Cat Shout for Joy

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

  She was as surprised as Joe, then as uneasy. “He gave you information when he never has before?” She looked at him, frowning. “Why would he do that?”

  “Trust?” Joe said hopefully. “He’s decided after all these years that I’m an informant he can trust?”

  They looked at each other, questioning.

  “It’s no more than that,” Joe said, feigning a conviction he didn’t feel.

  “Yes,” she said uneasily. “But I’d call what you were thinking no more than common sense. Ben was on the ladder. He saw or heard something, maybe heard the gun click. If the phone and notebook do contain something of value, he hid them in the only place handy. But what could be so important about the notebook? Ben used it for measurements and lists.”

  “And maybe other things,” Joe said. “I saw him more than once watching and listening to Tekla, frowning, moving away when she noticed him.”

  “Maybe Tekla has some suspicion about who this assailant is, about why he’s doing this? Maybe she said something to Sam, and Ben overheard? Ben made notes, trying to figure it out, to make sense of it?

  “But,” she said, “if Tekla had a suspicion, why wouldn’t she talk to the department? Why didn’t she speak up this morning, the minute she knew Ben was dead? Why didn’t she tell Dallas or Juana?”

  “Tekla wouldn’t talk to a cop. All she could think of was how inconvenient and embarrassing the murder was for her. She doesn’t care who killed Ben. She doesn’t trust cops any more than she’d trust the killer.”

  Ryan rose, took a glass from the cupboard, opened the refrigerator, and poured herself a beer. From a big covered bowl she dished up Rock’s supper, a concoction she cooked up every week for Rock and Snowball, and kept frozen in manageable portions. Setting the bowl in the microwave for a moment, she put it on the floor. She stood back as Rock rushed to his meal, scarfing up a mix of meat and a variety of steamed vegetables. She smiled when Snowball came trotting down the stairs, yawning, and tucked into her own bowl, close beside Rock’s gulping muzzle. Gently the big dog made way for her, not touching her food.

  “Snowball might be getting on,” Ryan said, “but with this new diet you’d never know it.” She looked down at Joe, sprawled across the table patiently waiting for his own supper, for Clyde to get home and start cooking. Joe wasn’t having even the most artfully prepared dog food. Ryan was saying, “If you’d just try a few bites . . .” when the intercom buzzed. She turned on the speaker.

  “It’s Charlie, we’re just headed home.”

  Ryan buzzed Charlie and Billy in. Charlie’s red hair was tucked back into an intricate twist. She was wearing black tights and a long, many-­colored, hand-knit shawl. “Kate and I were at the gallery,” she said. “A little private preview. The group show looks great, Kate loved it. And five of my large horse etchings have already sold. I’d hardly gotten there when Max called, wanted me to pick Billy up at the station. Something about a phone call just as they were starting home. He was headed up to talk with Celeste Reece and her sister,” Charlie said, puzzled.

  At the mention of Celeste Reece, Joe Grey came to attention. So his phone call had been important, had sent Max up there double ­time to talk with Bonnie, and surely to have a look at the gun.

  “Kate left the gallery and headed back to the shelter,” Charlie said, smiling. “She can’t leave it alone, has to make sure every detail is the way she wants it, has to pet and play with the few shelter cats that are already settled in, the few we’ve made room for. She’s up there more than the carpenters are. And . . .”

  But Joe Grey hardly heard her as he dropped off the table and melted away through the living room. With his thoughts on Max Harper, on Celeste Reece and her sister, he bolted out his cat door, scrambled up a pine tree, over his own roof and the neighbors’ roofs, heading for Ocean Avenue and the roofs rising up the hills beyond. The scents from the surrounding restaurants followed him, the smell of steak and lobster reminding him that he’d left home without his own supper. On the other side of the divided main street he hit the peaks and shingles, streaking up over the little shops and crowded cottages; hoping he’d beat Max to Celeste’s house, and knowing he wouldn’t.

  He just hoped he could get inside where he could hear what they talked about; he had a lot of questions about Bonnie Rivers. Above him the orange-­streaked sky was darkening, the sun gone, the streets below him growing shadowed. Approaching Celeste’s freshly painted, bright ivory cottage, he saw above its dark roof the first stars begin to gleam. Max’s truck was parked in the drive.

  15

  Wilma, having hugged and cried over Kit and Pan home from their long journey, had made supper for them, then saw that they were tucked up on the couch in the folds of her quilt. She had served them leftover shrimp Alfredo heated in the microwave, warm milk, and a nice bowl of custard, all of which vanished swiftly. The poor cats were starving, and exhausted, too, from their long climb.

  Now, full of their warm meal and happily back in their own world, they tried to tell her of their travels but all they could do was yawn—neither one could stay awake. Even as she stroked them, sitting on the couch beside them, the cats yawned and yawned and dropped into sleep. She sat looking down at them, so beautiful, Pan’s red-­striped fur tangled against Kit’s mottled black-­and-­brown coat; the two cats so lovely but so small and vulnerable—­and yet so bold and courageous in the adventure they had undertaken, in the dangers they must have faced. She wanted to grab them up again and keep holding them or to snuggle down warm between them. She left them at last, let them sleep and restore their strength, restore all that they had spent. She wanted to call Ryan and Clyde, call Charlie, call Kate, call the Firettis to tell them all that the cats were home, but she put that urge aside. Let them sleep, don’t encourage anyone to come racing over to love and hug them, to see for themselves that they were well and safe, to welcome and celebrate them. Let them sleep around the clock if they chose.

  But she did call Lucinda and Pedric, they would be so relieved. She called from the bedroom, shutting the door, speaking softly. When she couldn’t get them on their cell phone she called the lodge in Anchorage.

  The Greenlaws were in Denali, their cell phone out of range. The lodge called them on the radio, then put her through to them. Lucinda’s yelp of joy and her flood of questions wavered with static. When Pedric came on the line, his voice was shaking. Wilma couldn’t stop smiling. Now, their worries put at rest, Kit’s beloved housemates could get on with their own adventure.

  “Don’t wake them,” Lucinda said. “We’ll talk later. We’ll call as soon as we’re back from Denali.”

  Wilma, wishing them a happy journey, had hung up and headed for the kitchen when she heard the cat door flap open and Dulcie came bolting in. Glancing out the kitchen window, she saw Charlie’s red Blazer pulling away. Charlie waved, tooted the horn, and was gone. Wilma spun around at Dulcie’s excited mewl. In the center of the kitchen, Dulcie stood up on her hind legs, her ears up, her tail twitching, one paw lifted. She had caught Kit’s and Pan’s scent; she was poised to bolt for the living room when Wilma grabbed her up.

  “Don’t wake them,” Wilma whispered, cuddling Dulcie. “They’re worn out. They had such a long, hard journey up those endless tunnels, let them sleep.”

  “Oh, my,” Dulcie said softly. She slipped down from Wilma’s arms, padded silently into the living room and reared up, looking at the two cats so deeply asleep on the couch. She longed to reach out a paw and gently touch Kit, but she only looked, every line of her tabby body curved into pleasure, to see the two home again. Kit was safe, they both were home and safe. And won’t they be surprised when we tell them about the kittens? Oh, my, Dulcie thought, won’t Kit make over them and spoil them.

  But maybe she would spoil them more than they needed, this tattercoat Kit who was still, in spirit, a wild and unruly kitten herself. What kind of influence, Dulcie wondered war
ily, will Kit be on our innocent babies?

  From the shadows beside Celeste Reece’s front door Joe Grey could hear Max’s voice clearly. He wouldn’t need to find a way inside as long as Celeste didn’t close the windows. The front door was shut tight, but the tall glass panes flanking it stood wide to the evening breeze. Joe could smell coffee from within, and some kind of peanut butter confection that reminded him again he’d had no supper. The bright white room, clean and uncluttered, smelled not only of coffee and dessert, but a lingering scent of roast beef that didn’t help his emptiness, either. Max must have arrived just as they finished their meal.

  The windowsills were so low he had to crouch down in the petunias so as not to be seen. Celeste and her sister, Bonnie, sat on the white couch, Max in a matching chair, his dessert and coffee beside him on a small table. He had just finished asking a question that Joe missed; he looked at Bonnie expectantly for an answer.

  Bonnie, tanned and slim, was dressed in pale jeans and a light blue T-­shirt, her metal brace snug to her left leg. “It was me they were after,” she said shakily. “Not my husband. They didn’t . . . they didn’t care who else they killed.”

  Celeste said, “The trial itself was stressful enough for Bonnie. And then, all those weeks later, the accident—­what we thought was an accident. I headed for the city, stayed in the hospital with her. It was terrible. Gresham gone so suddenly, that long surgery on Bonnie’s shattered leg . . .” Celeste looked across at her sister and went quiet.

  Bonnie’s direct, steady voice was more in control now than her sister’s. “After all those days sequestered, sitting in the cold, stuffy courtroom, finally it was all over, the ugliness, the stress. I was just beginning to feel normal again. Gresham and I needing to be with each other, staying close, going out to dinner at our favorite little restaurants, going to movies, long walks through the park. And then . . . the accident.”

  Max was quiet, giving her time. Then, “The jurors,” he said at last, “could you identify them all, do you remember their names?”

  “I’d know them to see them. I’d know their pictures, of course. But I’m not sure I can remember all their names—­in most cases, just a first name.

  “But I’ll try,” she told Max. “I’ll start a list, write down descriptions and the names that I can remember. Maybe the full names will come to me. After the accident, it took me a while to realize what . . . what had really happened—­that it wasn’t an accident. When I read about that waiter, Jimmie Delgado, going home from work after midnight, his bicycle hit, Delgado killed . . . he was on the jury. It was then I began to put it together and got scared.”

  “I’d like you to come down to the station,” Max said gently. “Tomorrow morning if you can. See if you can identify the murder victims? I can have someone pick you up, if you like. If I’m not there, one of the detectives will work with you, show you the pictures.”

  Bonnie nodded. “I read something in the paper about James Allen, saw the paper some time after he was killed. I remembered him, maybe because it’s such a simple name, and because he was in a walker. An older man, nearly bald, gray fringe of hair around his ears. He complained, said he was too old to be on jury duty. But I guess the attorneys didn’t think so.”

  Max said, “We may need to get a release of the names of the jurors, that may still be sequestered. A list would help you put names and faces together.” He was quiet, then, “You’re sure you didn’t know the boy who followed you?”

  Bonnie shook her head. “All bundled up. A boy? A small man? I’d say a boy, though. A good runner. But the ­couple you mentioned, in red sweatshirts? A rather portly pair. I recognized them, but they weren’t on the jury, I never knew their names. I saw them in the visitors’ gallery several times. And during the verdict and sentencing? She was crying, both days. He had his arm around her, hugging her. I couldn’t tell whether she was crying from grief or was happy. It was that kind of crying,” she said, looking across at Max.

  Max nodded. He picked up some newspaper clippings from the arm of his chair. “May I make copies of these, return them when you come in?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Joe glimpsed the headlines for only an instant as Max folded the articles into his notebook and slipped it in his briefcase.

  . . . dies when car goes over cliff north of . . .

  . . . on a rainy street south of . . .

  Bonnie said, “Would first thing in the morning suit you? Say, eight o’clock?”

  “That’s change of watch,” Max said. “I’m tied up until, say, nine?”

  She smiled. “Nine’s fine. That will give Celeste and me a chance to have breakfast out, splurge a little.”

  When Max rose, the tomcat backed deeper into the petunias. Though the evening was growing dark, his white paws and white nose were always a problem, too bright in the gathering dusk, even among the tangled leaves. Watching Max head for his pickup, Joe wanted to leap in the truck, ride home with him unseen, slip into the Harper house, paw through Max’s briefcase and read the clippings. What trial was this? What was the offense? Who was the plaintiff? If someone was out to kill the ­jurors . . . a friend or relative of the plaintiff . . . then he must have received the ultimate sentence . . . life in prison or the death penalty. Joe wished he had run faster over the rooftops, that he hadn’t missed half the conversation, missed the telling facts.

  But now, as much as he wanted to know the rest of Bonnie’s story, he decided not to hitch a ride, not chance getting caught snooping up at the Harper ranch. He’d see the clippings in the morning, once he hit the station. Though even that wait annoyed him, he was wired with curiosity. He watched the chief cross the yard, step into his pickup and back out—­and Joe Grey hit the rooftops, his paw-­beats thudding across the shingles of the neighborhood cottages as he headed not for the Harper ranch, that long haul up the hills, but for Ben’s place.

  Maybe Juana had missed nothing at all—­and maybe not. Either way, she was sure to have cleared the scene by now.

  Maybe, in the process of removing crime tape, she had aired the apartment of cat-­box smell, had opened the windows and, if luck were with him, she had not relocked them all. Not likely, knowing Detective Davis, but he meant to find some way inside.

  Up across the roofs and oak branches, racing above the dropping canyon until he saw the tall old house ahead, Ben’s small basement apartment at the back. The outdoor security lights were on, but no interior lights at all, even in the big house. He came down two gardens away.

  There was no sound from within as he crossed the darkening yards onto the brightly lit lawn. Juana had removed the crime tape, and luck was with him. She, or maybe the landlord, had left the apartment wide open, to air. Strange, he thought, to leave it unlocked at night. Maybe that’s why the security lights were on, shining brightly into the tiny room, brighter than Joe wanted. His nose twitched at the lingering stink as he leaped to the sill of an open window.

  The screen was old-­fashioned with just the kind of latch he liked. With careful claws he ripped a small hole in the bottom. Reaching through, he flipped the hook, pulled the screen open, ducked under, and dropped down inside.

  The room was just as it had been except for the empty space before the windows where the two big cages had stood. Dent marks from their stands marked the carpet. He scanned the room looking for a hiding place that Juana could somehow have missed. Though still he found it strange that Ben would have left notebook and phone at home that morning. There was a better chance the killer already had them. Joe couldn’t get it out of his head that Ben had secretly taken pictures that he felt might lead to perpetrator of the street crimes—­pictures that Ben didn’t know might lead to his own killer?

  In this little square room, could there be some hiding place so small and out of the way that even Juana had overlooked it? She had surely gone over the carpet feeling for lumps underneath. Beside the narro
w bed was a little writing desk that served as a night table, cluttered with cough drops, a battery-­operated travel clock, a ­couple of paperback mysteries. Marks in the thin coating of dust described the shape of a laptop and what could be the feet of a small printer. Maybe one of those giveaway color jobs where the company made most of its profit selling cartridge replacements. In the far corner of the room a tiny refrigerator stood beneath a small counter with a bar-­sized sink. On the counter were a dozen cans of cat food, a few clean mugs and plates, and a microwave. And now, even with the windows open to air out the lingering stink of cat kennels, another scent touched Joe. He could smell, when he took a good whiff, the whisker-­licking aroma of young mice.

  Having missed supper, he spared a few moments to stalk the trail, hoping to assuage the hollowness in his belly. Slipping across the room following the mousy enticement, he had doubled back where it was stronger—­when a swift small shadow fled past his nose. Damned mouse exploded right past him! Enraged to have missed it, he leaped where the shadow paused for an instant. He missed again, the tip of its tail vanishing beneath the bed. Well, hell!

  Bellying under the bed among inert dust mice, he found where the little beast had disappeared. Where the molding was warped, concealing a sizable hole behind the wooden trim.

  Crouching to peer in he saw a tangle of chewed-­up paper, and the smell of mouse was strong. He was staring at the edge of a mouse nest: torn papers deep and cozy. He tensed when something small stirred within. Hungrily he flashed his paw in, fast as lightning he grabbed—­and drew back faster, hissing, pain shooting through his paw.

  A half-­grown mouse clung to his paw, its sharp teeth sunk deep in his tender pad. The tiny animal glared at him with rage. Joe shook his paw and backed away, the angry mouse clinging.

  In all his days, in all his battles with enemies twice his size, from fighting raccoons to enraged dogs, he had never been attacked by a mouse. He stared at it, shocked; he was about to pull the cheeky youngster off his paw and crunch and swallow it. But it was so small and so damned nervy. The stupid mouse had way more courage than sense. Joe bared his teeth over it. One chomp and it would be gone, warming his hungry belly.