Shirley Murphy - Cat Seeing Double

"I wonder if Ryan called Detective Garza," Dulcie said, glancing along the street as if Garza or Detective Davis might have hurried over from the station to stand among the shadows.

"I don't think so. She means to lead the guy on- that's Larn Williams, all right." Joe flicked an ear. "I was on the wall when he approached the truck. She told Clyde she can make a second switch, print a new, correct bill and mail it. Let Williams think he was successful, let him wait for the Jakeses to hit the roof because the bill's so high, wait for them to maybe file a lawsuit. She thinks he might tell the Jakeses that she cooked the books, even before the bill arrives, make up some story about how he found out."

"Would they believe him?"

"Are Larn Williams and the Jakeses close friends? We don't know a thing about them." Again Joe smiled. "One more phone call. Who knows how much Harper can pick up about Williams, while he's in San Andreas?"

"You're going to ask Harper to gather information for you?"

"Turnabout," the tomcat said softly, looking smug.

Dulcie stared at him for a long time. She did not reply.

Williams sealed the envelope and laid it on the seat. "Same position as he found it," Joe said. Quietly Williams depressed the lock, shut the truck door and slipped away up the street, disappearing around the corner. The cats heard a car start. He was gone when Ryan and Clyde emerged.

Ryan drove slowly away as if she had no idea the truck had been broken into. Clyde, parked in the next block, followed her.

"What will they do now?" Dulcie said.

"She'll swing by our place, I guess. She left Rock there. I'm betting that when they finish going over tomorrow's work Clyde will follow her home. Check out her apartment. Maybe try to talk her into staying at her uncle's for a few nights."

"She won't, she's too independent. And if Larn Williams wanted to kill her, why would he bother setting her up for a lawsuit?" Dulcie backed quickly down the tree and headed up the street toward home. "Maybe the kit's back, maybe she's raiding the refrigerator right now."

And Joe, his stomach rumbling with hunger, galloped along beside her. Within minutes they were flying through Wilma's garden among a jungle of chrysanthemums and late-blooming geraniums, the flowers' scents collecting on their coats as they approached the gray stone cottage.

Padding up the back steps and in through Dulcie's cat door, entering Wilma's immaculate blue-and-white kitchen, Joe headed directly for the refrigerator but Dulcie never paused, off she went, galloping through the house again searching for the kit.

The first time Dulcie ever brought Joe here, she had taught him to open the heavy, sealed door of the refrigerator, to leap to the counter, brace his hind paws in the handle and shove. Now, forcing it open, he dropped to the floor catching the door as it swung out. The bottom shelf was Dulcie's, and Wilma always left something appealing; she didn't forget half the time the way Clyde did. Joe might find on his own refrigerator shelf a fancy gourmet selection from Jolly's Deli, left over from the last poker game, or the dried up end of a fossilized hot dog.

Dulcie's private stock tonight included two custards from Jolly's, sliced roast chicken, a bowl of apricots in cream, and crisply simmered string beans with bits of bacon, all the offerings stored in Styrofoam cups that were light enough for a cat to lift, and with easily removable lids that were gentle on feline teeth. He had them out and was opening them when Dulcie returned.

"Kit's not home. And Wilma's still gone. I think she said there was some kind of lecture tonight on the changing tax picture."

"Sounds deadly. Why does she go to those things?"

"To reduce her taxes, so she can buy gourmet food for us." She nosed at the array of delicacies that he had arranged on the blue linoleum. "I wish the kit would come home."

But the kit did not appear. Joe and Dulcie feasted, then Joe retired to Wilma's desk to call Harper. He punched in the number but there was no answer. He tried again half an hour later, and again.

"The phone's turned off," Dulcie said. "Leave a message."

Joe didn't like to use the phone's message center, but he did at last, then curled up on the blue velvet couch beside Dulcie and fell quickly asleep. Curled next to him, Dulcie lay worrying. The kit's propensity for trouble seemed so much worse at night, when Dulcie imagined all kinds of calamities. She dozed restlessly, jerking awake when Wilma came in, and again at 6:00 in the morning when she heard her cat door flapping.

She leaped up, fully alert as the kit galloped into the living room, her tail high, her yellow eyes gleaming. Above them, the windows were growing pale. Hopping to the couch, Kit nosed excitedly at Dulcie. "I found the old man. I found where he lives. I smelled chemicals so maybe it's where he made the bomb. I found where he dumps his trash. Why does bomb-making leave all that trash?"

'Trash?" Joe said, sitting up yawning. "What kind of trash?"

"Boxes and cans that smell terrible of chemicals."

He rose to stand over her. "Where, Kit? How much trash? Where did you find it?"

The kit looked longingly back toward the kitchen where she had raced past the empty plastic dishes. "Is there anything left to eat?"

"We left a custard in the refrigerator," Dulcie said, "and some chicken."

The kit took off for the kitchen. Following her, they watched her jump up to force open the heavy door. The minute it flew back she raked out the cartons, fighting open the loosely applied lids, and got down to the serious business of breakfast. She ate ravenously, gobbling more like a starving hound than a cat, making little slurping noises. She didn't speak or look up until the custard and the chicken had disappeared and the containers were licked clean.

"All right," Joe said when the kit sat contentedly licking her paws. "Let's have it."

"I need to use the phone," the kit said softly. "Right now. I need to call Detective Garza."

Joe and Dulcie stared at her. "Come in the living room," Joe said. "Come now, Kit."

Cutting her eyes at Dulcie, the kit headed obediently for the living room and up onto the blue velvet couch.

"Start again," Joe said, pacing across the coffee table. "From the beginning."

"I found where the old man lives. Up the hills above the Pamillon estate in a shack on the side of a cliff above that big gully and a chicken house hanging-"

"Kit. How did you find him?"

"I hid in his car. A black Jaguar with the top down. He drove so twisty it made me carsick again. An old shack and the chicken houses hanging on the edge of the cliff and I could smell chemicals and there weren't any chickens, maybe the chemicals killed them all. He filled his car with stinking garbage bags and went away and then I saw his car far down in the old ruins and-"

"Kit," Joe said, "slow down. This is all running together. What are you leaving out?"

The kit stared at him.

"For starters, where did you find his car?"

"At the police station. After he talked to that boy. He drove like fury. I didn't know why he had such a nice car or why he would load it down with garbage. I-"

Dulcie licked Kit's ear. "Go slower. Tell us slower."

The kit started over from where she had slipped into the old man's black Jaguar. She described the shack and how she had gone inside. How he had loaded up his trash and driven down into the Pamillon estate. "I went there. I ran and ran."

The hills had loomed below her black and silent, and her head was filled with unfriendly beasts hunting for their supper. She ran listening for every sound, watching for any movement among rock and bushy shadow. Ran flying down the hills as night fell, trying to make no noise herself in the dry grass, ran terrified until the half-fallen mansion loomed against the darkening sky, and ancient dead trees rose up with reaching arms.