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Odelia and Chase stared after the man.“What do you make of that?” asked Odelia. “Leonora in charge, with a pet detective and his cat, and the entire staff fired.”

“Like the guy said. New brooms.”

Odelia thought for a moment.“Maybe that’s why they hired Chris Cross. He claims to be able to talk to pets, just like me. Only I always thought it was just a gimmick. You know, like a sales pitch.”

“Maybe he really can talk to pets, and now he’ll talk to Pussy and together they’ll run the show.”

Odelia glanced around. They still had no clue where Max and Dooley could be, and she was seriously starting to get worried now.

Chase, who could sense her agitation, said,“They’re probably home by now. Strike or no strike, they don’t like to be out and about for too long.”

“No, they don’t,” she agreed. “Maybe it’s time for us to head back.”

And so they strolled back to the front of the house.

Above their heads, and unbeknownst to them, three cats were yelling their little hearts out, pounding the window of Pussy’s room. Unfortunately a cat’s paws are outfitted with soft pink pads, and soft pink pads are not what you want when you try to attract attention by pounding on windows. The upshot was that their efforts produced no effect. And so it was with a desperate eye that Max and Dooley and Pussy saw the two humans who could have saved them from their imprisonment walk away and pass into the night.

Chapter 19

“How can they not have seen us?” asked Dooley with asperity.

“I guess they didn’t,” I said, feeling extremely disappointed in my human. I’d always assumed that Odelia and I shared a sacred bond. The kind of bond whereby she would instinctively know I was in grave danger and she’d come running to offer aid and support no matter the obstacles in her path. But whatever bond we’d once shared was clearly in very bad shape indeed, for even though I’d willed her to look up, she hadn’t done so once. Not a glimpse.

“Maybe they’re simply pretending not to notice us to throw Leonora and Chris Cross and Tank off the scent,” said Dooley, cheering up. “And any moment now they’ll come barging in here with the entire Hampton Cove police force and save us!”

“I don’t think, so, Dooley. They simply didn’t see us.”

“But how is that possible? It’s Odelia. She has to see us. She’s our human.”

“I’m starting to think she no longer is,” I said.

And we would have discussed the topic in depth if the door hadn’t swung open at that exact moment and the same motley crew that had locked us up was upon us once more: Leonora Flake, pushed by her strangely stoic nurse, Chris Cross and his feline sidekick Tank.

“Keep an eye on them, Tank,” said Chris. “Those two are cunning.”

“They don’t look cunning,” said Tank. “In fact they look pretty dumb. Dumb and dumber.” He laughed at his own joke, and so did Chris Cross.

“Will you stop with the inside jokes already?” said Leonora irritably. “So have we decided? Out with the intruders and in with Little Miss Sweet?”

“Yeah, I guess that’s the only way to go,” said Chris. “Max and Dooley clearly know too much now, and the moment we set them loose they’ll run and tell mama. And we can’t do without Pussy, in case we need to show her to the investors or the board at some point.”

“Fine. Do it quietly, though, will you? And make sure no one sees you.”

“Wait, you expectme to do it? Why don’t you do it?”

“Have you seen the wheelchair?”

“I wasn’t talking about you. I was talking about Nurse Ratched over there.”

Nurse Ratched didn’t seem all that happy with her new moniker. “My name is Helga Cooper,” she said in clipped tones. “And nowhere does it say in my job description that I should go around murdering cats. So I refuse.”

“You do it,” Leonora told Chris. “You’re good with cats.”

“I’m good with live cats, not dead ones!”

“Oh, for crying out loud!”

Dooley, who’d been gulping freely next to me, appeared on the verge of a panic attack. “They’re going to kill us, Max!” he cried. “Did you hear that? They’re going to kill us and throw away the bodies!”

“Bury the bodies, most likely,” said Tank with an evil glint in his eyes. “Deep, so that no one will ever find you. And if by some miracle they do, the worms will have eaten through your rotting corpses and all that will be left will be your bones. Sad, sad bones.”

“Oh, no!” said Dooley, hyperventilating now.

“Deep breaths, Dooley,” I said. “Deep, steady breaths.”

“Look, you don’t have to do this,” said Pussy. “You can keep us all in here and no one has to die.”

“Yeah, I know we don’thave to do it,” said Tank. “But that’s just the thing: we want to do it.” He turned to Chris. “Let me do it, boss.”

“You? You can’t kill those two.”

“Oh, but I can,” said Tank, licking his lips and extending a gleaming claw. “In fact I know just how. One nice jab to the jugular and they’ll bleed out like gutted pigs. And then all you have to do is dig the hole and dump the bodies.”

“I don’t want to die, Max!” Dooley cried. “I’m too young to die!”