It sits squeezed into the far corner behind Ove’s shed. It has little flecks of blood in its coat, or what’s left of its coat. Mutt bares its teeth; the cat hisses back.

“Don’t you hiss at Prince!” wails Weed, picking up another stone from Ove’s flowerbed and hurling it at the cat. The cat jumps out of the way; the stone hits the windowsill.

She picks up another stone and prepares to throw it. Ove takes two quick steps forward and stands so close behind her that she can most likely feel his breath.

“If you throw that stone into my property, I’ll throw you into your garden!”

She spins around. Their eyes meet. Ove has both hands in his pockets; she waves her fists in front of him as if trying to swat two flies the size of microwave ovens. Ove doesn’t concede as much as a facial movement.

“That disgusting thing scratched Prince!” she manages to say, her eyes wild with fury. Ove peers down at Mutt. It growls at him. Then he looks at the cat, sitting humiliated and bleeding but with its head defiantly raised, outside his house.

“It’s bleeding. So it seems to have ended in a draw,” says Ove.

“Like hell. I’ll kill that piece of shit!”

“No you won’t,” says Ove coldly.

His insane neighbor begins to look threatening.

“It’s probably full of disgusting diseases and rabies and all sorts of things!”

Ove looks at the cat. Looks at the Weed. Nods.

“And so are you, most likely. But we don’t throw stones at you because of it.”

Her lower lip starts trembling. She slides her sunglasses up over her eyes.

“You watch yourself!” she hisses.

Ove nods. Points at Mutt. Mutt tries to bite his leg but Ove stamps his foot down so hard that it backs off.

“That thing should be kept on a leash inside the residential area,” says Ove steadily.

She tosses her dyed hair and snorts so hard that Ove half-expects a bit of snot to come flying out.

“And what about that thing?!” she rages at the cat.

“Never you bloody mind,” Ove answers.

She looks at him in that particular way of people who feel both utterly superior and deeply insulted.

Mutt bares its teeth in a silent growl.

“You think you own this street or what, you bloody lunatic?” she says.

Ove calmly points at Mutt again.

“The next time that thing pisses on my paving,” he says coolly, “I’ll electrify the stone.”

“Prince hasn’t bloody pissed on your disgusting paving,” she splutters, and takes two steps forward with her fists raised.

Ove doesn’t move. She stops. Looks as if she’s hyperventilating.

Then she seems to summon what highly negligible amount of common sense she has at her disposal.

“Come on, Prince,” she says with a wave.

Then raises her index finger at Ove.

“I’m going to tell Anders about this, and then you’ll regret it.”

“Tell your Anders from me that he should stop stretching his groin outside my window.”