by Nic Saint
And so the discussion went on for a while. Harriet wasn’t to be deterred, though. She was directing a scathing glance in my direction. I rolled my eyes. She wasn’t going to let this go, I could tell. She was going to hound me until I produced this mysterious Patient Zero.
“Fine,” I said finally. “We’ll find your Patient Zero and we’ll find him today, all right?”
She smiled. “Thanks, Maxie. I knew you’d listen to reason. Brutus and I will join you. And together we’ll search this town until we’ve tracked down the cat who’s responsible for this terrible outbreak and make sure he or she is unflead ASAP.”
“I don’t think unflead is a word, honey,” said Marge.
Harriet flapped her paws. “Deflead, then. Whatever. But mark my words, I won’t rest until the last flea of Hampton Cove has been terminated.” When Dooley gasped, she quickly added, “in the most humane and kindest way possible, of course.”
Chapter Two
The moment we were finally declared flea-free, the four of us set out to start hunting high and low for Patient Zero and ‘take care of him,’ in Harriet’s words. She seemed pretty sure this Patient Zero was a male, as only males could be so dumb as to allow themselves to be infested with a bunch of lowly parasites.
“And it’s not just that the female of the species is smarter than the male, we’re more hygienic, too,” she claimed now as we tracked along the sidewalks of Hampton Cove. “I for one would never allow even a single flea to lay its eggs on my precious fur if I could help it.”
“None of us would allow that,” I countered. “Do you think I like hosting a flea party?”
“You tomcats are simply too insensitive to even feel that you’re being ravaged by a bunch of parasites,” she said, tail high in the air as usual. “You could have thousands of fleas feasting on your bodies and you wouldn’t even know. But put one flea on me and I’ll know instantly that something is wrong. Admit it, Max, females are much more conscious of their bodies than males.”
“Like the princess and the pea,” said Dooley, much to my surprise. When we all looked at him, he shrugged. “She could feel the pea, which showed everyone she was a princess. The same way Harriet can feel the flea, which shows us she’s…” He swallowed, and his cheeks would probably have flushed a bright scarlet if they hadn’t been covered in fur.
“Aw, Dooley,” said Harriet. “You think I’m a princess? That’s so sweet of you.”
Brutus gave Dooley a dirty look. Its meaning was clear: she’s my princess, buddy, so paws off.
We passed along the streets of Hampton Cove, the sleepy little town in the Hamptons where life is lived at a more leisurely pace than in other small towns the world over. This morning was different, however, with the sound of vacuum cleaners working at full tilt audible wherever we pointed our antenna-like ears. Windows had been flung open, with duvets, comforters and mattresses hanging from ledges, soaking up the sun’s rays, carpets being cleaned with a frantic energy that told us the flea infestation had left the good people of Hampton Cove scrambling. Some people were even fogging and fumigating their houses, judging from the clouds of acrid smoke wafting through windows and doors and chimneys.
Dooley shook his head. “Maybe we should call the Humane Society, Max. I think they’d have a field day fighting all this cruelty and this utterly senseless suffering.”
“How long do you think a flea can survive inside a vacuum bag?” asked Harriet.
“Not long,” said Brutus. “I imagine they die a slow and painful death of suffocation.”
Dooley uttered a strangled cry. “Oh, those poor, poor creatures.”
“They’re a pest,” Brutus grunted. “And pests should be eradicated. No mercy.”
“Some people consider cats a pest,” I said. “They feel we should be eradicated.”
“Some people are pests,” Brutus countered. “So maybe they should eradicate themselves.”
“Oh, but they do,” said Harriet. “People kill each other all the time. They enjoy it.”
She was right. Only a couple of days ago a grandson had killed his grandfather, just so he could take over the old man’s title as Most Fascinating Man in the World. No cat would ever kill another cat for the mere pleasure of being called Most Fascinating Cat in the World. Humans sometimes can be quite inhumane. Before I could ponder the topic more deeply, however, we’d arrived in the heart of town, and Brutus and Harriet took one side of the street while Dooley and I took the other. We were looking for clues revealing the identity of this Patient Zero, and what better way to go about this pursuit than to talk to other cats?
Cats, as you might imagine, are extremely chatty creatures. There’s nothing a cat likes better than to gossip about his or her fellow cats. And since our human is in the business of providing fresh human gossip to other humans every day through her column in the Hampton Cove Gazette, that works out quite nicely. So we passed by the barber shop and talked to the barber’s Maine Coon Buster, who sat licking his paws in front of the shop.
“First time I laid eyes on a flea I was a young whippersnapper of six months,” he said with a faraway look in his eyes as he temporarily halted his grooming. “My pa showed me. Said a cat’s not a cat without a bunch of fleas burrowing into his skin.” He sighed wistfully. “Ma kicked him out of the house that day and I haven’t seen him since. I miss my old man sometimes. Said he’d fathered a thousand kittens in his time, and felt ready and primed to father a thousand more. Which is probably why Ma kicked him out in the first place.”
“That’s all fine and dandy,” I said, trying to halt the stream of words. Buster likes to gab, and sometimes it’s hard to get him to focus. “But we’re trying to figure out when this flea infestation started, so try to cast your mind back to when you saw the first flea now—not when you were a young whipper… snipper.”
He dabbed at his eyes with his paws. “He said he’d be back for me, Pa did. But I never saw him again. I sometimes wonder if he’s out there somewhere, looking up at the same stars at night, thinking about me and those fun times we shared back in the day.”
“If he fathered a thousand kittens and was ready to father a thousand more it’s highly unlikely he remembers you, Buster,” said Dooley, offering his two cents.
Buster stopped rubbing his eyes and gave Dooley a nasty look. “Who asked you?”
“It’s simple logic,” Dooley argued. “How can a cat be expected to remember one cat out of thousands? And I’ll bet you were not very memorable at six months. None of us are.”
“Dooley,” I told him warningly.
“I stood out amongst the bunch,” said Buster through gritted teeth. “Even as a kitten.”
“I’m sure you did, Buster,” I said pacifically. “Now about this Patient Zero…”
“Are you telling me that my pa never gave me a second thought? Cause let me tell you, you scruffy-faced piece of no-good mongrel, he did. Pa said he’d be back for me and the only reason he would break that promise is if he was detained someplace, unable to come.”
“Probably fathering his ten-thousandth kitty,” said Dooley. “Or taking a breather. Fathering so many kitties causes a lot of wear and tear. Your pa probably hung up his spurs.”
“Why, you little…” Buster began, swinging his paw. “I should knock your whiskers off.”
“Now, now,” I said. “We’re all friends here.”
“Just buzz off,” said Buster, giving us a distinctly unfriendly look.
And as we walked away, Dooley asked, “Is it something I said, Max?”
“No, Dooley,” I said with a sigh. “But maybe from now on you’ll let me do the talking, all right? We are trying to find Patient Zero, not looking to start a fight.”
“Okay, Max. I was just pointing out a flaw in Buster’s logic, that’s all.”
“I know you were, Dooley. I know you were.”
Chapter Three
Next up was Tigger, the plumber’s cat, who, for some reason, sat people-watching on the stoop
of Daym Fine Liquor, the local liquor store.
“Hey, Tigger,” I said by way of greeting. “What’s new?”
Tigger, a small hairless cat, held up his paw and I high-fived him. “Hiya, fellas,” he said. “Just waiting on my human. My human likes this store. In fact it’s his favorite store in all of Hampton Cove. He’s in here all the time so I’m out here all the time.”
“Why?” asked Dooley, who was in an inquisitive mood today. “You’re not a dog. You’re not supposed to sit out here and wait for your human.”
“Oh, I know I’m not a dog,” said Tigger. “But once Gwayn has some liquor in him he tends to forget he’s got me to feed, so I like to trail him to remind him I’m still here.”
It was an intensely sad story, though Tigger didn’t seem to see it that way, judging from his chipper demeanor. Just one of those things cats take in their stride, I guess. When your human is a tippler, like Gwayn Partington obviously was, a cat learns to adjust.
“We’re looking for Patient Zero,” Dooley said, getting straight down to business.
“Maybe check the hospitals?” Tigger suggested. “That’s where they keep those. I know on account of the fact that Gwayn has been in one. He has balance issues, you see, and tends to fall on his face from time to time. It’s a terrible affliction. Every time it happens an ambulance comes and a couple of men in white take him down to the hospital.”
“We’re not looking for a particular patient,” I clarified. “We’re looking for the first cat in Hampton Cove who got infested with fleas. If we can track him or her down, we might be able to nip this thing in the bud, so to speak. Eradicate this infestation once and for all.”
Tigger shook his head. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, fellas, but you can’t eradicate a flea infestation. Fleas are everywhere! Fleas are all around, just like in the song.”
“Song? What song?” I asked.
“Fleas are all around,” he began to sing to the tune of ‘Love is all around.’
“They weren’t before—not on this massive scale. Someone brought them here.”
He stopped singing and gave me a pensive look. “Maybe ask Chief Alec? If anyone knows what’s going on in Hampton Cove it’s Chief Alec. Chief Alec knows. And he’s nice to cats. I should know. The other day, when Gwayn spent the night at the police station, Chief Alec drove over to the house and gave me a saucer of milk and a piece of his ham sandwich. What a mensch!”
“Gwayn spent the night at the police station?” I asked.
“Sure. He was driving through town when he happened to drive through a red light—Gwayn suffers from color-blindness as well as this falling-on-his-face thing, you see—and so Chief Alec made him walk a line. Apparently that’s what they do when people drive through red lights—make them walk a line. He must have aced the test because the Chief was so kind to offer Gwayn free lodgings at the police station for the night. Like I said, a real mensch.”
Just then, Gwayn Partington came staggering out of the liquor store, a big brown paper bag in his arms, and stared down at us. “Well, I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “First there was one cat and now there’s three? I must be off a damn lot worse than I thought!”
We watched as Tigger’s human stumbled down the street, his hair sticking up, his bushy beard unkempt, and his blue coveralls a little too tattered to appeal to the average client of his plumbing business. Tigger sighed. “I love my human, I really do, but he doesn’t make it easy.” He turned and started in pursuit of the sauced plumber. “See ya, fellas. And if you see this Patient Zero of yours, tell him next time he should keep his fleas to himself.”
“Wait, I thought you didn’t believe in this Patient Zero theory?” I yelled after him.
“If you believe it, I believe it!” he yelled back, and gave us a cheerful wave.
“He’s a real philosopher, this Tigger,” said Dooley admiringly.
“With a human like that, you have to be,” I said.
“Do you think Gwayn Partington is an alcoholic, Max?”
“Either he’s an alcoholic or a method actor getting into character as an alcoholic.”
We traipsed on, dodging pedestrians as we did, until we reached the Vickery General Store, where two cats sat shooting the breeze in front of the store. They were Kingman, generally accepted as the best-informed cat in Hampton Cove, and a ratty little cat called Kitty. She belonged to a local landscaper and was explaining something to Kingman while gesticulating wildly.
“And then he locked me up in the washer. The washer! Can you imagine?!”
I’d heard the story before so I wasn’t all that interested. Still, being locked up in a washing machine is one of those universal horror stories that gives cats the creepy crawlies.
“Her human locked her up in the washer,” said Kingman, jerking a paw to Kitty. “Can you believe it? What an idiot.”
“At least you didn’t get fleas,” I said.
“Fleas don’t kill you, tough guy,” said Kitty. “The washer will. Unless you’re me, of course.” She shook her head. “No idea how I survived that one. I must be one tough kitty.”
“Maybe your Odelia should write a story about that,” Kingman suggested. “I mean, all she ever writes about is humans doing stuff to other humans, but when is she finally going to write about the things that really matter? Like getting stuck in a washer, huh? Or this flea infestation? That’s the stuff I would like to see featured on the front page once in a while.”
“He’s right, you know,” said Kitty. “I mean, take that big story that’s been all over the news these last coupla days. About that Most Fascinating Dude that got killed by some other Most Fascinating Dude. Who cares, right? I don’t. Dudes be killing dudes all over the place all the time. But how often do you get to talk to a cat that survived three washing cycles?”
“You survived three washing cycles?” I asked.
“It sure feels like it! But do I get asked for an exclusive interview? No, sir! No fair!”
“You should tell Odelia to give me a call,” said Kingman, tapping my chest smartly. “I have an interesting story to tell about the flea epidemic. A story that would rock this town.”
“Or she could call me,” said Kitty. “A cat that survived four washing cycles!”
I stared at Kingman, hope surging in my bosom. “You know something about this flea thing?”
“Sure I do,” said the voluminous piebald, and wiggled one of his chins for emphasis. “Mark my words. If what I have to say gets printed in the Hampton Cove Gazette the good people of this town would be shocked. Shocked, I tell you!”
“Not as shocked as I was after surviving five washing cycles!” cried Kitty.
“Do washing machines even go through five washing cycles?” I asked.
“Ten! A dozen! If not more!”
“Just the one,” said Dooley. “I know because I love to watch the machine go round and round.”
“All cats love to watch the machine go round and round,” said Kingman.
“Well, my human’s machine goes round and round at least two dozen cycles,” said Kitty adamantly, “and I survived every single one of them. So there.” And having said this, she stalked off, ready to pounce on the next cat and start telling her story all over again.
“Look, Kingman,” I said. “We’re on a mission, Dooley and I. A mission to find Patient Zero. So better tell us everything you know about this flea infestation and better tell us now.”
Kingman nodded soberly. “It was a dark and stormy night…” he began.
END OF THIS EXCERPT
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About Nic
Nic Saint is the pen name for writing couple Nick and Nicole Saint. They’ve penned 70+ novels in the romance, cat sleuth, middle grade, suspense, comedy and cozy mystery genres. Nicole has a background in accounting and Nick in poli
tical science and before being struck by the writing bug the Saints worked odd jobs around the world (including massage therapist in Mexico, gardener in Italy, restaurant manager in India, and Berlitz teacher in Belgium).
When they’re not writing they enjoy Christmas-themed Hallmark movies (whether it’s Christmas or not), all manner of pastry, comic books, a daily dose of yoga (to limber up those limbs), and spoiling their big red tomcat Tommy.
www.nicsaint.com
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