Софи Келли: A Night's Tail

Ethan looked down at the little gray tabby. “Sorry, dude, the boss has spoken.”

Owen narrowed his golden eyes and his ears twitched. “I know,” Ethan said, a conspiratorial edge to his voice. “She’s been on me about my diet my entire life.”

Ethan got a kick out of how the cats responded when he talked to them. Part of that was that I talked to them all the time. They were used to having to hold up their end of a conversation even if it was just by tipping their furry heads to one side and making occasional sounds that seemed to indicate that they were listening. And part of it was that Owen and Hercules weren’t exactly ordinary cats . That was something I kept very much to myself.

Aside from the fact that they had been feral when I found them and didn’t handle people other than me touching them very well, the boys had certain skills that regular cats didn’t have. Owen could become invisible at will. It had seemed so shocking the first time I’d realized what he could do, and now it was no big deal—for the most part. Hercules, on the other hand—or maybe that should be “paw”—could walk through walls. Any kind of walls, from brick to wood to solid steel. They were no kind of obstruction to the little tuxedo cat. When Hercules had walked directly through a heavy, solid door into a meeting room at the library I wasn’t sure if I was hallucinating or having some kind of breakdown.

I also had the feeling that both Owen and Hercules understood a lot more of what was said to them than probably even I knew. Given their other talents, it didn’t seem that far-fetched. Luckily for me, my friends were all cat people. No one thought me talking to the boys was the slightest bit odd. Owen adored Maggie, who returned his affection by keeping him in yellow catnip chickens. Hercules had befriended both Rebecca and Everett, who were our backyard neighbors. And both cats had formed a bond with my friend Ruby, an artist and photographer who had taken a series of photographs of the two of them for what had turned out to be a very successful promotional calendar for the town. The one person they were somewhat iffy about was Roma. She was the town veterinarian, so not only was she always reprimanding anyone who fed them people food, she was also the person who administered their shots.

“I’m leaving,” I said to the room in general. “Are we still on for lunch?”

Ethan nodded over the top of his coffee cup.

“Okay, I’ll see you at Eric’s.” I mock-glared at all three of them. “Try to stay out of trouble.” All of them gave me their best innocent looks. I was not fooled.

Mountain Road, where my little white farmhouse was, curved in toward the center of town, so as I drove down the hill the roof of the library building came into view. The two-story brick building, which had originally been built in 1912, sat near the midpoint of a curve of shoreline and was protected from the water by a sturdy rock wall. The library featured an original stained-glass window at one end and a copper-roofed cupola, complete with the restored wrought-iron weather vane that had been attached to the roof when the library had been completed more than a century ago.

The Mayville Heights Free Public Library, like many others of its vintage, was a Carnegie library, built with funds donated by Scottish-American industrialist Andrew Carnegie. Everett Henderson had funded the renovations to the building, his gift to the town for the library’s centennial, and had hired me to oversee everything as head librarian. In eighteen months I’d fallen in love with the town and the people, and when Everett and the library board had offered me a permanent job I’d said yes.

Abigail Pierce was just walking along the sidewalk as I pulled into the parking lot at the library. She waited for me at the front steps and smiled as I reached her. “How was The Brick?” she asked.

I studied her face for a moment then narrowed my gaze. “You knew,” I said. Mary and Abigail were friends as well as co-workers. What were the chances Mary hadn’t said what she was going to be doing last night? It was her day off, otherwise I knew she could easily have shown up with an oversized feather fan and an offer—again—to teach me how to dance.

Abigail cocked her head to one side. Her copper-red hair was streaked with silver and she wore it in a sleek, chin-length bob that showed off her beautiful cheekbones and blue eyes. Not only did she work at the library, she was also a very talented children’s book author.

“I’m sorry, Kathleen, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. “Was there a problem of some kind last night?”

“Oh, no,” I said as I started up the stairs. “The band was fantastic. Ethan and the guys did three songs as well.”

Abigail’s lips twitched but she managed to keep a straight face. “What kind of music?” she asked. “Did they play anything you could dance to?” She put a little extra emphasis on the word “dance.”

I stared at her without speaking and she couldn’t contain her laughter any longer. “I swear I didn’t know Mary was going to be dancing until after the library had closed and you were gone.” She put up one hand as if to quell any objection I might make.

I opened the main doors, shut off the alarm and stepped into the library proper, marveling as I always did at the beauty of the restored building. A detailed mosaic floor was under our feet and all around the bright, open space was gorgeous wooden molding that had been meticulously refinished or carefully re-created to match the original.

“Mary and Sandra,” I said, flipping on the lights.

“Wait a minute. Sandra Godfrey?” Abigail was already halfway to the stairs. She stopped and looked back over her shoulder at me.

I nodded. “I think there were peacock feathers involved.”

“Sandra Godfrey dancing at amateur night at The Brick,” Abigail said. “Mary had to have had a hand in that.”

“From the very brief glimpse I got, Mary had more than just a hand in what was happening on that stage,” I said.

That made Abigail laugh again. “Great. Now how am I supposed to get the image of Sandra wearing peacock feathers and very little else out of my head the next time she comes in to borrow some books?”

“You know, I admire their confidence, getting up and dancing like that,” I said as we headed upstairs to the staff room. “I couldn’t do that.”

“That’s because you can’t dance,” Abigail said.

She was right. I couldn’t dance, I had no natural rhythm and it didn’t matter how many containers you gave me—buckets or otherwise—I couldn’t carry a tune. “Everyone else in my family can sing and dance, you know. For a while when I was a teenager I thought I’d been left by gypsies.”

“Gypsies who loved books and loved to organize things,” Abigail finished.

I grinned at her. “Pretty much.”

She pointed over her shoulder at her backpack. “I have muffins,” she said, waggling her eyebrows at me, “from Sweet Thing.”

Sweet Thing, a small bakery run by Georgia Tepper, was best known for its cupcakes, but Georgia had recently started making muffins as well.

“The way to my heart,” I said, putting both hands on the left side of my chest.

Abigail laughed. “I thought coffee was the way to your heart.”

I nodded. “It is. Oh, and pizza and Eric’s chocolate pudding cake.” I was still listing my favorite things to eat as we reached the staff room.

Abigail made the coffee while I dropped my things in my office. Then we took a few minutes to go over our plans for the upcoming Money Week we had planned for mid-April. We were going to talk about taxes, budgets and debt. We had several speakers scheduled, including a woman who ran a popular frugal-living blog. There were workshops planned for adults and teens. A couple of teachers at the high school were bringing their classes to the talk about budgets. Before that, in a little less than three weeks, we were going to be home to the Mayville Heights quilt festival, along with the St. James Hotel.