Ruby isn’t like other cats. Sure, she has the usual feline features, whiskers, sass, an Olympic-level disdain for humans but she also has a nose for nonsense and a tail that twitched whenever mystery was afoot.
This particular Tuesday, the mystery came in the form of absolute pandemonium. Yarn had gone missing. All of it. Every spool, ball, and half-knitted disappointment from Number 12’s crochet corner to grumpy Mr. Burble’s ‘sensitive sock experiment’ had vanished without a trace.
Except, of course, for the knots.
Knots. Everywhere.
Knots in trees, knots dangling from the swings at the park, knots that had tied poor Alfie Ferguson’s shoelaces together and sent him face-first into a decorative hedge.
“Who would do this?” Mrs. Whimple wailed, clutching a knot that suspiciously resembled a woollen squirrel. “My knitting circle is in tatters… literally!”
Ruby licked a paw and blinked slowly at the chaos. This, she decided, was a job for her. She had once located an entire pack of missing fish fingers behind a radiator (they’d been her fish fingers). And she’d exposed Percy, the labradoodle, for stealing sausages and blaming them on migratory birds.
She was ready.
* * * * *
Step One: Investigate the Scene.
Ruby padded casually to Number 14, where old Mabel was sobbing into a tangled mess of mauve alpaca blend. Ruby pawed at the yarn, nose twitching.
“Ruby, you clever girl, can you smell the thief?” Mabel sniffed, hopeful.
Ruby sneezed in reply. Definitely suspicious. Possibly cheese. She strutted off.
Step Two: Follow the Trail.
There were paw prints, faint, fluffy, and scandalously familiar. Ruby narrowed her eyes. These were not the subtle pads of a hedgehog or the drunken stompings of Ted the pug. No, these were elegant… graceful… feline.
“Traitor,” Ruby muttered, tail flicking like an angry metronome.
She followed the trail through the neighbourhood: over garden gnomes, under barbecues, and right through a flower bed that Ruby might have used as a toilet last week (the past was a dark place).
Then she found it. The den.
Under the shed behind Number 22, where no human dared venture thanks to the time Reginald Mewsworth scared the gardener into retirement with an aggressive hiss and a dead frog.
Ruby crouched. The air was thick with betrayal and the unmistakable smell of tuna.
Inside the shed sat Reginald Mewsworth III a massive Maine Coon with the vibe of a disgraced opera singer and fur like a French wig in a wind tunnel. And around him? Yarn. Piles of it. Knotted, twisted, braided into what looked like a scarf crown.
Reginald purred menacingly.
“Ruby,” he said, because in this story, cats absolutely speak and usually with posh accents, “I warned you to stay out of my territory.”
Ruby raised an eyebrow. “You stole every ball of yarn in the neighbourhood just to knit yourself a …what is that… royal bathrobe?”
Reginald fluffed. “It’s called statement fashion. But also, I was bored. And quite possibly high on catnip.”
Ruby scoffed. “Do you know what you’ve done? Mrs. Whimple is now talking to a woollen squirrel like it’s her actual therapist.”
“Perhaps it is,” Reginald sniffed. “Therapy is expensive.”
Ruby pounced, elegantly, her tail looping in the air like a calligraphy flourish. Reginald dodged, knocking over a tower of crocheted jellyfish.
A chase ensued.
Yarn tangled. Fur flew. A gnome was sacrificed.
They tumbled into the garden, Reginald wrapped in his own yarn cape, hissing. Ruby, triumphant, sat on his head.
From somewhere nearby, a child gasped. “LOOK MUMMY, THE CAT MADE A CAT BURRITO!”
* * * * *
Ruby returned the yarn like a queen descending from Olympus. She dumped it unceremoniously on Mrs. Whimple’s doily and accepted three sardines and a rub under the chin (which she tolerated for almost two seconds).
Reginald, sentenced to community service (volunteering as an emotional support cat for toddlers), sulked behind the compost bin muttering about ‘creative expression.’
The neighbourhood was safe. The knitting circle resumed. Alfie’s shoes were now triple-knotted for safety.
And Ruby?
She curled up on a sunny windowsill, eyes half-lidded, tail twitching with dreams of future mysteries.
But not before issuing one final statement to the press (aka the very enthusiastic six-year-old with a recorder):
“Justice,” Ruby yawned, “is best served with a side of sardines… and maybe a nap.”
THE END
Ruby Forensics 