“We should probably whip up two batches,” he said. “With the kind of demand we’re seeing we’ll run out as soon as the first batch hits the store.”
“Which is great, isn’t it? We’ll be able to raise our prices again, and pretty soon we’ll be making a lot more money by selling a lot less product, which is all to the good.”
Chris was right, but still.“You don’t know how frustrating it is to send customers away, Chris. You’re not in the store day after day, having to see the disappointed look on their faces, or to listen to their daily laments. I had to send a dozen away this morning alone, and I’m sure that half of the ones waiting until we open again will have come for the Duffer.” He gestured to the display window, through which they could see a line of two dozen customers already lining up until the shop opened again after the lunch hour.
“Just tell them we’re out. And that we’ll have fresh stock hitting the store soon.” He patted his brother on the back. “This is simply business ABC, Colin. When demand trumps supply, that’s when people get rich. So enjoy it, and don’t fret so much.” When Colin made to say more, he held up his hand. “I’m on it, all right, little brother? I’m on it.”
Colin watched his brother stalk off through the kitchen, and shook his head. Chris didn’t understand what it felt like for a people pleaser like him to have to disappoint people. He hated it. In fact he hated it so much he had half a mind to close the store until they were fully stocked again with fresh Duffers. But of course he couldn’t very well do that. So he walked to the door, turned over the Open sign, and unlocked the door.
The first question the first customer asked, a hopeful smile spreading across her face, was,“Are the new Duffers in?”
Chapter 15
“But I don’t want to go to the pound, Max!” Dooley was saying.
“I’m sure this is all a big misunderstanding,” I told my friend. “As soon as we arrive at the pound they’ll see we’re not strays, and they’ll call Odelia and get this all sorted out.”
“We are chipped,” Dooley reminded me.
“I know, Dooley. I was there when we were chipped, remember?”
He nodded anxiously, then glanced at the other collection of cats that were in there with us. They were cats of every possible persuasion: American Shorthair, Maine Coon, Serengeti, Ocicat, Highlander, California Spangled, Munchkin, Ragamuffin… Name one and it was represented in the van. In fact it wasn’t too much to say the van was like Noah’s ark, if Noah had only been interested in collecting one of every breed of feline.
I recognized a lot of familiar faces. Shanille was there, the director of cat choir, Tom, the butcher’s cat, Misty, the electrician’s cat, Tigger, the plumber’s cat…
“We’re all chipped,” said Shanille, “and we’ll all be released the moment the director of the pound realizes his overzealous workers have made a terrible, humongous mistake.”
“And then they’ll all be fired,” said Tigger. Tigger’s human is an alcoholic, which is probably why he’s always a little on edge. He was definitely on edge right now.
The van suddenly stopped, and moments later the door was thrown open and yet another cat was thrown in with the rest of us. I recognized her as Shadow, Franklin Beaver’s cat.
“The only one missing is Kingman,” I said as a joke, but no one was laughing.
“Kingman knows how to take care of himself,” said Tom. “He knows how to hide, which is more than can be said for the sorry lot that’s locked up in here.”
He was right.“We should all have been more vigilant,” said Shanille.
“How can we be more vigilant?” asked Buster, a Main Coon who belongs to Fido Siniawski from the barber store. “I was simply walking down the street, minding my own business, like I always do, when these two clowns suddenly grabbed me.”
“Yeah, no level of vigilance could have saved us from being captured,” Misty agreed.
“I think they’re doing a clean sweep,” said Missy, the landscaper’s tabby. “Making sure they take all the cats off the streets.”
“But why would they do that?” Dooley asked.
“Who knows?”
“Probably a political thing,” opined Tom. “Politicians are always doing things like that. They take a decision and then the next day they take a completely different decision.”
“The pound probably hired a new guy, and they didn’t explain to him that most cats in Hampton Cove are chipped and domesticated,” said Shanille.
“Except Clarice,” Misty pointed out. “By all rights Clarice should be in here with us. And the fact that she isn’t, just goes to show you this is all one big mistake.”
The van stopped jerked to a halt again, and we were all thrown against the van divider that kept us from getting our paws on the crazy driver who kept picking up fresh cats as if we were just so much garbage dumped on the sidewalk for collection day.
The door was flung open again and this time two cats were dumped in our midst.
“Harriet! Brutus!” cried Dooley.
“Max! Dooley!” cried Harriet, then glanced around, and when she met all the other familiar faces, frowned. “Is this a secret cat choir meeting? Did you set this up, Shanille?”
“Of course I didn’t set this up!” Shanille cried, indignant. “Do you really think I would hire a human to drag us in from the street and lock us up in this mobile cage?”
“I was just thinking out loud,” said Harriet.
“Well, think in silence, because nonsense like that is what kills reputations.”
Shanille lapsed into silence, and so did Harriet. Brutus crawled over three other cats to reach Dooley and myself, and asked in an undertone,“What’s going on here, boys? Where are they taking us?”
“Consensus seems to be the pound,” I said.
“I think they’re taking us to be exterminated,” said Buster, who could be a gloomy Gus.
“Exterminated!” Dooley cried, and all eyes suddenly fastened on him and Buster.
“Yeah, I got picked up by the guys from the pound once and in my professional opinion this van is not from the pound and the people that took us are not from the pound. In other words, this is not a pound-sanctioned operation,” said Buster. He paused for effect. “In other words, this is a private initiative, which can only mean one thing: animal testing and eventual termination. I’m sorry. But that’s the only explanation.”
I gulped, and so did every other cat in that van. We’d heard stories about pharmaceutical and cosmetics companies picking up strays from the streets to use them for testing purposes, and those stories never ended well. And then there were the stories about a cat-hating exterminator who drove around and collected cats and put them in his oven. Somesaid he worked for the Mayor, while others claimed he worked for an underground round table of concerned citizens with extreme views on pets as vermin.
I’d always assumed these were tall tales. Urban legends, if you will. But now I wasn’t so sure. I had a feeling maybe Buster was right, and that either this exterminator or the animal testing people had decided to wipe out the entire Hampton Cove cat population.
“I’ve heard stories,” Brutus now also intimated. “Stories about cat haters working with a hired gun. They consider cats a menace, and want to get rid of us once and for all. Accuse us of being silent killers of birds and other species, and want to make us extinct.”
I’d heard the stories, too, about an island in Australia where thousands of cats were marked for termination, with traps and toxins. Or towns where a cat curfew is in effect, and owners are advised to keep their cats indoors from sundown to sunup. Or else…