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Edna and the cow stared at each other
for half an hour. The cow seemed fascinated. Finally it arched its back,
peed and went back to eating grass.
 hen she staggered
up to her front door, loaded with groceries and digging in her pocket
for her key, she found a Post-It note on the door. It said, “Bob
is back,” in Henry's block letter hand writing. Edna wished Bob or
Henry or whomever the hell else showed up would open the door before she
dropped all her bags.
After she got in the house and put
her stuff on the counter, she looked upstairs and out all the windows.
Nothing looked unusual. The dogs weren't barking and the older cat was
prowling in the flowers catching grasshoppers. She shrugged.
The groceries were all put away and
she was eating lunch when a yowling like a giant cat fight came from the
crawl space. The dogs began to bark. Edna stopped chewing for a moment
and then went on eating. For twenty minutes there was screeching and thumping
and bumping below. Edna listened absentmindedly. Henry's leg was never
going to heal if he kept this up. When the noise stopped, she yelled down
at the floor, asking if Henry needed any package tape. He didn't answer.
For a few happy moments, she thought they were all dead. But then she
heard the ‘step, thump, step, thump’ sound of Henry and his
splint on the front porch.
“Where have you been?” he asked.
“Did you think I wasn't coming back?”
“No. We picked you because we knew
you wouldn't run. Women with lots of pets always come home. I was a little
bit worried that's all.”
“Worried about you dinner, I expect.
Where did the Bob come from?”
“Guy came to read your electric meter
and he was hiding in the back of the truck. Did you give that woman the
envelope?”
“No, it's still on the back seat of
the car.”
“Did you see her?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
“About what?”
“About us! About her husband!”
“You killed her husband. You killed
her dogs. You killed her.”
“She was killed? By whom? By us?”
“Yup.”
“How was she identified, how was she
found?”
“They asked someone to point her out.”
“They were in the store?”
“Quite a few of them, unless I'm mistaken.”
“That is extraordinary. That's not
regular procedure. They weren't government people.”
“Does this mean you will be finished
with me?”
“I have to stay here! You know that.
Besides, I am also collecting data on what you act like when you know
about me. This man and woman that were killed showed us how little we
know about you. We never thought humans could give us such a hard time.”
Henry thumped off the porch and Edna
rinsed her dishes. From the distance Henry yelled, “The envelope
has been opened!” He came bumping back onto the porch. “Come
over to the center of the room.”
“Oh lovely. More x-ray vision.”
He was on the other side of the solid
wall. “Okay, you're okay.”
“What was that about?”
“If you get the powder from that envelope
on your skin or inhale it, it makes you a Day-Glo purple to our way of
seeing. The bad guys could have spotted you from five miles out.”
“So, the powder's gone. You got your
dollar back.”
“It's a thousand dollar bill.”
“May I have it, please? For ice-cream
expenses.”
“Nope. It has to be burned. If they
could identify you, you would be dead just like that other lady.”
“This has been a very long morning.
I'm going upstairs and lie down for a while. You figure out what to do
with the latest Bob. If I come back from my walk this afternoon and find
a dead body lying in my bed or sitting in the bathtub, there will be no
more Fudgesicles. Ever.”
cont. on page twenty-one
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