by Clea Simon
Even Musetta seemed peeved with me. No toys waited for me, and my rotund little cat was nowhere to be seen when I got home. She finally came out as I was getting undressed, tackling me as I was pulling my blouse off over my head and biting—hard—at the top of my foot.
“Yow, kitty!” I hopped away and heard her scuttle. “Musetta, no!” Was Bill right? Had I indulged her to the point where she was becoming a bad pet? I dropped the shirt and saw her crouching, lashing her tail, just out of reach. “Or is it me?”
Without waiting for an answer, I retrieved her ribbon toy. Immediately she hunkered down, ears and whiskers pointing forward as her black butt twitched. There! She jumped and I jerked the ribbons back. She leaped again, paws extended to catch the fluttering toy. For five more minutes we kept this up, teasing and leaping until the jumps became lower and her attention seemed to wander.
“I’m sorry, Musetta.” I reached down to dig my fingers into the thick fur around her neck. “You’ve been all alone, and I’ve been so preoccupied. It won’t happen again.”
“Meh.” She stretched around to face me. We touched noses and I tried not to recoil from her breath. She’d been lonely. Bored. Was that the problem in Ellis’ life, too?
“There are no bad kitties, no matter what Bill says. There are only insensitive humans.” She mewed, and I had to laugh. Too many people in my life would have agreed with that tonight. Was I becoming unfit for human company? Now that Musetta was otherwise engaged, reaching carefully around her broad bottom to wash a spot near the base of her tail, I had to take my own question seriously. After all, here it was, Saturday night and not even close to last call. I was home, alone, with no plans to see any other humans. Not entirely true. I reached forward to scritch Musetta’s ears and got a look. I’d interrupted her. Tomorrow night was the fundraiser for the Helmhold House. Between Violet’s people, the musicians, and Bill’s staff, I’d bet almost everyone I knew would be there. But there was a good twenty hours before then, and I didn’t even have work to fill it.
Damn the Last Stand! Things had been good between us before Bill had bought that old bar and turned both our lives upside down. Musetta stopped washing for real and stared at me.
“You’re right, kitty. We had issues even then.” The difference had been that the issues had been Bill’s. He hadn’t liked my immersion in the rock scene. But I’d been happy, at least until he’d hurt his knee and taken early retirement.
And before Bill? Before then, I’d had my friends, and not just in the clubs. Sundays, for example, we’d meet up at Bunny’s house to gorge on French toast and the papers, or hit Chinatown to check out some dim sum place Tess had found, all of us marveling at how she never seemed to gain a pound. Even after Bunny had settled in with Cal, we’d kept up the ritual, and when we’d gotten to know Violet, she’d fit right in, leaving Caro at home to talk music and cats over midday feasts. So maybe it wasn’t me. Maybe it was Bill. I looked at Musetta and counted off the reasons. Bill was older than most of my friends. They were rockers. He was—had been—a cop.
Musetta got up to leave. “No, you’re right.” It wasn’t Bill, his age, or his various jobs. He’d let me into his life, and I’d slipped into my new habits willingly. Nor was it the club. Bill was happy with the Last Stand, or had been until this latest round of problems. Had he said someone was ripping him off? But my sweetie was resourceful. He’d figure it out. And we would, too. We needed to adjust and that had been hard, harder than I’d anticipated, but it was do-able. And if I missed my friends it was up to me to reach out to them. No, I needed to be honest. If I was going to get angry, I should be angry at whoever had killed my friend. That’s what had messed things up.
I laughed softly, and Musetta turned to give me one last look. “It’s nothing, kitty.” God, I was being selfish. Rachel’s murder had messed up my life? But it had, and if I wanted anything to get back to normal, I had to solve it.
Chapter Eighteen
“I still cannot believe you didn’t tell me. And, would you pass the butter?”
Bunny was on her third pancake and I wasn’t far behind. I hadn’t thought I’d be able to eat, at first, when Bunny called to remind me I was invited to brunch, with or without Bill. What with everything going on, I had told her about my work problems, but not about finding Rachel or about my arrest. I’d meant to, but going over it all again made it more real. Still, she was my friend, and I needed a morning off. And I was lucky; the Ralph story had bought me some sympathy, and she’d heard about Rachel already, thanks to the combined grapevines of the club scene and the Mail. After only minimal fireworks, she and her sweet husband had set to work, feeding me both information and those killer banana pancakes.
“I’m sorry, Bunny.” I figured periodic apologies were a small price to pay and handed this one up with the butter. “You know I am. Syrup?”
My large friend nodded. “I figured I’d get the whole story today. You’ve had a full plate. Speaking of which, another pancake?” I took two more without complaint. “So, tell me again, you think this other writer’s source, the one he won’t give you, was spreading lies about Rachel?”
“Uh huh.” I licked some syrup off my fingers. Bunny’s two cats were sleeping on the windowsill, but I think they would have approved. “I can’t help but wonder if there’s a connection between the whole no-kill controversy and Rachel’s death.”
“You do hear what you’re saying, right?” Cal poured me more coffee. Bunny was on herbal tea for the remainder of her pregnancy.
“Yeah, I know.” Out of guilt, I added a spoonful of strawberries to my plate before drenching the new stack with syrup. “It’s just that the policy is the only thing anyone seemed angry about.” I’d already told them about the letters, the ones calling Rachel a murderer, and about the search for an unhappy former employee. “But the shelter hadn’t fired anyone recently and, I mean, everyone wanted to work there.”
“So you’re thinking this was a no-kill murder?” The way Cal said it, I had to admit that, as a motive, a shelter policy was a lot more farfetched than plain old greed or lust. Still, I nodded.
“Well, let’s think about this.” Cal helped himself to another pancake. “What is this ‘no-kill’ pledge and what did those articles really accuse Rachel of?”
“It’s more a goal than a pledge.” I needed to stop eating. “Though some shelters say they’ve done it.” I poured myself more orange juice, liquids don’t count, and ran through the various programs. “Basically, you reduce the unwanted pet population through service, access, and, education. No Jack Russells for couch potatoes, for example. Or bitey cats where there are kids. But these articles say it was all window dressing, that the shelter was going to keep on euthanizing animals, they’d just find some excuse to say they weren’t healthy. And I don’t buy that. At the very least Rachel was starting up a foster program, I saw her notes. So I don’t know where those accusations were coming from. But, you know, a lot of money is involved. She raised as much as she could on the idea. She needed to, so she could get things moving and take care of all the animals that come in anyway.”
“So there wasn’t going to be much extra money floating around.” Cal looked thoughtful, but Bunny interrupted, stabbing the air with her fork.
“What about the lust angle? From the way you described it, your lawyer was looking at Piers, suggesting that he was jealous of someone else in Rachel’s life. But what if it was the opposite?”
“Rachel wasn’t the jealous type.” I thought of what Piers had told me. “If he had someone else, she would’ve just ended it.”
“But that’s just it!” Bunny was so excited now I had a flash of concern about her blood pressure. “He’s a guitarist. A boy in a band! He probably had a ton of women. What if one of the girls he had been seeing was ticked off that he’d gone all monogamous? Do we know who he dumped for her?”
I shook my head. Bunny was right in principle, but she’d not taken the extent of his good looks—or his laidback n
ature—into account. “He said there wasn’t any one woman. Nobody serious, he said.”
“To him!” Bunny used that exuberant fork to grab another pancake. “That doesn’t mean that some gal out there didn’t think they had potential, didn’t think that she was going to be the one.” She shrugged. “Might be worth looking into.”
“Maybe.” I hadn’t told my friends that I’d been accused of flirting with Piers. I really didn’t want to start asking around about his past affairs. “It just seems like there are other leads. I mean, what about the blood I saw?” I’d stopped talking about the blood on Musetta’s fur to almost everyone. But Bunny and Cal were family. I saw them exchange a look. “You do believe me, don’t you? Guys?”
“I believe you saw blood.” Bunny had a tone in her voice I recognized. “Or thought you saw blood.”
“Bun, this wasn’t a vision or the goddess sending me a warning or anything.” I wanted to respect her beliefs, I really did. But this was important. “This was real blood, and Violet saw it, too.”
“But you don’t know if it was human blood.” Cal’s objection had some weight, and I sighed. “I mean, you never were able to get it tested. At an animal shelter, isn’t it more likely that she came into contact with blood from an injured animal? Or even that maybe she’d drawn that blood? Theda, think about it. Say it was human blood. What’s to say that Musetta didn’t lash out at a vet tech or something?”
I shook my head. “Not this much blood.”
“So you’re saying, what? That the killer stabbed Rachel and then brought her back to the cat ward? Or stabbed Rachel and then went back to the cage room to pet Musetta? I mean, who else would do that except you or maybe Vi? The second part, I mean.” I sank back on the couch. That was always where my theory fell apart: the timing. “And another thing.” He and Bunny looked at each other again.
“Yeah?” I might as well hear it all.
“I hate to bring this up, but the Bun and I have been talking about it.” He paused and looked at his wife. She nodded ever so slightly. “It was Violet who first told you about the rumors, right?” I nodded. “Might it be possible, maybe, that Violet is the one who talked to that reporter?”
“Not likely.” I responded automatically, but even after a moment’s thought I dismissed the idea. “Why would she go to him when she knows both of us? And she didn’t work with Rachel. She runs her own shelter, so why would he trust her as a source?”
“So, you’re saying that Violet might have viewed Rachel as a competitor?” Cal spoke slowly, as if he were leading up to something. I saw it coming.
“No, no way.” I jumped up and looked over at Bunny. As a Wiccan, she believed that everything good and bad could bounce back at us, only three times as strong. This was slander and I waited for her to protest, too. To hear her deny our friend’s possible involvement and add her usual “blessed be.” I didn’t get it.
“Wait a minute, Theda. Cal has a point.” Maybe it was her belly that kept her from rising. Could she be that jealous that I’d called Violet to bail me out? That I hadn’t told her until now? What she was saying didn’t make sense. “I mean, Violet was the one who first told you about the euthanasia thing, and from what you said, she nearly got into it with Rachel when you went down there with the cat food.” She looked up at Cal, unwilling to continue.
“We’ve neither of us wanted to mention it, Theda, but you can see the logic of it yourself. I mean, who stands to gain if the city shelter loses its big donors? We all know how squeezed everyone is these days, and the Helmhold House is running out of money.”
***
We had planned to watch some movies while we digested, but I couldn’t wait to get out of there. As soon as the dishes were on the rack I made some excuse and left. After their bombshell, both my friends had been particularly solicitous. I didn’t want coddling. I wanted to believe in my friends, all my friends. As I drove home, I replayed the conversation in my head. What they had said, what Cal had put into words, just couldn’t be true. First, I couldn’t see Violet killing anybody. The girl had only recently started eating meat again. And if she did kill, it wouldn’t be for money. It would have to be for something she felt passionate about. To protect somebody; to stop an attack on a friend. Or, the thought crept in, on a cat. No, she wasn’t a fanatic. She’d have found another way.
“Crime of passion,” was that what Pilchard had said? Not premeditated? I shook my head. Especially now, when so much else seemed to be crumbling, I needed to keep my faith. What had seemed more promising was the idea of other romantic entanglements. Jealousy can be pretty painful, and I could easily see Piers as an object of adoration. And maybe Rachel’s past wasn’t as dead and buried as Piers had said.
Musetta pounced as soon as I’d opened the door, so I scooped her up and carried her over to the couch. My answering machine was flashing like a strobe and I reached to hit the button while cradling her in my arm.
“Hey babe.” It was Bill. Sensing my distraction, Musetta grabbed my forearm and started gnawing on my hand. “Are you up yet? Sorry I didn’t get over there last night.” We hadn’t made plans, but I was glad he’d thought about it. “Things were crazy here. On top of everything else, Ellis bit Neil. Hard. I’m beginning to worry about liability issues.” He laughed, but it sounded forced. He owned a business now; it was a real concern. I gently disengaged my hand and began rubbing the thick fur on the back of Musetta’s ruff. Maybe I should think about her training, too. Bill rattled on about the club, and I found myself enjoying the rhythm of his words. Maybe we were finally getting back to normal. “You’re coming tonight, right?” It wasn’t a question. “Love you.”
Musetta reached back to grab my hand, but I kept it behind her neck, refusing to be drawn in. The next message was from Violet. “So, don’t know if you heard. There’s going to be a memorial for Rachel next Sunday. I guess her family had a private funeral back wherever she’s from. This is being organized by Massio, the vet who’s taking over, at least for now. I guess they were friends.” Interesting. I wondered how welcome I would be. No matter, next weekend was an eternity away. “You’re coming tonight, right?”
The third message was more of a surprise. “Hey, Theda, it’s Tess.” I sat up, dislodging the cat. “I realized I was sort of distracted yesterday. I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything.” The pause lasted so long, I expected the machine to cut out. But Tess’ voice came back in time. “I guess I’ll see you tonight, huh?” And that was it.
“What do you make of that, kitty?” Musetta lay on her back, the afternoon sun warming her belly. “What’s going on with Tess?” I couldn’t resist and reached over to the soft white fur. But this time, when she started to bite, I withdrew. “Sorry, kitty. We’re turning over a new leaf.”
With that in mind, I walked back to my computer. First up was a combination thank you and apology to Patti. I knew she didn’t check her email often, and that I really should call her. But this was a lot easier than explaining my behavior of the previous night. I was tempted to email Pilchard, too. He had an address on his card. But he’d cautioned me about that on Friday, stressing that my privacy could be, in his words, compromised. I wanted to make some suggestions, pass along Cal’s idea about other women, but it would hold till Monday office hours. Who knew? Maybe I’d have more to tell him after the benefit.
Musetta came into the back room, then, and leaped to her usual perch on top of my file cabinet. The sun hit at an angle, highlighting her fur. “You’re a beautiful cat, do you know that?” She blinked once and lowered her head for a nap. I watched her for a while, the slow rise and fall of her side making her guard hairs glisten. What would I do without her? More important, what arrangements should I be making, just in case my trial went badly?
I shook my head. The thought wasn’t worth thinking, but once it had crept in I couldn’t shake it. Suddenly, I wanted to be outdoors, enjoying the air, the city. My freedom of movement. The day had turned fine, and I longed to see if any early
rowers were out on the river. This sun would be sparkling off the water, catching the little waves brought up by the breeze.
But on the off chance that I still had a life in front of me, I needed to finance it. Let me just get a couple of proposals out, then I’d reward myself with a run and maybe give Musetta a good brushing, too.
An hour later, and I’d managed to work up two queries. I realized belatedly that if I was banned from the Mail, that meant that I couldn’t pitch the paper’s Home section editor. I was halfway into a proposal about container gardens when it hit me that I had to find another market. A quick web search gave me the name of the new editor at City magazine, but that meant I couldn’t send my summer drinks pitch to her. That went, instead, to a new food and wine magazine that I’d picked up a week ago. I hated writing for startups. Half the time they disappeared before paying, and even when they did stick around they were prone to changing their editors frequently in their first year. But if I got in, now, before everything shook down, maybe Dish It Up! would become a regular client. Could I switch from writing about music to writing about food? The thought alone made me hungry again, much to my own amazement. I hit send and contemplated lunch.
But first a run. The weather was perfect. Cool but bright, and I knew I’d work up a sweat by the time I got down to the Charles. The first tune up was an oldie, and it made me think of that show I’d missed at Bill’s. Had that only been last week? It served to get me into a good rhythm, though, and when the next came on I was ready for a sprint. The sidewalk was damp and I kept my eyes down. One wet leaf and I’d wipe out. But it was fine to be outside, wonderful to be stretching and breathing hard. I knew I should be thinking about my case, about Rachel, and the shelter. For just a little while, though, I wanted to enjoy the day. I didn’t know how long I had, and I intended to savor every minute.
The river was as beautiful as I’d hoped. I saw an eight-man boat, oars extended while the coxswain yelled something unintelligible. Further down, two single sculls moved like waterbugs, skimming the surface and leaving hardly any wake. The path wasn’t crowded; not like it would be in a month. But the few runners who went by nodded and smiled. We were all glad to be out as winter ebbed. Even the trees looked ready for spring, small hard buds reaching up to the sun. Leaves would follow in just a few more weeks. I hoped I’d be here to see it.