The Real Macaw: A Meg Langslow Mystery

counter that the burly cousins could come back for another hour or two. I thought of a more practical deterrent.
    “Why repaint now?” I asked. “We could just touch things up a little. As soon as the boys start crawling, it’s open season on the walls. Makes more sense to repaint after they’ve had a chance to mess them up.”
    “That’s why I was thinking of repainting,” Mother said, with a delicate shudder. “We could use one of those paints that clean up easily with just soap and water. Like the one we found for the nursery. So much more practical for a room where small children will be playing.”
    I looked at her in astonishment. When had Mother begun taking practicality into account in her decorating?
    “And I’ve never been entirely happy with the shade,” she added. “We can adjust that when we repaint. I’ll bring you some paint chips later this week.”
    Aha. She wasn’t turning practical; she was using my focus on the practical to talk me into some minor redecorating.
    Still, not a bad idea.
    “Sounds like a good plan,” I said aloud.
    She nodded absently. She was still gazing around. I braced myself. She was probably going to suggest that as long as the living room was all torn up anyway, perhaps she could add a few more decorating touches.
    “I have to say,” she said finally. “I like this macaw much better.”
    I pondered this a moment. Did she mean that she liked it better than she had before—that the macaw had grown on her? Or that she preferred the macaw to some of the other animals we were fostering? Or …
    “Better than what?” I asked finally.
    “Better than that other macaw.”
    “We’ve only ever had the one macaw,” I said. “Multiple dogs, cats, hamsters, guinea pigs, and even rabbits, but only one macaw.”
    “I think you’re mistaken, dear.” She wasn’t really trying to argue—she was using the tone of exaggerated patience that all of my family had taken to using with me. A tone I’d begun to find very, very irritating, because it seemed to suggest that due to the hormones and possibly the sleep deprivation, my brain was on a leave of absence.
    I walked over to the mantel and picked up a stack of papers.
    “Here’s Clarence’s inventory.” I began running my fingers down the list and flipping through the pages. “First page is all dogs. So’s the second. More dogs, Then cats. Then the rodents.”
    Mother shuddered delicately, as she usually did when rodents were mentioned.
    “Here,” I said, flipping to the last page. “The birds. Not a lot of them. Three canaries, which I don’t remember seeing, so I suppose I should inspect all the cats’ whiskers. A pair of racing pigeons. And one macaw.”
    “Clarence must be mistaken, then,” Mother said. “You must have two macaws. Perhaps they’re hiding some of the animals from you.”
    I sighed. That seemed more than possible. Maybe it wasn’t just my imagination that the number of animals seemed to have grown larger every time I went out to the barn. Last night’s adoptions didn’t seem to have made as much of a dent as I’d hoped. Maybe they were importing them from other nearby shelters to take advantage of public sympathy.
    Well, if it helped get homes for the animals … I’d worry about that later.
    “What makes you think this isn’t the same macaw?” I asked aloud.
    “The color, dear. The macaw you had yesterday was mostly a very harsh Prussian blue. It didn’t fit your living room decor at all. This new macaw is a very lovely shade of turquoise instead. Very nice. Matches the upholstery.”
    Mother beamed at the macaw. The macaw ruffled its feathers slightly, and I braced myself, hoping it would only say something rude and brash, like “Hiya, toots!” instead of something from the X-rated end of its vocabulary.
    The macaw only emitted a soft squawk and began preening its feathers.
    “Now that’s odd,” I said. Yesterday the bird had missed no opportunity to speak. I didn’t recall hearing it say anything this morning. Could Mother possibly be right?
    And then I realized that of course she had to be right. Mother might have many strange notions and knowledge gaps, but she was absolutely sound on any subject even remotely related to decorating. And color was one of her passions. She had once spent an excruciating hour trying to explain to me the differences between purple, violet, lilac, mauve, heliotrope, magenta, lavender, orchid, grape, puce, pomegranate, Tyrian, wine,