Leann Sweeney - The Cat, The Professor and the Poison

I still had to bind quilts for promised orders. I make continuous bias bindings for all my quilts and hand sew them on during the last binding step for a nice, neat finish. I had yards of completed bindings and took a green and red tiny print from my binding drawer. A woman in Georgia had ordered a quilt for her cat Saint Nick and wanted, of course, green and red. I’d made a simple nine-patch with beautiful small-print fabrics and added a flying-geese border to this one. Custom orders like this are my favorite.

Long strips of fabric like bindings are a cat’s dream, and I always keep several that my three can play with. I pulled out one of those, and Syrah was on that fabric like a bear on a fish. He grabbed it in his mouth and started to run toward the windowsill, but Merlot immediately snagged the other end. Too bad Chablis was missing out on this game, but she was probably having more fun downstairs.

I sat at my sewing machine by the window. No lake view on this side of the house, but there were the big hickories and oaks with lots of birds and squirrels to distract me. The binding was all ironed, and once I had machine sewed it all the way around the quilt, making sure to miter the corners, I would then flip the binding over the raw edges of the quilt and hand sew it on. This was my absolute favorite part of making a quilt-the part that relaxed me the most.

But I’d managed to get only the machine- sewing part of the binding done when my cell phone rang. The small voice I heard at the other end took me by surprise.

“Is this Miss Jillian Hart?” whispered the boy.

“Jack? Is that you?” I said.

“Yes. I can’t talk loud. I don’t want Mom to hear. Can you come over and help her?”

My heart fluttered. “Is she hurt?”

“Nothing like that. She’s called Candace like a hundred times, but Candace must be so busy with the professor’s death investigation, she doesn’t have time for my mom right now. Totally understandable to me, of course.”

“Totally,” I echoed, astonished again at this child. I wondered what it must be like to be so different from other kids. Difficult, was my guess. “How can I help, Jack?”

“Would you come over? Just for a little while. She’s… well, you saw how she is. And it’s worse because the professor died.”

“I’ll be there as quickly as I can. And I won’t let her know you called me, okay?”

“That would be especially considerate. Bye.”

I made a quick check downstairs and saw Chablis, Dame Wiggins and the kittens sharing the quilt. The kittens were suckling, and Chablis was curled close to Dame Wiggins’s head this time. Syrah had carried the quilt binding downstairs and lay on his back on the game-room floor with the fabric between his paws. Maybe he thought he could tempt Chablis out of the bedroom with the binding and things could get back to normal for him. Not anytime soon, buddy, I thought.

After I turned the TV to Animal Planet for Merlot’s entertainment, I was off. Fifteen or twenty minutes later, I drove down Robin West’s long dirt driveway. I noted a new padlock on the barn and saw that the blinds on the house were all closed. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought no one was home. I slid from behind the wheel of my minivan and felt a few splats of rain hit my shoulders. I hurried to the porch before the dark clouds released the storm that was about to hit.

I knocked on the door and at the same time shouted, “Robin? It’s Jillian.”

Nothing at first, and then I saw the blinds crack on the window to my right. I heard Jack yell, “Mom it really is Miss Jillian.” His voice sounded muffled for some reason.

Seconds later, the door opened. Robin wore heavy-duty rubber gloves and had a surgical-type mask hanging around her neck. “Hi, Jillian. What brings you here?” Her smile was tight, her voice strained.

“In the neighborhood,” I said.

“Let her in, Mom. It’s about to storm.”

I realized why his voice was muffled when I peeked around Robin. He was wearing his surgical mask.

“Sorry to be rude,” she said. “Come in. Nice to see you again.” She opened the door, and I stepped into her ultra-tidy living room. No dust lived here, that was for sure.

“Is someone sick?” I asked, as Robin led me through her living room to the kitchen.

Jack walked beside me, and he rolled his eyes and shook his head.

Robin removed her gloves and pulled out a kitchen chair for me. She said, “Sick? Why would you-”

Jack pointed at his mask.

Her eyes widened in understanding. “Oh. No. I’m doing a little extra cleaning today. Those chemicals can be very harsh on the immune system.”

Jack removed his mask. “You’re finished cleaning for now, right, Mom?”

Robin glanced behind her. A bottle of Clorox Clean-Up sat by the sink. “Yes. I suppose.”

She looked like she hadn’t slept in days, which was probably true, what with the cow and the professor and the stakeout. “You look tired, Robin. Having trouble sleeping?”

Robin looked at her son. “Um, Jack? Would you mind leaving us alone for some girl talk? You can use your computer for one hour, okay?”

His eyes lit up. “Cool. Bye, Miss Jillian.”

He took off, and I felt like I’d already accomplished something. He could have a little fun.

“What can I get you to drink?” Robin asked.

“Water would be fine,” I answered.

She opened the refrigerator, took out a glass bottle and poured water into a spotless glass. “It’s filtered,” she assured me. “And I don’t like to keep the water in that plastic pitcher. Plastic is very bad for your health.”

“You’re not having anything?” I said.

“My stomach’s a little queasy,” she said.

I sipped my water. “You’re upset, right? Because you heard about the professor’s death?”

“Yes. I can’t help but think that if I hadn’t called Candace, if I’d left him alone and let him just take the milk-”

“Let him come on your property without permission and continue to steal from you? No. You did the right thing, Robin.”

“But he’s dead, and see, there’s more. He called me. And I wasn’t very nice to him. And I am so sorry for that.” Her eyes brimmed with tears.

I reached across the table and placed my hand over hers. They were clenched together in front of her and icy cold. “I can tell you’re the kind of person who takes on a lot of responsibility. But you don’t have anything to be sorry for. The man stole from you.”

“And I forgave him, but then on the phone, I just didn’t like what he had to say, and-” She pulled her hands from beneath mine and stood. “I forgot the coaster.”

Indeed, my glass was weeping and had left a wet spot on the table. I was the one who felt sorry now-for her and for Jack. Had she ever been treated for her over- the-top anxiety? Did she realize how much her behavior must be affecting her child?

She took her time wiping the wet spot, making sure the table was completely dry. She then placed a stone coaster decorated with a picture of the White House beneath my glass.

Thinking she might need to calm down before we continued talking about the professor, I said, “Have you been to the White House?”

“Jack met the vice president. My ex-husband even made the trip. My wonderful, brilliant son wrote an essay on saving the environment, and he got to read it to the vice president.” She shook her head, and the tears returned. “He is so special, and I am such a failure as a mother. I drove his father away because I do this crazy stuff, and-”

“Jack is amazing. Do you think a crazy mom could raise a boy like him? You’re doing a fantastic job.” She certainly admired her boy, that’s for sure.

Robin took a tissue from her pocket and blew her nose. “You think so?”