MRS. MILLIGAN’S CAT, by Gary Lovisi

Steaming teacups and gentle old ladies full of neighborhood gossip—not a one of which were under seventy years of age—were the usual at Cynthia Milligan’s house. My name is Delilah, dahling, and I am Mrs. Milligan’s prized longhaired Persian. A cat, for those of you not acquainted with the species. In fact, not just any cat, but one of the most graceful and glorious of all felines ever. And one of the most modest, dahling.

I sat watching my mistress and her guests with my usual bored feline detachment and disinterest. After all, it was just another day in Milliganland. Nothing unusual. Nothing unusual ever happened here.

Mrs. Milligan, my esteemed mistress, fairly congenial as humans go, was prattling on as usual, dear old soul. This time she elaborated profusely and I noticed with much nervousness to her lady friends on how young Roderick Thorpe, the neighborhood rogue—a tom if there ever was one—was seen coming out of Mrs. Beverly LeGrange’s residence in the very wee hours of the morning. Beverly LeGrange, being the very young and attractive—in a human sort of way, dahling—wife of rich old Stuart LeGrange—of the LeGrange Orchards, LeGrange Winery, LeGrange Mercedes.… Well, you get the idea.…

“Now, Maye,” my mistress chortled to her best friend, the dowager Maye Blumenthal, “and that’s not all I saw! I’m scared to say this, but I have just got to tell someone.… I saw young Roderick running from the house—carrying his trousers—not wearing them!

There was muffled laughter, accompanied by feigned sounds of shock. It was all so terrible, so tawdry…they were each dying to hear more!

“Really! Why, Cynthia Milligan! How do you know that?” Edith Jones cried out a bit too indignant for her own good.

My mistress just harrumphed and in that very confident voice of hers simply said, “Saw him! That’s how!”

“Saw him? Really?” Maye rasped, curious now, smelling some new sensational gossip brewing in the small town they inhabited.

“Sure as you, Debra, Edith and I are here right now playing cards and having tea,” My mistress added boldly. She always did love the dramatic.

I heard a collective sigh from the assembled biddies.

“Oh, my!” Debra Wilson replied when she was able to respond. “Bad! Bad! Very bad, indeed!”

My mistress and her three human companions each nodded their elderly heads and wagged their crooked old fingers furtively. More gossip. They said they hated it, but I knew differently.

I yawned. Then meowed loudly. Just to let the biddies know, “hello, ladies, I’m still alive and…still hungry!”

“Oh, Cynthia, that darn cat of yours just cannot be hungry again!” Edith Jones said between sips of her tea. The recalcitrant old crone, why I’d not eaten in hours! I thought of performing a hop-on-the-lap, spill-the-tea routine, dahling, but just then something caught my immediate and undivided attention. That being my dear mistress Cynthia Milligan, as she suddenly and quite conclusively keeled over dead.

Well, dahling, you can imagine the instantaneous chaos and shock. The ladies dropped their teacups, cards, cookies, and haughty expressions and tried to help my mistress as best they could. Her best friend, Maye, dialed 911. They waited. They tried to make her comfortable, but I knew that she was already gone.

I was aghast! I had a true soft spot in my heart for dear old Cynthia Milligan. She fed me well and often, kept a dry roof over my head, and let me have the run of the house and the yard. All things considered, dahling, a feline could ask for little better.

Now I realized the good life I had enjoyed for so long was all going to end.

* * * *

It did not take long.

Alberta, Cynthia’s older sister comes to the old, dark, house now each day. She does not feed me. She merely riffles her sister’s things. Always finding a few choice items to appropriate as her own by right of inheritance—an inheritance I find repugnant since Alberta hated her sister with a passion. I can only watch sadly, meowing for food that never comes. Doomed to watch my dearly departed mistress’s choice personal possessions—the sacred mementos of a lifetime—become the property of one who scarce appreciates them or the memories they house within them, one whose avariciousness is only exceeded by her own cold-blooded selfishness.

The last straw for me occurred when Alberta, using the old ruse of finally giving me something to eat, locked me out of the house and would not let me back inside. I now found myself without mistress, shelter, or food, and there was scant prospect of any coming my way soon. What would I do now?

* * * *

LeGrange Mansion was just down the road, a destination as good as any, and by the way I had curiosity regarding that place and the people who lived there. So, keeping an eye out for marauding mutts, I trotted on over to the big house with a two-fold plan brewing in my furry little feline mind. Food and revenge. But food first, dahling. Then revenge against the human who had caused the death of my mistress, thus also precipitating the plunge in my status and comfort level in this world. You see, we felines, contrary to popular belief, are nothing if not practical creatures.

LeGrange Mansion was large, lonely, and dark. My padded feet gave no noise as I scampered over the wall and onto the dewy lawn, through a partially opened front window to enter the huge house. There were dogs on the grounds and this caused me immediate concern, big cat-eating brutes, I was sure, but I could see they were securely locked away. I was safe from them for the present so I concentrated on the more immediate matter of finding food.

It was the shouting that drew my attention. Harsh human words. A man and woman arguing in another room of the house. The man saying “I knew it! I come home and find you with him! How could you, Beverly?”

Then a hard thump followed by a man’s painful yell, then by a woman’s sharp, high-pitched scream. I looked in the room and saw the two lovers; Roderick Thorpe and Beverly LeGrange. At their feet lay a very dead Stuart LeGrange, Beverly’s rich husband. He was obviously no longer an inconvenience to the two lovers now.

“You didn’t have to hit him so hard, Rod!” Beverly protested; she appeared on the verge of panic. “I think he’s dead!”

“Well, wasn’t that the plan, to lure him here and kill him, then hide the body? It’s done now and I’m glad. Now you can be mine!” Thorpe insisted, pulling her toward him roughly. She did not resist, but fell into his arms laughing, offering passionate kisses, even as the warm corpse of her husband bore silent witness to their lust.

I snorted, thinking, and humans have the gall to say that felines are selfish and cold!

Thorpe said between mouthfuls of Beverly, “The scare you put into that Milligan woman worked well, telling her if she ever opened her mouth and spoke about what she had seen or heard, she’d keel over and die.”

Beverly laughed, “Just a little mind game. I’m very good at them, Rod.”

Thorpe smiled, kissing her all the harder.

I flicked my whiskers in disdain.

“So what did you tell her that got the old crone so whacked out that her heart stopped?” Thorpe whispered as they continued their ravishing embrace.

“Oh, Rod,” she crooned, like a feline in heat now. “It was so funny. I threatened all kinds of harm to her property, even to her person. Nothing scared her. She was adamant about reporting us to the police. The only way she finally listened to me was when I threatened her cat. Imagine that! I told her I’d poison her cat with anti-freeze and then skin the little monster and make a purse out of the fur!”

Thorpe just laughed. He thought Beverly was so funny.

I shuddered; All right! Now you’re going to pay! Justice will be done in the human world and my mistress will be avenged!

However, I knew that could prove difficult. The murderers had taken the man’s body out of the house and buried it in a secluded location on the grounds of the huge estate. The killers had done a masterful job of concealing the grave. I watched from my perch in a nearby tree, knowing it would not be easy for me—a mere feline in a human world—to bring the police to where they would find the secret grave and solve this dastardly crime.

* * * *

Next day I found the shallow grave and began digging. It was hard work, unseemly for a delicate house cat such as myself, but necessary if I was ever to unearth this mess. My claws had just about reached the body when Beverly LeGrange saw me and ran to chase me away.

“It’s that damn cat!” She said to Thorpe. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was trying to dig up Stuart’s grave!”

Thorpe did not like that at all. “I’ll take care of her, honey,” and he drew a gun from his jacket and took a few poor shots at me in rage.

Beverly quickly put her hand on the gun saying, “No, Rod, that will draw attention. I have a better idea.”

I watched and waited, wondering what new horrors they had in mind.

Rod said, “You want to unleash the dogs?”

I dug my claws deeper into the wood of the tree I was perched upon.

“Oh, Rod, lover, that’s a good idea, but I have an even better one,” Beverly cooed. “Just wait here.”

Beverly LeGrange returned soon with a bowl of shimmering fluid, gently calling out, “Here kitty, nice kitty. Come here and have a drink of this nice bowl of delicious anti-freeze. It tastes so good and will kill you sooooo dead.”

Thorpe laughed and gave her a kiss.

What kind of monsters were these humans!

I put the thought of the tempting dish out of my mind. I knew it was poison, my mistress had raised me to be wary of such tricks when she let me out of the house to run at night.

I ignored the anti-freeze and concentrated on the problem at hand. Namely, how was I going to get the police to discover the hidden grave of Stuart LeGrange?

My chance came the next day when two plainclothes detectives called at LeGrange Mansion. Shots had been reported.

Of course, there was no way I could get close to the detectives, Beverly and Rod would see to that. And even if I did, there was no way I could make them understand what I was trying to tell them, after all, humans are not adept enough to communicate with felines yet.

“Funny thing about that cat following us,” one detective said. He was a large bull-necked fellow in a too-tight suit. He watched me carefully, as I played catch-me-if-you-can with young Roderick Thorpe who seemed to protest too much at my presence. “It’s almost as if that cat knows something, or is trying to tell me something.”

“That cat’s a damn pain in the ass, detective,” Beverly said smoothly, steering him away from my direction, but this cop was a smart one and would not be steered. Beverly, angry now added, “I should have had it taken care of a long time ago.”

I saw the detective’s eyebrows raise precipitously in interest.

The other detective looked at Beverly and said carefully, “Then it’s not your cat, Ms. LeGrange?”

Beverly stumbled for a mere second, regained her composure and replied, “Heaven’s no, detective. I would never own a cat. That’s just some stray that wandered onto the grounds the night that Stuart was due home. Been wandering around ever since, just a general nuisance. I have half a mind to sic the dogs on it.”

Roderick Thorpe suddenly grew concerned when saw the two detectives beginning to walk onto the grounds, and asked, “Ah, detective? Where are you going?”

“This is such a nice estate here, I thought Wendell and I would look around a bit. You don’t mind, do you?” he said, carefully.

Thorpe couldn’t reply, but he grew nervous as he saw the two cops were now investigating the grounds around the house. That would not do. Not at all. Why, it looked as if they were actually following that damn cat!

“Did I ever tell you my ex-wife had a cat, Wendell?” The cop named Joe Walker said to his partner as they walked further into the grounds, followed by a very nervous pair of murderers.

“All the time, Joe.…”

“Excuse me, detectives? Just where do you think you are going?” Beverly LeGrange said with a perceptible twinge of panic in her soft voice.

“Yes, detectives, what gives?” Thorpe added now, rather a bit too insistently.

The larger of the two detectives, a big, brawny fellow by the name of Wendell Paige said, “Just looking, Ms. LeGrange. That’s not a problem for either of you, is it? Because if it is.… Me an’ my partner, just looking, is all.”

“But, ah, it’s cold out here. Why not come back in the house, Detective Paige? Detective Walker?” Beverly offered, trying to cut them off, but they walked on, outflanking her, following the cat walking ahead of them.

“We’re just looking. Taking a walk. Lovely day for a walk, isn’t it, Ms. LeGrange?” Walker replied.

Now Thorpe was nervous.

He heard Beverly growl under her breath as she walked away, “That damn cat! I’ll fix her!”

* * * *

The dogs were set loose a minute later by Beverly. Big, howling brutes with large teeth, big mouths, and voracious appetites for all things, especially feline. Let me tell you something, dahling, I was not at all amused by this turn of events, but it did give me an idea.

I knew the dogs would be after me soon, because they’d scented my spoor and immediately give chase. I was determined to use that instinct in them, use it to lead the dogs to Stuart LeGrange’s hidden grave, even at considerable danger to my own physical well-being. I flew across the well-manicured lawn, down past a thicket of trees and into a secluded meadow behind the house. The dogs were right behind me. There were six of them and they operated as a pack. They had my scent committed to memory and locked onto the sites of their marauding jaws.

When I reached the gravesite I began digging and clawing furiously into the earth. I had little time. I had to free Stuart LeGrange’s spoor from where it was embedded in the ground of the grave, get it exposed to the air where the dogs could smell it. I knew it would be close, that my margin for error was slim, if nonexistent. So I dug and clawed deeper and deeper into the soft soil of the murdered man’s grave.

Then the dogs were upon me. They practically flew into the clearing, raging brutes, all-fiery eyes and slavering jaws just waiting to take some canine-size bites out of my furry little hide. I hissed and jumped back, trying my best to defend my turf as I did all I could to mix up the spoor of Stuart LeGrange that so permeated the soil with my own. It worked!

First one, then another of the huge dogs began to growl and cry, whine and claw the ground, pushing their great ugly snouts into the dirt and then lifting their great ugly heads and crying loudly to the heavens. By the time Beverly and Roderick arrived, I could see that the two detectives, who each held their service revolvers in their hands, accompanied them meaningfully.

The dogs were positively frantic now. They had found the spoor of their dead master Stuart LeGrange and were busy ripping into the loose soil of his unmarked grave.

Detective Walker took in the scene immediately, said to his partner, “Wendell, I think we may have solved that Stuart LeGrange missing person case.”

“Yeah, Joe, but I think we just got ourselves another case, a murder case,” Paige replied.

Then he took out his cuffs, ordering Beverly and Roderick, “Now you two wanna come over here. Slowly.”

The dogs continued to dig. It wasn’t long before they brought up what appeared to be a spotted sheet, torn and full of dry blood, and not soon afterwards, a man’s arm was visible in the dark dirt. The dogs whined madly, they had discovered their master.

Wendell Paige said, “Well, Joe, if that don’t beat all. That cat’s got real moxy. I think I’ll take it home to Martha, she’d like a smart cat like that.”

* * * *

From my vantage point on the hood of the detective’s car, I finished my meal of Tasty Tuna, then looked at Beverly and Roderick where they sat glaring at me, cuffed in the back seat of the police car. I gently lifted my tail in the air, giving them a full view of my exposed nether parts, insulting in the extreme. I thought of my dear mistress and rubbed my whiskers in satisfaction.

That will teach you to make trouble for Mrs. Milligan’s cat, dahlings!

Feline revenge is sweet!

Rest gently, dear Cynthia.