“Yeah, and then sometimes they take a pill and then they don’t have the babies,” Harriet explained. She seemed to know an awful lot about this stuff. Then again, at her house they watched the Discovery Channel all the time, which was probably where she got her information.
“They take a pill?” asked Dooley, looking up. “What pill?”
“Yeah, what pill?” I asked. This was news to me, too.
Harriet shrugged, studying her fingernails.“I dunno. Some pill.”
Dooley turned to me, and I could see the question in his eyes before he formulated it.“Does Odelia have this magic anti-baby pill, Max?”
Ugh.“How should I know?”
His face took on a determined look.“We need to find out. This is life or death, Max.”
I was afraid to ask.“Why is this life or death, Dooley?”
“Because the moment Odelia has her babies she’ll get rid of us!”
And there it was. The crux of the matter. I had to admit I’d given the matter some thought myself. Our mailwoman Bambi Wiggins recently had a baby, and her cat Ellen had told us that there are three rules for cats when in the presence of a human baby: don’t scratch the baby. Don’t sit on the baby. Don’t bite the baby. But I could tell Ellen wasn’t entirely sanguine about her position in the Wiggins household herself now that this baby was born. She tried to put on a brave face, but there’s a long-held rumor amongst cats that the moment humans have babies those same humans’ cats get offered a one-way ride to the pound. And if there’s one place us cats fear even more than the vet, it’s the pound.
“We have to stop her,” Dooley whispered, loud enough for the entire waiting room to hear. “Odelia can never have babies, Max. We need to stall her until she’s too old! Which is only…” He made a few quick calculations in his head. “Two more years!”
“Ten,” Harriet corrected him. “She’s ten now, which makes her twenty in ten.”
“Fifteen at the outside,” Brutus repeated. “Which gives you a window of five years.”
He cut me an urgent look. I knew what that look meant: have you thought of some remedy or cure for my very delicate issue, Max? I gave him a look back that said: no, Brutus. I haven’t. But I was adamant to bring it up with Vena when I had the chance, whether he liked it or not.
What? I’m not an expert on tomcat anatomy. Vena is. Which is why she gets paid the big bucks.
Chapter 11
Dooley, Brutus and Harriet were still discussing the baby thing, so I pawed Odelia’s leg until she picked me up. I had an important message to deliver and now was the time to do it.
“Brutus has issues, Odelia,” I told her quietly, making sure the other members of our cat menagerie couldn’t overhear us.
“I’ll say,” she said between unmoving lips. “You guys are so funny.”
I had no idea how to respond to that, so I went on,“He’s having pee-pee issues.”
This time a frown appeared on her brow.“Pee-pee issues?”
I cut a quick glance down to the floor, but Brutus was still engrossed in the entire pill discussion so the coast was clear.“You need to ask Vena to take a look at his pee-pee,” I said. “But don’t tell her I told you, cause this is a very sensitive matter for Brutus and he’ll probably kill me if he found out I told you to tell Vena.”
Odelia smiled. Cat drama. She knew all about it.“Fine,” she said, her lips still not moving, her eyes darting about the room to make sure nobody saw she was talking to her cat. I didn’t know how she did it. Each time I meow or mewl my lips have a tendency to part. Hard to keep them pressed together and still hold a well-enunciated conversation.
I made to jump back down but Odelia held onto me.“Wait. Tell me more about this pee-pee thing.”
“What more is there to tell?”
“Does he have pain when he urinates?”
Ugh. I so didn’t want to discuss this topic. “He urinates just fine. It’s the other thing that doesn’t work.”
She frowned, confused.“What other thing?”
I cocked a knowing whisker at her. And then she got it.
“Oh!”
“Yeah.”
“The… Brutus and… Harriet.”
“Yup.”
“You mean his soldier refuses to salute.”
Gah.“I think I’ve heard enough,” I said, and gracefully jumped down to resume my position at her feet. And it was then that the conversation really turned weird.
“Did you hear about that explosion this morning?” asked Shanille.
“Yeah, some old guy got blown up, right?” said Tom, the butcher’s cat.
“Not just some old guy,” said Tigger, the plumber’s cat. “The Most Fascinating Man in the World. My human loves those commercials. My human loves beer,” he clarified.
“Your human is a raging alcoholic,” said Shanille disapprovingly.
“He is not. He loves beer, that’s all. And Scotch. And vodka. And—”
“Kingman told me the guy’s cat is missing,” said Misty, the electrician’s cat.
“The Most Fascinating Man in the World had a cat?” I asked.
“Sure he did. The Most Fascinating Cat in the World. She was in some of those commercials. What’s her name again?” Misty clicked her nails annoyedly, then her face cleared. “That’s right. Shadow. Great name for a cat, huh?”
Shadow, who belongs to Franklin Beaver, the guy who runs the hardware store, grinned.“I like it.”
“I think he likes gin, too,” said Tigger, frowning, “though I’m not sure. He definitely likes his Martinis. Neat, not stirred or shaken. Poured straight from the bottle.”
“Maybe we should talk to this Shadow, Max,” Dooley suggested. “Find out what he knows.”
“Shadow is a she,” said Misty. “Not a he. At least that’s what Kingman told me.”
“I’m not a she,” said Shadow, a shadow passing over his face. “I’m a he.”
“Well, she’s a she,” said Misty decidedly. “So there.”
“And he likes his brandy, too,” said Tigger musingly. “Pear brandy, if I’m not mistaken. And apple.” He shrugged. “He’s not picky. Very happy-go-lucky guy, my human. Very easy.”
I held up my paws.“Where can we find this Shadow—he or she?”
Misty frowned.“Like I said, Kingman thinks Shadow went missing. Right after the explosion.”
“Must have scared the living daylights out of her,” Shanille agreed. “I know I wouldn’t enjoy my human being blown up.” She darted a quick look at Father Reilly, ascertaining he was still there, and had not been blown up while she wasn’t looking.
“None of us would enjoy our humans being blown up,” I said.
“Speak for yourself,” a ratty little cat piped up. I recognized her as the landscaper’s tabby. “Wanna know what my human did? Accidentally stuck me in the washer. The washer! I wanted to have a look-see and the doofus closed the door on me! It’s a miracle I survived!”
We all stared at the cat. She looked a little worse for wear but very much alive.
She sighed.“At least I don’t got fleas, like you lot do.” She scratched a floppy left ear. “It’s this damn water in my ears that bugs me, though. Can’t get it out! Soapy water. Ugh.”
“And then there’s wine, of course,” said Tigger, his face clearing. “Oh, he loves his wines. He loves his red wines, he loves his white wines, he loves his ros?s—”
“Will you shut up already?” asked Shanille plaintively. “I don’t care about your alcoholic human’s addictions and disgusting predilections.”
“Practice some kindness, Shanille,” Tigger said, stung. “Isn’t that what your human teaches? Kindness and your basic Christian compassion?”
Shanille tilted her chin.“I’ll have you know I don’t go in for all that religious stuff.”
“Your human runs a church for a living!”
“So? Your human unclogs toilets for a living. That doesn’t mean you have to.”
“It’s not the same thing and you know it.”
Pretty soon the whole thing erupted into a war of words, as it often does when a bunch of cats get together. I decided to do the smart thing and stay out of it. Instead, I turned to my compatriots, who sat following the back-and-forth with glittering eyes and clicking claws. Oh, cats do love a good cat fight.“You guys, we have to find this cat Shadow. Maybe she saw what happened to her human.” I looked up at Odelia who gave me a wink.