“Sure,” she said.
“Really?” I didn’t entirely believe her. “I thought a lot of the homeowners opposed the TNR program, and cats?”
“Some do,” she said. “My friend Sally is vice-president of the homeowners’ association. And she’s passionate about the cats. She drummed up a lot of support, and they took a vote about allowing this set-up through the winter. Then we’ll reassess.”
I had more questions, but Hutchinson and two uniformed officers appeared from around the corner of the building. Hutchinson waved but walked with the officers to the perimeter of the damage. I heard one of them let out a long whistle. After they had taken a good look, Hutchinson and one of the others, a young woman with dark hair and ice-blue eyes, walked over to us.
“Ladies,” said Hutchinson, nodding. “This is Officer Lindemann. She has a few questions.”
“Are you on this case, Homer?” asked Alberta.
Hutchinson shook his head. “Not officially, but I asked my lieutenant to let me take a look because this might be linked to the other vandalism on your house.” He looked me up and down and said, “You look cold.”
“Freezing,” I said, and realized my body was shaking again, although not so violently as before. “I can’t seem to warm up.”
“You can go in a minute,” said Officer Lindeman. “I need you to answer a few questions first.”
My teeth started to chatter, but I clamped them together and answered her questions—when had we found the damage, were any animals hurt, had we touched anything, and so on. I told her I had taken photos and she gave me her email address so I could send them, promising to print any she wanted once she had seen the digital versions.
When she was gone, I started again to excuse myself, but Hutchinson asked Alberta, “How are the kitties?”
“Doing great,” she said. “You must come see them.”
Hutchinson looked at me, his eyes sparkling. “Their eyes are open now, you know.”
Who couldn’t smile back at such news delivered with such wonder? I wondered whether my lips were blue. The police had just finished marking the area off limits when a small gaggle of people appeared. They were talking in friendly tones but walking toward us as if in a race. Reporters. I decided it really was time to make myself scarce before they trapped me there and I froze to death.
The wind was in my face all the way back to my van. I tried to run, but my eyes teared so much that I couldn’t see, so I walked with my head down and shoulders hunched. My hair whipped around so wildly I thought it might just blow away. At least without my camera I could keep my hands stowed in my pockets. Note to self: Winter is coming. Soon. Outfit your car.
Something was flapping in the wind. I could hear it as I crossed Alberta’s side yard and approached the driveway. Had I not noticed a flag out here? But when I was a few feet from my van and finally looked up, I saw it. A big sheet of poster board flapped crazily from its duct-tape anchor on my windshield. “What the … ?” I grabbed the near edge and pulled, but whoever taped the thing to my van meant it to stay there, at least for a while. I needed better leverage.
I opened the back of my van and looked for something I could stand on. My grooming box would have been perfect—big and sturdy—but I had taken it to the garage to tidy Jay’s coat up before the agility trial. The only thing I could find was the small plastic tackle box I used to hold a few basic tools—hammer, pair of screwdrivers, pliers. It would have to do.
It didn’t do at all. I could barely fit both feet on it, and as soon as I leaned over the windshield, the stupid box tipped out from under me. If I could get into Alberta’s garage … I tried the front door, hoping it would be open. No luck. When I turned away from the front porch, the little creep who had been stalking me was standing between the two houses across the street, sporting the navy hoody this time. “I hope you freeze your noogies off,” I muttered.
The poster board smacked flat against my windshield and I saw that there was writing on it, albeit faint and hard to see. Pencil, maybe. I grabbed the bottom corner and yanked. The tape held to the glass, but I managed to tear off about two-thirds of the sheet. I had to play with the angle to get the light just right on the graphite before I could read it. “Take you’re camera and go.” You’re a moron, I thought, and your spelling sucks. Any inclination I may have had to laugh went up in smoke when I read the next line, written near the bottom of the sheet. It said, “Remember: the fire next time.”
“What’s that?”
I think I might have sailed right over my van if I’d had any forward momentum, I jumped so high. The voice was right behind me.
“Sorry,” said Hutchinson. “Sorry.” He reached for the poster board in my hand. “What is that?” I handed it to him and he said, “That’s the same as the note to Alberta. ‘The fire next time.’ I don’t like this at all.”
“Hutch, don’t make a big deal, but if you look across the street, the guy who’s been watching me is over there, between the houses.” Honestly, I wanted him to make a big deal. I wanted him to catch the guy and find out why he—or she—was following me around, and whether the stalking and this threat were connected.
“There’s no one there now,” he said. He was right. I wondered whether he thought I was making this up, but he said, “I’ll take a look around.”
The warming effects of the adrenaline had worn off, and my shivering came back at a whole new level. Hutchinson said, “Get in and start the van and warm up.”
“But I can’t drive …”
“Get in. I’ll get that crap off your windshield.”
He was back in five minutes with a step stool, a can of adhesive remover, and a putty knife. I stepped out of the van and asked where he got all that.
“I keep a lot of stuff in my trunk. You never know when you’ll need it.”
My motto exactly.
I watched him work from inside my warm vehicle and tried to think, but I was too tired and too cold. The same four thoughts played over and over.
I want my normal, boring life back.
I want to talk to Tom.
I want to curl up on the couch with my dog, cat, and a hot toddy.
I don’t ever want to talk to Tom again. How could he … ?
Hutchinson got the tape and most of the adhesive off and signaled me to open the window. “It’s not perfect, but you can see to drive.” He held the bottle of remover toward me. “You want this?”
“Thanks, I think I have some.”
“Okay, then.” He stepped back from the van. “See you.”
Traffic was light and I made it home in record time. Leo was perched on his favorite length of windowsill, and when I pulled into the driveway, Jay popped up behind him on the couch. Home. All I wanted was a quiet evening at home.
forty-seven
My house was quiet. If I hadn’t been nodding off on the couch with Leo purring on my chest and Jay mostly on my lap, all fifty-five pounds of him, I might have said it was too quiet for eight o’clock. As it was, though, I probably needed a little down time after the bone- and spirit-chilling events of the afternoon. The van had warmed me up on the drive home, but once I was there, it took only five minutes outside with Jay to set my teeth to clacking again, even bundled up with coat, hat, and mittens. I fed the critters and opened a can of chunky vegetable soup, but once I had it in a bowl in the microwave, I realized there was no way around it. I was still chilled.
Twenty minutes later I stepped out of a hot shower, dried off, pulled off the shower bonnet I had pilfered from a motel ages ago, and jumped into pink polar fleece pajamas with dancing penguins, two pairs of thick slipper socks, and my ancient thick-chenille bathrobe. Warm at last. My face felt chapped from the wind, so I captured my crazy hair in a headband and slathered on some moisturizer. I gazed at the frump looking back from my mirror and told her, “Just look what that silly man is
missing.” My phone was on the counter beside the sink, and for half a second I considered taking a selfie, but quickly came to my senses. What kind of advertisement would that be for my own photography?
The soup came out of the microwave way too hot to eat, so I treated
it as a sort of inhalant while I munched crackers and sorted my mail from the past couple of days. I couldn’t help noticing a pattern in the messages plastered across the junk-mail envelopes. Don’t Miss Out! Act Now! … Before it’s too late! I gathered them up and chucked them into the recycle bin.
Leo strolled into the kitchen and lay down with Jay on the big red dog bed in the corner. They both watched me as if waiting for an explanation. “What?” I asked. Jay swiveled his head and Leo tucked his front feet under his chest. “Just lie down,” I said, which was ridiculous since they already were.
I hunched over my soup and tested a spoonful. It was tomato-y and rich, and I closed my eyes and tracked the heat slipping through my throat and chest and into my stomach. I tried to shut everything else out and let eating become a mindful meditation. Lift the spoon, hold while the good, earthy fragrance of roots and leaves and the fruit of the tomato vine rises into your consciousness. Blow gently. Let the fire go but hold the warmth and take it in.
Jay sighed and I looked at the big red bed. He and Leo had apparently given up on me and were sleeping, my little orange cat snuggled tight against the side of my dog’s head. Suddenly I realized that I missed the big black dog. It wasn’t so much that Drake and Tom were absent tonight. That wasn’t unusual, since we spent maybe half our nights together. But knowing they would soon both be gone for months, maybe a year, maybe even longer, created a gaping void in what had become, over the previous months since I’d met them, my life.
If that’s what he wants, fine, I thought. I cleared the table and put the kettle on. Goldie’s lights were on and there were two cars in her driveway and two more parked at the curb. Must be her book club night, or meditation, or … I was happy for her that she was back in the social swing that she had let go while she was ill, but a little disappointed that she wasn’t available for a chat. I walked to the big red bed, squatted down, and stroked Jay and Leo. “At least we have each other, right boys?” Leo opened one eye, gave me the “I’m sleeping” look, and curled up. Jay stretched his back legs and relaxed back into his snooze.
I sat down at the table with a cup of Earl Grey and unwrapped a bar of dark chocolate, because if nearly freezing to death isn’t a reason to eat chocolate, I don’t know what is. As the bittersweetness spread across my tongue, my thoughts spread out as well, beginning with events of the afternoon. Who in the world had taped that odd threat to my windshield, and why? I had been threatened before for taking photos of things someone wanted to remain unseen, but images of dormant woods and wetlands in the bleakness of November didn’t seem worth the trouble. Or was it because of my involvement, sparse as it was, with Alberta’s cat colony? And who in the world was that creepy person who was, apparently, stalking me? There was something familiar in the posture, but I couldn’t put the pieces together.
My thoughts traveled back, then, to earlier events. The thought of those ugly chunks of rock rendered even uglier by the orange spray paint made me smile. I couldn’t understand why anyone would think those bland bits of limestone made for a better pond’s edge than the natural grasses and reeds, and the thought of destroying habitat that nurtured the trilling blackbirds and myriad other creatures filled me with fury and hollowed me out all at once. Did the people who made these decisions simply not understand the environmental impact, or was there more to it? I thought about the little group who had been there to survey the area that was at risk, and that led my wandering mind back to Tom.
Admit it, said my Janet demon. You think about Tom all the time, even when you’re not thinking about him.
I moved on to thoughts of the police car, and Robin’s friend being guided into it, handcuffs on her wrists, the police officer’s hand on her head, and defiance on her face. Who else was in that car? Someone had been arrested for vandalizing the rocks and the bulldozer. That would delay destruction of the pond’s edge by a day or two at best, I knew, unless the activists were successful in their legal efforts. I decided to call a few people later and see whether my photos would be of any use to them. I wished I had gone out in summer as I’d talked about. The greens of summer are much more appealing than browns and grays.
Browns and grays. Tom flashed into my mind’s eye again, the brown of his eyes, the gray edges of his hair.
Go away.
Dammit, come back.
What time is it? All my time-keeping devices were in the other part of the house, so I pulled my robe around me and padded off to the bathroom. In my half-frozen state when I got home, I had tossed my jeans into the hamper without emptying the pockets. I found them under several other articles of clothing and pulled out my cell phone and my watch. It was almost nine. I had two messages.
The first came in late afternoon, and I recognized the number. Giselle. I realized for the first time that I hadn’t seen her with the environmental group at the pond. She had been pretty excited about the trip when I talked to her at Dog Dayz and I had expected her to be there. Something must have come up. I’d call in a few minutes.
The other message was from Tom. “Hi, you … Sorry we didn’t get to talk today. It didn’t seem like the right place … Anyway, I’m glad your mother is doing better.” Oh, crap, I need to call Norm and Bill, I thought, still listening to Tom’s message. “So, call me when you get this, okay? It’s, uh, seven p.m. on Wednesday. I … Okay, call me.” There was a long silence, as if he might have wanted to say something else, before the message cut off.
Something told me I wasn’t going to enjoy either conversation, and I had an almost overwhelming urge to turn off both phones and crawl into bed with my dog and cat and a good book.
forty-eight
Leo got up, stretched, and strolled over to rub himself against my fleece jammies. One second he was on the floor, the next he was on the table, leaning toward me with his squinty “I love you” look. We bumped noses and I said, “So, Catman, we didn’t get our practice session in today.”
He yawned, which I took to mean he could run the agility course backward with his eyes closed. But his eyes were wide open and he was looking right into me. I stroked his head and he pushed the top of it into my palm. I glanced at Jay. He was on his back, hips rolled one way and front legs the other, like a loosely wrung towel. His head was tilted back and gravity had pulled his upper lips into a passive snarly face. I looked at Leo and said, “Your brother looks like a doofus.”
He said, mmmrrrwwwwllll.
“So, what do you think?” I asked my cat. “Should I return those calls?”
“Mmmrrrwwl.”
“Should I call Giselle first, or Tom?”
He kept his opinion on that to himself and jumped down, so I pushed Tom’s speed dial button and was about to push “call” when my land line rang. I picked it up.
“Janet, I’m so upset? I don’t have a lawyer, should I talk to your, Bill’s … you know, I don’t know …”
When she stopped, I said, “Giselle? What’s happened? Why do you need a lawyer?” And suddenly I knew who was behind the tinted window in the back of the police car. I started to laugh, not because I wished her trouble with the police, but because it made me happy to know that Giselle was progressing from passive-
aggressive silliness to full-out civil disobedience.
“What’s funny?” she asked, more than a hint of hurt in her voice.
“No, it’s not funny,” I said. “Giselle, did you spray paint those rocks?”
“Yes?”
“Well done!”
“Really?” her tone shifted to something like tentative satisfaction.
“Oh yeah. Brilliant, really,” I said. “Although bummer getti
ng caught.”
“I’m out on bail?” Her voice lost its confidence. “They have evidence, they say …”
I cut her off. “Right, the nosy old neighbor saw you do it. Call my brother-in-law Norm in the morning. If he can’t handle it, he’ll refer you to another good attorney. But I bet they’ll back off. They aren’t going to want the publicity.”
“No, Janet, I mean, yes, I need an attorney, but it’s not the stupid rocks,” she said. “It’s murder. They think I killed that Rasmussen guy.”
That shut me up for a few seconds. Finally, I said the only thing I could think of. “What?”
She described her arrest, and I asked, “Are you okay? I mean, if you want you can come over here, stay in my guest room. You and Precious are welcome.” I thought about her little dog and added, “And Precious is welcome here if you need a place for him, you know, for a while.” Like twenty-five to life, I thought with a jolt.
“No, I’m okay. My friend is here.” There was a long pause, and then she said, “Thank you for not asking.”
“Not asking what?”
“If I killed him.” She hung up.
I knew she didn’t kill him. At least I knew it until I remembered her telling me about whaling away with the pooper-scooper in a fit of anger. Could Giselle actually have killed Rasmussen? I flashed back to another time and realized that I had suspected Giselle of murder once before. But I barely knew her then, and she had changed so much since those days that I had almost forgotten. But do people really change that much? I had thought her capable of murder at one time, so why not now? Then again, I had been wrong that other time, and besides, what real motive did she have? She hadn’t liked the way Rasmussen treated his wife, or my mother and her beau Anthony Marconi, but that hardly seemed cause to kill the man. She was certainly angry when he yelled at her and—worse—at her dog, Precious. Still, it was a huge leap from there to murder.
Besides, there were more practical issues. I wasn’t sure Giselle could have managed it physically. Rasmussen had not been a small man, and he had the power of intimidation on his side. I just couldn’t imagine Giselle mustering enough confidence to attack the man and do him in.
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