Shirley Murphy - The Cat, The Devil, The Last Escape

Beside the stove, Sammie turned. “I dreamed he broke in, I dreamed of a hand reaching through.”

Anne nodded. “That dream may have saved your lives.” And, as if half to herself, “The same . . . affliction . . . our mother called it, that our aunt Mae endured. She had the dreams, too,” Anne said softly. “Mother did tell me that, because of my own dreams, but she told me as if they were shameful. Otherwise she seldom talked about family, I know only a smattering of our history. I know that Mae was the youngest of our great-aunt Nell’s five children.

“Nell and her three girls moved to North Carolina after the children’s father died. He left them with very little, they sold their Arizona land for practically nothing, they had nowhere else to go but to her sister there. Mae’s two older brothers had already left home. Later Mae’s sister Nora married and settled in Georgia, our mother Nora.”

Becky laid her hand over Anne’s. “Do you know where Mae is now?”

Anne shook her head. “I don’t. It’s strange, embarrassing sometimes, shameful knowing so little about our family. Most Southern families are steeped in their history, from before the Civil War. But that’s the way we grew up. No discussion, so Caroline or I weren’t really interested. I didn’t realize then the emptiness that left in me, having no real ties to our past.”

Anne sipped her coffee, looked up at Becky. “I had a sense, too, that there might be more in our past even than the dreams, other ‘shameful’ things that Mama didn’t want to talk about.”

Becky, too, sometimes felt adrift not knowing their family history. Caroline had kept no letters, no pictures, nothing to define the past. She watched Mariol pour a glass of milk for Sammie and set her breakfast on the table. When Sammie slid into her chair, reaching for the syrup, Mariol kissed the top of her head, then turned away to test the skillet and pour more batter. Interesting, Becky thought, how comfortable Mariol seemed with the mention of prophetic dreams. As if she and Anne might have talked openly about Anne’s dreams. Maybe, in Mariol’s family, such talents were not considered strange. Whatever the case, Mariol’s acceptance comforted Becky, made her feel easier.

T HREE DAYS AFTERFred Coker died on the cellblock floor, Coker’s friend Delone cornered Lee between the buildings, flashing a thin, a prison-made knife. Lee had just left the kitchen after his shift and was heading for the automotive shop, when he heard the crunch of gravel behind him. He spun around, saw Delone coming on him fast, a blade shining in his palm.

“You cruddy old bastard, it’s your fault he’s dead.”

Lee wanted to reach for the garrote but something told him no, told him to get away. Puzzled, not used to backing off, he swung in through a side door of the masonry shop, a big, cavernous room. He saw no one, heard no sound. Dodging away among the freestanding practice walls and tall piles of stones and bricks, he lost himself in their shadows. He heard Delone behind him, heard him trip, maybe over a wooden support that steadied the masonry barriers. Dodging toward the back of the building where, Lee knew, another door led out again, he didn’t see above him the yellow shadow slipping across the tops of the stone and block walls, a shadow thin as smoke.

The tomcat could not have materialized if he’d wanted to. He was spent, his attack last night on Falon, as he diverted the intruder to protect Sammie, had left him weak as a new kitten. If this was Satan’s influence, he didn’t like it much. This happened sometimes when he sought to function in both worlds; and he had heard, last night as he dropped into sleep, the cold laughter of the dark prince; he didn’t like that much, either. Now he followed Lee along the tops of the freestanding walls until, at the far corner of the dim room, Lee slipped into darkness between the back door and tall piles of blocks.

Lee tried the door and found it locked. There was no knob to turn, no key in the keyhole. He shouldered uselessly against it, was unable to force it open, and, at the scuff of shoes behind him, swung around, waiting. Stood palming the ball of string, his finger in the loop.

It all happened too fast. A chunk of concrete fell and Delone rushed him, the knife-edged ice pick low and lethal. Lee saw too late there was no room to swing his weapon. He dodged but Delone was on him, the knife flashing as Delone rammed him into the wall. Lee felt the knife go in, low in his side.

Delone jerked the blade free, blood spurted. The weapon flashed again. Lee kicked Delone in the knee and kicked the blade from his hand. The effort doubled Lee over, the cat could feel the pain of his wound as if it were his own. He crouched to leap as Delone closed in, but instinctively backed off when Lee swung the garrote. He watched it circle Delone’s leg. Lee jerked the cord hard, the blades cut through cloth and flesh, Delone stumbled, clutching his torn leg. But when Lee jerked the weapon free again, Delone lunged. Lee dodged and swung higher, the cord whistled, light shattered off its arsenal of blades as it snaked around Delone’s throat. Lee grabbed the heavy nut, yanked the cord hard. Delone fell, clutching his torn throat. The ghost cat crouched lower, his yellow eyes burning, his own fear eased, his sense of Satan’s presence fading.

L EE, WATCHING D ELONEdie, knew he could have been dead in Delone’s place. He worked the garrote loose and backed away from the body. He found the lavatory, untied the nut from the cord, washed it off, and tossed it in the corner. He flushed the bladed cord down the toilet, stringing it out long, hoping it wouldn’t get stuck. He washed the blood off his hands and pressed a wad of paper towels under his shirt against the knife wound. The blade had gone through at an angle, piercing the flesh along his side and maybe cracking a rib; it hurt like hell. He prayed it hadn’t reached anything vital.

He stripped off his shirt and pants, soaked and scrubbed the blood out as best he could and dried them with paper towels. Tearing the towels in pieces, he flushed them down a little at a time. He cleaned his shoes and disposed of those towels the same way. He dressed in his wet clothes, securing the wadded towels under his belt. He scrubbed the floor, using the last of the towels; the pain turned him dizzy when he knelt. He walked out slowly, stopping only once on his way to the cellblock, at the back door of the cotton mill.

He got up to his cell all right, keeping his arm over his side against the bleeding. He pushed inside, chilled not only with the pain but with fear. This could blow his release, could put him in prison for the rest of his life. He’d snuffed a few men in his time, every one of them trying to kill him. He’d been lucky so far. This time maybe his luck had run out?

Lying on his bunk keeping pressure against the wound, he must have dozed some. He heard the Klaxon for supper, he’d have to skip that meal. He rose from his cot meaning to clean the wound better. He was standing at the small steel basin, his back to the bars, his shirt open, washing the jagged knife hole with soap and water, when he heard a thump behind him. Turning, he saw no one. On the floor inside the bars lay a little rag bundle.

He retrieved it fast, going sick with pain when he bent over. Inside were adhesive bandages, gauze pads, iodine, and ten aspirin tablets wrapped in a tissue. Thanks, Gimpy. Gimpy hadn’t batted an eye when Lee told him his needs. Lee swallowed three aspirin and, his back to the bars again, smeared on the iodine, working it in deep, clenching his jaw against the pain. He bandaged the wound, listening for the guard’s footsteps on the catwalk. He tore the bloody paper towels into small pieces and flushed them. He changed to his other shirt, pulling on the thick, prison-issue T-shirt under it. He hung the wet shirt on the hook to dry, and why would the guard ask questions? He often came in from the kitchen splashed with dishwater. When he stretched out again on his bunk he felt the cat land on the bed.