Read Online Nancy J. Bailey - Furry Murder 01 - My Best Cat by Nancy J. Bailey - Free Book Online Page B

myself.  I was not one bit happy about that.  Not one little bit.  Baloo had splashed it all over his forepaws and walked through it.  I had to take him into the restroom to rinse him out.  While I was in there, that weird mother and daughter pair were blow drying their Persian. 
    I knew who they were, because they were from my region and I saw them at shows a lot.  They were bankers – public servants.  I had actually gone to the daughter for investment advice shortly after I was fired.  Of course, I didn’t tell her I’d been let go.  She was basically no help anyway, in that regard.  I wanted something that would make the most for my dollar, as quickly as possible.  She suggested mutual funds and IRAs and other such nonsense. 
    “I just don’t have that kind of time,” I had told her.
    “Making money isn’t like making cats, you know,” she said with a little ironic grin.  “The gestation period is a lot longer.”
    She was, overall, a creep, but I actually found this statement pretty funny.  She wasn’t as big a dumb ass as I’d originally supposed.  She might be of some use to me.
    But as it turned out, she didn’t have any hard and fast suggestions in the money department.  I was kind of disgusted when I left the bank that day.  What were these facilities for, if they couldn’t be helpful to people at times like this?
    It was after that, that we decided to do the mortgage.
    The restroom was getting quite humid now.  It really was most uncomfortable, and I wasn’t thrilled about Baloo getting a steam bath at this point.  I sighed and leaned against the wall, but they didn’t seem to get the hint.  They just kept up their fervent grooming on that brainless Persian.  The daughter held the cat’s rump under the dryer on the wall, while the mother brushed like a madwoman.  The smell of anal glands – or maybe it was B.O. – wafted across the room.  My first impulse was to walk out, but I was running out of time.  The mother looked up at me.
    “This is what we get for having a white cat!” she grinned.
    I smiled but did not answer her.  My meeting with the daughter hadn’t raised my opinion of them, overall.  They were trash.  They were big campaigners and that white kitten was running hard for a grand this weekend.  She was going to be stiff competition.  An Abyssinian was not a minority breed, but blue was a minority color, sort of, and a white Persian was so standard.  Any judge with no guts would use a white Persian in a final.  No challenge there.
    They had a gimmick, too, with that “Sound of Music” thing.  With as nauseating as it was, it made them recognizable.  It was good advertising.  I had tried to start a gimmick, with the Jungle Book, but it didn’t seem to be taking off as well yet.
    “What a beautiful Aby!  What class is he in?” the lady asked.  She was going to persist in talking to me.
    “He’s a champion,” I said.
    “He’s lovely.  I’m sure you won’t have any trouble granding him.”
    “Thank you.”
    “What is his name?”
    “He’s Baloo.  He’s my Baloo Bear.”
    “Oh, like from the Jungle Book?”
    “That’s right.”
    She was clearly a genius.  I couldn’t wait to get out of here.
    “Well, good luck to him,” she said.
    “Thank you.”
    “I just love the blues,” she added.
    “They are a challenge to work with, but it definitely helps to have a good one.  Like Baloo Bear, here.”
    The daughter was looking at her cat’s britches, pointedly ignoring me.  I could tell she was threatened by Baloo.  I leaned over the sink and turned on the water, testing to see it was not too hot.  Baloo’s ears flattened and he squirmed.
    “Need a hand?” the Persian lady asked.
    “No thank you,” I said. 
    This was going to be a pain, washing his legs, because I would have to re-powder the stripes before his first ring, and that meant they had to be not only clean, but completely dry.  I hoped those two were almost