Catch as Cat Can

by Rita Mae Brown

  “Out. I called Krispy Kreme and told them to give everyone doughnuts and coffee. I'd pick up the tab. Mercifully, things are slowing down. Next shift comes on at six. Hey, want a jelly doughnut?”

  “No. You don't fool me. You bought those for you.”

  “Uh—yes. I even bought a carton of cigarettes, which I am stashing in your desk.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if my wife comes in she'll check my desk.”

  “Little lies lead to big ones.” Coop rolled her eyes.

  “It's my one vice. I've tried to give it up and I finally decided, to hell with it. I might as well enjoy it.”

  “Yeah.” She reached for another glazed doughnut. “My problem is I enjoy the first two puffs, then I can't stand the taste. Lot of money to spend for two puffs. I'm hungry. I think I'll call Miranda and ask her to make her orange-glazed cinnamon buns tomorrow.”

  “It is tomorrow.”

  “Oh—well, the next tomorrow.” She licked her fingers. “Mim threw another grand party. She was afraid it would be subdued because of Roger O'Bannon's death but it wasn't. Not really Roger's crowd.”

  “I wouldn't think so. What happened?”

  “He keeled over in his chair. Pretty much like you heard over the radio.” She mentioned the radios in the squad cars. “Makes you think. I mean about stuff like smoking and eating doughnuts and greasy hamburgers.”

  “Coop, when your number's up, it's up.” Rick folded his hands over his chest as he leaned back in his big chair. “And Sean won't agree to an autopsy?”

  “No, unless he's changed his mind. He was, well, you can imagine. Held it together but what a shock.”

  “People have strong feelings about autopsies. If it were my brother I'd do it. In case it's something hereditary, something I could attend to.”

  “Now wait a minute. You just said you're smoking, to hell with it and when your number's up, it's up.”

  He grinned. “Me?”

  “Wasn't it Emerson who said, ‘Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds'?”

  “You're the reader but it sounds good to me.” He cocked his head. “Christ, the storm is getting worse.”

  She polished off the last of her doughnut. “Who's back in the Taj Mahal?” she said, referring to the jail.

  “A full house. Students. People who should know better and Din Marks, the jerk who smashed Yancy.”

  “Din? Well, I suppose it's better than Spirit-Moves-Us. Remember him?”

  “Easy wardrobe. Bedsheets.” Rick laughed. “And people give money to guys like that. Religious nuts. I'm in the wrong business. I'll shave my head, put a dot in the middle of my forehead, wear bedsheets, and chant ‘Om'—instant riches. Tell people they're stressed out and need to find inner peace.”

  “Spirit-Moves-Us did, with prepubescent girls.”

  Rick grimaced, shaking his head. “Said it was part of his religion. He won't be out of jail for years.”

  “Is the guy's real name Din?”

  “That's what his driver's license said. Oh, can't really hold that Partlow kid on hubcaps. I'll let him go later. Actually, I ought to release him now. Kick his sorry ass right out in the storm. I'll run him by the salvage yard first.”

  “I think I'll pay him a visit.” She glanced at the clock. “A five o'clock wake-up call ought to bring a smile to his face.” She walked into the cell block, Rick with her. The arrested were sprawled in cells, dead drunk, sleeping it off. Wesley, though, sat straight up, listening to the storm. “Good morning, glory,” Cynthia said teasingly.

  “Sounds like a tornado.”

  “They're louder,” Rick answered him. “We're going to take you over to O'Bannon's Salvage later this morning. If Sean makes a positive I.D. your ass is grass. If not, you're free.”

  “I didn't steal nothin'. He'll tell you.” Wesley listened as the hail intensified.

  “Okay.” Rick shrugged.

  “Wesley, if you cooperate things will go easy.”

  He glared at her. “Nothin's easy.”

  “Fine.” She turned and walked out, Rick with her.

  Once outside the cell block they paused for a moment.

  Rick sighed. “I need to pay my respects anyway. I'll ask Sean if he's up to identifying the little jerk. If he's not, we let him go.”

  Unexpectedly, Sean agreed to do it, said he could handle it. When Rick brought Wesley to him he swore he'd never seen the kid though Wesley matched the description he'd given. Either there were two young men with a pronounced scar over the left eye or Sean was too rattled to make sense of anything. Then again, in his vulnerable state he could have figured nailing a kid for hubcaps wasn't worth it.

  Rick released Wesley Partlow. He'd already run a check with DMV on the kid's license, which was current and clean. His address was Randolph Street, Waynesboro. He didn't really think too much about it. Small-fry.

  16

  At seven o'clock Sunday morning, Fair Haristeen drove through the puddles in Harry's driveway. He stopped in front of the barn because he knew she'd be feeding the horses. At the slam of his truck door, Tucker joyously dashed out to greet the vet. Tucker loved Fair.

  “Wasn't that an awful storm?” The corgi wagged her tailless bottom.

  Small tree limbs were scattered over the yard and dogwood petals covered the ground.

  “You're the best dog.” Fair bent over to pat the silky head.

  “I'm in here,” Harry called out from the center aisle of the attractive old barn.

  “Figured.” Fair jumped over a puddle. “You should see the roof of BoomBoom's barn. Swiss cheese.”

  “Your first call?”

  “Not exactly. When I drove by I saw her and Thomas standing out by the barn so I pulled up. You know when Kelly”—Fair mentioned BoomBoom's deceased husband—“built that barn I couldn't believe he'd put on such a cheap roof. The man was a paving contractor. He knew better.”

  “Yeah, but riding wasn't his thing so he built a cheap barn. Pretty tacky of him.”

  Fair removed his baseball cap. “Never thought of it. He had more money than God.”

  “Just a little revenge on his part. Control. And to what do I owe your company?”

  “Does the word ‘control' have anything to do with it?”

  Mrs. Murphy, lounging in the hayloft with Simon, the opossum, remarked, “You know, I think he's gaining insight.”

  “M-m-m.” Simon evidenced scant interest in human couplings and uncouplings. “Did I show you the beads I found?” He rolled out his treasure.

  “Simon, those aren't beads, they're ball bearings, and if you found them around here it means a piece of Mom's equipment is about to die a horrible death.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. Where did you find them? And I assume this had to be a few days ago. You weren't fool enough to go out in that storm.”

  “I'm not telling.”

  “All right. Don't tell but put them back—maybe she'll see them before the damage is done. Something's broken.”

  “I'm not putting them back and I'm not telling. Anyway, maybe I didn't find them here. They're shiny and I found them fair and square. I like shiny things.”

  “Marsupials are weird.” Mrs. Murphy lashed her beautiful tail to and fro. She didn't like being disobeyed.

  “Pewter grabbing a dead woodpecker and then Harry picking it up is pretty weird.”

  “She took it to the taxidermist.” Mrs. Murphy laughed, her good humor restored. “And you know that Pewter will tear it to shreds the minute that stuffed bird is brought back into the house.” The cat tiptoed over to the edge of the hayloft, having decided that the human conversation might be more interesting than her own. Not that she didn't like Simon, but he was a bit simpleminded at times.

  Pewter reposed in the tack room on a neatly folded Baker blanket. She'd gorged herself at breakfast and would need half the day to digest.

  “It's been quite a Dogwood Festival.” Fair dipped a clean old towel in water, rubbed it
on a glycerin bar, and began wiping down Harry's hunt saddle.

  “You don't have to do that.”

  “No, but I like to be useful.” He hummed a Billy Ray Cyrus tune, then cleared his throat. “You seem to have hit it off with Diego.”

  “Yes,” came the terse reply.

  Fair knew better than to expect an explanation out of Harry. He'd known her all his life and having been married to her he felt he knew her better than anyone except maybe Susan Tucker. But women's friendships existed on a separate plane from spousal relationships. He often laughed to himself when he'd hear idle chatter about the differences between men and women. Women, according to the experts, were more forthcoming about their emotions than men and they bonded through sharing emotions whereas men bonded through activity. In all the years he'd known Mary Minor she'd never volunteered an emotion. You had to pry them out of her. She'd happily tell you what she thought, read, saw, did, but not what she felt. Susan used to harangue her over it but Harry was Harry and that was that. “Take me or leave me” was her attitude, and when Fair thought about it, he concluded she was right. You either accept someone or you don't and no amount of jawing about it will change them or bring you closer.

  “The guy looks like a movie star.” Fair flipped the stirrup iron up over the saddle seat so he could better clean the flaps. The saddle was clean but he needed a task.

  “He does but you're pretty great-looking yourself.” She winked.

  “You say that to all the boys.” He laughed, glad to be in her presence. “Lottie Pearson is on the warpath, by the way.”

  “Against me or BoomBoom?”

  “Anyone that gets in her way but I think you and BoomBoom are, well, let's just say, hold on to your scalps.”

  “What is Lottie's problem?” Harry scrubbed out a water bucket in the sink in the tack room. It had hot and cold water, a nice feature in a tack room. “I mean it's not like I woke up one morning and said, ‘Today I will piss off Lottie Pearson.' And I only agreed to be Diego's date after pressure from BoomBoom. She said Lottie would bore him to tears whereas I could talk about farming.”

  “Lottie's getting scared and she's getting bitter.”

  Harry tipped her head up to stare into Fair's blue eyes. “Scared about what?”

  “She's in her thirties, never been married, and no prospects in sight.”

  Dropping the bucket in the sink, Harry put her hands on her hips. “Oh, come on, you don't believe that.”

  “About Lottie I do. Man-hungry.”

  “Said by a man.” Harry giggled.

  “Hey, we may be the slower sex but I don't know any man who doesn't have radar for a woman crazed to get married. The pheromone of fear or mating or something is what she sends out. Nothing turns a man off faster than that except personal uncleanliness, I guess.”

  Harry resumed scrubbing. “Never thought about it but you're probably right. What's to get scared about, Fair? You can't just go out and find a mate. It's not like shopping for a car.”

  “No, but it is a big-ticket item.” He smiled. “What I find offensive about Lottie is that she wants to get married but no one is good enough. Roger O'Bannon was crazy about her and, well, now he's dead. He wasn't right for her.” Fair lost his train of thought. “It's hard to talk about him in the past tense.”

  “I know what you're trying to say.”

  “She wants someone who is First Family of Virginia. That stuff is so superficial.”

  “Easy for us to say because we are.”

  “Have you ever cared for one moment that your ancestors arrived here in 1620? No, 1640. Good memory.” He tapped his forehead.

  “No. I'm proud of them but it doesn't make me better than anyone. And the slave trade really picked up at the end of the seventeenth century so as far as I'm concerned those African-American families are F.F.V., too.”

  “If there's one thing that I really hate about Virginia it's the great game of ancestor worship.” He flipped over the other stirrup. “On the other hand, it gives us stability, I suppose. Anyway, even if Lottie marries one of us she's not F.F.V.”

  “No, but her children will be.”

  “Great. Another generation of snobs.” Fair laughed again. “My favorite low moment for Virginians was when the descendants of Thomas Jefferson had a reunion and argued about whether to let Sally Hemings's descendants join when the DNA tests proved they carried Jefferson's blood. I mean here we are in the twenty-first century and someone is going to argue about this.”

  “You're expressive this morning.” She shook her head.

  “Actually,” he exhaled, “I'm so glad I didn't find Diego here.”

  She shot him a searing look. “Oh, like I'd go to bed with him on the first date, so to speak?”

  “Uh—yes.”

  “Fair, it's my body.”

  “I love your body.”

  “Oh, Fair—” She threw up her hands.

  “I love your mind, too.”

  “This is getting good.” Mrs. Murphy leaned way over the edge of the hayloft.

  Even Pewter woke up. Tucker sat, tongue out, listening to every syllable.

  “You can be real smooth when you want to be. Now look, I'm doing what I want, when I want, and with whom I want. Don't fence me in.”

  “I haven't.”

  “Yeah, and you haven't had any rivals either.”

  “Oh, now I do?”

  “Might.”

  “I hate it when you're coy.”

  “Well, I hate it when you try to manage me.”

  “I'm not managing you.” He leaned over the saddle. “I'm being truthful.”

  “Then I'll be truthful right back. I like Diego and I'll see him again, most likely. Other than that, I don't know squat.”

  “Don't go to bed with him.” Fair's voice grew stronger.

  “I'll do as I damn well please.”

  “Latin-American men are faithful to their mothers and no one else. You don't know who he's slept with. You can't be too careful.”

  “That's pretty racist.” Acid dripped from her voice.

  “It's true. They're dominated by their mothers!”

  “Fair, you are so full of shit.” Harry laughed. He was unintentionally funny.

  “I'm trying to protect you.”

  “No, you're not. You don't want me to go to bed with anyone but you.”

  “I admit that.”

  “Get over yourself.”

  “Harry, go slow. Think things through. What kind of future would you have with a man from a country full of ex-Nazis?”

  “Fair, for Chrissake!”

  “It is.”

  “So are Argentina and Paraguay and, for that matter, the United States. After the war didn't our government spirit out any German who had knowledge we needed or wanted? And furthermore, that was over fifty years ago. Somehow I think most of those dudes are dead. Now you're an expert on Uruguay?”

  “Can't blame a guy for trying.”

  “Yeah, yeah. To change the subject, are you going on the coon hunt tonight?”

  “Thought I would.”

  The best time to hunt coons is the fall but sometimes a hunter would train his young hounds with an older hound before then. Summer was too hot so spring often was a good time to work young hounds. The female coons, “heavy,” usually gave birth in April through May to litters of between one and eight. They'd only be hunting males.

  She filled the cleaned-out bucket with clean sponges, placing the bucket under the sink. “I wonder when Roger's funeral will be.”

  “Wednesday or Thursday. Unless Sean thinks he'll have to wait for the weekend because of out-of-towners. I doubt it though. Herb will know. Brings death a little closer, doesn't it?”

  “Nah.” She shook her head. “Can't think about it. It doesn't do any good. You can die at four years of age or one hundred. But you can't think about it.”

  “Sounds like your dad.”

  “It's true, though.”

  “I suppose, but Roger's
death makes me think about it. One minute he's sitting in the chair and the next minute he's on the floor with Little Mim pulling on his arm and Lottie screaming.”

  “Been quite a weekend. Lottie falls off the float. Oh, wait, it started with Miranda's hubcaps getting stolen and winding up at O'Bannon's. Then Lottie bounces off the float. Given the hoopskirt I'm surprised she didn't bounce right back or she could be our own living Taco Bell symbol. Then Roger goes to his reward. The twerp who stole Miranda's hubcaps shows up parking cars at Big Mim's party. Tracy tackles him. Then the storm from hell rips through Albemarle County. And you're worried that I'm going to sleep with someone other than you? Isn't there a Chinese curse, ‘May you live in interesting times'?”

  17

  Diego and Thomas spent the day at Windy Ridge, an estate owned by the retired Ambassador to the Court of St. James's. Since she didn't need to be a tour guide for the visitors, Harry worked, suppressing her excitement about the coming evening's coon hunt. She loved to hunt. Picking up the debris around her house took two hours. Then she walked her fence lines to make certain they weren't torn up. Blair Bainbridge's cattle loved to amble over onto her lush pastures. Not that she minded herding them back but she didn't always have the time to drive them across the creek, repair the fence, check for injuries. Also, her three horses, Poptart, Tomahawk, and Gin Fizz, disliked the cattle. They'd pin back their ears, bare their teeth, hurl crude insults usually involving the fact that cows have four stomachs.

  Mrs. Murphy and Tucker accompanied Harry on her rounds. Pewter declared the storm frayed her nerves; she needed to rest in the house. The offending blue jay swooped around the kitchen windowsill. Seeing Pewter asleep on the kitchen table, he unleashed a torrent of abuse.

  After a day's work the tiger cat and Tucker felt entitled to participate in the coon hunt. Both waxed furious when Harry shut them in the house, closing off the animal door, then driving off in her 1978 blue Ford pickup.

  “You'll pay for this!” Murphy threatened as the red taillights receded into the gathering twilight.

  “Pipe down.” Pewter rolled over.

  “You've slept all day. Don't tell me you're tired.”