For a smile as wide as a country sunrise

Hi everyone! Welcome back to our wildflower series! Sorry things got a bit mixed up this week, but hopefully I have things back on schedule again. Today’s wildflower is the “marsh blue violet”. This one is found throughout eastern Canada and most of the eastern US. This violet likes wet soils and is often found along the shores of streams, rivers, lakes, edges of wetlands and wet meadows. It prefers shady areas, but will also sometimes grow in sunny locations. The leaves are heart shaped, the leaves and flowers are on separate stalks. The two side petals are “bearded”, they have short club like hairs on them which doesn’t show up well in my picture. There are about 500 species of violets worldwide, most in the northern hemisphere and about 70 species in N. America. I hope you all have a wonderful day and God bless!
Steve and Muffin.
©2021 Steve McLeod.
Pictures of Mr. Cat are kindly supplied by his human, Nina.
Previous chapters of this story, and other stories, can be found on my home page under “The Investigators, Inc.” and “20/20 Investigations, Inc.”
Our story ended in chapter 8 with a distress call from Mr. Cat, but we will back up our story just a bit to start today…
The doctor came into the room to look at Muffin once more before leaving for the night. Mr. Cat watched everything carefully. “You’re little friend is going to be fine Mr. Cat,” he said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if she was walking around and wanting to go home tomorrow. Now, is there anything I can get for you before I leave?” Mr. Cat went over to a chair, Meow!=Me want this by bed. And he ran back to the bed. “I think you want that chair by the bed, don’t you?”, he asked. Meow! Then Mr. Cat went to a stool so the doctor moved that over by the chair. “That will make it easier for you to get on the bed,” said the doctor. Meow.=Thank you human doctor. “You’re welcome Mr. Cat,” he said.

As he was about to close and lock the door he stopped and looked at Mr. Cat, who smiled back. He shook his head, maybe Elsa is right, I do need a vacation, now I’m hearing cats talk, he said to himself. Then he locked up and left. Then Mr. Cat carried Muffin down to the chair, then the stool and onto a blanket he had placed on the floor. Then he dragged the blanket with Muffin and put her under the doctor’s desk. Meow.=Muffin safer here if trouble come through door. Then he positioned himself and waited. Mr. Cat was just drifting off to sleep when he suddenly woke up to the sound of voices. Meow.=No one supposed to be here, I call help and get ready.
Now we continue where we left off yesterday…
“The cats are in trouble!”, I yelled to Caren. She got up amazingly fast and down we ran to her car. She tossed me the keys and off we went. We drove around back and sure enough there was a car parked there. Inside someone was trying to open the door where the cats were. Mr. Cat was ready for whoever came through that door. “Get out of the way, I’ll open that door,” growled one man. Then a loud crash and this big man came in and “Thwock!” The man groaned and fell to his knees. Then “Thwock!” and the man fell instantly to the floor. The other man shot several times at the bed just as we came down the hall. The man turned, I fired once and he fell. I ran into the room, turned on the lights and called “Muffin!”. Meow.=Not worry, Muffin okay, she not in bed, she under desk. Just then Muffin came crawling out and ran over to me. I picked her up and hugged her, then picked up Mr. Cat hugging him too.
The police had to be called, the doctor also. This created some problems. I explained I was here on a case and had a permit to carry a gun. “Well, you are off the case now, this is a police investigation,” he said. “No,” I said, “this is my case and my investigation, and I stay.” The officers looked at me. There was a man and a woman. Caren touched my hand which indicated these were the two she had talked with earlier. Their head of police came in at that moment and apologized to me, saying they didn’t know I was an undercover agent with the special European force. The other 2 officers just looked at each other when they found out who I was.
After the police left the doctor examined Muffin again and said she could leave now but she should definitely relax for a few days. “I’ll make sure she relaxes,” I told the doctor. “And you as well,” he said firmly to me, “you need to relax if you want to keep walking. I can tell you are in terrible pain right now. I will get you something for that.” And off he went. Muffin looked at me. Meow,meow?=Doctor say you should relax and you not? “Well, there are things to do,” I said quietly. Meow!=You being bad, you do what doctor say! Meow,meow.=Yes, we take time to relax, then continue with case. Caren agreed with that idea too. Sigh. The doctor came with some pills for me, plus he gave me a shot of something that would work faster.

There was no identification on these 2 men, but this proves that these people are after me, not Caren. But who are these people? Why are they after me? Is it Gisela again? This would be something she would do. What about Caren? Is she just an innocent bystander being used to catch me? Or is she part of the plot? Something still doesn’t fit, but I’m not quite sure what that is yet.
To Be Continued.
©2021 Steve McLeod.