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he called. “Grandma, are you here?”
    Danny sat in front of the TV, playing a video game.
    â€œYou seen Grandma?” Murphy asked him.
    Danny didn’t look up. “No,” he said.
    â€œWhere is she?” Murphy asked.
    â€œHow should I know?”
    â€œHave you seen Mousetrap?” Murphy asked again.
    â€œWho’s Mousetrap?” Danny asked with his hands stuck to the controls and his eyes glued to the screen.
    â€œMy cat, Mousetrap, is missing. Did you see him anywhere?”
    â€œThere’s a million cats around here,” Danny said, still without looking up. “I don’t pay attention to any of them.”
    Murphy turned and ran out the door and down the driveway.
    â€œMousetrap,” he called. A gray cat slept on the front porch and a black cat lay curled up on the hood of a pickup truck parked beside the driveway. He ran toward the bus stop and saw an orange and black and white cat wandering his way and a tabby cat perched on a bench.
    â€œMousetrap! Mousetrap!” he hollered at the top of his lungs. “Come here, Mousetrap!”
    He turned the corner and headed toward a part of the reserve where he had neverbeen before. Rows of houses lined up next to each other.
    â€œYou lost?” a boy shouted. It was the boy with the big front teeth and glasses.
    â€œMy cat is lost,” Murphy answered.
    The boy laughed. “You’ll never find him around here,” he said.
    Murphy ran to the end of the road, turned and headed back. His eyes darted under cars, down driveways, onto porches and up stairs. Mousetrap was nowhere to be found. Murphy ran home along the beach and checked between logs and in bushes, but still no Mousetrap.
    Murphy trudged back to Grandma’s house. “Mousetrap, please, where are you?” he said more and more quietly as he walked along. He checked in all the same places, but it was no use. Mousetrap was lost.

10
    Murphy had planned to collect stones from the beach after school. Instead, he crawled into bed and pulled the comforter over his head.
    The apartment was dark when Murphy opened his eyes and peeked out from under the covers.
    â€œMurphy,” Mom was calling. “Murphy, you here?” she called again.
    Murphy didn’t answer. Instead, he stumbled out from behind his blanket wall and up the stairs. He blinked his bleary eyes, not believing what he saw.
    â€œMousetrap?”
    He dashed across the room and lifted the cat from Mom’s arms. It was Mousetrap. But he didn’t have silky white hair. He had brown hair the color of gravy, hair that clumped together in wet bunches. Murphy hugged the scruffy cat while Mousetrap shivered and twitched the end of his tail.
    â€œWhere did you find him?” Murphy asked.
    â€œHe was sitting on the hood of an old pickup in front of Rudy’s place over by the gas station,” Mom said. “I had to look twice to make sure it was him. It’s pouring out there, but I don’t know how he got so dirty.”
    â€œThe gas station is a long way from here,” Murphy said.
    He grabbed a clean towel from the table and wrapped it tightly around his cat.
    â€œHow did he get out?” Mom asked.
    â€œGrandma must have come in,” Murphy said. “She left our laundry and mail on the table.”
    â€œWe better tell her,” Mom said. “Poor Mousetrap doesn’t know what to do outside.”
    She opened a bottle of canned salmon and dumped it into a bowl. Mousetrap jumped out of the towel and gobbled the fish. After supper, Mom combed Mousetrap’s hair while he slept so soundly that he didn’t even twitch when the comb snagged on a knot.

    Mom giggled. “I think he had a rough day,” she said.
    The next day after school, Murphy opened the apartment door and called, “Mousetrap.” He didn’t look under the bed or beside the computer. He knew that Mousetrap wasn’t hiding. He wasn’t home.
    A warm