Рита Браун: Murder On The Prowl

The hayloft covered one-third of the barn, which gave the space a lighter, airier feeling than if it had run the full length of the structure. Harry, using salvaged lumber, had built a hay shed thirty yards from the barn. She had painted it dark green with white trim; that was her summer project. Each summer she tried to improve the farm. She loved building, but after nailing on shingles in the scorching sun, she had decided she'd think long and hard before doing that again.

Mrs. Murphy climbed the ladder to the hayloft. "Fog is thick as pea soup."

"Doesn't matter. I can smell her well enough." Simon referred to the dreaded bobcat.

"Maybe so, but she can run faster than anyone here except for the horses."

"I'm hungry."

"I'll get Mom to put crunchies in my bowl. You can have that."

Simon brightened. "Goody."

Mrs. Murphy walked the top beam of the stalls, greeting each horse as she passed over its head. Then she jumped down on the tall wooden medicine chest standing next to the tack-room door. From there it was an easy drop to the floor.

Harry, having fed the horses, knelt on her hands and knees in the feed room. Little holes in the wooden walls testified to the industry of the mice. She lined her feed bins in tin, which baffled them, but they gobbled every crumb left on the floor. They also ate holes in her barn jacket, which enraged her.

"Mother, you aren't going to catch one."

"Murphy, do something!"

The cat sat next to Harry and patted the hole in the wall. "They've got a system like the New York subway."

"You're certainly talkative," Harry commented.

"And you don't understand a word I'm saying." The cat smiled. "I'm hungry."

"Jeez, Murphy, lower the volume."

"Food, glorious food—" She sang the song from Oliver.

Tucker, reposing in the tack room, hollered, "You sing about as well as I do."

"Thanks. I could have lived my whole life without knowing that."

Her entreaties worked. Harry shook triangular crunchies out of the bag, putting the bowl on top of the medicine cabinet so Tucker wouldn't steal the food.

"Thanks," Simon called down, showing his appreciation.

"Anytime." Murphy nibbled a few mouthfuls to satisfy Harry.

"I suppose Pewter will be hungry." Harry checked her watch. "She's not an outdoor girl." She laughed.

"If she gets any fatter, you'll need to buy a red wagon so you can haul her gut around," Mrs. Murphy commented.

Harry sat on her old tack trunk. She glanced around. While there were always chores to be done, the regular maintenance ones were finished: feed, water, muck stalls, clean tack, sweep out the barn.

As soon as the horses finished eating, she would turn them out. With the first frost, usually around mid-October, she would flip their schedule. They'd be outside during the day and in their stalls at night. In the heat of summer they stayed inside the barn during the day; it was well ventilated from the breeze always blowing down the mountain. Kept the flies down, too.

She got up, her knees cracking, and walked to the open barn door. "You know, we could have an early frost." She returned to Fizz's stall. "I wonder if we should get on the new schedule now."

"Go ahead. If there are a couple of hot days, we'll come inside during the day. We're flexible."

"Let's stay inside." Poptart ground his sweet feed.

"Who wants to argue with the bobcat? I don't," Tomahawk said sensibly.

Harry cupped her chin with her hand. "You know, let's go to our fall schedule."

Hooray!" the horses called out.

"Nighty night," she called back, turning off the lights.

Although the distance between the stable and the house couldn't have been more than one hundred yards, the heavy fog and mist soaked the three friends by the time they reached the backdoor.

The cat and dog shook themselves in the porch area. Harry would pitch a fit if they did it in the kitchen. Even Harry shook herself. Once inside she raced to put on the kettle for tea. She was chilled.

Pewter, lounging on the sofa, head on a colorful pillow, purred, "I'm glad I stayed inside."

"You're always glad you stayed inside," Tucker answered.

Harry puttered around. She drank some tea, then walked back into her bedroom. "Oh, no." In the turmoil of the day, she'd rushed out with Susan and Brooks, forgetting the mess she had left behind. The contents of her bureau drawers lay all over her bed. "I will not be conquered by underpants."

She gulped her tea, ruthlessly tossing out anything with holes in it or where the fabric was worn thin. That meant she had only enough socks left for half a drawer, one satin bra, and three pairs of underpants.

"Mom, you need to shop," said Mrs. Murphy, who adored shopping although she rarely got the opportunity for it.

Harry beheld the pile of old clothes. "Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without."

"You can't wear these things. They're tired," Pewter, now in the middle of the pile, told her. "I'm tired, too."

"You didn't do anything." Murphy laughed.

Harry stomped out to the pantry, returning armed with a big scissors.

"What's she going to do?" Pewter wondered aloud.

"Make rags. Mother can't stand to throw anything out if it can be used for something. She'll cut everything into squares or rectangles and then divide the pile between the house and the barn."

"The bras, too?"

"No, I think those are truly dead," Mrs. Murphy replied.

"Harry is a frugal soul," Pewter commented. She herself was profligate.

"She has to be." Tucker cleaned her hind paws, not easy for a corgi. "That post office job pays for food and gas and that's all. Luckily, she inherited the farm when her parents died. It's paid for, but she doesn't have much else. A little savings and a few stocks her father left her, but he wasn't a financial wizard either. Her one extravagance, if you can call it that, is the horses. 'Course, they help in 'mowing' the fields."

"Humans are funny, aren't they?" Pewter said thoughtfully. "Big Mim wallows in possessions, and Harry has so little. Why doesn't Mim give things to Harry?"

"You forget, she gave her Poptart. She and Fair went halfsies on it."

"I did forget. Still, you know what I mean."

Tucker shrugged. "They're funny about things. Things mean a lot to them. Like bones to us, I guess."

"I couldn't care less about bones. Catnip is another matter," the tiger said gleefully, wishing for a catnip treat.

"Ever see that T-shirt? You know, the one that says 'He who dies with the most toys wins'?" Pewter, snuggling in the new rag pile, asked.

"Yeah. Samson Coles used to wear it—before he was disgraced by dipping into escrow funds." Tucker giggled.

"Stupid T-shirt," Mrs. Murphy said briskly. "When you're dead, you're dead. You can't win anything."

"That reminds me. The bobcat's out there tonight," Tucker told Pewter.

"I'm not going outside."

"We know that." Mrs. Murphy swished her tail. "Wonder if the Fletchers will find out who put that phony obituary in the paper? If they don't, Mother will. You know how nosy she gets."

The phone rang. Harry put down her scissors to pick it up. "Hi."

Blair Bainbridge's deep voice had a soothing quality. "Sorry I didn't call on you the minute I got home, but I was dog tired. I happened to be down at the cafe when Marilyn ran in to tell me about Roscoe dying. We drove over to his house, and I—"

"Blair, it's okay. She's crazy about you, as I'm sure you know."

"Oh, well, she's lonesome." Since he was one of the highest paid male models in the country, he knew perfectly well that women needed smelling salts in his presence. All but Harry. Therefore she fascinated him.

"Susan and I are riding tomorrow after church if you want to come along."