4c392a139708e5efb30cc267dbb0c768

Odelia was surprised this Paunch person would know her editor. Then again, he seemed to know everyone else.“Okay, I’ll try to squeeze it in. I’ll have to fact-check it first, though.”

“No need. I already took care of that for you. Consider it fact-checked. Tallest President in history. Oh, and he’s also the President with the most hair.”

“Most hair?”

“Most hair. I counted them myself. Also the softest hair.”

“Softest hair?”

“That’s right. Touched it myself. Soft as a baby’s bottom.”

And with this startling revelation, he disconnected.

Odelia stared at her phone. Otto Paunch was her own personal Deep Throat, only the information he imparted wasn’t exactly groundbreaking or earth-shattering. Still, it was something. Like her own personal line to the President.

Chapter 24

The nocturnal blanket of darkness swept down on Hampton Cove, covering the picturesque Hamptons community in a cloak of peacefulness, most of its human inhabitants now fast asleep, while its cat population moved out of their houses in droves, led by that ancient hunting instinct and the desire to protect their domain from other felines.

And so it was that Odelia hopped into her car, watched her small cat menagerie gracefully jump into the backseat, and launched us on what she hoped would be a very fruitful night of snooping around on someone else’s property. For where humans fear to tread, cats have absolutely no compunction to trespass with absolute impunity.

Our destination? Geary Potbelly’s duck farm.

Our mission? Elicit the descriptions and possibly the names of the miscreants who had so dastardly stolen Mr. Potbelly’s equipment to carry out their murderous scheme.

Five cats rode in the backseat in relative silence. Relative, I say, because wherever there is more than one cat present, banter inevitably enters the picture. Cats hate those uncomfortable silences even more than humans do and are quick to fill them with chatter.

“Is duck poop smelly?” asked Dooley now.

“All poop is smelly,” I said.

“No, but I mean is it more smelly than cat poop—or even human poop?”

Harriet wasn’t in a chatting mood. “Didn’t you hear what Max said? All poop is smelly.”

“I know. But what I want to find out is how smelly duck poop is in comparison with our own poop and human poop. On a scale of smelliness, where would you place duck poop?”

Brutus was grunting something. He was keeping a close eye on Milo, who he suspected of having secretly developed a crush on Harriet. Why else would he have gone to such lengths to try and break up this love affair he and the feisty white Persian enjoyed?“Who cares how smelly duck poop is?” the black cat said now. “It’s a nonissue, Dooley.”

Dooley seemed to beg to disagree. He was also begging for a smack on the snoot if he kept this up.

“I think duck poop probably rates a five on the Richter Poop Scale,” said Milo, throwing his two cents in. “Human poop rates a six, and cat poop a solid seven.”

“Richter scale?” I said with a frown. “I thought the Richter scale was for earthquakes?”

“Oh, Dr. Richter worked on a lot of scales,” said Milo. “The earthquake thing was only one of them. For a long time he was actually more famous for his Poop Scale than for the Earthquake Scale. Of course he didn’t call it the Poop Scale. Scientists dislike simple names. He called it the Defecation Magnitude Scale. Worked very hard on it. Involved a powerful olfactory machine of his own design called The Sniffer. Now mainly used in the perfume industry.”

Dooley was interested.“So if cat poop is a seven on the Richter scale, what’s an eight or a nine or even a ten?”

“Elephant poop, obviously, is an eight. Mice poop a nine. And it will surprise you to know that fly poop is a ten. But because fly poop is so tiny it is very hard for us to detect its odor. Richter set up this massive experiment where he collected fresh fly poop in large Mason jars then subjectedits contents to The Sniffer. It registered as a ten.”

“Wow,” said Dooley, wide-eyed. “That’s amazing, Milo. Fly poop. A ten!”

“Yes. It is said even The Sniffer was impressed. And out of commission for a while.”

“Out of commission?”

“A smell that registers as a ten on the Richter scale is lethal for humans and very disruptive even to machines.”

I have to say that I took this Richter story with a sniff of salt. Then again, stranger things have been examined by the leading scientists of our time so why not fly poop?

“We’re almost there, you guys,” said Odelia. “I’m going to drop you off at the fence, all right? From there it’s not that far to the duck houses.”

“We’ll just follow our noses,” Milo suggested mildly.

Odelia parked the car and opened the door.“Good luck,” she said. “I’ll wait here, okay? And watch out for those dogs.”

“We’ll be fine,” I said. “We’ve handled dogs before.”

“Yes,” said Brutus. “I still have to meet the first dog who can best us.”