…!”
Buddy laughs and says, “You’re right about that,” then thanks her again and disappears.
The alarm
be-boops
as Buddy and Tina open the door, and the Croc waits for it to
bo-beep
closed. Then she turns on me and says, “I don’t see my dog.”
“I’m here to look at that video again.”
She flicks her fingernails, one at a time. “And why do you need to do that?”
I look straight at her. “Do you want me to try to find your dog or not?”
“Don’t be insolent! Of course I want you to find my dog! What kind of an idiotic question—”
“Then I need to see the video, and I need to see the calendar.”
She studies me a minute. “I presume you mean the Canine Calendar?”
“That’s right.”
She points through a doorway. “Down the hall and to the right. It’s hanging in the kitchen. I’ll cue up the video.”
The kitchen looked like the Fort Knox penny room. Copper pots and pans were hanging from the ceiling, from the walls—from everywhere. Even the three ovens were copper.
I saw the calendar right away, but I had to circle arounda large marble island to get to it. And I was so busy gawking at everything that before you know it I’d gawked my way clear past the island to the far side of the kitchen.
I peeked over some Dutch doors into another room, and right away I knew it wasn’t someplace Mrs. Landvogt spent much time. There was no marble, no copper, no glass, and no chandeliers. Just a simple table with some folding chairs and a small TV. On the floor were two white ceramic bowls—one with water, one empty—and at the far end of the room was the back door to the house with a small doggy door in it.
I looked out a kitchen window at Marique’s stomping grounds and was busy picturing Pomeranians playing golf when I heard, “Finding any clues, Samantha?”
I about shot through copper.
She laughed, then pushed a lever on the handle of her wheelchair and turned around. “You’ve got to work on those nerves if you’re going to be a private eye.”
I stuffed my heart back in my chest. “I don’t want to be a private eye.”
She zoomed off. “Sure you do.”
I pulled the calendar from the wall and followed her to a room with a white marble fireplace and a TV the size of a movie screen. She got the video going and handed me the remote. “So what are you looking for?”
I fast-forwarded to the part where the cats went flying, then watched the dogs jump off the float in slow motion. Only three of the dogs went in the direction that Marique had jumped. One was a gray, kind of hairless dog with a tail like a whip, one had long legs and long hair andlooked like a cross between an Afghan and a collie, and the third one was Hero. I flipped through the calendar until I found the hairless dog. It was on the July page, dressed in cowboy boots and a cowboy hat, sitting by a No Parking sign in front of the bus station. I checked the credits by the picture.
Dog: Ribs. Owner: Paula Nook. Photo: Paula Nook
.
I looked straight at the Crocodile. “What do you know about Paula Nook?”
She snickered and said, “She likes a good barbecue, and it shows.”
“That’s it?”
She eyed me like she wasn’t sure if she wanted to show off her muscles. Finally she pulled a large black leather notebook from beside her in the wheelchair. She kept one eye on me as she thumbed through it, and when she’d found the right page she cleared her throat and flexed. “Paula Nook. 801 Braxton Way. Married twice, divorced twice. Has a daughter in Santa Luisa who’s living with a rodeo washout. Owns a share of Palmer’s Bar and Grill and waitresses there six nights a week. Declared income last year, fourteen thousand, two hundred dollars.” She practically buffed her claws against her robe. “Next?”
I found the Afghan-collie on the August page. It was dressed like a clown, pawing at the fairground’s gate. I held it up for the Croc and waited.
“That’s Fiji. Nora Hallenback’s dog.” She
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