Look at him. He doesn’t look like much does he?  I never thought he would be fast enough to catch a mouse or vole or whatever it was. I mean he’s kind of big, not fat. We don’t say fat in our household. We say he is of generous proportions.

Anyway, I come home and my wife proceeds to tell me all about how our sweet Fawn caught a mouse and brought the poor thing into the house. I stop dead in my tracks and the conversation goes something like this.

Me: It’s not still in the house is it?

Wife: No I took care of it.

Me: What do you mean you took care of it?

Wife: It’s dead.

Me: Fawn killed a mouse.

Wife: No I did.

Me: You killed a mouse. How?

At this point I am imaging all kinds of gruesome ways to die and there is no way I guess the real cause of death.

Wife: The vacuum cleaner.

Me: You killed a mouse with our vacuum cleaner? How do you know he’s dead? He could be crawling around in the bag.

Wife: No he got caught in the spinning brush and I flushed him down the toilet.

Me: Why didn’t you just catch him and let him go in the field.

Wife: He was really fast, I couldn’t think of anything else.

Me: That’s really sad. I think we should get one of those humane traps.

The next day I’m outside and the patio door is open. I see a steak of gray run into the house and I think maybe it’s our resident squirrel. Nope it’s not. I hear the squeaking of a little gray mouse and Fawn jumps on it and grabs it in his mouth. I try to chase after them and decide no way am I going to try to catch the thing.

I call for my wife even though I don’t want a repeat of yesterday.  She’s out in the back of our property and doesn’t hear me. I’m not going after the mouse so I shrug, close the door, and resume my reading.

About a half an hour later my wife comes up on the patio. I tell her Fawn caught another mouse and it’s in the house. Of course I expect her to take care of it. She goes into the house. My protector.

Wife: It’s dead.

Me:  Fawn actually killed it?

Wife: No actually Onyx is guarding it.

So there you have it our cats are conniving serial killers. One catches them, the other kills them. At least they don’t use a vacuum cleaner.

We’re closing the patio door from now on.