Clearly she wasn’t used to acupuncture, and didn’t enjoy the treatment, for she started whirling around like a whirligig, and even though we tried to hang on, soon we were all relegated to the floor, where we recovered from this most trying ordeal.
Scarlett once more placed her arm around the woman’s neck, and Gran, who was recovering quickly, punched that panic button Isaac had told us about the first day.
It didn’t take long for Desmond to come running, and when he surveilled the scene, to his credit he immediately grasped what was going on, and acted with decision. Taking Mrs. Doyle by the arm, he physically removed her from the scene, and when he returned moments later, announced that he had locked herup in her room and had called the doctor.
“She tried to kill me!” Gran cried, touching her throat. “Actually tried to kill me!”
“She kept yelling ‘Intruder,’” Scarlett explained.
“She must have walked into the wrong room, thinking it was hers,” said Desmond, “and then when she saw you, thought you were an intruder, and tried to fight you off.” He shook his head. “It’s happened before. Not with Mrs. Doyle, but with another resident a few years back.”
“So what happened to the other resident?” asked Scarlett.
“He couldn’t stay here after that, and so he was transferred to a specialized institution. And I think the same thing will happen to Mrs. Doyle, I’m afraid. We’ve kept her here for as long as we could, mostly because her family asked us to, but after this it doesn’t seem safe or reasonable to keep her here.” His phone chimed, and he said, “The doctor is here. Excuse me for a moment, will you?” He walked into the corridor, speaking into his phone. Then he popped his head in again. “I’ll ask him to take a look at your throat in a minute, all right? Just hang in there, Janelle.”
“Thanks,” Gran croaked. “What a day,” she whispered. “First this whole Brian business, then that camera fiasco, and now a murder attempt!”
“It wasn’t really a murder attempt,” said Scarlett. “The woman was simply confused.”
“Confused or not, she tried to kill me!”
“Oh, and Gran?” said Dooley, amid all this hubbub and commotion. “Max and I have something very important to tell you.”
“Not now, Dooley,” I hastened to say.
“We’re on strike,” said Dooley happily. “And we have certain demands. And if they’re not met, we’re going to stay on strike until they are. Met, I mean.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Gran.
“We have a list of demands,” Dooley reiterated, “and all of them are about litter.”
“Litter!” Gran cried. “I’ve just been the victim of a violent attack and you want to talk about litter!”
“Litter is important,” said Dooley. “In fact it’s probably more important than food.” He thought about this for a moment. “Okay, so maybe not.”
“Whatever you gotta tell me, can’t it wait until tomorrow?” asked Gran, who was clearly in some degree of pain. “Only I think she might have broken something.”
“Oh, you poor thing,” said Scarlett. “Oh, look. The doctor is here now.”
A man with a black doctor’s bag walked in, looking very much like a doctor. “What seems to be the problem?” he asked, and I had to say that his bedside manner was perfect. I think we all felt better simply because of his mere presence in the room.
“It’s my throat, doctor,” said Gran. “She grabbed me by the throat and kept squeezing until I almost passed out.”
“Let’s take a look, shall we?” said the doctor, and then he did just that.
“I’m going to get back to our list of demands as soon as the doctor leaves, Max,” Dooley assured me. “One way or another this litter problem is going to be solved.”
“Perhaps not now, Dooley,” I said. “I think Gran isn’t in the mood to listen to our list of demands.”
“What’s all this about a strike?” asked Harriet.
“Max is sick and tired of having to do his business in a dirty litter box,” said Dooley. “And so he wants proper litter box procedure established and he wants all of us to follow this procedure to the letter. Isn’t that right, Max? To the litter letter.”
“And what is proper litter box procedure, according to King Max?” asked Brutus.
“Oh, don’t be like that, Brutus,” I said. “It’s only natural to want a nice, clean litter box, don’t you think?”
“What I think is that you’re being overly critical again, Max,” said Brutus. “And that you’re calling me unhygienic and smelly.”
“No, of course not! You’re not unhygienic and you’re not smelly at all!”
“But your doo-doo is smelly,” said Dooley. “And because you refuse to bury it, it stinks up the whole room, and makes it impossible for the rest of us to go potty without feeling nauseous. And that’s you being very selfish, Brutus.”
A hush momentarily descended upon the room. I don’t think anyone had ever spoken to Brutus this way, and we waited with bated breath for how he would respond.
But when he finally did, his response surprised us even more.