Shirley Murphy - Cat Breaking Free

Joe himself couldn't be seen among the roses; but with creative mimicking and plenty of pizzazz, he produced a fight between two tomcats that was so real, it was all she could do not to run before the two beasts found her. Gathering her wits, she watched the clerk and two more women hurry out into the patio with rolled-up newspapers, and one with a plastic wastebasket, which she filled with water at an outdoor tap.

The minute the lobby was empty she raced in and leaped to the desk, landing practically on top the guest register. She was pawing through, wondering how long ago Slayter had registered, how far back she'd have to turn the pages-and was keeping an eye on Joe in case those three women grabbed him- when Slayter himself appeared in the doorway, coming in from the street. Swallowing a hiss, Dulcie dropped behind the desk, then wondered why she'd done that. She was a cat, a dumb and simple cat!

In a moment she hopped casually up onto a file cabinet among untidy stacks of papers and books. Crouching where she could see through the window to the back garden, she pretended to pay no attention to Slayter. How could someone so handsome make her so uneasy?

He was dressed in pale slacks, sleek dark loafers, a dark shirt and a tan suede blazer. Pausing in the small lobby, looking out the window, he watched with amusement the scene in the garden. The three women had chased Joe up out of their reach onto a high wall. There the tomcat crouched among a tangle of ivy, licking angrily at his drenched coat. Slayter's grin had turned sly and, she thought, cruel-his amusement made Dulcie's fur crawl.

She hadn't yet found his room number; as Slayter moved on toward the hall, she came out from behind the desk and sat down where she could see the elevator. She watched him enter, then watched the dial; when its swinging arm stopped on three, she fled for the stairs that peeked out from behind the elevator's confining walls.

Racing up the two carpeted flights, she heard the elevator stop above her, heard the door open and close. As she hit the last step panting, she heard a door slam down the hall to her left. Peering around the corner, she scanned the hall in both directions.

Empty to her left, a maid's cart far down to her right. No maid in sight, but near it the door to one room stood open. Turning away toward the sound of Slayter's slamming door, she scented along the thick carpet, her nose and taste filled with the freshly laid smell of good leather and expensive, musky aftershave, the same aroma that had accompanied Slayter through the lobby. The trail ended at 307. On down the hall a narrow, carved table supported a potted plant beneath a large mirror with an old, hand-carved frame such as she had seen in the expensive antiques shops. Padding into the shadow beneath the table, she sat down, considering Slayter's closed door.

The room was on the west, so would overlook the garden. She wondered if Slayter had been sufficiently entertained by the tomcat's plight to be standing at the window now, looking down with that unpleasant smile. She hoped, if that was the case, that Joe got the hell out of there. How long would Slayter be in his room? If she waited until he left, and she was quick, could she slip in behind his heels?

If she failed at that, surely she could get in when the maid came to do up the room-but who knew how soon that would be?

Kit's notion that there was something in his room that Chichi wanted might be all wild imagination. Except that Chichi had searched Abuela's house. Was the object of her search the gun she hadn't found? Whatever, there was surely something definitely "off" about Chichi's behavior-fawning all over Clyde, her dislike and aggression toward Joe, her surveillance and partner status in Luis's crime plans. Her appearance running from the jewelry store with the black bag that later showed up in Luis's pocket, then her search of Abuela's house.

But then she had helped Clyde to free them all from the cage, and that puzzled Dulcie; except maybe Clyde had really forced her to do that. Edging deeper into the shadows beneath the little table, she curled down, waiting for Slayter, intent on getting into his room-and hoping Joe had made his sodden escape.

Half an hour after Dulcie settled among the shadows to watch Roman Slayter's door, Joe found her there asleep on the hall carpet beneath the little table. Having waited for her in the garden as he cleaned himself up, after that fool woman threw water on him, he had at last gone looking for her. If she'd gotten into Slayter's room, she'd better be well hidden. From the garden wall, he'd seen Slayter up at a third-floor window, sitting as if at a table. Then when he'd tracked Dulcie through the lobby and up the stairs, there she was asleep in the hall. He nudged her.

She woke at once. "Where have you been? He's in there." "I know, I saw him from the garden, sitting by the window with the TV on. What's to watch, in the daytime? The soaps? He made two phone calls, and answered three; I could just hear the phone ringing, and saw him pick up. Could you hear anything? But you were asleep."

"I wish you'd stayed awake. I'd give a case of caviar to know what those calls were. So many pieces that don't add up."

"They never add up until the last shoe drops, the last mouse runs out of the hole."

Joe settled down beside her. They were softly whispering, patiently watching Slayter's door, when a door just beyond them flew open and a second maid came out, wheeling her squeaky cart. She passed by three closed doors with DO NOT DISTURB signs on them, and knocked at 307.

"Housekeeping."

"Come in," Slayter called. She used her passkey, then flipped down the little doorstop to hold the door open. The cats, scrunching down beside the cleaning cart, were ready to make a dash inside when they heard the elevator humming, heard it stop at the third floor. Heard its door slide open and soft footsteps coming their way along the carpet, and they smelled the sweet, flowery scent of Chichi Barbi's perfume. Hunching smaller, they stared at each other. Joe ducked his head down to hide his white nose and chest and paws.

Chichi hesitated beside the maid's cart; then everything happened at once: They heard Slayter inside talking with the maid, heard the closet door slide open, heard him coming. Swift as a cat herself, Chichi drew back into the recess of the door to the ice machine. She watched, unseen, as Slayter left his room and went on down the hall, carrying a newspaper. The minute he stepped into the elevator and the door closed, Chichi came out and stood listening.

The maid was in Slayter's bathroom, running the water as she cleaned. Chichi slipped quickly in. Joe and Dulcie followed, strolling in behind her between the cart and the door. They stood watching as Chichi tossed the room. She checked beneath the mattress, which was on a solid platform, shook out the tangled bedding to glance underneath, then dropped it in a heap.

Stepping to the open closet she did a thorough job on his suitcase that stood inside on a stand, and on the hanging clothes. Fast and efficient, she was heading across to the windows when the maid came out of the bathroom.

"Hi!" Chichi said brightly, not missing a beat. "Roman sent me back up to find his jacket, he's waiting in the lobby. The blue one, but it isn't here. Could it be in the bathroom?"

"There's no jacket in there," the Latino maid said suspiciously, moving toward the phone. Quickly she picked it up, but before she could call security, Chichi was gone-and so were Joe and Dulcie. Chichi out the door, the cats behind the open draperies.

It was there they found the gun, in a hiding place so efficient that no maid would be apt to look. Maybe no one would discover it unless they were doing electrical repairs-or had their nose to the carpet.