Hellcats: Anthology

by Kate Pickford

  Fortunately for the cats, the Matthews Bridge wall wasn’t very high.

  “Okay, one, two, three,” Black said. “Go.”

  All thirty cats pushed the wrapped-up man horizontally onto the stone wall.

  Dad’s head bopped against the hard surface, producing an almighty groan of turmoil. “Ugghhh.”

  Stanley hopped onto the wall and trundled across the length of his Dad’s body, pausing occasionally to poke around the sudden juddering from his limbs under the plastic.

  “Hey, Dad?”

  “Uggghhhhh.”

  “So, here we are,” Stanley said as he analyzed the sack of shit below his paws. “Nice night for a drowning, huh?”

  “What?” came the muffled cry from inside the plastic tomb.

  “I wanna tell you something.”

  “Wh-what?”

  Stanley turned to the expectant crowd of felines all looking up at Stanley and his new victim.

  “You drink too much.”

  “Huh?”

  Stanley turned to the others two feet below, and yelled. “Now.”

  Meow—meow—shriek.

  All thirty cats, including Terry, Zephyr, Sweep, and Bunny climbed up the stone wall and pressed the sides of their faces and bodies against the tarp.

  “Help, help!” Dad screamed from inside the tarp as it rolled onto its side, and again, and again, until…

  …it dropped off the edge and hurtled toward the river one hundred feet below.

  Terry leaned over to watch the object scream toward its final resting place. “Damn, Stanley. You’re one mean badass, you know.”

  Without a trace of emotion, Stanley watched the wrapped-up bad guy vanish toward the water. “I know.”

  “You know, I got a mean bastard I could use help with back home.”

  Suddenly, several complaints came from the mouths of the cats behind, having been inspired by Terry’s confession.

  Sweep licked her paw, ready for war. “Yeah, me too. I got a human who needs taken care of.”

  “I do, too,” Zephyr said. “My owner hits me.”

  “Same here,” came another.

  Stanley turned around and addressed his new, murderous crew. “Don’t worry, guys. If you got a bad guy, we’ll get ‘em.”

  And with that parting shot, Stanley walked around one-hundred-and-eighty-degrees and watched the bag make contact with the water.

  “We’ll get ‘em all,” he whispered.

  Ker-splash.

  “Agh!”

  Dad woke up on the sofa, drenched in sweat.

  Or was it water?

  His face, neck, and clothes were soaking wet, like he’d been dunked in a swimming pool.

  “What the—?”

  He looked at his lap and eyed the half-consumed Rollneck Kojak beer in his hands.

  “Oh,” he exhaled, relieved that everything had just been some kind of bizarre dream.

  He cleared his throat, blinked hard three times, and was about to stand up when he heard a half-growl, half-hiss coming from the plug socket on the wall.

  “Huh?”

  Stanley was sitting upright on the carpet, swishing his tail, right next to the hole that had electrocuted him earlier.

  Dad performed an almighty double-take and lifted the bottle of beer to his face. “Ugh.”

  “Hey, Dad,” Stanley snapped.

  “Wh-what?”

  “You heard me.”

  “What? I had a dream that—no, I, uh—” he said, trying to make sense of the bizarre sight of his own cat talking to him. Then, he noticed the light sound of sobbing coming from the top of the stairs.

  “A dream?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Bricks? Plastic wrapping? River? Like you’ve done to so many other cats, you human asshole?”

  “What? N-No, I—”

  “—Mom’s very upset,” Stanley said. “Stop looking at that bottle and look at me. Dad.”

  Perplexed, Dad did as instructed. “Stanley? How are you able to talk—”

  “—Shut up. I’ve gotta go upstairs and calm Mommy down, now, thanks to you. But your bullshit ends right now. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  Still failing to process the image of a talking cat, Dad felt like grabbing his head and screaming for his sanity. “No, no, you got it all wrong—”

  “—my fluffy little tail, I have, asshole.”

  Stanley trundled along the wall, and reached the bottom of the staircase.

  Then, he turned to his father with the evillest look of determination his cute little face could muster. “Dad?”

  “Y-Yeah?” Dad asked, hoping to suppress his impending coronary in the face of his new, vicious feline adversary.

  “If you ever touch Mom again I’ll fucking kill you.”

  British multi-genre author Andrew Mackay is the creator of the best-selling Star Cat series. His passions include storytelling, caffeine, and writing about himself in the third person.

  Find out more at www.amazon.com/Andrew-Mackay/e/B01MDKTJ2Y.

  67

  Albert Smith’s Culinary Capers

  by Steve Higgs

  Albert and his neighbor Roy can’t seem to keep themselves out of trouble. The pair accidentally involve themselves with a mysterious neighbor. Is she innocent or a part of a criminal enterprise? While the mystery unravels, Albert’s trusty best friend Rex, an oversized German Shepard, seems to know exactly what is going on.

  Missing Rings

  Albert frowned, his face creasing as he began poking about. Petunia’s collection of engagement, wedding, and eternity rings were not where they always sat on her dressing table. They were there yesterday, weren’t they? How could they go missing?

  Rex wandered into his human’s bedroom, wagging his tail lazily from side to side until he caught the scent of the cat. The unwelcome scent meant the cat had been in here again. He’d caught it sitting on his human’s bed just yesterday, but this wasn’t the lingering smell from then, this was fresh. He jumped up to put his front paws on the bed, sniffing along the cover to find the spot it had occupied.

  ‘Down, Rex,’ commanded his human, a kindly old man whose nose was just as unused as all others of his species. So far as Rex was concerned, humans were fun to be around, but also intensely frustrating as they ran around using their eyes and ears, when the information was right there if they would just sniff it in.

  Albert stared at the dressing table again, moving things around until he spotted the glint of gold. There they were, he sighed with relief. His eldest grandson was planning to propose, he discovered yesterday. Martin was twenty-seven, a sensible age to be tying the knot, and though he hadn’t been asked, Albert wanted to offer the ring he bought Petunia when he asked for her hand. It was a two-carat diamond with a cluster of lesser diamonds around it. It cost a silly amount at the time; three months wages, if his memory served him correctly, but she had been worth every hard-earned penny.

  His frown returned: the engagement ring wasn’t there. The eternity and wedding band were, but not the one he wanted. How had they come to move anyway? Turning to spy the dog, an oversized German Shepherd, who was now lifting the valance with his head as he looked under the bed, Albert said, ‘Rex!’ to get the dog’s attention. He raised his voice to see if he could make the dog jump and chuckled when he heard the animal knock his head against the underside of the bed.

  Rex popped back out, a scowl on his face. He played tricks on his human regularly - looking under things until his human gave in and got on the carpet to see what he was looking at was a favourite. He fell for it every time, even though there was never anything there to look at. However, it simply wasn’t on for his human to get his own back.

  ‘Rex, have you been in here messing with things?’ asked Albert.

  Rex raised one eyebrow. ‘It was the cat. Can you seriously not smell it? It smells like evil mixed with gone-off fish.’

  Albert stared down at the dog, wondering what the odd whining/chuffing noises were a
ll about. ‘Honestly, dog, I swear you are trying to answer me sometimes.’

  Rex walked up to the dressing table and gave it a sniff. Then made a surprised face because there was visible cat fur among the items displayed. Looking up at his human, Rex would have shaken his head if he knew to do so.

  A knock at the door disturbed them and Rex exploded into action. He loved when people came to the door. It was the unexpected element that triggered his excitement. Behind the door could be anyone! It could be the postman with a parcel, or one of his human’s children with his or her family; that was always fun. Or, it might be someone calling to see if Albert wanted to go to the pub. That happened sometimes. Forgetting the cat for a moment, Rex barked and ran, charging down the stairs to run at the door where he leapt up to place his front paws on either side of the small frosted-glass window. A whiff of Old Spice cologne and moustache wax told him the person outside was the man from across the street.

  Albert put the two rings into his trouser pocket as he made his way down to the front door. He had to fight Rex to get him out of the way, eventually shoving the daft dog back and holding his collar with one hand so he could open the door. The shadow outside proved to be Wing Commander Roy Hope, Albert’s neighbour from across the road.

  Albert wasn’t expecting him, but the two men got on well and saw each other in church each week. Their wives had gone to school together and were friends their whole lives. Albert’s wife, Petunia, had been gone for most of a year now, and the couple across the street liked to check in on him semi-regularly. Albert greeted his caller. ‘Good morning, Roy.’

  Roy wasn’t one for chit chat, especially not when he had a purpose. ‘I say, old boy, you’ve got a snooper.’

  ‘A what?’ said Albert, not sure he’d heard correctly.

  ‘A snooper,’ announced Roy again, speaking loudly as was his habit. However, he then leaned in close to whisper surreptitiously, ‘It’s that woman from number twenty-three. The odd-looking one who just moved in. She’s up to something,’ he concluded confidently.

  Albert, a seventy-eight-year-old retired detective superintendent, was known by his children for poking his nose in when he thought a crime might be occurring, but he hadn’t noticed anything untoward about the new neighbour two doors down. ‘When you say snooping…’ Albert prompted Roy for more.

  Roy wriggled his upper lip, an act which made his pure-white bushy moustache dance about. ‘She was looking through your windows, old boy. I saw her, blatant and bold as brass. Cupped her hands either side of her head and looked through your windows. Then she moved to a different spot. I dare say she was casing the joint and getting ready to burgle you.’

  Albert almost snorted a laugh. The lady in question was in her mid-twenties and chose to dress in a manner which residents of the village might think unusual or odd, as Roy chose to put it. She was an EMO, Albert thought, though he struggled to keep up with all the fashions and trends now. Her clothing was mostly black and had a ravaged look to it. Apparently, it could be bought like that, even though, to Albert’s mind, the wearer looked to have lost a fight with a tiger. The laugh which started to form, died when he remembered his wife’s missing engagement ring. ‘When was this?’ he asked.

  ‘Yesterday, old boy. And again this morning.’

  Albert’s eyebrows made a bid for freedom, hiking up his forehead as they tried to reach the summit of his scalp. Leaning from his door and craning his neck around to look in the direction of her house, he said, ‘You say she was looking through my windows?’ The comment was made more to himself than to Roy. ‘I think I might need to find out who she is.’

  Rex had been waiting patiently, but the scent of the cat was ripe on the air. Trained by the police to discern different smells, he’d qualified as a police dog only to be fired months later for having a bad attitude. The only dog in the history of the Metropolitan Police to ever get the sack, Rex had been loyal and obedient to his human handlers but despairing of their inability to use their olfactory systems to smell the clues. He generally worked out who the killer/robber/criminal was within minutes and got upset when the humans wouldn’t listen to him.

  The cat had been in his house, and Rex was going to have a word with it.

  ‘Rex!’ shouted Albert as his dog ran across the front lawn and leapt the low hedge into his neighbour’s garden.

  ‘Won’t be a minute!’ barked Rex.

  ‘What’s got him so excited?’ asked Roy.

  Albert muttered some expletives, ducking back into his house to snag the dog lead from its hook. Then, when Rex stopped at number twenty-three and started sniffing around the house, he saw an opportunity.

  ‘It would appear that I need to retrieve my dog,’ he announced as if orating to the back row of a theatre. He’d spotted something of interest already and had a legitimate reason to take a closer look.

  ‘You’re going over there, old boy?’ Roy wiggled his moustache, and set off too, ambling down the street with a sense of righteous purpose.

  Rex would go into the house to find the cat if someone would open the door, but he could smell that the cat had been through the overgrown undergrowth at the front of the house in the last few minutes. That meant it might still be outside. He followed the smell to the side of the house where a tall wrought-iron gate barred his progress.

  He could hear his human calling his name. A quick glance over his shoulder revealed the old man and his friend with the facial hair coming to him. Heavens be praised, they understood for once: the cat needed to be taught a lesson.

  He pawed the gate, making it clang as it moved, but it wouldn’t open. Frustrated, Rex peered into the dark space down the side of the house where the gate led to a path overgrown with more weeds and shaded by an out-of-control wisteria. The scent of the cat was rife now, though Rex couldn’t believe it when the evil feline wandered into view.

  Rex barked his displeasure. The cat sat on its haunches and began to lazily lick a front paw. This was the first time Rex had seen it. Until now, all he got was the smell to let him know it had been in his garden and into his house, finding itself a comfortable place to sleep on his human’s bed—a place where Rex wasn’t allowed to go! The cat was missing its left eye, which gave it a hellish appearance when combined with the tattered left ear. Then Rex noticed the stumpy tail when the cat flicked it in an annoyed way.

  Rex barked again, louder this time, letting the cat know what was in store if Rex caught it on his land again. The cat flicked its tail and sauntered away in an overly casual manner.

  Albert and Roy arrived at the front of the property, opening the garden gate to proceed down the path to the door.

  Seeing them, Rex barked, crouching his front end, and signalling as the police handlers had taught him. ‘It’s right down here! Open the gate and I’ll get it!’ Rex knocked the gate again with his skull, keen to get through it and teach the cat a swift lesson in humility.

  From his front door, Albert had seen an envelope dangling from the letterbox. Rex’s decision to go to the property gave him a perfect reason to see if the homeowner’s name was on it.

  ‘Why is he barking madly like that?’ asked Roy. He couldn’t see anything that would make the dog want to continue to bark.

  Roy’s question gave Albert pause, his dismissive answer about the dog being bonkers dying on his lips as he observed Rex’s behaviour. Was he alerting? That’s what it looked like. He knew Rex’s background as a police dog. Albert’s three children were all serving senior police officers; a call to his youngest one was all it took to scoop one of many dogs who failed the training. He only found out afterwards that he’d been duped and given a problem dog who passed the training but then couldn’t be managed.

  Whatever the case, Rex was displaying behaviour he’d seen before in other police dogs. If he were interpreting it correctly, his dog could smell one of three things: drugs, guns, or cash. ‘Rex, to me,’ he used his insistent voice and the dog complied.

  ‘It’s back there som
ewhere,’ Rex whined. ‘I’m not going to hurt it. I just want to make sure it doesn’t come into the house again.’

  To Roy, Albert murmured, ‘I need to make a phone call.’

  Professional Busybody

  Albert stayed in his neighbour’s front garden, confident his dog had made so much noise that there couldn’t be anyone home. Yet if someone did come to the door, Albert had a line prepared in his head about wanting to welcome their new neighbour in person. He plucked the envelope from the letterbox, fishing for his reading glasses only to discover he’d left them at home

  Albert offered the letter to Roy with his left hand, using his right to dig around for his phone. ‘Can you read this and tell me what name is on the address?’

  Thinking it likely the letter was for the previous resident since the new owner only just moved in, Albert was pleased when Roy said, ‘Ophelia James.’ The person in the house previously was Darren somethingorother.

  The ringing in his ear stopped when his call was answered, the voice of his youngest son echoing loud and clear. ‘Hello, Dad.’

  ‘Are you at work?’ Albert asked, getting straight to the point—a trait he’d instilled in his children at an early age.

  At the other end of the call, Chief Inspector Randall Smith pursed his lips. His dad didn’t call very often, and when he did, it tended to be because he wanted to know something he couldn’t find out for himself. ‘I am,’ Randall replied cautiously.

  ‘Super.’ Albert grinned at Roy and waggled his eyebrows. ‘Can you look up the name Ophelia James for me, please, son?’

  Randall sighed. As he suspected, his father was poking his nose into someone’s business. It wasn’t the first time, it wouldn’t be the last, but helping him with information generally resulted in trouble. ‘I don’t think I should do that, Dad.’

  Albert’s smile froze. ‘Why ever not? I think I’m onto something, Randall.’

  ‘Like the time you thought the verger was sending poison pen letters?’ Randall reminded him.