Софи Келли - Cat Trick

The carrier wiggled against my hip, and Hercules stuck his head out again. “Ruby should be here any minute,” I said.

He looked around, then focused on the tents over on the grass, and his green eyes narrowed. He shifted in the bag, and before I realized what he was doing, he jumped out and started purposefully down the street along the side of the arts center.

“Hercules, get back here!” I shouted. I started after him, but he was already at the curb. He looked both ways, crossed to the other side and then continued down the hill, intent, it seemed, on checking out the tents.

I had to wait for two cars to pass before I could follow. By then, he’d made it to Main Street. Again he looked for cars and then trotted across the street. My heart was pounding like a Caribbean steel band in my chest. I ran, yelling for the cat, but he didn’t even break stride.

When he reached the first tent, Hercules looked back over his shoulder at me, then walked right through the heavy canvas panel and disappeared inside. I was maybe half a minute behind him. I had to duck around the tent flap because I couldn’t just pass through it.

“Hercules, wherever you are, get over here right now!” I called, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness inside the canvas structure before I started looking for him.

Turns out I didn’t need to look for the cat at all. He was sitting on the grass next to a plastic lawn chair. Mike Glazer was in the chair. Even in the dim light, I was almost positive that the man was dead.

3

Hercules looked over at me and meowed.

“Yes, I see him,” I said. I let the bag slip from my shoulder onto the grass and made my way carefully over to where the body was slumped in the white resin chair. A square metal table sat maybe four feet or so away, a tangle of dark fabric piled on top.

Mike’s eyes were closed, and his head sagged to one side. I knew he was gone even before I felt for his pulse, but I swallowed down the sour taste at the back of my throat and touched the side of his neck with two fingers just to be certain. His skin was cold and mottled and I couldn’t feel the thrum of a heartbeat.

I closed my eyes for a moment and mentally wished his spirit safe passage, and then I straightened up and looked down at Hercules, who was sitting patiently at my feet. “We have to call the police,” I told the little tuxedo cat.

Hercules picked his way carefully back across the grass to where I’d dropped the carrier and climbed inside. I followed him, trying to stay in my original footprints on the grass. I grabbed the shoulder strap of the bag and stepped back outside.

Ruby was across the street on the sidewalk, looking up and down, probably wondering where I was. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed 911, and when she looked in my direction, raised a hand in recognition. She started over to me.

“Admiring Burtis’s handiwork?” she asked with a smile as she reached the curb. Her red and blue hair was pulled back into a short braid, and she was wearing earrings only in the piercings in her left ear.

Something in my expression as I ended the call must have told her there was a problem. “Kathleen, is something wrong?” she asked, two frown lines appearing between her eyes.

I looked back over my shoulder at the tent. “Mike Glazer’s . . . dead.”

The color drained out of her face. “Good dog,” she said softly, closing her eyes for a moment. “Have you called the police?” she asked when she opened them again.

I held up my phone. “I just did.”

Ruby crossed one arm over her midsection. “Have you called Detective Gordon? I know the two of you are . . . friends.”

I exhaled slowly. I had been planning to call Marcus.

“I think you should.”

I punched in his number from memory, thinking I should program it into my phone.

He answered on the fourth ring. “Hi, Kathleen,” he said. “I already know, and I’m on my way. Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” I said.

“Stay where you are. There’s a cruiser on the way, and I’ll be there in about five minutes.” He ended the conversation, and I put my phone back in my pocket.

Ruby had been staring out at the water, but she looked back at me. “Ruby, could you take Hercules over to your studio?” I asked. I didn’t want him getting out of the bag again, or even worse, demonstrating his walking through walls—or canvas tents—skills to the Mayville Heights police department.

I put my hand on the bag, and Hercules meowed from inside. “As long as you don’t touch him, you’ll be fine.”

“Sure,” she said.

I handed over the carrier and cat. Ruby headed back to River Arts, holding the bag out in front of her body by the strap as though it might spontaneously combust.

A couple of minutes later, a police car came down the street, lights flashing but siren silent. It stopped nose-in at the curb. Officer Derek Craig got out of the driver’s side. According to gossip around town, the young policeman had applied to the University of Minnesota for winter admission. He’d been reading everything we had or had been able to request about the law and law school for months, so I suspected the rumors were true.

The other officer, Stephen Keller, was a little older than Derek. His serious expression and straight-backed posture made me think he’d been in the military before he’d become a police officer.

They both nodded at me.

“He’s in that tent, in . . . in a chair,” I said, gesturing behind me.

Officer Keller moved past me, to check on the body. Derek Craig took a couple of steps closer. “Good morning, Ms. Paulson,” he said. “What happened? How did you find the body?”

Before I could answer, I saw Marcus’s SUV at the corner. He pulled onto the street, swung around and slid in next to the cruiser. He got out from behind the wheel, and I was both relieved to see him and a little worried that he was going to give me a hard time. He came across the grass in a couple of long strides. He was wearing dark gray trousers and a black and gray tweedy sport coat over a white shirt and plum-colored tie. He looked good.

“Give me a second,” he said.

I nodded.

He took a couple of steps away from me with Derek. The other police officer came out of the tent then and joined them. Marcus spoke briefly to the younger man, clearly giving him some kind of instructions, and then he followed Officer Keller back into the tent, pulling on a pair of latex gloves as he went.

I stayed where I was, hands in my pockets, staring out over the water until Marcus came back out and walked over to me.

“What happened?” he asked, peeling off the thin purple gloves.

“I came down to meet Ruby.” I gestured across the street to the River Arts Center. “I was a bit early and she wasn’t there.”

He nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“I had Hercules with me and, as we started for the building, he jumped out of the carrier.”

“And?”

“And he ran down the hill and across both streets.” I put my hand back in my jacket pocket.

Marcus exhaled softly. “Kathleen, don’t tell me your cat discovered the body.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Cats have a highly evolved sense of smell—a lot more sensitive than ours.”

His gaze automatically went to the studio building, one street up, before he focused again on me. “You think that Hercules knew there was a dead body over here a block and a half away?” Marcus’s tone told me it wasn’t what he thought.

“I know he did,” I said. “He crossed two streets and came directly to the tent.”

“What did you do?”

“I followed him. When I saw . . . the body, I checked for a pulse; then I called nine-one-one. Ruby had arrived by then. I gave her Hercules and called you. Then I just waited.” The muscles in my shoulders were getting tighter, and I could hear an edge in my voice.