Leann Sweeney - The Cat, the Lady and the Liar

“You do have her, then? Oh, good gracious, thank the Lord.” Her anger melted away, and all that I now saw in her body language was relief. “Show me where she is.” She stepped toward the hallway and in the direction of the now insistent meows.

“Please. You’re having trouble with your hip. Let me bring her to you.”

“I respect the privacy of your home, so I will wait here, but do please bring her to me,” she said.

I hurried past her toward the other part of the house. Ritaestelle may have been troubled, but she obviously loved her cat. Nothing heals a soul better than a furry friend. And she could definitely use some healing.

I stopped in the quilting room first, Merlot on my heels. No Isis. And no Chablis or Syrah either. I understood then that if I found my two cats, I’d find Isis.

Another pitiful meow came from my bedroom. Ah. That was where they were. I hurried down the hall and found Syrah and Chablis sitting outside my closet. I’d closed the door—and unknowingly closed in Isis. But the bawling had stopped, and when I opened the door, Isis didn’t come streaking out as I’d expected.

I flipped on the light. My closet is a large walk-in, and L shaped. Now I heard a pitiful mewl coming from around the corner where I’d stored extra cat quilts and several boxes of John’s things—photos and a few personal items I would never part with.

“Come here, Isis,” I said softly. “I promise I won’t tap you on the nose or squirt you with coffee.” Oh, I was definitely feeling guilty now.

I walked slowly toward her soft meows. But when I found her, I had to cover my mouth to keep from breaking into laughter. The goddess was surely embarrassed by her predicament, and I didn’t want to make her feel worse.

Isis had climbed into a basket—one that had come with a floral arrangement, I’m sure. It was dark-colored wicker with a handle—and much too small for her. And yet she’d managed to squeeze into it and now obviously couldn’t get out.

I knelt and realized at once that she’d squirmed so much, she’d managed to wedge herself into that basket. I couldn’t even get my hands around her body to get her out. This would require a dismantling of the basket.

“Wait right here, oh brilliant one.” Like she was actually able to move anywhere. I do like to offer hope in these situations, however; this was the kind of problem my own cats had made me familiar with.

I hurried back down the hall to my quilting room, where there were plenty of tools to be found. I called out to Ritaestelle that I would be right with her, Isis in tow, and then gathered a small needle-nose pliers (excellent for pulling stuck needles through layers of a quilt), my large sheers and a seam ripper.

Taking my arsenal with me, I allowed myself a laugh and even picked up my phone from my nightstand. I had to get a picture of this first.

With all this going on, I’d have thought my own three cats would be following the action, but they must have decided Ritaestelle needed company. After I snapped a photo of Isis in all her glory, I worked away at one handle of the less than top quality basket. I used the pliers to pull away some of the wicker that attached the handle to the basket. I realized the sheers were too big for the job and ended up using the seam ripper to tear away the wicker strips. After maybe five minutes, I lifted one side of the handle toward Isis’s back and then up and away.

Silly thing just sat there and looked up at me, as helpless as, well . . . a kitten. I gently reached under her and lifted her up and out of her tiny prison. How had she ever managed to get in there in the first place?

I held her close, which she didn’t seem to mind at all. I left the basket and my tools on the floor, picked up my phone and off we went for the reunion. I was betting Isis would be more than ecstatic to see her “mom” after this latest experience.

But when I got to the living room, Isis purring away in my arms, the chair where Ritaestelle had been sitting was empty. Then my protector cat Merlot let out one of his loud, deep-throated meows—the ones I rarely hear. He was in the kitchen.

Had Ritaestelle gone for more water and fallen again? If so, I sure couldn’t see her in there. I rushed around the counter, and the smell of the humid night air greeted me at once.

The back door was open.

Merlot and Syrah were sitting on the stoop, and Syrah’s ears were twitching like crazy. That was always a sign that something was wrong.

“Ritaestelle?” I called, joining my two cats at the back door.

From somewhere down near the lake I heard her call, “Here. I am down here. We need help.”

I heard the panic in her voice, but I couldn’t see anything except the giant black silhouettes of the huge trees on my sloping back lawn.

I turned on the lights and saw her then.

What was she doing on the dock? What was she holding?

I got a taste of my own heart about then. Chablis wasn’t here with the other cats. Had she gone down to the lake? And why was the back door open in the first place?

I had enough sense to shut the door before I set Isis down. I didn’t want her racing off to find another highway. After making sure she and my two boys didn’t get outside, I slipped out into the night.

I keep a pair of Crocs on the back deck and put them on before I ran down toward the water to the sound of Ritaestelle’s pleas for me to hurry.

But I ran a little too fast. The pine needles were damp with dew, and I fell on my rear. I hadn’t realized I was still clinging to my phone, but it went flying out of my hand somewhere to my right. I scrambled to my feet and made it to the dock. Ritaestelle’s face was so pale in the moonlight, so fraught with terror, that I swallowed hard. Especially when I realized she had Chablis under one arm. And it looked like she held a rock in her other hand.

“Help us. Help her,” Ritaestelle said. She looked down into the water.

I followed her gaze.

The lake lapped against the riprap, a sound I’d always found soothing. But the sight of the woman facedown in the water, her lifeless body swaying with each small wave, was anything but soothing.

I scrambled to the shore, climbed over the low metal corrugated retaining wall, and carefully stepped on the stones that led to the water. I squatted and reached out for the woman’s outstretched arms. I could touch only her hands, but they were still warm.

She might be alive.

“Hurry, Jillian. Hurry,” I muttered as my heart pounded wildly.

I waded into the tepid water, and as I fought to turn the woman over, I looked up at Ritaestelle. “My phone. I lost it up there somewhere. Please find it.” I turned my head in the direction she should go.

“Oh, dear sweet Jesus. I will try my best.” Ritaestelle must have dropped the rock she’d been holding because I heard something hit the dock and plunk into the water.

I struggled with the woman’s slippery and surprisingly heavy body. She was such a small person, and yet turning her over seemed almost impossible. But I finally flipped her face up. Then I positioned myself at her head, grasped her beneath her armpits and began to drag her out of the water. I glimpsed at Ritaestelle, who was slowly making her way down from the dock and up onto the lawn.

I hauled the woman onto the riprap, worrying about tearing up her back on the rocks. Then I pressed two fingers to her neck and felt for a pulse. Nothing.

I smoothed sopping hair away from her face.

And stared into the wide eyes of Evie Preston.

Those eyes and her slack jaw confirmed what I feared. I was probably too late.

I fought back tears, thinking that I couldn’t give up. I turned her head to the side and emptied her mouth of water. Then I did the CPR I’d learned in a class right after John died—was I even doing it right?—until my shoulders and arms burned. But she didn’t suddenly gasp for breath like on television. Evie Preston, who couldn’t be more than thirty years old, was dead.