Cat on the Scent

Cat On The Scent

RITA MAE BROWN SNEAKY PIE BROWN

 

BANTAM BOOKS NEWYORK • TORONTO • LONDON • SYDNEY • AUCKLAND

To a cat queen,

Elizabeth Putnam Sinsel

            Cast of Characters

            Mary Minor Haristeen (Harry), the young postmistress of Crozet

            Mrs. Murphy, Harry’s gray tiger cat

            Tee Tucker, Harry’s Welsh corgi, Mrs. Murphy’s friend and confidante

            Pewter, Market’s shamelessly fat gray cat, who now lives with Harry and family

            Pharamond Haristeen (Fair), veterinarian, formerly married to Harry

            Mrs. George Hogendobber (Miranda), a widow who works with Harry in the post office

            Market Shiflett, owner of Shiflett’s Market, next to the post office

            Susan Tucker, Harry’s best friend

            Big Marilyn Sanburne (Mim), the undisputed queen of Crozet society

            Tally Urquhart, older than dirt, she says what she thinks when she thinks it, even to her niece, Mim the Magnificent

            Rick Shaw, sheriff

            Cynthia Cooper, police officer

            Herbert C. Jones, pastor of CrozetLutheranChurch

            Blair Bainbridge, a handsome model who lives on the farm next to Harry’s

            Sir H. Vane-Tempest, a modern Midas who proves there is nothing like the greed of the rich

            Sarah Vane-Tempest, the much younger, fabulously beautiful wife of the imperious H. Vane

            Archie Ingram, as a county commissioner he has been a strong advocate of controlling development and preserving the environment. Too bad he couldn’t preserve his marriage

            Tommy Van Allen, tall, dark, and handsome, he’s been wild as a rat ever since childhood

            Ridley Kent, an easygoing man who has inherited enough money to sap all initiative. He means well

            1

            The intoxicating fragrance of lilacs floated across the meadow grass. Mrs. Murphy was night hunting in and around the abandoned dependencies on old Tally Urquhart’s farm, Rose Hill. Once a great estate, the farm’s main part continued to be kept in pristine condition. A combination of old age plus spiraling taxes, and wages forced Thalia “Tally” Urquhart, as well as others like her, to let outlying buildings go.

            A huge stone hay barn with a center aisle big enough to house four hay wagons side by side sat in the middle of small one-and-a-half-story stone houses with slate roofs. The buildings, although pockmarked by broken windows, were so well constructed they would endure despite the birds nesting in their chimneys.

            The hay barn, whose supporting beams were constructed from entire tree trunks, would outlast this century and the next one as well.

            The paint peeled off the stone buildings, exposing the soft gray underneath with an occasional flash of rose-gray.

            The tiger cat sniffed the air; low clouds and fog were moving in fast from the west, sliding down the Blue Ridge Mountains like fudge on a sundae.

            Normally Mrs. Murphy would hunt close to her own farm. Often she was accompanied by Pewter, who despite her bulk was a ferocious mouser. This evening she wanted to hunt alone. It cleared her mind. She liked to wait motionless for mice to scurry in the rotting burlap feed bags, for their tiny claws to tap against the beams in the hayloft.

            Since no one paid attention to the Urquhart barns, the mousing was superb. Kernels of grain and dried corn drew the little marauders in, as did the barn itself, a splendid place in which to raise young mice.

            A moldy horse collar, left over from the late 1930s, its brass knobs green, hung on the tack-room wall, forgotten by all, the mules who wore it long gone to the Great Mule Sky.

            Mrs. Murphy left off her mousing to explore the barn, constructed in the early nineteenth century. How lovely the farm must have once been. Mrs. Murphy prided herself on her knowledge of human history, something the two-legged species often overlooked in its rush to be current. Of course, she reflected, whatever is current today is out of fashion tomorrow.

            The tiger cat, like most felines, took the long view.

            Her particular human, Mary Minor Haristeen, or Harry, the young, pretty postmistress of Crozet, Virginia, evinced interest in history as well as in animal behavior. She read voraciously and expanded her understanding of animals by visiting Virginia Tech in Blacksburg and the MarionDuPontScottEquineResearchCenter in Leesburg, Virginia. Harry even studied the labels on crunchy-food bags to make certain kitty nutrition was adequate. She cared for her two cats, one dog, and three horses with love and knowledge.

            The flowers continued to push up around the buildings. The lilac bushes, enormous, burst forth each spring. The sadness of the decaying old place was modified by the health of the plant life.