Блейз Клемент - Even Cat Sitters Get The Blues

“We have a tag ID for your mystery woman. The car she’s driving was reported stolen three months ago in Langley, Virginia.”

“Did they get latents from the car?”

“Surprisingly few, and what they got were poor quality.”

Guidry sat down on the sofa and took his coffee cup in both hands, leaning over it with his elbows on his knees and looking into its dark depths as if he were trying to find the woman’s identity there.

He said, “She look like a car thief to you?”

If my head hadn’t been so full of wet wool, I would have said Aha! So now you believe me about the woman! Instead, I just thought it, but slowly.

I said, “She looked like a soldier.”

He raised his head with a spark in his eyes that told me I’d said something that fit an idea he had.

“Talk to me, Dixie. Why did she look like a soldier?”

I squirmed down in the chair to find a more comfortable place for my head. “Her posture, I guess, and her shoulders were square, like somebody who’s spent a lot of time standing at attention.”

“Anything else?”

“Just a general feeling of authority, like she knew how to give orders. Deep, husky voice. She didn’t smell like a heavy smoker, so I think the voice is more from expecting people to listen when she talks.”

“So she could have been law enforcement too.”

“My head hurts really bad, Guidry. The coffee’s not helping and I need to take a nap.”

He got up and extended his hand. “Let’s go out on the porch. The fresh air will make you feel better.”

Upright, I felt nauseated again, and I had to take a minute to let my brains settle down inside my skull. With the afghan around me like a sarong, I held Guidry’s arm while we slow-walked to the French doors. Outside, we leaned on the porch railing under a star-sparked cobalt sky. Down at the shore, a moon-oiled sea whispered secrets to the pale sand, and somewhere in the treetops a nesting osprey whistled urgently for its mate.

Guidry said, “Somebody wiped down the inside of that car. Just like somebody wiped down the nurse’s bathroom and bedroom, the washer and dryer, the kitchen counters. Both of those women made deliberate efforts to erase fingerprints.”

I put my hand over my eyes to shade them from the piercing starlight. “You checked the refrigerator door handle? From when Gilda opened it and took the bundles inside?”

He gave me a stern glare. “None there either, although yours would have obliterated them if there’d been any.”

I said, “Probably the gloves.”

“What?”

“Gilda was wearing latex gloves when she came to Kurtz’s door. Not the colored things that people wear to clean house, but thin ones like nurses use. She kept them on, too. Maybe the mystery woman also wore them.”

Guidry stood straighter and stared out toward the invisible horizon for a second, then whipped out his cell phone, hit a number, and barked at whomever answered.

“Did you find latex gloves in the sedan?”

A beat went by.

“Did you lift latents from inside them?”

I could tell from his face that the answer was no.

“Do it!”

He clicked off and stared out at the horizon again.

I said, “I’ve had enough fresh air. Can we go inside now?”

He looked startled, as if he’d forgotten why we were on the porch. “You want some pizza? I’m starving.”

I waved vaguely at Michael’s house. “Michael will make you something. I don’t want delivery people coming here.”

“Michael’s on duty, Dixie. Remember? He was at the Kurtz fire.”

Faster than an eyeblink, I was draped over the porch rail sobbing. “He’s so brave! My brother is so brave!”

Guidry said, “Okay, concussion emotions. Sorry. Come on inside, I’ll scramble us some eggs. You have eggs?”

Still bawling, I held up five fingers to show how many eggs I had. Grinning, he led me into the living room and gently shoved me back into the chair, where I continued to leak tears while he went in the kitchen. I heard the refrigerator open, I heard soft thumps of items being deposited on the countertop, I heard my microwave buzzing and a pan clank on the stovetop. I stopped crying and wiped my wet face with the paper towel Guidry had brought me to blot the coffee on my sweater. I also used it to wipe at some stains that I suspected were dried spit-up.

Guidry came back with the coffeepot and refilled my cup, gave me a searching look, and went back to the kitchen and got two plates, one of which he set on the table beside me. I knew I couldn’t eat, but I looked at it anyway, curious to see what he had managed to put together from my meager supplies. Along with buttered toast, there was a mysterious mass of yellow and green stuff with some little chunks of something I couldn’t identify. I took a tentative bite and did a mental groan. I should have known Guidry would be a good cook. Coming from New Orleans, he probably interned as a chef at Antoine’s. He probably knew how to make beignets and crawfish étouffée and jambalaya, whatever that is. I took another bite and looked at him. The arrogant son-of-a-bitch was watching me with a slightly smug expression.

I said, “Not bad.”

“Thanks.”

“What’s this green stuff?”

“You had a package of spinach in your freezer.”

“Hunh. Where’d you find the mushrooms? I didn’t have mushrooms.”

“Yeah, you did, dried ones way back behind the year-old packages of rice cakes that have never been opened. At least you had real Parmesan, not that stuff in a can. It was so hard it must have been in your refrigerator for months, but it was real.”

“I got those rice cakes when I thought I would go on a strict diet.”

“Changed your mind?”

“Uh-hunh.”

“Dixie, tell me again what the woman said to you this morning.”

God, had it just been this morning? It seemed like eons ago when I’d met the woman with her bulldog.

I sipped coffee and tried to remember the woman’s exact words. “She said her dog’s name was Ziggy Stardust because she was a David Bowie fan. I said that was the second time I’d heard about a pet named Ziggy, but the other one was an iguana. Then she said, ‘You’ve just heard about him? You haven’t seen him?’”

Guidry was leaning forward as if he wanted to soak up every word. “Then what?”

“I said I was on my way to see him right then, and she said ‘Good’ and ran off. In a minute or two, I saw her driving away in a sedan.”

“That’s all?”

“Something about it seemed odd. I had the feeling she’d been watching for me. She was relieved when I said I was on my way to see the iguana. Then, when I saw her picture on Kurtz’s table, I knew there was a connection.”

“You said you asked Kurtz about it. How did he react?”

“That was odd too. For a second he looked excited, and then he said it was purely coincidence, that the woman in the photograph was dead. I’m almost positive it was the same woman.”

Guidry sat back on the couch and gnawed on the inside of his cheek.

I said, “There’s something about the name Ziggy that has meaning. Kurtz changed when I told him the man who called me said the iguana’s name was Ziggy. I think it’s some kind of code, a message of some kind.”

As soon as I said the word message, I sat up straight. “Uh-oh.”

“What?”

“I got a phone message this afternoon. It was the same man with the Irish accent who called me last night, the one claiming to be Kurtz. He apologized for lying to me and told me to give Kurtz a message.”

“What message?”

“I wrote it down so I wouldn’t forget it, but I remember it. Ziggy is no longer an option. You must act now .”