by Nic Saint
“We hope to have a fresh selection of Duffers in two weeks,” said Colin.
“But… how can you be out of Duffers?” she asked.
“Yeah, how can the Duffers be out of Duffers?” asked the customer immediately behind Marge. She recognized her as Bambi Wiggins, their mailwoman.
“I’m afraid we are a victim of our popularity,” said Chris, spreading his arms in a gesture of apology. “We’ve been selling so much product lately that we can’t keep up.”
“You have to understand this is still a mom-and-pop operation,” said Colin. “It’s just Chris and myself, and not a big conglomerate that produces the salamis in China or the Middle East and then brings them into the country in large containers. No, we do everything ourselves. We cure the meat, produce the salamis, and sell them ourselves, or prepare the shipments. It’s a long and dedicated process to produce the famous Duffer.”
“You can’t rush greatness,” Chris agreed. “But, like my brother said, we hope to have a fresh batch of delicious Duffers for sale in two weeks’ time. Scout’s honor.”
More voices had been calling out with questions and critical remarks, all expressing their disappointment that the famous and delicious salamis were not available.
“They’ve run out,” said a voice as Marge left the shop.
“They’ve run out of Duffers? But I’ve come all the way from Newark for a Duffer,” said another disappointed customer.
And as Marge walked into the Vickery General Store, hoping to buy some salami there, she thought about her daughter. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to write an article about the famous Duffer? The salami that put Hampton Cove on the map. Odelia could even ask to be shown the production line and describe the process that went into producing the famous delicacy. And as she pushed her trolley into the store and headed for the butcher counter, she fired off a WhatsApp message to Odelia.
‘New idea for story: the Duffer.’
Then she fired off another message to her brother.
‘Hey, sleepyhead. Duffers are off the menu. Any ideas for an alternative?’
Alec wasn’t exactly a foodie, but he did have his faves, and Marge enjoyed catering to her family’s wishes when it came to cooking their family dinners.
She’d arrived at the butcher meat counter and checked out the salamis on display. Then, on a whim, decided not to buy any. Nothing could compare with the Duffer, so why even try? Instead, she ordered pork chops. She’d just remembered Alec loved glazed pork chops, and so did Tex and Vesta. A nice truce reached over pork chops. Why not?
Chase walked into the police station and the first person he saw, as always, was Dolores. Then again, Dolores was the person everybody saw when they set foot inside the station. Dolores Peltz, a red-haired woman with a fondness for mascara, had been a mainstay of the Hampton Cove Police Department for as long as the town could remember. Rumor had it she’d been born at that desk and had simply never left. Long after the last Hampton Covian had died, Dolores would probably still be there, manning the desk and guiding the citizenry to the right officer or taking down their complaint.
“Hey, Dolores,” said Chase as he breezed in.
“Shouldn’t you be home?” asked Dolores. “Enjoying your vacation?”
“Yeah, well, we hit a snag,” he said.
The snag being Vesta Muffin. Tough to redecorate a house when your girlfriend’s grandmother has suddenly decided to move in and throw her weight around. So he’d figured he might as well head into the office and let Odelia and Vesta duke it out.
“You look tired, honey.”
“That’s probably because I am tired.”
He hadn’t slept well, and neither had Odelia. First the change of location to a bed he’d never slept in before, and then the midnight trip to Vena’s, and afterward he’d had a hard time finding sleep with four cats jostling each other for space at the foot of the bed. They all wanted to sleep at Odelia’s feet, but since there was only so much space to go around, his stretch of foot space had become collateral damage in the silent battle, and even though he’d kicked out his feet from time to time, sending one or two cats flying, they’d encroached on his territory again and again until finally he’d given up and stuck his feet out the side. He’d woken up with cold feet as a consequence. And a stiff neck.
It was something he’d learned through long association with Odelia’s cats: cats always won out in the end.
“So have you seen Alec?” asked Dolores in that croaky, cigarette-smoked voice of hers. She’d probably been smoking a couple of packs a day since the cradle, judging from her wrinkly face and throaty purr.
Chase, who’d already walked past the desk, retraced his steps. “What do you mean? Is the big guy not in yet?”
“Nah,” said Dolores, who’d been filing her nails and now blew on them.
“Didn’t he say anything yesterday when he left?”
“Didn’t say nothing to me. He just left and said he was going to look into that missing kid case, and that’s the last I heard of him. He didn’t get back before my shift was over so I figured he’d gone straight home.”
Chase nodded. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, hun.”
He walked on, and passed his boss’s office, poking his head in just to be sure Dolores hadn’t missed the chief. It happened. But the office was empty. Huh. Weird. Then again, the chief was probably out and about, checking something or working on a case. He often did that, and even though he usually conferred with his people when he was on a case, often, if the case was too minor to bother his officers, he handled it all by his lonesome. Obviously that was what was going on here. So he moved past the chief’s office and then into his own and turned on his computer to start his day.
Chapter 10
In spite of the fact that my night hadn’t included its usual entertainment—and with entertainment I mean our regular trip to the local park to partake in that age-old ritual of cat choir—I was still feeling like a million bucks. In fact I could hardly believe how great I was feeling, considering the fact that only a day before I’d been stabbed with needles, and jabbed with all manner of surgical instrument, and on top of that had been incarcerated against my will in a jail cell in a dark and dank dungeon.
Well, perhaps the dungeon hadn’t been as dark and dank as some of the more dingy dungeons in existence but I’d still been confined to a jail cell for a considerable period of time, until Odelia, like a minor Kim Kardashian, had sprung me from prison prematurely.
I’d slept like a log, probably because the others had all decided to give me preferential treatment and had allowed me to occupy the prime real estate at the foot of Odelia’s side of the bed, while they battled it out with Chase for a space at the foot of his portion of the conjugal bed—and I use the word conjugal lightly, as Odelia and Chase are not married, even though they are betrothed.
So it was with a spring in my step—well, a relative spring, as it’s hard to put a spring in one’s step when one is as big-boned as I happen to be—big bones can be a curse—that I arrived downstairs and padded into the kitchen in search of some delicious kibble.
To my surprise there was no kibble in my bowl, and the bowls of my friends were all devoid of kibble, too. Instead, some gooey sludge occupied my bowl. I took a tentative sniff and decided that it smelled like meat, but not a type of meat I’d ever eaten before.
And as I settled down, staring dumbly at the gray sludge, suddenly a voice overhead announced, “Oh, you found it. How do you like my latest invention, Max?”
I glanced up into the face of Gran, who apparently was the person I had to thank for the peculiar sludge.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Well, pureed meat, of course. What did you think it was?”
I stared back at the glop and took a lick. It tasted quite… tasteless.
“I made it especially for you,” said Gran. “Following Odelia’s instructions, of course.”
“Odelia told you to make this?
” I asked, my love and affection for my human suddenly trading a couple of points lower on the Dow Jones Industrial Average Index.
“Yeah,” she said. “You’re not supposed to eat kibble or anything crunchy for a couple of weeks. It’s the teeth, you see,” she explained, tapping her own dentures to add a visual image to the word picture she was painting. “You need to let those gums heal, buddy.”
“Oh, trust me, I understand,” I said, giving my absent teeth a sad lick. My gums felt weird. Metallic. Probably still healing, like Gran said. “So it’s three weeks of this?”
“Afraid so.”
“Oh, all right,” I said grudgingly. And here I’d thought I’d be spoiled rotten now. Wasn’t that what humans did when babies or kids got sick? Spoil them to within an inch of their lives? Apparently Odelia and Gran and Marge hadn’t gotten the memo on this.
Harriet, Dooley and Brutus had also joined us in the kitchen and as they parked themselves in front of their respective bowls, they all stared at the sludge, their faces mimicking my own surprise at this sudden reversal of fortune.
“Um, so what’s this?” asked Harriet.
“Meat,” said Gran. “And you better eat it, missy, cause it’s all you’re going to get for the next three weeks or so.”
Harriet slowly looked up at Gran. “What did you just say?” she asked, looking shocked.
“No kibble,” said Gran. “Max can’t chew it, because of the teeth thing.”
“I just wish you’d all stop referring to my teeth,” I said, starting to feel annoyed.
“Max lost his teeth and now we all have to eat this… muck?” Harriet demanded.
“I didn’t lose all my teeth,” I said. “Just three.”
“Yes, you do. Max can’t chew anything tougher than Jell-O, so no kibble or fish bones or whatever for you guys. Until Max’s gums are fully healed. Now tuck in, for this is some prime meat we’ve gotten you. It’s got all the proteins your growing little kitty needs.”
Her sales talk did little to convince Harriet to ‘tuck in.’ On the contrary. “This is an outrage,” she said, stomping her paw, even though stomping paws on a stone floor doesn’t really have the impact one hopes to achieve.
“Well, it’s either this or nothing at all,” said Gran, who wasn’t budging. Gran doesn’t have a budgy personality, I should add. On the contrary. She’s very unbudgy, so to speak.
“But it’s not fair!” Harriet cried.
“You’re doing this to help your friend—so don’t give me this fair or not fair crap.”
They all turned to me, and I could sense a distinct coldness in their gazes. “Hey, guys,” I said, holding up my paws in a gesture of defense. “This wasn’t my idea.”
“It was Odelia’s idea,” said Gran. “She said you’re like the three musketeers. All for one and one for all, though technically you’re four musketeers, but whatever.”
“If only you’d taken better care of your teeth, Porthos,” said Harriet, giving me an icy look, “this would never have happened. So this is all your fault.”
“Why are you calling me Porthos? And how am I supposed to take better care of my teeth?”
“Porthos is the fat musketeer,” said Brutus. “He’s also very jolly,” he quickly added when I gasped in shock. “Fat, jolly and cheerful. He’s like Santa Claus. But with a sword.”
“Oh, my God,” I said, shaking my head in dismay. “I’ve never been so insulted…” That wasn’t true, though. I’ve been insulted a lot in my life. The curse of having big bones.
“You do look a little like Santa, Max,” said Dooley now, adding his two cents. “With the red head and the white beard and all.”
“It’s not a beard,” I said haughtily. “It’s my neck.”
“You should have brushed your teeth, Max,” Harriet said, not allowing herself to be distracted by all this Santa talk. “Twice daily, or even three times. Once after breakfast, once after dinner and once before going to bed. Didn’t your parents teach you anything?”
“Yeah, didn’t your parents teach you about dental hygiene?” Brutus echoed. “Take better care of your snappers, Max, and we wouldn’t have to eat this… junk.”
“Hey, I heard that, mister,” said Gran. “This isn’t junk. It’s chicken liver, chicken stomach, chicken hearts, chicken necks and… some other stuff. Cooked and put through the blender.”
“Did you really make this yourself?” asked Dooley. “You put in so much work, Gran.”
“Oh, well… “ said Gran with a throwaway gesture of the hand. “It’s a labor of love.”
“But you didn’t make this yourself, did you?” said Harriet, narrowing her eyes at the old lady.
Gran shrugged. “Who cares who made it? It’s good for you—and probably a damn sight better than that kibble. Who knows what they put into that stuff? Rat guts, probably, or pulverized beetles. Now eat up, before I chuck it all down the garbage disposal.”
Reluctantly, we all started eating from the cold pureed meat, straight from the fridge. It went down like cardboard. At least it was something, though, and after the ordeal I’d had the previous day I have to confess that I would have eaten pretty much anything.
Not Harriet, though, who, after one swallow, declared, “I’m not eating this crap. I’m sorry, but I’m not. I want my usual gourmet food, or else.”
“Or else what?” asked Gran, giving Harriet a distinctly nasty look—not the look a loving human is supposed to give a favorite and beloved pet, I might add.
“Or else I’m going on a hunger strike,” said Harriet, tilting up her chin.
“Suit yourself,” said Gran, and started collecting the bowls, then chucking their contents into the sink, turned on the garbage disposal, and let it chew up all of our food!
“Hey, you can’t do that!” Harriet cried, aghast at the chain of events her words had set in motion.
“Watch me,” said Gran, and we did. I hate food going to waste, even food that tastes as if someone has mixed in a splash of Drano, but this was taking waste to another level.
“Gran!” Harriet cried. “We have to eat!”
“I thought you said you were on a hunger strike?”
“You have to feed us!”
“Says who?”
“It’s in the Universal Declaration of Feline Rights!”
“There is no Declaration of Feline Rights,” said Gran. “And when I look at you bunch of ingrates I think a nice long fast will do you a world of good. Now if there’s nothing else, I’m off. Ta-dah.” And she hooked her arm into her purse strap and was off!
We stared after her, our jaws on the floor, except for mine, because opening my mouth that far still hurt a little.
“She can’t do this, right?” asked Harriet when we’d ascertained that Gran really had left the building.
“I think she just did,” I said, staring at the empty spot where my bowl used to be.
“We have to fight her on this,” said Harriet. “If I have to go all the way to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, I’m going to fight for my feline rights!”
“Good luck with that,” said Brutus, also looking distinctly dismayed at this sudden dearth of foodstuffs at our disposal.
“Just watch me. I’m going to fight until my dying breath!”
“Which may come a lot sooner than you think.”
Harriet pointed to the sink. “That’s waste. A waste of good food. What is Greta Thunberg going to say about this? Mh? She’s going to get mad. Mad at Gran. That’s what.”
“Uh-huh,” said Brutus sadly.
“Is Gran really going to starve us to death?” asked Dooley.
“I’m not sure, Dooley,” I said. “But it sure looks that way.”
And there was not a thing we or the Secretary-General of the United Nations or Greta Thunberg, whoever she was, could do about it.
Chapter 11
“I don’t like this, Max,” said Dooley, using one of his favorite phrases.
“Yeah, I don’t like
it either,” I said.
“She can’t do this!” Harriet cried, starting to sound like a broken record.
“Maybe we should go and see what food Odelia has put out for us,” said Brutus, who turned out to be the only practical thinker in our small company today.
“You’re absolutely right, Brutus,” said Harriet, perking up. “Odelia won’t go to these extremes. She would never force us to eat this junk, and then throw it down the drain if we decide it is simply not fit for feline consumption.”
She was right. Odelia would never put us through the wringer like that. So we walked out of Marge’s kitchen, through the hole in the hedge that divides both backyards, and into the house through the pet flap and straight into the kitchen.
It hit us like a cold shower. The four bowls that greeted us were filled to the brim with… the same grayish-greenish sludge we’d already encountered over at Marge’s.
“Yuck,” said Harriet, wrinkling up her nose. “That’s it. My hunger strike is on. When they see my wasted, weakened body, they’ll be sorry. I mean, they could have given us some gourmet soft food, but instead they chose to feed us this tasteless, odorless guck.”
We all looked up when sounds of a cat eating with relish reached our antenna-like ears. It was Dooley, who’d hunkered down while Harriet was officially announcing her hunger strike, and was eating his fill from the bowl that carried his name.
“What?” he said when he caught our looks of horror and shock. “I’m hungry.”
“But Dooley!” cried Harriet. “We have to stick together. We have to show them that we mean it.”
He gave her a sheepish look. “It might not taste like much, or smell like much, or look like much, but it’s full of the necessary proteins and vitamins and essential minerals that a growing body needs, so I’m eating it.”
A snicker sounded from Brutus, and immediately Harriet turned to him with outrage written all over her features. The snicker was squelched, and Brutus rearranged his features into the appropriate expression of solicitude and quiet resolve to go without food for as long as he could manage, or as long as Harriet told him to.