Nero stayed rooted to his spot. The young cat would have to learn not to be so hasty. There was still something big left to be found. ‘Not so fast. There is another clue.’
Marlowe turned back, her green gaze slit. ‘There is? I skulked around the whole perimeter of the room and didn’t see anything that is not supposed to be here. Nor did I smell anything other than what I mentioned.’
‘Sometimes when looking for clues, it is not what you see, it’s what you don’t see,’ Nero said wisely.
Marlowe rolled her eyes. ‘Seriously? Could you be any more vague?’
Nero simply gave her a blank look.
Marlowe sighed. ‘Okay fine. I’m making another round.’
Nero watched the young cat carefully as she sniffed the perimeter, coming to stop in front of the small bookcase just as Nero had hoped. The bookcase was only two shelves that Millie had stuffed with a few old Reader’s Digest volumes. It looked like Charles had put those all on one shelf and added his own books to the other.
Marlowe turned around triumphantly. ‘Aha! One book is missing.’
Nero nodded. ‘Yes, and from the fact that the victim had placed books here in the first place, I think we can conclude that these books were important.’
‘Yeah, I see that. So how are we going to alert the humans?’
‘We’ll have to draw their attention to it somehow. Naturally they will think they made the discovery.’
‘I know! We never get credit,’ Marlowe said. ‘But how should we draw their attention? Hair ball? Incessant meowing? Leaping in the air?’
Nero watched as Marlowe pantomimed all of the above. He was proud that the young cat had figured out the clues, but she could be a little overzealous at times. ‘I think this calls for something more subtle. The good old pushing-everything-off-the-top-of-the-bookshelf routine should do the trick.’
The police had secured Charles’ room with a large ‘X’ of yellow crime scene tape. Was that really necessary? I worried that it would make the other guests nervous.
Millie must have had the same thought because she stopped in front of it. ‘Seems overly dramatic to have this here. What does he think this is, a scene from Castle?’ She ripped the tape off one side and Mom and I followed her into the room.
The first thing I noticed was that the duvet was messed up. It looked like something had been burrowing in it. A movement in the corner of the room caught my eye. The cats.
I was sure Nero was the culprit. ‘If you put any tears in that cover I’m not feeding you any more of that nice food with the gravy.’
Millie frowned. ‘Josie! That is no way to speak to the cats.’
As if understanding what she said, both cats trotted over to her purring and rubbing against her ankles while casting me angry looks.
‘But they messed up the bed!’ In my defense I had no idea how to talk to them. Should one let them just do whatever they wanted or was there some secret way to get them to obey you?
‘You must never admonish or threaten them,’ Millie said. ‘That will only make things worse. You should speak to them as if they are the superior beings that they are.’
The cats preened and purred.
I looked at Millie out of the corner of my eye. I wasn’t sure if she had said that bit about superior beings for their benefit or if she was serious. If she was serious, then she was crazier than I’d previously thought. I filed that thought away for future reflection.
‘Enough about the cats,’ Mom said. ‘We’re in here looking for clues, right?’ Her gaze fell on a pair of tan pants on the floor. ‘Look, the man couldn’t even pick up his dirty laundry.’
Now what in the world was I supposed to do with those pants? I had no idea what the protocol for dealing with deceased guest’s belongings was. Would the police come and take his things? Should I box them up? How long should I wait? Because judging by the police tape that used to be on the door, I wasn’t even supposed to be in here.
‘I don’t see any computer, that’s usually where the good stuff is.’ Millie looked around the room.
‘I don’t remember him having one,’ I said. Had he? I thought back to when he’d checked in. He’d had a suitcase and a blue paper notebook but no case for a computer.
‘Darn,’ Mom added. ‘Maybe he left another clue.’
‘I say we look to his bureau drawers.’ Millie opened a drawer and started pawing through it.
‘I’ll take the bathroom,’ Mom said.
‘I guess that leaves the rest of the room for me.’ I got down on my hands and knees and peeked under the bed. There was nothing under there but dust bunnies. Not a surprise, I doubted Flora vacuumed under the beds. ‘Just what, exactly, are we looking for?’
Thud.
Over on the other side of the bed, something hit the floor. I jumped up to look. Marlowe was on top of the little bookshelf and apparently angry at the lack of attention. I’d heard that cats could be persnickety that way. She must have decided that a good way to get it was to push the little lighthouse statue off the top of the bookshelf.
‘Hey now, kitty, that’s not necessary for a supreme being such as yourself.’ I tried to temper my voice so it was soft and placating as I strode around the bed and picked up the statue. I was certain that cats responded to the tone of one’s voice and not the words.
‘They can understand sarcasm,’ Millie said from her position crouched on the floor looking in the bottom drawer of the bureau.
I smiled at the cat who looked at me warily. I reached out to pet her and she hissed. I replaced the lighthouse and went over to the closet.
‘No clues in here.’ Millie stood and brushed her hands together. ‘Maybe we should look in between the mattress and the box spring.’
Thud. Mew.
We turned to see that Marlowe had now pushed a candle off the top of the bookcase.
‘Is this some kind of behavioral problem I should be aware of?’ I asked Millie.
‘No dear, they just love to push things onto the floor. Nothing is safe.’
I replaced the candle. I could’ve sworn Marlowe rolled her eyes and looked at me like I was stupid. If you ask me, I wasn’t the stupid one. Pushing things onto the floor when you knew someone would just put them back was stupid.
Nero was much smarter. He’d jumped up on the bed and was curled up on the duvet. ‘Please don’t get cat hair on that.’ I tried to say it with the reverence due a superior being.
‘There’s nothing in this bathroom but shaving cream and toothpaste.’ Mom leaned against the doorframe looking disappointed. ‘How are we going to figure out why someone killed the guy if there are no clues in his room?’
Thunk! Merow!
Marlowe had pushed the alarm clock off the bookshelf.
‘Now Marlowe, really,’ Millie strode over to the bookshelf and petted the cat, who purred and bumped her head up against her hand. ‘She bent to pick up the alarm clock but stopped halfway down. ‘Hey, this doesn’t look right.’
‘What?’ Mom and I joined her. I could see someone had rearranged her Reader’s Digest volumes and put different books in. ‘Ava told us Charles was writing a cookbook, maybe these are his books for reference or something.’
Meow!
Nero had come over for his portion of attention and was rubbing the side of his face against the corner of one of the books.
‘Huh, looks like there’s a book missing,’ Mom said.
‘Maybe he just didn’t have enough books to fill up the shelf?’ I suggested.
Millie straightened. ‘No, I don’t think so.’
Just then Flora sauntered past the room.
‘Hey, Flora!’ Millie yelled.
Flora stopped, backed up a few steps and narrowed her owlish eyes at us. ‘Oh no. I don’t clean crime scene rooms. Anything with police tape I don’t go in.’
‘We don’t want you to clean,’ Millie pulled her into the room and dragged her over to the bookcase. ‘Do you remember if this shelf was full?’
‘You remember that it was full?’ I asked.
‘Nah, my memory isn’t that great. But look at the dust on the edge. If that spot had been empty, there’d be dust in there too and that spot is clean as a whistle.’
Five
Nero breathed deep, savoring the delectable aroma of rotting fish. The bait wharf was one of his favorite places in Oyster Cove. It wasn’t just because the fishermen would sometimes throw them succulent scraps, either. The wharf had a certain ambiance that couldn’t be found anywhere else. From the sounds of the waves lapping on the dock, to the briny scent of sea and the warmth of the sun warming his back.
It was heaven on earth… well, except for the seagulls. They were partial to the bait dock too and, as far as Nero was concerned, created an incessant nuisance with their constant swooping and cawing. A cat had to be careful lest he get knocked into the water. No cat liked that, except for Harry, who loved the occasional saltwater bath.
A shadow darkened Nero’s path from above, and the loud gull cry made him cringe. He crouched, ready to dart under something, but the gull flew past. Looking up into the sky, Nero felt a tinge of sadness. There were fewer gulls than last week and even though he wished they would go swoop somewhere else, he still didn’t like the way their numbers were mysteriously dwindling. He didn’t want them to die off, just to tend to their business elsewhere. Still, he was glad there were no dead gulls at the wharf, last week they’d seen a gull body floating in the water and it was a most unpleasant sight.
Milling about in their usual spot, behind a stack of lobster pots, were five cats. The largest one, a solid gray cat named Poe, was sitting atop an old lobster pot, watching a fishing boat make its way out of the harbor and into the Atlantic.
On the ground next to the pot, Stubbs, an orange striped cat named such because his tail was a short stub, sniffed around the lobster pot for any old scraps of bait. The rumor about him was his tail had been chopped off with a cleaver when he’d been caught stealing an oxtail right from the butcher’s shop, but Stubbs would neither confirm nor deny this.
Boots, a black cat with white paws and somewhat of a snobby attitude sat in the sun grooming his whiskers, as he often did. His whiskers were elegantly long and thick, and they were his pride and joy. Nero had to admit they were lovely, but they were just whiskers after all. The way Boots carried on about them you’d think they were made of gold.
Harry, the large fluffy Maine Coon, was flopped down in the sun snoozing while Juliette, a fluffy gray cat with a white diamond on her forehead, groomed her tail in a quite unladylike manner.
The cats stopped their activities as Nero and Marlowe approached.
‘Heard someone got iced up at the guesthouse,’ Stubbs said. He was prone to using hard-boiled detective slang and Nero often thought that Stubbs’ owner must read too many Dashiell Hammett novels aloud. Then again, perhaps that was why the cat was such a good detective.
‘Unfortunately, it’s true.’ Marlowe trotted over to the lobster pot and peeked inside.
‘Was it murder?’ Boots gave his long whisker an extra tug to emphasize the last word.
Nero’s gut clenched. He was embarrassed that a murder had happened under his very nose. ‘Yes, it was.’
‘Did you see it happen?’ Harry stretched, humping his back up with his front legs out in front of him before trotting over to sit in the circle the cats had formed.
Nero and Marlowe exchanged a guilty glance. ‘Neither of us was present at the time.’
‘So you don’t know who the culprit is?’ Poe asked.
Nero shook his head.
‘How was it done? Poison? Gunshot? Stabbed?’ Harry asked.
‘Bludgeoned with a newel post,’ Nero answered.
‘Nasty,’ Juliette shuddered.
‘Who was the vic?’ Stubbs asked.
‘One of the guests at the inn. Charles Prescott,’ Marlowe said.
‘And you didn’t notice anyone unusual? Who’s been hanging around there?’ Poe asked.
‘Well, there is Mike, Millie’s nephew,’ Marlowe said.
‘Oh, not Mike,’ Juliette said. ‘He’s much too handsome. And besides, we all know Millie is one of the good ones and therefore Mike must be too.’
Poe frowned. ‘Yes, but what about the new one, Josie? Of course, we all love Rose and Millie, but Josie is an unknown. She’s from away.’
‘She’s not from away.’ Nero felt obligated to defend the new guesthouse keeper even if he wasn’t exactly sure that he liked her himself. ‘She was raised here and moved away to raise her own litter. Now she’s back where she belongs.’
Boots raised a brow. ‘So you two like and trust this new human?’
‘Sort of,’ Marlowe ignored the warning look from Nero. ‘She did mention she owned us… she’s not quite pet-broken yet.’
Harry laughed. ‘Owned you? She’s new to serving cats then?’
Nero nodded. ‘She sort of came with the house when Millie entrusted it to us. We still have much training to do.’
‘Have you tried the severed mouse head routine?’ Harry asked.
‘Not yet. We’re still breaking her in.’
‘What about the pet and scratch routine?’ Sonny referred to the typical routine of acting like you wanted the person to pet you and then scratching them when they did.
‘I’ve done that a few times,’ Marlowe said. ‘It seemed to put her in her place, but then she didn’t want to pet me anymore.’
‘How about refusing to eat? So that she has to bribe you with tasty morsels?’ Stubbs asked. ‘That one always sets the tone as to who is master.’
‘We might try that next.’ Truth was, Nero enjoyed eating too much to try that one. ‘Let’s keep on task here though. We must focus on finding the killer. If we don’t, we may not be training Josie at all, or even have a guesthouse to live in.’
The cats nodded somberly.
‘So you want us to do the usual? Keep our eyes open and scour the town for clues?’ Harry asked.
This wasn’t the first crime the cats had solved. Of course, the humans didn’t realize the cats’ involvement. Nero often thought it would be so much easier if humans would just be more aware. The human’s lack of cat-communication skills made the cats job that much harder because they had to practically hit the humans over the head with clues to make them think it was their idea.
‘Yes, but first I need to know if any of you saw anything out of the ordinary last night,’ Nero said.
The cats watched a sailboat glide past, cutting through the water silently as it made its way under the footbridge at the head of the cove and out past the jetty.
Finally, Juliette spoke. ‘It wasn’t last night, but I saw a man up on the cliffs the night before that. It’s quite unusual to see anyone up there, as the path to the cliffs is steep and treacherous.’ Juliette lived with their feline friend Julie at the rectory of St. Michael’s church, which was below the cliffs. She often cat-napped in the belfry, which afforded a birds-eye view of the cliffs. That was when the two cats weren’t wreaking havoc in the rectory by spooling toilet paper off the rolls.
‘Are you sure it was a man? It might have been Barbara Littlefield. You know how she mothers that Lousewort.’
The cats all made a face at the mention of the noxious herb. Lousewort smelled like wet dogs and tasted even worse.
Juliette narrowed her luminescent blue eyes. ‘Of course I’m sure. I have excellent vision. It was a man and he was short, fat and bald.’
‘That sounds like Charles,’ Marlowe said.
‘And that would explain why he smelled like wet dogs and seagulls,’ Nero added. All the cats knew the seagulls nested near the cliffs and liked to eat the flockenberries that grew on the cliffside.
Nero nodded sagely. ‘Indeed, but what was he doing up there and why would that have anything to do with his death?’
‘We’ll have to sniff around town and see what we can dig up,’ Boots said.
‘I’ll listen in on Father Timothy’s confessions. Perhaps the culprit will confess,’ Juliette offered.
‘If only it would be that easy.’ Boots preened his mustache. ‘What we need to do is set our superior brains to thinking of the solution. Are there any other clues?’
‘Only a missing cookbook,’ Nero said. ‘Oh, and it appears that someone was trying to cover the crime up and make it look like an accident. Someone had sabotaged the stairs at the guesthouse to make it look like the victim fell.’
‘And it almost worked except Nero here discovered the truth and we showed the clue to the Sheriff,’ Marlowe said proudly.
‘The Sheriff does need a certain amount of… help,’ Stubbs said.
‘That’s why we need to get cracking on this.’ Nero swished his tail with urgency. ‘We need to find out if there was anything going on with the victim and someone in town. He must have been up to something to get himself killed. Can I count on you guys to scour the town, eavesdrop on all conversations and report back if you hear anything?’
‘Yes!’
‘Certainly.’
‘Of course.’
‘Consider it done.’
‘Good.’ Nero surveyed his gang of feline friends with pride. If there was something to be discovered about Charles’ behavior, they’d ferret it out. He also knew the most important clues would be closer to home. ‘Meanwhile, Marlowe and I will go sniff around the guesthouse and see what we can dig up.’
I didn’t see any sense in doing something that would cause Seth Chamberlain to suspect me any more than he already did, so I was reattaching the crime scene tape to the door when Ava Grantham came down the hall and caught us.
‘Doing a little amateur detective work?’ At first I was worried she might be the type who would tell the police that we were in the room, but her tone was laced with curiosity and her eyes sparkled with mischief, so I doubted she disapproved.
A Twist in the Tail: An absolutely purrfect cozy mystery (The Oyster Cove Guesthouse Book 1) Page 4
