Food Bowl Mysteries Books 1-3

by Katherine Hayton

  “Better reverse the car out before your cat tries to make another getaway, Dicky,” the man at the door called out. “I don’t want to have to stay like this all day.”

  I started to poke my nose out from beneath the seat to survey what was happening, then the front door opened, and a man sat down just above my head.

  Once again, I froze in place, not knowing what the best course of action was. Should I make a break for it and spring back out the back window while I still could, or just stay put and hope that the man practically sitting on my head didn’t see me?

  The car started up and began to reverse down the driveway before I’d come to a decision. That effectively made it for me—I wasn’t about to leap out the side of the metal road-beast when it was in motion. That would kill me faster than One-Eared Whitey!

  I settled back, not relaxing but not too tense, and waited to see where this car would take me.

  My only means of keeping track of where we were headed was my sense of direction and the sliver of sky that I could see out of the car window. If I angled my head to the greatest extreme, I caught sight of a greenish tinge that might be the distant hills.

  Of course, if I just walked out from under the seat, I’d be able to see as much as I liked. Common sense was the only thing that stopped me doing just that.

  The hum of the road beast’s engine settled into my paws and vibrated along my spine. It soothed my muscles, including my heart, which was overwrought with stress.

  Today hadn’t been a good day yet, and it showed no signs of changing. Whatever place the man in the driver’s seat was taking me—I couldn’t imagine it would be much improvement over the last.

  I woke with a start when the car shifted onto gravel. For a second, I thought that I was in for a bumpy ride, but it was just a short driveway, and the man soon brought the car to a halt.

  A few minutes after he got out and slammed the door behind him, I jumped up onto the back seat and took a look at where we were.

  To my surprise, we were just on the other side of town. It seemed to me that we’d been driving for a longer time, but it must have been my tired brain playing tricks.

  Gulping courage in with a big mouthful of air, I scrambled out the partially opened window. Before anybody had time to spot me, I was under the shade of some bushes that lined the drive.

  The man who’d emerged from the vehicle was standing at a side window, chatting with a fellow inside. After a few words back and forth—the sentences stolen by the wind before I could disentangle their meaning—they both moved to the back porch and sat down on a bench seat to watch the setting sun.

  When I was sure that they were focused on other things, I slunk around the side of the house, sniffing and searching for an entrance. When I came to an angled wooden shutter, my tail perked straight up in the air. Whatever else was in the cellar that it covered, Agnes’s clear scent indicated that she was there.

  I nosed around the outside of the door, smelling rust along with the fresh oil on the hinges. If I were a betting cat, then I’d have laid a wager that the doors had rested for a good long while, undisturbed, before recently being put back into use.

  From here, I could run back to my home. If I took a shortcut over the back streets, then I might make it in less than an hour. Evening would be falling by that time, but that shouldn’t stop anyone mounting a rescue.

  Except, if even my human didn’t seem to understand me then precisely how could I raise the alarm?

  I dismissed the idea, turning back to the cellar shutters. The only thing that I could see holding them in place was a long bolt. After a few tries, I managed to get my teeth onto it, then had to let go to wipe the taste of oil off my tongue.

  Disgusting. Almost on a par with that can of evil that my human had put into my bowl this morning.

  Deciding that it would be better to sacrifice my fur than my sense of taste, I rubbed along the bolt as best I could to wipe away the surface grease. Once the scent had receded back to an acceptable level, I gave the endeavor another try.

  This time, I could bear to keep my teeth and tongue in contact long enough to draw the bolt back an inch. After a short rest, I got stuck in again and made some more progress. One more go and I’d have it free.

  The sound of voices sent me scuttling away, darting around the edge of the house even though I knew the men were no longer outside. They were down in the cellar room with Agnes.

  Why had I been so fickle about the taste of the metal? If I’d just ignored it for a while, then I could have set her free!

  While I piled recriminations on my head, the men took turns in saying short phrases followed up by hearty bursts of laughter. Typical. I finally find the two humans who enjoy their job, and it’s a criminal outfit.

  Although I didn’t have a hope of deciphering what they were saying, I kept my ears attuned to the low rumble of their voices. As soon as they stopped, and I heard footsteps moving away, I returned to my previous position.

  I’d been wrong about it taking one attempt. The edge of the bolt got caught at a funny angle, and it took an age to work it free. By the time it popped past the lip that held it secure, my teeth were aching from the prolonged contact with the metal.

  But that was insignificant compared to my victory!

  I tugged at the handle of the shutter and managed to drag it up enough to see down into the cellar. Poor Agnes. She looked much the worse for wear—so tired that she was slumped askew on an old, wooden seat.

  I thought that when she saw the flash of fading sunlight, she’d be pleased, but the face that turned up toward me was filled with terror. Agnes blinked her eyelids while water cascaded down her cheeks. It took me a moment, but then I realized that she’d spent so long in the dark that the late afternoon sun was blinding her.

  Never mind. Once I got Agnes out of there, we could deal with that.

  While I kept a watchful eye on everything in the vicinity, and my ears peeled for sounds indicating trouble, I let Agnes recover. Problem was, even after a good few minutes had passed, she still made no attempt to stand and clamber up out of the cellar to freedom.

  With worry pinching my face, I angled my head down a few inches to see what the cause of the holdup was. After squinting for a few seconds while my own eyes adjusted, I saw the ropes binding her in place.

  No use holding the door open when she was tied to the chair.

  Once more, I had to summon up my courage and pick my way down the ladder into the cellar. Two rungs down, I overbalanced but nimbly landed on my feet. I don’t think that Agnes noticed or, if she did, the lady had the good sense to keep her own counsel about it.

  The ropes were tied in an intricate pattern behind her. Hessian a good half-inch thick—it would take me forever to chew through that. I walked around the chair two times, making careful observations. Despite the thoroughness of the rope tying, I finally spotted a weak point.

  My teeth were already protesting from pulling on the metal bolt, but I ignored them and set to work, pulling on one of the ends. When the first loop came untied, I did a little bit of fancy paw-work to hold it in place while I tugged at another knot.

  My eyes hadn’t failed me. Within a few seconds, the entire structure came apart.

  Agnes gave a gasp and pulled her hands free of the loosened bindings. She quickly dealt with the bindings around her ankles and then reached forward, chucking me in the ticklish spot, just under my chin. My eyes closed in a brief moment of ecstasy, then I shook my head and moved out of reach.

  This wasn’t the time nor the place for such frivolities, and there was still a long way to go before we’d be safe from the kidnapping thug’s hands.

  I turned and stared up the length of the ladder. If my dexterity had failed me on the way down, I wondered how much worse it would be on the way up. Luckily, Agnes saved me from the truth of my agility, or lack thereof. She tucked me under her arm and mounted the ladder one-handed.

  As we got to ground-level, I sprung free and tur
ned to see Agnes carefully clambering from the ladder onto the surrounding drought-affected lawn. She winced as she straightened upright, rubbing just above her right knee.

  I scampered out the driveway, leading the way. Agnes followed along far more slowly, favoring her left-hand side. As she turned out onto the sidewalk, I heard a yell.

  The men who’d held her captive were running straight down the drive.

  Chapter Nine

  Agnes nearly fell as she looked over her shoulder at the fast-approaching men. I ran back up the driveway, trying to trip them up so that she’d have the chance to make her escape.

  Although the men cursed at me, they were too sprightly on their feet to fall for my lunges. They easily skipped out of my path, gaining on poor Agnes all the while.

  I couldn’t let them win.

  The rumble of a car engine drifted to me on the prevailing breeze. I knew the hitch in the ball joint—the sound had haunted my dreams for many years. That was a council van. The animal catcher. Bigger than One-Eared Whitey, more tenacious that Fat Bobby.

  If Agnes was to stand a chance of escaping, I needed to enlist my sworn enemy’s help.

  Giving up on my attempt to get under the men’s feet, I ran out onto the road instead. The van was headed my way at a fair clip—far faster than it ever traveled on the central route through town.

  Every nerve in my body yelled at me to veer, to swerve, to get out of the van’s way. Instead, I stood staunchly in the center of the lane, hoping that my old foe wouldn’t fail to see me.

  He didn’t.

  The van jolted as the driver slammed on the brakes and skidded to a halt. While I closed my eyes and waited to see if the animal control man had applied them in time or if I was going straight to kitty heaven, Agnes started to yell for help.

  I felt the breeze of the vehicle puff toward me, tickling the ends of my whiskers. After a second with no impact, I forced my eyes open.

  The van’s wheels had stopped barely an inch from my face.

  “Please help me!” Agnes cried out, wrenching the handle on the side of the van in a vain attempt to force it open. “There’re two men. They kidnapped me!”

  I scampered underneath the vehicle and stood by Agnes’s side. The two men who’d been in pursuit just a split second earlier had turned tail and now ran back toward the house.

  Agnes slammed her hand in frustration on the side of the council van. “Let me in. Please. They’re coming right for me!”

  The door unlocked, and she pulled it open. It stayed that way for barely a second—I only just managed to jump inside—before she pulled it shut and slammed her hand down on the lock.

  “Do you have a phone?” Agnes’s voice was still at fever pitch, her yelling echoing around the closed confines of the van. “Call the police!”

  In the side mirror, I could see the men now pulling out of the drive. Their car’s wheels skidded as they swerved out into the middle of the road. Two long black lines were left behind, marking the street, as they accelerated away.

  As they sped away, Agnes noticed me in the footwell of the van and lifted me onto her lap.

  “Chuck him in the back,” growled the council worker. “There’re cages to keep him locked up.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, young man.” Agnes’s voice was so indignant and appalled that I almost felt sorry for him. She turned her face away with a sniff, then tickled me under the neck again. “This is my savior. My lucky cat. Nobody is ever going to lock him up in the pound!”

  Agnes wouldn’t let go of me as we waited in the van for the police to arrive. She patted my back in long strokes until I purred louder than the road-beast’s engine. All the while Sergeant Matthewson was questioning her, Agnes kept me on her lap. When the policeman helped her out of the council van and into his car, she snuggled me up under her chin.

  “If it wasn’t for this little fellow,” she told Matthewson, “then I don’t know if anybody would’ve ever found me. I don’t know how he knew I was down in that cellar, but he got the shutters open and then untied the rope.”

  While Sergeant Matthewson made sounds of agreement, I was savvy enough to see his eyes roll. I didn’t care. There was no need to be officially recognized—I didn’t seek a medal of honor pinned to my collar. All I wanted was for Agnes to be returned to her husband and for him to stop moping long enough to reopen the shop.

  The sun had well and truly fallen out of the sky before Matthewson relinquished his hold on Agnes and allowed her to return home. When he offered to drive her, she fixed him with a sharp eye, retorting, “I’m not an invalid, young man.”

  She strolled out of the station house, maintaining an even gait until she was out of sight. Once around the corner, Agnes began to limp again, continuing her uneven pace down the road to Old Man Jack’s shop.

  When she pounded on the door, a grumpy voice emerged from inside, “I’m not having visitors at the moment.”

  Agnes chuckled in a low voice to herself, then knocked again harder. When it still didn’t elicit a positive response, she called out, “For goodness’ sake. Let me in, you foolish man.”

  It was an overjoyed Jack who flung the door open and enveloped his wife in a breath-stopping hug. Lucky for me, I jumped down out of Agnes’s arms just in time, or I would have become the cat meat in an Old Man Jack and Agnes sandwich.

  When he’d checked every inch of her with his shaking hands and misty eyes, Old Man Jack threw back his head yelled out in triumph. No words, just the sound of a man possessed with outrageous joy—a wonder to behold.

  “Oh,” Agnes said when the merriment died down enough for her to step inside. “Whereabouts has my favorite cat gotten to?”

  I meowed with my usual humility and let her pick me up and escort me inside.

  “I know that cat,” Old Man Jack exclaimed. “He was around here watching the CCTV of your kidnap earlier.”

  “Well, he’s a far cleverer cat than the police believe,” Agnes said, stroking my back again. “He’s the one who found me and let me out of the cellar.”

  Afraid that she was about to start reciting her tale again—to her husband instead of the police, this time—I angled in between the two of them and demanded my due.

  “I’m starving,” I said with the most politeness my grumbling stomach would allow. “Would you fetch me a can of your finest cat food?”

  “Hold on,” Old Man Jack said. “I know the fellow who owns this cat. I’ll give him a call and let him know he’s safe and sound. The poor man must be worried sick!”

  Although I rolled my eyes at the wait, I didn’t offer up much in the way of resistance. So long as I got fed soon, I supposed it would be nice if my human stopped by to collect me and take me home.

  When he arrived, I jumped up with a mite more energy than I’d expected. Perhaps I’d missed him more than I liked to admit. My human picked me up and cuddled me close, wiping a tear out of his eye.

  “I thought that something terrible had happened to Thor,” my human explained to Old Man Jack. “When I saw his collar hanging on the end of a coat hook, I thought he must’ve been stolen by some terrible pet thieves.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised if they had,” Agnes said, with a worrying lack of sensibility. “He’s such an amazing wee fellow.”

  “Well, both he and I like to think so,” my human said, eliciting a round of laughter. “By the way, since I’m here, I wonder if I could trouble you for a favor?”

  “Anything,” Agnes said at the same time Old Man Jack uttered, “Depends.”

  With his wife giving him the hairy eyeball, Jack changed his mind. “If there’s anything I can help with, I’d be most happy to oblige.”

  “It’s just, with your store shut, I had to pick up some food from the local superette, and I don’t think it suited Thor’s delicate palate.”

  While the trio laughed again, I don’t know at what, Old Man Jack nodded and headed for the shop. Just as he reached the dangling plastic strips that separate store from
home, he turned back to my human with a frown.

  “It’s not the premium brand ‘Divine Dining’ you’re after, is it?”

  I called out, “Yes, yes, yes,” and tried to jump down and run through to the shop but my human restrained me.

  “That’s the one,” he said in a cautious tone. My human must have seen something more in Jack’s facial expression than I had, and his voice made a worm of unease start to wriggle down my spine.

  “I’m so sorry,” Old Man Jack said. “But that one didn’t come in with the latest delivery. Our usual driver is off sick, you see, and the new guy didn’t drop off the supplies of those cans.”

  The words spiraled around my head in a dizzying swirl until the whole world began to fade. How on earth was I meant to cure a sick delivery driver? When would meal-times get back on track?

  Chapter One

  In the morning, I woke and stretched out luxuriously. The adventure that saw me setting Agnes free and restoring her to Old Man Jack had worn me out, so I’d slept longer than usual. With each tick of my realigning bones, I felt goodwill settle into my body.

  Until I remembered that despite my efforts, there’d still be no decent food for me today.

  It was in an altogether different mood that I finally wandered into the kitchen. I mean, my human had tried, don’t get me wrong, but there was little he could do. The smoked salmon would have been lovely on its own but piled atop of the foul mess he’d sprung from the inferior can, it just wouldn’t do at all.

  I sniffed at the bowl and ate out of it the things that I could stomach. It was precious little compared to the gaping hole in my midriff. Even a quick lie-down in the early morning sun didn’t restore my good cheer.

  “Look at this,” my human called out a few minutes after I’d got myself comfy. He turned the computer screen towards me, pointing at a flickering picture with excitement. “Isn’t that your brand?”