by Edie Claire
Leonard shook his head. His weathered face was lined with misery. “No,” he said softly. “No, I don’t think… that’s best.”
Then man looked so truly wretched that Leigh began to feel sorry for him. But then he coughed again.
Hack, wheeze, hack. Hack hack hack!
Leigh sucked in a sharp breath and looked meaningfully at Maura. I’m telling you, she telepathed. It was him!
Slowly and surreptitiously, Allison was moving around to peer into the kitchen and dining room areas that connected with the living room. Leigh figured her daughter must also have seen the pied cockatiel. And wondered…
“Well, you see,” Maura said conversationally, scooting over to pull Eddie out of range of a spotted finch. “You’re making a problem for me, here. Because we both know that I’m a better detective than you are an actor. Remember that Valley Forge play in the third grade? You totally sucked, man. So I know you’re afraid of something. And you should probably just go ahead and spill it.”
A hint of a smile played at the corners of Leonard’s mouth, but only for a second. Then he looked miserable again.
“How did you know?” he whispered hoarsely, ignoring the two budgies currently scuffling over the space on top of his head. “How did you know to ask me? I didn’t say anything!”
Leigh opened her mouth, but Maura threw her a quick warning look.
“Say anything about what, Len? Just tell me. If anybody saw me outside, they’ve already seen me. You know what I’m saying?”
The professor dropped his face into his hands. “But I can’t risk it! I can’t lose him again. I raised him from an egg!”
Leigh blinked in confusion. She cast a glance at Allison, who had finished her sweep of the room and returned with a blue budgie on her finger. She gave a slight shake of her head. Our cockatiel’s not here, Mom.
“Tell me what you mean, Len,” Maura repeated patiently.
Leonard was silent for a long moment, evidently contemplating his options. Then, stiffly, he rose. “Come on upstairs,” he said with defeat. “I’ll show you.”
He headed toward another curtain of beads, then pulled them aside to reveal a narrow staircase. He headed up with Maura following, but Leigh hung back a few paces. At the top of the staircase he opened another door, only to have an Amazon alight immediately on his shoulder. “Welcome to South America,” he announced. “The cockatoos are in the smaller room that way. I call it ‘upper Australia.’”
Leigh’s curiosity got the better of her. She climbed the remaining stairs and slipped through the door also, followed closely by Allison. A large, open area that was supposed to be a bedroom contained two free-flying Amazons and a blue and gold macaw, plus a second macaw in a huge cage that took up one corner of the room and a dormer window. “Casper and Goldie don’t get along,” Leonard explained sadly. “They have to alternate.”
“Geez, Len,” Maura exclaimed, looking through the myriad bird perches and toys to the sparse human furniture, which consisted of a leather couch and chair. “Where do you sleep?”
He pointed to a short, closed door along the far wall. “In the closet,” he admitted sheepishly. It’s the only way I ever get any peace. But what I want to show you is in the bathroom.”
Leigh looked over her shoulder to note the quickest exit.
“The bathroom’s kind of like an isolation unit,” Leonard explained. “Right now the bird in it is… recovering.”
“Which bird is that?” Allison piped up.
Leonard opened the bathroom door and gestured them inside.
Leigh looked around. It was an unexpectedly large bathroom, completely covered with white tiles, which weren’t nearly as dirty as she might have expected. In fact, considering the number of birds in the house, she had to admit that Leonard did a reasonable job of keeping the place clean. At least he had the sense not to have carpet.
“Opie, boy!” Leonard called. “Come on out! Everybody’s a friend, here.” He turned to whisper to Maura. “He’s still pretty traumatized, I’m afraid.”
Leigh watched, breath held, as a white and yellow lutino cockatiel strutted out from behind the toilet and fluttered up to perch on Leonard’s hand. “That’s my boy,” the man cooed affectionately.
The bird cooed back.
Leigh heard Allison’s sharp intake of breath beside her. The bird had a dime-sized patch of bare skin in the center of its chest.
Tears formed in Leonard’s eyes. “It was so nice outside last weekend. He always enjoys a little time out back. I swear I checked on him every couple of minutes. But one time I looked out, and he was just—” he choked on the words. “Gone. Cage and all!”
Maura looked sideways at Leigh, then Allison. Both nodded silently.
“Are you saying this bird was petnapped, Leonard?” Maura asked.
He sniffed and nodded.
Leigh’s anxiety grew. It was a nice story, and he was very convincing. But it made no sense. If the bird was his, why was he stealing it from her parents’ house? How he could even know it was there? He had to be lying!
Leigh stared hard at Maura. They needed to get out of here, before the man started flipping out at a whole new level. However Maura wanted to handle the police part was her problem. But they could all worry about that later. Much later.
She turned to open the bathroom door, but a sound from the hallway outside stopped her.
Hack, wheeze, hack. Hack hack hack!
Her blood ran cold. She whipped around to see Leonard standing quietly in the same place he was before, with the cockatiel still perched on his hand.
He laughed out loud.
Chapter 16
Leigh stared at him, wide-eyed.
“What’s so funny, Leonard?” Maura asked calmly.
“The expression on her face!” he chuckled, gesturing toward Leigh. “They do a pretty good job, don’t they? That was Ricky you heard, although he’s not the only one that does it. It’s kind of embarrassing, actually. But they do hear it a lot.”
Leigh and Allison exchanged a glance. The birds?
As if on cue, Opie sat up straight, puffed up his partially plucked chest, and let loose. Hack, wheeze, hack. Hack hack hack!
Leonard exploded into laughter. “He does it better than any of them! Don’t you, precious?”
Leigh felt the need to sit down. But the only available surface was the closed toilet lid, and it was speckled with bird poop.
“It was the bird!” Allison breathed, stating a larger truth than was obvious to Leonard.
“Oh, yes,” he said proudly. “They’re wonderful mimics. Everyone knows that parrots can do it. But cockatiels can do a good job with sounds, too, even if they aren’t as skilled at talking.”
“But they only do it when they’re feeling good,” Allison suggested tentatively. “When they’re comfortable. Right?”
“That’s right,” Leonard confirmed.
Maura’s sharp eyes connected with Allison’s. Don’t say anything else, the policewoman transmitted.
Allison’s return nod was barely perceptible.
“When exactly did the bird disappear, Len?” Maura asked.
His face paled again. “Friday night. There was a note left where the cage had been. It said if I told anybody, they’d kill him!” He gulped. “They wanted three thousand dollars, set out Saturday night at midnight in the park. I got it, and I left it. I expected Opie back the next day, but nothing happened. I hoped maybe that it was just hard to get him back without being seen. You know, with people out in the neighborhood over the weekend. I hoped I would get him Monday. But there was nothing!”
“Why didn’t you call the cops? Or me?” Maura asked, sounding slightly hurt.
“The note said they’d kill him!” Leonard defended. “It said that if I told the police even after the bird came back, that they’d come find him again — or another bird of mine — and ‘wring its skinny little neck!’” He hung his head a moment. “I know I should have. But I just couldn’t. This guy means eve
rything to me.” He put up his other hand and nuzzled the back of the cockatiel’s neck with a fingertip. “Don’t you, Opie sweet?”
Maura cleared her throat. “When did you get him back, Len?”
“Not until this morning,” he answered gravely. “I looked outside first thing, and there he was. The cage was hanging right where I’d left it. Every day he wasn’t returned I worried that something had gone wrong, that maybe he’d gotten away from them somehow… or worse. But I kept telling myself I’d give them just one more day, and then I would tell the police everything. Every day I kept hoping for a miracle. And finally, it happened!”
Leigh watched as the cockatiel closed its eyes and leaned into the curve of Leonard’s stroking finger. The bird purred happily.
There really was no doubt about it. The cockatiel they had all been pet sitting since Monday was definitely Leonard’s bird. Which didn’t make Leonard a suspect. It made him another victim.
“Three thousand dollars is a lot of money,” Maura said soberly.
Leigh knew what she was thinking. Leonard lived in a modest house in a modest neighborhood with a whole lot of birds. To ask for so much, the petnapper must have known not only that Leonard was emotionally attached to his birds in general, but that he felt strongly about this cockatiel in particular. And that he could actually afford such a ransom. Otherwise, the risk of his turning to the police would be too great.
“It was worth it,” Leonard insisted, still caressing the happy bird. A tear slid down his cheek. “He missed me, I think.”
“I’m sure he did,” Leigh agreed sincerely.
Leonard straightened and turned to Maura. “I can’t lose him again,” he said firmly. “If I cooperate with the police, can you promise me I won’t?”
“I’m not God, Len,” Maura replied. “But we’ll certainly do our best to be discreet. Do you have the ransom note?”
He shook his head. “They wanted it left with the money. But I took a picture of it on my phone.”
Maura smiled. “Good work. Can you send it to me?” She pulled a card out of her wallet and gave it to him. “I’ll need to explain the situation to the local PDs. There’s a couple different jurisdictions involved. But I’ll make sure no black and whites come to your house. You can meet the officers elsewhere, if you like. But with your help, maybe we can finally get this guy.”
Leonard’s answering smile was uneasy. “I hope so.”
The ride back to the animal hospital was a quiet one. Leigh was absorbed in her own not-so-pleasant thoughts, and Maura seemed equally contemplative. No one spoke until the van was parked on the street outside the clinic. “You should go back and help Grandpa the rest of the afternoon like we planned, Allison,” Leigh advised.
Allison unbuckled her seatbelt, but rather than getting out, she leaned forward between the front seats. “Whoever wrote that one tip letter has a point, you know,” she said evenly. “So far the petnapper has a pretty amazing record of targeting owners who care about their pets, who have the money to pay him, and who won’t go to the police. Anybody who works at the clinic would know that stuff. If they pay attention.”
Maura looked at Leigh and nodded. “She’s right, Koslow. To look at Lenny or his house, you’d never guess he was a professor at CMU who could come up three grand over a weekend. Ginny cares as much about Lucky as Len does about Opie, but she’s been living on social security for years. Three hundred was the most anyone could possibly squeeze out of her. If they asked for too much, she’d have no choice but to go to the police. Our petnapper knew that.”
“Even I could come up with a list of good targets, and I’m only there every once in a while,” Allison added.
“You wouldn’t have to work at the clinic to know those things,” Leigh protested, still not wanting to believe that any of her father’s current employees could be so secretly cruel. She turned to Maura. “You knew both our victims so far, didn’t you? And their circumstances?”
Maura tilted her head from side to side. “Maybe. But I didn’t know Len was so gaga about birds.”
“I did,” Allison insisted. “And I knew he was a professor. I didn’t know he was especially attached to the cockatiel, but if I worked down there all the time, I bet I would. He comes in a lot. All the bird people do. All the most devoted clients do!”
Leigh groaned beneath her breath. She really, really did not want an employee of the clinic to be involved. What a terrible situation for her father!
“If we are dealing with a petnapper inside the clinic,” Maura theorized, “or even just an informant feeding information to somebody else, they’ll certainly be aware by now that you and I are looking into it.”
Leigh groaned again, this time audibly. The back door of the van opened. Allison was getting out.
Leigh felt a sudden flare of panic. “Allison, wait,” she warned. She turned to Maura. “If this person knows we’re on to them, should she even be going in there? What about the boys?”
“Who says the perp knows we’re on to them?” Maura reasoned. “All they know is that you’re aware of the petnappings and are trying to get information from clients. If we’re lucky, that alone will make them think a little harder before trying it again. But they have no reason to think we suspect anybody inside the clinic. Not yet, anyway. The best thing to do would be to carry on as normal. Wouldn’t it look more strange if Allison stopped helping your dad now?”
“I suppose so,” Leigh grumbled.
“Mom,” Allison drawled with typical preteen exasperation, “I’ll be fine. I am not going to make anybody suspicious of me. They’ll never even know I’m listening. You never do.”
Maura chuckled.
Leigh frowned. “I’ll pick you up at five.”
Allison smiled and skipped on into the building, now looking every bit of six years old.
“That child will put me in an early grave,” Leigh lamented.
“Well, what are kids for?” Maura quipped, taking a quick look at Eddie in the back seat. He was kicking his tiny legs and drooling on the terry cloth strap covers of the car seat. She smiled indulgently.
Then she turned back to Leigh, and her expression sobered. “I didn’t want to say this in front of Allison,” she said heavily. “But you do realize that we now have evidence that Mason Dublin handed off stolen property?”
Leigh felt her chest constrict. The thought had been there, at the back of her mind, ever since she’d seen the familiar cockatiel fly onto Leonard’s hand. But she hadn’t wanted to face it. “He didn’t know,” she defended. “I’m sure he didn’t. He told me himself, that morning, that he didn’t know where the bird had come from. That he’d never seen it before.”
“That’s good to hear,” Maura replied. “That’s what he told me on the phone, too. But it doesn’t change the facts. Kyle had a stolen bird in his apartment. For all we know, the cat could have been stolen, too.”
Leigh’s angst ratcheted up another notch. Crap. “Lenna is head over heels in love with that cat already!” she opined. “I was already dreading having to return it to Kyle. Surely she’s not stolen. Mason said that Kyle was crazy about the cat. He must have had it for a while!”
Maura raised one eyebrow. “And of course we have no reason to doubt anything that Kyle might say about the pets in his possession.”
Leigh sighed.
“We already know Kyle needed money,” Maura continued. “Can you think of any link he might have to the clinic, besides Mason?”
Leigh shook her head firmly. “Mason has nothing to do with the clinic. He and my dad get along okay, but they’ve never been buddies, and Mason avoids my mother like the plague. Up until a few weeks ago, he lived in Jennerstown! As for Kyle Claymore, I’d never heard the name before all this started. Living in Bellevue, he could be a client, but I don’t know. You’d have to ask my dad.”
“I suspect the police will do just that,” Maura said thoughtfully. “But under the circumstances, I’ll see if I can get them to interview
him at home, rather than at the clinic.” She cleared her throat. “As for Mason, he told me he’d likely be rolling back into town sometime tomorrow. For his sake, I hope he does.”
Leigh felt slightly sick again. “I mean it, Maura,” she repeated. “I really don’t think Mason had any idea that the bird was stolen. I know he’s an ex-con, but he’s got a good heart. He wouldn’t have anything to do with a petnapping ring. I know he wouldn’t.”
Maura’s baby blue eyes shone with sympathy. “If it makes you feel any better, Koslow, I don’t think he had anything to do with it, either.”
Leigh exhaled with relief.
“But it’s not my call,” Maura added ominously. In the backseat, Baby Eddie squalled. “Nap time,” she announced. “Would you mind running us home?”
Leigh dropped off Maura and the baby at their house, her thoughts drifting in an unpleasant fog as she drove away. She did believe in Mason’s innocence. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t in trouble. And trouble, for an ex-con, always came with a capital T.
Without conscious thought as to where she was going, Leigh found herself parked back outside the animal clinic. The phenomenon was an oft-rehearsed one. From the day she had gotten her first driver’s license, her father’s clinic had been her port in a storm.
She got out of the van and walked inside.
Chapter 17
Leigh went in the back door of the clinic and waited outside the exam rooms for a chance to catch her father alone. When she saw Allison head out of the room to fetch something, she scooted inside and found a chow and its owner just leaving.
“Dad,” she asked swiftly. “Important question. Do you remember a patient that’s a youngish shorthair cat, dilute tortie, with its left front leg amputated?”
Only after she asked the question did she notice that her father was standing up on one leg, leaning against the table. He looked tired and a little pale.
“Dad!” she chastised. “You’re supposed to be keeping that foot elevated.”
Randall exhaled loudly. “I know, I know. I just get so tired of sitting all the time.”
