efe24af1849d5822a0fb0e585c983840

“One and the same,” I confirmed cheerfully. I quickly tamped down on my cheerfulness, though. It doesn’t suit a serious-minded detective like me to be flippant when dealing with death. So it was in grave tones that I continued, “Mr. Ed thinks there’s something fishy about Bob’s death. In fact he thinks Bob was in on the whole thing. That the only reason he got involved with Evelina was to get his hands on her money.”

“So Mr. Ed—your snail—thinks Bob Rector set up his own kidnapping?”

“Mr. Ed isn’t our snail, Odelia,” said Dooley with a laugh. “He’s Evelina’s snail.”

“Uh-huh,” said Odelia pensively. I could see her little gray cells were working hard now, trying to grasp the salient facts. “So this Bob Rector sets up his own kidnapping, he collects the money, and then he disappears… only to turn up dead on a potato truck.”

“That is a very succinct and accurate summary,” I said admiringly.

“Oh, and Brutus and Harriet don’t believe Mr. Ed’s story,” said Dooley. “But Max and I do. Just so you know. In case they try to convince you that Mr. Ed is full of manure.”

“Full of crap,” I corrected automatically.

“I think maybe we should go and have a chat with Evelina,” I suggested. “And Evelina’s sister, too. Because as far as I understand, it was the sister who set things in motion. So she’s the one who could possibly tell us more about Bob and his motives.”

Odelia was still assuming the position of Rodin’s Thinker, though without taking off her clothes, of course. “I think I’ll go and talk to my uncle first,” she said, immediately countering my suggestion with a suggestion of her own.

That’s the trouble when you work with humans: they always have their own opinions—and more often than not what they say goes. What can I say? That’s the life of a cat.

Chapter 8

“What were you working on, Odelia?” asked Dooley as we set paw—or at least we set paw, while Odelia set foot—in the direction of the police station.

“It’s an interesting story, actually,” she said. “Wilfred Hilbourne, who’s an actual English lord, is coming to visit. He’ll be in town for a week or so, and Mayor Butterwick is going to give him the keys to the city. Or one of the keys, at least,” she added with a smile.

“Keys to the city?” asked Dooley. “What does he want with the keys to Hampton Cove?”

Odelia laughed.“It’s an honor bestowed on people the town feels have made a big contribution in some way. Lord Hilbourne’s mother actually grew up in Hampton Cove, before she met Wilfred’s dad, and followed him to England, where they live in a castle.”

“Lord Hilbourne,” I said musingly. “So he’s a lord, is he?”

“What’s a lord, Odelia?” asked Dooley.

“A lord is a man of noble rank or high office,” Odelia explained. “A peer.”

“A pear?”

“Not a pear. A peer. A member of the nobility like a duke, or an earl or a baron. Collectively they’re members of the House of Lords—part of the British Parliament.”

“So… he’s a politician?”

“Well, not really. It’s more of an honorary position. They don’t actually do a lot of the real decision-making as far as I understand. But it is a very prestigious title, and Mayor Butterwick, and the rest of the town council and many people in Hampton Cove, feel it’s an honor to have a son of the city who’s now a lord.”

“When is he arriving in town, this Lord Hilbourne?” I asked.

“Oh, he’s here already. He’s staying at the Hampton Cove Star. In fact I’m scheduled to meet him in… one hour,” she said as she checked her watch. “Dan asked me to conduct the interview. It’s going to be tomorrow’s front page.” She smiled down at us. “Unless your story of Bob and Evelina bumps Lord Hilbourne to the second page, of course.”

We’d arrived at the police station and trudged into the vestibule, where Dolores Peltz, the dispatcher and desk sergeant who presides over these hallowed halls, gave us a curious eye. “One of these days you have to explain to me why every time I see you you’re surrounded by a flock of cats,” she said in her customary raspy tones.

“It’s a clowder of cats,” I corrected the blond-haired dispatcher with a penchant for mascara, even though she probably couldn’t understand me.

“Well, you know how much I like my cats, Dolores,” said Odelia with a smile.

“Oh, I know, honey. You’re probably here about that potato truck incident?”

“You heard about that?” asked Odelia, approaching the woman’s desk.

“Heard about it? Phone’s been ringing off the hook. People wanna know what happened. They figure there must have been more dead bodies—a massacre. I keep telling them it was just the one guy, but they don’t believe me. Figure we’re trying to keep the whole thing under wraps.” She shookher head. “Damn conspiracy wackos.”

“Was it an accident, you think?” asked Odelia.