Ширли Мерфи - Cat Chase The Moon

When Juana turned away to join Max and the two deputies, the men were smiling, watching the warm scene, and then watching Rock and Joe Grey. The minute Joe bellied out of the leather bag, the big silver dog had been all over his housemate, licking and nibbling at him while Joe slapped at Rock playfully and purred against his sleek coat. Such warm, innocent moments were all too rare in the life of a cop. Tall, big-boned Officer Crowley, looking very tender, rose to stack the breakfast dishes and carry them into the kitchen. Jimmie McFarland gathered up the cups and cream and sugar, still watching the two animals. His short brown hair was neatly trimmed and he was clean shaven, his uniform sharply pressed. “So the lost cat is found,” he said, grinning.

Max said, “Someone chased the hell out of them.”

“No wonder they’re scared. I’ve never seen Joe Grey frightened—but where are Dulcie and Kit? Did those guys catch them or did they escape? And what the hell do they want with cats?”

Max said, “I hope they escaped, and are unhurt. These three got away with a lot of fight, from the amount of blood on them. All the posters about her being lost, everyone searching for her, all that time someone had her locked up, maybe in a cage.”

Juana said, “What kind of person would do that, yet apparently not harm her? What do they want . . . ?” She paused, staring at the window. They all turned to look. Rock and Joe Grey abandoned their tussle and leaped on a chair nosing at the drawn drapery, at the open corner where, in the soft lamplight, a pair of green eyes shone and a dark tabby face looked in. When Dulcie saw Courtney inside she rose up, meowed softly, and scratched frantically at the glass. As Juana opened the window, Rock stuck his nose in the tabby’s face; gently she nipped the big gray dog and pushed past him, leaping to join her escaped kitten. She wanted to cry, she wanted to praise Courtney. All she could do was meow.

“Come up,” Maurita said.

Dulcie landed softly on the blanket between her two kittens and curled down, licking Courtney’s ears. Her child was free. They couldn’t talk, she’d hear the story of Courtney’s escape later. Right now all that mattered was that her child was safe. Buffin put a paw on Dulcie’s face and licked her nose, and she could almost feel him healing her, as he seemed to be soothing Courtney and Maurita; and Dulcie sighed. They were all together, and they were safe. They were secure under the protection of the cops, of friends they could count on and trust.

Jimmie McFarland watched them with interest, this close and loving cat family. He watched Maurita, her own eyes damp. When she looked up, he handed her a tissue, watched her wipe her tears then wipe remaining blood from Courtney. He hoped most of it was human blood. The way she held and stroked the cats touched Jimmie deep down. This was not the hard-cop part of him, as he thought he should behave. Their eyes met for a moment, Maurita’s dark eyes wide with a sudden surprise as well as with tenderness. McFarland blushed and looked away.

Earlier, when Kit awakened from her nap in her tree house, she hadn’t gone along the branch that led in through the dining room window, she hadn’t wanted to wake Lucinda and Pedric and get caught up in a long explanation; that could come later. She had left the tree house backing down the broad trunk of her oak tree, racing through the rain, across the yards to where the village roofs would take her to Seaver’s Antiques, on her way to relieve Pan at his watch; it would be dawn soon, the sky in the east was barely turning light.

But when she got there, she couldn’t find Pan. Dropping down to the sidewalk by way of a potted bush, she peered in the windows of the closed store looking for Courtney. Not finding her, she climbed the tall pine at the side of the building and went across the flat roof, looking in the second-floor apartment. No sign of her kitten. Circling the apartment on the window ledge, she didn’t find Pan crouched outside in the sheltered corner where he had chosen to keep watch. But when she padded along the ledge back to the alley, she smelled blood. Human blood and cat blood. Courtney’s blood?

She could see no one. Scrambling down the ivy vine to the alley she found spots of Courtney’s blood glistening on the wet macadam. She could smell both the calico’s and Pan’s fresh scents, and the trail of Ulrich and Thelma. But the smells that alarmed her were where they were all mixed together: Courtney’s blood, Joe Grey’s and Pan’s scents and the two humans, tangled with the lingering smell of fear and of rage, a fighting stink that sent Kit racing away to the rooftops again following where the three cats had fled, and Thelma and Ulrich had climbed after them.

Earlier, looking down from the roofs, she’d thought she glimpsed DeWayne Luther for an instant. A tall man with a touch of white hair under a floppy cap—but no, this man smelled like a gas station. He had a mustache, his service jacket was stained with grease, and his shoes were filthy. Anyway, DeWayne wouldn’t be here in the village when there was a warrant out on him. And why would he care about Seaver’s crazy plan? DeWayne Luther ran to high-toned robberies, to the most exclusive stores, to jewelry worth millions, not to stealing cats; and why would he care about ancient, ragged tapestries and old fairy tales surrounding a stolen cat?

Had that been DeWayne back there despite his looks and smell? Had he been part of the chase? Pan said she had too much imagination, that her wild ideas sent her flying off into tangents.

But right now she wanted to know if the three cats had escaped, and where they had gone, she had to find them. Following their scents over the roofs to the station, she could smell several men’s, and Thelma’s, trails along the shingles, they crossed back and forth then separated. Thelma and Ulrich had gone down some steps to the street. But Kit followed the path of Courtney and Joe and Pan past where the humans had turned away, followed them toward the PD. When she found the cats’ scents strong on the bars of the holding-cell window, she sighed with relief.

But when she looked down into the cell, no one was there. Not even a drunken prisoner—then, looking across the roofs, she saw Joe Grey at Juana’s condo, leaping out a slightly open window. Juana and two officers stood behind him. For an instant, Joe turned back to rub his face against Juana’s hand then he was gone, heading over the rooftops toward home looking very happy. As if, for the moment, his job was done. Kit raced over the roofs and branches for the window, mewling and mewling at Juana before she closed the glass. She burst into the room, into the detective’s arms, and was amazed at the gathering.

She looked shyly at the chief and the two deputies, flicking her tail in a demure greeting. She thought at first the dark-haired woman on the couch was Detective Kathleen Ray snuggled with Courtney, Buffin, and Dulcie; then she saw the woman’s scars, the bruises, the stitched-up ear: the lady from the grave. And Kit found it hard not to speak right out, to shout out her surprise and her joy.

24

The rain had eased. Low in the east, thin, orange streaks of dawn shone into Joe Grey’s tower, waking Mindy. She felt around among his pillows and found she was alone, Joe was gone. She pushed up and looked out the open window. Yes, earlier in the night the tomcat had raced away chasing her mother’s car, heading into the village.

Why would a cat want to follow Thelma? Why would a cat care where she was going? When she looked across toward her room and down at the street, she eased back deeper among the pillows out of sight. Her mother was home. Even in the first whisper of dawn, Thelma might glimpse her dark silhouette up here in the tower.