Barking Detective 04 - The Chihuahua Always Sniffs Twice

by Waverly Curtis

  He rolled back over and tried to stretch, but his feet just ran into the armrest of the rear passenger door. “What a bunch of BS,” he thought, grabbing the back of the front seat and pulling himself up to a sitting position. The blaze of light intensified as he got level with the car windows. Slowly, he recognized that his sensitivity to the light and his dry mouth and the thumping in his head were the signs of a hangover.

  What the devil was Jimmy G doing last night, he asked himself as he dragged himself out of the car and took his bearings. He was standing in a huge parking lot, full of cars, the metal sparkling in the sun. Far off was a large building he recognized as the casino. That’s when it came back to him: he had spent the night drinking and gambling, stumbling out of the casino just as the sun was coming up, too wasted to get in his car and drive.

  And drive where? He remembered now he had been staying with a good-looking hippie chick in a motel the night before. But she had betrayed him. Taking naked photos of other men.

  He looked at his watch. It read 9:30. It was a beautiful sunny morning, but Jimmy G didn’t feel sunny at all. Wasn’t the first time he’d slept in his car. Neither was it the first hangover he’d had. Or the first dame who had betrayed him.

  But maybe she hadn’t betrayed him, he thought. Maybe she just liked to take photos of naked men. After all, she was an artist. Artists did that kind of thing all the time.

  Jimmy G climbed into the front seat and poked around in the ashtray until he found a stogie. He fired it up and puffed on it like mad. His next move would have to involve gallons of caffeine. And perhaps a little hair of the dog. He could find both at the casino.

  But what was his next move with the dame? He figured he hadn’t really given her a chance. Maybe she could explain those photos to Jimmy G. He pulled the camera out of the glove compartment and manipulated the buttons to look at the photos.

  He winced when he got to the photos of the other guy. Who was this naked, blond-haired, bronze-bodied, pearly-toothed Adonis, anyway? But this time, he kept on going back. And sure enough, the photos that preceded the male model, for that’s how Jimmy G now thought of him, were innocent enough: an old red barn in a field of lavender, a black-and-white dog sitting poised by a sign that read LOST LAKES LAVENDER FARM, a plate of cookies beside a white picket fence. Nice angles, he thought. She clearly had the artistic eye. Which must be why she had fallen for Jimmy G.

  And he had blown it. Made off with her camera. Stood her up. He needed to make it up to her. Give her a second chance. And he knew where to find her. He would head off to Lost Lakes Lavender Farm just as soon as he was presentable. He got out of the car, tucking the camera in his pocket, and ambled off toward the casino.

  Chapter 41

  I woke up from a wonderful dream and realized that my dream had actually come true. I was gazing at the sleeping form of my handsome boyfriend. Felix lay sprawled on his back, one arm flung over my side. Pepe was curled up against my back, and I could hear Albert purring from above my head. The sun was shining, and the room smelled like roses.

  Pepe can always tell when I wake up. I don’t know how he knows, but he does. I wanted to prolong the moment, but as soon as he sensed I was awake, he jumped down from the bed and ran to the door and started scratching on it. Next thing I knew, Felix’s dog, Fuzzy, had joined him, whining softly.

  Felix opened his warm, dark eyes and asked, “Is this what it would be like to have kids?”

  “Probably,” I told him.

  “No!” blurted Pepe. “Niños would have already peed their diapers when you awoke, unlike yours truly, who waits to pee outside like a civilized being.”

  Felix sat up and rubbed at his eyes. “OK, you two, calm down, I’ll take you out.”

  I smiled. Felix didn’t even ask me if I’d do it. My ex would’ve given me a shove out the door and told me to do it. (We never had a dog, or kids, but that’s beside the point.)

  “Be quiet as you can,” I called after him. “We don’t want Kevin or Lionel to know about the extra animals.” We had smuggled in Felix’s dog, Fuzzy, and my cat, Albert, when Felix arrived the night before. He had to wake me up, as I had fallen asleep trying to read the legalese in the trust document.

  Felix had thoughtfully brought a picnic: a French baguette, some grapes, a delicious cheese, and a bottle of white wine, which meant we could eat in the room with the animals. After the dinner, we took a stroll along the waterfront, with the two dogs, before returning to the room to try out the fabulously huge bathtub, which was a nice prelude to several hours of satisfying sex, with the animals locked in the bathroom so they wouldn’t disturb us.

  “We didn’t get much sleep last night,” complained Pepe as they went out the door.

  “Well, neither did we, but we aren’t complaining,” I said, smiling at Felix.

  “What do you have planned for today?” Felix asked, when he came back into the room with the dogs. He hadn’t bothered to put on a shirt, just pulled on a pair of worn jeans. He was barefoot.

  “What about coming back to bed?” I asked.

  “As you wish,” Felix said, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me down onto the bed. I was still just wearing the flimsy nightie I had packed for my romantic weekend, a little black silk number that revealed more than it concealed.

  “Hey, Geri,” said Pepe, “we have work to do!”

  “Ha!” I said.

  “You’re pleased to have me under your control?” asked Felix, who I had just pinned underneath me.

  “Yes,” I said, determined to ignore Pepe and bending down to kiss Felix.

  “And it is breakfast time!” said Pepe, hopping up onto the bed.

  Pepe never misses a meal. And he was right. It was 9:30, and breakfast was served only until 10:00 AM.

  “Do you think you and Fuzzy could leave us alone for just a few minutes?” I asked.

  “Only a few minutes?” Felix asked. “I think we can do better than that!” He pulled me down for another kiss.

  “Geri, you forget our mission!” Pepe said. “Boswell’s cat is in the building.”

  “The cat is in the building?” I sat up abruptly.

  “Is that some kind of code?” Felix asked. “Are we playing spies?”

  “Sort of,” I said. “We’ve been assigned to reconnoiter the dining room.” I climbed off Felix, shaking back my hair.

  “OK, Agent Sullivan,” said Felix. It is one of the things that I love about him: he likes to play games. “Agent Navarro, at your service.”

  I put on more suitable clothes—a pair of shorts and an embroidered cotton top—without much help from Felix, who kept trying to take them off again, and without much help from Pepe, who kept nagging me to hurry up. But finally Felix and I arrived at the dining room, leaving the dogs in the bedroom, just fifteen minutes before the end of breakfast.

  Lionel poured us some coffee in painted china cups, then left to get the morning’s offerings: lavender-crusted roasted red potatoes and a scramble with fresh tomatoes and spinach and a dash of parmesan, the plate garnished with a sprig of lavender. Apparently all the other guests had already left, headed for the lavender festival.

  “So what are we reconnoitering?” Felix asked, after Lionel left the room.

  “Breakfast for now!” I said, filling my fork with the roasted potatoes.

  We talked about what we wanted to do during our weekend while we polished off the breakfast and drained the pot of coffee. Felix was fascinated by the idea of walking out to the end of Dungeness Spit, a five-and-a-half-mile-long sand spit that projects out into the bay near Sequim, while I wanted to drop by Carpenter Manor and check on the cocker spaniels.

  “I have a favor to ask,” Lionel said, as he cleared our plates.

  “Yes?” I asked.

  “We just picked up the cat from the pound and Kevin’s already wheezing. You said you could keep him in your room. Is that OK with you?”

  I nodded.

  “I’ll take him in there,” he offered.


  “Oh, no, let me do it!” I said, knowing how Lionel would feel if he saw the menagerie in our room: not just Pepe, but Felix’s dog, Fuzzy, and my cat, Albert. I jumped up and followed Lionel into the cozy room behind the office. The cat was in a large crate in the center of the carpet.

  I staggered under the weight of the huge cat and the heavy crate, but luckily Felix had come in behind me, and he got a firm grasp on the carrier and hauled the crate and the occupant out the door. I followed him.

  Having four animals in a tiny bedroom is not ideal. Having four animals who don’t know or like each other in a tiny bedroom is a disaster. Fuzzy and Pepe have developed a cordial relationship—after all, they helped each other take down a gangster in a previous case. But my cat Albert doesn’t like Pepe, whom he considers a usurper, and Precious didn’t like any of them. Poor cat. He was probably still in mourning for his person.

  Albert took one sniff at the crate of the big cat, eliciting a hiss and an outstretched claw from Precious, and then stalked off to one corner of the bedroom.

  “Why did you ask me to bring the cat?” Felix asked.

  “I’m trying an experiment,” I said.

  “Really, what?”

  “Interspecies communication.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You know how Pepe speaks to me.”

  “And you speak to him!”

  “Yes, and Pepe claims he can speak to Albert.”

  I saw the worry in Felix’s brown eyes. “OK.”

  “And if Albert can speak to the cat who was in the house when Boswell was killed, then we can find out who killed Boswell.”

  Felix pondered this for a moment. “So you are working still,” he pointed out.

  “It’s just a good opportunity to try this out,” I said. “Since the cat is in our possession.”

  Felix crossed his arms and looked glum.

  “It could be a huge step for mankind,” I said.

  “Or catkind,” said Pepe. “They are not known for their services to humanity. Unlike dogs.”

  “Even if you could get this cat to tell you what it saw . . .”

  I knew it! Felix was coming around!

  “How could you possibly use that evidence in a court of law?” Felix asked.

  “We do not need a court of law,” said Pepe. “We are judge, jury, and fury.”

  “Pepe and I will think of something,” I said. “We always do.”

  “Well, it’s worth trying,” said Felix. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Maybe you can take notes,” I said. There was a pad of pink paper on the desk, embossed with the Floral Fantasy emblem. I handed it to Felix, along with a pen bearing the same logo.

  “Pepe!” I said. “Tell Albert what we need.”

  Pepe approached Albert in the corner. Albert gave a few yowls. Pepe muttered. To my surprise, after a few minutes, Albert reluctantly sidled up to the crate containing the Maine coon. He sat and looked through the bars. The cat inside the crate hissed at him again.

  “He is reassuring him that we mean him no harm,” said Pepe.

  “It doesn’t sound that way,” I said.

  “Am I supposed to write that down?” Felix asked.

  “Not yet!”

  There was more yowling and hissing at the cat cage. Then Pepe, who was seated to the side of Albert but out of view of the cat in the crate, turned to me. “Precious is willing to help us if it means we find the person who killed his servant.”

  “Someone killed a servant?” I asked, confused.

  “The person who fed him. I assume he means Boswell.”

  “Oh, of course!”

  “What’s going on?” asked Felix, his pen poised.

  “The cat’s going to help us!” I said. “Tell Precious that is our goal.”

  More muttering between Pepe and Albert, more yowling between Precious and Albert.

  “What are they saying?” I asked Pepe.

  Pepe shivered. “The cat is describing what he will do to the person when he is caught. It involves rending and tearing at the throat with sharp teeth. You do not want to hear it, Geri.”

  “OK,” I said.

  “What now?” asked Felix.

  “Cat threats,” I said. “Tell Albert to ask for a description.”

  Pepe muttered in Albert’s ear, and another round of yowling and hissing ensued.

  “What are they saying?” I asked.

  “I don’t understand cat,” said Pepe. “I just caught a few words. Stranger. Hat.” He conferred with Albert, then turned to me. “Apparently there was a stranger in the house that night. A man who treated the cat roughly. A man who stole some papers from Boswell’s desk.”

  “Oh, that’s great!” I said.

  I turned to Felix: “Stranger in the house on the night of the murder. Treated the cat badly. No skip that. We don’t need that. The man stole papers from Boswell’s desk.”

  Felix looked confused. “Just write it down,” I said.

  “It’s not going to stand up in a court of law,” Felix said. “You’re just pretending to talk to a dog, and then telling me to write it down.”

  “I’m actually translating from cat to pidgin to English,” said Pepe. “And that is more than you can do!”

  “It’s just for our use,” I said. “Go on!” I told my dog. “Ask him to describe the man.”

  There was more hissing and muttering. Then Pepe said to me: “The cat describes a man who wore a funny hat on his head and had brown eyes that bulged like an English bulldog’s.”

  “That sounds almost like our boss,” I said.

  “That’s what I thought,” said Pepe. “I told you Jimmy G was there that night.”

  “What would Jimmy G be doing in Port Townsend?” I asked. “And did he murder Boswell?”

  “What?” That was Felix. “What does this have to do with Jimmy G?”

  “Just thinking out loud,” I said.

  Pepe turned back to Albert, who resumed his hissing and spitting dialogue. Pepe seemed to be able to get every other word. “Papers,” he muttered. “Rough man leaves. Boswell goes to kitchen. Returns. Sits at desk. Drinks yellow water. Falls over on floor. Hacking like he had a fur ball.”

  I repeated those words to Felix, who wrote them down. “The stranger leaves. Boswell goes to the kitchen. Returns to his desk. Sits down, drinks his lemonade and then falls to the floor, hacking and coughing like he had a fur ball.”

  “Poisoned!” said Pepe.

  “Yes, we already knew that,” I said.

  “You already knew how Boswell died?” Felix asked.

  “Well, he looked just like Bickerstaff, and the one thing they have in common is they both drank lemonade before they died,” I said. “The question is, did the man in the hat put the poison in the lemonade?” I didn’t want to use Jimmy G’s name. I still didn’t really believe our boss would murder someone.

  Pepe had another consultation with the cat. “The man never went into the kitchen,” he said. “In fact, the man was with Boswell the whole time he was in the house. The cat said he smelled like wet, rotting leaves.”

  “A cigar!” I said. That’s exactly what Jimmy G’s nasty cigars smelled like.

  “You want me to write down cigar?” Felix asked.

  I nodded.

  “The cat thinks the man put a spell on his servant that took effect after he left.” Pepe turned to me. “Apparently cats believe in witchcraft.”

  “The cat thinks Boswell was killed by a witch,” I said to Felix.

  “A witch who wears a hat and smokes cigars,” said Felix, looking at his notes.

  He held my gaze for a long time. I could practically guess what was going on behind those big, soulful eyes. He was thinking, “My girlfriend is as crazy as a loon.”

  Chapter 42

  A knock on the door broke the trance.

  “Geri, it’s Lionel!” said the voice on the other side. “I’ve got to get the cat up to Boswell’s house before we leave
for the lavender festival.”

  “Oh, don’t come in!” I shouted out quickly. “I’m just getting dressed.”

  “Geri, we should offer to take the cat,” Pepe said. “We could examine the crime scene.”

  “Great idea!” I told him. “Do you want us to take the cat for you?” I called out.

  “Oh, that would be fabulous!” said Lionel. “We’re in a hurry to get to Lost Lakes. Kevin promised to help his sister in the gift shop, and I’ve got to deliver the lavender cheesecakes I made.”

  “Just leave the keys on the front desk,” I said. “We’ll deliver the cat, and then return the keys to you. We’re going to Lost Lakes, too!”

  And that’s how it turned out that less than half an hour later, we were tiptoeing up the steps of Boswell’s gorgeous Victorian mansion. Precious seemed to get more upset the closer we got. Albert doesn’t like car rides either, but Precious wailed constantly from the moment the car started—maybe it was because we took Felix’s old beater of a car, as it was set up for carrying animals, but surely smelled like a lot of dogs. I thought Precious would stop wailing when the car stopped, but he howled even louder, heart-breaking cries that reminded me of how he sounded on the morning we found Boswell dead. Felix carried the heavy cat crate up the front steps as I struggled to turn the key in the lock. Finally I applied the right pressure and the ponderous door swung open slowly.

  The air in the house was warm and stale. We set the crate down in the hallway, with its welter of Victorian objects, and lifted the latch on the door. Precious sprang out and ran up and down the hall, galloping, like a wild thing, like a cat on a rampage.

  “What’s that about?” I asked Pepe.

  “I have never understood that behavior,” said Pepe. “In a dog, it would mean he was full of glee, but in a cat?” He shook his head.

  “Probably he’s just releasing pent-up energy,” said Felix. “He has been cooped up in a crate.”

  Then Precious stopped in midgallop and dashed into a door at the end of the hall.