Cat on the Scent

            She thought Harry would be much improved with a tail. Tucker could certainly use one.

            A flurry of squawks, screeches, and whistles drew her from her grooming. She dropped her tail, which she had picked up in her paw.

            “That jay family is pushing it too far.” Pewter shook herself and strolled to the barn door.

            “Death to cats!” The jay swooped down on Pewter, flew through the barn, and zoomed out the other end.

            “I’ll break your neck!” the humiliated cat hollered.

            “I’ll help you.” Mrs. Murphy trotted over to Pewter.

            Tucker joined them, too.

            Again the jay swirled around the hayloft, then dove at a forty-five-degree angle.

            Murphy leapt straight up, the swish of tail feathers by her ear. She clapped both paws together but missed.

            “Ha!” the jay called out.

            “Let’s lure him into the hayloft. We’ll cut down his air space,” Pewter sagely advised.

            Mrs. Murphy blinked. “Forget him, I’ve got an idea. Follow me.”

            The two animals trailed after Murphy as she loped across the field.

            “Where are we going?” Pewter asked.

            “To Tally Urquhart’s.”

            “Why?” The day was pretty enough that Pewter felt she could endure exercise.

            “The blue jay made me think of it.”

            “What?” Tucker’s soft brown eyes scanned the fields.

            “I should have thought of this before. We need to work in circles around the barn. A human can’t see the nose on his face.”

            The animals arrived at the abandoned barn a half hour later. Since the weather was good they had made excellent time.

            “The sheriff has scoured the barn and the outbuildings. My plan is that we each work fifty yards apart in a circle. Pewter, take the closest circle. I’ll take the second circle. Tucker, you take the farthest circle. If anyone finds something, yell. If we don’t find anything let’s work three more circles.”

            “When you saw the two humans, where did they walk?” Tucker lifted her head to the wind.

            “Down the dirt road.”

            “If Tommy was killed out here he could be buried anywhere,” Pewter said.

            “Yes, but the other human was little. He wouldn’t be able to drag that heavy carcass far.”

            “Let’s go to work.” Tucker trotted out 150 yards from the barn and shouted back, “We’ll use the road as our rendezvous point, but remember, I’m on the farthest circle, so it will take me longer to get back here.”

            “Okay.” The two cats fanned out.

            Murphy worked quietly. She found old smoothed-over bits of glass from long-ago bottles for poultices, worm remedies, even liquor. Here and there she turned up a rusted horseshoe or a rabbit’s nest. She throttled her instincts to hunt.

            They worked in silence for an hour. Murphy, on the second circle, came back about ten minutes after Pewter.

            “What’d you get?”

            Pewter shrugged. “Ratholes and high-topped shoes.”

            “Come on.”

            “A piece of an upper, I think, anyway. Humans sure put their bodies into some pinchy clothes and shoes.”

            “Whee-ooo.”

            The sound, to their right, sent them scrambling. Tucker sat on the edge of an old dump. Pieces of tractor stuck out through the brambles, which seemed to grow overnight.

            “What have you got?” Pewter thought the graveyard of machines eerie.

            “Nothing, but wouldn’t this be a great place to dump a body?” Tucker said.

            “Yes, but we would have smelled it when we led Harry to the barn.” Mrs. Murphy marveled at how quickly brambles grow in the spring. They were already twirling through an old discarded hay elevator.

            “Yeah.” Tucker, disappointed, bulled through the thorns into the pile, her thick coat protecting her. “I’ll just nose around.”

            “No hunting, Tucker. We’ve resisted.”

            “Pewter, I wouldn’t dream of it.”