Cattery Row

by Clea Simon

  “But I won’t.” Cool smiled at me. The big, easy grin that lit up so many album covers had returned. “I’m okay, now.”

  “Yeah.” I reached over and patted her hand. “You are.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Bill took longer to return than he’d anticipated, but that turned out to be just as well. I needed some time to sit and listen to music with my old friend. I needed the familiarity of clubland. I didn’t know if I was digesting what had happened, or simply distracting myself, but by the time the third band had finished I’d begun to breathe normally. We both did.

  Despite the shock about Sunny, the evening proved perfect for Cool. People trickled in slowly, many of them having been around long enough to have known her from the old days. She got attention, sure, but it was more of the friendly “Where have you been?” variety than anything nasty. And little by little she told them. All of it. By the time my guy did come down the stairs she was sitting in the center of about a dozen people. Sara, the opening act, had joined us, too, looking pleased as punch to be invited. And the bar was sending over complimentary bottles of San Pellegrino with every round. Cool was back, the queen of the underground.

  ***

  The next morning it all seemed so unreal as I woke up to the sound of Bill making coffee. Musetta jumped to the windowsill, pushing aside the curtain and letting the sun stream in. Sunny as a blackmailer? My cat stretched out, reaching for the window catch, the bright light revealing red highlights in her fur. Sunny as a murderer? I tried to imagine her killing Rose. If she were threatened, maybe a desperate fight had broken out. Maybe she’d even willed herself to forget it, admitting to the crimes she planned but not to the accidental one. Which brought me around to my own head wound, which still made no sense. Was that, and the break-in at Violet’s, somehow related? Had Sunny been trying to keep me from talking to Rose? I preferred to think perhaps the cops on the scene had been right, and that attack had been the result of my interrupting an unrelated robbery. I sighed, letting out tension I didn’t know I still had in me. Tomorrow was Halloween, and maybe some pranksters had simply started early. Musetta settled onto the sill. I wondered where those two missing kittens were, and slipped back into sleep.

  “You up for a phone call?” I came awake with a start. “It’s Violet.” Bill was standing in the doorway, holding a mug.

  “Yeah, sure.” I reached for my robe and shuffled toward the phone. “Hey, Violet. What’s up?”

  “It’s an emergency, Theda. I wouldn’t ask otherwise.”

  My sleepy thoughts of kittens vanished. “What? What’s wrong?”

  “It’s the van, Theda. It’s dead. Caro thinks it’s the transmission.” I breathed out what must have been an audible sigh. No point in yelling. She couldn’t know what had happened last night. “This is serious, Theda. The open house is tomorrow and I’ve got a ton of supplies on order, waiting for me.”

  Bill handed me a mug of coffee. I put my hand over the receiver and mouthed “car trouble.”

  “So you need a ride? Where to?” I dreaded the answer.

  “Uh, that Pet Set again, in New Hampshire.” I sipped. “Denise is being really nice. She may even take some of our kittens for her next cat-show adoption center. But she can’t waive the delivery fee, not for out-of-state.”

  “It has to be today?”

  “The open house is tomorrow.”

  I looked over at Bill, who’d already started on the paper, and at Musetta, who’d jumped down from my window and claimed the business section for a nap. They looked so relaxed. I sighed again.

  “Okay, give me a half hour.”

  ***

  It was closer to an hour by the time I showered, dressed, and bolted down the oatmeal Bill had made. But Violet was so grateful she didn’t mention it. As we sped up I-93, past the bare hillsides that define “stick season,” I filled her in on the events of the previous night.

  “Man, I knew I should have headed out for Amphibian.”

  “Sounds like you had your hands full.” Despite all her planning and Caro’s help, Violet had ended up working till past midnight, cleaning the shelter’s big ground-floor living rooms and finalizing plans for the neighborhood party.

  “So, you think Rose’s death had nothing to do with the cattery thefts?” She hit on the same point I’d been wondering about.

  “I guess not. I guess the whole idea of a kitten mill was just imagination.”

  “Oh they exist.” Violet relaxed, putting her feet up on my dashboard. “But, well, maybe we did get carried away on that one ad.”

  “I’m glad we weren’t able to sic those Customs people on anybody, after all.”

  “Yeah really!” She began looking through my CD case. “Do you think there’s a fine for false reporting of a cat sale?”

  ***

  Denise wasn’t there when we got to the big mall, but the well-groomed manager had left detailed instructions about Violet’s discounts along with a note for us.

  “This is so nice.” Violet read as a scrawny teen piled sacks of litter, flats of food, and two bulk bags of cat toys, especially set aside, into our cart. “She says she can’t promise to place any cats, but if we have any particularly cute kittens, she’ll take them to the next cat show for the Pet Set booth.”

  “The woman knows a good customer when she sees one.” Pity she wasn’t nicer to her staff, I thought. We’d gotten to the register by that point and the taped-up photo of a plump orange tabby reminded me of our last visit. What had that cashier’s name been? Sandy? The girl working today was undoubtedly more to the boss’ liking: slim, pretty, and quick about ringing us in without any chitchat. But I didn’t see any photos of her pets taped to the register, and that made me miss the heavy girl we’d met before.

  “Well, I’m grateful, anyway.” Violet was looking over her receipt. The discount had saved the shelter almost forty dollars. I wheeled the overloaded cart through the electronic door and waited while she unlocked my trunk. Looking around, I was hit by deja vu.

  “Hey, Violet. Is that the same sign?” Someone had stapled a handmade poster to a telephone pole. The big letters, in black magic marker, looked familiar.

  “Hang on.” Violet ran over to read. A moment later, she’d ripped it down and had shoved it in my face.

  “Look!”

  “Halloween Kittens,” the sign read. “Just in time for Halloween Fun.” A crude map indicated a site not five blocks away.

  “Let’s get this stuff in the car,” I barked. “This time we’re not going to let this go.”

  ***

  The map left out a few streets and misspelled some others, so it took about twenty minutes before we found ourselves cruising in mostly angry silence through a rundown industrial area with large patches of scrubby brush and leafless trees. Looking for building numbers had us going at a crawl, and it would’ve been hopeless if I hadn’t spotted a handmade sign, magic marker on cardboard this time, announcing “Halloween Kittens.” Following the arrow at its bottom, we made our way down a rutted drive to a dingy white ranch house. On the steps sat a heavy young woman, a girl really, who looked up as we got out of the car.

  “You here for the kittens?” I was fully prepared to hate her, and Violet didn’t seem much better disposed, but the face that looked up at us was swollen with weeping. One eye, peeking through lank brown bangs, was also blackened and nearly shut. The rest of her was unformed, doughy and shapeless. She couldn’t have been more than sixteen.

  “Wait a minute, don’t we know you?” Even with the bruising, that round pale face looked familiar. “You’re the checkout girl from Pet Set. Sandy, right? The one with the orange cat?”

  “Bootsy.” She sniffed and wiped her nose on the back of her hand. It wasn’t any cleaner than her face, just wetter. “Yeah, he’s my cat. But do you want to see the kittens?”

  Clearly something was going on here, but I wasn’t sure what it had to do with cats. “Yeah, sure.” At least we could keep the girl talking.r />
  We followed her into the house, which looked as scruffy as its surroundings. Passing through a nearly empty living room, we came to a kitchen. In a large box, probably fresh from the Pet Set warehouse, were five kittens, all black.

  “These are the Halloween kittens.” Sandy nodded toward the box, as if she were afraid of picking them up herself, her hands jammed into her baggy jeans pockets. “They’re black, special for the holiday. Twenty dollars each.”

  “Twenty dollars?” Violet had already reached in and picked up two. “What are you talking about? You should be happy to find these guys a home.” She passed one to me. The round blue eyes that looked up at me were lined with mucous, but the face was alert. As I held him to me, he sneezed.

  “How old are these kittens and when were they taken from their mothers?” Violet put hers back in the box and reached for another, flipping him over to run her fingers over its belly. “They’re undernourished.” She turned the kitten to peek at its bottom. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve got worms, either. Poor babies.”

  Sandy scuffed her sneaker toe into the grimy linoleum. Violet tried to hand her one of the squirming kittens, but she kept her hands in her pockets. “Twenty dollars. They’re for Halloween. I’m not supposed to say anything else.”

  “What do you mean, ‘not supposed to’?” The kitten I was holding had climbed onto my shoulder and begun to nurse on my earlobe. The big girl hung her head and didn’t answer. “Who’s making you do this, Sandy? And who gave you that shiner?”

  She started to sniffle again and ran her arm over her face. I feared a full-fledged bout of tears was on its way.

  “Wait a minute.” Violet stood up, holding the fourth kitten. “Wait a minute.” She took it over to the window where the midday sun was shining in, even through the dirty glass. “Theda, come here. Hold that kitten up, too.”

  I did, and as we examined both the mewling babies in the light I saw what had alerted her.

  “These kittens aren’t black.” It seemed preposterous, but as I started brushing the little one’s fur backward it was clear. “They’ve been colored. Dyed or something. What did you do to these kittens?”

  Sandy was crying in earnest now, both hands over her face, and I handed my kitten back to Violet. Maneuvering Sandy into one of the two folding chairs that constituted furniture in the room, I pulled the other up beside her. I put my arm around her broad, heaving shoulders and tried to talk as slowly and calmly as possible.

  “Sandy, something’s going on here. Somebody has hurt you, and somebody’s doing something funny with these kittens. I want you to tell me who hurt you and what exactly is going on here.”

  She shook her head, dark hair hanging in strings over face, fresh sobs wracking her round shoulders. “I can’t.”

  Time for another tack. “You like kittens, right? You love Bootsy! Bootsy was a tiny little kitty once. Right? So help me help these little, tiny kittens. Look how cute they are.”

  Violet handed me one of the kittens and I placed it on the girl’s lap. Her hands, down from her face at least, clenched. She was going to put them back in her pockets. But just then the kitten sat up and batted at a stray lock of hair.

  “Oh!” One hand came up, one finger extended to touch the little paw. The kitten reared back to smack at it, and lost its balance. Tumbling backward, it fell into Sandy’s other hand and then she was holding the kitten up to her face. “So cute! Such a pretty little kitty.”

  “Sandy.” If this moment of bonding didn’t open her up, I had no idea what would. “Sandy, honey. Don’t you want to help this kitty? Won’t you tell me what happened here?”

  The face that looked up at me was a mess, but the eyes that met mine were clear. “It’s Bruce. He’s my boyfriend.” I recalled the hulking teen who’d been helping out at the Pet Set booth. “He said I had to stay here and sell the kittens. He said I wasn’t to play with them or anything. Just get what I could. He said ask for twenty.”

  “He dyed them?”

  “Yeah, he used something from the grocery store, said it would make them good for Halloween parties and all.”

  “Bastard.” Violet was now on her knees examining the other kittens. I motioned for her to be quiet.

  “And he hit you to make you do it?” She shook her head no. Her tears had slowed to an occasional sniff.

  “He said I had to get rid of these today. Three of them are sick. I wanted to take them to the vet, but he said no. I tried anyway, tried to sneak them out, and that’s when he hit me. The other two, he just wanted to get rid of them quick. They weren’t good or something. He said get some money for them or he was going to kill them.”

  I thought of the options, and realized these babies were the lucky ones. “Were there other kittens, Sandy?” I tried to keep my voice gentle. “Do you know what happened to them?”

  “Yeah, there were lots. The healthy ones. They took them away.”

  “They? Bruce has a friend in on this?” I imagined a group of large, brutish boys alone with cats, and shuddered.

  “His boss! His boss was the one who said to color the kittens, the ones they left behind. She said they could make some more money that way, without taking them away.”

  And keep them from getting sicker and dying en route to wherever “away” was. The boss’ mercenary decision may have saved these kittens’ lives. But to what end?

  “And the others?” Violet was standing behind me now, anger coming off her like heat. “Where did they take them?”

  “They had a big order, and they were scared someone was onto them. They said they’d better stop after that.”

  I looked at her, holding my breath, willing her to continue.

  “They drove them down to Boston, to the airport this morning. They had boxes of kittens. Dozens. Some really young, and still with their mommas.”

  She looked back down at the tiny animal in her lap and began stroking it. I was afraid we’d pushed her too far, but she kept talking. “They left most of the momma cats behind, though.” That was a blessing.

  “Listen, Sandy, do you know Bruce’s license number?” Violet was all business now.

  “Uh uh.” At least the girl seemed calm. “But they rented a truck, does that help?”

  “Bingo!” Violet jumped up. “Sandy, is there a phone around here?”

  “You going to call the cops?” I felt as confused as the girl.

  “Even better!” Violet fished a business card out of her jacket pocket. “I forgot to give this back to the designer yesterday. I’m going to call the Feds!”

  ***

  Sandy showed us to a phone, back in the other room, and gave Violet all the details she could dredge up about the truck, Bruce, and the boxes of cats he’d loaded in that morning. Violet, in turn, alerted the Customs hotline about an orange rental truck that would be carrying cats, possibly sick and certainly without papers, into Logan. They’d left less than two hours before, she worked out from Sandy’s story, which meant that they’d probably be at the airport within the hour.

  “They said they’d get them!” Violet looked triumphant as she hung up the phone. “They’re going to put the agriculture department on it. Turns out there are laws against breeding and selling without licenses, and the guy said they’d probably get them on animal endangerment, too.”

  “Yes!” Violet and I traded high fives, causing all the kittens— and Sandy—to look up.

  “But what about the momma cats?” Despite the bruising around her eye and the gray smudges on her face, the teen now looked positively kittenish.

  “I forget to tell them.” Violet looked back at the phone.

  “No, wait. Sandy, do you know where the mother cats are?” She nodded enthusiastically. The girl was coming back to life. Working with us was helping her. I turned to Violet. “Even if Customs lets Bruce and his buddies go, we’re going to have hours before they get back. Why don’t we go liberate some cats?”

  Chapter Twenty

  We loaded the box
of kittens into the Toyota’s back seat with Sandy and set off to the old warehouse where the girl had last seen the cats. We were in holiday spirits, congratulating ourselves on a job well done, and the warehouse was off in the boondocks, so it wasn’t long before Violet and Sandy each had kittens out and were playing with them.

  “Look at this baby. I think I’m going to call you Smokey.” The girl did not have the greatest imagination.

  “I wonder if you’ll be smokey, too, when we get this stuff off of you.” Violet was holding one of the blue-eyed kittens again, rubbing her fingers through its long, soft fur. “Sandy?” Violet held the fur bundle up to her face to examine more closely. “What color were these kittens before Bruce dyed them?”

  “The two fluffy ones? They were sort of white and brown. Like Siamese, you know?”

  Violet looked across at me. “The kittens from the shelter.”

  It made no sense. “Sandy, did Bruce steal these kittens?” I tried to imagine why someone would break into a shelter to steal kittens.

  “The kittens and their momma, too.” Their mother?

  “Wait a minute, Sandy. Let’s go slowly here. Are these the kittens from Violet’s shelter?”

  I could see her nodding in the rearview mirror. “There were lots of kittens, but three got sick and Bruce was going to drown them. I said we should just take them to the animal hospital and leave them there, but Bruce was scared. I figured if I took them far away, I thought nobody would recognize them and it would be okay. So I got a nice carrier from the store, took my dad’s car, and headed into Boston. I’ve got a learner’s permit.”

  “How’d you end up at Violet’s?”

  “She comes in a lot and she always seems so nice.” Sandy looked up at me like I was her last hope. “I got lost, once I was off 93. But there were signs up about a Halloween party with lots of cats and kittens. It sounded like so much fun. Then when you came back to the store, I knew I’d picked the right people. I knew the kittens would be safe with you.”