by Lyle, Dixie
Oscar gave me a long-suffering look. “Oh, very well,” he said. “Your canine companion seems to have made himself at home, you may as well do the same.” He opened the door all the way and ushered me in with a resigned wave.
The guesthouse was only a single story, a large central living room with an adjoining dining area and small kitchen. The kitchen was all spotless stainless steel, the stove never used, the fridge mostly for wine and a few snacks. Oscar had never cooked a meal in his life—he probably couldn’t even identify a can opener, let alone use one.
The room was neat and clean, of course, courtesy of the housecleaning staff, and decorated in designer furniture that looked both elegant and timeless; Oscar had picked it out himself, though ZZ was the one who’d paid for it. If he ever got really hard up for cash, he could always hock one of the chairs for a couple grand.
Oscar’s guest, currently perched on a titanium stool that probably cost more than my last vacation, viewed me with suspicion and a touch of hostility. “Francis, this is Ms. Lancaster, ZZ’s executive assistant, known to all and sundry as Foxtrot, for reasons that escape me. Foxtrot, this is Francis. He is rather excitable, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
“Hey!” said Francis.
“No need to demonstrate, Foxtrot has a keen mind for details. Now, as I said before—how can I help you?”
This was going to be harder than questioning the guests; Oscar wasn’t as smart as he thought he was, but he was still smarter than most. I’d given the matter some thought, and decided the best approach was to play on the fact that he’d just been busted for something else. “Oscar, where were you last night?” I kept my voice firm, my attitude stern.
“After dinner, you mean? Here, for the most part. Why?”
“What do you mean, for the most part?”
Normally Oscar wouldn’t put up with this kind of questioning from me, but I had him on the defensive due to his recent gambling debacle. “I went out, briefly. Francis was kind enough to pick me up, as Mother’s driver was occupied.”
Well, at least he didn’t try to drive drunk. “When did you get back?”
“Before ten, I’m sure. Francis dropped me off and I retired early.”
I could check with Shondra on that—she had motion detectors and things that kept track of comings and goings. Now, if my partner did his part—
Right on cue, Tiny darted across the room, heading for the hallway that led to the bedroom. Unfortunately, that’s where our luck ran out; the bedroom door was closed.
“Oh, good Lord,” Oscar muttered. “Foxtrot, will you please control your companion? I don’t understand why he’s here in the first place—our zoo is already overstocked.”
“I’ll get him,” Francis said. He bolted from his chair and down the hall ahead of me. Tiny was already there, sitting patiently. I was debating with myself how to get the door open without seeming obvious when Francis stepped between Tiny and the door.
Tiny growled.
Which didn’t faze Francis at all. He just smiled and said, “You’re gonna have to do better than that, pooch. I boss around bigger critters than you every day.”
“Tiny, cut it out. C’mon, let’s go.” I thought he was probably bluffing—all that biting someone would do was screw up our investigation. After a second, Tiny reluctantly got to his feet and followed me back out into the main room.
“He needs a collar,” Francis said. “And tags, for that matter.”
[And you need a bath. You smell like a horse barn.]
“Bigger critters, huh?” I said to Francis. “You work with animals?”
Francis glanced at Oscar, who was currently adding vodka to a glass of tomato juice. “Yeah. I’m a jockey.”
A jockey. Small, athletic, was on the grounds at around the right time—and worked with the kind of large animals that might occasionally require a powerful anesthetic.
“Is this your new role, Deidre?” Oscar said, stirring his drink with a small silver spoon. He only called me Deidre when he wanted to annoy me; it didn’t, but I pretended it did. If he was going to be vindictive, I preferred it be verbal and face-to-face. “Are you my parole officer as well as my accountant? Am I going to be required to void my bladder into a cup for your inspection, too?”
“I suggested that to your mother,” I said. “But she vetoed the idea—said any samples I collected would be a fire hazard.”
He saluted me with his drink, then took a sip.
I glanced at Francis. He looked nervous again; something about the conversation was making him uneasy. “Have you talked to Sheriff Brower, yet?” I asked Oscar.
“No. Why should I?”
“Because he’ll probably ask you the same questions I just did. I don’t care if you lie, but he might. That’s why I came down here—to give you a heads up.”
He studied me for a second, then gave me a grudging nod. “In that case, thank you. Not that I have anything to hide.”
“Of course not. Come on, Tiny.” I headed for the door. “Nice to meet you, Francis.”
“Yeah, likewise.”
I let myself out, Tiny in tow. “That could’ve gone better,” I said quietly once the door was shut.
[We can always come back later. For now, he remains a viable suspect.]
“Along with everyone else. About the only two people we’ve ruled out are ZZ herself and Mr. Kwok.”
[We haven’t talked to Juan Estevez or Kenny Gant yet.]
“Or the staff.”
The sun was high and hot enough now that I was glad the path back to the main house was shaded. The green of the lawn seemed too bright, like it was being illuminated from underneath.
[Oscar’s companion seemed ill at ease.]
“Yeah, he did. Oscar didn’t, but he’s slippery; he could, with great sincerity, warn you about the dangers of pickpockets while lifting your wallet.”
[Deception is a universal trait. Most species eventually discover its usefulness in mating, hunting, or evading predators—but yours is the only one that practices self-deception.]
“Oh, we excel at that. For instance, right now I’m trying to convince myself that I don’t really need to question every single member of the staff and search the entire estate.”
[You don’t. You just need to find out which staff members were actually on the grounds last night, which I’m sure Shondra can help you with. I can conduct a thorough outdoor search without you, and your passkey should get us into any staff quarters. It’s still a large job, but—]
“But I don’t need to set actual foot in the graveyard.”
He gave me a doggy look, one of those quick, sideways glances complete with raised doggy eyebrow. [Well. Perhaps not immediately.]
I waved my hand. “No, no. I’m good at a lot of things, but lying to myself isn’t one of them. If nothing else, maybe I can clear Keene—that’ll drop our suspect pool by one.”
[Interesting that you would choose him to eliminate as a suspect.]
“What’s that mean?”
[Nothing.]
“Choice has nothing to do with it. It’s just the logical way to proceed.”
[Of course. Very sensible.]
“Scentsible? Great. Not only do I have a partner who can use his nose to check my hormone levels, he makes bad puns about it.”
Tiny stopped and looked up at me seriously. [Foxtrot. Let’s get two things straight, shall we? First, I regard any information I might acquire via my sense of smell concerning your emotional state to be private, and therefore not to be commented on. Second, dogs do not pun.]
“Really?”
[Really. Most of us are quite literal. You don’t know how many times I’ve had to explain the concept of “irony” when another dog learns my name. It’s quite tiresome.]
“I’ll bet. If you hate it so much, why do you keep it? Or is that one of the rules you can’t explain?”
He didn’t say anything for a moment, just walked alongside me, panting in the heat. When he did speak, h
e sounded thoughtful. [No, it’s not that. I can choose to be called something different, if I wish. I keep it to honor the one who gave it to me.]
“You must miss them.”
We were close to the house now, and Tiny stopped again. This time he sat down and studied me intently. [No, Foxtrot. I don’t miss her at all.]
I stared down at him and frowned. “I’m sorry, did I say something wrong? I’m sorry if did—”
[That’s not it. When I talked to my superiors, I was given clearance to share additional information with you. But you can’t tell anyone else; that’s very important. Do you promise to keep what I’m about to tell you confidential?]
I didn’t hesitate. “Yes, of course. What is it?”
[I don’t miss my former owner because I just saw her.]
“I’m not following.”
[She’s dead, Foxtrot. Just like me.]
It took me a second to understand the implications. “So you’re saying … oh. Oh.”
I’m not stupid, all right? But I hadn’t had a moment to really sit down and think about all this supernatural stuff, or what it ultimately meant. Maybe a religious person wouldn’t think any of this was unusual, and the fact that animals have their own little afterlives wouldn’t be much of a shock.
But Tiny was talking about people.
I was an agnostic. I was pretty sure there was something else going on in the universe that mankind hadn’t quite figured out yet—I just didn’t know what it was.
Now I did. Sort of.
There was an afterlife. People went on. My grandparents, my aunt Gillian, all the people who ever lived and breathed and died before I was ever born—they were still somewhere. Weren’t they?
Maybe this all sounded obvious, but it wasn’t to me. My whole view of the world—of everything—had just changed. I felt a little dizzy, and put a hand against a nearby tree to steady myself.
[Are you all right? Do you need to sit down?]
“I’m fine,” I managed. “Wow. I feel really stupid and incredibly enlightened, all at the same time.”
[It’s a lot to take in, I know.]
“Can—can I ask you a few questions?”
[It’s best if you don’t. I’ll tell you what I can, how about that?]
“Sure. Go ahead.” I braced myself, both physically and mentally. The tree felt real and solid under my palm.
[Try to imagine the graveyard like a train station—]
“Where are you?” I said, glancing around.
I looked up. A black-and-white face looked back at me from a branch ten feet above.
[I assure you, I have the proper approval—]
“Love?”
[I was getting to that. I just wanted to her to envision the physical structure first—]
Tango snorted.
I was expecting a snarky retort from Tiny, but he said nothing for a moment. When he did reply, it was simply to say, [Well put. Continue.]
[Yes?]
[Heading from one place to another. Travelers crossing paths in a large central area.]
I was beginning to see how it worked. “So if, say, the spirit of a hamster wanted to visit her previous owner, she could scamper out of one grave, across the graveyard, and dive into another?”
[Not just any graves. The grave of a hamster, and the grave of a human being.]
“The cremains,” I murmured. Plenty of pet owners wanted to be interred with their pets, but state regulations wouldn’t allow anything but cremated remains—so while Fido got an actual burial, his owner would be perched on the headstone in a brass urn. “Does it work the other way around, too? Can human spirits visit the animal afterlives?”
<’Fraid not.>
“That doesn’t seem fair.”
[It’s not a question of fairness, Foxtrot; it’s a matter of respect. In life, pets are forced to live in the human world. In death, don’t they deserve their own?]
I had to admit he had a point. “I suppose they do. But what happens if the owner isn’t dead yet? Or gets buried someplace else?”
Tango jumped down from her perch, then stretched and yawned.
[Tango,] Tiny said warningly.
It was starting to sink in. “So the graveyard—it doesn’t just hold the ghosts of the animals that are buried there, any more than Grand Central Station houses all the people that pass through it. Ghosts come there from other places.”
[Exactly so.]
“Are there … a lot of them?”
Tiny looked at Tango. Tango stared off into the distance and didn’t say anything.
[You’ll see,] said Tiny.
* * *
But I didn’t, not right away. First I had to track down Juan Estevez and Kenny Gant and quiz them about where they were, talk to the rest of the household staff and find an excuse to have Tiny roam through their quarters—while remembering to periodically check in on ZZ and make sure she was still breathing—and do my regular job. But before she slipped away, Tango asked to speak with me privately for a moment, which is to say she told Tiny to get lost while she and I talked. He told me he would see me in a few minutes and lay down to wait.
Tango and I wandered over to the gardens. Just me and my dead cat …
We stopped by a bench and I sat down. Tango studied me without saying anything. That was something I’d seen her do many times over many years, but her keeping quiet was suddenly in the abnormal column.
“What?” l said.
“What? That’s not true. I do trust you—both of you. Honestly, you seem to have a better grasp of the situation than I do—”
“I don’t know why you’d say—”
I stared at her and didn’t reply.
“That’s not it. Not exactly.” I hesitated, trying to put into words what I barely understood myself. “I don’t think this is all in my head. But you…”
“You died,” I said quietly. “I loved you so much. I knew you my whole life and then you left. I know it wasn’t your choice but it hurt, more than anything else ever. I guess I’m still a little angry about that. And then to find out that not only are you not really gone but that you had whole other lives I don’t know anything about? I feel more than just angry about that—I
feel betrayed.” I realized that tears were running down my face and tried to cover them by turning my head and making a joke. “What, you couldn’t pick up a phone?”
Tango jumped up beside me.
I turned back to face her. Very carefully, she put one soft paw very gently on the back of my hand, the first physical contact we’d had since I found her on my doorstep. She looked, unblinking, into my eyes.
And then something broke inside me and I was laughing and crying and she didn’t say anything else, just leapt into my arms and my cat was back, she wasn’t dead, she was alive and warm and furry and oh God, I’d missed her so much. And she let me hold her tight and cry and tell her that I loved her, and she didn’t need to use words to answer me. Her purr did that, just like it always had, a strong, steady vibration straight from her heart to my own.
And when we were done she said,
Always.
* * *
Shondra was as good as her word: Every time I saw ZZ, her security chief was right there by her side. Staff quarters turned out to be easier than I figured—only ZZ’s cook and driver lived on site, the driver in an apartment over the garage and Ben Montain in three rooms behind the kitchen. Ben was in town picking up some groceries, so that took care of one problem. I felt more than a little guilty snooping through Ben’s stuff, though, so all I did was let Tiny in and then out again. He didn’t find anything.
Victor lived over the garage, but that didn’t mean his place was small; ZZ had quite a few cars, and the building that housed them was spacious. Tiny and I checked the garage itself first, and found Victor waxing the red Rolls-Royce that was ZZ’s favorite ride.
“Hello, Victor,” I said.
“Ms. Lancaster,” he said. He was one of the few people who didn’t call me Foxtrot; there was a certain stiffness to Victor’s personality that wouldn’t relax if you dunked it in a hot tub full of white wine and Valium. He was extremely good at his job, though, ferociously punctual, and as loyal to ZZ as a cult member to a messiah. I found him just a touch scary, but I got the feeling most people did.