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  This investigation was no different. Archie left us all behind as he bolted into the room. As the Madame droned on with her chant, and I tried to shake Flufferton loose from my jacket, a loud clang and thud sounded from across the room. While I instinctively run toward danger, I was stopped by Flufferton’s white-knuckled grip, which had moved from my sleeve to a full clutching of my arm with claws dug in.

  I yanked my arm from his clasp and ran in the direction of the sound. Fortunately, the candlelight was enough to help me navigate through the room. It was also enough light to help me make out the mysterious figure waiting for me on the other side of the kitchen island. “Archie?” I inquired as I approached.

  There was no response from the figure, but I could see it raise a large object and start to swing at me. I probably would have been hit by the object except that I was tripped by something on the floor. As I fell, I could feel the object graze the fur on the tips of my ears.

  Falling onto the large mass beneath me, which I quickly surmised to be Archie, I rolled over to see the figure standing over me, ready to inflict another blow with the object. As it came toward me, I rolled to my right, dodging the second attack. Unfortunately, Archie didn’t fare as well because of his position underneath me. My avoidance of the object, which I was beginning to think was a frying pan, meant that Archie had been hit again.

  Using my cat-quick reflexes, I was able to pounce on the mysterious and somewhat aggressive figure, knocking it to the ground. I wrestled the pan from a pair of well-manicured paws, subduing it. Holding the attacker on the ground, Madame Buttercup came to me with the candle so we could see who the perpetrator was.

  “Is it a ghost?” Madame Buttercup questioned as she shoved the candle in its face.

  The yellow orange light fluttered across the attacker’s face, making it quickly apparent this was not a ghost much to Madame Buttercup’s displeasure. This feisty feline was very much alive.

  “Let go of me!” the diminutive cat demanded in what sounded like a French accent as she tried to wrestle from my grip.

  I stood up and raised the non-ghostly culprit to her feet to get a better look. She was so slight, she had little chance of escaping, but as cats can do, she writhed and wriggled with a fury.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” I said in the calmest voice I could muster while struggling to maintain my grip. “Stop fighting.”

  “It’s okay, honey,” the Madame added, which seemed to help in calming her.

  “Who are you?” I questioned.

  “Fiona Fleur,” she responded. Her voice still a bit shaky. “Mr. Hashimoto’s chef.”

  “You’re sure you’re not a ghost?” Madame Buttercup hopefully chimed in.

  “Me? Oh, no. I’m harmless.”

  “I think Wigglebutt would beg to disagree,” I laughed as I looked over at Archie lying unconscious on the floor behind me.

  “Oh my!” Fiona gasped, “I thought he was the ghost when he came flying through the kitchen so fast.”

  “And you thought you could stop a ghost with a frying pan?” I questioned. “Can’t a ghost fly right through it?”

  Fiona thought for a moment before responding, “I don’t know.” She paused again before looking me in the eye. The fear was still present. “I was scared.”

  What she was saying sort of made sense. It was completely illogical to think you could stop a ghost with a frying pan, but what’s a cat to do? Instinct tells you to protect yourself, but how do you protect yourself against a ghost? I figured I might have done the same thing.

  The sound of groaning came from behind me. I turned to find Archie starting to wake, as he rubbed the bump on his head. I went to help him sit up although my disdain for him made me want to ignore him.

  “Come over here, honey, and sit down,” Madame Buttercup offered to Fiona, gently taking her by the arm and guiding her to a chair along the wall.

  For the moment, I turned my attention to Archie who had not quite come to his senses. He was saying things like, “I like to be scratched behind the ears,” and, “Help me catch the canaries?” I think he might have been referring to the imaginary birds circling his head.

  “You took a pretty good whack to the noggin, ol’ pal.” I said as I helped him to his feet. I’m not sure why I called Archie “pal” because he wasn’t my pal. That’s what I used to call him when we were partners on the force, but ever since his betrayal, we’ve been anything but. “Do you know where you are?” I asked.

  “The House of Hashimoto… I think,” he replied groggily.

  “I guess she must not have hit you too hard.”

  “She?”

  “The chef, Fiona. She clocked you with a frying pan,” I told him.

  “Not the first time,” Archie said as he rubbed the growing knot on his head. “Ouch.”

  “Reminds me of that time you charged in on that tabby taking a catnap.”

  Archie laughed at the memory, “Ha! She woke with such a start; I never saw the book she threw at me.”

  “I did,” I snickered, trying to hold in a bigger laugh. “It was the unabridged version of Beocat. You’ve taken a few big hits to the head.” We both laughed for a moment, reminiscing at the memory. It was how we used to laugh together.

  “What did I miss?” said a voice from behind us. It was Flufferton. I’d almost forgotten all about him after I’d left him behind at the entrance to the kitchen.

  “Where have you been?” I questioned.

  “Oh, well… I was just…” Flufferton was stalling to make up a story. “I thought I heard a sound out there so I went to investigate.

  “What’d you find?” asked Archie.

  “It was nothing… a branch rubbing on a window from the storm,” he lied.

  I was beginning to become suspicious of Flufferton. Was he really a great mouser or a fraud? Maybe he was really just one of those actors who pretended to be something he wasn’t. I’ll bet he’s never caught a mouse in his life.

  Not wanting to waste any more time with Flufferton, and taking the opportunity to get a paw up on Archie while he recovered, I went over to Fiona to find out what she knew about the ghost. As I approached her, I could see that she was a Birman breed with either a French or Burmese background by her cream colored medium length fur and dark face and ears. Her accent was a bit of a clue too.

  “Fiona,” I called to get her attention. “You mentioned that you were protecting yourself from the ghost. Have you seen this ghost before?”

  Her eyes widened like saucers of milk. “Oh, yes. Many times.”

  “And how do you know it’s a ghost?” I pried.

  “I just do.”

  “Is there something specifically ghostly that he… or she… or it does?” I was a bit flummoxed over the idea of whether a ghost should be referred to as a boy or a girl and was about to ask Madame Buttercup her opinion when I caught myself. In my youth I would tend to ask questions before thinking things through. Fortunately, I took a moment to ponder the question and concluded that it was a question best kept to myself, and the answer really didn’t matter that much.

  “Does the ghost float or pass through walls?” Madame Buttercup inquired.

  “Well, I think…” Fiona started.

  “Does the ghost say, ‘boo’?” Archie chimed in with a mocking tone.

  The Madame cast a scornful look at him.

  “Come on. We all know that this ghost thing is just a game by Hashimoto,” Archie said a bit defensively.

  “Yes, he likes to play games, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a ghost,” the Madame argued.

  “Except that to this point, there’s been no sign of a ghost,” he countered.

  “What about the lights going out?” Flufferton said, joining the conversation.

  “It happens all the time when there’s a storm like tonight’s,” Archie replied.

  I hated to admit it and didn’t do it out loud, but Archie was right. So far there had been no sign of any ghost. In fact, it was just
the opposite. Everything we’d seen to this point confirmed that the only mystery was trying to figure out what the mystery was.

  “Then why are we wasting our time?” Flufferton huffed.

  It was at that moment, when everyone started to doubt the truthfulness of Hashimoto’s claim that a chilling wind rushed through the kitchen. It blew out our lone source of light returning the room to pitch black accompanied by a crashing sound from an adjacent room. With the moon covered by the storm clouds, our only source of light came from the flashes of lightning briefly shining through the kitchen window.

  “That had to be a ghost!” The Madame exclaimed.

  “Or someone left a door open,” Archie responded.

  “Fiona,” I called out in the calmest voice I could conjure. “Do you have a match to relight the candle?”

  I heard her timidly say, “Certainly,” and then the faint pitter-patter of her feet move across the floor. Next I could hear a cabinet drawer roll open and the sound of a paw rustling around the contents of that drawer. With the scratch and crack of a match being struck across the box, a faint light filled the room.

  Fiona held the lit match to the candle and everything returned to normal. Or did it?

  “Where’s Dr. Flufferton?”

  “Where’s Dr. Flufferton?” Madame Buttercup questioned in a panicked tone.

  We all turned to look where the doctor had been standing. He was gone. I walked around the food preparation island to see if he had merely passed out and fallen to the floor, but he wasn’t there either.

  “It was the ghost!” Fiona cried.

  “He’s probably just hiding,” Archie stated. “We’ve all seen that he isn’t up to this game.”

  I wasn’t sure where he could have escaped to so quickly, but Flufferton had proven to be a skittish cat. And he had already disappeared once when we entered the kitchen. “My guess is he stepped into the other room,” I said as I took the candle from the counter and started toward the door on the other side of the room. “You said Mr. Hashimoto often retired to his study after dinner?” I enquired of Fiona.

  “Yes, through that doorway.”

  I gently pushed open the door, which was already slightly ajar. Archie was right behind me, champing at the bit. “Let’s go catch a ghost.”

  “Easy, partner. You don’t want to get hit with something worse than a frying pan,” I cautioned. Once again the word “partner” came from my mouth so easily, and it bothered me. How could years of disappointment be erased in only an hour? It was going to take more than a game of mystery to erase Archie’s offenses.

  I could see it caught Archie off guard too as he responded with, “you lead the way, chief.” That was what he used to call me.

  I hesitated a moment as a flood of memories raced through my brain. The times we were together in training, on cases, and hanging out after work. Good times.

  “Did you change your mind?”

  As I traveled through memory lane, I could faintly hear the voice of Madame Buttercup. She repeated herself, “Did you change your mind, Mr. Pajamas?”

  Snapping back to reality, I replied, “Not at all. Let’s go catch a ghost,” and I pushed the door open the rest of the way, revealing a room even darker than the kitchen. I stuck the candle, which was quickly shrinking to a puddle of wax, into the room as I took a couple cautious steps in. Faintly, I could see something moving at the bottom of the bookshelf across the room.

  The others joined me at the entrance, and I directed their attention to the mysterious movement with a silent nod of my head. While Fiona took a step back behind me for protection, Archie moved quietly forward with the Madame close behind. I took an alternate route through the room to cut off any possible angles of escape.

  Approaching from both sides, Archie and I found that whatever was causing the mysterious motion was beneath a pile of books that had fallen from the shelf. Archie started to reach for a book to clear the pile when he stopped and looked at me. I was familiar with that look. It was the kind he would always give me before asking a sincere and thoughtful question. “How do you actually catch a ghost?” he whispered.

  I looked back at him, realizing I had no clue. I’ve always been used to apprehending individuals I could hold on to. A ghost, on the other hand, would be like holding onto a cloud or steam I figured, having never knowingly touched a ghost.

  Shrugging, I looked over Archie’s shoulder to Madame Buttercup who was supposed to be the ghost expert. She smiled as she reached into her oversized purse and pulled out a glass jar with something that looked like dirt in the bottom. “This usually works,” she said quietly. “It has dirt from the cemetery, which usually draws them in.”

  She made it sound so simple, but it was better than any idea I had, so Archie and I started pulling books off the pile. The Madame stood close by holding the jar in one hand and the lid in another. Fiona was few steps behind me and ready to run, but that was better than Flufferton, who had still not reappeared.

  Book by book, we got closer to revealing the truth. We must have pulled off over a hundred books when we started hearing a moaning sound from under the pile.

  “I’d recognize that sound anywhere. We definitely have a ghost,” the Madame excitedly declared as she moved closer with her open jar.

  Archie and I dug through the books a little faster. We both wanted to see a ghost up close. And then with a burst of books, a boney, fur-covered paw thrust upward from under the pile. Fiona screamed with an ear piercing shrill as we all jumped back in shock.

  “It’s the reaper!” Madame Buttercup exclaimed in a panic.

  But that was nowhere near the truth. It wasn’t the reaper and it wasn’t a ghost. It was only Cornelius, Mr. Hashimoto’s extremely tall butler, buried beneath the books. You can imagine how many books there were to cover such a long and lanky cat.

  I took Cornelius by the paw and helped him to his feet. He appeared a bit dazed but otherwise unharmed. “Thank you for rescuing me,” he said in his familiar low, drawn-out tone.

  “How did you get under there?” I asked.

  “I had been preparing Mr. Hashimoto’s study for his after dinner retreat when the power went out,” he said as he took a seat in what appeared to be an oversized stationary chair. “He typically comes in here for a warm glass of milk while he watches Cat News.”

  “That’s on CATTT network, isn’t it?” I noted. Cat News was the evening program that detailed all the latest events around New Purrt, and as I mentioned before, it’s all about cats.

  Cornelius nodded.

  “And Mr. Hashimoto owns CATTT, right?” I continued.

  Archie didn’t find my questioning to his liking and interrupted. “More importantly, did he come in here tonight?”

  “No. When the power goes out, as it often does when we have storms like this, he retires to his bedroom.”

  “That still doesn’t answer the original question,” Madame Buttercup pointed out. “How did you get buried by the books?”

  “I was trying to find my way through the dark to retrieve a candle when a cold gust of wind rushed through, blowing the books from the shelf on top of me.”

  “That was the same wind we felt in the kitchen,” Fiona exclaimed.

  “A sure sign of a ghost,” interjected Madame Buttercup.

  “Or an open door,” Archie said dryly.

  “Did you get a look to see if there was anyone or… thing in the room with you that could have knocked the books off the shelf?” I asked.

  “As I said, I was trying to find a candle, so when it happened the room was pitch black,” Cornelius replied. He appeared to tire of the questions, like he wasn’t concerned about the ghost and had no interest in participating in Hashimoto’s game.

  Deciding that Fiona would be as good a resource as Cornelius about the activities around the house, I turned to include her. “Is there a place in the house where the ghost is more active?...” My voice trailed off as I realized that Fiona, who had been standing behind m
e a moment ago was no longer there.

  “Fiona? Where’d you go, Fiona?” I called into the darker part of the room, but there was no reply.

  “

  Fiona ?” I called into the shadowy room.

  “Where’d she go?” Archie puzzled.

  “She was right there a second ago,” the Madame confirmed.

  We all curiously scanned the room for Fiona, but she was nowhere to be seen. Only Cornelius seemed unfazed by her disappearance.

  “See if there’s some type of doorway behind the bookcase or in the floor,” I suggested.

  Each of us felt our way around the dimly lit room trying to find a lever or handle to reveal a way Fiona may have made a quick escape. Considering she worked in the mansion, she would know all the ins and outs of the Hashimoto house best.

  Archie was trying to fit his claws into the sides of the built-in bookshelves with no luck. Madame Buttercup was lifting knick-knacks and anything else that might serve as a quick-release lever for a secret passageway. I crawled along the floor fruitlessly feeling for loose floorboards. After a minute of unsuccessful searching, we reconvened by Cornelius, frustrated with our efforts.

  It was at that moment that we all simultaneously realized that not only would Fiona know all the inner workings of the house, but so would Cornelius. We all looked to him for guidance. And even though he seemed more interested in relaxing in the comfy chair, he did glance up and say, “There is one book still left on the bookshelf.”

  Turning our attention away from Cornelius and to the shelf, we saw that he was correct. There was one lone book perched on the top shelf. I looked to Archie and Madame Buttercup, confirming that it would be okay if I did the honors of pulling the book. They both nodded their approval and I reached for the

  copy of Cat in the Rye.

  “You will want to be careful…” started Cornelius, but it was a bit too late.

  As I pulled on the book, one side of the bookshelf swung open from the middle like a spring-loaded trap, knocking Archie across the room.