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We all directed a curious look at the upstairs window, behind which I could easily picture the homely scene that was now playing out: Chase and Odelia would have immediately woken up, and were presumably staggering, still sleep drunk, in the direction of the cradle that housed the source of all this clamor. Moments later, the screaming stopped, and we all shared a look of satisfaction. Odelia had done it again: she’d managed to tame the savage beast that lurks behind the pure face of innocence.

“Who knew that such a tiny human could produce such a big sound?” said Harriet, shaking her head in wonder.

“She’ll have a great career as an opera singer,” said Dooley. “She already has the volume, now all she has to do is work on expanding her repertoire.”

He was right. So far Grace’s performances kept within the one-note range.

From next door, Fifi came trotting up. Fifi is a Yorkshire Terrier, and probably one of the nicest dogs alive—and I don’t say this lightly, as everyone knows that most dogs are foul creatures who like nothing better than to chase cats up trees.

“Kurt isn’t happy, you guys,” she said as she joined us.

“Kurt is never happy,” I said. Kurt is Fifi’s human, and our perpetually grumpy next-door neighbor. Though what he isn’t happy about tends to vary day by day.

“What isn’t he happy about this time?” asked Brutus, popping out through the pet flap, satisfied that his bowl still contained the necessary foodstuffs.

“It’s the baby,” said Fifi. “He says she’s way too loud, and if this keeps up he’s going to file a noise complaint.”

“Good luck with that,” said Brutus. “Doesn’t he know Grace’s dad is a cop?”

“Oh, he knows, which is why he won’t file the complaint in Hampton Cove. He’s going straight to the top.”

“The top?” I asked, intrigued. “You mean the Mayor?”

“The Governor,” said Fifi. “He’s going to claim that his rights as a citizen and a taxpayer are being trampled on. And he says there’s a precedent.”

“What precedent?”

“Remember how they wanted to build an airport in Happy Bays last year and how the neighbors successfully petitioned against it? Well, he says the same principle applies.”

I have to confess we were all a little flabbergasted, but finally I pointed out,“A baby isn’t an airplane, Fifi.”

“Max is absolutely right,” Dooley chimed in. “For one thing, babies don’t fly.” He turned to me. “Do they?”

“No, Dooley,” I said. “Babies don’t fly.”

“Unlike the storks that deliver them,” said Dooley with a nod in my direction.

“I know that,” said Fifi, ”and Kurt knows that, but he says she makes the same noise as a jumbo jet, and since he was here first, that dreadful baby has to go. And if the Governor doesn’t get rid of her, he’s taking his case up to the President.”

“Dreadful baby?” said Harriet. “Did he really call Grace a dreadful baby?”

“Actually he used a much stronger term,” said Fifi with a touch of bashfulness. “But I don’t want to be rude.”

“Kurt isn’t a very nice person,” said Dooley.

“He’s nice to me,” said Fifi. “But you’re right. He’s not very nice to other people.”

“And babies,” said Dooley.

“Babies are people, too, Dooley,” said Harriet. “Only they’re a lot smaller.”

“They’re like miniature people,” Brutus explained with an indulgent smile. “They have tiny toes and tiny fingers and tiny ears and a tiny nose and—“

“Yes, yes, we get the picture,” I interrupted my friend’s vivid word picture of what, exactly, constitutes a human baby.

“They’re not really going to get rid of Grace, are they, Max?” said Dooley, a look of concern now marring my friend’s funny little face.

“Of course not,” I said. “The whole idea is ridiculous.”

Still, I have to admit I wasn’t sanguine about Fifi’s report, straight from the front lines. Kurt has been known to throw the odd shoe in our direction, you see, expressing in word and gesture his displeasure with our vocal performance of an evening. Was it so hard to imagine the lengths he’d go to to rid himself of an admittedly vociferous infant? After all, no man is born a shoe thrower. As a young boy Kurt probably threw matches at passing cats, then gradually worked his way up to twigs and sticks, then shoes, and now he was moving into the baby removal business. If he kept this up, pretty soon he’d morph intoa full-fledged Bond villain and construct a secret lair underneath his lawn so he could destroy the world.

CHAPTER 2

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Vesta Muffin hadn’t slept well. Now she’d read in some magazine that once you reach a certain age you need less shut-eye but lately she’d been more awake than asleep during those restless nights. It had become so bad she’d developed a habit of getting up in the middle of the night and going for a midnight walk around the block. The fresh air and the brisk exercise usually tired her out to such an extent that by the time she tumbled into bed again, she slept like the proverbial baby… until what seemed like moments later it was time to start her day.