The Big Cat Nap

by Rita Mae Brown

  “Hooray.” The cats cheered as they reached the stone wall, all three bounding up, ready for a cat gossip.

  “This pink is so soft.” Miranda admired the color as she planted one of the bushes.

  “It gave me an idea for the house,” Harry said. “What if I planted roses all along the first fence between the barn and the pastures? I’d start with the deepest pink closest to the barn, and each successive rose would be a lighter shade until the very end, when it would be so pale, almost white.”

  Miranda and the others stopped for a moment.

  “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen that,” said Alicia, who’d been all over the world. Now she was on her knees, putting in a yellow bush.

  “I figure if it doesn’t turn out as I like, I can always rearrange the bushes to a more conventional color scheme. I don’t know. Just sort of hit me.”

  “Great idea.” Susan thought maybe she’d try it at home, too, but she wanted to use white roses with slightly different colors deep down on the petal.

  “Where are we going to plant the pyracanthas?” BoomBoom asked.

  “Dee’s plan, which is in my truck if you want to see the drawings, is to have those on the building walls that Herb can see from his office window. There are a few already there. We have to train them with, uh, espalier. What do you call it?”

  “Fish wire and a trellis.” Alicia laughed, since this technique used heavy cord or wire to support the growing branches.

  “Right. I didn’t do so well in French,” Harry ruefully remembered.

  “Because you hated the teacher,” Susan laughed.

  “Every time Mademoiselle Suchet said”—BoomBoom imitated their high school teacher’s high-pitched voice—“ ‘Ouvrez la porte,’ Harry would stand up and go open the door just to piss her off.”

  “Harry?” Miranda chided her. “How could you do that to poor old Mademoiselle Suchet? Poor woman could barely walk, bless her soul.”

  “Such a pill!” Harry wrinkled her nose. “I did learn enough to read a menu in a French restaurant.”

  As the humans and cats talked and laughed, Tucker, nose to the ground, followed the various human scents throughout the enclosed graveyard. She’d follow one or another, inevitably winding up at a grave with flowers against the headstone. The intrepid dog was surprised by how many people had been to the graveyard in just the last two days.

  Lifting her perfect corgi head, she said, “Lots of traffic in here.”

  Elocution responded, “The whole Petrus family comes once a week since Georgette Petrus passed.”

  “Had to be one hundred years old,” Cazenovia giggled.

  “She looked one hundred,” Lucy Fur chimed in.

  “Humans obey strict rules about their dead. Even if the person dies at sea, there are these rules and prayers and ceremony.” Elocution knew these things because Herb had to provide funeral services—although not at sea, of course.

  Pewter saucily tossed her head. “Wasteful. Think of all the animals that could eat those bodies. What good does all that protein do moldering in a coffin?”

  Mrs. Murphy thoughtfully said, “That’s true if the bodies are relatively young, but old Georgette was so full of drugs. Any animal that ate her would probably die, too.”

  They giggled, then Lucy Fur added, “Poppy reads a lot about other religions. He read this article aloud to us about Parsis in India. I think that’s what you call them. They put their dead up on stilts, kind of on a canvas or something, and vultures come and eat them. It’s part of their religion. Well, the vultures are dying from a rare bird disease, but not from the human bodies which they’ve eaten for centuries. Anyway, the Parsis won’t change their ritual, and without the vultures, all these rotten bodies are lying above people’s heads in the hot Indian sun. It’s crazy.”

  Pewter wrinkled her nose. “Revolting.” Her eyes brightened. “Want to hear something really revolting?”

  “Can hardly wait,” Tucker drily replied.

  “Years ago at Halloween, I found a severed head in a pumpkin. It hadn’t gone off yet, but the hair was full of pumpkin mush and the mouth spilled out pumpkin seeds.” Pewter used the old expression “gone off” for the beginnings of decay.

  “I was there.” Mrs. Murphy didn’t remember it quite as Pewter did, since Pewter made herself the center of attention.

  “I was there, too,” Tucker piped up. “The head was gross.”

  “I miss everything,” Elocution whined.

  “You weren’t born yet,” Cazenovia sniffed.

  Reverend Jones walked out from the administrative offices of the church and strolled across the verdant lawn.

  “He’s got to lose weight.” Cazenovia shook her head.

  “Good luck.” Lucy Fur’s whiskers drooped for a moment. “That man loves to eat. He can sit down and eat a quart of ice cream.”

  “He’s a big man.” Tucker gallantly defended the beloved pastor.

  “He doesn’t have to be that big,” Elocution said.

  “Look at these beautiful roses.” Reverend Jones swept his hand toward the gardeners as opposed to the roses.

  Miranda smiled. “That honeyed tongue, but I do like to hear it.” The others agreed.

  Harry said, “We’ll get this done today and then put the hydrangeas in tomorrow so there will be color for the Flag Day celebration. Actually, as you know, June 14 is tomorrow, but we have to honor the flag on the weekend. It’s the only way St. Luke’s can make it work for everybody.”

  “It will be beautiful.”

  “If Flag Day were later, all those fabulous crepe myrtles lining the drive into the church would be in full bloom,” BoomBoom noted.

  “We’ll think of another party for July.” Herb smiled.

  “Did Craig Newby get the flags?” Susan asked about their fellow vestry-board member.

  A broad smile filled Reverend Jones’s handsome face. “He found every flag we’ve ever had, starting with Old Glory. Big ones that he’s going to hang off the roofs all around the inner quad. He swears he can do this without harming the gutters. It should look sensational. And, of course, he bought flags on sticks for every attendee. The flags for the graveyard for those who have fought in our wars are provided by the DAR and the Veterans of Foreign Wars. As you know, our parishioners who belong to those organizations knock themselves out.”

  “It is impressive.” Miranda nodded. “And let’s not forget the Confederate veterans.”

  “They’ll have their flags, too.” Then Reverend Jones focused on Harry and Susan. “Latigo says he’ll give me eight thousand dollars for my old truck. Victor told me that, yes, he could get it running again but given its age I should just go with a total loss. Latigo arranged it. I guess when you’re the president of a big insurance company, you can do anything. Eight thousand dollars is a lot more than it’s worth.”

  “Preacher’s price.” Alicia stood up, dusting off her gloves.

  “Special interest for good works,” Harry teased him.

  “You all should get deals, then, with all you’re doing. And, Harry, you said you’d come back Friday and mow, so everything will be perfect for Saturday.”

  “I’ll be here with my magic zero-turn mower.”

  “So what are you going to buy?” BoomBoom wanted to talk trucks.

  “Something big enough so you all can haul more plants.” He laughed.

  “Come on.” BoomBoom smiled and winked at him. “What do you want?”

  “Well, now, I have to take this slow. Check around, check what I can pay per month. I like the new Dodge. Really like the interior. I don’t know. You girls can help me when things settle down.”

  Susan watched as the cats leapt off the wall to chase butterflies and one another. “When do things ever settle down in Crozet?”

  Saturday, cool at 6:00 A.M., promised to turn up the heat and humidity as the hours wore on. Rising at her usual 5:00 A.M. in the summer, Harry patted herself on the back for mowing and weed-whacking at St. Luke’s yest
erday morning, as the day was cooler.

  After drinking her first cup of coffee and feeding Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker, she returned to the bedroom. Fair, on his side, head nestled in a goose-down pillow, remained sound asleep.

  “Poor guy,” she whispered to herself.

  He’d gotten a midnight call from a frantic horse owner. The big expensive dressage mare she’d purchased a month ago was colicking. He finally got back home at 2:00 A.M. She heard him take a shower. When he crawled into bed, she’d rolled over and he told her all was well.

  Tucker, always wanting to be beside Harry, said, “He’ll be awake in a little while.”

  Harry looked down at the small dog she loved so much and smiled. Although she hadn’t a clue as to Tucker’s prediction, she knelt down, kissed her friend, then returned to the kitchen.

  Tucker really did know when Fair would awaken. As Fair’s skin cooled down or heated up, the dog detected changes in his scent. No matter the season, Fair usually woke up sweating slightly.

  “How come you got the beef?” Pewter paid no attention to Harry returning to the kitchen.

  “I don’t know. How come you got chicken?” Mrs. Murphy responded to her peevish friend.

  “I want some.”

  “Pewter, go ahead.” The tiger cat backed away from her dish, and Pewter dove right in.

  “Hey! Hey, what are you doing?” the gray cat yelled, mouth full so she dropped food on the counter.

  “You’re eating my food. I’m eating yours.”

  “I didn’t say that you could eat my chicken!”

  Early it may have been, but Mrs. Murphy’s patience was already thin as a bee’s wing. She hauled back, giving Pewter a real swat—claws out, too.

  Pewter, no wimp, stood on her hind legs to box. Terrible words were spoken. Neither cat would back down. Tufts of fur flew all over the kitchen counter.

  Harry fed them breakfast up there because, when she turned her back, Tucker would steal the cat food. Good as Tucker was, she loved cat food. It contained a higher fat content than did dog food. Supper, however, was different. They all ate a light supper on the floor because Harry, preparing food, remained in the kitchen. Mornings had the pretty woman rushing all over the place.

  Now it looked like a fur blizzard.

  “Stop it!”

  The opponents ignored Harry.

  Fair, with a towel wrapped around his waist, bed head, and slippers on his feet, more or less stumbled out. “Jesus, sounds like the cat house at the zoo.”

  “I am a lion.” Pewter whacked Mrs. Murphy on her side as the tiger whirled around.

  “A lion of lard!” Mrs. Murphy shot back.

  The combat escalated. Harry grabbed the kitchen broom. With a sweep over the floor, she caught the tiger cat under the butt, pushing her out the door to the screened-in porch.

  Pewter flew after Mrs. Murphy, but Harry stood in the doorway, greeting her with the broom face. Pewter, moving fast, smashed right into it.

  “Ha!” Mrs. Murphy gleefully observed.

  Once back on her feet, Pewter leapt over the bottom of the broom. Mrs. Murphy blasted out the animal door in the outside porch. Pewter got caught with the flap swing back and fell backward. This so enraged the gray cat that she spit like a llama.

  Tucker, dumbfounded at the vehemence of the fight, sat on her rear end.

  Even Fair was impressed. He walked to the screened-in door.

  Harry joined him. “They’re totally nuts.”

  “I’m not going out there to stop it,” Tucker declared.

  The two cats ran in big circles. Then they ran through the barn. The horses stopped eating in the pastures to observe the kitty NASCAR races.

  Shortro, hay still in his mouth, said, “I didn’t know cats could move that fast.”

  Tomahawk shook his gray head. “Especially the fat one.”

  The fat did tell on Pewter. Finally, she slowed down. Mrs. Murphy sat about thirty yards distant from her on a fence post. They glared at each other.

  At the top of her lungs, Pewter bellowed, “I hate you. I hate everybody. I hate the whole world!”

  She turned, thumping back to the house, each determined step heavy on the ground. She reached the walnut tree, paused for breath, and saw Matilda hanging by her tail, looking straight down at Pewter.

  “You don’t hate me, do you?” The blacksnake laughed mischievously.

  Pewter’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. She hit her turbo, zooming into the house, where she collided with Fair, his towel falling off.

  “Speaking of being nuts.” Harry put her hand over her mouth, laughing so hard her sides hurt.

  “I am not nuts. I just happen to have them.” He laughed, too.

  “For which I am grateful.” She handed him his towel and, as he wrapped it around his waist, she gave him a hug.

  Still laughing, they sat down at the table. She poured him coffee.

  “Eggs, cold cereal? This short-order cook is taking orders.”

  “Hmm, cold cereal.” He smiled at her. “We’ve had our entertainment. Flag Day can’t possibly top the cats.”

  Later, the cats managed a truce. If they hadn’t, Harry would not have taken them along for the day. They sat in the back of the Volvo station wagon. Silent.

  Tucker curled up in her riding bed. She, too, shut her mouth, feeling that sooner or later the feline tinderbox would explode.

  As they approached the church, Fair noticed the hydrangeas along the drive. “Honey, the place looks beautiful.”

  “We all did it. St. Luke’s needed a pick-me-up. Dee Phillips created such a lovely plan.”

  “Isn’t she Episcopalian?”

  “Kissing cousins, Episcopalians and Lutherans.”

  Fair twisted around and checked on their passengers. “Not a peep.”

  “Good.” Harry parked on the lower level.

  As the humans walked up the terraced path to the interior quad, the two cats and Tucker followed. The Very Reverend Jones loved animals, so anyone’s animals who behaved were welcome.

  Once inside the inner quad, both Harry and her husband stopped.

  “Fabulous!” Harry exclaimed.

  As promised, Craig had hung the flags from the roofs. The various numbers of stars bore evidence to our growth as a nation. At one end of the quad—the administrative end—he’d also hung flags from the nations that first gave us colonists: England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France. Since Germany did not become one nation until under Bismarck in the nineteenth century, there wasn’t room to hang the flags of all the various small German states. Craig did, however, hang the flag of the Austrian dual monarchy, as well as the flag that now represented all of Africa to African Americans.

  “How smart he is.” Fair rubbed his chin.

  “I would have never thought of the parent nations, for lack of a better word.” Harry enjoyed watching the slight flutter of the flags.

  The pyracanthas stood out from the stone building that Herb could see from his office. Clear fishing line had been set up so the branches would grow on it, creating straight horizontal lines. The church side of the quad, covered in wisteria that had already bloomed, offered deep shade. In glorious symmetry, St. Luke’s looked especially beautiful today.

  Elocution, in her office window, looked out. None of the cats appeared eager to mix with screaming children all waving their little flags.

  Pewter stopped under the window. “I’ve had a horrible day.” Whether or not any of the other cats wished to hear Pewter’s lavish lament wasn’t going to stop the gray fatty from going on and on.

  Mrs. Murphy, in contrast, stuck with Tucker, who loved children. This canine affection was returned. One little boy gave Tucker his flag. The dog patriotically ran all around the quad, flag in mouth.

  On long wooden picnic tables in the middle of the quad was true summer picnic fare. Miranda, although not a Lutheran, had helped with all that. Everyone attended this gathering: Catholics, Baptists, Jewish families from the temple
in Charlottesville. Flag Day at St. Luke’s was not to be missed.

  The veterans saluted the flags at a short ceremony before food was served. Victor Gatzembizi was an Air Force veteran, though he had not seen combat. However, heroically enough, he now paid for transportation for those elderly vets who might otherwise have difficulty attending. Mostly their families brought them, but some lived in nursing homes.

  Sipping a cold one after the ceremony, Fair slapped Victor on the back. “Thanks. Having those World War Two veterans here is an inspiration for the rest of us.”

  Latigo strolled over. “Vic, I’ll be sending you more work after the holiday.”

  Fair wasn’t sure if Latigo was joking or not. “What do you mean? You think there’ll be more accidents from Flag Day? It’s not a drinking holiday. Not like Memorial Day,” Fair remarked.

  “Any holiday is an excuse,” Latigo replied in an even tone. “I was actually thinking about the Fourth of July. Always a lot of accidents then.” He asked Fair, “You didn’t serve, did you?”

  “No, I headed straight to vet school after undergraduate. I often think I missed one of life’s central experiences—for men, anyway.”

  “All I heard was ‘central experiences.’ ” Yancy Hampton joined them.

  “Didn’t serve in the military.” Fair drained his longneck.

  “Navy,” Yancy stated. “I’ve even been thinking about going back in. They’re offering tempting packages to those of us who made captain or above.”

  Victor’s eyebrows raised. “I learned a hell of a lot in the Air Force. I was in transport and they taught me about engines. But you’d go back? Why leave a thriving business? And, hey, it’s the assholes above you and the idiots below.”

  “That’s anywhere.” Yancy waved his hand dismissively. “I’d go back to get away from home. Next weekend is my daughter Stephanie’s wedding. Around my house there’s been just about as much estrogen drama as I can handle.”

  Latigo’s daughters were the same age as Stephanie, all the girls having attended St. Anne’s. “Stephanie’s pretty reasonable.”