave the skeleton alone, we’ll put out better bones, other stuff for you back here,” Mrs. Murphy promised. “We want to see the skeleton.”

“Snow’s deeper up there. Can’t get to it now. I won’t bother it, but why do you want to see old bones?” Odin thought this very odd.

“A human buried outside a cemetery.” Mrs. Murphy paused. “Always means evil.”

“Not to you,” the gray-coated fellow said.

“No, but I live with two humans. Bones upset them. We don’t want them worried,” Mrs. Murphy informed him as Tucker pressed her ear more tightly to the lower barn door.

Odin thought a bit. “I don’t understand it, but if you bring me food I promise I won’t disturb the long dead.”

“Deal,” Mrs. Murphy swiftly replied.

“Deal,” Pewter echoed.

“Deal,” Tucker also agreed.

As Odin loped off, the two cats slid back the hayloft doors.

“Thank goodness. That air is like a knife.” Simon sighed, then said, “I’d be careful if I were you.”

“We will,” the two cats promised as they backed down the hayloft ladder to join up with Tucker, who was awaiting them.

The three rushed back to the house, eager for the kitchen’s warmth.

Tucker shivered for a moment. “Mrs. Murphy, there will be hell to pay.”

“Whoever is out there already paid it,” the tiger cat replied.