Shirley Murphy - Cat Fear No Evil

Snatching up the emerald bracelet, Azrael spun and ran, leaping for the blackness beneath the stairs.

Kate rose to follow but Clyde grabbed her, drawing her back.

They stood at the edge of the hole staring down beneath the stairs into total blackness. They could see nothing, no hint of foundation, no broken timbers or tumbled earth. Only emptiness falling away, deep black space that seemed to go down and down as if it spread out beneath the house, black and endless, as if perhaps the quake had shifted the earth, leaving a cavern beneath that part of the house. Kate backed away, dizzy. Leaning against Clyde, she leaned against Joe Grey as well where Clyde had snatched him up, holding him safe from that abyss. In Clyde's arms Joe met her stare with the same deep fear that filled Kate herself; and from somewhere within the blackness, Azrael spoke to her.

"You would do well to follow me, Kate Osborne. You would do well to come with me." Was he crouched on some ledge or fallen timber that was invisible to her? She stared and stared but could see nothing, no glint of his yellow eyes. Then beside Kate something moved among the rubble, and from the shadows a pale cat leaped past her into the blackness, then another, another-and they too vanished. And from deep within that dank space, Azrael's purr rumbled. "You will forever regret your cowardice, Kate Osborne, if you stay behind. You can see that they accept me now. Because I took the jewels. Because I bear the emerald choker. They will lead me now, down into that world." The cat purred louder, his rumble echoing. "Come with me, Kate Osborne. Come now…"

Kate backed farther away.

"If you will follow me, I will lead you home, Kate, where hidden rivers run beneath the earth among green meadows, where you can dig jewels from the cavern walls, all the wealth you want, for the taking." A cold breath touched Kate, a stink of damp sour earth as if stirred by movement somewhere deep within that void. And Azrael did not speak again.

She stared down into the empty dark that waited just beneath her feet, and she turned away sickened, leaning into Clyde's steady grip. He pulled her away, putting his arm around her; she could feel Joe's heart pounding fast between them. The relief on the tomcat's face was comical.

Behind Clyde, Lucinda and Pedric stepped from the shadows. Whatever they felt, whatever they had seen, they did not speak. The four of them knelt, searching for Kate's inheritance among the rubble and broken lumber, while Joe Grey sat washing blood from his paws.

Moving one splintered board at a time, they uncovered and retrieved nine pieces of the jewelry. When Pedric got a flashlight out of his car and shone it under the stairs, they could see only blackness, as if indeed, beneath the house, a vast area of landfill had shifted away, leaving the building on some earthquake-riven ledge. There was no sign of the choker, no answering flash of gold and green from those murky depths.

"Out," Kate whispered, backing away, the true sense of danger coming home to her. They moved swiftly out beneath the door's barrier, into the fresh air.

A police car was pulling to the curb. As Detective Reedie stepped out, Joe Grey slid from Clyde's arms into Lucinda's, and under her jacket, out of sight. And the old woman wandered away with him.

Kate, smoothing her disheveled hair, smiled at the detective and held out her folded sweater, in which she had wrapped the jewels and the shredded blue bag. "We have them!" she said breathlessly, trying to invent a plausible story that did not include a thieving black tomcat. "How did you find us?"

Reedie looked at the jewels and at her bleeding arm, at her dirty hands and streaked face. "I saw you running," the detective said warily, "from the window of the condo. What was that you were chasing? A cat? It was carrying that blue bag?" The handsome young detective looked hard at her. "You want to tell me what happened?"

Kate didn't know what to say. He watched her, waiting. His thatch of brown hair made that handsome face look even more boyish; his brown eyes looked half angry at being scammed, half filled with curiosity.

"I saw Consuela's car," she said, "we were coming back from breakfast. The blue Corvette? I pulled over, hoping it was hers, and saw something running-a big black cat-from under a pine tree at the end of the condo. I couldn't believe… It was dragging something blue. My bag, I knew it was my bag. I just… jumped out of the car and ran."

The detective turned, glancing toward Clyde. "And your friend in the silver Cadillac?"

He had obviously seen Clyde parked in front of the condo. Kate explained that Clyde had seen the Corvette, too, that he had been sitting in his car watching the building where it was parked, wondering if it belonged to Consuela. She was faltering when Clyde took over.

Clyde seemed truly amazed that the cat had grabbed the blue bag; he thought Consuela must have thrown it out the window when she knew the police were at the door. "I was turned away," he said. "I thought I heard something hit the ground among the dead leaves. When I looked, I saw a snatch of blue. But why that cat would grab it up…" Clyde shook his head, at a loss to explain the black beast. "Cats do weird things. Well," he said, grinning, "Kate got her jewels back." He studied Reedie. "Was that Marlin Dorriss's condo? I'd heard it's in the Marina. Was Consuela connected with Dorriss?"

"It is Dorriss's condo," Reedie said stiffly. "What made you ask?"

"A hunch," Clyde lied. "I saw them together once, in Molena Point, and wondered. Are you going back there now?"

"I am. You have some business there?"

"I would like to follow you back, talk with you."

Reedie glanced at Kate, then nodded.

Kate just hoped Reedie wouldn't go digging for more answers than he needed.

Well, her story sounded plausible to her. The best lie, sometimes, was the truth, with the incriminating parts left out.

After Reedie left, Lucinda dropped Clyde and Joe back at the condo. There, Joe quietly slipped into the Cadillac while Clyde talked with Reedie then went with him to look for the Packard-but only after Reedie called Molena Point PD and talked with Harper.

Clyde told Reedie that he had no proof of any misconduct on Dorriss's part. Just a feeling, Clyde said. A hunch that Dorriss might be involved in the thefts. He lied to Reedie, and through Reedie he lied to Harper, and all to protect Joe Grey. He said to Reedie innocently that, if the officers had found any stolen items in the condo, then maybe Dorriss had the Packard as well. In short, Clyde wove a tangle in a way that he abhorred, all for the gray tomcat.

Kate said later that she wished Clyde didn't have to stir up so many questions for Reedie, when the detective would be talking more than once with Harper and Garza about the case. But it couldn't be helped, if Clyde wanted to look for his Packard-and Clyde loved that Packard.

She did wonder privately sometimes if any woman ever in Clyde's life would stir the possessive emotions generated by those abused and neglected old cars that he made whole and new again.

Dropping Clyde off at the condo, Kate and Lucinda and Pedric, feeling suddenly nervous at carrying all the jewels with them, headed for the Greenlaws' appointment with the appraiser, hoping he would see them though they were nearly an hour late. They agreed to meet for lunch either at Kate's favorite sidewalk cafe, or across the street at I. Magnin where Clyde-after he found the Packard, he said, as if he was certain he'd find it-had a bit of shopping to do. Off Kate and Pedric and Lucinda went, carrying with them what might be a fortune wrapped in Kate's sweater; and Clyde and Joe Grey went to shop, all as if this were a perfectly ordinary morning.