A Mew to a Kill

by Leighann Dobbs

I didn’t really know Maisie all that well. George had a much stronger motive to kill Paisley, but I still needed to find out more about Maisie. How seriously did she take this art stuff, anyway? Fortunately, I knew just who to ask—my neighbor, Elspeth Whipple.

  Chapter Eight

  Elspeth Whipple was like a second grandmother to me. Growing up, I’d spent a lot of time with my grandmother and, since Elspeth and she were good friends, I’d spent a lot of time with Elspeth, too. Elspeth’s house was a short distance from the old Victorian I’d inherited. In a way, I’d inherited Elspeth, too, because Gram had left instructions for me to check on her. Elspeth had no family of her own in the area and she wasn’t getting any younger.

  Elspeth was also friends with Maisie Beardsley, so my visit to check up on her wasn’t entirely altruistic. I hadn’t been to Elspeth’s in a few days and I really did want to make sure she was okay, but if I happened to get some information that would help in my investigation in the process, what was the harm?

  I parked my Jeep at my house, rushed in through the farmer’s porch, shoved my purse onto the counter and grabbed a gray hoodie from the pegs just inside the door. Instead of making a bee-line for her food bowl like she usually did, Pandora followed me around as if she knew we were going out.

  After making sure the porch door was shut tight, I headed toward the woods at the end of my property. Elspeth lived one street over, but I always took the shortcut between the two houses that ran through the woods instead of driving. I needed the exercise. Pandora trotted right along beside me as she often did. Elspeth had a family of cats, and Pandora liked to hang out with them while I visited with Elspeth.

  It had grown dark, but a crescent moon lit the path. I didn’t really need the moon, though. I’d traveled the path so many times, I knew it like the back of my hand. The setting sun had brought a chill to the air reminding me that up here in the White Mountains nights were cooler than down south, despite the warm summer days. I snugged my gray hoodie around me and listened to the dry leaves crunch under my feet as I walked through the silent, peaceful woods.

  It wasn’t long before Elspeth’s house, with its intricate gingerbread moldings and wraparound porch, came into view. Emerging from the woods into Elspeth’s yard always felt like walking into a fairy tale. Elspeth, herself, reminded me of a fairy godmother, with her snowy white hair and sparkly cornflower blue eyes.

  A warm, golden light glowed on the porch, highlighting the clusters of pink roses that grew along the railing. As I got closer to her house, Elspeth appeared almost as if she was expecting me. An orange striped cat weaved in and out between her ankles.

  “Willa, how lovely to see you.” Elspeth wrapped me in a hug. She was a tiny little thing, but her hug had a strength to it that belied her small stature. She seemed fragile at first glance, but I knew she was made of tough stuff.

  At our feet, Pandora and the orange tiger cat sniffed each other enthusiastically before trotting off together toward Elspeth’s barn.

  Elspeth saw me looking after the cats. “They’ll be fine out there. They always are.”

  She ushered me into the house and the scent of gingerbread and molasses made me forget all about Pandora. Besides, the cat didn’t need me worrying about her. She could take care of herself.

  I followed Elspeth down the hall to her old-fashioned kitchen and she gestured for me to take a seat at the pine table. “What brings you over?”

  “I wanted to see how you were doing and make sure you didn’t need anything. Do you?”

  Elspeth sprinkled giant sugar crystals on the brown cookies and slid them off the cookie sheet onto a plate. “No, I’m just fine. Don’t need a thing.” She set the plate and a cup of tea on the table in front of me and then sat down opposite me. “I heard there was some excitement at the judges’ meeting for the art show.”

  I nodded, taking a bite of the cookie. Spicy ginger and molasses peppered my taste buds. “Yeah, I guess Paisley Brown really wanted a spot in the show and there was a disagreement with the judges.”

  Elspeth frowned. “And then she ended up dead.”

  I nodded.

  “Do you think the two could be related?” Elspeth leaned back in her chair, raising her cup of tea to her mouth as she studied me.

  I shrugged. “Some people were upset that she got the spot.”

  “Maisie Beardsley,” Elspeth said.

  “You know Maisie pretty well, right? You don’t think she would’ve done anything…” I let my voice trail off.

  Elspeth waved her hands. “Lordy, no. She wouldn’t harm a fly. Surely the police don’t suspect her?”

  I thought about the charm in my pocket. “I don’t know who they suspect. But Maisie did make a threat.”

  “Against Paisley?” Elspeth’s tone was incredulous.

  “Well, not technically. She said she’d see Paisley in the show over her dead body.”

  “I hardly see how that qualifies as a threat. If she'd said over Paisley’s dead body, maybe. Anyway, I’ve known Maisie my whole life and I can assure you she wouldn’t do anything like that. She is very serious about things when it comes to art, but she wouldn’t take it to that extreme.” Elspeth’s brow wrinkled. “Surely there must be someone more likely on the suspect list.”

  “Well, it does seem like she might have had something on George Witt. They were … friendly. He was the one that used his power as head judge to ensure she got a spot in the art show.”

  Elspeth’s lips pressed together. “I don’t like that man. I know he’s a cheater, but I never pegged him for a killer. But you never know what people will do when they are desperate.”

  “I’m not sure if he was desperate, but he did use his influence to get her into the show and so he must have been scared. Unless he really liked her work. The thing is that she did get into the show, so she wouldn’t have threatened George. I have to admit he’s my favorite as a suspect, but something doesn’t quite add up.”

  “Maybe she got greedy and wanted more. You know, threatened him for money or something once she’d seen her threats worked on getting into the show.”

  “Maybe.” That would have made sense if Paisley herself didn’t tell me otherwise. Of course, I couldn’t tell Elspeth that.

  Elspeth shook her head. “But George seems so concerned about his reputation and his wife comes from money so he wouldn’t want to screw that up. Who else didn’t want her in?”

  “Well, there was Maisie. She was pretty adamant about it.”

  “I doubt it was her. Looking into her as a suspect would just be a waste of time.” Elspeth stared into her cup pensively. “How did Paisley die? Maisie is pretty old. She wouldn’t have the strength to kill someone by physical methods.”

  “I’m not sure how she died. I thought it was in the fire, but you know Gus and Striker … they won’t share information with me.”

  “Well, they have their jobs to do.”

  “I don’t think it was Maisie either, but I’m afraid Gus might get wind of what she said at the judges’ meeting, and you know how Gus can be.” Once Gus got wind of a suspect, she was like a dog with a bone—she would not let go until the person was either convicted or cleared. “Maybe if we could find out where Maisie was last night it would help to clear her. It looks like the shop was broken into in the wee hours of the morning. She probably wouldn’t be up that early, right?”

  Elspeth grimaced. “Actually, she does get up early. She likes to paint the morning sunrise. She’s one of those people that doesn’t need a lot of sleep anyway. And she lives alone. You can probably help her best by figuring out who the real killer was.” Elspeth shot me a sideways look. “You are trying to figure out who the killer is, aren’t you?”

  I grimaced. “Is it that obvious?”

  Elspeth laughed. “No, but I know you and I know your investigator’s intuitions won’t let you just sit back. What happened at that judges’ meeting, anyway? How did George get to decide on her getting that last slot? I thought you all
voted on it?”

  “We did, but there was a tie and George used his head judge status to decide. Maisie, Brenda Parrish and I voted against her. Opal Winters voted for her—she and Paisley are good friends. Nina Lovejoy didn’t seem like she liked Paisley’s work, but I think she was afraid George might fire her from the real estate office if she didn’t vote his way.”

  Elspeth’s brows tugged together. “Was her work really that bad? I’ve only been in her shop a few times and wasn’t impressed, but then art is subjective.”

  “I hate to say it, but it was bad. It was some collection of photographs she took down on Main Street. They were all blurry and grainy.”

  Elspeth narrowed her eyes. “Is that the collection she had taken from the Founder’s Day parade? The one taken in the window reflections?”

  “Yep. Main Street Reflections, I think she called it.”

  “That’s the one I saw in her studio. I hate to say something bad about an artist but it wasn’t the best art we have here in Mystic Notch. I can see why Maisie was so adamant about her not getting the spot. And I could see why Brenda would be opposed to the pictures themselves.”

  “Because of the fire?”

  Elspeth nodded. “It was just awful. Her sister, Amanda, was such a sweetie and her dying like that to go in and save the kitten…” Elspeth’s voice trailed off, her eyes misting over. If there’s one thing that Elspeth was sentimental about it was cats. She had a whole barn full of them and was a big contributor to helping the population of feral cats we had in the Notch. "To top it all off, the girls were identical twins. Brenda must have that reminder every time she looks in a mirror."

  My heart tugged for Brenda. It must have been awful to lose her sister and her business like that. “At least Brenda seems to have been well compensated. She could have lost everything.”

  “True,” Elspeth said. “Good thing her parents had the good sense to insure that business to the hilt and the girls kept that insurance active. The girls didn’t have the business sense that their parents did.”

  I smiled to myself. Elspeth seemed to have the same view of younger people that a lot of old-timers did. They thought we couldn't do things as well as they could. Maybe in some cases they were right.

  Elspeth’s brows tugged together. “I seem to remember Maisie telling me that someone else was a shoo-in for that spot. Who was that?”

  “Neil Lane. You know, that reclusive artist.”

  “Oh, that’s right. He must’ve been mad to find out Paisley had gotten a spot that he was practically a shoo-in for.”

  I took a sip of tea and thought about that. I didn’t know Neil Lane personally. He was reputed to be reclusive. He lived in the woods and preferred to stay in his cabin and do his art. “Maybe. Hattie said he had a bad temper. But I couldn’t see killing someone over not getting a spot in an art show.”

  “Probably not, but if he wasn’t in the art show, then he wouldn’t be eligible for the twenty thousand dollar grand prize and that might be enough to kill over.”

  “Maybe. I’ve heard of people killing for less.” I mentally moved Neil Lane up on the suspect list.

  Elspeth broke off a little piece of cookie and nibbled on it. “It still seems pretty thin, though. Maybe the fire and her death aren’t even related to the art show. Is there someone else who would have benefited from her death?”

  “Striker said she had a brother, but they didn’t know how to find him. I guess if she had a brother, he would inherit everything. But I don’t think she had anything of value, so I doubt that would’ve been a motive for murder. Unless he had a grudge against Paisley, or there was some big family secret that he killed her over.” I chomped down on my cookie with a sigh. “Anyway, we don’t know how to find him so that’s not an angle I can pursue.”

  Elspeth brightened. “Paisley’s brother? Oh, I know how to find him. He’s right here in town. I think you can find him over at St. Vincent’s homeless shelter.”

  ***

  Pandora followed Tigger, the orange tiger cat, into the barn behind Elspeth’s house. The barn was dark, but like most cats, Pandora could see well enough in the dark to make out the shapes of the other cats that lived in there.

  To an outsider, it might seem like Elspeth was just some crazy cat lady with a barn full of felines, but the barn—and Elspeth’s cats—were much more than that. The barn was the gathering place of the elite cats of Mystic Notch, and Elspeth’s cats were the leaders of the felines’ efforts to balance good and evil.

  Pandora moved further into the barn. The scent of hay and dried wood made her whiskers twitch.

  “What brings you here?” The voice, dripping with distaste, came from atop a bale of hay. Pandora looked up to see the fat calico, Otis, glaring down at her.

  There was no love lost between the two of them. Otis hadn’t liked Pandora from the beginning. She’d guessed it was because Otis was one of the old ones, an ancient line of cats that had served many humans. Much like groups of humans, the old ones wanted to stick to the old ways and the younger ones, like Pandora, had new ideas. It was a constant battle, but for the most part they put aside their differences when it came to protecting the forces of good.

  Otis and Pandora were always in conflict and, despite Otis’s ‘seniority’, Pandora often won, causing Otis to dislike her even more. But it wasn’t just the conflict over ideas that put Pandora off. Otis liked to think he was more important than he actually was. He was constantly reminding them how rare it was to have a male of his breed—only one in three thousand calicoes were male. Big deal, Pandora thought.

  Pandora tried not to let Otis rile her up. Even so, she felt the fur standing up along her spine.

  “I’ve heard tell of the kitten that survived a fire.” She glanced around the room as more cats came forward. Kelley, the Maine Coon, trotted out from one of the stalls on her left. Inkspot, the large black cat who was their leader, jumped down from the loft, his twenty-two pound girth landing beside her with a soft thud. Snowball appeared next to him, her white fur contrasting with Inkspot’s black like night and day.

  “So what?” Otis wrinkled his face.

  “Now, Otis, you remember what you promised.” A beautiful, orange curly-haired cat appeared beside Otis. Pandora recognized her as Euphoria, the Selkirk Rex that belonged to Gladys Primble.

  They’d met Euphoria recently while trying to make sure an important journal was kept away from evil hands. Gladys was the keeper of this journal and, as her cat, Euphoria was also sworn to protect it.

  Otis purred at Euphoria and Pandora’s stomach churned. She didn’t know what the sweet Selkirk Rex saw in the fat calico, but if it made him act nicer she wasn’t about to question it.

  “A kitten? Why do you come to us?” Inkspot’s deep baritone rumbled through the barn.

  Pandora flicked a paw behind her ears and sat on her haunches. “I’m not sure, but when I heard the story I got the distinct feeling that we should know more about the kitten. Perhaps we should seek her out and bring her to our circle. If she has the blessings of mystical forces, as it seems from the story, won’t we want to bring her into the fold before the other side gets a hold of her?”

  “I might have heard of this kitten.” A voice purred from her right and Pandora turned to see the powder blue eyes of the Siamese cat, Sasha, blinking at her. “Long ago, I heard of a cat that would be very powerful. One that could survive against all odds.”

  “Surviving a fire seems like it would be against all odds,” Snowball said.

  Inkspot's glowing, green eyes narrowed to slits. “Yes, I think this is something we should pursue. Tell us more about this kitten?”

  Pandora’s tail twitched nervously. She didn’t know much more. Should she have tried to get more information before she came to the others? “Well, I suppose she wouldn’t be a kitten anymore. From what I heard, she was saved at the fire in the lumberyard last summer. A human gave its life for this kitten.”

  “Last summer?” Otis flicked
a piece of straw with his paw. “Why, the kit would be practically grown by now. If it really were special, we would have heard." Otis smirked at her. "Perhaps it is the two-faced cat."

  Pandora's fur ruffled, but she held her temper in check. Otis was making fun of her, referring back to a time long ago when they'd been pawing through the ancient scrolls. Pandora had read a reference that she thought said something about a two-faced cat. Otis had laughed at her, saying she'd misread it. There was no such thing as a two-faced cat. Most born with two faces died shortly after birth.

  Later on, Pandora had gotten on the internet when Willa had left her laptop open and learned there was only one cat with two faces who had survived until age fifteen. Frank and Louie, his name was. But that cat was dead now. He wasn't the cat from the fire.

  "Ha. Ha," Pandora said dryly. "I guess you will never let me live that one down. Anyway, since no one has been able to decipher the scrolls fully, we don't know if there are other references to powerful cats such as the one Sasha remembers."

  "Then why have we not heard or seen this cat before?” Otis asked.

  “That’s what I don’t understand,” Pandora said. The group took pride in knowing all the cat goings-on in the area. Not all cats had the powers of the society, but the clan liked to know about even the “regular” cats and there was a large network of cats, both mystical and non-mystical that passed information around. With the help of these cats, especially the feral cats who ran wild and were witness to most of the happenings in the Notch, Pandora and her gang knew pretty much everything that was going on. Yet, Pandora had not heard of this kitten. “It’s almost as if something were keeping it from us.”

  “Well, who is its human?” Otis's voice held a hint of laughter. Pandora got the impression he was trying to make her look bad in front of everyone by proving how little she knew. “It’s simple enough to find the cat that way.”

  “From what I heard, the cat’s real human died in the fire, but now her sister, someone named Brenda, apparently has the cat. She’s very protective of it … maybe she keeps it locked indoors.”