“Same here,” said Flame. “Litter gets stuck to my paws, and so it spreads all over the place.”

  “Oh,” said Dooley, looking much disappointed that his theory about Suzanne being his litter monster looked like a dead end.

  “So where is Harriet?” asked Flame, who apparently had become attached to our Persian friend.

  “In town investigating the murder of your human,” I said. “We decided to split up so we can pursue multiple leads at the same time.”

  “Good thinking,” she said. “Okay, so there is something I forgot to mention when I was talking to her.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, the thing is that even though Robert was very attached to his privacy and didn’t have a lot of friends, he did have one good friend he’d known forever.”

  “Name?” I asked.

  “Sebastian Poe. The odd thing is that I saw Sebastian last night when he paid us a visit.”

  “And why is that so odd?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “Because Sebastian died a couple of weeks ago.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Caroline Poots had been cleaning the kitchen counter with a dishrag when she happened to glance out of the kitchen window and saw an old lady and two cats pass by her house. She stared at the strange spectacle for a moment, wondering what they were up to. Mostly what she saw on any given day were dog owners walking their dogs, but she had never seen anyone walking their cats. And the cats were gorgeous: one was a white Persian, and the other a big, butch black one that looked like a real bruiser. The old lady looked vaguely familiar, as if she had seen her somewhere before, and then she had it. It was that ornery receptionist she sometimes saw when she went to the doctor. Rumor had it that she was Doctor Poole’s mother-in-law, which had always struck her as a sad thing, since Doctor Poole was such a nice man—so warm and understanding—and then he was saddled with this annoying harridan for a mother-in-law. And not just that, but also his receptionist. Once she had even told the doctor that he should pick another receptionist because some people might be scared off by the one he had. But Doctor Poole had said the only way he could get a different receptionist was if he murdered the one he had, and it hadn’t even sounded as if he was joking!

  “Poor man,” she now said as she rinsed the dishrag and draped it over the rack.

  “What did you say, sweetie?” asked her husband, who was drinking a cup of coffee and reading his paper.

  “It’s that receptionist of Doctor Poole,” she said. “She just passed by on the street with two cats in tow. And I was just thinking that Doctor Poole should really do something about her, since she’s just about the meanest old woman I’ve ever met in my life. Every time you call, she acts as if you’ve just disturbed her doing something a lot more important than taking your call. And then when you come in, she just looks at you as if you’re something that’s stuck to the bottom of her shoe and she’d much rather you hadn’t come in at all.”

  “Yeah, she’s just the worst, isn’t she?” said Kirk, folding his paper. “Do you know that the last time I went in to see Doctor Poole, when I had that pain in my foot, and I told her about it, she said I should just chop it off if it was bothering me so much?” He laughed. “Chop off my foot!”

  “People like that shouldn’t be allowed to work in a doctor’s office,” said Caroline with a shake of the head. “There should be a law against it.”

  “Well, she does keep the hypochondriacs away. You have to be really, really sick to decide to brave that horrible woman to go and see the doctor.”

  But Caroline shook her head. “It’s a nice theory, but it doesn’t work like that, honey. Remember Ida Baumgartner? She’s got all the diseases that have ever existed, and none of them are real. And still, she goes in and sees Doctor Poole all the time. Every time I go in, she’s right there, explaining in excruciating detail about some new disease she just got. So no, if the doctor put his mother-in-law in place as some kind of gatekeeper, it’s not working.”

  “Oh, well, at least we have a good doctor, even if he has lousy tastes in receptionists.”

  “It’s not his fault. It’s one of those curses a person has to bear.”

  And having said that, she put the phenomenon out of her head. Or at least she would have if not for the doorbell ringing, and she and her husband sharing a look of surprise.

  “Now who can that be?” asked Kirk.

  “Postman, probably,” said Caroline.

  But when she went to open the door, who did she find on the doorstep, looking at her as if she was a piece of poo stuck to the bottom of her shoe? None other than Vesta Muffin, accompanied by two cats, one black and one white.

  “Caroline Poots?” asked the woman.

  “That’s right,” said Caroline, much surprised by this visit. She stared at the cats, and it could just be her imagination, or they were staring back at her in much the same way Mrs. Muffin was.

  “You’re the head of the Chamber of Commerce committee that decides on the awards being given for the best Hampton Cove businesses?”

  “Business of the year,” she said. “Yes, I’m the chair of that committee.” She wondered if Mrs. Muffin was going to ask to select her son-in-law for a prize. Caroline didn’t know if the doctor was eligible, but having to put up with this woman, he might be eligible for the prize for a good Samaritan. Or maybe even a saint!

  “Well, the thing is,” said Mrs. Muffin, “that the winner of this year’s award has just been murdered, and they’ve asked me to poke around and collect some impressions from people who knew the guy. Just to try and paint a picture of what he was like, you know, for police purposes?”

  Caroline eyed the woman with a look of absolute bewilderment. “You... work for the police now, Mrs. Muffin?”

  The woman looked surprised. “Oh, have we met before?”

  “Yes, we have. I’m a patient of Doctor Poole’s.”

  Mrs. Muffin’s eyes narrowed, and Caroline could see the little cogs in her brain, hidden under those deceptively sweet-looking little white curls, working at full capacity. Then her face cleared. “Of course!” she said, pointing a finger at her. “Gallbladder!”

  “Gallbladder?”

  “I’m terrible at remembering names, so I just associate patients with their diseases, and for some reason, your face has gallbladder written all over it.” Caroline’s face must have betrayed her extreme dismay at being categorized in such a disrespectful way, so she amended, “Could be an ulcer, of course. Tex has so many patients, I get confused. But anyway, what can you tell me about Robert Ross? Have you met the guy? Did he hit on you?”

  “Hit on me!”

  “My granddaughter is conducting the actual investigation into the murder—or at least assisting the detective, who’s her husband—and she tells me that Robert liked to hit on women. Hence the question.”

  Caroline blinked a few times. She was having a hard time coming to grips with the conversation as it was developing. This was the first she’d heard that Mr. Ross had died—murdered even—and here stood this annoying woman asking her all kinds of questions about the guy. “No, he has never ‘hit’ on me,” she finally managed. “Look, do you work for the police or not?”

  “Absolutely,” said Mrs. Muffin proudly.

  “Can you show some ID?” She found it extremely unlikely that the woman would suddenly go from being a receptionist to working as a police detective.

  “No need!” said Vesta blithely. “My son is the chief of police. So that gives me all the credentials I need to run any investigation I want.”

  “I... don’t think it works like that, exactly. I’m pretty sure giving birth to a police officer doesn’t make you a police officer yourself.”

  “Not a police officer. Alec is the chief of police.”

  “I know. But that doesn’t make you the chief of police. Qualifications and experience don’t travel up the hereditary line to a parent. If that were true, a president’s mother would also be a president, a doctor’s father a doctor and a Nobel-Prize-winning scientist’s mom a scientist.”

  “Okay, so that’s your opinion,” said Vesta, “and of course, I respect your opinion, but that’s not how I see it. And besides, it strikes me as significant that you’re skirting the issue here.” She fixed her with those beady eyes of hers. “What have you got to hide...” She glanced down at her phone. “Caroline Poots? Cause that’s your name, isn’t it? Caroline Poots?”

  “That is my name,” Caroline confirmed. “And I’ve got nothing to hide. But I do like to speak to an actual detective, and not my doctor’s receptionist when I answer any questions. Because as far as I know, that’s how things are done in a murder inquiry. Are you sure it was murder, by the way?”

  “Absolutely,” said Vesta. “I saw the dead guy myself. And I listened to, um, well someone who knows, explain exactly how he was murdered: poisoned. With cyanide, most likely.” She took a step closer and sniffed. “Did you know that cyanide smells like almonds?”

  “No, I did not know that,” Caroline confessed.

  “You smell like almonds, Caroline.”

  “That’s probably because I just ate almonds.”

  “A likely story,” Vesta scoffed. She now took a step back and shouted, “Caroline Poots, I’m arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Robert Ross!”

  “What!”

  “You have the right to... oh, heck, how did that go again? You watch a ton of crime shows and then when you need it, it’s all gone. Anyway, you better come with me to the station so I can question you.”

  “I will do no such thing!”

  “Then I’m afraid I’ll have to use violence.” She held up her arms in a pugilistic stance. “I’ll have you know I’ve got a black belt in karate.”

  “Be that as it may, but I’m not going anywhere with you. You’re not a cop, you can’t go around arresting people. You can’t even interrogate people like this!”

  “I think you’ll find that I can... Miss Gallbladder!”

  Behind her, Kirk had appeared. He looked mildly amused, which told Caroline that he must have followed the interaction. “Mrs. Muffin,” he said. “What seems to be the problem?”

  “You’re the gallbladder!” said Vesta, pointing an accusing finger at Caroline’s husband.

  “I think you’ll find I’m the migraine sufferer.”

  “Oh,” said Vesta. “Well, my bad. So how are you involved in all of this...”

  “Kirk,” he said helpfully. “Kirk Poots. Well, I’m married to Caroline, who works for the Chamber of Commerce, and in that capacity decided to award a prize to Robert Ross. But apart from that, we never actually met the man. Not me and not Caroline. All this was handled by Mr. Ross’s manager.”

  “Agent,” Caroline corrected him.

  “Big Hollywood stars like Mr. Ross don’t deal with these matters personally,” Kirk explained. “As a representative of the Hampton Cove Chamber of Commerce, you decide to award a prize, so you contact the man’s agent or manager, and everything is arranged by them. And then, if you’re lucky, the star in question will show up on the day and collect his award. Though more often than not, he will not show up and will send the agent or manager.”

  “So you never met Ross?” asked Vesta, sounding and looking disappointed.

  Both Caroline and her husband shook their heads.

  “Never met the man in my life,” Caroline confirmed.

  “So he never hit on you?”

  “He never hit on me.”

  “Oh.”

  For a moment, no one spoke, then Kirk cleared his throat. “So is my wife still under arrest?”

  But Vesta’s mind seemed to have leaped to other pastures, like a nimble mountain goat jumping from crag to crag. She made a throwaway gesture with her hand. “Nah, that’s all off,” she said vaguely. “So can you think of anyone who might bear a grudge against the guy?”

  “Not really,” said Caroline. “Because I don’t know him.”

  “Never met him,” Kirk repeated in kindly tones.

  “So... why did you decide to give him this award?”

  Caroline took a deep breath. “Because he was born in Hampton Cove, even though he left to pursue an acting career at an early age.”

  “I think he was eighteen when he left home,” said Kirk.

  “But the fact remains that he’s a Hampton Covian, and with the success he’s had, we’ve been wanting him to accept this award for a long time. Only he never seemed interested.”

  “So you contacted him before?”

  “Oh, absolutely. The first time we got in touch with Mr. Ross’s team was fifteen years ago when he first landed the James Fox role and became a star and a household name. But he refused. We’ve asked him every year since, and every time he said he wasn’t interested.”

  “Until this year.”

  “Until this year,” Caroline confirmed, though she wondered why she was even talking to this ridiculous woman. Sooner or later, a real police detective would probably show up and ask them the same questions. Then again, maybe not. If he allowed this woman to run loose and harass people, clearly Chief Lip wasn’t running the tight ship Caroline had always supposed he did.

  “So what made him change his mind?”

  “No idea.”

  “We’ve been asking ourselves the same question,” Kirk intimated.

  “It’s puzzling,” said Vesta as she took out a notebook from her pocket and scribbled down a couple of notes. She then gave them a cheerful smile. “Well, that’s all, folks. If I think of something else, I’ll be back. Until then, cheerio!”

  “Cheerio,” said Kirk, earning himself a scowl from his wife.

  When they closed the door, she thought she heard Vesta’s cats say something in their cat language. And oddly enough, Vesta actually talked back to them!

  “The woman is certifiable,” she told Kirk.

  “She’s quite a colorful character, isn’t she?”

  “Colorful isn’t the word I would use.”

  “So Robert is dead?”

  “Murdered.”

  “How about that?”

  They shared a look. “I wonder if Jane knows.”

  CHAPTER 10

  “I think you made an indelible impression on that woman, Gran,” said Harriet.

  “Yeah, she really spilled the beans, didn’t she?” asked Brutus.

  “Oh, well,” said Vesta modestly. “Sometimes you have to be tough with these people. It’s the only way to get them to talk.” She, too, was pleased with the way her first interview had gone. When Odelia had asked her to talk to people who may have known Robert Ross, she had experienced one of those very rare—for her, at least—attacks of self-doubt, wondering if she’d be able to crack these people and make them talk turkey. But that business about arresting Miss Gallbladder had done the trick. Good cop, bad cop all rolled into one!

  “So Mr. Ross never wanted that award, and then suddenly this year he did?” asked Harriet. “Doesn’t that strike you as significant, Gran?”

  “It most certainly does, Harriet. I think we just got our very first clue. And if I’m not mistaken, this just might blow this whole case wide open!”

  “Well done, Gran,” said Brutus with genuine admiration in his voice.

  “It’s all those years working as a receptionist,” she said. “You learn to read people, you know, read them like a book. Now take this Poots woman, for instance. I knew the moment I laid eyes on her that she was going to be a tough nut to crack, so I had to go in guns blazing, put the fear of God into her. And good thing I did, for she started singing like a canary as soon as the prospect of spending the night in a cold, uncomfortable police cell was raised.”

  “Were you really going to arrest her, Gran?” asked Harriet.

  “Of course I was! Idle threats fool no one, and she would have seen right through me. I had to make it real, or it wouldn’t have worked.” She took out her phone and moments later was in contact with Odelia. “Honey, I just blew this whole case wide open.” And as she proceeded to explain to her granddaughter how her first interview had gone, she was satisfied to note that Odelia was as intrigued as she was by Robert’s sudden about-face where that award was concerned. “I’ll keep talking to people,” she promised. “And I’ll keep chipping away at this case bit by bit, piece by piece, until I’ve got my hands on that killer!”

  “Please be careful, Gran,” said Odelia. “If Robert’s murderer realizes that you’re on to him, he might strike out, like a caged animal.”

  “Don’t you worry about that, honey,” she said. “I’ve got Harriet and Brutus with me, and they’ll protect me from this maniac, I’m sure.”

  Though when she glanced down at her cats, they didn’t seem as sanguine as she was about their capacity for stopping a murderer. Luckily she had faith enough for three. She hung up after once again promising her granddaughter that she would be careful. She had arrived at her next witness. This time it was one of the people supplying food to the ship’s cook on a regular basis. It didn’t seem like a high-profile witness, not the way Caroline Poots had been, but still, it was important to talk to everybody, from the lowliest to the most important, and since she had a job to do, she pressed her finger to the buzzer and got on with it.

  Odelia gave her husband a look of concern. They had just finished talking to the chef who had prepared meals for the star but also for the crew, but unfortunately, the man hadn’t given them anything they didn’t already know.

  “What?” asked Chase, catching her look.

  “Remember I asked my grandmother to go and talk to people who might have seen Robert?”

  “To get her off the boat and stop messing with our investigation? Sure.”

  “Well, now she’s actually interviewing people and representing herself as a member of the police force, which of course she is not.”

  Chase’s expression clouded. “She shouldn’t do that. It’s going to mess even more with our investigation than if she had simply remained on board and stuck her nose where it didn’t belong.”