“Busy,” Mrs. Murphy replied as Tucker dropped the money.
“What have you got?” Harry reached down and picked it up, her jaw dropping as she flipped through ten thousand dollars. “What the hell!”
To hold ten thousand dollars in cash in her hand took her breath away. She sat down hard in a kitchen chair and recounted the money.
“There’s more. You’ll be rich!” Tucker wiggled her tailless rear end.
“Think of the tuna that will buy,” Pewter purred. “Let’s go get the rest of it.”
“We can’t do it without Mom,” Mrs. Murphy advised. “The rest of it is in a metal toolbox.”
“You carried that. We should all go, and we have to hurry because a storm is coming. We could bring it here. Think of the food, the catnip!” Pewter displayed a rare enthusiasm.
Harry peered down at her friends. “Where’d you get this?”
“I thought you’d never ask.” Tucker walked to the door, then looked over her shoulder at Harry.
Over the years, Harry had learned to pay attention to her animals. For one thing, their senses were much sharper than her own. Then, too, they had never let her down, even Pewter, who grumbled far too much. She’d followed Tucker and the cats before, so she knew the signs and, clearly, Tucker had a mission.
“All right.” She rose, pulled her heavy coat off the peg, wrapped a plaid scarf around her neck, and took the cashmere-lined gloves from the pockets.
“How far is it?” Pewter inquired.
“Walnut stand,” Tucker answered.
“Mmm, well, since she’s got the message, I’ll hold down the fort.”
“Pewter, you are so lazy,” Mrs. Murphy said. “You were the one who said, ‘Let’s go get the rest of it.’ ”
“It’s cold. And there really is no reason for all of us to go.” With that, she turned and sashayed back into the living room, where Harry had restoked the fire.
“Can you believe her?” Mrs. Murphy was incredulous.
Tucker laughed. “Right, she volunteered to carry money.”
“You’re talking about me,” Pewter called from the living room. “Because I’m so fascinating.”
Harry opened the door, then the screen door, and stepped out to see a rapidly changing sky. Clouds rolled lower now, dark clouds piling up behind the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Wouldn’t be long before they’d slip over. She could just make out gusts of snow in some high spots. If only the dog and cat could talk, she’d take the truck. She started walking behind the two, who were already shooting ahead of her. The Thinsulate in her boots sure helped, as did the wool- and-cashmere- blend socks. Much as Harry refrained from spending money, she had sense to spend it on good equipment and warm work clothes.
The remnants of the last snow crunched underfoot. By the time they all reached the creek, she followed the two over the narrowest place, her heel just breaking the ice at the edge. She didn’t get wet, though, so she smiled and picked up her pace, since the animals had started trotting.
“Sure hope we can get up and back before this hits.” Mrs. Murphy sniffed the air. “It’s higher up there, so I bet the flurries are already swirling.”
“Even if it snows harder, we’ll make it,” Tucker replied optimistically.
“As long as we can see. A whiteout scares me.” The cat felt the barometric pressure slide a bit more.
“If only she could move faster.” Tucker looked back at Harry striding purposefully along.
“She can run, but with all those clothes on she can’t run for long.” Mrs. Murphy fluffed out her fur, for it now felt even colder.
Even with the weight of her coat and the sweater underneath, Harry could keep up, as long as the two kept it at a trot. She reached the walnut stand in a half hour, snow falling thicker now.
“Over here.” Tucker bounded to the outcropping.
“Someone’s coming.” Mrs. Murphy heard a motor cut off perhaps a quarter of a mile away.
Tucker heard it, too. “We’d better hurry.”
Harry reached the box protected by the low rock overhang. Just then a gust of wind sent snow flying everywhere. The denuded walnut tree bent slightly, and the pines beyond bowed as if to a queen.
She knelt down, opened the box. The crisp bills, neatly stacked, promised some ease in her life. However, Harry, raised strictly by her parents, would never take money that wasn’t hers. She’d turn this over to Cooper, as she realized immediately that something was terribly wrong. This had to be blood money, more or less.
She didn’t realize how wrong things were, even though Tucker barked loudly and Mrs. Murphy leapt up on the overhang. The wind, whistling now, obscured sound to human ears. Harry never saw what was coming. One swift crack over the head and she dropped.
Tucker started to attack, but Mrs. Murphy screamed, “Leave him. He wants the money, not Mom.”
She was right. Brother George hurried back up to the old fire road before the snow engulfed him.
Tucker licked Harry’s face. Mrs. Murphy jumped down. A trickle of blood oozed down the side of Harry’s head. Her lad’s cap had fallen off.
“I can’t wake her.” Tucker frantically licked.
“She’s alive. I hope her skull isn’t cracked.” The cat sniffed Harry’s temples. “Tucker, Fair should be home. You have to get him. I’ll stay here. This storm is only going to get worse. Help me push her cap back on. At least she won’t lose so much heat from her head.”
“I can’t leave you all.”
“Tucker, you must. She’ll suffer frostbite if she’s here too long. She might even freeze to death. And if she wakes, what if she’s disoriented? I don’t know if I can get her home. You have to go, NOW.”
The dog touched noses with her dearest friend, licked Harry one more time.
“I’ll see you.” The mighty little dog left them.
Tucker ran for all she was worth, goaded by both fear and love.
Mrs. Murphy curled around Harry’s head. The low overhang offered some protection. It wasn’t so bad, the tiger told herself. She desperately wanted to believe that as the world turned white.
21
“Thanks, Coop. Call me on my cell, okay?” Fair punched the off button.
He’d arrived home an hour ago. Harry’s beloved truck sat in the driveway. He assumed she was in the barn. But when Tucker failed to rush out and greet him, he poked his head inside. No Harry. Not a sign of her in the house. Pewter meowed incessantly, even though Fair had no idea what the cat was telling him.
He wasn’t a worrier by nature, but what set him off was ten thousand dollars in one-hundred- dollar bills, bound by a cardboard sleeve, sitting on the kitchen table, big as you please.
Where did Harry get the money? Why would she just leave it on the kitchen table? This was so out of character for his wife that he had called Cooper to find out if she was over there. Cooper’s farm was the old Jones family place, which the young detective rented from Reverend Herb Jones.
Cooper, also at a loss over the money, was now worried herself.
Fair called her back. “Hey, I’m sorry to bother you again, but I just noticed the sleeve on this wad of bills has teeth marks.”
“Human?” Cooper was more than intrigued.