Canapés for the Kitties

by Marian Babson

“As I have said, we are in a life-or-death situation. We must face that fact and prepare to act accordingly. If the choice is between our Chronicler and ourselves ...”

  “Petunia!” Marigold buried her face in her hands.

  “You mean – ?” Lily gave a long low whistle.

  “Precisely,” Miss Petunia said again. “I fear we are left with no other choice in the matter. Lorinda Lucas

  m

  u

  s

  t

  d

  i

  e.”

  She had never written that! Not one word of it!

  The pages slid from Lorinda’s nerveless fingers and slithered across the carpet with the dry rustling sound of a snake gliding through the undergrowth.

  Had she?

  Lorinda backed away from the scattered pages even as Had-I and But-Known advanced to inspect them.

  No! Her mouth shaped the word soundlessly. No! Something struck her in the back and she gave a muffled shriek before realizing that she had backed into the wall.

  But-Known gave a final sniff at the papers and seemed to understand that she was needed elsewhere. She strolled over and brushed against Lorinda’s ankles, offering comfort.

  “Oh, But-But.” She bent and gathered the little calico into her arms, holding her close. But-Known twisted to stroke her head along Lorinda’s chin. The little body throbbed and a soft deep purr rose like a benediction. Lorinda hugged her tighter.

  I can’t be going mad. Can I?

  The dark terror lurking at the back of every human mind assailed her. She clung to But-Known and looked around her little study, hub of her new home, her peaceful ordered life. Was it all about to implode on her? Had the tenuous link with reality snapped? She earned her living from her imagination; was the mind that had given her that imagination now turning on her like some rogue cell battering at an immune system that was failing to contain it?

  Her imagination – was that it? Surely, she could not have read what she thought she had read. She was overtired, stressed – her imagination was playing tricks on her. Her imagination – not her mind. Just a little blip. Perhaps the onset of a nervous breakdown? No, that wasn’t a very reassuring thought, either. Nor was the next thought she had.

  She was going to have to read those pages again. Make sure that they actually said what she thought they had said.

  She forced herself to approach the scattered pages, fighting down the dire realization that she was in a no-win situation. It was bad if the pages remained as she had first read them; it would be worse if they didn’t.

  “All right, move.” She shifted Had-I, who was sitting on two of the pages, putting But-Known down beside her. The pages shook only slightly in her hands as, carefully looking at nothing but the page numbers, she put them in the right order. Then she retreated to sit at her desk and stare into space for a long moment before she looked at them again.

  Yes, they were the same. Unexpectedly, she was aware of a feeling of relief, mingled with a growing anger.

  This was some sort of elaborate joke. It had to be. And it wasn’t funny. But who would do such a thing? And how had they known – ?

  She rose abruptly and crossed to the filing cabinet. It looked the same. One didn’t tuck a betraying scrap of paper into the crack of a drawer or paste a hair across it in ordinary life. Only in the sort of books she and her colleagues wrote – and any one of them could imitate each other’s style for a few pages.

  She pulled out her Final Chapters file and immediately knew that someone had gone through it. The gold-rimmed pince-nez glasses were missing.

  Miss Petunia had come back to reclaim her property!

  Lorinda pushed the thought away. She must not give in to such an idea. She was not completely mad. Not yet. While she could still function, she must. And when she found the perpetrator of this abysmal joke ...

  She thrust the file back into place and took a large manila envelope instead. She put the counterfeit chapter into it and looked around for a safe place to hide it.

  The cats watched with great interest as she pried up a corner of the carpet and slid the envelope to lie flat beneath it. Not very original, perhaps, but what was the point of that when the joker who wrote those pages probably knew as much about crime and concealment as she did?

  She should have hidden the pince-nez better. She should never have put them in that file. She had put them there, hadn’t she? Without them, she could not prove they had ever existed. But they had. She could not have hallucinated such a thing. Could she? She could see them now, even down to the tiny “14K” imprinted in the gold rim.

  Unfortunately, no one else could see what was in her mind’s eye. And she would sound like a fool if she tried to tell anyone about it. That was what the joker would be counting on.

  Had-I walked gingerly over the replaced carpet, testing it with tentative paws, as though it might collapse beneath her. But-Known sat on the desk, looking down on her intrepid sister and giving her familiar impression of a Victorian Miss wringing her paws at the recklessness of a daredevil.

  Lorinda tested that patch of carpet herself, treading on it firmly. There was no telltale rustle of paper and no obvious difference in the thickness of the carpet. It would do.

  The best way to handle the situation now was to ignore it, give no sign that she had ever seen those pages, and disappoint whomever was waiting for some sort of reaction from her.

  An unpleasant feeling remained with her. Perhaps because Someone had violated the privacy of her home as surely as any burglar: sat at her desk, written on her machine – hijacked her characters. Although the escapade could be written off as a joke if anyone admitted it, there was an underlying malice that was disquieting. Someone had read through her files, invaded her home in her absence.

  Who? Not Freddie. Automatically, she exonerated her friend. But who?

  She had been in London for the past week, attending to all the errands she had been postponing since her move to the country. A visit to her dentist, giving a talk at a suburban library, lunch with her agent, doing research at the London Library, dinners with friends and catching up with theatre-going. She had even done some Christmas shopping. The week had sped past and she had enjoyed it thoroughly, knowing that Freddie would be looking after the cats.

  It had never occurred to her that someone might be needed to watch the house. Freddie had the only duplicate keys. She would never have allowed a stranger inside, probably not even a friend. Of course, there was always that time-honoured pretext: “I loaned her a book and I need it back.” Yes, even Freddie might have fallen for that one. She would have to find out if anyone had tried it.

  If anyone else was involved. The quiet terror stirred at the back of her mind again. If she hadn’t written that chapter herself before she went up to London and then forgotten about it, blotted it out of her memory. People could do things like that.

  But they were cases of split personalities, perhaps even multiple personalities. Fighting against themselves, hating themselves, doing strange things to punish themselves for transgressions only they knew or cared about. She couldn’t be one of those – could she?

  She drew a deep, unsteady breath; then another, somewhat steadier. She must not give in to these thoughts. That way lay madness. If madness was not already ...

  Had-I and But-Known, who had been curled up on the corner of the desk, suddenly sat up and turned toward the doorway, eyes bright and alert, seeing, as cats do, something invisible to the human eye. The back of her neck prickled. She watched the empty doorway with apprehension.

  Had-I abruptly stood and leaped to the floor, followed by But-Know. They advanced to the door in time to greet Roscoe as he sauntered in and touched noses with them.

  “Oh, Pud.” Lorinda went limp with relief. “I didn’t hear the catflap.” Left to himself and without being harried by his female friends, Roscoe could negotiate the catflap, moving slowly and taking his time.

  The wild thought swept into her
mind and she dismissed it instantly. Of course, it wasn’t possible for anyone to squeeze in through the catflap. Poor Roscoe could barely make it himself and he was nowhere near the size of an adult human being – or even an adolescent human. Apart from which, adolescents entered with intent to remove, not add to, the contents of a house.

  The cats finished their silent communion and turned to look at her with faintly accusing stares. What had they been saying to each other? And why were we wasting so much time, energy and money in trying to contact whatever might exist in outer space when we couldn’t even communicate properly with the warm friendly creatures living beside us?

  I can explain everything, she felt like saying defensively. But she knew that she couldn’t – and so did they.

  The ring of the telephone came as a lifeline. She snatched it up quickly. “Hello?”

  “Oh, good, you are back. Freddie wasn’t quite sure –”

  “Macho, yes.” She had not realized how much she had tensed until she felt herself relax. “Yes, I got back late last night. And I’ve been out shopping this morning, replenishing the larder.”

  “Good ... good.” Macho sounded somewhat abstracted. “Er ... have a nice time in London?”

  “Oh, yes. Saw a lot of friends, got a lot of things done. I’m glad to be back, though.” Surprisingly, she found that she meant it; the place was beginning to feel like home. At least, it had been. “I haven’t caught up with Freddie yet. What’s been happening while I’ve been gone? Have I missed anything interesting?”

  There was a curious silence at the other end of the line. “Oh ... nothing much,” he said eventually. “We’ve all got invitations to an early Christmas Party at Dorian’s on the nineteenth, because he’s off on a cruise over the holidays. If yours hasn’t arrived –”

  “I haven’t gone through my post yet.” She glanced at the pile of envelopes on her desk. “I was planning to do that this evening.”

  “Oh ... good, you’ll find it then. Er ... he was elaborately casual. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen Roscoe anywhere around?”

  “He’s right here with the girls,” she said. “He came in a few minutes ago.”

  There was an explosive exhalation of relief.

  “Macho, what is it?”

  “Oh, nothing, nothing. I’m glad to know he’s sa – there. I haven’t seen him all afternoon. I was getting – I mean –”

  “I was just about to open some of the gourmet cat food I brought back from London for a treat for them,” she said. “Why don’t you come over? You can have a drink, of course.”

  “Oh, yes. Yes, I will. Thanks. I’ll be right over.” He put the phone down.

  She had just reached the kitchen when he appeared at the back door. He looked over his shoulder, then caught the door before she opened it fully and slid through the narrow aperture. Inside, he stood with his back against the wall and slowly turned his head to scan the room.

  “Macho, what’s wrong?” She was shocked by the change in his appearance. In the week since she had last seen him, he had grown haggard with dark shadows under his eyes. Furthermore, although it was a pleasantly misty mid-December day outside, with the red tinge of the setting sun colouring the mist, Macho was behaving like someone out of a film noir.

  “Wrong?” For a moment, he was his old fussy self. “Why should you think there’s anything wrong?” Then the invisible atmosphere settled around him again. He stared at the far doorway with haunted eyes, a fugitive wrapped in the deep gloom of a perpetual midnight, with danger lurking in every shadow.

  “Ah! There you are!” He dashed across the room as the cats appeared in the doorway and scooped up Roscoe, holding him close. “I haven’t seen you for hours.”

  Roscoe looked up in mild surprise at finding himself thus clasped to his master’s bosom. He stretched up to touch noses with Macho and began purring.

  Had-I and But-Known strolled over to sit at Lorinda’s feet and stare meaningly at the small stack of gourmet cat-food trays she had brought them. If it was cocktail time for humans, it was treats time for felines.

  “Game with turkey.” Lorinda picked up the top container and read the contents. “How does that sound to you?”

  It sounded good to Roscoe. He twisted free of Macho’s arms and hit the floor, bouncing over to take his place beside the others.

  “So, what’s been going on while I’ve been away?” Lorinda divided the cat food into three neat portions, then glanced down doubtfully at Roscoe. He was watching her in bright-eyed anticipation, licking his chops. He could polish off one of those small containers all by himself.

  “Hasn’t Freddie filled you in yet?” Macho sounded surprised.

  “I still haven’t seen Freddie.” And that was unusual; she had expected to see or hear from Freddie before this. Of course, she had arrived home last night too late for visiting and perhaps Freddie had rung this morning while she was out shopping.

  “Freddie isn’t looking too well lately,” Macho said. “She seems a bit ... stressed.”

  “Oh?” That was surely the pot calling the kettle black. Perhaps Macho hadn’t looked in a mirror lately. Lorinda set the saucers down on the floor. Had-I inspected the size of her portion and gave her a wounded look. “You can have seconds, if you want,” she told her, then led Macho into the sitting room while the cats hunched over their treat.

  “What would you like?” If she poured fast, they might have time for a few sips before the cats came in to demand more.

  “What do you have?” He peered suspiciously at the small collection of bottles. “There’s no tequila there, is there?”

  “Sorry, no. Do you want some?”

  “God, no!” He shuddered. “I never want to see or hear of the stuff again!” He spoke with bitter vehemence and looked over his shoulder again as he did so. Lorinda wondered if that was becoming a nervous tic.

  “I’ll have a dry sherry,” he decided. “A large one.”

  “Trouble with the new book?” she asked sympathetically, handing it to him and pouring one for herself.

  “The publishers want to call it Blondes Die Screaming.” He took a deep swallow and brooded into his glass. “There’s no blonde in the book and I told them anyone would die screaming when a serial rapist-murderer went to work on them.”

  “What did you want to call it?”

  “Does that matter?” He was in a mood. “I’m only the author.” He flung himself into an armchair and stared into space. After a moment, he twitched and looked over his shoulder. “What was that?”

  It was only the sound of cats’ dishes moving around the kitchen floor as tongues scraped to get every last morsel off them. If Macho couldn’t identify that familiar sound, he must be in a bad way.

  “Macho, what is it?” She tried again. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Do? Do?” He gave a snarling bark of mirthless laughter worthy of his PI hero in a cornered moment. “There’s nothing anyone can do. Except –” He raised his head and looked at her strangely.

  “Yes?” she encouraged.

  “Lorinda, if anything ... happened to me, you’d take care of Roscoe, wouldn’t you? I mean, adopt him. He gets on so well with your two, it wouldn’t be like going to a stranger. I think he’d be happy here.”

  “Macho, are you ill?” Dying? she meant. Had he been informed that some fatal disease was unexpectedly numbering his days?

  “No, no.” He caught her thought. “Not that. It’s just that I may be put – have to go – away.”

  “Put away?” She pounced on his slip of the tongue. “Macho, what is it? What have you done?” He was an erratic driver, but usually quite careful. Had he killed someone in a moment of inattention in the night fog? A hit-and-run? She could visualize him panicking when he realized his victim was dead and instinctively bolting for home and safety. Then, with time for reflection, realizing the full horror of his position (MACHO MAGEE RUNS AND HIDES, the tabloids would scream) would dawn on him. With his knowledge of police pr
ocedures, knowing that they were waiting for the results of their forensic tests to filter through, wondering what evidence he might have left behind – flecks of paint, tyre treadmarks, hairs from his beard – that would lead inexorably to him, there was no wonder he was a nervous wreck, constantly looking over his shoulder.

  “Nothing!” he declared vehemently, as though suspecting the trend of her thoughts. “I’ve done nothing. Yet. And nothing may ever happen. But, if it should –” He looked at her pleadingly, “Roscoe – ?”

  “Prrryaaa?” Roscoe padded into the room, drawn by the sound of his name. He leapt into Macho’s lap and settled down purring. Had-I and But-Known were right behind him. They looked at Lorinda thoughtfully, then settled on the hearthrug in front of the fire. They had obviously decided against agitating for any more food right now, realizing that they would have to share it with Roscoe if they did.

  “Of course I’ll take him.” She could reassure Macho on that point. “It will be no trouble at all.” Apart from having to get a larger catflap installed.

  “Thank you.” He sank back in his chair, running his fingers through Roscoe’s fur. “It may never happen,” he muttered. “It may all be just my imagina –”

  “Macho!” There was something terribly familiar in his attitude. “What – ?”

  The back door slammed. “Had-I! But-But!” Freddie’s voice carolled. “Come and get it!” The cats rose unhurriedly and strolled towards the kitchen.

  “We’re in here, Freddie,” Lorinda called. “Come and have a drink.”

  “Oh, no!” Freddie appeared in the doorway, looking guilty. “You’re back. I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have burst in like that if I’d known. I thought you were coming back tonight.”

  “Last night,” Lorinda said. “Don’t worry, it’s all right.” What was not all right was Freddie’s appearance. She looked grey and drawn. What was going on around here?

  The cats, sensing that they were not about to get another feed, turned and went back to their spot before the fire.

  “Are the Jackleys still fighting?” Lorinda asked.

  “They’re trying, but some of the old fire has gone.” Freddie curled up on the sofa. “Jack still has one arm in bandages – he can’t throw things the way he used to.”