Ширли Мерфи - Cat Chase The Moon

“With each one he got less loving, soon he was treating me like a slave. He made me dress real refined to do the shopping—pretend-shopping while I made the jewelry inventory. He always had to be sure I had it right, the prices, the value of the gems, always asking questions, when I knew more than he did. I managed a jewelry store for ten years in Panama City.

“That’s why he wanted me. He’d be nervous, but real loving, until a job was over, until I’d done my part and we’d gotten away clean. Then he’d forget me, treat me like mud. Like a trick dog that, after its act, got put in a kennel and forgotten.”

Like Courtney will be , Dulcie thought. And Joe and Kit and Pan thought the same.

“When I got up the nerve to tell him I didn’t want to do the robberies anymore, he blew up. I knew he would, but I wanted out real bad. I had a bag packed. I didn’t like the danger, the tight planning, avoiding cops all the time, watching for store detectives. I didn’t like any of it. We fought a lot between jobs. The other guys didn’t care when he hit me. I was his woman, he could do what he wanted, it was none of their affair.

“That night when I told him I was leaving him, he beat me really hard.” Her eyes teared up. “I was half unconscious when he dragged me into one of the older cars. I tried to fight but I was already hurt pretty bad. I remember the smell of dirt. I don’t know, maybe I fainted. I was lying on the dirt, I could see fallen trees, night-dark clouds and a smear of moonlight. I heard him digging. I was dizzy, sticky with blood. When he pulled me into the grave I fought him harder. He clutched at my throat, I couldn’t breathe, I was thrashing and kicking him. When I kneed him, he grunted and let go. And then the real pain . . .” She caught her breath. “Pain like knives when he ripped off my earring.”

At the mention of the earring, tears came to her eyes again, as if the lost piece of jewelry meant far more to her than a mere earring.

It was then that Kit, listening at the window, sneezed. Rock heard her, and saw a small movement beyond the crack of drapery; he let out a bark and leaped for the window. All four cats reared up, they didn’t realize until too late that their shadows showed through the draperies. Seeing the faint shapes, everyone but Maurita stood up to look. Dulcie, Kit, and Pan fled the scene fast, down the bougainvillea to the sidewalk and they were gone, into the early sun and the fog that crept after it.

Joe Grey stayed where he was. He strolled to the center of the window and stood tall, scratching at the glass, yowling at Rock’s leaping shadow; the excited Weimaraner could see Joe’s silhouette and could clearly smell him. Dallas rose and took Rock by the collar. His vocabulary, at Rock’s bad manners, was the law’s finest.

But he wasn’t going to shut the dog up until he let Joe Grey in—the two were pals, housemates, sometime fellow guardians. The detective opened the drapery and the glass and slid back the screen. “What the hell do you want?”

Joe came flying in, leaping at Rock as if he hadn’t seen him in months; the two wrestled, banging against furniture and uniformed legs until Max and Dallas settled them with a few sharp words and Rock lay down, pressing his head against Max for sympathy. Juana and Kathleen were bent over laughing. Maurita only looked startled, then turned away from where the low rays of the sun shone directly at her, sharpening the scars on her face.

As Juana rose to more securely draw the draperies, Joe glimpsed Dulcie and Kit and Pan fleeing across the courthouse roof, flipping their tails with annoyance. They’d be thinking, Too many cats converging all at once, too many cops wondering why, too many cops asking questions.

Max petted Rock, then sat looking at Maurita. “Can we get to the logistics, to just how he laid out these jobs?”

He, who? Joe thought, watching the chief. She must have told Max who her attacker was before I got here. If the guy thinks she’s still alive, he’ll keep looking until he finishes her —and Maurita mirrored his thought. “If DeWayne sees me in here he’ll find some way in, and he’ll kill me.”

DeWayne Luther! Joe thought, sitting up to stare at her, then hastily rolling over. DeWayne Luther! A sharp picture in his mind of Maurita lying battered in that damp and moonlit grave, and now he could see Zeb’s white-haired son bending over her . . . A vision he hadn’t seen but felt as if he had, as if he had seen the killer as well as his victim. On the couch, he stretched out innocently pretending to nap while Maurita gave Max and the detectives details of every crime that she and DeWayne and his partners had committed.

“And the earring,” Max said. “He must have been really in a rage to rip it off like that.”

“Those earrings were the only gift he ever gave me, part of our first burglary, from the museum of Panama. They were ancient Peruvian, and valuable. They were among the few pieces that remained when the Spaniards melted down all that beautiful work just for the gold. Did they even know what a real fortune they destroyed? It was the only sign, right at first, that he loved me—or, I thought he did.”

She said, “A locksmith with an electrician’s skills traveled with us. He quietly cased the lock mechanisms while I assessed the jewelry and handbags and luxury items. Every job went down without a hitch.” She twisted her long black hair. “At least, every robbery since we became a twosome. A twosome,” she said, laughing. “Such as it was. The bastard.”

She looked at Max. “My blood should be on the earring, but I guess no prints, he was wearing gloves. I suppose it’s not much use as evidence, now that you know who he is.”

“With your blood and flesh on it, it could corroborate your testimony.”

She said, “It’s silly, but I want the earring back. If anyone ever finds it, and when the police are done with it, I want it.”

It was late afternoon, nearly dusk when Max, Kathleen, and Dallas left the condo, crossing the back street hastily to the department—three uniforms: the chief and two of his detectives. Juana stayed with Maurita until Officers McFarland and Crowley arrived through the back door, the two officers dressed in jeans, sport shirts, and loose vests. Young McFarland was neatly shaven, hair trimmed short; tall, big-boned Crowley with such large hands that Joe always thought he should be farming or felling timber. Both were armed, both carried black camera bags, which Joe and Rock immediately inspected. It took only one sniff to know that these were packed with a few clothes and with a supply of groceries. Juana busied herself making sandwiches until Clyde arrived to show them Rock’s commands, and to give the big dog a last run for the night. When they returned, McFarland, Crowley, and Juana, and Maurita wearing Juana’s blue robe, had settled in for their supper. As Clyde headed home, Joe Grey followed him, leaped in through the Jaguar’s open driver’s door, and lay down on Clyde’s smoothly folded sport coat.

Clyde scowled down at him. “I just had that coat cleaned. I suppose you think you’re going home to pig out as usual on our dinner. Why didn’t you eat with Maurita and the cops? You too good to beg?”

“I’m going with you because you smell like lasagna, that’s why.”

19

Clyde turned the corner on the green light. “So you’ve been spying on the law, watching Maurita dress up like Detective Ray.”

“Not a bad likeness. If Max would let her carry, just in case . . .”

“That’s not up to Max. That’s the governor’s call. Max has given her two guards.”

“And for how long will that condo be safe?”

“A long time with two or three cops and Rock. I wouldn’t want to tangle with them. But I don’t think Max will keep her in one place very long. Every time I think of that grave I wonder all over again, what kind of society has this turned into?”