Raining Cats & Dogs (A Melanie Travis Mystery)

by Laurien Berenson

  “She doesn’t look entirely happy about it,” I said.

  “She doesn’t have to be happy, she merely has to comply. There’s no way we can include anyone in our group who runs even the slightest risk of endangering one of the patients. Obviously we want the residents to enjoy our visits without reservation, but aside from that, just think of the potential liability.”

  Steve strode to the center of the room. “Back to work, everyone,” he said. “Time to see how much your dogs like you. Let’s work on the recall next.”

  We pulled ourselves back into a semblance of organization. Over the next forty-five minutes, Steve ran us through the rest of the basic obedience exercises that would be expected of a dog competing for its Companion Dog degree. After the recall, we did two long stays—one with the dogs sitting in a long row, then another one with them lying down. We heeled in a figure eight pattern, then practiced the stand for examination.

  Due to her experience in the conformation ring, Faith, who was clearly behind most of the others in the majority of the exercises, was a star at this one. So much so that Steve pulled us out into the middle of the mats to demonstrate how it should be done. I knew we weren’t showing the other handlers anything they hadn’t already known and guessed that the trainer had singled us out to boost our confidence. Even so, it was nice to know that we could do one thing exactly right.

  The class, which was scheduled to last an hour, ran closer to two. And as I was gathering up my things, I saw that many of the participants intended to stay even longer. Julie and Steve were pulling equipment out of a corner to set up broad and high jumps on the mats. Stacey had a petite, Papillon-size dumbbell in her hand, and Minnie had gone to get her scent articles.

  Faith had a long way to go before she’d be ready for the exercises they were about to work on. Still, I was willing to bet they’d be fascinating to watch. Another night, when Sam wasn’t already expecting me, I intended to stay late and see how it went.

  Kelly had headed straight out the door the minute Steve declared the end of our part of the class. But Paul and I ended up walking out together.

  “That’s a really nice Poodle,” he said. “Is she a show dog?”

  “She was. She’s retired now.”

  “If you have any interest…” He paused, then frowned. One hand reached up and brushed back the hair that had fallen into his eyes. “When we were talking about the therapy group earlier, I hope I didn’t give you the wrong idea. The staff at Winston Pumpernill really enjoys our visits. And so do the participants. Lots of the older people we see…well, they talk about Poodles. That breed was popular for so many years, it seems like half of them owned one at some point in their lives. You probably haven’t given this any thought at all, and I don’t want to put you on the spot, but if you’d like to come with us, I’m sure they’d all be delighted to meet Faith.”

  Actually, I’d been thinking about it since Julie had first mentioned the visits earlier. They sounded like something Faith and I might enjoy.

  “Sure,” I said. “I’d like that.”

  “Great! We’ll be going again this Sunday. You should join us. Unless that’s not enough notice for you….”

  “That should be fine. Let me just check…” I started to say “my schedule,” then quickly amended, “…with my husband. I’ll let you know, okay?”

  Paul pulled out a piece of paper and scribbled his phone number on it. “Try to make it,” he said. “You won’t be sorry.”

  4

  My husband. Talking to Paul wasn’t the first time I’d tripped over the phrase. Even after three weeks, I was still getting used to saying the words.

  But if I had trouble announcing our new status, Sam seemed to delight in blurting it out on any and all occasions. “I’ll have what my wife is having,” he’d say when we ordered dinner in a restaurant. Or when the phone rang and it was for me, “Let me get my wife for you.”

  Somehow he’d immediately adapted to the rhythm of our new relationship, whereas I was still struggling to come to grips with the change. Now that we were married and living together, it was as though somebody had raised the stakes when I wasn’t looking. I suddenly realized how badly I wanted everything to work. With one failed marriage already, I was working with a track record that wasn’t stellar. For all our sakes—Davey’s, Sam’s, and mine—I was desperately hoping to do better this time around.

  When Eve wasn’t entered in a dog show, Saturdays were my morning to sleep late. I loved not having to jump right out of bed and do something useful. Somehow, though, Sam didn’t seem to have gotten the memo.

  “Time to get up,” he said, sitting down on the edge of the bed.

  The mattress dipped in his direction and I rolled with it. I groaned, then deliberately lifted the pillow and placed it over my head. Even the Poodles could read that body language. It didn’t deter Sam, though.

  I’d been vaguely aware of him getting up twenty minutes earlier. I’d heard the dogs scramble down the stairs to go outside. Then the soothing sound of the shower running had lulled me back to sleep.

  Now Sam was back, dressed and ready to go. His hand stroked the lump I made under the covers. I lifted one edge of the pillow and eyed the clock. It wasn’t even eight yet.

  “Go away,” I mumbled.

  “I can’t. We have an appointment.”

  “Who would be so dumb as to make an appointment at eight o’clock on a Saturday morning?”

  “Nine,” said Sam. “Downtown.”

  Notice he didn’t respond to the part about being dumb.

  “We’re meeting Marilyn.”

  Marilyn was our real estate agent. The one who had yet to show us the perfect house. In her defense, we’d only been looking for two and a half weeks. But it was seven-forty-five on a Saturday morning, and I was feeling cranky and not up to defending anyone.

  “I thought we were seeing her later,” I said.

  “She and I talked yesterday and decided we might as well get an early start. She’s giving us all day.”

  “Yippee,” I said. My tone might have lacked conviction.

  “So that’s why you have to get up.”

  I groaned again and rolled over on my back. Sam gazed down at me, looking impossibly cheerful. If my hands hadn’t been tangled in the covers, I might have been tempted to slap him. Either that, I thought, looking at the mussed blond hair still wet from the shower and the laugh lines that creased either side of his slate blue eyes, or reach for his belt buckle and pull him toward me.

  Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance to do either one.

  “Hey, Mom,” said Davey. He walked into the bedroom, cradling a mug of steaming coffee carefully between both hands. “Sam told me to bring this up when it was ready. He said you needed it.”

  I pulled myself up into a sitting position. Always in a hurry, I tended to buy whatever coffee was handy in the supermarket. Now that Sam was in residence, he’d been experimenting with all sorts of new blends. The coffee smelled heavenly. As if it might even be worth getting up for.

  “Thanks, Sport. I do need that.”

  Reaching for it, I saw that Davey had already added a dollop of milk. What a kid. The first sip tasted every bit as good as it smelled.

  Faith had followed Davey up the stairs. She slipped around him and jumped up onto the bed. She circled twice, then laid down across the warm pillow I’d just vacated. It was a conspiracy, all right. Even my dog wanted me to get moving.

  “All right,” I grumbled. “I’m going.”

  Sam was smiling.

  “You,” I said, pointing rudely. “Cut that out.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

  Fifteen minutes later, I walked downstairs into mayhem. Actually, I’d heard the Poodles barking as soon as I turned off the water in the shower. It was amazing how much louder five canine voices sounded than two.

  Even more amazing was the fact that the Poodles continued to bark as I pulled on my clothes. Downstairs, the din must have
been deafening. I wondered why Sam hadn’t told the dogs to be quiet. Or, failing that, why Davey hadn’t done the job.

  Enforcing the rules with five dogs wasn’t nearly as easy as it had been with two. But they were Poodles, after all, so they understood what was expected of them, even if—in these new and unaccustomed circumstances—they might be tempted to see what they could get away with. But while the Poodles worked on perfecting their pack mentality, I was working equally hard on asserting my position as alpha bitch. The house was simply too damn small for everyone in it to have a different opinion.

  Then I reached the kitchen and realized why nobody had told the dogs to shut up: nobody was there.

  Nobody human, that is. The five Poodles were very much in evidence. As was the big orange cat we’d seen on Thursday evening. He was, once again, peering into the kitchen through the window above the sink. And, as I discovered when I made my way through the pack of outraged canines, opened the back door, and slipped carefully through, leaving the Poodles behind to continue voicing their annoyance at maximum decibels, this time the cat had brought a buddy with him.

  A second cat—sleek, black, and medium size—was sitting calmly on the back steps cleaning one of his front paws. The fact that five dogs—each of which outweighed him by at least fifty pounds and none of whom were pleased about his existence in their lives—were mere inches away on the other side of the door didn’t seem to distress him in the slightest. It certainly didn’t distract him from his bathing ritual. As I watched, he took the wet paw and dragged it up over his head, smoothing back his ears.

  “Shoo!” I said.

  Neither cat paid a bit of attention. After a moment, the one who’d been balanced on the windowsill hopped down and landed beside my feet. Back arched high in the air, he curled his body around my ankles.

  “Go home!” I said, trying to sound menacing.

  The cats looked at me as though I were daft.

  Maybe I was. I’d never had a cat myself, but I’d always heard they were supposed to be smart. These two didn’t seem to have a clue.

  A dog, even a dumb dog, could take a hint.

  Maybe they were deaf, I thought.

  I leaned down and cupped my hands around the body of the orange cat. He was still pressed up against my legs. Long orange hairs stuck to my jeans where he’d rubbed. His tail was curled around my calf.

  The cat felt firm and plump beneath my fingers; well fed, not like a stray who’d had to fend for himself. I tried to nudge him toward the steps. He tipped his head sideways, looked up at me, yowled loudly, and resisted.

  That got the black cat’s attention. He stood up and sauntered over to see what was going on. Now I had two of them circling my legs in unison.

  “Stop it,” I said. “No!”

  Was there a dog in the world who didn’t know what that meant?

  Inside the house, the Poodles abruptly stopped barking. They must have thought I was talking to them.

  I rest my case.

  I reached down and picked up the orange cat. He weighed more than he looked like he ought to, and long, silky hairs immediately floated up to tickle my nose and eyes. He didn’t threaten to bite or scratch, however, so I figured I should probably be grateful.

  “Come on,” I said. “You’re leaving. Both of you.”

  But when I reached down to scoop up the black cat with my other hand, he squirmed away and shot down the back steps into the cedar-fenced yard. When I went after him, I saw that the gate around the side of the house was open. It was a good thing I hadn’t let the Poodles out to deal with these feline interlopers, or the entire neighborhood would have been treated to a spectacle. A not entirely unusual occurrence around here, unfortunately.

  “There you are,” Sam said when I reached the gate.

  He and Davey were standing in front of the house next door with a woman I hadn’t seen before. She was younger than me by a few years and apparently brave enough to stand outside on a brisk April morning dressed in only a negligee and peignoir. In her arms was a third cat; this one buff-colored with black points. It looked like a Siamese.

  The woman’s fingers, nails painted shocking pink, were stroking the cat’s long body. Even from where I stood, I could hear it purring. The cat hummed like a well-tuned motor. Since she was barefoot, I could see that the woman’s toenails were also tipped in pink.

  Until very recently, the house next door to mine had been occupied by an elderly Italian woman. Edna had moved out just after Christmas, however, and had gone to live with her daughter in Seattle. Her house had been on the market only briefly before selling. I knew the buyers were a young couple; and I’d heard from my friend, Alice Brickman, that a moving van had come and unloaded someone’s belongings that week while I was at work. Presumably, then, the woman talking to my husband in little more than her underwear was my new neighbor.

  Oh joy, I thought.

  The black cat shot past me and wrapped itself around the woman’s bare legs. Maybe they could cuddle together for warmth.

  “Wonderful,” she said brightly. “I see you’ve met Felix. You must be Melanie. Sam was just telling me all about you. I’m Amber Fine.” She untangled one hand from the Siamese’s sinewy body and held it out.

  My hands were, of course, similarly occupied with the orange cat. And being accustomed to big animals, the kind that stood on their own four feet next to me, I didn’t have Amber’s skill at tucking a wriggling cat under my arm. Instead, I bent over to put him on the ground.

  Felix, unamused by the change in stature, suddenly braced both hind paws against my chest and pushed away hard. He flew out of my arms as if I’d thrown him. The cat hit the ground and landed running—right back into my yard. Long hairs, left floating in his wake, drifted up to coat my lips and eyelashes. Before I could straighten, I was already sneezing.

  And by the time I caught my breath I could hear the Poodles barking again. Felix, I realized, was probably back on the windowsill.

  “Oh, dear,” said Amber. “You’re not allergic, are you?”

  “I don’t think so. To tell the truth, I don’t know. I’ve never been around cats before.”

  “Never?” Her green eyes widened, and I realized that although Amber hadn’t bothered to dress yet, she had had time to put on makeup. More than I wear in a month, actually.

  “My mother didn’t like pets,” I said.

  “How very sad for you.” Now she was pouting. The woman had an entire arsenal of charming expressions at her disposal.

  “And now I have dogs.”

  “So I hear.”

  Her tone hadn’t been reproving, but I bristled anyway. Anyone who lives with multiple dogs in a neighborhood setting has to be aware of the necessity of keeping them quiet. And until recently, I’d had no problems in that regard. Things had become a little more complicated with the addition of Sam’s three Poodles, but we’d been working them out.

  Until Felix and cohorts showed up.

  “My Poodles don’t usually bark this much,” I said. “Your cats have been coming over and teasing them. That’s what’s setting them off.”

  “Teasing them?” She laughed. “You must be kidding.”

  “No, I’m not. When Felix climbs up the back of my house and the dogs see him through the window, they bark at him.” I paused—mindful of the fact that we’d just met and I was going to have to live next door to this woman—then added in what I hoped was a diplomatic tone, “Which is why he’s going to have to stop doing that.”

  Amber drew in a breath. Her chest swelled with the effort. Sam, I noted, was carefully looking elsewhere.

  “But cats are natural climbers,” she said. “It’s what they do. It’s not as if anyone can regulate their behavior.”

  So much for diplomacy. Maybe blunt would work better.

  “Of course your cats are welcome to do whatever they want.” I smiled sweetly. “As long as they’re on your property.”

  Sam reached out, took my hand, and squeezed. Hard.


  “This certainly isn’t something we have to settle right this minute,” he said. “Amber’s barely even moved in.”

  Oh, I thought snidely. Maybe that was the problem. She had yet to unpack her clothes. I did not, however, remove my hand from Sam’s.

  “In time,” he continued, “I’m sure we’ll be able to get everything worked out.”

  “Mrs. Fine is really cool,” said Davey. “She has seven cats. That’s even more than we have Poodles.”

  “Seven cats,” I repeated. The phrase seemed to stick in my throat. “How unusual.” Apparently my standards for what was cool and what wasn’t were different than Davey’s.

  “Not really,” Amber replied. “Many cat lovers tend to be collectors. I certainly never started out to have this many. But the first one needed company, which meant adding a second. The third one sort of adopted me. The fourth was a rescue who turned out to be pregnant, so you can see how things just kind of snowballed.”

  I could, actually. And I’d seen plenty of dog owners do the same thing, adding just one more and then one more after that, until their homes were filled to bursting. Considering that I currently had five big Poodles living in my small house, I didn’t have much room to complain. And I wouldn’t have if Amber Fine had looked like she had even the slightest intention of keeping her feline population out of my yard.

  Then I thought back to what Davey had said. He’d called Amber “Mrs. Fine.” I brightened slightly and wondered if Mr. Fine was going to be joining us in his bathrobe some time soon.

  “Your husband must like cats, too,” I said.

  “James?”

  She made it sound like a question. If she didn’t know what her husband’s name was, I had no idea how she expected me to. I nodded anyway, just for the heck of it, and that seemed to be enough encouragement for her.