The Cat, the Mill and the Murder: A Cats in Trouble Mystery

by Leann Sweeney

  But Dustin has a job to do, too, I thought. If he made a lot of noise again, I’d say something. Now was not the time. Instead, I said, “I’ll bet these wood floors will be beautiful once they’re refinished.”

  Dustin still wasn’t talking. He’d taken several steps farther into the abyss and now focused his light on one of the many support pillars.

  “Wow.” He sounded awed as he rested a hand on the pillar. Then he ran his hand up and down.

  I stepped closer so I could see what had grabbed his attention. The round support had some kind of metal sleeve that went about halfway up. I touched it and realized the metal was thick. I could feel gouges and scratches beneath my fingers. I said, “I’ve never seen anything constructed like this. Why did they put metal around the supports?”

  “There are two stories above us, not to mention a basement below.” Dustin put his face close to the metal and held the light so he could see better. “In a building this big, that’s a lot of weight to sustain a structure as large as this building. They had to use strong materials like cement and cast iron.”

  As I touched the beam, my fingers found something etched into the metal. “Can you focus the light right here?” I tapped a spot at my eye level.

  We both moved our faces close to see what was written and I smiled as I made out the words “Rosie loves Joe.” The building suddenly seemed less empty. Three little words told so much.

  Dustin stepped away from the support, apparently uninterested in this newfound touch of humanity. He was all about metal and wood and load-bearing beams. “Where did Shawn go?”

  “To find the cats. Probably toward the walls and those bricked-up windows,” I said. “He’ll be looking for spots where the cats are getting in and out of here.”

  We walked side by side in the direction Shawn seemed to have gone—seemed to being the key words.

  Dustin said, “We’ll have to set up some kind of light source, probably halogens. Either that or knock out some of those bricks that obscure the windows.”

  “Getting rid of those bricks would be a wonderful idea.” I could see Shawn’s light up ahead and to our right. “There he is.”

  We picked up our pace and I whispered, “Best to keep quiet now. The cats have probably already gone into hiding, but we don’t want to spook them any more than we have just by coming inside the building.”

  Dustin whispered back, saying, “Got it.”

  Shawn was standing by old machinery that had been pushed against one wall. He was focusing his light inside what looked like an old twisting machine. Since twisting machines were no longer used in the textile process, the foreigners, mostly the Chinese and the Indians, who’d bought up most of the spinners, combers and other mill equipment, had apparently left these behind. I might not know about bricked-up windows, but I knew my textile machinery.

  Shawn whispered harshly, “What is this piece of crap? How can I get any kind of cat count with this kind of junk all over the place? I see at least a dozen pairs of eyes staring up at me in just this one piece of machinery.”

  “All over the place?” Dustin said, sounding confused.

  Shawn extended his arm and his Maglite illuminated an entire row of old equipment.

  “But this is wonderful,” I said, wishing I’d known we’d need flashlights and brought one for myself. “This is part of our history, Shawn. Maybe some of this machinery can be put in the museum if that’s what the town council decides.”

  “Wonderful?” Shawn said. “Are you kidding me? There’s a gazillion places for cats to hide in these damn machines. I thought this building was empty.”

  “Why don’t we skip the machinery for now and take a look at the offices and the boiler room?” Dustin said. “No doubt there was a break room and bathrooms, too. Might be easier to find cats hiding in there.”

  “Yeah, let’s get all the bad news out of the way so I can come up with a plan,” Shawn said. “I can tell you right now, in a building this big, I’m gonna need a whole lot of feral cat portable structures. And they aren’t cheap.”

  I swore it took us a good five minutes to walk to the far end of the ground floor. My exhilaration at being in such a historic place was wearing off. The darkness and the chill were sinking in and I felt my heart pounding a little faster. What would light reveal about this old place? I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

  At one point in our trek, Shawn stumbled over something and swore. He said, “Not a dead cat, I hope,” a hint of anguish in his tone.

  I immediately looked down to where Shawn had trained his flashlight, my heart thrumming with dread. I saw a cheese cone. This odd name was slang for the extra-large bobbins used to hold wound cotton yarn. I wanted to pick it up and take it with me, but I figured there was probably plenty of time to collect souvenirs later. We’d be back here often in the next few weeks.

  “What other kind of junk will we fall over in this place?” Shawn kicked the cone, sending it out of sight.

  I heard no cats meowing or hissing during our walk, not even the mewling of newborn kittens—though I was sure we’d find some of those in the near future. Meanwhile, Shawn was mumbling under his breath about how this would be a lot tougher job than he’d thought.

  We came to a wide hallway. To our left, a stone staircase curved up into darkness, so sturdy it probably hadn’t needed to be repaired in the past one hundred thirty years. To our right was a tall, closed door, its paint so deteriorated it was impossible to tell what color the door had been. Shawn put a finger to his lips and quietly twisted the ornate and tarnished brass knob Dustin illuminated for him. Though he was hoping not to disturb any cats that might be hiding beyond this door, I was certain if they were inside this room, they’d already heard us. A cat’s hearing is at least a hundred times more acute than a human being’s.

  I saw a hint of light coming from inside the room. Faint. Dull. Was there an actual unbricked window beyond?

  But when a woman’s voice yelled, “What you think you’re doin’ in here?” I jumped back and got a taste of my own heart.

  Two

  I froze, more than a little startled at the sound of a woman’s voice. Shawn immediately pushed the door completely open.

  Dull light emanated from a candle sitting in what appeared to be a pie plate on the floor. I pressed my hand to my mouth and whispered, “Oh my goodness,” between my fingers.

  The clouded eyes of a woman stared up at us. The odor hit me then, the unpleasant combination of spoiled food and an unwashed body.

  Shawn didn’t whisper when he spoke. “What in hell are you doing here?”

  “I asked first,” the woman said.

  “This place is dangerous, lady,” Shawn replied. “Plus, I’m thinkin’ you don’t have a key.”

  Dustin cleared his throat. “This isn’t a healthy place to be…staying.”

  The woman drew her legs up to her chest, wrapped them with her arms and began to rock.

  I felt a swell of emotion seeing her withdraw. I approached her, moving slowly so as not to upset her any more than she already was. When I reached her side, I knelt and saw she was wearing what could only be described as rags. Filthy ones at that.

  “Are you all right?” I said.

  She turned her face to me. “Right as rain,” she answered. “You one of them?”

  “One of whom?” I asked, taking in the objects surrounding her. I saw a saucer of curdled milk, a few chicken bones, a roll of paper towels, an old glass milk bottle full of water and a cellophane package of powdered sugar donuts.

  “The ones that comes in the night,” she said before burying her head in her knees again. More rocking.

  “This is the first time I’ve been here,” I said in a soft tone, hoping to calm her obvious fear. Before she hid her face, I’d seen her features more clearly—the road map of wrinkles and scars, the frizzy gray hair spilling over her shoulders and surrounding her face like a kinky woolen hat. She appeared to be a few decades older than me.

  Sha
wn hovered over us. “You don’t belong here, lady. Why are you here?”

  She lifted her head and met his stare. “I don’t have to tell you nothin’.” Her mouth puckered into a childlike pout.

  I held up a hand to Shawn, hoping he’d keep quiet. “I’m Jillian. What’s your name?”

  “Clara Jeanne if you’d met my mama, but I was always Jeannie to the rest of my kin.” She squinted, looked up at the high ceiling. “Course Mama’s been gone so long, I can be Jeannie, period. Just Jeannie.” She looked toward the saucer on the floor. “Ain’t that right, Boots?”

  “Boots?” I said.

  “My kitty. She’s pretty, huh?” Jeannie smiled, revealing her rotting teeth.

  An invisible cat. My heart ached with sympathy and concern. This woman definitely needed our help.

  Dustin cleared his throat again before speaking. “We do have a job to do here, Mrs. Hart.”

  I turned to him and in a calm tone said, “We have a problem, though, don’t we? One that needs to be handled first.”

  “I—I guess you’re right,” he replied.

  Shawn offered a disgruntled “Great,” under his breath.

  “Boots is great,” Jeannie said with a nod.

  “I don’t see Boots,” I said.

  “That’s ’cause you don’t believe. Most folks don’t.” She reached out with an arthritic hand and made a stroking motion, as if petting a cat.

  “Ah,” I said. “Boots is your pet. Do you both live here?”

  “Yup. Gotta guard the door, you know. Never knew the creepers would come in the day. Never happened before.” She stopped her hand movement and said, “Okay, my baby girl. You go on then. I’m kinda scared myself.”

  “Don’t be afraid, Jeannie. This is Shawn, by the way. He likes cats, too.” I gestured up at him and then pointed toward the open door where Dustin stood. “That’s Dustin. No one will hurt you. I promise.”

  “Then you can just take your own selves right back out the way you came. Shut the door, too. Boots might get out and those mean cats will get after her. They’s always stealin’ her food.”

  “Mean cats?” Shawn said, his interest suddenly piqued. “Where are they?”

  “All over the dern place,” Jeannie said. “They do take care of the critters, though. Boots ain’t such a great mouser. Never was.”

  “Maybe if we had invisible mice to go with the invisible cat, she’d do a better job,” Shawn said.

  “You might be right about that,” Jeannie said, the sarcasm lost on her.

  “Jeannie, we have a job to do here,” I said. “Those mean cats, as you called them? They don’t come near you, do they?”

  “Nope. They just steal food when I’m sleepin’.” She glanced toward an old fireplace across the room.

  I could see more objects now that my eyes had gotten used to the dim light. Several unlit candles sat on either side of the big fireplace. A wooden desk stood in the corner along with a pile of cheese cones. I also noted a large trash bag filled to near bursting with who knew what.

  Dustin started toward the bag and Jeannie startled me by springing to her feet and racing across the room. She planted herself between Dustin and the bag, legs spread, arms folded.

  “You leave my belongin’s alone, you hear?” She lifted her chin and stared up at him.

  Dustin, palms facing her in surrender, took a few steps back. “I—I promise not to touch anything.”

  But while this action was taking place, Shawn had gone to the fireplace and crouched. He was scanning the opening with his Maglite.

  “You stay away from there, too, Mister Shawn. Don’t be disturbin’ nothin’.” Jeannie, clearly agitated now, was glancing back and forth between Dustin and Shawn.

  Shawn got down, pressed his cheek against the wood floor and trained his light inside the fireplace. “This could be one spot where the cats are coming and going. I can see daylight beyond all the hunks of concrete and loose bricks in this old fireplace.”

  Jeannie abandoned her spot in front of the trash bag, scrambled across the room and kicked Shawn’s backside. “You stay away. Just stay away. That there is a holy place.”

  Shawn rose and looked up at her, unperturbed by this frail woman’s attempt at an assault. “Sorry, but if you’d like those mean cats removed, I’m your man.”

  “How’s that?” she said, taking a step back, her arms folded.

  Each movement she made filled the already dank air with her sour odor. I wondered when she’d last bathed. Years ago, maybe?

  “We plan to take them to another place. Take them away from here where they’ll be fed and cared for,” Shawn said.

  “Maybe we can do the same for you, Jeannie,” I said quietly. But I knew there was no maybe about it. She would have to leave. None of us had planned on finding a human being living here. Solving this problem took priority now. She could be ill. She might have family looking for her.

  Jeannie backed into a corner of the room. She wasn’t about to go—at least not now. “This is a holy place, I tell you. I ain’t goin’ nowhere.”

  “That simply won’t work, um…Miss Jeannie,” Dustin said. “This structure could be unsound and—”

  “Oh, there’s sounds, plenty of ’em,” Jeannie said, defiance in her tone. “Don’t you be tellin’ me somethin’ you know nothin’ about.”

  But I was tuned in to what Jeannie had said not once, but twice. “You say this place is holy. What does that mean?”

  “Oh, come on,” Shawn said, rising. “We do not have time for this crap, Jillian.”

  Shawn preferred dealing with animals over people every time, so I wasn’t surprised at his impatience.

  “Give me a moment, okay?” I edged closer to Jeannie. “How is it holy?”

  She raised her chin. “It just is. This is where I belong. Don’t need nothin’ from the likes of y’all, neither.”

  I nodded. “Okay. We’ll leave. But Jeannie, we have to come back. Do you understand?”

  “Wait a minute,” Shawn said. “Leave?”

  I stared at him and I saw his expression change from stubbornness to understanding. He knew better than to argue.

  “I—I think that’s wise,” Dustin said. “We should go.”

  Jeannie remained in the corner, her arms wrapped tightly around her. “You do that and don’t bother comin’ back.”

  Shawn led us out of the room with his Maglite and then shut the door behind us.

  “Didn’t expect to find a—a person,” Dustin said. He said this as if we’d just stumbled upon Martians.

  “We need help on this one,” I said, half to myself. I looked at Dustin. “And not from the town council. Can you keep quiet about this to Councilwoman Webber?”

  “I—I don’t know. She’s the chairwoman of the council and expects a report from me soon, so—”

  Shawn closed the space between himself and Dustin. “You want these cats out of here fast?”

  Despite the lack of light, I could tell poor Dustin was completely intimidated by Shawn and upset by our surprise discovery.

  “Y-yes. Of course we need to deal with all the…problems,” Dustin said, nodding.

  “Then do what Jillian says. She’s good with problems. And, dude,” said Shawn, tossing his head in the direction of the closed room, “that lady in there is one big problem.”

  Three

  Since Shawn had driven us to the mill in his truck, he dropped Dustin and me off at Belle’s Beans so we could pick up our cars. Shawn said he trusted me to solve the “Jeannie problem,” as he called it, and solve it fast. For now, he had work to do at his Mercy Animal Sanctuary. Dustin agreed to follow me to my house to help me with the “solving.”

  On the five-minute drive home, I called my best friend, Deputy Candace Carson of the Mercy Police Department.

  “Hey there,” she answered. “You still at the mill?”

  “We had to leave sooner than expected and we need your help,” I said.

  “Uh-oh. Were there…d
ead cats? Because I don’t think I can deal—”

  “No. Gosh, no,” I said quickly, not wanting to even think about the possibility. “We ran into an unforeseen problem. When you have time, could you swing by my place so I can explain?”

  “How about now?” she said. “This town is so quiet, I swear I can hear my fingernails growing.” Candace didn’t wait for me to respond before saying she would join me at my house in a few minutes.

  I felt a smidgen of relief after I disconnected. I wanted to brainstorm with Candace before getting social services involved in relocating Jeannie. In our county, the system was not known for its speedy action. Overworked, understaffed and underpaid, the social workers stayed too busy. My guess was they stayed too busy all over the country.

  After Dustin pulled into the driveway behind me, I got out of my van and he exited his yellow VW Bug. His car looked vintage, not one of the newer models, but it gleamed, even in the gloom of the late-winter morning.

  As we walked along the side of my house toward the back door, I said, “I have three cats, just so you know. And they won’t hide like those in the mill. In fact, they’re very friendly.”

  While I said this, I glanced at Dustin’s chestnut hair. Because I have one cat allergic to human dander, this was routine for me—checking new visitors for dandruff. His hair looked as perfectly clean and flake-free as his car seemed to be. Chablis—my funny allergic cat—wouldn’t need a dose of Benadryl, thank goodness.

  As we walked around to the back of the house, Dustin stopped abruptly. He looked out at the lake beyond and said, “Wow. What a view. I hope to live on a lake like this one day. I love anything to do with water—skiing, boating, fishing.” He nodded. “Yup, I want to wake up and see something like this every morning.”

  “It’s peaceful here,” I said. Despite the overcast weather, the lake shimmered. I loved how mysterious Mercy Lake seemed in the dead of winter. “I not only love this lake; I love this town.”