Дебора Хоу - Howliday Inn

“It happens all the time,” he said. “Besides, just because you look like you wouldn’t hurt a fly doesn’t mean you aren’t capable. I checked into your file while I was being held in the office, and I found out a thing or two.”

“Really?” Taxi asked in surprise. “What kinds of things?”

Chester just smiled.

“You read the files?” I asked.

“Yup,” he said. “Harrison and I pored over every single one of them that evening. And let me tell you, there was some pretty interesting stuff in there.”

I started to panic. I was hoping there was nothing in my file about the incident with the geranium. I mean, it had been in poor taste (and it tasted pretty poor, too) to eat Mrs. Monroe’s favorite plant. I didn’t sleep too well after that one, but whether that was from an unclear conscience or an unsettled stomach, I wasn’t too sure.

Chester must have been reading my thoughts. He looked into my eyes with a knowing little smirk.

“Geranium?” I inquired innocently.

He nodded his head. Was nothing sacred? I thought. Boy, you make one mistake in life and they never let you forget.

“There was also mention of the episode with Mr. Monroe’s electric shaver,” he added.

Boy, you make two mistakes in life and they never let you forget. That one wasn’t really my fault anyway. Could I help it if I thought he was being attacked by an oversized bumblebee? It was a perfectly logical error.

“Clever of you to grab the shaver with your teeth and toss it in the toilet the way you did,” Chester commented.

Taxi looked at me with a queer sort of expression on his face. I couldn’t tell whether he was appalled that I had done such a stupid thing or appalled that he hadn’t been as clever under similar circumstances. He just shook his head slowly and said, “You’re some dog, Harold.”

I decided to take it as a compliment. “Thanks,” I replied.

“Yeah, you’re some dog, all right,” Chester joined in. “So clever you couldn’t even figure out the message I sent you until it was too late.”

“So it was from you,” I said.

“Of course it was from me, you ninny. What did you think it was, a fan letter from Taxi here?”

Taxi looked puzzled. “What message?” he asked.

“Oh, just a little after-dinner reading I sent Harold,” he answered.

“Huh?”

I was getting fed up. I had tried and tried to get Chester to tell me the whole story, but he kept pleading emotional fatigue. “Come on, Chester,” I said. “Tell us what really happened.”

“Okay, okay,” Chester said irritably. “I’m still suffering from mental exhaustion, of course—”

“Would you like to suffer from physical exhaustion as well?” I asked between my teeth.

He picked up his tail with one paw and began to bathe it. “Boy, talk about impatience,” he said.

Taxi whispered to me, “Is he going to tell us the story or take a bath?”

“I know Chester,” I answered quietly, “and he always bathes his tail before he settles down. Don’t worry.”

“If you two boys in the back row will stop whispering,” Chester said then, dropping his tail, “I’ll begin.” And so it was that I learned the true story of the strange events at Chateau Bow-Wow.

“AS I WAS eating dinner the other night,” Chester began, “I felt myself growing drowsy. Oh, no, I thought, how could I be so dumb? I was so worried about staying awake that I hadn’t even considered the obvious. And here it was, right before me.”

“Here what was?” I asked. Chester stopped and gave me a look through half-closed eyelids.

“The food, Harold,” he said.

“Oh.”

“After all, we knew Louise hadn’t eaten all of her dinner the night before. And we knew there was a good chance she’d been poisoned. By that time, I had figured out that Harrison was the culprit, so l—”

“How did you know that?” I asked.

“Patience, Harold. You can’t rush a great mind.”

“Oh. I’m sorry, Chester.”

“That’s all right. Now, where was I?”

“Something about a great mind,” I said.

“Before that, you dolt.”

“Oh … uh …”

“Oh, yes. So it stood to reason that if Harrison had poisoned Louise, he might pull the same trick on someone else. As I say, this thought didn’t occur to me until I’d already eaten some of my dinner and was beginning to drift off. I tried to call out to you, Harold, but my voice was fading. You couldn’t hear me.”

I felt awful thinking of my poor, dear friend calling out for help in the bungalow next door and me being unable to heed his plea.

“Of course, you were slurping your food so loudly,” he went on, “you wouldn’t have heard me if I’d used a microphone and loudspeakers. Anyway, before I knew it, I was asleep.”

“Then what happened?” Taxi asked.

“I slept.”

“Oh,” Taxi said, taking it in. “That makes sense.”

“When I woke up, it was dark all around me. I didn’t know where I was or how I had gotten there. After a while, my eyes made out a window, and with the help of the little bit of light coming through it, I could tell that I was inside a cage of some kind. I tried to undo the latch, but there was a heavy padlock on the outside. Seeing that there was no way to escape, I had no choice but to wait it out till morning.

“When I awoke again, it was light in the room, and I realized I was inside Greenbriar’s office. Suddenly, Harrison’s face appeared before me. I felt my heart pounding in my chest.

“ ‘Good morning, Chester,’ Harrison said. I wasn’t fooled by his pleasant tone of voice. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to put you downstairs for a while.’ And he picked up my cage, carried me down into the basement and left me there all alone. Now the thing is, I must have been near a heating duct or something because I could hear what was going on upstairs in the office. Jill had arrived and—well, it doesn’t matter everything that was said. The important thing was—”

“I know,” I said, interrupting. “I heard it, too. Harrison told Jill you were poisoned.”

“Exactly,” Chester said, looking at me with a puzzled expression. I smiled. Chester wasn’t the only sleuth in the joint, and I wanted him to know it.

“Anyway,” he continued, “he gave her the rest of the day off, came downstairs to get me and brought me back up to the office.

“Later, he took me out of the cage and put me on the examining table. I didn’t know what was going to happen next. But I kept my eye on the window, which was open slightly, planning my getaway as soon as he came near me with any funny-looking instruments. But he didn’t do anything. Just sat down next to the table and stared at me.

“ ‘Are you the one?’ he asked after looking me over from head to tail. ‘I don’t see what’s so special about you.’ Well, the insult aside, I found what he had to say very interesting. I wanted to know what he meant. So I began to purr. I sashayed over to him and bumped my head against his shoulder. I looked up at him with big, soft, mushy eyes, and just when I had him hooked, I got the purr going a little deeper in my throat so that it sounded like I’d just fallen in love. People are suckers for that stuff. Harrison was no exception.

“ ‘Aw, you’re a nice kitty,’ he said, patting me, ‘but you don’t seem very special.’ I almost stopped purring at that, but remembered that I was after something. ‘I was sure you were the one. Doc says you’re special. I heard him tell your family. And your file has got some pretty interesting stuff in it. Still, you look like a pretty ordinary cat to me.’ I wanted to bite him then, but resisted.”

Knowing Chester, I had to admire his restraint.