by Gary Lovisi
Well, what of it? He smiled twistedly. The cat was dead now, and no harm had come to him. Obviously her words had been the ravings of one on the edge of eternity.
Just the same, it mightn’t do any harm to have a look at the tarn and reassure himself. He couldn’t altogether feel too sure that all was well there.
“Chasin’ a crazy idea, I guess,” was his growling comment, as he rose and lighted a storm lantern. “About time I took myself in hand, instead of behavin’ like a durned fool.”
He slipped into his oilskins, seized the lamp and went outside. Soft drizzling rain was falling, making the ground of the fields beyond the farm sodden and mushy. He progressed deliberately, alone in a world of cold and dankness. His emotions dropped to zero. Jaw outthrust, eyes staring ahead, he clumped steadily in the tarn’s direction.
Finally he gained it. Setting down his lamp on a ledge of rock, he stared reflectively into the stenching stagnation below. A low sigh of relief escaped him at seeing nothing different. His inner expectations of some supernatural manifestation were unrealized.
He turned to go at length, satisfied—then abruptly stopped. The storm lantern nearly fell from his hands with fright, and his goggling eyes fixed themselves on the mushy, ill-defined path at his feet. For there, clearly imprinted, were the marks of an animal’s foot. A large foot, too, complete with claws, heading away from the tarn.
Draycott had no idea how long he was held transfixed by that unexpected sight. It held his body and soul with its spell, but at last his eyes jerked from the imprints to the tarn again. A quivering hand pulled shudderingly at his lower lip.
“No—no, it can’t be!” he shouted hoarsely. “You couldn’t have gotten out of that tarn! You couldn’t!”
He fell silent again, shaking so violently that he had to rest for a moment against a nearby rock. The oppressive quiet hemmed him in. His scared, disordered mind painted that quiet with all manner of incredible fantasies. He could have sworn that he heard the voice of his wife, thin and far distant, rising from those murky depths—accusing him, laughing at him, triumphant in the knowledge that her beloved cat was abroad in the dark waiting to spring, to exact a tearing, snapping vengeance for the brutal thing he had done.
Weak from strain, he forced himself up at last and staggered shakily along the path. Immediately he left it, the tracks of those feline feet vanished in the crushed and rain-sodden grass of the moorland. Fright was cramping him now. He went forward at a half run, convinced that some shadowy terror was waiting to emerge from the tarn and seize him.
It was then, as he ran, that he became conscious of something else. Not an echo of his own sogging, sloughing footfalls, but a deliberate and steady padding in the gloom some little distance behind him. When he stopped the sound stopped too, and left him alone in that horrible, dank emptiness.
He twisted a fearful face toward the dark behind him, but saw nothing. He went on again, more slowly, not looking where he was going—and suddenly found himself flat on his face in the mud with the storm lantern dashed out beside him.
“Who’s—who’s there?” he screamed hoarsely, as he scrambled up again. “Why are you following me like this? Who are you?”
There was no response save the croak of a bullfrog at his feet, sending his heart slamming harder than ever. For a full minute he stood gaping into the drenching, obscuring mist, then there came to his ears a low and chilling whine like the cry of a whipped puppy. Instantly his mind flashed back to the plaintive cry the cat had given when he’d pushed it in the sack.
“You!” he shouted hoarsely. “You’re out of the tarn—dead! You’re three times your size! Waiting there in the dark—”
He twirled back again and commenced to run blindly through the abyss, heart bumping against his side until he thought it would fail him and drop him into eternity. The padding feet were swifter now, bounding after him, carrying something he couldn’t see but which his anguished mind knew was some gargantuan reincarnation of the helpless animal he had drowned. The warning of his dead wife was coming true—
By the time he reached his cottage he was in a pitiable state. Mud-smothered and drenched in rain and sweat, hand shaking so much he could hardly raise the door latch. He stumbled blindly within and fumbled with matches—stood shivering violently as the yellow flame kindled into an amber glow.
Silence grouped around the farm now—heavy, suggestive silence that had a portent of impending disaster. Draycott found himself moving about on tiptoe, afraid to disturb the quiet. His oilskins rustled unnervingly as he tugged them off amidst a shower of raindrops.
Then he moved to the fireplace and tried to coax the smoldering embers into some semblance of life. Failing, he sat by the darkened grate in the deep shadows and tried to compose himself.
His mind was on fire now. Memories of his wife and the cat pulsated alternately through his brain. The tarn, the prints of the enlarged cat, the wail in the mist, the soft footfalls that had followed him back—they were all gigantically magnified in his brain, sent gelid stiffness into his joints and nerves.
Suddenly he stiffened. That wailing again! It reached him clearly from the silence outside, the wail of an angry, lonely beast. Trembling he rose up and snatched down a rifle from the wall, though even as he did so he knew it would be useless against something reincarnated from death itself.
Step by step, shaking with each movement, he went to the window and pulled aside the faded curtains. What he saw was an actual physical as well as mental shock. Dimly visible in the reflected light from the swinging oil lamp was the face of the drowned cat, incredibly huge and ferocious, fur plastered wetly to its head just as it had emerged from those water logged depths.
Dazed, weakened with horror, Draycott’s terrified eyes fixed their gaze upon the horrible fanged teeth, upper lip drawn back in a hideous snarl of vengeful cruelty.
Then the eyes—brazen, malevolent orbs boring from the midst of that frame of sodden fur. Blazing green, catching the light—Draycott fell backwards, overpowered with the shock, and groped weakly for the table for support.
After a while he steadied himself and slammed over the huge bar of wood that bolted the door, tremblingly clutched his gun once more as there came a fiendish scratching and tearing at the woodwork, accompanied by a throaty growling and snarling.
“You can’t come back!” Draycott screamed madly. “Evelyn, my wife, if you are anywhere within hearing, call off this terrible cat! I can stand anything but this monstrous reincarnation of the creature I destroyed! Please—please, I beg of you! You were right in saying that the cat’s death would avenge you! I admit it! Take it away!”
As though in response to his sobbing entreaty silence fell again. There were no sounds from outside. Little by little Draycott began to recover himself, gradually convinced himself that somewhere in the unknown his long-dead wife had heard him and recalled the hideous reincarnation back to the mystic hell from which it had emerged.
He relaxed a little and cautiously lifted the heavy wooden bar from the door—opened it very gently. But the instant he did so something vomited from the dark outside to the accompaniment of a piercing, paralyzing shriek. A vast body, terrible claws outspread, hurtled inwards and struck Draycott clean in the chest, sending him hurtling backwards helplessly.
“Evelyn!” he yelled madly, struggling frantically. “Evelyn! Call off this cat of yours! Call off this cat—!”
Then his words froze as his arms stiffened helplessly, powerless to ward off that fanged abyss of death closing in upon him—
The following day the Little Benton Times carried a report that was brief but significant. It read:
Mr. Revil Draycott, well-known farmer of Little Benton, met his death last night in tragic circumstances. All day yesterday a tiger, escaped from the Little Benton circus, was being searched for unsuccessfully, owing to the mist. Its trail was finally picked up at Gilpin’s Tarn and the animal itself was found
at Mr. Draycott’s farm. Unfortunately Mr. Draycott was evidently killed in trying to attack the tiger, which had obviously been attracted to the farm by the livestock.
The tiger is now back in the circus and Mr. Draycott’s death will be much regretted by those who knew him.
MRS. MILLIGAN’S CAT, by Gary Lovisi
Steaming teacups and gentle old ladies full of neighborhood gossip—not a one of which were under seventy years of age—were the usual at Cynthia Milligan’s house. My name is Delilah, dahling, and I am Mrs. Milligan’s prized longhaired Persian. A cat, for those of you not acquainted with the species. In fact, not just any cat, but one of the most graceful and glorious of all felines ever. And one of the most modest, dahling.
I sat watching my mistress and her guests with my usual bored feline detachment and disinterest. After all, it was just another day in Milliganland. Nothing unusual. Nothing unusual ever happened here.
Mrs. Milligan, my esteemed mistress, fairly congenial as humans go, was prattling on as usual, dear old soul. This time she elaborated profusely and I noticed with much nervousness to her lady friends on how young Roderick Thorpe, the neighborhood rogue—a tom if there ever was one—was seen coming out of Mrs. Beverly LeGrange’s residence in the very wee hours of the morning. Beverly LeGrange, being the very young and attractive—in a human sort of way, dahling—wife of rich old Stuart LeGrange—of the LeGrange Orchards, LeGrange Winery, LeGrange Mercedes.… Well, you get the idea.…
“Now, Maye,” my mistress chortled to her best friend, the dowager Maye Blumenthal, “and that’s not all I saw! I’m scared to say this, but I have just got to tell someone.… I saw young Roderick running from the house—carrying his trousers—not wearing them!
There was muffled laughter, accompanied by feigned sounds of shock. It was all so terrible, so tawdry…they were each dying to hear more!
“Really! Why, Cynthia Milligan! How do you know that?” Edith Jones cried out a bit too indignant for her own good.
My mistress just harrumphed and in that very confident voice of hers simply said, “Saw him! That’s how!”
“Saw him? Really?” Maye rasped, curious now, smelling some new sensational gossip brewing in the small town they inhabited.
“Sure as you, Debra, Edith and I are here right now playing cards and having tea,” My mistress added boldly. She always did love the dramatic.
I heard a collective sigh from the assembled biddies.
“Oh, my!” Debra Wilson replied when she was able to respond. “Bad! Bad! Very bad, indeed!”
My mistress and her three human companions each nodded their elderly heads and wagged their crooked old fingers furtively. More gossip. They said they hated it, but I knew differently.
I yawned. Then meowed loudly. Just to let the biddies know, “hello, ladies, I’m still alive and…still hungry!”
“Oh, Cynthia, that darn cat of yours just cannot be hungry again!” Edith Jones said between sips of her tea. The recalcitrant old crone, why I’d not eaten in hours! I thought of performing a hop-on-the-lap, spill-the-tea routine, dahling, but just then something caught my immediate and undivided attention. That being my dear mistress Cynthia Milligan, as she suddenly and quite conclusively keeled over dead.
Well, dahling, you can imagine the instantaneous chaos and shock. The ladies dropped their teacups, cards, cookies, and haughty expressions and tried to help my mistress as best they could. Her best friend, Maye, dialed 911. They waited. They tried to make her comfortable, but I knew that she was already gone.
I was aghast! I had a true soft spot in my heart for dear old Cynthia Milligan. She fed me well and often, kept a dry roof over my head, and let me have the run of the house and the yard. All things considered, dahling, a feline could ask for little better.
Now I realized the good life I had enjoyed for so long was all going to end.
* * * *
It did not take long.
Alberta, Cynthia’s older sister comes to the old, dark, house now each day. She does not feed me. She merely riffles her sister’s things. Always finding a few choice items to appropriate as her own by right of inheritance—an inheritance I find repugnant since Alberta hated her sister with a passion. I can only watch sadly, meowing for food that never comes. Doomed to watch my dearly departed mistress’s choice personal possessions—the sacred mementos of a lifetime—become the property of one who scarce appreciates them or the memories they house within them, one whose avariciousness is only exceeded by her own cold-blooded selfishness.
The last straw for me occurred when Alberta, using the old ruse of finally giving me something to eat, locked me out of the house and would not let me back inside. I now found myself without mistress, shelter, or food, and there was scant prospect of any coming my way soon. What would I do now?
* * * *
LeGrange Mansion was just down the road, a destination as good as any, and by the way I had curiosity regarding that place and the people who lived there. So, keeping an eye out for marauding mutts, I trotted on over to the big house with a two-fold plan brewing in my furry little feline mind. Food and revenge. But food first, dahling. Then revenge against the human who had caused the death of my mistress, thus also precipitating the plunge in my status and comfort level in this world. You see, we felines, contrary to popular belief, are nothing if not practical creatures.
LeGrange Mansion was large, lonely, and dark. My padded feet gave no noise as I scampered over the wall and onto the dewy lawn, through a partially opened front window to enter the huge house. There were dogs on the grounds and this caused me immediate concern, big cat-eating brutes, I was sure, but I could see they were securely locked away. I was safe from them for the present so I concentrated on the more immediate matter of finding food.
It was the shouting that drew my attention. Harsh human words. A man and woman arguing in another room of the house. The man saying “I knew it! I come home and find you with him! How could you, Beverly?”
Then a hard thump followed by a man’s painful yell, then by a woman’s sharp, high-pitched scream. I looked in the room and saw the two lovers; Roderick Thorpe and Beverly LeGrange. At their feet lay a very dead Stuart LeGrange, Beverly’s rich husband. He was obviously no longer an inconvenience to the two lovers now.
“You didn’t have to hit him so hard, Rod!” Beverly protested; she appeared on the verge of panic. “I think he’s dead!”
“Well, wasn’t that the plan, to lure him here and kill him, then hide the body? It’s done now and I’m glad. Now you can be mine!” Thorpe insisted, pulling her toward him roughly. She did not resist, but fell into his arms laughing, offering passionate kisses, even as the warm corpse of her husband bore silent witness to their lust.
I snorted, thinking, and humans have the gall to say that felines are selfish and cold!
Thorpe said between mouthfuls of Beverly, “The scare you put into that Milligan woman worked well, telling her if she ever opened her mouth and spoke about what she had seen or heard, she’d keel over and die.”
Beverly laughed, “Just a little mind game. I’m very good at them, Rod.”
Thorpe smiled, kissing her all the harder.
I flicked my whiskers in disdain.
“So what did you tell her that got the old crone so whacked out that her heart stopped?” Thorpe whispered as they continued their ravishing embrace.
“Oh, Rod,” she crooned, like a feline in heat now. “It was so funny. I threatened all kinds of harm to her property, even to her person. Nothing scared her. She was adamant about reporting us to the police. The only way she finally listened to me was when I threatened her cat. Imagine that! I told her I’d poison her cat with anti-freeze and then skin the little monster and make a purse out of the fur!”
Thorpe just laughed. He thought Beverly was so funny.
I shuddered; All right! Now you’re going to pay! Justice will be done in the human world and my mistress will be avenged!
However, I knew th
at could prove difficult. The murderers had taken the man’s body out of the house and buried it in a secluded location on the grounds of the huge estate. The killers had done a masterful job of concealing the grave. I watched from my perch in a nearby tree, knowing it would not be easy for me—a mere feline in a human world—to bring the police to where they would find the secret grave and solve this dastardly crime.
* * * *
Next day I found the shallow grave and began digging. It was hard work, unseemly for a delicate house cat such as myself, but necessary if I was ever to unearth this mess. My claws had just about reached the body when Beverly LeGrange saw me and ran to chase me away.
“It’s that damn cat!” She said to Thorpe. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was trying to dig up Stuart’s grave!”
Thorpe did not like that at all. “I’ll take care of her, honey,” and he drew a gun from his jacket and took a few poor shots at me in rage.
Beverly quickly put her hand on the gun saying, “No, Rod, that will draw attention. I have a better idea.”
I watched and waited, wondering what new horrors they had in mind.
Rod said, “You want to unleash the dogs?”
I dug my claws deeper into the wood of the tree I was perched upon.
“Oh, Rod, lover, that’s a good idea, but I have an even better one,” Beverly cooed. “Just wait here.”
Beverly LeGrange returned soon with a bowl of shimmering fluid, gently calling out, “Here kitty, nice kitty. Come here and have a drink of this nice bowl of delicious anti-freeze. It tastes so good and will kill you sooooo dead.”
Thorpe laughed and gave her a kiss.
What kind of monsters were these humans!
I put the thought of the tempting dish out of my mind. I knew it was poison, my mistress had raised me to be wary of such tricks when she let me out of the house to run at night.
I ignored the anti-freeze and concentrated on the problem at hand. Namely, how was I going to get the police to discover the hidden grave of Stuart LeGrange?
