Рита Браун - Catch As Cat Can

“Ha, ha,” the dog dryly replied.

“Why isn't anyone paying attention to me?” Pewter pouted.

“You said you wanted to take a nap,” Murphy fired back.

“Am I asleep?”

“Pewter, you are so perverse.”

“All cats are perverse.” The little dog headed for the back animal door.

“Where are you going? What are you doing?” Mrs. Murphy demanded.

“Hey, there's nothing in here but two bitchy cats.”

“Is that so?” Pewter fluffed her fur.

“Guess you won't find out what Thomas told BoomBoom.” Mrs. Murphy cleverly dangled the bait.

“Oh, yeah.” Tucker stopped, returning to the counter.

“Well?” Miranda expectantly leaned over the counter.

“Thomas said that Diego hopes to see Harry again.” BoomBoom hooked her thumb under her overall strap. “Has he called you?”

“No, Thomas hasn't called me,” Harry said.

“You know what I mean. Don't be such a smart-ass, Harry.”

“Yes, Diego has called me. Is everyone happy now?”

“You didn't tell me.” Miranda was hurt.

“Because he called last night after our painting party. I forgot to tell you because there's so much else going on. Anyway, Diego has to fly back to Montevideo this week, but he hopes to be down for the Wrecker's Ball.”

“Oh. What painting party?” BoomBoom asked.

Mrs. Murphy, bored with the humans, put her hind leg down finally, swept her whiskers forward, and stared right down at Tucker. “What a pretty doggie.”

Tucker looked up but a fraction of a second too late because the cat swooped down on her, bowling her over. “Oooph.” The dog had the wind knocked out of her and was rolled over by the force of Murphy's aerial bombardment.

Pewter, ears up, inched closer to the tangle. “This looks good.”

“Banzai! Death to the emperor,” Murphy sang out.

“You watch too many war movies,” Tucker snapped as she scrambled to her feet. She bolted out the animal door, Mrs. Murphy in hot pursuit.

Pewter hesitated a moment. After all, puddles dotted the alleyway; but the screams from outside finally lured her out the animal door, where both cat and dog pounced on her, knowing she'd fall for it.

“Nonstop party.” Harry laughed.

“What, painting?”

Both Harry and Miranda told her about the painting party at Tracy's apartment and Tracy asking Coop to see the rope.

Just then the phone rang. Miranda picked it up and Harry crowded next to her. BoomBoom hurried behind the counter to listen in.

“Oh, hello, Mim.” Miranda tried to hide the disappointment in her voice.

“Has my package arrived from Cartier? I sent my tank watch up to New York to be fixed weeks ago.” Big Mim emphasized “weeks.”

“No package today. I'm so used to you being my first customer. Where are you?”

“I'm on my way to Richmond with Marilyn. I promised I'd take her to Monkey's.” She mentioned a dress shop much frequented by ladies such as herself. “I'm on the car phone. Clear as a bell, isn't it?”

“You two have a wonderful time. Bye now.” Miranda hung up the phone.

Lottie Pearson walked through the door. “Hello.” She opened her postbox, gathered her mail, and walked right out.

“Can you believe?” BoomBoom's eyebrows shot upward.

The phone rang again. They all reached for it but Miranda was first.

Miranda picked up the receiver. “Hello.”

“Hi, sugar.” Tracy's baritone sounded deep. “I'm heading back. Need anything?”

“What'd you think?” Harry, leaning over, spoke into the receiver.

“Did you grab the phone from my beautiful girlfriend?”

“No. She's right here. BoomBoom, too. We're hanging on your every word.”

“Oh.” He inhaled. “Heavy rope, climber's rope. You know when you see movies of hangings in the Old West, how the rope has a special kind of noose?”

“Yes,” they said in unison.

“That's what I wanted to see. If Wesley took the time to make that noose, assuming he killed himself, or if his killer did, assuming he was murdered. The noose isn't as easy to tie as you would think.”

“And?” Harry's tone raised up.

“No. A simple knot like you tie when you're tying up a package.”

“Honeybunch, what does that mean?” Miranda breathlessly asked, having regained full access to the receiver.

“That either Wesley or his killer didn't know how to tie the knot, didn't care, didn't have time. Or that the climber's rope would hold.”

“I don't follow.” BoomBoom honestly didn't.

“One of the reasons the noose knot was used to hang people is that it would hold the weight of the body and snap the neck. It's more humane than choking to death, which is what happens if you tie a common package knot. In time the common knot will give even on good quality rope.”

“This gives me chills. You come on home.” Miranda half laughed.

“I will. Say bye to the girls.”

Miranda hung up the phone as the three animals pranced through the animal door, best friends again.

“I didn't know that about a noose.” Harry's hand instinctively flew to her neck. “Choking and swinging at the same time. What an awful way to die.”

“I think we missed something.” Mrs. Murphy quietly sat down on a chair by the table in the back.

“We have only to wait. They're bound to tell another human. You know how they are.” Pewter jumped on a chair at the table and began biting out the mud between her toes. She hated dirt.

“All this talk of death . . .” Boom's voice faded away, then increased in strength. “Roger's funeral is tomorrow. Are you all going?”

“You know we will.” Miranda frowned for a moment. “Now, why would you even ask?”

“I don't know.” BoomBoom's shoulders hunched up, then she relaxed. “I'm a little distracted. Aren't you?”

“Well, it has been a strange couple of days but we may be making too much of it all.” Miranda noticed the tiny mud pellets falling to the floor since Pewter was sitting in one of the chairs next to her. “Pewter, pick up after yourself.”

“I'll clean it up.” Harry opened the small broom closet in the back, fetching the dustpan and brush.

“Well, I'm off.”

“You never said why you're wearing overalls.” Harry knelt down, brushing up the mud bits.

“I'm going to work.”

“What work?” Harry rather impolitely replied.

“Welding. I have an order to make a hen and chickens for Opal Michaels.”

“Better make it a chicken with attitude,” Harry said.

“If I were making it for Big Mim I'd put a crown on that bird.” BoomBoom laughed as she opened the front door.

Miranda picked up Mrs. Murphy to pet her. “I'm glad to see you and BoomBoom are getting along better.”

“She's always made more of an effort than I have.”

“Well, I'm glad to see you recognize that. Remember your Proverbs . ‘A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.'” Miranda quoted Chapter Seventeen, Verse Seventeen.

“I wouldn't go that far.” Harry winked at her.

Mrs. Murphy listened as the tiny mud bits hit the floor. “Pewter, you have more mud between your toes than an elephant.”

“And you don't?”

“Not as much as you.”

“Why aren't you grooming yourself?” the gray cat wondered.

“I'm waiting until she sweeps up your mess. Then I'll make another one.”

“Murphy, you're awful,” Tucker giggled.

23

St. Luke's Lutheran Church, pleasing eighteenth-century architecture with clean brick and white lintels, filled with those wishing to pay their last respects to Roger O'Bannon. The town residents crammed into the pews, the light streaming through the stained-glass windows.