Bran New Death

But there was something inside. A piece of paper. Maybe Dinah had left a little note for Bi

For some are sane and some are mad

And some are good and some are bad

And some are better, some are worse—

But all may be described in verse.

What the . . . ? I recognized the piece; who was it by? It was . . . I searched my brain, sure I had heard those same words before. Aha! T. S. Eliot. From “Old Possum.”

Becket leaped up on the table and nosed the box, causing it to fall on the floor.

“Stop it, Becks!” I hollered, pushing him away. He came right back and nosed at the teapot, then at the note in my hand. “Becks, don’t . . .” I paused as my hand brushed against his collar, which I had put back on him. The tag on it that gave his name and that was all, was plastic, and had survived the almost-year he had spent in the wild since his master was killed. But the tag was oddly thick.

Why hadn’t I noticed that before?

My attention was pulled back to the note. The quote was in different handwriting, a nice, cursive script, than some of the other scribbles on it. And there were underlined words in the verse. It all seemed gibberish, and there was a string of exclamation marks, and a faint penciled phrase. I held the paper up to the light. “What the hell does this mean?” was scribbled in a slanting hand different from the poem.

I wished I knew.

I couldn’t shake the sense that there was some significance to it all, something I was missing. I retired to the kitchen, made a pot of tea, and sat in the chair by the empty fireplace, where, for the first time, Becket leaped up onto my lap. I toyed with his collar, and the tag. The plastic disc covering his name fell out, and out of the opening came a thin packet of paper, which folded out like a paper doll, maybe twenty discs long.

Just then Shilo came into the kitchen with Pish, both of them overheated but excited from their day. I couldn’t attend to what they were saying, though, because I was still puzzling over the paper disks. On each disc was a Latin word or phrase, begi

Well, of course when I shared all of this with my friends, Shilo said, popping the lid on a can of cola, “Val Kilmer? Why would old Mel write down Val Kilmer’s name on his cat’s tag?

Pish frowned over at her. “Are popular references the only ones you know? Perhaps it refers to Joyce Kilmer . . . you know, ‘I think that I shall never see a poem so lovely as a tree?’”

“So she liked trees and poetry, huh?”

“It’s not a ‘she,’” I said absently. “It’s a he . . . I mean, Joyce Kilmer is a ‘he.’ They’re actually distant cousins, I’ve heard, Joyce and Val. Pish, do these Latin words mean anything to you?”

He leaned over the chair arm. “Hmm. Well, animals and plants are often called by their Latin names. Does that help?”

My eyes widened. I had actually seen some of these same words, on plaques in the arboretum! I shared my discovery with my friends, and said, “I wonder . . . okay, is this crazy? My mind is making co

“Could be,” Pish said.

Shilo hopped up and down. “A treasure, a treasure! Let’s go look for it.”

“How?” I said. Wait . . . tree names. Slowly, I came to a conclusion and spoke up. “I think that there is something to this, and I think it has to do with the arboretum. If these are tree names, then the woods is the place to look.”

Pish plunked down on the chair next to me as Shilo danced around the kitchen. “You know what, my dear, I think you just may have something. And I want to be in on the fun. I have a proposal to make. I would like to rent a room from you for the foreseeable future, and move some of my things here. This fraud investigation has got my juices going, and I’d like to make it the central story of my book-to-be.”

“Is it going to be that big a story?” I asked, startled.

“Sadly, my dear, I think so. I’m pretty sure it’s going to go national, if the financial papers get ahold of it. I am trying to do all I can to help the Autumn Vale Community Bank stay alive, because it is in grave danger of folding. That is the more important story here. Those federal investigators don’t really care, but I do. I hate to see small, local banks fail. Diversity in the banking industry is unfortunately becoming quite rare.”

“Yikes. I care, too. These folks have been through enough tough times.”

His tone honeyed and persuasive, he said, “If I stay and rent a room, Merry, it would help you with the utility bills, which are not going to be pretty this winter. And I can help, then, with the treasure hunt!”

“Deal,” I said, not adding that he had not needed to sweeten the pot, so to speak. Having him around was a treat.

“Deal, deal, deal,” Shilo sang, spi

I took a deep breath. An adventure had begun. In fact, I was in the middle of an adventure, but hadn’t stopped to realize it. I gri

I couldn’t wait to get started.

Recipes

Golden Acres Banana Bran Muffins

Yield: 12 Muffins

1 1/2 cups bran flake cereal

1 cup mashed ripe banana (2–3 large)

1/2 cup milk

1 egg

3 tbsp. vegetable or canola oil

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup sugar

2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp. ci