The Purrfect Murder

Harry greeted her.
    “Didn’t get you on the phone, so I thought I’d come over.”
    “Need a hand with anything?” Fair asked.
    “No. I wanted to tell you we’ve heard from Will Wylde’s killer.” She paused, while the other two held their breath for a moment without realizing they were doing so. “No name. No anything except he—I assume it’s a he—says he has the list of all Will’s patients over the years and he is going to do to them what they did to the unborn.”
    “What?”
    “Dropped off an envelope sealed with Scotch tape—obviously he’s smart enough not to lick the envelope. Dropped it in Rick’s mailbox at his house. Smart there, too. Too big a risk to leave it at the station, even in the middle of the night.”
    “Good God.” Fair was aghast.
    “He could be bluffing.”
    “Harry, he could, but I keep coming back to someone on the inside. It’s not that hard for a nurse or office manager to steal files. Everything is on a disc. How hard is it to copy it and give it to our killer?”
    “True.” Fair was more computer literate than Harry, but she was pretty good at doing agricultural research on her computer.
    “Thank heaven,” Harry whispered, “I’ve never had an abortion.”
    “Me, either. But there are so many women who have and no one knows. Apart from the danger if he does make good on his threat, what about the mess in their personal lives?”
    “Are you going to make this public?”
    “Well, that’s not my decision, but I don’t see how Rick can keep it quiet. It’s important to the case, and people must take precautions.”
    “This could destroy marriages, careers.” Harry wiped the sweat pouring down her brow. “There are an awful lot of women in this county keeping a secret.”
    “Exactly.” Coop leaned against the truck’s grille. “We’ve got to catch this guy.”
    “If he starts killing women, you will, but let’s pray he trips up before that.” Fair felt sick about the threat.
    “Why now?” Harry asked.
    “What do you mean?” Coop respected Harry’s mind.
    “Why kill now? Will Wylde has been practicing medicine in our county for three decades. What’s set off this person?”
    “Could be he’s found out his wife or girlfriend had an abortion and didn’t tell him,” Fair stated logically.
    “Or it could be his mind is deteriorating in some fashion,” Harry thought out loud.
    “Like drugs?” Coop had seen plenty of what booze and drugs can do to the human brain.
    “That, but sometimes the mind goes when it’s diseased and the person doesn’t know. He thinks his thoughts and actions are normal. That’s the truly frightening thing about being crazy: so often the person doesn’t know. And sometimes a head injury can change a person’s personality,” Fair informed them.
    Harry turned to Coop. “You might want to check the experts on this. I guess psychiatrists would be a good place to start.”
    “I will. Either way, if this guy is a raving lunatic or a political fanatic, we’ve got major problems.”
    “Coop, come on in. It’s sweltering out here.” Harry touched Fair’s hand.
    As they walked into the house, Matilda, eyes glittering, swayed gently on her limb. Mrs. Murphy glanced up at her but said nothing.
    They were grateful to come into the kitchen, the large overhead fan cooling the room. Harry refused to put in air-conditioning, because she thought going from cool air to the hot outside all the time made you sick. Fair knew in time he could wear her down. As it was, the fans in the house helped, but sometimes all they did was push around humid air.
    “The statement?” Coop gratefully took a beer offered her by Fair as she queried Harry.
    “We drove over this morning after church. Harry tried.” He shrugged.
    “It’s the talk of the town: the murder and the face-off between Big Mim and Little Mim.” She swallowed straight from the bottle. “Perfect.”
    “A cold beer on a hot day, one of life’s little pleasures.” Fair sipped his, too.
    After Cooper left, Harry called Little Mim and gave her the news so she could be calm when she heard it from the sheriff.
    “Mother is probably being briefed by Rick as we speak,” Little Mim replied, trying to push down the rising terror.
    Rick had learned the hard way to keep Big Mim informed. Part of it was because she felt she ran the town along with the western part of the county; part of it was because she knew a great deal that a sheriff might not know and could be