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“It could be a kidnapper,” Brutus suggested, now that Harriet had been sufficiently consoled. “Out to nab baby Grace. There are gangs that steal babies on commission. Or they could be wanting to kidnap her and hold her for ransom.”

“Oh, no!” said Harriet. “Not baby Grace! Max, you have to do something!“

Brutus looked a little perturbed at the mention of my name.“Or I could do something,” he pointed out.

“Of course, twinkle toes,” said Harriet sweetly. “But since Odelia is Max’s human, and Grace is Odelia’s baby, Max is probably best placed to save her.”

“Mh,” said Brutus, clearly not in full agreement with this specious reasoning.

“We better see if Grace is still there,” I said, and moved off in the direction of the house. My friends all followed me, and moments later we were passing through the pet flap and into the house proper, making a beeline for Grace’s crib. And as we hopped up onto the table to take a closer look, much to our satisfaction she was still happily gurgling away, looking as pink and cherubic as usual.

“Phew,” I said, and probably spoke for all of us.

Odelia, who’d just returned from upstairs, where she’d been overseeing sleeping arrangements for the Boggles, started a little when she saw us all hovering over the crib. “What’s wrong?” she immediately asked as she joined us.

“We saw a man in the bushes,” said Dooley. “And he attacked Harriet. We think he might be a kidnapper. And so we wanted to see if he kidnapped Grace or not.”

“Oh, dear,” said Odelia, bringing a distraught hand to her face. “Are you all right, Harriet?”

“My tail still hurts,” said Harriet. “And if Brutus hadn’t fought him off, things could have turned really nasty. I could see it in his eyes. Evil, Odelia. Pure evil!”

“He could be part of a gang of baby snatchers,” said Brutus. “I heard there’s one active in the neighborhood. Snatching babies and selling them for parts.”

“People don’t sell babies for parts, Brutus,” said Odelia.

“Yeah, you’re thinking of cars,” I said.

“Maybe they want to eat them?” Harriet suggested. “I read on Facebook that there are people out there that like to eat babies. Like a Snickers bar, you know.”

“Don’t believe everything you read on Facebook, Harriet,” said Odelia. But I could tell that the story of this tall, dark stranger in the bushes had rattled her.

“I just wish I’d knocked him out when I had the chance,” said Brutus grimly.

“You’re much too nice, wuggle bear,” said Harriet. “That’s your problem.”

“I know, I know. I had him in my paws but I let him go. Darn it!”

“Can you give me a description?” asked Odelia.

“I can do you one better,” said Brutus, expanding his chest. He held out his paw. “You can scrape some of his DNA from my claws and have Chase run it through the database.”

“Oh, love muffin!” Harriet cried. “You’re so clever!”

“One does one’s best,” said Brutus modestly.

“I’ll carefully scrape off some of that DNA from your claws, Brutus,” said Odelia, “so Chase has something to work with.” And she proceeded in the direction of the staircase to retrieve what is commonly termed a cotton swab. Humans use it to poke around in their ears—the reason is entirely unclear to me, but then we all know humans are a very strange species. If someone tried to poke me in the ear with a cotton swab they’d get quite an earful, I can promise you.

But before Odelia could equip herself with the necessary DNA-retrieval tools, suddenly John Boggles appeared in the stairwell, almost bumping into our human.“Oh,” said Odelia, a little startled. “I was just going to—“

And she probably would have said more, but just at that moment Harriet started screaming at the top of her voice—quite the performance, I must say.

“It’s the man!” she shrieked. “Brutus—get him!”

And true enough: the mystery man who had appeared, then disappeared from the bushes, was staring at us through the sliding glass door!

“It’s the kidnapper!” Odelia cried, and grabbed for the first available weapon that she found, in this case a smallish statuette of Minnie Mouse Gran had once gifted her.

“What’s going on?” asked Big John, much perturbed.

“This man is here to kidnap my daughter!” Odelia said as she took a firmer grip on the makeshift weapon. The wannabe kidnapper had now placed both hands next to his face, and his face flat against the window, his damaged schnozz greasing up the glass, in an obvious attempt to look inside.

“The nerve of the guy!” said Brutus. “He’s simply blatant!”

And then the most astonishing thing happened: like a man possessed with nerves of steel, John Boggles stepped to the fore, like the fearless leader that he was, yanked open the door and… clapped Harriet’s attacker on the back!

“Anything to report, Wilkins?” he asked.

“No, sir. Looks like the coast is clear.”

“Good man,” said Big John, and Wilkins tipped an imaginary cap, then removed himself from the scene, presumably to invade some other home!

“What just happened?” asked Harriet.

“Do you know that man?” asked Odelia.