Cat Breaking Free

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

  Yawning, their stomachs full of kippers and smoked salmon, of imported cheeses, shrimp salad, and rare roast beef from the alley behind George Jolly's Deli, the three escapees curled up among the leaves in purring contentment. They were deep down into the most welcome sleep when a lone car woke them, slowing on the street below and pulling to the curb.

  "Clyde's car!" Kit hissed, peering out the door as Dulcie and Joe leaped out and looked immediately up into the tree. "Wake up," she hissed. "Run!" This was not the time to be found though the three ferals so badly needed rest. Kit, herself, did not want to be found; but she didn't want to think about why she didn't. Clyde was getting out.

  Swiftly she led the ferals out the window and into the next oak tree, and the next and the next until at last far away they scrambled down to a distant yard. And they ran.

  Maybe Joe and Dulcie didn't hear us, Kit thought. When they go up in the tree house-which they would surely do- maybe they won't smell us. The ferals, coming through the village gardens, had rubbed against and rolled on every strongly scented bush they could find, to hide their own scent that was so strong and ugly after that stinking cage. So maybe Joe and Dulcie would discover only a windy miasma of garden smells that could easily have blown in from the surrounding yards, and no smell at all of cats.

  Maybe.

  But now they were safely away, hiding among the far houses, and Kit looked back to her treetop.

  There was Dulcie looking out.

  But with the tree house empty, surely they would leave soon. She thought she would make up to them later, for their useless search.

  And it was there in her heart, what she meant to do. The thrill had been there all along, waiting inside her. The wild free days from her kittenhood. Forgetting all the hunger and cold and pain of that time, she remembered only that unfettered running, traveling on and on across the empty hills running with the ferals. Those wild and giddy feelings filled her right up; and with her little entourage, Kit leaped away through the dark gardens mad with pleasure, heading for the far hills.

  In the treehouse, though Joe and Dulcie could smell the medley of scents the cats had collected on their fur, those aromas did not hide completely the sour stink of caged cats. They could smell, too, that Kit had led the cats here by way of Jolly's alley, could detect a faint but delectable melange of salmon and fine cheeses. Dulcie, looking down into the dark gardens, felt incredibly hurt. "Why did she leave? Why did she lead them away?" She looked at Joe, sad and worried.

  "They'll be watching us," Joe said.

  "But why…?"

  "Kit doesn't want to be found, Dulcie. Kit is having a lark."

  "But she knows we would worry."

  "Best thing we can do is leave her alone, let those cats get on with their escape and their own lives. Then," he said, "Kit will come home." He wished he believed that.

  "Will she? She isn't… She won't…"

  "The kit," Joe said, "will do exactly what she wants to do. We can't change her. She's crazy with the excitement of the rescue, she feels big and powerful, invincible. These are her old clowder mates, Dulcie." His yellow eyes burned. "We can't run her life. Let her be, and she'll come home." But he looked away and licked his paw, hoping he was right.

  "If she doesn't…" Dulcie said miserably, "if she goes off with them…"

  Joe just looked at her. "There is nothing we can do. The kit must decide this for herself." And he turned away and left the tree house, backing swiftly down the oak with clinging claws and leaping into Clyde's car.

  Reluctantly Dulcie followed, silent and worrying. What would they tell Lucinda, tell Pedric? That Kit had been there and gone again, that she didn't want to be found? What could they tell the old couple that would not break their hearts?

  Dulcie knew that Joe was right. Kit had a powerful wild streak, a crazy headlong hunger for freedom, and they could only let her be.

  But Kit had chosen to live with Lucinda and Pedric because she loved them. Now, would she at last return to them?

  I'm worrying too soon. She isn't gone yet, not for good. She's only leading the ferals through the village, showing them the best way, how to avoid heavy traffic. If Joe and I try to force her back now, we would only bully her. We can't force her to be safe and loved, we can only trust in her judgment. And miserably Dulcie curled up on the cold seat of the car, ignoring Joe and Clyde. She remained lost and sad as Clyde carried her into Wilma's house and put her in Wilma's arms.

  For a long time after Dulcie went to sleep beside Wilma, beneath the flowered quilt, Wilma lay in the warm glow from the bedroom fire, not reading the book she held but seeing the ferals and Kit racing away through the chill wind.

  "Something in Kit's eyes," Dulcie had said. "When Clyde freed us and Kit went out that window, when she turned and looked back at me, something so wild-that look she gets…" And Dulcie had sighed, and hidden her face in the crook of Wilma's elbow. Then later, just before she slept, Dulcie had roused and looked up at her. "I would miss her so. I don't want her to go back." And long after Dulcie did sleep, long after Wilma put her book on the night table and switched off the lamp and curled up around Dulcie, still she kept seeing Kit out there running in the night beside those untamed, joyous cats.

  When Clyde and Dulcie and Joe had gone, the car gone, the street empty and the night silent again, Kit and the ferals returned to the tree house. There the ferals curled up once more, deep within the pile of oak leaves, and they slept. They needed to rest, needed to heal, before they made that last frenzied dash up into the open hills. For the first time in weeks they truly did rest; no crowding against each other and into a dirty sandbox, no shouting human voices to alarm them, no bars, no padlock. It was well past midnight when they left Kit's sanctuary, moving swiftly through the village shying away from the glow of shop windows, the fleeing cats no more than shadows. Above them behind reflecting glass golden light illuminated worlds of human artifacts, Gucci handbags, Western boots, red satin nighties and candied cactus, items of which these cats knew nothing. With the cats' shadows flashing across pale walls like the ghosts of long-dead cougars, Kit led them on a circuitous route avoiding the brighter streets. Surely Luis and Tommie wouldn't come looking, but still she was nervous. She guided them up to the rooftops among the chimneys and penthouses where they glanced into high windows and down through skylights into strange human worlds. They left the roofs at the little park that crossed over Highway One.

  Racing up through tame residential gardens, they at last fled beneath fences into pastures where cattle slept. The full moon was setting when they bolted across Highway One and into the tall forests of grass that blew across Hellhag Hill.

  Up through the windy grass racing and leaping, the ferals knew their way here; but still they followed Kit. They heard no threatening sounds, and no swift shadows paced them. Above them the sky grew darker as the moon set, and far below, the silver sea darkened. They were back in their own wild world, and still Kit ran with them. No one asked her why. Cotton, white as a ghost in the dark night, bolted ahead of the others wild for the far, empty reaches. Coyote waited for Willow; his long ears and encircled eyes, in the darkness, making him look indeed like a strange and uncatlike predator. It was Willow who kept glancing at Kit, wondering. Wondering if Kit meant to stay with them or go back. Willow thought that even Kit didn't know the answer. High on Hellhag Hill, the four cats paused.

  Below them gleamed the endless sea with its drowned mountains. Kit said, "Does the sea run on to eternity? Humans don't think so. What is eternity?" But then she looked up at Hellhag Cave, looming black, high above them. If that was eternity, she didn't want any part of it. Cotton and Coyote were staring as if they wanted to go in there, but Kit pushed quickly on. "I don't like it there, it's all elder there." She made a flehmen face and they galloped away to a happier verge where they rolled on gentler turf and groomed themselves. There Kit curled up to rest against a boulder watching the others, her thoughts teeming with daydreams and uncertainties.

/>   We could have our own clowder, we don't have to go back to Stone Eye. The four of us, off on our own. We don't need Stone Eye.

  The night's siren song of freedom sang loud in her heart, running unfettered beneath the moon and wind turning her drunk with excitement. They would have their own clowder, beyond Stone Eye and beyond the world of humans.

  But then she curled smaller against the boulder. I would never again see Lucinda and Pedric. I would never again be loved like they love me. Like Joe and Dulcie love me and all my human friends. Pressed tight against the boulder, steeped in a fugue of uncertainly, Kit did not know what she wanted.

  A thin, dawn fog began to rise hiding the sea; lights appeared on the road far below, careening around the verge of the hill: two cars with spotlights blazing out of their windows to sweep the hill-the kind of spots a hunter would use to shine and confuse a deer, freeze it in its tracks before he shot it. The four cats closed their eyes and melted away up the hill where a stand of boulders offered shelter.

  Kit thought of hiding in Hellhag Cave where they would never be found, slip deep into the earth where no human would ever see them. Yes, so deep they might never get out again.

  Lucinda, who knew so well the world of Celtic myth, thought Hellhag Cave might lead to places where no sensible cat would want to go. The idea that Hellhag Cave's fissures might drop away forever had once thrilled Kit. Not anymore.

  The two cars had pulled onto the shoulder. The headlights went out. The doors opened and five men emerged. As they crossed the road and began to run up the hill swinging their searching beams, the gusting sea wind carried the faint scent of Luis and of Tommie McCord.

  The cats fled up the high precipice that rose above Hellhag's grassy slopes, up into steep rocky verges that would slow or stop a man. Up cliffs that could, on this dark night, be dangerously deceptive to a human. Kit was drunk with excitement-she was feral, born to fear and escape. Heady memories filled her as the spotlights gained on them, violent bright shafts knifing close. She scrambled up the cliffs panting so hard she could hardly breathe; and on they raced, drawing away at last to lose their pursuers in steep, rocky blackness.

  Three of the men stopped and stood arguing and at last turned back, heading down toward their cars. Only Luis still climbed. Behind him Tommie McCord stood halfway up the hill shouting, "Enough! Not chasing cats anymore." They heard a tiny scratch as Tommie stopped to light a cigarette; they saw the flame and smelled the smoke. Luis pushed on, grunting.

  "Don't care what kind of money they're worth!" Tommie yelled. "I'm not climbing any more hills."

  "Do what you want!"

  But Tommie raced up at him suddenly, lunged and grabbed Luis by the shoulders. "This crazy idea of Hernando's! Get your mind on business." Pulling Luis close, Tommie stared into his face. "I don't care what they're worth, to the movies, to God Himself. I don't care what they know. I'm not messing with any more cats!"

  Luis hit him, hard. They fought across the hill pounding each other, reeling and punching until Luis sent Tommie sprawling. And Luis raced on uphill, leaving McCord groaning on the ground. The cats fled up the stony crest and skidded and tumbled into a rocky canyon too steep for any man; loose gravel scudded down around them.

  But the danger didn't stop Luis. He came crashing down between the boulders sliding so precipitously the cats were certain he'd fall; they prayed he would fall, that they'd be done with him. As he came sliding down like an avalanche they leaped to the narrow rocky bottom of the ravine and up the other side, scrabbled up between hanging rocks and over the next crest into deep woods.

  Swiftly they climbed a tall pine up into dense foliage. From among the concealing branches they watched Luis circle below them until at last he turned away and, swearing, started his slow progress back down the cliffs.

  Exhausted, the cats curled among the branches and closed their eyes. They slept so deeply they hardly heard, far away, Luis's car start and head, alone, back toward the village.

  34

  The chill February morning was still dark. Max, having kissed Charlie good-bye as she worked at her computer, shrugged on his jacket and headed out to his truck. Over Charlie's protests, he'd been eating breakfast in the village all week so she could work. For two weeks she'd been out of bed by four, was showered and at the computer within twenty minutes, a cup of coffee by her side. She always brought a thermos of coffee into the bedroom for him to enjoy when he woke.

  Heading across the stable yard to his truck, he glanced to the pasture where he had turned the three horses out, smiling at the way they tore at the fresh spring grass. Since Charlie started on the book, he had returned to his old routine of feeding the dogs and horses as he had done before they were married. In the last six months, Charlie had royally spoiled him.

  The book she was working on pleased him very much; she knew animals, but this story was amazing. And it and the illustrations totally absorbed her. Turning onto the main road, he looked off across the pasture again where Bucky and Redwing had begun to play, chasing the two dogs.

  Charlie's project had started out as a short, children's book, but was turning into a much longer and more complicated story, into a book for all ages; it reminded him of the horse and dog stories he'd read as a boy. He wouldn't have chosen cats to write about, but Charlie understood them amazingly well, her words rang so true that he had begun, himself, to understand the small felines better. As he reached the end of the drive he was surprised to glimpse a cat tearing across the pasture as if terrified, as if racing for its life. Stopping the truck, he tried to see what was chasing it, half expecting a coyote or bobcat. It must be a cat from one of the small ranches. Swinging the door open he stepped out thinking to turn the predator aside. Or, if it was a cougar, he'd run it off and go back to tell Charlie and to shut the horses and dogs in the barn.

  But behind the fleeing cat, nothing else moved in the green grass; and suddenly the preoccupied cat saw him. It disappeared at once. It would be crouching low in the grass-yes, he could just make out its dark shape, deadly still; as if it was more afraid of him than of whatever chased it. He watched until he was certain nothing approached it, then headed on down to the village. Maybe the cat had, like the horses and the two pups on this chill morning, only been playing-running for pure joy in the cold, early dawn.

  Parking near the Swiss Cafe he moved in across the patio to the back table to join Dallas and Juana Davis. Clyde was there this morning, too. Stopping to give the waiter his order, he sat down with his back to the wall; he reflexively glanced above him.

  From within the thick jasmine vine Clyde's gray tomcat peered down at him, his yellow eyes returning his stare as bold as some skilled confidence man.

  Clyde grinned. "He was hungry. I get tired of cooking for him."

  Max looked at the cat, and looked at Clyde. "You order yet? I'm surprised the cat doesn't order for himself."

  "He orders too much. Gets expensive."

  Dallas laughed, then went silent while their orders were served. Max thought the cook must have seen him walk in the door; he nearly always ordered pancakes. He watched Clyde set a small plate up on the wall. Clyde said, "Slayter called Ryan again last night, wanted her to meet him again, was really pushy. She turned the speaker on so I could listen, told him she was busy. He said he desperately needed her help." Clyde grinned. "She told him to call 911." He glanced at the other tables, but the people around them were deep into their own conversations, a bunch of guys arguing about baseball, one couple so involved with each other they wouldn't have known if an earthquake hit the restaurant. "He told Ryan he's up here looking into a shooting in L.A., that he followed the suspect up here, that he's working as a private investigator."

  Davis said, "Did he tell her what shooting?"

  "Something that happened during a bank robbery. Said the case is still open."

  "If he's legitimate," Davis said, "he'd have come to us, share information."

  "She told him that. Slayter told her LAPD was accuse
d of killing the guy. Unnecessary force during a bank holdup. Said there'd been an investigation and two officers had been suspended-that it was those officers who hired him to find out who did kill him."

  "Who was the victim?" Max said. "Did Slayter mention a name?"

  "A Frank something."

  "Frank Cozzino," Dallas said.

  Clyde nodded.

  Davis spread marmalade on her toast. "Slayter wanted Ryan to pass him departmental information. Wanted her to pump us. Interesting."

  "Sleazebag," Dallas said casually.

  Clyde was silent, looking from one to another. Above him, Joe Grey belched. Everyone laughed. Clyde looked up at the tomcat, scowling. He couldn't mouth off to Joe-with sufficient prodding, who knew what the tomcat might do. Joe looked back at him, smug as cream.

  Max said, "Frank Cozzino was a snitch for LAPD. He worked for several gangs, gathering intelligence for them on some high-powered burglaries. Then he started passing the information on to L.A. Looks like that got him dead.

  "He and the DA managed the cases so smoothly that it was a long time before anyone caught on that he'd furnished the information. When one of the gangs made him on it, someone took him out and tried to make it look like the uniforms did it. Of course L.A. got the blame." Harper finished his coffee and set down his cup. "L.A. has the bullet but they've never come up with the gun."

  Dallas finished his breakfast and laid half a slice of bacon up on the wall, making Clyde smile. "Maybe those two guys did hire Slayter. But if he's up here for that, why hasn't he come to us? Why try to go through Ryan to find out what we have?"

  Davis finished her coffee, wiped her hands on her napkin, and straightened her uniform jacket. Tucking a five and some ones under the ketchup bottle, she rose. "You want to go over that matter you mentioned, Max?"

  Harper nodded, reaching for her money to add to his own.

  "I'll make a pot of coffee," Juana said. "I made empanadas last night, we can warm them up later."