Catch as Cat Can

by Rita Mae Brown

  The tiger cat eluded this clumsy effort by jumping onto the wing chair, taking up residence on the back behind BoomBoom's beautiful, long blond hair, held up in a simple swirled French twist. Having just left the hairdresser's, BoomBoom's tresses were lighter than usual. “BoomBoom has big bosoms. Bet she blacks her eye when she jogs. Bet it's hard to bend over and stand up again. Maybe her face just hits the floor,” she warbled, quite pleased with herself.

  “Boom, push her off of there. She's being naughty.”

  “I don't mind the noise. The tuna breath is what gets me.” BoomBoom laughed.

  “Tuna breath?” Mrs. Murphy's eyes widened, the beautiful electric color seemingly brighter. She unleashed one dagger claw, expertly hooking it into the pretty tortoiseshell clip holding up Boom's hair. With a flick she dislodged half of it so Boom's golden hair fell out of place.

  “Now that is enough!” Harry, angry, stood up, grabbed the cat—who offered no resistance—and dropped her to the floor. “One more stunt like that and you're sleeping in the barn tonight.”

  Pewter, observing the display, coolly said, “She's only doing what you'd like to do, Mom. You can't stand BoomBoom.”

  “Right.” Mrs. Murphy, emboldened by the support of Pewter, emitted another yowl.

  “First you fight and now you're best friends. You two are infantile.” The dog rolled her eyes. She had squeezed next to Harry on the sofa.

  “Big word, Tucker. Congratulations,” Mrs. Murphy said sarcastically as she turned her back on the company and lifted the tip of her tail in her right paw, bringing it to her lips for grooming.

  “Hee hee.” Pewter couldn't resist laughing because it was funny to her but also because it would make the dog mad.

  Tucker ignored them, placing her head in Harry's lap, looking as adorable as possible.

  “You know what I'm doing, I'm venting. Humans vent all the time,” Murphy said.

  “I wouldn't imitate humans.” Pewter thought about grooming but then decided she was too tired. “It's a species that has as its motto: I can't always do it the hard way but I can try. They make everything so complicated, no wonder they vent, bitch, and moan. It's their own fault.”

  “There is that,” the tiger cat agreed with her.

  BoomBoom had just finished an elliptical tangent that finally returned to its starting point, her need of Harry's help—“. . . so you see Susan wouldn't be quite right and Lottie Pearson is too eager, if you know what I mean. She parties in D.C., Richmond, and Charlotte, all in search for a man of means. She's beginning to get panicky about marriage, I swear. Of course she says she's canvassing for contributors to the university. Her job as a fund-raiser covers a multitude of sins, I swear.” Lottie Pearson was a social acquaintance of BoomBoom's, whom she sometimes liked and sometimes didn't. Today was a didn't.

  Harry, fearing what was coming, quickly interjected, “But Lottie Pearson is single and Susan is not. That's a plus.” Harry echoed BoomBoom's earlier dismissal of turning to Susan for help. She wished BoomBoom would get to the point. Exactly what did she want?

  “Lottie Pearson will complicate things. I really don't want my friends interviewed about their net worth.”

  “Boom, you're losing me here. What friends? What net worth?”

  After a long, refreshing draft of steaming-hot Plantation Mint tea, the tall woman placed the china cup in the matching saucer and laid them on the coffee table. “Your grandmother's china. I remember your grandmother.”

  “Mom's mom.” Harry smiled, an image of a lean, silver-haired lady crossing her mind.

  “She was a good teacher. Pony Club.”

  Pony Club teaches young people all aspects of horsemanship. Riding is but a small portion of one's skills.

  Harry leaned forward. “Remember when she made us take apart a bridle, strip it, dip it, put it back together, and she inspected everyone's work? Susan tried to cheat and used a toothbrush to clean around the bit instead of totally dismantling it?”

  BoomBoom laughed. “And then she gave that lecture on shortcuts. Hey, I can still hear her voice when I'm considering the lazy way—‘the shortest way around is often the longest.'”

  As they neared forty both women were slowly realizing that shared experiences were binding. Time possesses the greatest power. Men who fought on opposite sides in a war, in old age, often felt closer to their former enemies than people of their own nationality who were younger.

  “You know.” BoomBoom lowered her voice, a sweet, dark soprano, a counterpoint to Harry's liquid alto. If the two had sung together they would have sounded heavenly. “I've been seeing this divine man. He's so interesting. He's urbane, speaks four languages, and he's tremendously intelligent. He's coming down this weekend and at the last minute his assistant at the embassy said he could come and—”

  “Embassy?”

  “Yes. He's Under-Secretary to the Ambassador for Uruguay.”

  “Who?” Harry was fighting exasperation.

  “My friend, Thomas Steinmetz, is Under-Secretary.” BoomBoom threw up her hands. “I'm going in circles. Will you escort my friend's friend? That's what I'm trying to ask.”

  Now this was interesting. The two cats and dog turned their heads to stare at Harry, who blinked.

  “Say something,” Mrs. Murphy suggested to Harry.

  “Uh—”

  BoomBoom tried to be more organized now that the cat was out of the bag, so to speak. “Handsome. Fun. A lot of fun really. Recently divorced.”

  “How recently?”

  “U-m-m, a year.”

  “Why are you asking me, really?”

  “Because you're fun, you're very attractive, and because, well, you never know.” She held up her hand, her large diamond reflecting the light.

  “Know what?”

  “When lightning will strike.”

  Harry scrunched down in the sofa a bit. Tucker refused to budge. “Tucker.”

  “I don't want to miss a thing,” the bright-eyed corgi replied to the complaint.

  “Ha,” both cats giggled.

  “Harry, you need to get out more.” BoomBoom picked up the teacup once more.

  “How ironic coming from you.”

  When Harry and Fair separated and filed for divorce, his brief affair with BoomBoom kept tongues wagging in Crozet. It was like the small-town version of being splashed across the front page of the tabloids.

  Harry always felt that Fair could have picked someone out of town or that BoomBoom could have refused him. The fact that both Fair and BoomBoom were great-looking people, in the prime of life, escaped her.

  “You're still angry with me and I've done all but grovel, and I repeat for the thousandth time, he was separated from you. Separated.”

  Ignoring this because she didn't believe BoomBoom's version of the timing of the affair, Harry plunged in. “Well, it hurt like hell. And just why didn't you stay with him?”

  “I could never be a veterinarian's wife.”

  Truer words were never spoken. Not only could BoomBoom not stand the schedule of an equine vet, those calls for colic coming right in the middle of a romantic evening, she needed more position, more power, more money.

  BoomBoom's affair with Pharamond “Fair” Haristeen, DVM, owed something to putting herself back together after the shock of her young husband's sudden death. To her credit, though, she never used her loneliness as an excuse.

  On Fair's part, the affair was a flight from responsibility, pure and simple. He realized it. Broke it off after six months and went into therapy—a tremendously difficult thing for him to do, to ask for help. After the first year of therapy, he begged his ex-wife's forgiveness. He still hoped to win Harry back. She was the best mate he could find and he knew it. She understood horses. She understood him. She expected to work hard in this life and what she asked in return was a partner who also worked hard, remained faithful, and had a good sense of humor. He knew he could do that now.

  She remained diffident, although at times she would
be pulled back toward him not just emotionally but physically, and that only stirred the pot. Not that she told BoomBoom but Susan knew, of course, and Mrs. Hogendobber suspected.

  The animals remained discreet on the subject.

  Harry, silent for a while, finally spoke. “What I don't get is why you won't leave me alone? Why is it so important that we be—something?”

  “Because we're part of one another's lives. We grew up together. And because we're women and women are smarter than men about these things.”

  “I don't think I'm smarter than a man about infidelity.”

  “But he wasn't unfaithful, Harry. You were separated.” BoomBoom made this point again, as though speaking to a slow child.

  “Can we table this?” Harry rolled her eyes heavenward.

  “You've been tabling it for years. Surely we can coexist. We work on all the same projects.”

  “So does everyone else. It's a small town,” Harry said peevishly.

  “We hunt together, we play golf and tennis together.”

  “I hardly ever play golf and tennis. I haven't got the time.” Harry fidgeted.

  “Okay.” BoomBoom took a deep breath. “Will you be Diego Aybar's date?”

  “That's his name?”

  “Diego Aybar. And trust me, he is handsome, full of energy—even if lightning doesn't strike, you'll enjoy his company. Please say yes, Harry. I know he'll like you and it will be an unforgettable weekend for all of us.”

  “Fair asked me to the Wrecker's Ball. I could go to everything but that and I'm parade coordinator for the festival”—she paused—“but you know that. 'Course once that last float pushes off—”

  “Say yes,” Pewter meowed. “A little shake-up in the status quo can't hurt.”

  “All status and no quo.” Mrs. Murphy watched her human struggle with conflicting emotions, the most obvious being mistrust of BoomBoom.

  “Harry, if you don't like this, if you suffer through the weekend I'll buy you that new Wilson tennis racquet everyone is raving about. Then you can beat me.”

  “I beat you anyway. You don't have to bribe me, BoomBoom.”

  “Well?”

  “Clothes?”

  “God, she's a hard nut to crack.” Pewter exhaled.

  “And lacking in all spontaneity but I love her,” Mrs. Murphy purred as she leaned into Pewter who'd come up right next to her.

  “Don't you two make a pretty picture, but I'm next to Mom and you aren't.”

  Rising to the little dog's challenge, the cats leapt onto the back of the sofa. They plopped down behind Harry's head.

  “It will be fun. All you need is a spring dress for the tea. Your white evening gown looks lovely on you. You need only one new dress. I know how you hate to shop.”

  “That evening gown was Mother's.”

  “Classic. Christian Dior classic. Your mother had fabulous taste.”

  “And no money. She won the gown.” Harry smiled, remembering her mother and her pride in the gown that she had, in fact, won in a contest to design the Christmas Ball for the United Way. Christian Dior, a friend of Tally's—Big Mim's aunt who knew everyone and anyone—put up the gown as a reward.

  “Come on. It will wake up Fair. He has no competition.”

  Harry uncrossed her arms. “That's a fact.” Her eyebrows twitched together a moment. “All right, BoomBoom. I'll do it. I don't exactly know why I'm doing it but I'm doing it.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Spring fever,” Pewter laconically said, a small burp following.

  “Excuse yourself, pig.” Mrs. Murphy reached out and touched Pewter on the shoulder.

  “Excuse me. Spring fever.”

  “Pewter, what are you talking about?” Tucker wanted an answer. She hated it when the cats got “airy,” as she called it.

  “Spring fever. That's why Harry is going out with this new guy.”

  “You might be right,” Mrs. Murphy agreed. “This will get Lottie Pearson's knickers in a twist. She's on the man hunt and BoomBoom ignored her in favor of Mom. She'll have her revenge. Just wait.”

  “On whom? Mom or BoomBoom?” Tucker lifted her head.

  “Both, if I know Lottie. Her social ambitions seethe. Being escorted by a handsome man working on Washington's Embassy Row is her idea of perfect. She'd get to meet more important people and she'd look important. She cultivates people, I guess that's how you put it, before she asks them for hundreds of thousands of dollars for the university. She'd like to run this town someday, too. Never happen. Big Mim will live to be one hundred and fifty. Look how old Aunt Tally is. They never die, I swear. But you mark my words, Lottie Pearson is smart and devious. She'll get her revenge.”

  “It's so petty!” Pewter exclaimed.

  “Precisely but that's the way people are. They're further and further removed from nature, and they get weird, major weird.” Mrs. Murphy watched as Harry walked BoomBoom to the back door in the kitchen.

  “Spring fever.” Pewter marched back into the kitchen for more crunchies.

  6

  The work week rolled along without incident. Harry and Miranda sorted mail, light this time of year. Big Mim made pronouncements about how to improve the Dogwood Festival before Saturday's parade. Everyone smiled, said, “You're right,” and went about their business.

  Fair, Harry's ex-husband, was just wrapping up foaling and breeding season. Upon hearing that Harry would be accompanying Diego Aybar to the tea party and then the dance, he fumed; but Fair had committed the mistake of thinking he didn't need to ask Harry. He assumed she would be his date if he could shake free of work. Usually a low-key and reasonable man, he slammed the door to her kitchen, upsetting the cats and secretly delighting Harry.

  Miranda glowed for her high-school beau, who would be returning from Hawaii, where he had finally settled his estate, would be her escort for all festivities. She was to pick him up at the airport Friday morning and she figured he'd bounce back from his travails and travel by Saturday, the big day. Tracy Raz, former star athlete of Crozet High, class of 1950, was a tough guy and an interesting one, too.

  Reverend Herbert C. Jones, pastor of the Lutheran church and parade marshal this year, was the most jovial anyone had ever seen him, which was saying something as the good pastor was normally an upbeat fellow.

  Little Mim, as vice-mayor of Crozet, used this opportunity to insist more trash barrels be placed on the parade route. She endeared herself to the merchants in town by having flags made up at her own expense for them to hang over their doorways. The flags, “Crozet” emblazoned across a French-blue background, also had a railroad track embroidered on the bottom right-hand side. As Crozet was named for Claudius Crozet, former engineering officer with Napoleon's army, she hoped out-of-towners would ask about the tracks. Crozet, after capture in Russia, again rejoined the emperor for Waterloo, managing to escape the Royalists and sail to America. He cut four tunnels into the Blue Ridge Mountains, an engineering feat considered one of the wonders of the nineteenth century. His work—sans dynamite, using only picks, shovels, and axes—stands to this day, as do the roads he built from the Tidewater into the Shenandoah Valley.

  The town itself never became a glamorous depot but remained a quiet stop before one plunged into the mountains themselves. Most residents worked hard for a living, but a few enjoyed inherited wealth, Little Mim being one, which is why she paid for the flags herself. She thought if merchants hung the flags out it would create further color for the day, showing pride in the community. Not that residents of the small, unpretentious town lacked pride but rather, in that quiet Virginia way, they didn't speak of it. The surrounding countryside, dotted with apple orchards, drew tourists from all over the world, as did Albemarle County itself, laboring under the ghosts of Jefferson and Monroe, to say nothing of all the movie stars, sports stars, and literary lights who had moved there, enticed by the natural beauty of the place and the University of Virginia. As it was only an hour by air from New York City, some of the richest
residents commuted daily in their private jets.

  Crozetians, although part of Albemarle County, more or less ignored Charlottesville, the county seat.

  Little Mim, a Republican, and her father, a Democrat, now ran the town together. He was grooming her as well as pressuring her to jump parties. So far, she had resisted.

  The merchants adored her, not just because of the flags. Like her father, she had a natural flair for politics.

  Lottie Pearson assisted Little Mim. Both women were five feet six inches, slender, and well-groomed. Since both favored bright spring sweaters, khaki slacks, and flats, the only way you could tell them apart from the back was that Lottie's hair was honey brown while Little Mim's was ash blond this week. Lottie was much in evidence throughout the week as she climbed on a ladder watering and inspecting the huge hanging baskets at each street corner. Like Fair, she wasn't thrilled about Harry escorting Diego Aybar but she put a good face on it. Little Mim was so busy preparing for the festival that she really hadn't the time to tell anyone what she thought even if she was so inclined. Little Mim, divorced, was beginning to feel lonely. Diego would have been a suitable escort for her, too.

  The last task before the parade was hanging the bunting. Everyone pitched in, so the blue and gold colors streamed across Route 240 and Whitehall Road. Bunting hung from buildings. Blue and gold flags and streamers waved from people's windows. Blue and gold were the colors of the French army under Napoleon, or so the town felt. White and gold with the fleur-de-lis was the emblem of the Royalists, so there wasn't a fleur-de-lis in sight.

  In addition to the big wrecker's ball crane, which the O'Bannon brothers used to carry the heavier items through town, they owned a smaller, second crane. Roger perfected the knack of appearing wherever Lottie happened to be, always using the excuse that he had a job to do. He asked her to be his date at the Wrecker's Ball, held the first weekend in May, but she put him off, saying she needed to get through the Dogwood Festival first.

  Since she didn't give him a flat no, he felt hopeful. Sean told him to give it up, as did Don Clatterbuck, his fishing buddy. Roger swore he'd win her over.