Moments later a big sheepdog appeared on the scene, and gave Little Randy a good-natured nod. “Hi, there, buddy. Ready for dog choir?”

  “Um…” said Little Randy, then smiled. “Sure. Why not?”

  And so the unlikely trio set off along the strip of lawn that lined Odelia’s house, and moments later they were out in the street, and on their way to the park.

  Tex entered the room where his patient was holed up with a slight sense of trepidation. He was of course used to treating people who were sick or even dying, but rarely it happened to him that he treated a person as famous as Randy Hancock.

  “Come in!” said Randy. The first thing Tex thought when he caught sight of the fitness guru was that he didn’t look very sick—or dying, for that matter. In fact he looked like a real live wire.

  “Well, there he is!” said Randy. “The man of the hour. Are you ready to do this, Tex—can I call you Tex?—I’m not sure what you need from me. Do you want me to lie down? Sit up? Stick out my tongue? Drop my pants and bend over? Though if it’s blood you need I’ll tell you right now I’m squeamish, Tex. Extremely squeamish. I just hate needles!”

  “Oh, Randy,” said Marge with a schoolgirl giggle.

  Much to Tex’s surprise, his wife of twenty-five years had taken off her sweater and was sitting on the bed next to Randy, looking flustered and grinning like a teenager at her first dorm party.

  “Okay, big boy,” said Randy as he held out his arm. “Just stick it in before I change my mind.” He squeezed his eyes closed. “But don’t expect me to watch! I’ll start to scream!”

  “Randy, you’re such a hoot!” Marge giggled.

  “It’s the entertainer in me, Marge,” said Randy. “I may be dying but I’ll make you laugh until the day I die!”

  “Um, I’m not going to draw blood now,” said Tex.

  “Well, that’s a relief!”

  “I mean, I could, if you wanted to, but I’d have to get my stuff.”

  “He didn’t bring his stuff!” said Randy.

  “Oh, Tex,” said Marge. “I told you to bring your doctor’s bag.”

  Tex frowned. He had a feeling something was going on. He didn’t know what, exactly, but he was pretty sure he didn’t like it. “If you want me to give you a complete physical I suggest you come to my office tomorrow,” he said, a little stiffly. “I have all of my equipment there, and I can even arrange for your blood work to be examined at the lab—normally I would suggest you go to the hospital, but I promise you I’ll do my best to—”

  “I can’t leave the house, Tex. People might recognize me, and I know this will sound a little weird but my enemies can’t know I’m staying here. So….” Then his face lit up. “What I could do is wear a disguise. Do you have a wig, Marge? Any old wig will do.”

  “Oh, absolutely. I’m sure we’ve got something lying around.” She giggled again. “You really want to walk the streets wearing a wig, Randy? You will look funny.”

  “Haven’t you figured it out by now, Marge? Funny is my middle name!”

  Tex cleared his throat. “So are you coming in tomorrow or…”

  “You betcha, Doc!” said Randy, clapping him on the shoulder like an old friend. “I’ll come and see you first thing tomorrow. And I want to thank you for doing this. You don’t know how much it means to me to be welcomed into your family like such an honored guest. No, not like a guest—like a member of the family.” He gave the doc a warm smile.

  “That’s all right,” said Tex. “So… see you tomorrow then?”

  “See you tomorrow, Tex.”

  And as Tex walked out, he waited by the door for his wife to follow him. When she didn’t move from the bed but stayed right where she was, he felt a little shocked.

  Strange things were happening. And as he descended the stairs, he could have sworn he heard Marge giggle again. Giggle like a naughty girl up to doing naughty things!

  17

  We were on our way back from cat choir when we unwittingly witnessed a strange scene: very near to our rehearsal space—the playground at the park—a couple of dogs were howling at the moon. Usually it’s wolves that engage in this sort of behavior but it was definitely dogs this time, since as far as I know we don’t have any wolves in Hampton Cove.

  And as we quickly walked past, putting some pep in our step to leave this disturbing scene in our rearview mirror, suddenly Dooley said, “Isn’t that Fifi?”

  We now all glanced over, something we’d neglected to do before, and much to my surprise I saw that one of the dogs was, indeed, our neighbor Fifi. The Yorkshire Terrier was howling up a storm, and creating quite the ruckus I must say.

  “Hey, that’s Rufus!” said Harriet.

  “And Little Randy,” said Brutus, sounding as surprised as I was feeling.

  We now stared at the scene, and I felt as if I was in the upside-down version of my usual world.

  “I don’t get it,” I finally said. “What do they think they’re doing?”

  “Sounds like they’re howling at the moon,” said Dooley.

  “I know what it sounds like, Dooley,” I said, “but what I want to know is why they’re behaving in this ludicrous way.”

  “Why ludicrous?” asked Harriet.

  “Because they’re not wolves!”

  The dogs must have spotted us, for they suddenly halted their howling and came trotting over.

  “Hey, you guys,” said Fifi. “So what do you think?”

  “Think of what?” I asked.

  “Our performance. Is it as good as or even better than yours?”

  “Better than what?”

  “Cat choir! Is dog choir as good as cat choir, better than cat choir, or worse. It’s a multiple-choice question,” she added when we just stared at her.

  “Do you mean to say you’re starting a… dog choir?” asked Harriet with an incredulous laugh.

  “That’s right. We just figured if cats can do it, so can dogs. Maybe even better.”

  “I like it,” said Rufus. “I like the singing. Though I think we’re going to need a conductor. It doesn’t feel right without a conductor.”

  “I like it, too,” said Little Randy. “I’m not a natural-born singer, and I don’t think I have an ounce of talent, but I really had fun tonight, guys. So thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, Lil Ran,” said Rufus.

  “Lil Ran?” I said, aghast.

  “The fellas decided Little Randy was a real mouthful so they’ve baptized me Lil Ran.”

  “It was my idea,” said Fifi. “It has a certain ring to it, don’t you think? And once we take dog choir to the next level, you need a name for when we talk to the press.”

  “Talk to the press!” I said. “Dogs don’t talk to anyone, and certainly not the press!”

  “But… you talk to the press, don’t you?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “So what do you call it when you talk to Odelia?”

  “She’s got you there, Max,” said Brutus with a grin.

  “Look, for me this is just a way to while away the time,” said Lil Ran. “And to take my mind off things.”

  “Lil Ran is feeling blue,” said Rufus. “On account of the fact that his human is dying.”

  “I’m sorry, Lil Ran,” said Dooley. “If my human was dying I’d feel bad, too. And even when she’s not dying,” he added, “but getting married instead.” He sighed deeply. “Today is a sad, sad day.”

  “Maybe sing some more, Dooley,” said Fifi with a smile. “It will cheer you right up—you’ll see.” And to show us what she meant, she raised her face to the moon and started howling—and very loudly, too!

  Moments later a shoe came flying in her direction and knocked her off her perch. When she’d recovered enough to join us again, she stared at the shoe, then at us, and said, “What just happened?”

  “Welcome to cat choir,” I said.

  18

  In spite of the fact that Wilbur Vickery wasn’t anyone’s dream date—most certainly not Vesta’s—she had been fully prepared to give the man the benefit of the doubt.

  They’d gone to see a movie, one Wilbur had picked. It had been one of those violent movies, with plenty of action and shooting and a body count that went through the roof. And throughout the movie Wilbur had been laughing his ass off, clearly having a ball.

  Vesta, meanwhile, had been so bored she’d surfed on her phone the entire time, chatting with Scarlett, giving her a live report of the evening as it progressed.

  ‘Nine fifteen—Wilbur almost choked in his extra-large popcorn.’

  ‘Nine thirty—Wilbur almost choked in his extra-large Coke.’

  ‘Nine forty—Wilbur almost choked laughing when one of the bad guys got smushed.’

  And she’d just started to figure the evening was a bust when suddenly Wilbur had placed an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close. It was at a moment in the movie when the hero was locked up in a bank vault with a pretty girl and noxious gas was being pumped in by the bad guys and instead of trying to get himself and the girl out of trouble he started kissing the girl instead. Go figure. That’s what you get when Hollywood movies are all made by men for men: they make absolutely no sense!

  And so when the hero started feeling up the scantily-clad leading lady, who was thirty years his junior, Wilbur started leaning in and had actually tried to kiss her!

  She responded by grabbing his left nipple and giving it a tight squeeze.

  Wilbur had squealed like a pig and for the rest of the movie had kept his hands—and his lizard tongue—to himself.

  ‘Ten twenty—Wilbur has stopped talking to me.’

  “So where do you wanna go?” Vesta asked as they walked out of the movie theater, three hundred dead bad guys, one molested leading lady, and a smirking hero later.

  By this point Wilbur’s face was a thundercloud, and he grunted, “Dunno.”

  “Maybe we could go for a walk? There’s a full moon out tonight. And then we can go patrolling, like we said.”

  “Hrmph,” Wilbur said, which Vesta took as a yes. So she took hold of the shopkeeper’s arm and together they walked through downtown Hampton Cove, then proceeded in the direction of the waterfront.

  “This is nice,” said Vesta as they reached the boardwalk and joined the many couples leisurely strolling along and having a good time.

  “Hrmph,” Wilbur repeated. He’d recently shaved off his beard and mustache, but was growing them back. The beard didn’t become him, and neither did the mustache. The beard was white and made him look like Father Time, and the mustache was the color of urine and gave him the aspect of a derelict. Along with his bushy brows and skeletal build, he looked more like a bum than the owner of one of Hampton Cove’s most popular stores.

  “So I’ve been thinking,” she said now as she gazed out across the ocean, which reflected the light of the full moon.

  “What?” he said, openly gawking at a pretty young thing strolling past on the arm of her boyfriend.

  “About the watch. What if we recruited a couple of new members? That way we could cover more ground.”

  “What would you want to do a silly thing like that for?” asked Wilbur, his jaw moving lasciviously as he ogled another young girl moving by on roller skates.

  “Because one neighborhood watch isn’t enough, Wilbur. If we want Hampton Cove to be the safest town on the East Coast we need a watch in every neighborhood. And that means recruiting people from all over the place. Responsible citizens.”

  “You go ahead if you want. I’ve got enough on my plate as it is, without being responsible for the safety of an entire town.”

  “So what do you suggest?”

  “I suggest you leave well enough alone. If those other neighborhoods want to start a block watch, then let them. It’s none of our business.” He glanced at a tall blonde with a deeply cut cleavage. “Frankly I don’t see why you even bother.”

  “I bother because I care about this town of ours. I want people to feel safe when they’re out on the street. And I want them to feel safe when they’re at home. Don’t you?”

  But the shopkeeper shrugged. “As long as I’m safe, that’s good enough for me,” he said, causing Vesta to raise her eyebrows and cast a censorious look at her date.

  “You know, Wilbur, when Scarlett suggested we go out on a date, I’ll admit I was skeptical.”

  “Oh?”

  “But now that we’re out and about, I think she was right. This was a great idea.”

  “It was?” he said, giving her a look of surprise.

  “Why don’t we take a seat on that bench over there,” Vesta suggested. “I’d like to hear some more of your ideas about the watch.”

  “Okay,” said Wilbur as he walked her over to the bench and took a seat. One bench over a young couple sat, locked in a tight embrace, their lips also locked and clearly in their own world. Wilbur glanced at the young couple, then at Vesta, and he grinned a suggestive grin that showed all of his crooked, yellowing teeth.

  “So what do you want to ‘talk’ about?” he asked, wiggling his eyebrows meaningfully.

  “How you see the future of the watch?”

  He frowned. “Um… Well, we drive around some, like we’ve been doing, and if we see something that ain’t right, we call the cops.” He was leaning in again, an arm slowly sneaking around her back.

  She glanced down at her nice dress, which she’d worn especially for this occasion. She hadn’t worn it in a while, and she was starting to feel a little silly wearing it now. “So you’d call the cops if you saw something suspicious. Not go in there and deal with it yourself?”

  “Are you nuts? What if these people are armed? We don’t want to get our heads blown off, do we? No, we let the cops take the heat. They know what to do.”

  “Cops are people, too, Wilbur. With families and lives they’d like to keep.”

  “They get paid to do this shit, Vesta. With our tax money. So I say let ‘em go in first.”

  “And if they get shot?”

  Wilbur shrugged. “They knew what they were getting into when they signed up for the job.” He pulled her in a little closer. “Aren’t you cold? You look cold.”

  She half expected him to offer his jacket, but instead he wrapped his arms around her, and suddenly she felt as if she’d been snagged by an octopus. And since he’d pinned her arms to her body, she couldn’t even pinch his other nipple!

  So when he lowered his mouth to hers, instead she bit his tongue—hard!

  “Ouch!” he cried, and released her from his grip. “What did you do that for?”

  “Wilbur,” she said with a smile, “I think this date has been very illuminating.”

  “What are you talking about, you crazy woman?” he said, touching his mouth.

  “I’ve made up my mind. From now on you will no longer be part of my watch.”

  “What?!”

  She got up swiftly. “You’re fired, Wilbur.” And she started walking away before turning. “Oh, and this will be our one and only date. Goodbye.”

  ‘Eleven ten—Wilbur almost choked again. This time in his own arrogance and bad behavior and terrible opinions. Lucky for him I performed CPR. He didn’t seem to like it.’

  19

  Dooley hadn’t stopped talking about the upcoming wedding of Gran and Wilbur Vickery since we left the park. It was clearly bugging him a great deal.

  So finally instead of going to bed, I decided to suggest something else.

  “Why don’t we go and spy on Gran’s date with Wilbur?” I said. “And then maybe you’ll see that there isn’t all that much to worry about.”

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?” he said. “Gran won’t like it when we spy on her.”

  “She’ll never know, Dooley. We’ll simply make sure she doesn’t see us.”

  He looked in equal measure excited and terrified at the prospect of spying on our human, but finally his fear of becoming Kingman’s brother and having to go and live with Wilbur decided him.

  “All right,” he said. “But only if you promise me that Gran won’t see us.”

  “I promise, Dooley,” I said, even though it wasn’t really a promise I could make. Gran has eagle eyes, in spite of her age, and sometimes I think she even has eyes in the back of her head. Still, I wasn’t prepared to listen to Dooley go on and on all night about Gran’s wedding, and this seemed like a good plan to put his mind at ease once and for all.

  So we left the others and set a course to downtown Hampton Cove, where we figured Wilbur would have taken Gran.

  “I know they were going to see a movie,” said Dooley.

  “So that’s where we’ll go first,” I said. “And we’ll see where they went next.”

  And so it was arranged: we headed to the Happy Flix movie theater in town, and got there just in time to see people pouring out of the entrance, one of them Gran, and the other her date for the night, silver fox Wilbur Vickery. Though he looked more like a silver dog to me, but then I’m not a woman so what do I know.

  We followed the couple as they strolled along the sidewalk, keeping our distance so as not to be noticed, and soon they plotted a course to the boardwalk, where all loved-up couples go when the moon is full and the night is young.

  “I don’t like this, Max,” said Dooley. “This looks very romantic. Too romantic!”

  He was right. All the couples I saw were holding hands, or seated on wooden benches overlooking the ocean and hugging and kissing and whatnot.

  So maybe this wasn’t a good idea at all!

  “They’re sitting down, Max!” said Dooley, pointing in the direction of the couple. They now looked as loved-up as the other couples in their vicinity, and I could sense that love was in the air, and soon sparks would fly and morals would get a little loosey-goosey!

  “Maybe we should get going,” I said. “Nothing much to see here, just like I told you.”

  “I think there’s plenty to see!” said Dooley. “Look, Max, they’re going to kiss!”