The Mysteries of Max: Books 25-27

Chapter 24

That evening, I was sitting in the window for a change. Yes, I know cats sitting in the window looking out into the street is a cliché, but I never said I was Mr. Original, did I? Besides, Dooley was also there, snoozing and enjoying a pleasant break from the excitement of before.

“I really thought it was a UFO, Max,” said my friend now. “It looked like a UFO, and it sounded like a UFO, so why wasn’t it a UFO?”

“Maybe the people who designed it are UFO fans,” I suggested. I didn’t care what it was, I was simply glad Odelia had gotten rid of it, and had promised us she’d never buy another. Which didn’t mean much, of course, as she hadn’t bought this one either.

“I don’t understand why people buy all these horrible machines, Max. Haven’t they learned anything from watching The Terminator?”

I smiled. “The Terminator is just a movie, Dooley. It’s not real.”

“It looked very real to me,” he said.

I heaved a big sigh of contentment. A cat really doesn’t need much, you know. My belly was full, and so was my bowl, I had a nice roof over my head, my best friend was right next to me, my human was watching television on a couch nearby, where I could keep an eye on her, so as far as I was concerned everything was A-okay with the world.

Chase walked in and sank down onto the couch. “You’ll never guess what happened,” he said.

“What?” asked Odelia, turning down the volume on the movie she was watching.

“Vale and Carew tried to escape. They knocked out the two priests they’d asked to help them come to terms with their misdeeds, donned their clothes and walked out!”

“But you caught them, right?”

“I didn’t catch them—your grandmother did, along with her cronies of the neighborhood watch.” He placed his hands behind his head and leaned back. “What a day. At least they’re behind lock and key, and this time there will be no visits for their spiritual nourishment.”

“Did you get Ida’s Picasso back, and the other stuff they stole?”

Chase shook his head. “Nope. They’re playing dumb. Insist they’re innocent. But they’ll crack sooner or later. Alec will make sure of that. And in the meantime it’s back to insurance fraud for me.”

“Poor baby,” said Odelia. “I can’t believe my uncle is letting you handle what must be the most boring case in police history.”

“It’s not that bad,” said Chase. “But it’s definitely not as exciting as chasing a couple of crooks dressed up like Jehovah’s Witness elders. Here, did you see this video?”

He took out his phone and showed Odelia a video. Unfortunately I couldn’t see from my vantage point, and I was frankly too lazy to get up.

Lucky for us, Odelia carried Chase’s phone over to us and showed us the video. It was clearly shot by someone with an unsteady hand, but it was still entertaining to watch: Johnny and Jerry running at full tilt, chased by a motley crew of crime fighters: Dan Goory, Charlene Butterwick, Uncle Alec, Gran and Scarlett. And the ones who actually caught them were Wilbur Vickery and Father Reilly!

“A regular team effort,” I said.

“Yeah, the watch did good today,” said Odelia as she handed Chase back his phone.

The lanky cop yawned and stretched. “I’m beat. Early to bed tonight, babe?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty bushed, too. Let’s make it an early night.”

And as the humans turned in for the night, Dooley and I were only just getting started. But first I needed a quick power nap, too.

Marge was still smiling when she thought back to the cats and their heroic fight with the Roomba. She should have been upset that they managed to destroy the thing, but she wasn’t. The Roomba wasn’t a real Roomba but a cheap knockoff she’d found in a store off Main Street and had bought for a bargain. Odelia had suggested getting it fixed but she thought that was probably not a good idea. If the cats had destroyed it once, they would probably do it again. Besides, the poor darlings were clearly terrified of the machine.

And as she walked into the bedroom, much to her surprise she found her husband seated on the bed, a beatific smile on his face and apparently staring off into space.

“Hey, honey. Boy, do you look happy.”

Tex seemed to wake up as if from a dream. “Mh?”

“I said that you look happy.”

“Oh, it’s because I finally found the perfect place to put my Metzgall.”

The temperature in the room dropped a few degrees as Marge’s mood plummeted. She hated that Metzgall with a vengeance. Tex had paid twenty-five thousand bucks for it, claiming it was the perfect investment, and a bargain at that price. She’d wanted to throttle him when she found out what he’d done with their hard-earned savings: spent it on an ugly painting of a hideous troll.

Sometimes she didn’t understand her husband. Really she did not.

And it was when she closed the bedroom door and discovered that the painting of the troll was hanging on the wall behind the door that she yelped in horror and surprise.

“What the…” she said, staring at the thing. So that’s what Tex had been looking at.

“I saw it in a documentary,” said her husband, sounding proud of himself. “Thieves will never find it, as the bedroom door is always open except at night, and we can still enjoy it by simply closing the door and looking at it from the bed.”

Marge stared at her husband. “You want me to look at that thing from the bed? Are you nuts? I’ll have nightmares knowing that gnome is staring at us all night.”

Tex’s smile faltered. “You don’t like it? It is a real Metzgall.”

“When did I ever give you the impression that I like that horrible thing?” she said, her voice rising both in pitch and volume. “I hate it. I want you to give it back to this Metzgaff guy.”

“Metzgall,” Tex corrected her. “And I don’t think he’ll take it back.”

“I don’t care! It’s revolting to look at and I want it gone. Out of my sight!”

“All right, all right,” said Tex, getting up from his perch on the foot of the bed. “Where do you want me to put it? The basement is too humid, the attic too dusty, the kitchen too smelly, and in the living room it’s going to attract too much unwanted attention.”

“Put it in the garden shed,” she suggested.

“But honey!”

“Or bury it for all I care. I want it gone—out of my life—gone, you hear?”

Tex looked like a kicked puppy when he took down the painting and carried it out of the bedroom. Marge shook her head. Men. They really were impossible sometimes.