The Purrfect Murder

half-round bridle holder on the wall. “Come on in the house. I’ll make you some Silver Queen.”
    “Where’d you get Silver Queen in October?”
    “I bought four bushels in August and put them in cold storage—you know the refrigeration plant downtown? Anyway, we tested two last night and they’re still really good.”
    “Four bushels?” Cooper asked as they left the barn, Simon looking out from the open top barn door in the hayloft.
    “For the St. Luke’s reunion.”
    Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker tagged along.
    “Saturday after this; that’s always such a wonderful day, isn’t it?” Cooper smiled.
    As they passed under the wide branches of the walnut tree, Matilda, swinging by her tail, dropped.
    She just missed Harry, who was walking behind Cooper, and landed right on Pewter.
    “Death from the skies,”
Matilda hissed.
    Pewter screamed so loudly that everyone jumped. Matilda slithered toward the barn. Time to go in, because she knew in her bones that tonight would be the first frost.

    “God!” Cooper exclaimed.
    “She was going to wrap herself around my throat. She’s a wicked, wicked snake.”
Pewter, beside herself, babbled on.
    “Every now and then she does that,” Harry laconically replied.
    “Why is she in the tree?”
    “Birds’ eggs in the spring and summer—birds, period. She’s fast when she wants to be. Look how fast she’s heading toward the barn.”
    Harry knelt down to pet Pewter, who was recovering.
    “Big baby.”
Mrs. Murphy giggled.
    “Shut up.”
Pewter crawled into Harry’s arms, allowing herself to be carried into the house.
    The women chatted as the corn boiled.
    “Sometimes things do fall out of the sky. Sometimes we miss things.” Cooper was still surprised at Matilda’s bomber act. “If we hadn’t shaved Bechtal, who knows? And we should have done that right away. We only had a high-school photograph of him, no beard. He’d erased most everything about his life.”
    “Criminals fall into two camps: dumber than posts or extremely intelligent.”
    “Yep.”
    “I’m reasonably intelligent, but…” Harry didn’t finish.
    “You’d be lost without us.”
Mrs. Murphy smiled, then hopped on the kitchen counter to gaze out the window.
    Mrs. Murphy knew they’d been very lucky this time. She and Pewter had used up one of their nine lives, and it was uppermost in her mind that Harry had only one.

Dear Reader,
             
    I keep forgetting to mention that four books equal one year. Each mystery represents a season. I thought it was obvious, which it is to cats, but I overestimate human intelligence sometimes. You’d think after all these years with my typist that I’d figure out how dim they are.
    I will give my human credit for a green thumb. She can grow anything and I reward her for her crop of fresh catnip by not shredding the furniture.
    This isn’t to say I don’t love my human and like some others. I do, but the poor things are so limited. Can’t see in the dark for squat. No claws. No fangs. Slow as molasses when running. Climb with difficulty. Besotted with ideologies that don’t correspond to reality. It’s a wonder they’ve survived, and really, they only began to flourish after we cats chose to assist them. Think what would have happened to the granaries of Rome if cats hadn’t guarded them? But as usual, humans are so drastically self-centered, they ignore what we’ve done. They ignore dog contributions, too, although we all know dogs aren’t as intelligent as cats. In some ways they are well suited to be companions to humans since dogs believe what humans tell them.
    Not me. I know the emperor has no clothes; a pity, since naked humans are ghastly!

    Ta Ta,

    Sneaky Pie

Dear Reader,
             
    She really is insufferable!

About the Authors
    RITA MAE BROWN is the bestselling author of several books. An Emmy-nominated screenwriter and poet, she lives in Afton, Virginia. Her website is www.ritamaebrown.com .
             
    SNEAKY PIE BROWN, a tiger cat born somewhere in Albemarle County, Virginia, was discovered by Rita Mae Brown at her local SPCA. They have collaborated on fifteen previous Mrs. Murphy mysteries:
Wish You Were Here; Rest in Pieces; Murder at Monticello; Pay Dirt; Murder, She Meowed; Murder on the Prowl; Cat on the Scent; Pawing Through the Past; Claws and Effect; Catch as Cat Can; The Tail of the Tip-Off; Whisker of Evil; Cat’s Eyewitness; Sour Puss
; and
Puss ’n Cahoots,
in