by Sharon Pape
Jaye had to relocate to the curb in order to keep her in sight, at which point she realized that if any of the neighbors were outside they would also have a great view of the not-a-cat. She glanced around, hoping it was still early enough that most people were inside getting ready for their day. So far, so good—there wasn’t a soul outside, not even a dog walker.
Up on the roof, Raffles had gone straight to the chimney, which she circled a couple of times, apparently perplexed by the metalwork cap on it designed to keep animals out. Then she sniffed around the vent pipes from the kitchen and the two bathrooms. Jaye had to bite her tongue not to yell for her to stay away. If the animal became stuck in one of them, Jaye had no idea how they would get her out. Perhaps having come to the same conclusion, Raffles backtracked to the edge of the roof and started to descend the trellis. But a third of the way down she stopped short. From her vantage point, Jaye couldn’t tell what the not-a-cat was doing, so she hurried back through the gate into the side yard.
Directly below her now, Jaye could see that Raffles had stopped beside a small louvered vent. Her hind legs still on the trellis, she was leaning toward the vent and tugging at the narrow metal slats with her hands. The more frustrated she became, the harder she tugged, until Jaye was sure she was going to tumble off the trellis. She had no idea if a not-a-cat could survive what was at least a ten foot drop, but all she could do was hope for the best. If she called up to the animal, she might distract her, making the situation even more perilous. Then Jaye seized upon the one thing that might work. She could bring the tuna outside and put an end to Raffles’s arduous quest. She was about to do just that when the not-a-cat let out a trill of victory and disappeared through the vent.
“I can’t believe she was able to squeeze through there,” Sierra said, filling two mugs with the green tea she’d made while she waited inside. Raffles was making comical lip-smacking noises as she ate her tuna breakfast from a plate on the kitchen floor.
“I told you—she can fit through incredibly small spaces.”
“But she has bones and joints, not to mention a skull.” Sierra carried a plate of chocolate chip scones to the table. “Try one—I was up until after midnight perfecting the recipe.”
“It’s like she can make her joints lie flat,” Jaye said, helping herself to one of the scones. “I have no idea how she does it. Her head is actually easier to explain—she has such dense fur there, it looks much bigger than it is.”
“Okay, then. Why question success? Unless Peggy’s house is hermetically sealed, Raffles shouldn’t have any trouble getting in there one way or another. Now all you have to do is teach her to unlock the front door, and our mission will be ready to launch.”
Jaye broke off a piece of the scone and popped it into her mouth. “Ummm,” she groaned with pleasure. “These are ridiculously good. Do you realize I’ve gained five pounds since I moved here and you made me your taste tester?”
“I’m sure I can find someone else to take on the job,” Sierra said, calling her friend’s bluff. “I bet Daniel would be willing to step in for you.”
Jaye laughed. “Don’t you dare—I never said anything about quitting.” They lingered over the tea and scones for another half hour; then Sierra went off to keep her promise to Frosty, and Jaye took Raffles home to get on with the training. She’d arranged for Bryn to open the shop and run it by herself for the day. But when Jaye pulled into the crowded parking lot, she realized she hadn’t worked out how she was going to get Raffles past everyone in the shop and up to the apartment. She could let the not-a-cat go free. After all, she’d proven more than once that she could gain access to the apartment. But Jaye didn’t want to waste any more time, and there was always the possibility that Raffles might go off on one of her three-hour jaunts first. That left only two ways for them to go up to the apartment together. Jaye could shimmy up the tree beside the building with Raffles under one arm, or she could take her through the shop. Okay, since she wasn’t much of an athlete, there was only one realistic option.
She tucked the not-a-cat under her Windbreaker, holding it closed as she entered the shop. She did a slalom run around the customers and was making a beeline for the stairs when Raffles took exception to her mode of transportation, sprang free of Jaye’s grasp and popped out of the jacket, not unlike the birth of the alien in the old Sigourney Weaver flick. At least the animal was quick about it, leaving just a few stunned expressions in her wake, one of them on Bryn’s face.
“What was that?” she gasped, her eyes locked on Raffles’s disappearing hindquarters.
“Just a stray cat,” Jaye said as calmly as possible. Nothing strange going on here. “I found her in the parking lot playing ‘dodge the cars.’ I was afraid she was going to get herself killed, so I grabbed her. She looks like she could use a meal too.” She was becoming so proficient at making up stories, maybe she should become a novelist.
“I think you’ve just adopted yourself another cat,” Bryn said, turning back to Jaye. “They know when they’ve found a cushy setup.”
A white-haired lady standing nearby was shaking her head. “Are you sure what you’ve got there is a cat? I’ve had cats all my life, and I’ve never seen one like that before. You best be careful till you can get it over to a vet and make sure it isn’t diseased or something.”
Jaye thanked the woman for her advice and ran for the stairs before Raffles came back down to see what was taking her so long.
***
Early the next morning Raffles’s introduction to locks began. Step one: Jaye showed the not-a-cat how to open the simple lock on the apartment door from inside, repeating the word “open” as she did it. Raffles tilted her head first to one side, then to the other, as if a better angle might help her fathom what her pal was trying to tell her. Step two: Jaye took the animal’s hand and held it under her own so they could open the lock together when she said “open.” Within a couple of minutes Raffles understood what was required of her and was more than happy to oblige. In fact, she really seemed to be getting into it— with or without the magic word. Jaye had accidentally created a monster. Since she needed to be able to lock her door for the sake of security, another round of training was necessary to teach Raffles not to open the lock unless she was specifically told to. It turned out to be a vastly more difficult concept.
Once Jaye was sure Raffles understood the rules, it was time to give her a final exam. Jaye turned the lock and closed the door behind her. The moment it clicked shut she realized her mistake. She hadn’t taken her key. No problem. She had faith in all the training Raffles had just completed.
“Open the lock,” she called to her star pupil. There was no noise from the other side of the door. No sounds of the lock mechanism turning, no clicking of the animal’s nails on the hardwood, nothing. Jaye raised her voice and called out to her again, ordering her to open the lock. Still nothing. She tried demanding Raffles open the lock, followed up by begging and finally a last-ditch attempt at bribery. Nothing. In the end, Jaye had to go down to the shop to use the phone and call a locksmith. An hour later she walked back into her apartment to find the not-a-cat fast asleep on her favorite love seat.
Although there was still the matter of showing her how to open a deadbolt from inside, Jaye had to wait until after the shop closed for the night. The only deadbolt she had was on the front door of the building. It shouldn’t be difficult to open even that kind of lock from inside if the key was still in it, but what if it wasn’t? In her paranoia, Peggy might have taken to stashing it away in the general vicinity of the door so it was easy to grab when she was home and wanted to lock up. To cover this possibility, Raffles needed to be taught to look for it. Jaye tried to turn this part of the lesson into a game. In order to keep the animal from seeing where she was planting the key, she slipped a small paper bag over Raffles head. Raffles immediately made it clear that she didn’t care for the idea by teari
ng her way out of the bag and causing collateral damage to Jaye’s shirt in the scuffle. Time to rethink her strategy.
Sierra arrived fifteen minutes later with bits of bread dough dotting her hair.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were in the middle of baking?” Jaye asked when she saw her friend.
“Because what you’re trying to do is more important than perfecting a seven-grain peasant bread. What happened to your shirt?”
“Raffles and I had a difference of opinion about my teaching method.”
“Where is she anyway?”
“In the bedroom sulking.”
“Raffles,” Sierra called out sweetly. “Raffles.” A moment later the not-a-cat dashed into the room and launched herself into Sierra’s arms. She barely had time to brace herself for the impact. “Poor baby,” Sierra cooed, once she’d regained her balance. “What did your mommy do to you?”
“Thanks,” Jaye said wryly. “You’re a big help.”
“Well, right now she needs to trust at least one of us.”
Jaye explained what she’d been trying to do when Raffles turned into the Tasmanian Devil.
“I’ll take her outside while you hide the key,” she said, taking charge. When she brought Raffles back in, she set her down with instructions to find the key. Ninety seconds later, the not-a-cat did. They repeated the exercise until both women were satisfied that they’d prepared her as best they could for their first attempt at breaking and entering.
Chapter 16
Jaye and Sierra had spent the better part of an evening debating what time to schedule their undercover mission. The first thing they��d had to establish was whether or not Peggy’s electricity had been shut off and along with it any security system she might have had. They certainly didn’t have the expertise to disarm a system themselves. When Jaye had called the power company to inquire about the electricity at Peggy’s address, she’d been told that privacy regulations prevented them from discussing the account with anyone other than the individual listed in their records. The one recourse left to them had been to sneak over to Peggy’s house at night and look for the electric meter. Fortunately, the streetlamps had provided them with enough light to locate the meter on the left side of the house. But they’d needed to turn on their flashlight in order to determine whether it was working. Jaye had cupped her hand around the flashlight in case any neighbors happened to be looking out their windows and then flicked it on. They’d only needed two seconds to see that the meter was stopped dead. The electricity was off. They could move ahead with their plan once they selected a time.
Although waiting for the cover that darkness could provide had initially been appealing, they’d quickly realized that the extended use of a flashlight inside the house was likely to catch a neighbor’s eye and trigger a call to 911. And without light they couldn’t possibly navigate the unfamiliar house, let alone hunt for evidence in it. Of course, the daylight hours had some obvious drawbacks of their own. The houses in that neighborhood were set close to one another, and after the recent death in their midst, the homeowners were sure to be more vigilant than they’d been in the past. By default, early morning seemed like the best solution.
The morning of the mission, Jaye escorted Raffles outside during the last hour of darkness to minimize her need to run off when they reached their destination. The not-a-cat, who’d been sleeping soundly tucked into the crook of Jaye’s knees, wasn’t at all happy about being awakened, carried downstairs and unceremoniously plunked outside in the early-morning chill. She looked up at Jaye, her dark, luminous eyes clearly asking her roomie, “What are we doing out here at this ungodly hour?”
“Trying to keep your meal ticket from being shipped off to prison,” Jaye told her. Raffles still looked perplexed, but she yawned widely and gave her whole body a good shake before finally trotting off into the darkness. Jaye waited inside the shop for her return. If she came back too late, they’d have to scrub the mission and try again another day. But the animal, perhaps sensing something different was in the offing, came back in record time, after which she followed Jaye around the apartment as if afraid of being left behind.
“No worries. You’re coming too,” Jaye promised after twice turning and slamming into Raffles, who’d been tailgating. After that the not-a-cat backed off and followed at a safer distance. Jaye supposed she’d used the words “you’re coming” often enough in their brief relationship that the animal might have learned what they meant. But it was equally possible that she was just tired of having her toes stepped on.
Jaye gave her breakfast before they left. There was no point in bringing tuna along. They couldn’t very well tempt her to break into the house by waiting inside with the fish. Jaye refused to dwell on the possibility that Raffles might not be interested in finding a way inside without such an incentive. She was determined to go into the mission with as much optimism as she could muster, along with a truckload of fervent prayers that they wouldn’t get caught.
Sierra met them at Dee’s, where she left both Frosty and her car. When she climbed in beside Jaye, Raffles welcomed her with a high-pitched trill of delight and snuggled her almost-a-cat head under Sierra’s arm. In return, Sierra provided some enthusiastic petting. But as they drove to Peggy’s house, she fell silent.
“Having second thoughts?” Jaye asked, worried that her own resolve might falter if her friend had changed her mind.
“No,” Sierra replied with a sigh. “We need to find some clue the cops missed. But sometimes the reality of what we’re up against just smacks me in the face.”
“We’re going to find what we need in that house,” Jaye said firmly, to bolster Sierra’s spirits as well as her own. “Don’t forget, we have a not-a-cat-burglar on our team.” She glanced at Sierra and was rewarded by the smile brightening her face.
“Hey, you’re playing my role,” she said with a laugh.
“No problem,” Jaye smiled back. “I’m happy to be your understudy.”
***
Jaye parked down the street from Peggy’s house on a block of modest, older homes with stucco facades and Spanish tile roofs. No one was out and about yet, since the sun had only recently scaled the horizon, a tougher job in Sedona, where the horizon involved monoliths and mountains.
Jaye had Raffles mostly hidden under her jacket, with only the animal’s golden head poking out. After the incident when she’d jumped out of Jaye’s grasp and run through the crowded crystal shop, and the more recent paper bag fiasco, Jaye had learned her lesson. Raffles would tolerate being held or carried as long as she could see where she was going. From a distance her face looked enough like a cat’s that she wasn’t likely to raise any eyebrows. It was the best compromise Jaye could come up with.
In daylight, Peggy’s house looked forlorn and abandoned. As if in mourning, the ornamental bushes and trees drooped from dehydration now that the drip system was off-line. Several of the free local newspapers littered the driveway, and a hearty crop of weeds had pushed up between the pink marble pebbles that substituted for a lawn.
Without hesitating, Jaye and her little band of would-be thieves hurried through the gate in the adobe wall that enclosed the sides and back of the property. After shutting it behind them, Jaye set Raffles down. Then Jaye and Sierra pulled on latex gloves. Jaye took a cloth out of her pocket to wipe off any fingerprints they might have left on the gate and latch. Stage one of the plan was completed without a hitch. Jaye was fairly confident no one had seen them so far. Now Raffles just had to find a way to get inside the house.
It was immediately apparent that the only opening on this side of the house was a small louvered vent several feet beneath the eaves. Since there were no trees or trellis to make it accessible to the not-a-cat, they moved on to the backyard.
“It seems Peggy was into flowers,” Sierra said, pointing to the garden adjacent to the brick pa
tio. Jaye walked over to have a better look at it. Small, carefully manicured bushes were interspersed with lavender, lilies and some other perennials Jaye didn’t recognize. Half the garden had also been planted with impatiens, petunias and snapdragons, but the remainder of the new annuals were still in their original containers from the nursery. With no watering system or human hand to keep them alive, all the flowers were withering or already dead. But it was the decorative rocks in the garden that captured Jaye’s attention. The medical examiner had found particles from rocks like these imbedded in Peggy’s skull. There were no such rocks in Sierra’s yard. On closer inspection, Jaye spotted the place where one of the rocks should have been, it’s imprint in the flower bed as obvious as a footprint left by a person. Either the police had taken the rock as evidence, or the killer had taken it when cleaning up the crime scene. From the state of the garden, it certainly seemed as if Peggy had been planting her flowers when she was attacked. The only problem with that scenario was that, according to Dr. Gatwick, she’d died at Sierra’s house.
“Jaye,” Sierra said, trotting up to her, “from the back wall I could see the whole roof. There’s no metal cap on the chimney, but there are no trees close enough to the house for Raffles to climb.”
Jaye hunkered down beside the not-a-cat, and when she was sure she had her full attention, she instructed her to “be a good girl and go inside.” The animal looked at her and Sierra, then at the house and then back at her. “Go inside,” Jaye repeated, firmly but gently. She’d learned that Raffles didn’t respond well to being ordered around. Couching the same request in a less authoritarian manner produced much better results. As Sierra had noted early on in the process, it was hard to tell exactly who was training whom.
On Jaye’s third request, Raffles finally seemed to understand. She went to the back door and turned the knob. When that proved to be locked, she scampered off toward the gate and presumably the front of the house. Blasting herself for not having taken that possibility into consideration, Jaye was about to run after her when Sierra grabbed her arm.