The Real Macaw(6)

“Sammy!” he shouted.

“Yes, sir!” Heavy footsteps raced up our walk and clomped across the front porch. Deputy Sammy Wendell appeared in the foyer. Unlike the chief, who appeared perfectly normal and wide awake, Sammy had clearly been roused from a sound sleep and hadn’t yet combed his hair, which was sticking out in all directions.

“Ms. Langslow,” the chief said. “I gather you and Mr. Waterston have been home with the babies?”

I nodded.

“And your grandfather and his party arrived about twenty minutes ago?”

“No idea,” I said. “We were all either asleep or upstairs feeding the kids with the white noise machine on. It was about fifteen or twenty minutes ago that the racket from the animals got loud enough for me to hear it.”

“Who else is here?”

“Well, apart from Rob, I expect Dad is out in the barn,” I said. “Clarence Rutledge is upstairs helping Michael with the babies. My cousin, Rose Noire, and our houseguest, Timmy Walker, are upstairs asleep, unless the noise woke them. That’s all I know about.”

I was assuming, of course, that “who else” didn’t include four-legged visitors.

“Dr. Blake, Dr. Langslow, Dr. Rutledge, and Mr. Langslow.” The chief had taken out his notepad and was scribbling in it. “Dr. Blake, was there anyone else with you?”

“No,” Grandfather said. “Damn! I guess I should take back some of the harsh things I’ve been saying about Parker for the last couple of hours, when I thought he was just being feckless.”

“Sammy,” the chief said. “Round them up and keep them in the kitchen.” He looked at me. “If that’s acceptable.”

I nodded.

“Or you can use the library, if you like,” I said. “Or both.”

“Keep them in the kitchen, Sammy.” The chief glanced down at his notebook and appeared to be studying something. “I’ll just talk to them here. Now, Dr. Blake. Where—”

He stopped and glanced down. One of the kittens was loose and had begun climbing the crisply pressed left leg of his uniform trousers as if it were a tree. He blinked, then forced his eyes back to Grandfather.

“Dr. Blake, where were you for the last couple of hours?”

“It wasn’t just an accident, was it?” Grandfather asked. “Someone knocked him off.”

The chief nodded. He winced as the kitten’s razor-sharp little claws dug into his skin. The chief shook his leg slightly in an attempt to dislodge his attacker. The kitten thought this was fun, and scrambled a little higher.

“And you want to know if we have alibis,” Grandfather said. He glowered for a moment. Clearly he was reluctant to admit what they’d been up to. Understandable, but this was not the time to clam up.

“Clarence, Rob, James, and I were all together,” Grandfather said finally. He glared at the chief as if daring him to ask where.

I realized I’d been holding my breath. I let it out as quietly as I could.

“During what time period?” the chief asked.

Another kitten had joined its brother or sister in scaling the chief’s pants leg.

“Since about ten o’clock,” Grandfather said. “We were supposed to meet Parker at midnight at the intersection of Little Creek Road and the Clay County Road.”

“By the old churchyard?”

Grandfather nodded.

“We got there about five minutes to midnight, and stayed until maybe one forty-five A.M.”

The chief was trying to shoo the kittens—three of them by now—off his trouser legs without looking at them. I suddenly realized why. He was trying not to look at the kittens because if he took notice of them, he might have to deal with the whole shelter burglary thing. And right now he didn’t want to do that. Maybe he was in sympathy with Grandfather’s protest, or maybe he just felt the murder was more important and didn’t want to be sidetracked.

I decided to help him.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Rose Noire’s new kittens aren’t very well trained yet.”

“Trained?” Grandfather snorted at the thought. “You can’t train cats.”

“You can make sure they know that climbing on people is not acceptable,” I said as I plucked one of the kittens off. “And you could help me with this. I’ve only got two hands.”

We finished plucking the kittens off the chief and returned them to the large cardboard box where they belonged.

As I stood up from depositing the kittens, I jarred the macaw’s cage. The tarp that had been partly covering it fell all the way off.

“Hiya, babe!” the macaw squawked. “How’s about it? Just you and me.”