Dewey by Vicki Myron Read Free Book Online

are coming from your mug.”
    “That’s impossible. I’ve never seen Dewey
around my desk.”
    “Evidence suggests the suspect is intentionally avoiding your desk to
throw us off the trail. We believe he only approaches the mug at night.”
    “What
evidence?”
    I pointed to several small pieces of chewed rubber band on the floor. “He
chews them up and spits them out. He eats them for breakfast. I think you know all the usual
clichés.”
    Mary shuddered at the thought of the garbage on the floor having passed into
and out of the stomach of a cat. Still, it seemed so improbable. . . .
    “The mug is six
inches deep. It’s full of paper clips, staples, pen, pencils. How could he possibly pluck out
rubber bands without knocking everything over?”
    “Where there’s a will, there’s a
way. And this suspect has proven, in his eight months at the library, that he has the
will.”
    “But there are hardly any rubber bands in there! Surely this isn’t his only
source!”
    “How about an experiment? You put the mug in the cabinet, we’ll see if he
pukes rubber bands near your desk.”
    “But this mug has my children’s pictures on
it!”
    “Good point. How about we just remove the rubber bands?”
    Mary decided to
put a lid on the mug. The next morning, the lid was lying on her desk with suspicious teeth marks
along one edge. No doubt about it, the mug was the source. The rubber bands went into a drawer.
Convenience was sacrificed for the greater good.
    We never completely succeeded in wiping out
Dewey’s rubber band fixation. He’d lose interest, only to go back on the prowl a few months or
even a few years later. In the end, it was more a game than a battle, a contest of wits and guile.
While we had the wits, Dewey had the guile. And the will. He was far more intent on eating rubber
bands than we were on stopping him. And he had that powerful, rubber-sniffing nose.
    But
let’s not make too much of it all. Rubber bands were a hobby. Catnip and boxes were mere
distractions. Dewey’s true love was people, and there was nothing he wouldn’t do for his
adoring public. I remember standing at the circulation desk one morning talking with Doris when we
noticed a toddler wobbling by. She must have recently learned to walk, because her balance was
shaky and her steps uneven. It wasn’t helping that her arms were wrapped tightly across her
chest, clutching Dewey in a bear hug. His rear and tail were sticking up in her face, and his head
was hanging down toward the floor. Doris and I stopped talking and watched in amazement as the
little girl toddled in slow motion across the library, a very big smile on her face and a very
resigned cat hanging upside down from her arms.
    “Amazing,” Doris said.
    “I should
do something about that,” I said. But I didn’t. I knew that, despite appearances, Dewey was
completely in control of the situation. He knew what he was doing and, no matter what happened, he
could take care of himself.
    We think of a library, or any single building really, as a small
place. How can you spend all day, every day, in a 13,000-square-foot room and not get bored? But
to Dewey, the Spencer Public Library was a huge world full of drawers, cabinets, bookshelves,
display cases, rubber bands, typewriters, copiers, tables, chairs, backpacks, purses, and a steady
stream of hands to pet him, legs to rub him, and mouths to sing his praises. And laps. The library
was always graciously, gorgeously full of laps.
    By the fall of 1988, Dewey considered all of
it his.

Chapter 6
    Moneta

    S ize is a matter of perspective. For an insect, one stalk of corn, or even one ear of corn, can be the whole world. For Dewey, the Spencer Public Library was a labyrinth that kept him endlessly fascinated—at least until he started to wonder what was outside the front door. For most of the people in northwest Iowa, Spencer is the big city. In fact, we are the biggest city for a hundred miles in any direction. People from nine