The Catnap Before Christmas

by Kathi Daley

  Of course, it was also possible they were staying at a home owned by one of them or a family member. None of us could understand why three guys hanging out on the island over the holidays would go around vandalizing holiday-themed stores and displays, but perhaps they have some sort of a dare situation going on.

  Meanwhile, I told Finn about Wiley and his drawings. I could tell he was intrigued by the notion that the boy might know something about the fire at the Santa House. I assured him I planned to utilize both the boy and the cat in the hope of stumbling on a real clue we could use to bring in the person who’d killed Tom Miller. Finn and I were both of the opinion that if it did turn out that the college-aged men were the individuals vandalizing random shops and displays around town, it was more likely than not that they weren’t the ones who had set fire to the Santa House. We both felt that a group of men playing pranks wouldn’t start with a big fire that killed a man and then go out that night and chop down a tree and steal a baby Jesus. There was still that small voice in the back of my mind that wouldn’t let go of the idea that the random acts of vandalism were nothing more than a decoy to cast suspicion away from whoever had killed Tom Miller, but after seeing Wiley’s drawings this morning I was even less convinced that was what had happened.

  I decided to leave work early so I could spend a few minutes chatting with Jane while I picked up Jingles. My intuition told me that the key to solving Tom’s murder lay in getting to what the cat and the boy knew but would have difficulty communicating. I knew that it was Finn’s job to track down the mistletoe vandal, but now that I no longer suspected that the vandal was the one who killed Tom, I was much less interested in him and much more interested in the man, or woman, who’d burned down the Santa House.

  “You’re early,” Jane greeted me when I knocked on her door.

  “I hoped that you might have a few minutes to chat. I need to get home to my husband and the baby we are sitting for, so I can’t stay long, but the drawings Wiley came up with this morning have been on my mind all day. I think that between them, Wiley and Jingles hold the key to bringing Tom Miller’s killer to justice.”

  “Wiley and Jingles have been up in Wiley’s room all day. I know there has been a lot of drawing going on. I didn’t want to disturb them because both of them seemed content, but I am willing to try to talk with Wiley to see if he will share his work with us. Just be warned that he may not be.”

  I nodded. “I wouldn’t want to do anything to upset him. Let’s just ask him if we can look at his drawings and take it from there.”

  I followed Jane into Wiley’s bedroom. Jingles trotted over to greet me, but Wiley never looked up from the picture he was drawing. There were other pictures scattered all around the room. Some were of the same basic scenes he’d drawn that morning with slight variations. There were additional drawings of Santa in a burning house, additional drawings of a brightly wrapped gift on fire, and other drawings of the interior of the Santa House.

  Yet while some of the drawings seemed to be duplicates, others were different. There was a drawing of Santa in a coffin, which I found disturbing, Santa in a boat, which I found less so, and Santa in a windowless room. On the wall of the room without windows were panels, or perhaps doors.

  “What do you make of the drawing of the room?” I asked Jane.

  “It feels to me like a cellar. It has a dark feel to it.”

  I nodded. “I had the same reaction. What do you think is going on with the back wall?”

  Jane frowned. “I’m not sure. It seems as if perhaps the wall has doors or drawers built into it. My first thought was that it was a mausoleum, but I’m not so sure.”

  “Do you think it might be a bank? When I look at the wall, I think of safety deposit boxes.”

  Jane shrugged. “Maybe. It’s hard to tell. The feel of the drawing is dark and almost sinister. But I guess now what you mention it, safety deposit boxes might work as well.”

  “I guess the main reason it occurred to me that the drawing could be of safety deposit boxes is because we found a key among Tom’s possessions. It looked as if it might have belonged to a lockbox of some sort.” I paused. “I wonder if Finn ever followed up on that.”

  “So you think that it’s possible whatever is inside a safety deposit box might somehow be related to his death?”

  “I don’t know. It seems pretty random to me right now, but it might be something to look in to.”

  I glanced at the other drawings in the room. Among all those duplicates, I also wondered about the ones of the boat. There were quite a few images of Santa in a boat, and while the other drawings felt dark in tone, those did not.

  “Do you have a boat, or do you know anyone who does?” I asked.

  “No. Wiley has never even ridden in a boat. I did wonder about those drawings. I’m not sure what they’re all about.”

  “I sort of hoped that Wiley might provide additional details about the man with the scribbled-out face, but it seems as if they are all the same.”

  Jane smiled at her son, who was working on a drawing of a large tree with branches that looked a lot like arms. “If the figure of the man in black is something from his nightmare, he may be blocking out the details of his face. It’s so hard to understand why he draws what he does.”

  Jingles walked over and brushed up against Wiley. He paused what he was doing and looked directly at the cat. The cat butted his head up against the boy’s hand, and he smiled.

  “Did you see that?” Jane asked.

  “See what?”

  “Not only did Wiley stop drawing to give his attention to the cat, which he never does, but he smiled, which he also never does.”

  I put my hand across my heart. “Wow. That is really something. I can see why you want to adopt Jingles so badly.”

  “In my mind, this cat is the answer to a prayer. Wiley was so upset this morning, but then Jingles showed up and he has been happy and peaceful all day.”

  There was no way I could take the cat away from this child. “Look, I know I said that I couldn’t let you adopt Jingles until we found Tom’s killer, but Jingles and Wiley seem to be working together. I can probably leave him here as long as I can come back in the morning to check on things, and as long as you are able to have him overnight.”

  “I don’t have any supplies. Food. A cat box. That sort of thing.”

  I glanced at the cat, who seemed pretty darn content. “Okay. I’ll go get what you need. When I come back, we’ll work out a way for Jingles to both work with Wiley and help me find Tom’s killer.”

  “Thank you so much. I can’t tell you how much this means to me and Wiley.”

  I turned to leave the bedroom to get the supplies I’d need to bring back for Jingles from my cabin when one of the drawings caught my eye. “Do you think we could take a closer look at that drawing of the wall of boxes?”

  Jane nodded. “Wiley honey, Cait is going to let Jingles stay with you tonight, but she needs to go get some supplies. She would like to look at one of your drawings a little closer. Is that okay?”

  The boy reached over and picked up the drawing I wanted to examine and handed it to his mother. He did so without ever looking up from his current drawing.

  “Is it okay if I take this?” I asked. “I’ll bring it back when I come back with the food and other supplies Jingles will need to stay with you.”

  He didn’t respond. I looked at Jane.

  “I think it is okay. If he didn’t want you to take it, he would let you know. Let’s leave the room and see what happens.”

  We walked out of the bedroom and down the hallway. Wiley hadn’t resisted my taking the drawing that far away, so Jane felt certain he didn’t mind my leaving the house with it. I told her I’d be back in an hour and then headed toward my cabin.

  Chapter 13

  “So what do you make of this?” I showed Cody the drawing Wiley had done as soon as I arrived at my cabin to pick up the things for Jingles.

  “It looks like
a mausoleum,” he answered. “A building where bodies are buried in drawers built into the wall.”

  “That was my thought as well, but then I wondered if it might be a wall of safety deposit boxes. Finn and I did find a small key among the possessions Tom had in the pocket of the pants he left in his dirty clothes hamper.”

  “Did Finn ever figure out what the key went to?”

  “Not as far as I know,” I answered. “I intended to stop by to chat with him, but Tara and I spent the afternoon setting up the cat lounge as a Santa’s workshop.”

  “Won’t that be a problem with the cats?” Cody wondered.

  “We have no cats for the lounge right now. The ones I had were all adopted, at least the ones we felt were eligible for adoption. I did pick up the new cats this past weekend, but I’m going to wait to take them to the lounge until after the holiday, so the room isn’t being used. In the past, we’ve just set up a chair for Alex in the bookstore, but he is such a popular Santa, there is always a line to see him, so we figured there would be more space if we used the cat lounge. You should see the place. Tara got a lot of new decorations. It looks adorable.”

  “I’ll stop by tomorrow. Maybe I’ll bring Sammy.”

  I glanced at the infant, who was watching us from his bouncy chair. “We did talk about getting a photo of him with Santa for his parents. I guess that would be as good a time as any.” I began gathering the supplies. “I’m going to run this stuff over to Jane, but then I’ll be right back. Do you want me to pick up some food?”

  “I guess that might be a good idea. I never did make it to the market.”

  “How about Mexican?”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Maybe I’ll call Siobhan to see if they want to join us if they haven’t eaten yet. She was busy with two babies today, so she might be happy not to have to cook.”

  As it turned out, Siobhan was thrilled with the idea of not having to cook, so I explained that I had to drop off the cat stuff and pick up the food and then Cody and Sammy and I would be over.

  ******

  “So, did you find the college-aged guys who bought the mistletoe?” I asked Finn once we’d each served ourselves from the selection of enchiladas, tacos, tamales, and beans and rice I’d brought.

  “I did. As I expected, they’d rented a house on the island. When I first spoke to them, they denied having been responsible for the vandalism, but when I brought up the fact that a man had died in the fire at the Santa House and someone was going down for murder, they confessed to the lesser crimes. They are in jail on San Juan Island now, but I’m sure they’ll be processed and then released, but I can guarantee you when they get the bill for the damage they caused, they are going to wish they’d found a less expensive way to pledge a club.”

  “Is that why they did it?” I asked. “They were pledging a club?”

  “That’s what they said,” Finn confirmed.

  “And you are sure they aren’t also responsible for the Santa House?” Siobhan asked.

  “I don’t believe they had anything to do with that. The other crimes were petty in nature, and the fire at the Santa House feels like it was set by someone with knowledge about arson. The men I spoke to were just a bunch of goofy kids who got together and made a lot of really bad decisions during their Christmas break from college.”

  “Well, I’m glad we have at least part of the crime spree solved,” I said. “Now we can focus on the Santa House. Did you look at the copy of the drawing I left for you?”

  Finn nodded. “It has a familiar feel to it, but I can’t say that I know offhand where a wall with boxes might be.”

  “I thought they might be safety deposit boxes. Did you find a safety deposit box to go with the key?”

  “No. I checked all the banks on the island, and the key is not a match for any of their systems. I figure the key either goes to something else entirely, or it belongs to a safety deposit box located off the island.”

  “I guess we should refocus on the individuals with a motive to want Tom dead,” I said. “I feel like there have been so many distractions, we may have lost focus, which, again, is something Tansy warned me about.”

  “I still can’t believe that none of the other acts of vandalism ended up being connected to the fire at the Santa House,” Cody said. “I mean really, what are the odds that we’d have so many incidents, all relating to Christmas in some way, and yet not have them connect to one another?”

  “It seems unlikely,” I agreed. “Yet that does seem to be the case.”

  We fell silent as we ate our dinner. Afterward, Cody and Finn got up to see to the dishes, leaving Siobhan and me alone.

  “Are you still able to watch Sammy tomorrow evening while Cody and I are at play rehearsal?” I asked her.

  “Yeah, we can watch him. How is the play coming along?”

  I groaned. “Let’s just say it will take a real Christmas miracle for us to pull it off this year. Cody and I haven’t been able to do extra rehearsals, as we have in the past, and I feel like the kids are distracted. I’m glad we decided on a small production at the church rather than the larger one we sometimes hold at the community center. I figure most of the audience will be parents and other family members, so maybe they’ll be more forgiving if all the kids haven’t learned their lines.”

  “Did you remind them to practice at home?”

  “I did. That doesn’t mean they did, however.”

  “If you can get the kids to come for an extra rehearsal, I can watch Sammy,” Siobhan volunteered.

  “I was thinking about doing one on Friday. I guess we’ll see how tomorrow’s rehearsal goes. I feel like it isn’t just the kids who have been distracted. Between having Sammy to take care of and moving and the remodel, I feel like Cody and I are on overload most of the time.”

  “Just another week and it will all be over one way or another,” Siobhan said.

  I knew she was trying to be encouraging, but the reminder that Christmas was less than ten days away did not leave me feeling more confident at all.

  “Do you need help with the Christmas Eve party?” Siobhan asked.

  “Francine is doing the turkeys again,” I said, referring to our next-door neighbor. “You and Tara are already taking care of most of the side dishes. Cody and I plan to decorate the ballroom as soon as we finish moving our stuff out of there. Danny ordered the wine, and Mom is going to make a nonalcoholic punch. I think we have everything covered as long as everything else in our lives goes smoothly between now and then.”

  “Mr. Parsons is so grateful for all you do for him that I don’t think he is going to care a bit if everything isn’t perfect,” Siobhan reminded me. “How many guests have you confirmed?”

  “Around eighty-five,” I answered. “But there always end up being additional folks with nowhere to go for Christmas Eve, so we are planning for a hundred.”

  “Just let us know what you need,” Siobhan said. “Finn and I want to help. Don’t we?” she asked as Finn and Cody wandered back into the room.

  “As long as I don’t have to work,” Finn replied.

  I frowned. I supposed that if we hadn’t identified Tom’s killer by Christmas, Finn might not end up being able to take a few days off as he’d hoped. We had another week to figure this out. We’d just need to step up our game.

  Chapter 14

  Wednesday, December 18

  Wiley’s mom called me the first thing that morning. She shared that while Wiley and Jingles had gotten along fabulously the previous evening, Wiley had awoken early today from what appeared to have been a bad dream. He had been drawing frantically ever since, and the cat seemed restless as well. She wondered if I could stop by on my way to work. She wasn’t sure if I should take the cat home with me for a while or if it would be better to leave him with Wiley, but I had asked her to call me if the cat started acting oddly and in her mind the way he’d been behaving this morning definitely qualified as strange.

  I called Tara and fill
ed her in. Cody had already planned to take Sammy to day care, and he offered to take Max into the newspaper with him, so he was covered as well. I grabbed a cup of coffee and a piece of toast and headed out the door a full thirty minutes earlier than I would have otherwise. I figured even with the early start, by the time I drove to Harthaven, sussed out the situation, and got back to Coffee Cat Books, I’d wind up being late. I really wanted to be on time because today was Alex’s first day as Santa, but all I could do was all I could do.

  Jane met me at the door. The poor woman looked exhausted. I offered her my most encouraging smile and tried to assure her that I was certain that everything would be okay. When I walked into Wiley’s bedroom, Jingles ran straight over to me despite the dozens and dozens of drawings on the floor.

  “Wow. Someone has been busy.” I bent over to pick up the cat.

  Wiley didn’t look in my direction, but I hadn’t expected him to. There were a lot of drawings of the man with no face, but there were also a lot of Santa sitting on a chair with a brightly wrapped gift beside him. In a few of the drawings, fire was coming out of the top of the package. The drawings were similar to those he’d drawn of the Santa House the day before, but the ribbon on the package was green this time rather than red, and the seat in which Santa sat was less of a throne and more of a plush chair.

  I supposed that just because the details between yesterday’s drawings and today’s were slightly different didn’t necessarily mean they were significant, but still, they did seem worth noting.

  “Meow,” Jingles said, struggling to get down.

  I set him on the floor. He headed for the door.

  I glanced at Jane. “It looks like he might want to go with me.”