“So he is a bum?” asked Dooley.

  Odelia smiled a tight smile. “Yes, Dooley. Looks like our John Doe is a bum.”

  8

  While the police handled the investigation into the mysterious death of a homeless person, it was back to our regular lives for us cats. Important things had been happening at the home of Marge and Tex, Odelia’s parents, and it was time we pulled our attention from recent events as they’d unfolded, and returned it to what was really important, namely the picking of the right kitchen design for Tex and Marge’s new kitchen.

  The old kitchen had been there since Odelia’s folks had bought that house many years ago, and Gran had felt for a long time that it was time to retire it and put in a new one, and that she had to have the last word when it came to picking the new design. Marge, of course, felt differently, and so did Tex, and that was where matters now stood.

  Our humans had at least agreed on one thing: where to buy the kitchen, and so we found ourselves in the showroom of Kramer Kitchen Kreation, the company owned by Fred Kramer, also known as the Kitchen King, faced with an impossible choice.

  “So many kitchens, Max!” Dooley said with words of hushed awe.

  He was right. I don’t think I’d ever seen so many kitchens in the same room, and a big room it was, too. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to reconstruct dozens of different kitchens in one big showroom, and plenty of people were milling about, potential customers all in the same position as our own humans: faced with the near impossible task of picking just one of these gorgeous kitchens.

  “Look, it’s very simple,” said Gran. “Just give me carte blanche and I’ll pick the right kitchen for us. In fact I’ve picked the right kitchen already, so you really don’t have to bother anymore.” She smiled, and added the magic words: “Trust me!”

  Magic in the sense that they worked on Tex like a red rag on a bull.

  “And how much is this going to cost me?” asked the good doctor as he eyed his mother-in-law with an expression that betrayed his lack of trust in her judgment.

  “Oh, not that much,” said Gran. “In fact it’s a real bargain, if you ask me.”

  “This is my kitchen as well as yours, Ma,” said Marge, glancing around and looking for a salesperson. “So excuse me if I’m going to have the final say in this.”

  “And since I’m the one who’ll have to pay,” said Tex, “excuse me for having final say.”

  A salesperson had come charging to, and he must have realized he had a couple of real buyers before him, and not just window shoppers, for he displayed the wide smile your real salesman likes to display when he’s about to make a killing. “Excellent choice,” he said, as he nodded at the kitchen we just happened to be standing in. It was all dark wood and gleaming new appliances, and wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Nancy Meyers movie, preferably starring either Diane Keaton or Meryl Streep.

  “We’re not buying this,” said Tex immediately. He’d taken a gander at the price tag which was displayed on a stand near the entrance, and there was a finality to his voice that told of his reluctance to pay through the nose for what he considered an exercise in futility. Tex had long argued that they didn’t need a new kitchen, that the old one was perfectly fine, that it had at least another fifteen years left in the tank, and he wasn’t budging from this point of view, juxtaposed with that of his wife and mother-in-law.

  “So what did you folks have in mind?” asked the salesman, smile still firmly in place.

  “Why is he smiling like that, Max?” asked Dooley, who’d been studying the man like one studies an animal at the zoo.

  “Because your true salesperson believes that a smile allays some of that sales resistance,” I explained. “A smile says: I have absolute faith in your ability and your willingness to pull your wallet and hand me your credit card so I can swipe it.”

  “Tex doesn’t look like he’s ready to pull his wallet.”

  “No, he certainly does not.”

  In fact Tex looked like he was ready to pull a gun on the salesperson and make him go away, like a bad dream—or a highway robber.

  “We want a new fridge,” Tex explained. It was one point on which he was willing to concede.

  “We want a new kitchen,” Marge countered.

  “We want the whole enchilada,” said Gran, rubbing her hands. “And in fact I already have the perfect combination in mind, picked from your website.” And to prove she wasn’t lying, she took out her phone and showed them the design she’d picked.

  “Ma!” said Marge. “I told you I want light colors. Light and modern!”

  “This is a timeless design,” said Gran.

  “It looks like something from the forties!”

  “The forties are coming back,” said Gran. “In a big way.”

  “I suggest we sleep on it,” said Tex.

  “And I suggest we pull the trigger,” said Gran.

  Tex’s eyes narrowed, and his index finger twitched. It was clear he was definitely ready to pull the trigger—and then bury his mother-in-law in a shallow grave.

  “Why don’t I show you folks some of our more contemporary designs?” the salesman suggested, proving his mettle by focusing on the most important person here: Marge.

  And so for a while we moved from one kitchen installation to the next, while the salesman explained the ins and outs of every installation in great detail. And just when I thought I couldn’t take any more, the door opened and Harriet and Brutus walked in on the heels of more customers.

  “What’s the situation?” our Persian friend asked.

  “Tex doesn’t want to buy a kitchen, Marge wants something light and modern, and Gran wants something old and timeless,” I summed things up in a single sentence.

  “I think Tex is probably right,” said Brutus. “Why spend money on a new kitchen when the old one is perfectly fine?”

  “It isn’t fine,” I told him. “The wood is chipped and the fridge is broken and the whole thing looks like it’s seen better days.”

  The butch black cat shrugged. “Looks all right to me.”

  Just then, Gran caught sight of our newly arrived friends and came trotting over. “I need your help,” she told Harriet, then without further ado picked her up and carried her over to where she was duking it out with Tex and Marge. “I’ve got an idea!” she cried.

  “Oh, my God,” said Tex.

  “What is it?” asked Marge a little uncertainly.

  “We’ll let a neutral party decide,” said Gran, and held up Harriet as if this was a scene from the Lion King and she was introducing the new king to the world.

  “You’re going to let a cat decide what kitchen we choose?” asked Tex with a touch of incredulity.

  “She has to live there, too, right? And everybody knows that cats have great taste.”

  The salesperson, whose smile had fallen off his face by now—no one can train those facial muscles to keep working so hard for that long, not even a seasoned kitchen-hawking pro—glanced at Harriet, and nodded his acquiescence. “Why not?” he said.

  In other words: if you people are crazy enough to trust the word of a cat, I’m perfectly willing to indulge you. Or also: never argue with a crazy old cat lady.

  “So what will it be, Harriet?” asked Gran as she showed Harriet some of the designs they’d put aside. “Just pick a number—one to twelve—for the one you like best.”

  “Seven,” Harriet said immediately, and placed her paw down on its corresponding design.

  “Not that one!” Tex said, looking as fed up with this whole kitchen-choosing process as we were.

  “I told you!” said Gran triumphantly. “Good job, sweetheart.”

  “I’m not sure,” said Marge, wavering.

  “Why not? It’s light, it’s modern—”

  “And timeless,” the salesman interjected.

  “It’s also the most expensive one of the bunch,” Tex added, an objection immediately brushed aside by his wife and poo-poohed by his mother-in-law.

  The salesman was fully on board with the decision, for he was beaming again, and said, “Shall I wrap it up or are you going to have it here?” And laughed heartily at his own joke.

  9

  We’d just arrived home when we came upon Odelia giving us a look of determination.

  “What is it?” I said immediately.

  “I have an idea, Max.”

  “You have?”

  “An idea to catch this catnapper of yours.”

  “Well, he’s not my catnapper, per se,” I countered.

  “It’s a foolproof plan,” she assured me.

  Even through our recent kitchen saga, the thought of a person catnapping cats and murdering homeless people hadn’t been far from my mind. It was a very strange tale.

  “We need to stop this person,” Odelia announced. “And also, if this is the same person who’s killed and buried our John Doe, he needs to be stopped before he kills more people.”

  “Do you really think he’ll kill more people?” asked Dooley.

  “I don’t know, Dooley. As long as we don’t know why he did what he did, we have no way of knowing what his next move will be.”

  “So weird,” I murmured. “A man who kidnaps cats and murders homeless people then buries them in the woods for some reason.”

  “It is a very strange business,” Odelia agreed. “So I’m going to run my idea by you.”

  “Shoot,” I said, perhaps a little injudiciously, considering our John Doe had been killed with a firearm.

  “I was thinking: why don’t you let yourselves be taken by this person, and that way we’ll know exactly who’s doing this, and we can catch him in the act.”

  Both Dooley and I stared at our human in visible dismay. “We have to allow ourselves to be taken?” I asked, wanting to make sure I’d heard her right.

  “You’d wear a tracker, of course,” she said, “and Chase and I will be close by, so that when you’re taken, we’re right on that catnapper’s heels.”

  “Um… sure,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely convinced of their scheme. Don’t let my robust appearance fool you, I’m not exactly the world’s most courageous cat. Still, it seemed like a good plan, so I decided to go along with it.

  “So what exactly is it we’re supposed to do, Max?” asked Dooley.

  “Odelia is going to put a tracker on us,” I explained, “and so when we’re taken by the catnapper she’ll know exactly where we are at all times.”

  He nodded intelligently, then said, “What is a tracker, Max?”

  “A tracker is exactly what the word says, Dooley: it is a small device that tracks our every movement. In fact the full term is GPS tracker, and it sends a signal to a satellite, which sends the signal back to an app on Odelia’s phone pinpointing our exact location.”

  “You mean like the GPS on Odelia’s car?”

  “Exactly like the GPS on my car,” said Odelia with a reassuring smile. “That way whatever happens to you, Chase and I will know where you are, and we can come and save you.”

  “And catch the catnapper,” I added, “which is what this is all about.”

  “Since all five cats were taken in the same area and around the same time,” Odelia explained, “I think it’s best if you roam around that area around that time—assuming the catnapper hasn’t changed his MO—and hope he’ll take the bait.”

  I nodded, seeing the soundness of her scheme.

  “What do they say, babe?” asked Chase.

  “They’re going to do it,” said Odelia.

  Chase nodded. “Good boys,” he said, giving us both a pat on the head for our trouble. He’d crouched down so he was at eye level. Then suddenly, and completely out of the blue, he put a collar around my neck!

  “What are you doing?” I asked, slightly alarmed. I trust Chase, of course I do, but no cat likes to be outfitted with a collar. I mean, we’re not dogs, okay?

  “It’s the GPS tracker I was telling you about,” Odelia said.

  “Oh, right,” I said, only mollified to a minor extent.

  “Are you sure this is safe, Max?” asked Dooley as Chase repeated the procedure with my friend.

  “Yeah, I’m sure it is,” I said, though to be perfectly honest I wasn’t entirely sure myself.

  Harriet and Brutus had entered the house through the pet flap and now halted in their tracks when they caught sight of the recent additions to our costume. “Why are you wearing a collar, Max?” asked Harriet.

  “It’s not a collar,” I told her. “It’s a GPS tracker.”

  “We’re going to nab the nabber,” Dooley announced.

  “Nab the nabber!” said Brutus. “And how are you going to do that?”

  “You’re going to know exactly how they’re going to do that because you’re going to be nabbing that nabber along with your friends,” said Odelia. And before Brutus and Harriet knew what was happening they, too, had both been outfitted with tracking devices!

  Harriet blinked and said, in a plaintive voice, “I don’t like the color. It doesn’t become me.”

  “There isn’t much choice in tracking collars, unfortunately,” said Odelia. “So these will have to do I’m afraid. How do they feel?”

  “Weird,” I said, grimacing and pulling at the collar.

  “A little tight,” said Brutus in a tight voice.

  “So if these give off a signal that transmits to a satellite,” said Dooley, “isn’t that dangerous? I mean, doesn’t that kind of thing give you cancer?”

  “Don’t worry about that, Dooley,” said Odelia, getting slightly annoyed with all these objections to a plan that must have seemed perfect in her mind when she thought it up.

  “So what’s going to happen now?” I asked.

  “Now you’re going to walk around where the others were all taken,” said Odelia.

  “And where is that?”

  And as she told us where she was going to drop us off, and even was so kind to show it on a map on her phone, Harriet said in a low voice, “You guys, it’s the Bermuda triangle.”

  “The Bermuda triangle?” asked Brutus.

  “You know, the place where everything disappears.”

  “Oh, right.” He produced a low chuckle. “It’s the Bermuda triangle of cats—the place where all cats disappear into thin air!”

  “Oh, God,” I said, liking this whole endeavor less and less as time went on and the hour of putting ourselves in the path of this crazy nabber/killer drew closer and closer.

  “Max?” said Dooley as Odelia and Chase talked the plan through a little more, “I don’t like this.”

  “I don’t like it either, Dooley, but I’m sure it will be fine.”

  “But we’re wearing a cancer-inducing collar, and Odelia is going to drop us right in the middle of the Bermuda triangle for cats. This is very dangerous, Max!”

  “Just think of it this way, Dooley,” I said. “Soon we’ll have this catnapper behind bars, and then all cats of Hampton Cove can finally breathe a little easier again.”

  He took a deep breath, then said in a small voice, “I just wish I could breathe a little easier now.”

  10

  Marge was not in a good mood. Though she should have been in a great mood, she wasn’t, and it was all because of her mother. “Look, this is still my kitchen,” she said, “and I’m the one who has to pay for it, so I think it’s only reasonable that I’m the one who decides.”

  “Excuse me, but I live here, too,” said Ma, “and also, I’m paying from my pension, so I have as much right to have the deciding vote as you have—if not more!”

  Marge looked at the design her mother had chosen on the computer tablet, and shook her head. “I don’t like the cupboards,” she said finally. “They’re too small. My tableware is never going to fit. And besides, I always wanted a kitchen island.”

  “So what?”

  “So where is my kitchen island? There’s no kitchen island in this design.”

  “If you want a kitchen island, Marge,” said Ma, sitting next to her at the computer in their cozy little living room, “you should get a bigger kitchen.” She threw up her hands. “There simply isn’t enough space for the kind of kitchen you want.”

  Marge knew that her mother was right, of course, but she was loathe to admit it. “I’m sure that if we measure things again we can create enough space.”

  “You can measure all you want, but as long as that measurer you have isn’t one that belongs to Harry Potter you’re not going to create more space, Marge. You knew when you bought this house that you were getting a small kitchen, an okay living room and a small sitting room.” She paused. “Though if you really want a bigger kitchen there is a solution.”

  Hope surged in Marge’s bosom. She really had always wanted a bigger kitchen. In fact it was her main gripe ever since they’d moved into the place. “There is?”

  “Of course. All you have to do is knock out a wall, or better yet, two walls.” She pointed to the living room walls. “If you knock out that wall, and that one, you create one big space. And then you’ll have an open kitchen, with kitchen island, and you’ll also have a lot more light in here.”

  “You’re right,” she heard herself say.

  Ma’s jaw dropped. “What did you just say?”

  “I said you’re absolutely right.”

  Ma smiled a beatific smile, which was a rarity for her. “I’m glad to hear you say it.”

  They should have done it a long time ago. The living room, which was located in the center of the ground floor, didn’t get any light at all, and the sitting room, where they didn’t spend all that much time, got all the light, as did the kitchen.

  “How much is this going to cost, though?” she asked, immediately putting a damper on these ambitious plans.

  “Oh, don’t you worry about that,” Ma suggested.

  “Tex is going to—”

  “Tex will be happy as a clam! He wants this as much as we do. He just doesn’t want to pay for it, even though he can easily afford it.”

  “It would mean remodeling the entire downstairs,” Marge pointed out.