“I take it this is a Coronado property? Does your client keep birds on his property?”
“I don’t know if I’d say he keeps the birds.”
“Your Honor, I’d like to inquire if he feeds birds on his property. If he ever purchased birds for his property.”
“Counsel, if I want to know what you would inquire, I’ll probably ask.” He looked at Her like they’d never met before.
And she knew. With a sinking sensation she’d been trying to stave off since she’d entered his courtroom, she knew he’d make the wrong decision. She glanced down at her notes. She tried to rationalize away her intuition that he wouldn’t do the right thing.
“He doesn’t purchase birds. Or feed them. But if birds fly near his property, he shoots them for dinner,” Attorney Minter said.
“Cat’s pajamas. I’m going to have my servants kill birds for me. Save on my food budget. Counsel, I want to thank you for appearing here today. I’ll take it on submission.”
“Will there be a temporary injunction until the Court rules?” Attorney Minter asked, hoping for even a glimmer of judicious thought.
“No. Expect my ruling the day after Christmas. After the lazy state employees come back from their paid day off.” Judge Scrooge looked at his clerks and bailiff.
“Thank you, Your Honor.”
“May I submit my Supplemental Brief?” Attorney Minter asked.
“Of course, my bailiff will take it.”
Judge Scrooge watched the attorneys exit. Her hips still beckoned in a way he didn’t want to remember. He imagined her sitting at home and pining for him at night.
The bailiff handed him Attorney Minter’s brief. Judge Scrooge threw it in the trash.
“That was a most excellent idea. I’m going to start shooting birds for supper. And eliminate any cats around. They just catch birds for themselves. Self serving creatures.”
“Ugh,” Judge Scrooge said to no one in particular, leaving the courthouse, looking at Broadway Street and its derelict inhabitants. Shame we can’t just put them all in a trash can and just haul it away. He pinched his aristocratic nose between his fingers at the sight of the people he called the unwashed masses. He stumbled slightly.
“Are you ill sir?” A little boy asked.
“I will be if I’m asked to endure much more of this exorbitantly priced Christmas season. Just another excuse for emptying pockets. Get your hand away from me.” He barked at the boy.
“I was afraid you might fall. I wanted to help you.”
“Get away from me! Why do you look familiar? Are you one of the delinquents who appear in my courtroom?”
“No. I’m your cook’s son. I’m Tiny Tim. My Mama sent me downtown to shop because she’s not feeling well.”
“Hurry along then. And remind your Mama I don’t offer sick pay.” Judge Scrooge ambled by a bucket marked Salvation Army.
“Do you want to give to the poor?” The Salvation Army man asked, ringing his bell.
“I can’t stand the poor,” Judge Scrooge said.
“Do you want to help crippled and starving children?”
“I hate crippled and starving children. My mother died of small pox. My father disappeared one night after a saloon fight. My little sister didn’t have money for food for weeks at a time—”
“—I’m sorry, Sir,” The Salvation Army man said gently, placing a hand on Judge Scrooge’s shoulder.
“And I didn’t do anything for them. So why would I help crippled and starving children? Pests. If only there was an easy way to eradicate them.” Judge Scrooge said, stepping past the homeless on Broadway.
The Salvation Army man moved backwards, almost toppling over. A good looking man moved quickly to help him.
Two cats were near him, a white fluffy feline and her black and white companion. The cats glared at Scrooge. He had an uncomfortable feeling they knew about his ruling.
“I hate cats,” Judge Scrooge said.
“Hi neighbor.” The good looking gentleman held out his hand for Judge Scrooge to shake.
“Excuse me?”
“I’m Jack. And this is Grace. We’re buying the lot next to you on Glorietta Bay. We’re building a home in Coronado. We were just checking the property records at the courthouse.”
“It’s Honorable Neighbor to you.”
“Merry Christmas neighbor. This is our cat, Tatania,” Grace said, reaching down to pet the white cat. And her friend.” Grace pulled her cloche hat over her head and twirled her ninety inch Chanel pearls. A girl could never have too many pearls.
Judge Scrooge shrugged and went home.
• • •
Scrooge barked at his butler to turn down the heat.
“Your Honor, it’s cold outside. And raining. The cook has the sniffles.”
“I know. I saw that sickly spawn of hers downtown. I don’t want their germs.” He turned down the thermostat.
“When you pay the bills, you just don’t feel the cold.” Judge Scrooge explained.
A clanking noise made him curse the heating system. He didn’t want to pay a repair bill.
His former law partner and uncle appeared, wearing chains, and looking a little dusty.
“What are you doing here? You’re dead.” Scrooge rang a bell.
“Brandy. I need my brandy.” He yelled.
“No one can hear you,” His uncle said.
“You’re supposed to be dead. I thought after years of being told to go to hell, you finally did.”
“No, I’m wandering the earth. A kind of purgatory.”
“Uncle Calvin, we are not Catholic.”
“You’re going to be visited three times tonight. By magical cats. They have important news for you.”
“That reminds me. There’s been a stray cat around here. I’m thinking about putting out some poison.”
“You didn’t hear me. I’m condemned to walk the earth in penance for all the bad decisions I made. You made the wrong decision today,” Uncle Calvin said.
“I’m a judge. I’m not paid to make the right decision. I’m paid to make a decision. And I’m not allowing a cat in the house.”
“They might take care of any rodents lurking around.”
“They might also kill birds. My food supply. I can have the cook start preparing birds for me. It’s the least that overpaid wench can do for me.”
“You’re not dining on rodents.”
“Who knows if the cats are doing their jobs with the rodents? They’re so secretive. And occasionally, I hear meowing at night.”
“Cats tend to be amorous. Falling in love all the time.”
“That’s their first mistake.” Scrooge grumbled.
Uncle Calvin rattled his chains again. “Scrooge you must listen. Seek first to hear and then to be heard.”
“That would change my whole lifestyle.”
“That’s the point.”
• • •
Tatania appeared on his fireplace mantle. Judge Scrooge lunged for her. He wasn’t quick enough. He stood at the mantel, looking around for her, until she meowed from the chandelier.
He couldn’t reach it and was going to bark for the maid to get a ladder and get her down when Tatania spoke.
“You weren’t always this nasty,” she said.
“This is a bad dream. And I’m determined to wake up from it.” Srooge replied.
“I’m going to show you the way used to be. The way you ought to be. The way you still could be.”
“Get out of my house.”
“I’m deaf. I can’t hear you. But that’s alright. It’s important that you hear what I have to say. Not the other way around.”
“Remember when you were a student?” Tatania lept off the chandelier and a cloud like atmosphere entered the room, rendering everything blurring, until it settled and she and Scrooge watched a handsome young man and a beautiful young woman in a long dress. She smiled at him with red lips that matched Her red hair.
“You dated in law school. A
nd then you left Her.”
“She had some screwed up idea about being in law to help the world. Instead of to make money.”
“She was one of the first women to go to law school. When you were young, you emotionally supported her. Even the Professors bullied her. You stood up for her. You risked your own standing to defend her.”
“Kitty, I’m not a pussy. Emotionally supported her? She’s gorgeous. I faked empathy to be with her. We studied together in the library. I didn’t pay for dates.” Scrooge stroked his beard and looked at Her.
“I remember when she won dinner for two at the Hotel del Coronado in a raffle to support French war orphans. I took Her to dinner on it.”
“You gave her a kitten,” Tatania said.
“It was free to a good home.” Scrooge watched Her smile and a long dormant feeling began to awaken within him.
“She probably spent the rest of Her life pining for me.”
A distinguished gentleman, in an expensive suit, walked up and kissed Her cheek.
“John Alden. She married a land baron,” Scrooge said.
Tatania tried not to smile. She had a Cheshire cousin and a genetic tendency to show amusement.
“When you were a little boy, you had a kitten,” Tatania said.
Judge Scrooge shrugged.
“The kitten used to help your Mother. When she became ill, the kitten would go out and beg for fish from the fishermen on the island. And bring them back to her. How do you think all those fish stews happened? Your father disappeared with dreams of making it rich gambling on the railroad.”
Judge Scrooge remembered how weak his mother looked in her waning days. She still managed to cook for him. And encourage him to study and become a lawyer. The kitten would quietly nudge her, purring next to her, when she finally rested.
“Can you imagine little boys and girls never experiencing the joy of a kitten?”
“One less mouth to feed. All my cook can think about is asking for time off because she has a cold. And a sick child. If these people died, we’d have less dependency on the state. And what exactly do cats do for me?” Scrooge scowled when he saw Her and Her husband play with a kitten and a boy of about three.
“How could Scrooge do this to feral and stray cats? All they ask is to live silently among us, hunt and keep the universe in balance.” She said to Her husband.
The kitten lept up on the chair and began playing with the scarf around Her neck. The boy laughed as the kitten wound himself around Her scarf, taking it off in the process.
“Scrooge wasn’t always this horrible.”
“Yes he was. You just didn’t notice. Love is blind. And deaf. What was it William Butler Yeats said? Deaf and dumb and blind with love?”
Scrooge pet Tatania reluctantly. He might hate cats. But he didn’t want to see one so blatantly insulted. He wasn’t certain she couldn’t hear. She seemed to understand. The cat had a magical quality to her and eyes as green as a Christmas tree.
“Scrooge was never as eloquent as you and William Butler Yeats. But he was kind and handsome once. Now his bitterness has overtaken him. I barely recognized him.”
“What’s Her problem?” Judge Scrooge spat his tobacco in the nearest spittoon.
“You were in love with her once. Everyone thought you’d get married,” Tatania said.
“Proving once again that everyone is wrong while I’m right. It’s liberating to be free of love. It’s cheaper too. Bah Humbug. When you’re not in love with anyone, when you don’t care for anyone, no one can take your money from you at Christmas. My life is how I want it. I chose my life. And that’s more than most people can say.”
“I’m as necessary to my humans as the air they breathe. And I love them too. I must always return to them. A friend of mine, Zeus, will help me show you what it’s like to live in a world without cats. It’s going to feel like oxygen is being sucked out of you, Scrooge.”
• • •
Scrooge poured a glass of brandy immediately on waking. He didn’t usually imbibe. Alcohol cost money. Prohibition created astronomical prices and rich bootleggers. Scrooge could happily live the rest of his life on what he stockpiled before Prohibition went into effect.
He tried to shake off the talking cat nightmare. A nightmare worse than a drunken sailor’s propensity to over tip. He gulped the brandy. He considered allowing the servants to burn some logs in the fireplace. But no point in pampering them. They’d get used to the cold or die. If you can’t make it through a cold winter, it’s nature’s way of telling you to move along.
Zeus, the black and white tomcat, landed on Scrooge’s lap.
“Why don’t we check on your niece? She bears a beautiful resemblance to the sister you adored so much.”
“Am I drunk dreaming? What is going on here?” Scrooge tried to dislodge the cat. Zeus simply stretched languorously on Scrooge’s lap.
The windows rattled and dust settled over the room. Scrooge blinked and saw his niece, Elizabeth, and her husband, Edward at home.
“Why do you keep inviting him, Elizabeth?” Edward asked his wife.
“Uncle Scrooge will always be family to me. I want to spend Christmas with him. My Mom would have liked it. He’s just frugal.” Elizabeth hung strands of popcorn and cranberry on a tree lit with candles.
“And how. He didn’t RSVP to our wedding until you sent the amended invitations that said, No Gifts Please.” Her doting husband agreed.
A striped grey tabby nestled on a pillow by the fireplace. Her purr harmonized perfectly with the Christmas carols playing on the Victrola.
“He came to our wedding for the free dinner. He was unbearable before he was a Judge. Now he’s even worse.” Edward reminded her.
“Don’t be so hard on Uncle Scrooge. My Mom used to tell a story about a hunting dog named Lawyer. All the hunters loved Lawyer. He was the brightest, most aggressive hunting dog ever. So one day, when they couldn’t find Lawyer, they kept looking for him. They didn’t want to go on the hunt without him. Then, they found out that someone made the mistake of calling him Judge. And now he just sits on his ass and barks at people all day.”
They both laughed.
Judge Scrooge scowled. “I can’t believe my niece would tell such a distasteful joke.”
“No one can hear you,“ Zeus said.
Elizabeth cranked up the Victrola.
“They look so cozy and happy.” Zeus purred, snuggling a little closer to Scrooge.
“Bah Humbug,” he said.
“They look like they parted with too much money. Look at all those presents they bought themselves.” He shook his head.
“Christmas is for shops, sellers, charity peddlers and anyone else who wants to separate you from your money. The bailiff and clerks are well paid. As are my servants. I see no need to supplement their salaries. And my wretched niece and nephew make merry without me.”
Tatania flew into the room. Though deaf, Tatania had nary a problem communicating with other cats. They spoke each other’s language. She spied a mouse scurrying past and motioned for Zeus to catch it. A cricket stood in front of the mouse. Zeus lept up on the hutch, the highest piece of furniture in the room. He looked down, embarrased.
“You’re afraid of bugs?”
He looked down and groomed his paw.
“I’m trying to convince this human that cats are fierce terminators and highly valuable to them. And this is the example you’re setting?”
Zeus looked away.
Tatania lept up next to him. She groomed his ear. Poor Dear. What a secret to be carrying around.
Tatania nuzzled him gently. “Whenever you’re afraid to do something, think of the one you want to protect most in the world, and you can do it,” she said kindly.
“Why can I understand you? This is a nightmare,” Scrooge said.
“I’m magical. That’s why you can understand. Without Coronado’s stray and feral cats to control them, the jackrabbits would eat all the bark off the Orange trees on Ora
nge street,” Tatania said.
“I haven’t seen any cats doing any work around here. If a cat isn’t doing a job, I think it should go. Who needs another mouth to feed?”
Tatania felt stumped for a moment. She’d hoped Zeus could display his hunting skills. She tried another tact.
“When you were in love with Her, the two of you had a kitten.”
“When I was a little boy, I believed in Santa Claus. When I was a young man, I believed in love. The only thing that sustains me now is my money. And when people tell you life isn’t about the money, they’re lying. It’s always about the money.”
“Cats work silently. Cats are emotionally honest. All feral and stray cats ask is to live quietly among humans while providing free rodent termination service. Without poison. What other animal will work for free for humans? You don’t even have to feed feral cats. Leonardo da Vinci said the cat is nature’s masterpiece. And despite what flappers may think about themselves, rouged knees, short skirts, and all, a wise man once said that a cat is always the most beautiful woman in the room.”
• • •
The dust blew through the room again. When it settled, they saw jackrabbits running down Orange Street. The tops of Orange trees lay on the ground. Jackrabbits had devoured entire tree trunks.
A mother with a mask on her face didn’t see the rat in her baby’s stroller. A spider crawled up the stroller’s side. Zeus thought of Helen, the kindly woman who cared for him, and flew at the rat, and the spider, saving the baby from a deadly bite.
He strutted back to Tatania and Scrooge.
“I’m no Rin Tin Tin. I didn’t serve in the Great War. But I can smell and kill a rat with the best of them.”
“Maybe he’s not a bad cat after all.” Scrooge said.
Rodents ran through the Hotel del Coronado. Ladies shrieked, spilling their champagne.
The Victorian Tea room was in an uproar — with mice leaping on tables, spilling dark liquids, stopping to nibble cookies, and swinging from the tablecloths.
“I was abandoned at an early age, but I still mix with humans sometimes. I love the garden where Tatania and I met. A lady in a nearby house dotes on me. She gives me succulent morsels. Then disappears for weeks at a time. Fortunately, I know not to depend on one single human. I have more than one woman. What is it you humans say? Womanizing?” Zeus looked at Scrooge.
Magical Cool Cats Mysteries Boxed Set Vol 1 (Books 1, 2 & 3 & A Christmas Feral) Page 14