Рита Браун - Sneaky Pie For President

“You two never went to market.” Tally sidestepped another lunge by Addie.

“No,” said Great Bess. “We live in paradise. Good pasture, lots of water, sometimes grain—plus, the human comes down to feed us apples. Oh, I love apples. We’re lucky. We came to a good person when we were calves.”

“Yes, but back to the central problem,” said Sneaky. “This isn’t a cattle farm. This is hay and timber, mostly. She would make a lot more money if she did run cattle.” Sneaky considered this. “She can’t take anything to be slaughtered. Just can’t do it, so she struggles. Do you know how much money she could make with a herd of one hundred head of high-grade cattle? Let’s say she sold fifty each year and bred back the best fifty, which she kept. At today’s price, and I know this because I heard it on the ag report on the radio, cattle are bringing four dollars and forty cents a pound, give or take. She’d make about two hundred thousand dollars once you subtract the feed and the net costs, et cetera. The four-forty per pound is meat price. Doesn’t count bone. But two hundred thousand dollars is really good money. So you can see why most humans run cattle.”

“I can see it. I don’t have to like it,” Great Bess said.

“Even if reducing dependence on beef meant some cattle would live as companions to humans, herds would be drastically reduced or phased out altogether. Vegetarian ways could mean the extinction of some breeds,” the cat said.

“Sneaky Pie, I’ll be long gone by then, and so will you,” Great Bess bellowed. “Give up this idea. Let humans steal, rape, kill one another. We can’t do a thing about it.”

“I think I can. They are deeply irrational. They need reasoned leadership.”

“Hormones. They’re brainless, really.” Addie noticed the Great Blue Heron, the daddy, flying overhead. “He gets taller every year.”

Great Bess looked up, too. “When he stands and stretches his neck all the way up, I bet he’s six feet tall. Skinny, though. Well, herons are. Back to hormones. Addie is right. Scrambles their brains. We only have that problem about twice a year. They are demented around the clock.”

Tally piped up from where she was sitting on the soft grass. “Is this what our Can Opener calls testosterone poisoning?”

“Rat dog, I don’t think estrogen is any better.” Great Bess let out a belching laugh.

“You’ve got a point there, Great Bess,” Sneaky said. “They’re just a hot mess, but they’re clever. They use what brains they have to justify all their irrational behavior. Well, I’ve taken up a lot of your time. I appreciate you hearing me out.”

“Pussycat, you are a decent sort. You’ve always been polite to us. Give up this crazy idea. You can’t save anybody or anything, including us. Fate, you know.”

“Great Bess, I aim to make my own Fate.”

As the two animals walked away, Great Bess turned to Addie. “Not wise to tempt Fate, you know.”

Up at the house, Pewter was tempting the C.O., who was scrambling eggs.

Tucker slept under the table.

“Come on, put one out for me,” cried Pewter. “Fresh eggs are the best, like candy.”

“If you put your paw on this bowl one more time I’m getting the squirt gun,” the human threatened.

The squirt gun rested on the kitchen sink.

“That’s low, really low. I need protein. Selfish.”

The Can Opener did put the two eggshells on the counter for the cat to lick.

The back door, wide open to catch the breeze, afforded a majestic view of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The less majestic view was of Sneaky Pie and Tally running this way and that for all they were worth while a flock of enraged cowbirds dive-bombed them from above.

“We are not no-counts,” one shrieked.

“Laying an egg here and there in another nest is good policy,” another squealed while executing an impressive threatening swoop.

“Cheap bastards.” Tally snarled as she ran.

“You have offended every cowbird in this state, in the nation!” the original cowbird, who laid the egg in the Yellow Warbler nest, warned. She plunged toward the cat’s head at a forty-five-degree angle.

The racket brought Pewter, Tally, and the C.O. to the door.

Tally barked furiously while Pewter ran out, leapt up, grabbed a diving cowbird, and broke its neck. “Ha! Kill and eat your enemies.”

The flock, however, was thick enough that Pewter didn’t have a chance to even pull off one feather. The three animals bolted into the house to avoid the human, now armed with a broom.

The C.O. leaned the broom up against the door. “That was dramatic.”

The human knelt next to Tally: no damage was done, but the Jack Russell had suffered a direct poop hit. A wet rag took care of that indignity.

“Well, Tally, now I can say you are full of poop.” Tucker laughed.

Tally did not.

Pewter stated the obvious to Sneaky Pie: “I don’t think you can count cowbirds among your supporters.”

“I didn’t think there were that many on the farm.” Sneaky took a deep breath.

“Oh, there aren’t. She went out and sold her tale of woe,” Tally replied. “She blathered on about being insulted. The cowbird insult story is probably making the rounds in Maryland and North Carolina by now. Tomorrow it will have reached even farther north and south. Cowbirds have big mouths.”

“Guess so.” The tiger, chastened, sat down, then smelled the eggs. “I knew you didn’t come down with us for a reason. Breakfast.”

“I get tired of canned food and crunchies,” said Pewter. “I like what she eats.”

“Pewter, you’ll eat anything,” said Tally. “You’ll eat greens with fatback.” The little dog acted superior, a joke, given her indiscriminate appetite even if a bit hungry—which was always.

“It’s the fatback, soaks through all those collard greens. Yum.”

The dog wrinkled her nose. “Pewter, greens are disgusting.”

Sneaky observed the two eggshells on the counter. “Did you get two eggs?”

“Nah, just the shells.”

“You know, if the wrong people get in the White House, eggs will be off-limits.”

“Huh?” Pewter raised her eyebrows.

“Unborn chickens,” the tiger cat declared.

Back to the Land

The lightning bugs, pinpoint divas, had yet to make their seasonal debut. The cats, dogs, and human loved that first night when darting dots, ice yellow and pale green, filled the meadows. While the beguiling insects were eagerly awaited, a mid-May night offered many consolations. Twilight lingered, then night finally came, and with it that dampness peculiar to the night air, fragrances made more potent because of it.

Central Virginia’s springs exceeded the expectations of even those who had lived in this area all their lives. While the area’s fall could disappoint, with little color or a high wind taking away the red, gold, and orange leaves, spring lasted about two full months, with glorious colors, aromas, and giddiness. As the redbuds hit full blossom, an early-blooming dogwood might swell to a big, white bud, light green at the base of the unopened petals. And even with a tight bud, one could see a flaming azalea’s promise. Daffodils, jonquils, tulips, all of them overlapping—some early, some right on time, some late—covered the earth like a holiday carpet.