Cat Playing Cupid

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

  "Why did you leave, Lindsey? You've given me excuses. But why, really?"

  She looked at him for a long time. The waiter appeared, then turned away again as if loath to interrupt their intimate exchange.

  "To simply say you were all mixed up," Mike said, "that left me pretty uncertain. Mad as hell one minute, ready to fly down there the next minute and demand some straight answers-and then the next minute resolving to put it behind me, to forget you and move on."

  "And you did move on," she said softly. "Why did you, Mike, why did you let me go?"

  His jaw hardened. "What the hell? You were doing no more than playing hard to get?"

  "No, I…I didn't mean…"

  "I didn't think you were that childish, Lindsey. I didn't think…" He stopped and turned to look behind him, where she was staring, watching the couple who had come down the five steps from the street. A big, scruffy-haired man in black jeans and black leather jacket, and Ryder, wearing a short, low-cut black dress, her tawny hair fluffed around her shoulders; Mike noticed again how closely Lindsey resembled her sister.

  Seeing Lindsey, they paused at the bottom of the short stairs, and the man's voice rose. "What the hell is this, Ryder!" He clutched her shoulder, spun her around, and dragged her back up the short flight. "Christ! Sitting there waiting for us! What did you do, tell her you were coming here?"

  "I didn't tell her anything, I didn't know where we were going! I hardly speak to her!" Ryder hissed. She mumbled something more that Mike and Lindsey couldn't make out as Gibbs hurried her away.

  Behind them, Lindsey had gone pale. Mike put his arm around her, and she leaned into him. He searched her face sharply.

  She shrugged. "Ray never liked me."

  "He was your boss, one of your bosses."

  "He…came on to me once, pretty roughly. In the file room. I told him if he did that again, I'd tell Carson-and that I'd file charges against him.

  "He pretty much left me alone after that."

  Mike took her hands to warm them, they were cold and shaking-but whether from distress or from a harsher anger, he couldn't be sure.

  ***

  B ACKING DOWN the oak tree to the roof of Gibbs's condo, the cats licked bits of oak bark from between their claws, but Joe couldn't wash away the sour taste of Ray Gibbs's stubbly face.

  "I wish," Dulcie said, "you'd slashed his throat, down to the jugular."

  Joe smiled, wishing he had, too.

  "Gibbs shot Carson Chappell," Dulcie said. "He accused Ryder to make himself look innocent. Is there a gun hidden in there? Or is it buried in that Oregon forest? I guess," she said with distaste, "I guess we'll have to go back and toss the rest of the place."

  "Not tonight," Joe said. He wasn't going in again with Gibbs there. And more important was to deliver the box of stationery. He tried to decide where was best to leave it. At the back door of the station? Haul it through the window of Dallas's Blazer and drop it on the seat?

  How many pieces of evidence, over the years, had they dragged across the village to deliver to Molena Point PD-each time increasing the unease of Max and his officers over the identity of the unknown snitch? How many times had they made that delivery just hours after someone in the department expressed a need for such evidence? Or after some development that cried out for additional information?

  It wasn't half a day, now, since Ryder had brought in the letter-in front of Joe Grey. Then an anonymous someone provides the detectives with a lead to the source of the letter. The cats looked at each other, thinking about that. And they left the condo hauling the black T-shirt over the dark rooftops, taking turns dragging it, moving directly away from Molena Point PD.

  Carrying it perilously between them across spreading oak branches above the narrow streets, taking a circuitous route above the dimmest streets to avoid being seen from below, they at last backed down a pine tree in Wilma Getz's garden and, with difficulty, were just able to force the package through Dulcie's cat door, into the laundry.

  They could hear Wilma in the kitchen, at the sink, could hear the water running. Dragging their prize through, they dropped it by the kitchen table.

  "What?" Wilma said, turning from the sink where she was washing salad greens. She eyed with suspicion the wad of black T-shirt, lying like something dead on her clean blue linoleum. "What?" she repeated.

  The cats looked up at her innocently.

  "What?" she said a third time, not liking their wide-eyed stares.

  "Evidence," Joe said. "We need to leave it here for a while."

  "What evidence? Evidence to what? What have you two stolen now? Who's going to break in here looking for it?"

  Joe said, "You can't steal evidence. Evidence, by its very nature, is-"

  Wilma wiped her hands on her apron, her look stern, her eyes never leaving Joe. Dulcie was silent, watching the two of them, thinking that over the years Wilma had grown as acerbic as Clyde-though she knew very well that, in the end, Wilma would join them in hiding the box of stationery.

  The upshot was that Wilma put the black package in a shoe box and hid it at the back of her closet until the cats chose a more opportune time to deliver it to the law. Then, returning to the kitchen, she fixed them a snack of crackers, Havarti cheese, and deli turkey. "I have," she said as she added a plate for herself and poured a cup of tea, "I have something to tell you."

  It was now that Sage woke and came hobbling out to the kitchen, encumbered by his cast and bandages. Kit padded sedately beside him, quiet and responsible, quite unlike herself. When Wilma lifted Sage into a chair, Kit leaped up beside him.

  Wilma set the cats' plates on their chairs. "While Charlie sat with Sage and Kit this afternoon, I did some research in the library." She looked very pleased with herself.

  "I looked first in the computer index of local history, and then went to the microfilm reader. My arm's sore from cranking through back issues of the Gazette. I thought I'd find it in the society pages, hoped I would…"

  She paused to sip her tea. "And there it was," she said with excitement.

  "There what was?" Dulcie and Kit said together, lashing their tails with impatience.

  "A picture of the same rearing cat."

  "In the society pages?" Dulcie said.

  "The society pages. I thought I remembered it. I had an idea about what year it was from helping a patron research Molena Point in the 1920s. And there was the picture, just as I remembered. A photograph of Olivia Pamillon, a close-up of four women dressed for a charity ball."

  "And?" Dulcie said, fidgeting. She hated it when Wilma dragged things out, and she knew Wilma did it on purpose.

  "She was wearing the bracelet," Wilma said. "The rearing cat was quite clear."

  "Then that is Olivia's body," Dulcie said. "But why would they bury her in that little courtyard and not in the family cemetery?"

  "That I haven't found out," Wilma said. "I did find her obituary, and it says she's buried in the family plot."

  "Did her family change their minds at the last minute?" Kit said. "Why would they?"

  "Or," Joe said, "did someone move the body?" The tomcat looked around at their unlikely little group, four cats in chairs and one human with her silver hair looping out of its ponytail. "Or," Joe said, "is that not Olivia, in the grotto? Is that not Olivia, wearing her bracelet?"

  20

  I T WAS LATE the next morning when Clyde and Ryan returned home from their honeymoon. Joe Grey was napping in the sun on the roof outside his tower, taking a little personal time after facing off with Ray Gibbs the night before. He woke at the faintly familiar sound of the car slowing, and looked over the edge of the shingles.

  The sight of the Damen entourage pulling up the street was so amazing that he nearly rolled off the roof. Standing with his front paws in the gutter, taking in the scene, he wished Mike were there to observe the newlyweds' spectacular homecoming-talk about a pair of nutcases!

  Early that morning Mike had gone off to the station, having cooked break
fast for Joe, a more than adequate omelet-though he had offered no imported sardines, a condiment the tomcat considered essential with his breakfast eggs. Joe couldn't talk to Mike, couldn't demand sardines. Sometimes he didn't know how he'd survived before he discovered he could speak. All that incessant meowing just to get his message across and half the time people would stare blankly down at him with no clue at all, looking incredibly mindless.

  Though he had to admit, despite their communication problems, Mike was fairly responsive-and he did make a pretty good omelet. This one was with sausage and goat cheese, a combination that Joe intended to bring to Clyde's attention.

  He wondered if Ryan would be making the omelets from now on. Not likely-she'd made it clear she'd rather repair the plumbing than cook a meal. But now…

  The SUV had pulled into the drive, his family was home, and what a laugh. He couldn't see much through the vehicle's tinted windows, but it was so heavily loaded that it rode way low on its axel, and the tangle of cast-offs tied to the top of that shining, cream-colored Escalade was enough to make a whole gaggle of cats crack up laughing. There was a carved mantel undoubtedly ripped from some decrepit house before the wrecking ball hit it. Five lengths of carved stair rail, ornate and dirty. A pair of heavy carved doors and various other odd-looking building parts Joe couldn't identify. Further insulting the nice Cadillac SUV was the orange rental trailer hitched behind it, riding equally low, loaded with two more bulky mantels, five big cartons sealed with tape, and a dozen stained-glass windows carefully stacked, with folded blankets tucked between them.

  Where was Ryan planning to put that stuff?

  Clyde swung out of the Escalade, but Joe couldn't see Ryan-then a big orange rental truck came up the street and turned into the drive, beside the Cadillac. Ryan, at the wheel, looked jaunty in a Windbreaker and baseball cap. This was the blushing bride's demure return from a romantic honeymoon? As Clyde crossed the yard, Ryan stepped out of the rental truck flinging her cap on the seat. Both were dressed in worn old jeans and T-shirts, Ryan's short, dark hair more than usually mussed and a streak of dirt across her nose, and Clyde with a big purple bruise on his arm. The newlyweds looked, not like a couple glowing from a week of romantic indulgences, but like a pair of traveling junk dealers.

  If this was how they'd started their marriage, who knew where it was headed. Who knew where this pack-rat insanity would lead? As Joe hung over the roof peering down, Ryan, heading for the front door, seemed to sense him there above her. She paused to look up.

  "Come on, Joe, come on down and greet the bride and groom-greet your new housemate." Then she halted, listening for the sound of barking from the patio but hearing only silence. "Where's Rock?"

  Joe slipped across the roof and into his tower, then in through his cat door to a rafter above Clyde's study. Dropping down to Clyde's desk, then to the floor, he bolted down the stairs and into the living room-he couldn't hold back his laughter as Clyde carried his dirty-faced bride across the threshold, he laughed so hard he thought he'd choke himself.

  "Is this how you're starting your new life? Looking like a pair of itinerant trash peddlers? Where have you two been?"

  "When you've finished laughing," Clyde said coldly, "would you like to welcome us home? Would you like to welcome your new housemate?"

  Ryan had her fist to her mouth to keep from laughing, too, her green eyes merry, her cheeks flushed.

  "You'll get used to him," Clyde said. "I hope you will."

  "Where's Rock?" Ryan repeated suddenly, looking worried.

  "At the station with Mike," Joe said. "Making nice to Mabel, begging cookies."

  Ryan smiled. "Scoffing up your treats," she said with perfect understanding.

  Joe grinned at her. "Where," he said, "are you going to put all that stuff?"

  "Not stuff," Ryan told him. "These are treasures, Joe! Architectural gems. I'll put them over at the apartment, in the garage. You didn't think we were bringing it all in here?"

  Joe looked at her in silence, the kind of unblinking cat stare that made people begin to fidget.

  "Well," she said, "there are one or two pieces that I'll slip into the carport until I'm ready for them upstairs. You want to see?"

  He really didn't want to look at the torn-out parts of old buildings that Ryan insanely coveted, but she was so thrilled with her discoveries. He couldn't refuse, couldn't hurt her feelings.

  "I want you to see the mantel," she said. "I'll be saving that for some really special job. Beautiful hand-painted tiles, Joe, and it's in wonderful shape."

  So, tiles. Joe yawned. So, okay.

  "Tiles," she said, "painted with cats. It came from Los Gatos, the city of cats, from a big old house that was torn down. It's charming, please come and see."

  Cats? Curious, Joe trotted beside her out to the rental truck, leaping in when she opened the back doors-at once he saw the mantel and felt his fur bristle.

  The face of the mantel was set with blue and white tiles, each six inches square, each painted with a cat: cats hunting, cats sleeping, cats rolling over, everything a cat could think to do. But it was the cat on the center tile that held his attention. This was exactly the same cat that appeared at the Pamillon mansion, the rearing cat carved over the doors to the bedchamber. The same cat that was embossed on the dead woman's bracelet, rearing up with its paw thrust out in an attitude of austere command.

  Joe stared at it for a long time, then he leaped to the top of a wooden crate, face-to-face with Ryan. "What did the dealer tell you about this?"

  "Not a lot," she said, frowning. "What's wrong? I thought you'd be pleased."

  "What did he tell you?"

  "That the house was built by a cousin of the Pamillon family, the family that built the mansion," she said, gesturing in the direction of the hills and the old ruins. "What is it, Joe? What's wrong?"

  "Charlie told you about the body up at the mansion?" Joe said.

  "Yes, she called us." Ryan glanced out through the open tailgate at the neighbors' houses. "Let's go inside where it's private." She picked Joe up from atop the crate and slung him over her shoulder with a familiarity that both amused and pleased the tomcat. She smelled of cinnamon and of seasoned lumber. Heading inside, she set him on the couch and sat down beside him.

  "What?" she said again, her green eyes searching his, wide with curiosity. "What about the mantel?"

  "The cat in the center," Joe said. "The rearing cat. The body that the ferals found…It's wearing a bracelet with the same cat."

  Ryan was silent, thinking about this. Clyde had sat down beside her and was holding her hand; he watched the two of them, saying nothing.

  "And that cat is carved on a lintel, too, over a door of the mansion. The same cat as on the bracelet and on that tile."

  Ryan looked at him for a long time. "I don't know what it means," she said, "but maybe we can find out. Charlie told me your plan-if that works, maybe we'll be closer to knowing what all this means."

  "And?" Joe said nervously. "You think the plan will work?" Was she going to buy his idea? Or was she going to start hedging, saying it might not work, might be nothing more than an off-the-wall cat dream?

  Ryan was silent a moment, then laughed and reached to pet him. "It's a great idea, Joe! It's inspired!"

  Joe looked up at her and purred, and was glad Clyde had chosen, so well, their new housemate.

  "I tell Dad I want to test Rock," she said, "to see if he has tracking potential. He'll say I'm crazy, that there's no point testing him until he's had some training, no matter how naturally talented he is, that I would never be able to teach Rock anything in one day, that it doesn't work that way." She sat very still, looking at Joe so deeply that he began to shiver. Then, "He'd be right, you know. It's absolutely nuts, no human could train a dog that way. But," she said softly, "I think maybe you can," and she grinned at him. "Let's do it. Let's go for it, Joe."

  21

  T HREE THINGS HAPPENED the morning after the honeymooners returned ho
me. Ryan and Clyde and Joe Grey put the first step of Joe's plan into action-the vital, pivotal step upon which the success of the operation depended. Kit and Sage argued hurtfully, and not for the first time. And Kit discovered Ray Gibbs lurking behind Molena Point PD, looking around warily as he shoved something against the locked back door.

  The cats' argument had begun the evening before at the Greenlaw home as Kit and her two humans, and Wilma and Dulcie and Sage, gathered for an early supper and a reading of the Bewick tales; it was that reading that sparked Sage's sullen response and Kit's anger.

  The Greenlaw house was one story at the front but two at the back; the daylight basement had been converted to a separate apartment, which still stood empty, waiting for the right tenant. The view from both floors was of the village rooftops and the hills beyond.

  Surrounding the house, Lucinda's garden shone bright with early spring flowers, but the evening was chill, and within the cozy rooms a cheerful fire burned on the hearth. As the Greenlaws and Wilma settled down for supper in the corner dining room, they looked out over hills awash in golden light as early evening tucked itself down around the village. Wilma had brought a salad to complement Lucinda's shrimp Creole, and for desert Pedric had baked a key lime pie. The three cats ate on the kitchen floor where they could splatter Creole sauce without regard for the rugs and furniture; already Sage's pale fur and white bandages were splattered with tomato sauce as if he'd just endured a second bloody encounter. Whoever said cats ate tidily hadn't seen these three, particularly when shrimp was on the menu. Only Joe Grey was missing; the tomcat was not a big fan of the ancient Celtic tales-and after supper, as everyone settled before the fire, it became apparent that Sage felt the same. As the humans sipped their coffee, and the cats licked the last splashes of Creole sauce from their paws, and Pedric read about doors that led beneath the green Celtic hills into under-earth worlds where lived cats that spoke like men, Sage grew increasingly uncomfortable.