Catscape by Mike Nicholson Page A

Raeburn Place was said to want the extra spacefor the inventions that have led to his increasingly eccentric reputation.”
    His face had been glued to the screen a matter of seconds before, but on reading this Murdo leapt up and disappeared. There was a loud rustling of paper from the hallway and moments later the plan from the kitchen table appeared with Murdo’s legs underneath it.
    “I thought we should match up the latest findings with Jessie’s plan,” said Murdo.
    “Yes, just where is Crockett’s in relation to here?” said Jessie helping Murdo to flatten out the plan on the coffee table. They found that Crockett’s was situated between the Copper Kettle Café and Stein’s Fish Shop. Although some way from the manhole cover, they concluded that it was possible that the six sets of vaults bought by Charles Crockett belonged to the shops between the Watches and Clocks shop and the manhole cover, including the one that now housed the cheery Warren and Capital Computing.
    “Okay, so if the vaults below the manhole cover outside here belong to Mr. Crockett then why would standing above the cellar of a clock shop make your watch go backwards?” asked Fergus.
    “Well,” said Murdo who had not been put off by his last explanation being cut short, “maybe the combined power of all the watches and clocks stored in Crockett’s shop generates some sort of powerful collective time-force that gets channelled through the vaults and surfaces at various points around the city, and grips each watch it meets in a vice-like stranglehold that squeezes seconds out of it and …”
    Murdo looked up to find that he was alone in the living room. He could hear giggling from the hall and realized that Jessie and Fergus had sneaked out while he was in full flow. Murdo shook his head in exasperation at the fact that his good ideas seemed to be ignored so often. Fergus and Jessie then had to convincehim that they were just having a bit of fun and that his idea was certainly one they would come back to, although they took care not to say when. The three then pondered on what to do next and it was Jessie who once again decided that a direct approach was the answer.
    “I’ve been meaning to have this fixed for years,” she said pointing to the wall clock with its long motionless pendulum. “I could get Bob Crockett round to look at it and we can get chatting. That way there will be no interruption from customers.”
    So the plan was set and Jessie made the call. She had been a customer at Crockett’s for many years and the boys could hear her chatting on the phone to someone at the shop.
    “He’s coming tomorrow in his lunch hour,” said Jessie triumphantly as she came off the phone. “Right, I think we’ve done all we can on the watches until tomorrow so we should get back to the cats. Let’s not forget there are two mysteries to be solved here.”
    “We could do some brainstorming,” said Murdo enthusiastically.
    Fergus realized he was rolling his eyes again at the thought of more of Murdo’s “blue sky thinking.”
    “Okay,” said Jessie, spotting Fergus’s reaction but forging ahead anyway. “I can’t believe that so many cats can be disappearing for any natural reason. It isn’t normal. I just have a hunch that someone, somewhere, is up to something.”
    “But who would have a grudge against cats?” said Murdo.
    Jock pricked up his ears.
    “A demented dog lover?” suggested Fergus.
    “Someone who’s allergic to cats and wants to get rid of them all?” said Murdo.
    “The Society for the Protection of Garden Birds?” said Fergus.
    “I don’t know,” pondered Jessie. “I don’t think we’re on theright track here.”
    “I suppose it depends what someone was doing with the cats,” said Fergus. “We’re assuming that something bad has happened to these cats.”
    “Yeah,” said Murdo. “It could be someone who has a particular interest in cats.”
    “Or maybe someone is pinching them to sell