Cat Laughing Last. Cat Seeing Double. Cat Fear No Evil

“‘Specially if it rains.” Ryan returned his laugh shakily, sounding close to tears.

Chair legs scraped as if he had risen. “Hang in there, honey. We’ll get it sorted out. We’ll do our work, and you do yours, and it’ll come out all right.”

The cats heard him leave, and watched Ryan at the window following the detective’s progress as his car headed down the hill. Beyond the windows the setting sun hung like a third-degree spotlight blazing in at her, and forcing the cats’ pupils to the size of pinpricks. The sun would be gone soon, pressed into the sea by the dark clouds that hung heavy above it.

Ryan worked at her desk for some time. The cats napped lightly. So did the weimaraner, who must be very full indeed, of sugar doughnuts. As the sky dimmed, only the desk lamp and the light of the computer brightened the darkening room. Ryan didn’t pull the curtains. When her phone rang she answered abruptly, as if irritated at being disturbed.

“R. Flannery.”

As she listened, a smile touched her face. “Yes, I’m about ready, I just want to finish up some billing. We need to go over the time schedule too and rethink a few details.”

The call had waked Rock. Sniffing the scent of cat, and not preoccupied with sugar doughnuts, the big weimaraner trotted across the studio to where Joe and Dulcie were hidden, and poked his nose under the daybed.

“Get back!” Joe hissed in the faintest voice. “Get back!”

The silver dog, having no experience with obedience commands from a cat, flashed him a look of disbelief and hastily backed away.

“Sit,” Joe breathed.

Rock, his yellow eyes wide with amazement, sat down on the handwoven rug.

Ryan, still talking to Clyde, was punching in a program. “They’re open on Sunday? Mexican food sounds like heaven. See you in a few minutes.”

As she hung up the phone, behind her the big dog was trying, from a sitting position, to scoot closer to the daybed for a better look at the amazing talking cats.

“Stay,” Joe told Rock. “Stay!”

Frowning and perplexed, Rock settled back on his haunches. Ryan did some final addition, hit the print button, and headed for the bathroom. The cats could hear her brushing her teeth, then the little crackling sounds, barely audible, as she brushed her hair. She appeared again when the phone rang, smelling of dusting powder and mouthwash. She was wearing lipstick.

Standing by the desk she lifted the papers from the printer and picked up the phone. “Flannery,” she said shortly. “Oh� Hi, Larn.” She didn’t sound pleased. As she listened, she glanced over the printed sheets, then laid them on top of what was probably a stack of bills. “You did? No, I haven’t run my messages. I left San Andreas very late. Did your remodel client get in touch?”

Balancing the phone between shoulder and cheek, she tamped the papers to align them. “Looks like I’m booked for a few months, picked up another couple of jobs. And as for tonight, I’m sorry but I have a date. I was just going out the door.”

She hung up and turned, looking relieved that she had a ready excuse. She looked at Rock, frowning. He was still in the sitting position, hunched down staring fixedly under her daybed. As she started forward, the cats tensed to run.

“What are you staring at?”

The big dog turned to look at her.

“What?” she said softly. She looked at him and at the daybed which had only five inches of space underneath, not enough to accommodate any prowler. She glanced toward the closet and bath, and toward the door that led to the inside stairs, and silently she moved to try its bolt.

“What is it?” she asked Rock. “What’s the matter? Come, Rock,” she whispered. Again she glanced toward the closet and bath. But she had just come from there. She turned, looking into the empty kitchen.“Come,Rock.”

Rock seemed torn between the two commands. When Ryan knelt, the cats backed out from beneath the daybed on the far side.

But she wasn’t looking underneath. She reached out to Rock from his level as if she thought he needed that face-to-face reassurance. Rock went to her at once.

“You want to go for a romp with Rube, in Clyde’s yard?” At the wordgo,Rock began to dance. Ryan endured several minutes of wagging, leaping delight before she got him settled down.

Turning on the copier, she made a second set of bills, addressed a large brown envelope and tucked the copies inside with her printout. Weighing the envelope, she slapped on some stamps, picked up her purse, spoke to Rock again and they headed out, Ryan carrying the envelope and key-locking the door behind her.

The minute they heard her descend the stairs, the cats leaped to her desk. In the darkening evening, they watched her truck lights come on. Waiting to be sure she wouldn’t forget something and come rushing back, Joe nosed at the San Andreas bills for lumber, electrical and plumbing supplies, and miscellaneous hardware. Dulcie sat admiring Ryan’s business cards.“R. Flannery, Construction.Very nice. Home phone and cell phone.” Quickly she memorized the numbers.

But Joe, reaching a paw to the phone, stared out through the window hissing with surprise, watching a gray hatchback pull out without lights, following Ryan’s car; and before Dulcie could say a word Joe was pawing in the number of Ryan’s cell phone. The cats caught one glimpse of the driver as the car moved under a streetlight.

Ryan answered at once.

“This is a friend. It appears that a car is following you, a block back, without lights. A gray hatchback.”

“Who is this?”

“A neighbor, just happened to look out and see you leave in your red truck, saw this guy pull out from up the hill and take off following you. You might want to see if you can lose him. I didn’t see the plate number.”

“How many people in the car?”

“One man,” Joe said. “Tall and appeared to be thin. Seemed to have a relatively short haircut. That’s all I could see.”

“Where do you live? A neighbor? How did you-”

Joe hit the disconnect, then punched in another number, accessing Max Harper’s cell phone. Dulcie sat quietly listening, washing her paws and whiskers. She liked watching Joe at work. He’d told her about the first time he had ever used a phone, how scared he was. In the village drugstore, crouching behind the counter, he had used their business phone to call Clyde. That had been a big-time emotional trip, a milestone trauma for both the tomcat and Clyde.

It was different now. Joe had developed a really professional telephone presence.

When Dulcie heard a woman answer, she put her face close to Joe’s, to listen. He’d gotten Charlie. Dulcie gave him a stern sideways glare, adon’t you dare play gameslook.Don’t you dare draw Charlie into a conversation in front of Harper-if indeed the captain was present. Knowing Joe, the temptation had to be great, and she watched him with a warning gleam.

“Captain Harper’s number,” Charlie repeated.

“Charlie? It’s� This is�” Joe swallowed. “I have information for Captain Harper.”

“May I take a message?” The cats could hear in Charlie’s voice a desperate attempt to hide a guffaw of laughter. This was a first for her, taking a call from Joe Grey for the captain. Passing on a secret feline communication that, if Harper knew the identity of the caller, would send him right over the edge. “I� he’s driving,” she told Joe shakily. “Wait, I’ll turn on the speaker.”

There was a pause as if she was looking for the speaker button. “Go ahead.”

“Captain Harper? That boy, Curtis Farger-I think he gave you a no-good address in San Andreas.”

“Wait a minute, you’re cutting out,” Harper said. There was a long pause. Then, “Okay, go ahead.”

“Apparently Curtis was staying with his uncle up there, a Hurlie Farger. I think Hurlie is Gerrard’s brother. I don’t know where he lives. I get that the Fargers have friends or a contact of some sort in San Andreas, maybe friends of Hurlie’s.”

“Do you have something more specific?”

“At the moment, that’s all I have, that was all I could pick up, and you’ll have to run with that.”

“Where did you hear this?”

“I� a discussion between the boy and the old man.”

“A discussion where?”

“The old man was talking through the kid’s cell window. I’m sure Detective Garza will want to know that the old man is still in the village. Will you fill him in?”

“I’ll do that.” Was Harper laughing? Joe didn’t know how to take that. Laughing at what? He turned an alarmed look on Dulcie.

But maybe Harper was only laughing because the snitch was telling the captain what to do.

“Maybe someday,” Harper said, still with a smile in his voice, “you’ll have sufficient trust in me-as I’ve learned to trust you-to share your sources with me, and share your identity.”

Joe hit the disconnect, his paws tingling with nerves, his whiskers twitching. He looked at Dulcie, frowning. “I think I’ll tell Garza myself.”

She shrugged, amused at him because Harper had made him nervous.

Dialing a third number, he looked at Dulcie’s grin and pushed the headset across the blotter. “It’s your turn, miss smarty. You talk to Garza.”

“I can’t. What�” Taken off guard, she was silent when Garza came on the line.

“Detective Garza,” he repeated.

She swallowed. “That old man,” she said in the sultry voice that she saved for these special calls, “that old man that bombed the church. Are you looking for him?”

“We are,” Garza said, dispensing with unnecessary questions.

“He’s in the village, or he was around noon today. He’s driving a black Jaguar convertible�” She allowed herself a little laugh. “Done up real classy with zebra seat covers. California license two-Z-J-Z-nine-one-seven.

“He talked with the boy, through that high little window into the holding cell. He climbed up that leaning oak trunk, and nearly fell. He’s pretty crippled. They have-the boy has an uncle in San Andreas. Hurlie Farger, apparently Gerrard’s brother. That’s where the boy was staying. We’ve already informed Captain Harper. He was in his car, so they may already be on their way to San Andreas.” And before Garza could ask any questions, Dulcie hit the disconnect and collapsed on the blotter.

Joe watched her, grinning. “That should shake things up. Let’s hit for Lupe’s Playa, before we miss the action-and miss supper.”

16 [��������: pic_17.jpg]

The aromasof garlic and chilies drew Ryan like a benediction. The enticement of a spicy, delicious meal, the hot Mexican music, the soft light cast by the swinging lanterns, all the rich setting of Lupe’s Playa seemed to cosset and comfort her. On the brick patio beneath the gently blowing oaks, they had their favorite table in the far corner beside the brick wall. This was where she and Clyde had first met, when she first arrived in the village and Dallas brought her here for dinner. Now, seated beside Clyde, ordering a beer, she took his hand, comforted by his strong presence. Ever since taking the call on her cell phone she had felt even more uncertain, even more raw and exposed.

She hadn’t told Clyde about the call, hadn’t wanted to spoil their evening. Now, she tried not to keep glancing out through the pieced-brick patio wall, to the street, to see if shehadbeen followed. Yet she couldn’t help watching the host’s desk, through the patio doors, studying each new arrival, wondering� a thin man, the caller had said. She had no idea whether she would know the person-ifshe’d been followed, if this wasn’t some hoax, someone wanting to harass her. Who could have made such a call?

Certainly Max Harper received some strange phone calls. But she wasn’t a cop, she was a private citizen. How could this call tonight have any connection to a police informant?

Whatever the truth, that anonymous call, just after the murder, had given her a deep and lasting chill.

It wasn’t as if she knew her neighbors, as if any of them would be concerned about her safety. Certainly none of them would have her phone numbers handy.

“So, you have another date? You want to hurry on through dinner?”

She looked at him blankly.

“You’ve been staring out at the street like you’re waiting for a lost lover.”

“I had a phone call, coming down. He wouldn’t give a name. Said that when I left the apartment I was followed. I didn’t want to tell you, and spoil the evening. He described a slim man driving a gray hatchback, said he’d been parked above the apartment apparently waiting for me. It’s probably some nut call, but�”

Clyde’s expression startled her. His face flushed but he didn’t seem exactly surprised. “What the hell. You don’t need crazy phone calls on top of everything else.”

“It made me a little nervous, that’s all,” she said quickly. She wiped some water from the table with her napkin and unrolled the blueprints, weighting them down with the chip and salsa bowls. Clyde leaned over, studying the drawings. She had presented the floor plan and several elevations. The vaulted ceiling of the new room was impressive, both from the street and from within.

But even with the excitement of the promised addition, Clyde’s mind remained on the phantom snitch. His thoughts about the tomcat were not charitable. Did Joe have to upset Ryan? Probably the car Joe saw had been some neighbor or visitor pulling away, and Joe had let his imagination run. Damn cat had to mind everyone’s business. And what was he doing near Ryan’s place? Or,inRyan’s place? Involuntarily Clyde glanced out through the pierced wall, himself, at the slowly passing cars, wondering if someonehadfollowed her-and that message to Ryan wasn’t the only phone call Joe had placed tonight.

Just before Clyde left the house Max had called, on his way from San Francisco to Sonoma. The snitch had been in touch, the same unidentified voice that contacted Harper periodically. Max always filled Clyde in because those calls made Max nervous. The snitch had never been identified, the caller refused to give his name, and he did not fit the profile of most snitches-he sure never asked for payment.

The bottom line was, Joe Grey could not stay off the phone.

And now, tonight, had the snitch gone too far? He had told Harper that the San Andreas address for Curtis Farger was a fake, that Curtis had been staying with an uncle up there. How could the tomcat know such a thing, so soon after the bombing? Know more about the young prisoner than did either Garza or Detective Davis, both of whom had questioned Curtis?

This time, Clyde didn’t see how Joe could have a solid source, for either call. So he saw someone driving down Ryan’s street behind her. Probably some guy running down to the store for a bottle of milk or a six-pack. Joe had to be snatching at whirlwinds, clawing at unreliable “facts” that would only serve to muddy the investigation. Clyde didn’t like to think that of Joe.

Certainly he’d underestimated Joe in the past; but these calls just seemed too far out-scaring Ryan, and maybe sending Harper on a wild-goose chase. And there was nothing that he, Clyde, could say to Harper to stop him from wasting his time.That was my tomcat calling, Max, and this time, I gotta say, he was way off base.

Right.

Clyde did not stop to examine his perplexed anger, or to consider that it grew precisely from his own increased respect for the small hunter’s skill. Deeply irritated with Joe, wanting only to dismiss the matter, he concentrated on the blueprints.

The first stage of the work to update his modest Cape Cod cottage called for converting the smaller of Clyde’s two bedrooms into a stairway and storage closet, the stairs to lead to the new second floor. Ryan planned to jack the tilting roof straight up to form two walls of the new upstairs. She said this was the fastest and most economical approach, and it was a concept that made sense to Clyde. The new master bedroom would have a fireplace, two walk-in closets, a compartmentalized bath, and a large study with a second fireplace. Both fireplaces would have gas logs but could be converted easily to burning wood. Neither Clyde nor Ryan had mentioned that the suite was admirably set up for a couple.

The waiter appeared. As they ordered, Clyde glanced out through the wall again, to where Ryan’s truck was parked. Several tourists were passing, glancing into the cab as people seemed compelled to do, peering into empty vehicles.

“It’ll take only a day to raise the roof,” Ryan said, “once we have the end walls off. A few days to build and sheath the new roof and new end walls. Then we’ll be dried in and it won’t matter what the weather does.“Or if I go to jail,she thought. “My uncle Scotty will be coming down to work on the job. My dad’s brother.”

Clyde nodded. “Dallas calls him a red-faced rounder of an Irishman with a Scotch name and the mind of an insanely talented chess player.”

She laughed. “Scotty loves analyzing the smallest detail, sorting out every possibility. It was from Scotty I learned to love all kinds of puzzles-that’s what made me want to be a builder. When I was little he taught me about space, the uses of space. I learned to design from Scotty-silly games a kid loves, that teach you to look for all possibilities in how you arrange and use space.”

She looked at him solemnly.He didn’t teach me about finding a dead body in your space. What kind of puzzle is that?She said, “Dallas called Harper. He and Charlie are coming back, canceling the cruise.”

“Yes, Harper called me just before I left the house. They were on the road, going to stay somewhere in the wine country tonight then spend a day or two in San Andreas, see if they can get a line on what the boy was doing up there.”

“Some honeymoon.”

“Dallas said you talked with the kid again, in jail. What do you make of him, now?”

“He’s difficult to read. Maybe scared, maybe just hard-nosed defiant. It’s ugly to think about a ten-year-old kid without conscience, but it can happen. Or maybe,” she said, “maybe he’s trying real hard to protect his grampa.”

“You think the old man set the bomb?”

“His son’s in prison for running a meth lab. The fact that Harper couldn’t make a case against Grampa may have left the old boy feeling like he had to do a little payback.”

“Pretty heavy payback. Have you wondered if the kid, when he was up in San Andreas, had anything to do with copying your truck keys?”

“It’s possible. That was the first thing Dallas asked me. We both had keys, Scotty and I. I suppose mine could have gone missing for hours, and I wouldn’t notice. But that’s�” She shivered. “If that’s the case, who got him to steal them?”

Clyde buttered a tortilla. “Whatever they find out about the boy, looks like the department’s stuck with him for a while. Harper said juvenile hall can’t take him, he’d just talked with Dallas. The fire they had last month destroyed most of the building, and the temporary quarters aren’t that secure. Juvenile authorities want Curtis to stay where he is.”

“When Max called, did you talk with Charlie too?”

He nodded. “She had lunch with Kate Osborne yesterday in the city while Max made some phone calls and kept an appointment-a couple of Dallas’s buddies on San Francisco PD,” he said softly. “They’ll be checking, unofficially at this point, on Rupert’s connections in the city.”

“The girlfriends,” she said. “That’s encouraging.”

He nodded. “The girlfriends, and their male companions. Maybe they’ll turn up a jealous lover or two, find something they can run on.”

“I hope.” She touched his hand. “I feel shaky about getting through your job without the grand jury coming after me. If you want to�”

“Will you quit that? You didn’t kill him and you’re not going to jail.” He took her hand. “You figure a month to do my upstairs. You were right on schedule with my patio construction, so I’m guessing you will be with this. Long before that, Dallas and Harper will have Rupert’s killer behind bars.”

She just looked at him.

“Believe me. You have no faith in those guys? In your own uncle?” He winked at her. “You’ll have to stay out of jail if you mean to be on time, so you can get on with the next project.” They had agreed early on that ripping out one downstairs wall, opening Clyde’s seldom-used dining room to the kitchen to make one big space for casual entertaining, fit Clyde’s lifestyle. Clyde and his friends played poker in the kitchen, and enjoyed their potluck meals there, or on the new enclosed patio.

“And you still want the little tower at one end of the new upstairs?”

“Absolutely. Joe would feel slighted if he didn’t have his own place.”

Ryan laughed. “You don’t spoil your animals.” “Of course not.“A private cat tower,Joe Grey had said,with glass all around. Sun warmed, with an ocean view. A private feline retreat, off-limits to humans.

But as he joked with Ryan and tried to reassure her, Clyde kept wondering if the cats had called her from her apartment. And wondering if someonehadfollowed her. Wondering if they might have doubled back when they were sure the apartment was empty, maybe used a duplicate key? And that worried him. If someone was in there, he prayed the cats had left.

The gray hatchback did return to Ryan’s place while the cats were still crouched on the desk. They were poised to leave when the same car passed below the windows, coming slowly up the hill, and parked half a block up the street.

A tall man emerged moving swiftly toward the building and silently up the wooden stairs. He was maybe forty, with soft brown hair in a handsome blow-dry and, in his right hand, a small leather case the size of a cell phone. As he approached the door the cats dropped off the desk and under the daybed. They were beginning to feel like moles, or like a pair of fuzzy slippers abandoned beneath the mattress. He knocked, knocked again, waited a few minutes, knocked a third time. Then faint scratching sounds began.

“Picking the lock,” Joe said.

He was inside within seconds, moving directly to Ryan’s desk. Pulling the curtain across the broad windows, he switched on the lamp to low and reached to a pile of files. But then he shoved them back, laughing softly, and picked up the bills and the copy of her billing for the Jakes job, that lay on the blotter. Chuckling, he turned on her computer. The cats glanced at each other. What had these no-good types done before the invention of computers? Seemed like every kind of villainy, these days, required electronic assistance.

But Dulcie couldn’t be still, she kept fidgeting and glancing away toward the bathroom window, thinking about going home, thinking about the kit. Joe laid his ears back, hissing.

“Will you cut it out? She’s fine.”

“We don’t know that. We don’t know where she is. I don’t like when she’s gone for hours and hours. We haven’t seen her since breakfast.”

Joe hissed again gently to make her shut up, and watched their burglar bring up Ryan’s bookkeeping program. He went immediately to the Jakes account.

He made a disk copy of the pages, then changed the figures on her hard drive, making them higher, adding several thousand dollars to the bill. Cooking Ryan’s books, setting her up for some kind of swindle. Turning on her copy machine, he made two sets of her lumber and supply bills. He put one set in his pocket, and worked on the other with an eraser and Wite-Out, apparently inserting new figures to match the higher numbers in her computer. He made fresh copies of these. As he ran a printout of the doctored billing, the cats could only puzzle over where this was leading. Ryan had taken her completed bill with her, ready to mail. Had the guy guessed that? Had he seen her through the window working at her desk? Did he plan somehow to intercept the envelope after she mailed it?

Or had she not had time to mail it? Was the envelope still in her truck? If he had followed her to the restaurant, he’d know she didn’t stop at a mailbox. Maybe he’d strolled by her truck and seen the envelope lying on the seat.

Shutting down the machine and slipping his various sets of bills and the printout into his pocket, he was out of there quickly, locking the door behind him. The cats fled to the desk watching him descend the stairs, walk the half block up the bill, and swing into the gray hatchback. He headed back toward the village.

“What now?” Dulcie said. “If she’s already mailed her bill, what’s he going to do with that stuff? Do you think that was Larn Williams? That he called earlier just to see if she was going out this evening?”

Joe didn’t answer. Knocking the phone off the cradle, for the second time that night he pawed in the number of Ryan’s cell phone.

Ryan was enjoying the last of her flan when her cell phone rang. She didn’t want to answer, she pushed it across the table to Clyde.

“R. Flannery, construction,” he said between mouthfuls.

“May I speak to R. Flannery? I called earlier, I have an urgent message for her.”

“I can take the message,” Clyde told Joe, trying not shout with rage.

At the other end, Joe sighed. “All right,” he said. “Ithinkthe guy who followed her is going to break into her truck, within the next few minutes. It’s kind of complicated.”

Clyde stared at the phone. “Just a minute.” He handed the phone to Ryan. “You’d better take this.” But he leaned close to listen.

“It’s me again,” Joe said. “I believe someone is intent on falsifying your billing for the Jakes addition in San Andreas. Have you mailed that bill?”

“I� who is this? How do you�? What are you talking about?”

“Have you mailed the bill or is it still in your truck?”

“No. Yes. It’s in my truck. What�?”

“The person who followed you earlier returned to your apartment and broke in. With lock picks. While you’ve been having dinner he changed the billing on your computer and made copies of the original bills and doctored them. He ran a new printout, made copies of the doctored bills, and left. I’d guess he’s headed your way.”

“Who is this? How could you know such a thing?”

“He prepared the new statement for considerably more than your original cost-plus numbers. If you’ve mailed the bill, probably no harm done-unless he is able to intercept it at the other end. If you haven’t mailed it, I think he’ll try to break into your truck, open the envelope, and switch billings. In other words, he wants to set you up, add embezzlement to the possible charge of murder.”

“Why would he bother? Isn’t murder enough?”

“Maybe he thinks embezzlement would in some way strengthen the murder charges.”

“What does this guy look like, who’s supposed to be doing all this?”

Listening to the caller’s description of the burglar, she felt all warmth drain from her hands and body.

“Don’t let him get that envelope,” the caller said. “There isn’t much time.” And he hung up.

Hitting the disconnect, Joe dropped to the floor and headed for the bathroom window. Ahead of him Dulcie, balanced on the windowsill, said, “I’m going home first, see if the kit’s there. She�”

“There’s not time,” he said, leaping past her. “We’ll miss the action.”

“Can’t help it. Go watch Ryan’s truck. I’ll be along when I know the kit’s safe.”

“But�”

Dropping from the window she fled around the building and raced down the sidewalk heading for home, filled with worry.

17 [��������: pic_18.jpg]

The rustywire netting of the chicken houses was half falling down like those the kit had seen long ago in her travels when she was small. She longed to push inside and have a look but the smell stopped her, burning and stinging her nose. The stink came strongest where the dirt floor of the pens was covered with sheets of rotting plywood. In the darkening evening she could see that one of those had been shifted aside. A black emptiness loomed beneath, a hole big enough for a man to slip through. Why would a man want to go down there? Padding around the side of the pen, she could see down into the pit where heavy timbers stood against the earthen walls. Rough steps led down.

Backing away sneezing and coughing, she knew she had found something important. What was the old man up to? She wanted to look closer, but she daren’t creep down into his stinking cellar, that smell was like something that would reach up and grab her. Tales filled her of human people dying, of skin and eyes burned, of lungs rotted, and even their brains turned to dust, and she hurried away, afraid clear down to her paws.

But she could follow the old man, if she kept her distance. She could see what that was about, dumping his bags of garbage down there among the ruins.

Hurrying away from the ugly, deserted cabin, she raced down the narrow road and down the scrubby, empty hills as fast and silent as a hawk’s shadow. But she ran scared. Traveling the darkening, empty land so far from home, alone, was not like when she slipped through the night shoulder to shoulder with Joe Grey and Dulcie feeling bold and safe. Watching the falling blackness around her for prowling raccoons and coyotes or bobcats, she ran pell-mell for the Pamillon estate.

Dulcie hurried through the village beneath pools of light from the shop windows heading home, praying the kit was there, an uneasy feeling in her stomach, a frightened tremor that drew her racing along the sidewalks brushing past pedestrians’ hard shoes and dodging leashed dogs, running, running until at last she was flying through Wilma’s flowers and in under the plastic flap of her cat door. Mewing, she prowled the house looking for the kit, mewing and peering behind livingroom furniture and under the beds, unwilling to speak until she was sure Wilma didn’t have company.

Determining at last that the house was empty of humans and of the kit as well, she called out anyway, her voice echoing hollowly. “Kit, come out. Kit, are you there? Please come out, it’s important.” All this in a voice that was hardly a whisper though her calls would reach feline ears.

There was no answer, not a purr, no soft brush of fur against carpet or hardwood as she would hear if the kit sneaked up on her, playing games.

At last, leaving the house again, she scented back and forth across the garden, and searched driveway and sidewalk for a fresh track. She raced up a trellis and sniffed all across the roof too and up the hill in back through the tall dry grass where hated foxtails leaped into her fur. Finding no fresh scent of the kit she grew increasingly worried. Kit hadn’t been home at all.

Well, she couldn’t search the whole world, one couldn’t searchallthe hills though she and Joe had tried to do just that when the kit disappeared for three days last winter.

But the kit had been smaller then, and more vulnerable. She was a grown-up cat now. And, as Kit was far more than an ordinary cat, Dulcie thought stubbornly, she would have to take responsibility for herself.

Hurting and cross but giving up at last, Dulcie headed for Lupe’s Playa.Imust not worry, I hate when Wilma worries about me. The kit is big now and can take care of herself.But Dulcie was so unsettled that when she saw Joe on the low branch of a cypress tree outside Lupe’s Playa she scorched up the trunk ploughing straight into him, shivering.

He hardly noticed her; his entire attention was on Ryan’s red pickup parked just across the street.

The passenger door stood open. A man sat inside, poised with one foot on the curb and watching the restaurant through the window, as if ready to slip away at any sign of Ryan.

Joe Grey glanced at her, and smiled. “He opened the envelope. Removed Ryan’s billing.” They watched him fill Ryan’s large brown envelope with the sheaf of papers from his pocket. “He opened the door with a long, thin rod. Only took a second. Opened the bottom of the envelope, peeled it back as slick as skinning a mouse. He doesn’t see Ryan and Clyde watching.” He looked toward the patio wall where the bricks were spaced in an open and decorative pattern offering passersby a teasing view of the garden and diners. In the restaurant’s soft backlight Dulcie could just see Ryan and Clyde with their heads together, peering out through the wall’s concealing vine. Talk about cats spying.

“I wonder if Ryan called Detective Garza,” Dulcie said, glancing along the street as if Garza or Detective Davis might have hurried over from the station to stand among the shadows.

“I don’t think so. She means to lead the guy on-that’s Larn Williams, all right.” Joe flicked an ear. “I was on the wall when he approached the truck. She told Clyde she can make a second switch, print a new, correct bill and mail it. Let Williams think he was successful, let him wait for the Jakeses to hit the roof because the bill’s so high, wait for them to maybe file a lawsuit. She thinks he might tell the Jakeses that she cooked the books, even before the bill arrives, make up some story about how he found out.”

“Would they believe him?”

“Are Larn Williams and the Jakeses close friends? We don’t know a thing about them.” Again Joe smiled. “One more phone call. Who knows how much Harper can pick up about Williams, while he’s in San Andreas?”

“You’re going to askHarperto gather informationfor you?”

“Turnabout,” the tomcat said softly, looking smug.

Dulcie stared at him for a long time. She did not reply.

Williams sealed the envelope and laid it on the seat. “Same position as he found it,” Joe said. Quietly Williams depressed the lock, shut the truck door and slipped away up the street, disappearing around the corner. The cats heard a car start. He was gone when Ryan and Clyde emerged.

Ryan drove slowly away as if she had no idea the truck had been broken into. Clyde, parked in the next block, followed her.

“What will they do now?” Dulcie said.

“She’ll swing by our place, I guess. She left Rock there. I’m betting that when they finish going over tomorrow’s work Clyde will follow her home. Check out her apartment. Maybe try to talk her into staying at her uncle’s for a few nights.”

“She won’t, she’s too independent. And if Larn Williams wanted to kill her, why would he bother setting her up for a lawsuit?” Dulcie backed quickly down the tree and headed up the street toward home. “Maybe the kit’s back, maybe she’s raiding the refrigerator right now.”

And Joe, his stomach rumbling with hunger, galloped along beside her. Within minutes they were flying through Wilma’s garden among a jungle of chrysanthemums and late-blooming geraniums, the flowers’ scents collecting on their coats as they approached the gray stone cottage.

Padding up the back steps and in through Dulcie’s cat door, entering Wilma’s immaculate blue-and-white kitchen, Joe headed directly for the refrigerator but Dulcie never paused, off she went, galloping through the house again searching for the kit.

The first time Dulcie ever brought Joe here, she had taught him to open the heavy, sealed door of the refrigerator, to leap to the counter, brace his hind paws in the handle and shove. Now, forcing it open, he dropped to the floor catching the door as it swung out. The bottom shelf was Dulcie’s, and Wilma always left something appealing; she didn’t forget half the time the way Clyde did. Joe might find on his own refrigerator shelf a fancy gourmet selection from Jolly’s Deli, left over from the last poker game, or the dried up end of a fossilized hot dog.

Dulcie’s private stock tonight included two custards from Jolly’s, sliced roast chicken, a bowl of apricots in cream, and crisply simmered string beans with bits of bacon, all the offerings stored in Styrofoam cups that were light enough for a cat to lift, and with easily removable lids that were gentle on feline teeth. He had them out and was opening them when Dulcie returned.

“Kit’s not home. And Wilma’s still gone. I think she said there was some kind of lecture tonight on the changing tax picture.”

“Sounds deadly. Why does she go to those things?”

“To reduce her taxes, so she can buy gourmet food for us.” She nosed at the array of delicacies that he had arranged on the blue linoleum. “I wish the kit would come home.”

But the kit did not appear. Joe and Dulcie feasted, then Joe retired to Wilma’s desk to call Harper. He punched in the number but there was no answer. He tried again half an hour later, and again.

“The phone’s turned off,” Dulcie said. “Leave a message.”

Joe didn’t like to use the phone’s message center, but he did at last, then curled up on the blue velvet couch beside Dulcie and fell quickly asleep. Curled next to him, Dulcie lay worrying. The kit’s propensity for trouble seemed so much worse at night, when Dulcie imagined all kinds of calamities. She dozed restlessly, jerking awake when Wilma came in, and again at 6:00 in the morning when she heard her cat door flapping.

She leaped up, fully alert as the kit galloped into the living room, her tail high, her yellow eyes gleaming. Above them, the windows were growing pale. Hopping to the couch, Kit nosed excitedly at Dulcie. “I found the old man. I found where he lives. I smelled chemicals so maybe it’s where he made the bomb. I found where he dumps his trash. Why does bomb-making leave all that trash?”

‘Trash?” Joe said, sitting up yawning. “What kind of trash?”

“Boxes and cans that smell terrible of chemicals.”

He rose to stand over her. “Where, Kit? How much trash? Where did you find it?”

The kit looked longingly back toward the kitchen where she had raced past the empty plastic dishes. “Is there anything left to eat?”

“We left a custard in the refrigerator,” Dulcie said, “and some chicken.”

The kit took off for the kitchen. Following her, they watched her jump up to force open the heavy door. The minute it flew back she raked out the cartons, fighting open the loosely applied lids, and got down to the serious business of breakfast. She ate ravenously, gobbling more like a starving hound than a cat, making little slurping noises. She didn’t speak or look up until the custard and the chicken had disappeared and the containers were licked clean.

“All right,” Joe said when the kit sat contentedly licking her paws. “Let’s have it.”

“I need to use the phone,” the kit said softly. “Right now. I need to call Detective Garza.”

Joe and Dulcie stared at her. “Come in the living room,” Joe said. “Comenow,Kit.”

Cutting her eyes at Dulcie, the kit headed obediently for the living room and up onto the blue velvet couch.

“Start again,” Joe said, pacing across the coffee table. “From the beginning.”

“I found where the old man lives. Up the hills above the Pamillon estate in a shack on the side of a cliff above that big gully and a chicken house hanging-”

“Kit.Howdid you find him?”

“I hid in his car. A black Jaguar with the top down. He drove so twisty it made me carsick again. An old shack and the chicken houses hanging on the edge of the cliff and I could smell chemicals and there weren’t any chickens, maybe the chemicals killed them all. He filled his car with stinking garbage bags and went away and then I saw his car far down in the old ruins and-”

“Kit,” Joe said, “slow down. This is all running together. What are you leaving out?”

The kit stared at him.

“For starters, where did you find his car?”

“At the police station. After he talked to that boy. He drove like fury. I didn’t know why he had such a nice car or why he would load it down with garbage. I-”

Dulcie licked Kit’s ear. “Go slower. Tell us slower.”

The kit started over from where she had slipped into the old man’s black Jaguar. She described the shack and how she had gone inside. How he had loaded up his trash and driven down into the Pamillon estate. “I went there. I ran and ran.”

The hills had loomed below her black and silent, and her head was filled with unfriendly beasts hunting for their supper. She ran listening for every sound, watching for any movement among rock and bushy shadow. Ran flying down the hills as night fell, trying to make no noise herself in the dry grass, ran terrified until the half-fallen mansion loomed against the darkening sky, and ancient dead trees rose up with reaching arms.

Slipping into the ruins among the old oaks she had padded among fallen walls into the empty mansion with its rooms open to the stars. She could smell where the old man had walked, his scent thick, his old-man stink mixed with the nose-burning chemical odors. His trail led through the half-fallen parlor and through the kitchen and down into the cellars, his sour trail clinging along the walls.

The cellars were too black even for a cat to see. She had to travel by her whiskers alone, by the little electric messages telegraphed from muzzle and paws. Warily jumping at every imagined movement, she drew deep beneath the mansion. A thinnest light came at last seeping in from a great crack in the cellar wall. And smells exploded suddenly, as loud as a radio blaring on. She could barely make out, ahead in the blackness, a looming form like a huge misshapen beast. It was silent and still, and it stunk: the garbage bags, black and lumpy. Imagining the old man standing there too, she spun and ran again back and up through the tunnels until at last she could see starlight once more, above the open rooms.

Hiding behind fallen stones panting and staring out at the night sky, she had crept up the broken stairs to the nursery and into the old chest beside the fireplace where once her friend Dillon Thurwell had hidden. There, hungry and frightened and very tired, she had curled up in a tight ball trying to comfort herself, and soon she slept.

She had awakened when the first hint of dawn shone in one long pale crack beneath the lid of the chest. Pushing up the lid with her nose, and crawling out, she had padded across the second-floor nursery to where the wall fell away. There she stood looking down at the heaps of rock and dead oaks that bristled like some gigantic devil’s garden, stood looking past the ruins to the hills that dropped away below her. Wanting to be home right then, right that minute, wanting breakfast, wanting most of all to telephone Dallas Garza and tell him where that old man was, who had tried to kill half the village. Was she the only one in the world who knew where that old man was hiding? Consumed by her need she had leaped down the ragged stairs flying over heaped stones and through tangled bushes running for home, running.

“And here I am,” said the kit, licking a last smear of custard from her whiskers. “No one else knows where that old man is. No one but the boy because the boy’s clothes were in the shack but that boy will never tell anyone.” And she sailed to the desk and pawed at the phone, her ears and whiskers sharp forward, her long fluffy tail high and lashing-this kit who was scared of the phone but who, right now, was more full of herself and more eager to confide in the law, or at least to confide in Detective Garza.

18 [��������: pic_19.jpg]

“Very smooth,“Joe said, leaping on the breakfast table, landing inches from Clyde’s plate.

“What’s smooth?” Clyde said, wiping up the last of his fried eggs. “Where’ve you been? Your breakfast’s getting cold.”

“Up on the roof, watching them put up the platform and stairs. Pretty fast workers.”

“Scaffolding. It’s called scaffolding.” Clyde glanced at his watch. “They got here before seven, one of the carpenters had the lumber on his truck. They’re expecting another delivery at eight.”

“I gather Ryan’s not a union member. She’d never get away with starting work so early.” Already Joe’s ears felt numb from the thunder of hammers and the rasping scream of the electric saws. He might boast superior knowledge and skills, for a tomcat, with none of the normal feline fears, but the sound of a Skilsaw or an electric drill still sent shivers up his furry spine.

The scaffolding that Ryan had constructed along the side of the house, with a temporary stairway from the front sidewalk, was indeed a platform large and strong enough to support any number of carpenters plus a considerable weight in lumber and building materials. The men wouldn’t have to enter the house except to connect the plumbing and, at some point in the job, to build the inner stairway in half of Clyde’s small guest room. Clyde’s present bedroom would become the new guest room, without his desk and weight equipment that now cluttered the little space. That would all be moved upstairs.

“They plan to have the shingles off the roof this morning before the lumber arrives,” Clyde said. “There’ll be roofing nails all over the yard. I’m taking the morning off to vacuum them up, but you cats stay out of the way. Watch your paws. Stay inside when the truck gets here, until they’ve dropped that load of lumber. Be sure the kit is inside.”

“Anything else? Don’t pick up any fleas? Stay away from barking dogs?”

Clyde gave him a long, patient look. “I am only a human. You can’t expect me to be as intelligent or perceptive as a feline. But because I am human, I worry about you. That is what humans do. You are going to have to make allowances. If you want to keep me healthy and happy and keep me bringing home the kippers, you will have to humor me. Stay out of the way of the truck. Is that clear?”

“There is no need for early morning sarcasm. I already told Dulcie about the lumber. And I laid down the law to the kit. You don’t need to write a script and do a two-minute stand-up.”

Clyde glared.

But Joe Grey smiled. “A load of lumber in the yard will be the end of that patch of scruffy grass you euphemistically call the front lawn.”

Ignoring him, Clyde rose to rinse his plate. Joe nibbled at his own breakfast. “Very nice omelet.” Savoring the Brie-spinach-bacon-and-cheese concoction, he pawed open the morning paper.

DETECTIVE’S NIECE PRIME MURDER SUSPECT

San Francisco contractor Rupert Dannizer was found shot to death Sunday morning in the garage of local contractor Ryan Flannery, niece of newly appointed police detective Dallas Garza.

Rupert’s death had not come to the attention of reporters until the Sunday edition was already on the street. This Monday morning it filled me front page above the fold. There was no photograph of the body or of Ryan; likely Dallas had seen to that. Joe scanned the article, which said nothing that he didn’t already know. The press had made clear mat the murdered man’s widow, in whose garage the body had been found, was not only police detective Dallas Garza’s niece, but was the sister of local interior designer Hanni Coon. And that Ryan’s father was Michael Flannery, chief U.S. probation officer for the northern district of California, based in San Francisco. The article pointed out that Ryan had filed for divorce from Dannizer six months earlier when she moved to Molena Point to open a separate contracting business. It gave the name of her new business and some interesting details about the lawsuit in which she was suing Dannizer for half the value of their San Francisco firm, Dannizer Construction. That lawsuit was now unnecessary. The paper made it clear that, with Rupert’s death, Ryan would be a wealthy woman. Joe scanned, as well, theGazette’slatest article on the church bombing, but it was only a rehash of previous reports, except for information on those who had been treated for minors wounds or shock, and that Cora Lee French had been released from the hospital.

Now that Cora Lee was home, Joe thought, it was time to take the kit up to stay with her. The kit could have gotten herself into all kinds of trouble, up at that old man’s shack. Cora Lee would love playing hostess to her favorite cat, and until this bombing business was cleared up, the unpredictable tattercoat would be safer-and Dulcie wouldn’t be wound in knots. Joe was more than curious to see if Garza would run with what the kit had told him.

It did occur to the tomcat that, in worrying over the kit, he was behaving exactly like Clyde and Wilma. But he immediately dismissed that thought. This was an entirely different circumstance. The kit was still young, innocent, and totally unpredictable.

Abandoning the newspaper and his empty plate, Joe dropped off the table. If the police had further information about the bombing, it wasn’t in theGazette.But, of course, Garza would keep any new leads strictly within the department. Nipping out his cat door and up a neighbor’s pine tree, he stretched out on a branch where he could watch Ryan tear up the roof, and could think over the two cases.

As to evidence in the church bombing, he knew the county lab was backed up for months and that they made very few exceptions. But couldn’t they try, for a case such as this? Harper said every department and every court had to wait its turn. So why wasn’t there more staffing? Joe scratched an itch that was definitelynota flea. All kinds of people were out of work, yet these high-tech jobs were going begging. Why? Humans were adaptable, they were smart. If a cat couldn’t catch rats, he’d go after other game.

Still, he guessed it was hard to make a change in your life.

He watched Ryan and a young, long-haired carpenter cut and nail plywood flooring. Above them on the attic roof the other carpenter knelt, ripping off shingles, dropping them down to the yard and sidewalk. In a moment Clyde wandered out of the carport with a rake and went to work down at the end of the yard where shingles already Uttered the grass and cement. Sometimes, all the banging and hustle that accompanied busy human endeavor wore a cat right out.

Dulcie would say all that hustle was what humanity was about. Build, invent, improve, and move on. Push the envelope. The ingenuity of the human mind was no longer involved simply with hunting. A billion possible scenarios now waited, to be deftly harnessed. She would say, only when that eager creativity was twisted into negative channels, into destruction, did mankind falter and slide back to the cave mentality.

Now that old man, old Gramps Farger.Therewas a cave mentality, with his bombs and drugs.

Gramps had disappeared completely from the little house where he and Curtis’s father had run their original meth lab. Harper’s men hadn’t found a sign of life when they went back after the bombing, again looking for Gramps. The lab had been out back, a quarter mile away from the house, in a rough shack. Harper said it stunk so bad that the officers had to wear masks. Those chemicals got right in your lungs. Maybe the house would have to be burned down, Joe thought, and the earth turned under like some atomic waste.

And now Gramps was running free, letting the kid take the rap, letting a ten-year-old boy cool his heels in jail.

Joe watched the carpenters tearing out the two end walls, preparing to cut loose the apex of the roof. Eight huge, businesslike jacks stood ready to lift the long halves of the roof straight up, turning them into walls. He wondered how dangerous that would be, jacking up those two forty-foot sections. Wondered how Ryan was going to secure them in place while she built the new roof on top and built the end walls. He’d hate to be underneath if one of those mothers gave way. Talk about a cat pancake.

But watching the dark-haired young woman swing her sledgehammer knocking out two-by-fours, Joe didn’t doubt that Ryan’s plan would work, that it was efficient and professional, and as safe as any construction operation could be.

Still, though, he thought he’d keep his distance during the jacking up. He was just wondering if Ryan planned to do that after lunch, when Rock’s booming challenge filled the morning, echoing from the backyard where Rock had been confined with old Rube.

Leaping to the next tree between the neighbor’s house and his own, Joe watched Rock cavorting and dancing around Rube trying to get the old black Labrador to play. The two elderly cats and the young white female looked on from atop the trellis, not yet comfortable with the big energetic weimaraner. Poor Rube seemed willing to romp, ducking his gray muzzle and pawing at the paving but his limbs and joints didn’t want to cooperate. Joe mewed softly, knowing how much Rube hurt and feeling bad for him, knowing that even with the wonders of modern medicine Dr. Firetti couldn’t turn off all the pain of arthritis.

At least Rube had a nice backyard. And the patio’s heavy Spanish-style trellis provided fine aerial walkways for the cats. To say nothing of the warmth-the high stucco wall at the back trapped the afternoon sun so the patio was warm as a spa, holding the heat well into evening where an animal could stretch out for a luxurious nap.

Ryan had even provided a decorative tile border around old Barney’s gravestone. The golden retriever, Rube’s lifelong pal who had died last year, was buried just beyond the oak tree. Ryan had, with tenderness, retained the small sentimental elements that were important to their little family while, in more practical terms, pursuing a remodeling regimen that would make the house worth twice its present value.

Clyde’s “building money” for this project had been, just as when he bought the old apartment house, cash earned from the sale of his restored antique cars. The latest vehicle, a refurbished 1942 LaSalle, Clyde had purchased in a shocking condition of rust and neglect. Now, renewed nearly to better than its original state, the antique car had sold almost at once for more than enough to complete the upstairs project, a sum hard to comprehend in terms of kitty treats or even in confections from Jolly’s Deli.

Watching his contented housemates, Joe was glad Clyde hadn’t sold their little home. As for the house next door, it had not been turned into a restaurant after all, but had been sold again. The one property alone, apparently, hadn’t been large enough to make the venture cost-effective.

Listen to me, Joe thought, alarmed. Cost-effective? Worth twice its present value? Sometimes I worry myself, sometimes I sound way too much like a human. Next thing you know, I’ll be buying mutual funds.

It was well past noon when Ryan and the carpenters broke for lunch, when Clyde’s car pulled in. The sudden silence of the stilled hammers and power tools was so profound it left Joe’s ears ringing. Any sensible cat would have left the scene hours before to seek a quiet retreat, but he didn’t want to miss anything-and now he didn’t want to miss lunch. He watched Clyde come up the steps toting a white paper bag that sent an aroma of pastrami on rye like a benediction, watched Ryan hurry down the makeshift stairs and around to the backyard to see that Rock had water and a few minutes of petting, before she ate her lunch. As she returned, Joe settled beside Clyde, where he sat on the new subfloor, opening the white paper bag. He felt sorry for the household cats, that they couldn’t have gourmet goodies. The vet had warned Clyde long ago about the dangers of such food to felines. Dr. Firetti had no idea of the delicacies in which Joe and Dulcie and the kit indulged, apparently without harm. They all three checked out in their lab tests and exams with flying colors. “Healthy as three little horses,” the doctor always said, congratulating Clyde and Wilma on their conscientious care. “I see you’re sticking to the prescribed diet.” And no one told him any different.

Listening to Ryan’s soft voice, Joe tied into his share of Clyde’s sandwich, holding it down with his paw. Far be it from Clyde to cut it up for him. Glancing above him, he saw that Ryan hadn’t yet cut loose the roof along the peak. All was solid up there over their heads. The two carpenters sat at the other end of the room, their radio playing some kind of reggae, turned low. Both were young and lean and tanned, one with a rough thatch of hair shaggy around his shoulders, the other, Wayne, with dark hair in a military trim that made Joe wonder if he was moonlighting from some coastal army camp. Ryan’s uncle Scotty hadn’t yet arrived.

Ryan was saying, “When I got home last night, Rock took one sniff at the stairs and the door and charged into that apartment roaring. He knew someone had been in there. He raced around looking for him, pitching a fit. Took me a while to get him settled. I didn’t want to discourage him from barking but 1 sure don’t want the neighbors on my case.”

“Neighbors ought to be happy to have a guard dog in residence. Put it to them that you had a prowler and you’re sure glad the dog ran him off.”

“I wonder if the neighbors saw Larn, if anyone saw him come in. You’d think if they had, they’d have called the station.”

“Did you tell Dallas?”

“Yes. He’s checking for prints, something for the record.” She looked at him solemnly. “My dad called early this morning from Atlanta, he’d heard about the murder on the news.”

“He didn’t know?”

“I asked Dallas not to tell him. There’s nothing he can do and I thought it would only distract him. Don’t those TV stations have anything to fill up their time besides a murder clear across the country? They gave it the same spin as the San Francisco papers, contractor’s money-hungry wife.”

Clyde handed her a container of potato salad, glancing across at the carpenters. The two men were deep in conversation, paying no attention to them. “What are you going to do about Williams?”

“Wait and see what he does. I sent a correct bill this morning to the Jakeses by registered mail. Put the doctored billing in my safe deposit box with a note about the circumstances.”

Clyde raised an eyebrow.

She shrugged. “Just being careful.”

“Your dad was upset when he called?”

“Mad as hell, ready to kick ass. I told him it would be okay, I told him Dallas would get it sorted out. He’d already talked with Dallas. He’ll be back at the end of the week, plans to catch the shuttle on down here.”

“You told him about Larn Williams, about the billing switch?”

“Yes. He agreed with me, that I should wait to see what Larn will do.”

Clyde was quiet.

“If Larn wanted� he could have killed me the night he killed�”

She stared at him, her eyes widening at what she had said, what she’d been thinking. They were both silent.

“I have no way to know that,” she said quietly. “That just slipped out. I� it will be interesting to see if Larn calls me again. Maybe to see if his switch of the billing worked.” She smiled. “Maybe I can lead him on, maybe learn something.”

“What does that mean? You wouldn’t go out with him.”

“That would be foolish.”

“That’s not an answer.”

She was silent.

“Would you call me if you decide to see him? Let me know where you’re going?”

She just looked at him.

“Will you call me? I make a good backup. Like the safe deposit box.”

She grinned. “All right, I’ll call. If you’ll stay out of the way.”

“Totally invisible,” Clyde said. They were finishing their lunch when Dallas showed up wearing scruffy clothes and driving a rusted-out old Chevy. He stood in the yard watching Ryan descend.

“On my way up the hills, see if I can find Gramps Farger. A tip that he’s living up there in some old shack.” Dallas looked at Ryan. “We have some blowups of the murder-scene photos. Found the hint of a tire mark, thin tire like maybe a mountain bike. Lab is doing an enhancement.”

He put his arm around her. “From the small amount of blood and the condition of the body, and the angle of the shots, coroner says Rupert wasn’t killed in your garage.”

Ryan relaxed against him, letting out a long sigh. “I didn’t know any news in the world could sound so wonderful.”

Clyde said, “What’s this about Gramps Farger?”

Dallas moved toward the back patio out of range of the two carpenters. “I got a tip, early this morning, a young woman. She said the old man’s living in a fallen-down shack up along that ravine above the Pamillon estate.” The detective leaned over the gate to pet Rock who had come racing up. Rearing, the big dog planted his front feet on top the gate and reached to lick Dallas’s face.

Dallas rubbed behind the dog’s ears. “That old place was sitting vacant. We check on it every couple of weeks-he could have moved in right after our last run up there. A guy can make a lot of mischief in two weeks. Informant said he’s dumping bags of trash down among the ruins.”

Clyde nodded. “Like maybe drug refuse?”

“Maybe.” Dallas smiled. “If I can lay my hands on Gramps Farger, he’ll be out of circulation for a while, you can bet.”

“You going up there alone?”

“Davis is meeting me. If we can corner Gramps, we’ll go on down to the Pamillon place, have a look. Whoever the caller was, I hope she’s right on this one.”

Joe glanced at Clyde’s scowl and looked away. The kit would be pleased, would be all puffed up with triumph.

But until Gramps Farger was in fact behind bars, how safe was she?

He waited until Dallas left in the old surveillance car, then he took off before Clyde thought to stop him. Clyde would think he was headed for the hills to get in the middle of the potentially dangerous arrest of Gramps Farger. When, in fact, he was only going to have a talk with Dallas’s young, female informant.

19 [��������: pic_20.jpg]

Rocky FaceInn outside San Andreas featured private patios with a wide view of the pine-covered Sierra Nevada Mountains, and the best pancakes and home-smoked ham in Calavaras County. Even the coffee tasted wonderful to Charlie, though maybe that was owed in part to the fresh mountain air and the scent of pines, and the fact that they had been driving since 6:00 in the morning, heading inland from Sonoma. Charlie was an early riser but she’d never match Max. If he wasn’t up well before sunrise he felt that the day was half gone. Having checked in at 8:00 in the morning and enjoyed a leisurely breakfast, she didn’t welcome the sight of Max picking up his jacket and reaching for his truck keys.

“You could stay here,” he said. “Lie by the pool.”

“Only if you stay with me.”

Max picked up her chair with her in it, and tilted her out. “Get your coat, we’re burnin’ daylight,” he said in his best John Wayne imitation.

She made a face at him. “Don’t need a coat. It’s going to be ninety.”

Slapping her on the rump, he nudged her out the door. “I want to get over to the Jakeses’ house before Ryan’s uncle leaves for the coast, spend the rest of the morning talking to the local shopkeepers, see if they’ve had any unusually large chemical sales. We’ll grab a bite of lunch somewhere then have a look for Hurlie Farger. Probably a wild-goose chase, but who knows. And maybe we can get a line on this Larn Williams.”

He had, in San Francisco, made contact with Sergeant Wills and Detective Sergeant Parker, and had given them the names that Dallas wanted checked out. Within a few hours of Max’s meeting with them, Parker had called to say that two of the women were out of me country, Barbara Saunders and Martie Holland, or appeared to be, at this juncture. June Holbrook was working down in Millbrae and had, several months ago, left her husband. Tom Wills would go down there this morning to see what he could find.

Max ruffled her hair and opened the truck door for her. Settling in the cab, he unfolded the local map, took a quick look then pulled out to the highway.

With the information the two officers supplied, Dallas would work what he could from Molena Point, doubling back to Parker and Wills with questions they could best handle. Charlie had never before been so fully aware of the cooperation among law-enforcement officers. Of the women that the two officers were unofficially investigating, had the jealous husband or lover of one of them killed Rupert and set up Ryan, as a handy alibi?

Driving north from the inn, they turned onto a newly laid granite-block driveway before a peak-roofed, rustic house that had, on the north side, a pale new addition, its fresh cedar siding and shingles reflecting the morning sun. At the side of the garden a man rose from his knees, a big, wide shouldered, redheaded man, his jeans splattered with mud and his hands wet where he had been working on a sprinkler pipe.

He stepped up to the car, wiping his hands on a clean handkerchief. “Scott Flannery. You two are up early.” He winked at Charlie. “Nice to meet you both. Come on in.” His neatly trimmed hair was, if possible, a brighter red even than Charlie’s own. His voice was deep and soft as it had been last night on the phone when he returned Max’s call-a comforting sort of man, Charlie thought. A reassuring kind of man to have helped raise Ryan and her sisters after their mother died.

“Those kids showed up this morning,” Scotty said, ushering them into the house. “There’s something about cooking pancakes and bacon with the windows open that draws wandering kids same as it draws bears. Come in, come in, I just made a fresh pot of coffee. The Jakeses moved the house trailer yesterday, to the far side of the pasture.”

Seated at the breakfast table in the large, high-raftered family kitchen, Charlie breathed in the scent of new cedar lumber, and, through the wide, open windows, admired the dark mountains that rose in the distance above the golden hills.

“Kids’ names are Andy and Mario,” Scotty said. “I stuffed them with pancakes, and we talked about the dog. I said I missed seeing him, said maybe the dog was with their friend Curtis, that I hadn’t seen him, either. They weren’t quick to answer. Maybe they don’t have a clue that anything’s wrong, and maybe they do. They said sometimes Curtis doesn’t show up for a while, that sometimes he goes off with his uncle, cutting timber.”

“Did they mention Hurlie by name? What did you learn about him?”

“One of them slipped and mentioned his name, then tried to cover up. They referred to him as Curtis’s uncle. Said he works odd jobs around the area, some up in the larger estates. The way this land lies, the wealthy areas are shoulder to shoulder with the rundown little farms, depending on the drainage and on the view.

“The kids claimed they didn’t know where Curtis lived, that they just saw him at school, or ‘around’ as they put it.” Scotty made a wry face, not buying that. “The boys could live in a little shacky area just east of here, Little Fish Creek. I’d look for Hurlie there too. You talk with the sheriff?”

Harper nodded. “He mentioned Little Fish Creek as a transient area, and several other places. Said Hurlie works odd jobs, including some of the larger estates. After some prodding, he suggested the Carter place, the Ambersons and the Landeaus.”

“He left you wondering,” Scotty said.

Max nodded. “A bit reluctant. Particularly regarding the Landeaus. As if he gave me those names to cover himself, in case I got information from other sources. You see a problem, there?”

“Possibly. I’ve heard hints, from our lumber people, but nothing specific. A sense of things unsaid, an unease.” He laughed. “If I were a local, they’d talk more. You asked about Larn Williams. He and Ryan had dinner to discuss a possible remodel. I don’t think she considered it a date. He had come around to look at her work, seemed to like it. Small-time realtor. Works on his own, I gather. She wasn’t real taken with him.”

“Have you heard anything�off,about him?”

“Nothing. I see Williams sometimes in town when I go for lumber. I’ve seen him a couple of times talking with Marianna Landeau. Once on the street, once in the door of his office. They seemed-easy with one another. And the Landeausareinto real estate, or at least her husband is. Apparently a big-time operator.”

Charlie watched Scotty with interest. Everything he said was soft-spoken, but he wasn’t shy, he seemed bursting with male energy. She liked this “second father” of Ryan’s, already she felt comfortable with him. She could imagine growing up under the humorous eyes of a man like this, so different from her own reserved and austere father whom she had known only until she was nine. As Scotty refilled their coffee cups, she rose. “Could I take a quick look at the new wing?”

Scotty waved his arm toward the large living room that she could glimpse beyond the kitchen, and she moved on through, into a space that took her breath away.

The room was the size of a triple garage, but with a high-raftered ceiling that made it seem much larger. It was still empty of furniture. The north side was dominated by a river-rock fireplace that rose from the pine floor, soaring ten feet up to the cedar beams. To her right, the floor-to-ceiling windows looked at the mountains, but to her left the tall glass panes embraced a view of the yellowed hills against the sky, hills dotted with dark oaks and with a scatter of grazing cattle.

Stepping out onto the stone terrace, she could see a fence line far below, and as she watched, three deer wandered across the pasture among the black Angus steers and stopped to graze.

Turning back inside, she imagined the room furnished with Navajo rugs and soft leather couches and, in the shelves that lined the back wall, hundreds of books. Through an alcove into the dining room she could see a rough-hewn table set before another fireplace and, on the plain white wall, a collection of small framed landscapes. For a long moment she imagined herself and Max there having supper by the fire, watching their horses down in the pasture.

Oh, the stuff of dreams.

But she and Max had what they wanted, they had a nice home and plenty of room for the horses, and soon, probably under Ryan’s skilled hand, they would add a studio where she could work. But, most wonderful of all, and amazing, was that she and Max had each other.

Slipping into the older part of the house she admired the way Ryan had converted the original living room into a handsome master bedroom and turned the old, smaller dining area into an ample dressing room. There were fireplaces everywhere. The original rough-stone fireplace now faced the bed beside window seats where one could look down on the hills. Charlie wondered how Ryan would approach their own building project. Maybe they could turn part of the existing house into studio space, and build a new great room. That possibility was even more exiting.

As she returned to the kitchen, Max was saying, “You’re guessing the kids know about the bombing, know that Curtis is in jail?”

“Those kids are secretive about something,” Scotty said. “But maybe only about their own situations. There’s a lot of petty crime back in these hills, a lot of guys with small marijuana patches. Whatever the problem, the kids sure wouldn’t open up about Hurlie. I hope you turn up something more at Little Fish Creek.”

Harper nodded, and rose. Charlie touched his arm. “Can you take a minute? To walk through the house? It’s quite wonderful.”

“Guess I’d better,” he said, grinning, “if we’re going to hire this gal.”

Charlie sat with Scotty, letting Max look on his own without her comments. She told Scotty about Max’s ranch and the studio they planned to add.

“A studio,” Scotty said, “where you will draw animals. Ryan says you’re the best she’s seen. You’ll be wantin’ to draw that big dog that hitched a ride with her, he’s a fine, well-bred fellow. He should be hunting. Someone’s a fool to have lost a dog like that, and not look for him.” Scotty frowned. “Those boys know more about that dog too than they’re saying. Maybe something they’re ashamed of?” He gave her a puzzled look. “Can’t figure out what it might be. The dog was sure easy with them all, not like they’d hurt him.”

Charlie watched him a moment, wondering, then Max returned. Rising, Scotty held out his hand to them. “You have the kids’ descriptions. Sorry I didn’t learn more. I’ll be headin’ back for the coast mid-afternoon.

Ryan’s ready to jack up the roof, in the morning, and that takes six men-five men and Ryan. She’s got a couple of off-duty officers coming over to help out-for pay of course,” Scotty said, watching Max.

Max nodded. “Nothing wrong with that. They earn little enough. I hope they do good work.”

“She’ll see they do,” Scotty said. “I’ll be staying with Dallas down there, if there’s anything I can do. You want to take my old truck? You’d be less conspicuous up in the Little Fish neighborhood than with that late-model king cab.”

“Thanks for the offer,” Max said, shaking his head. “But we’ll stick with this one. At least it’s respectably dusty.”

Scotty walked to the truck with them, lifting his hand as they backed out then bending again to his sprinkler pipes. Pulling down the drive, Max glanced at Charlie. “I like the new addition, like what Ryan did. You want to talk to her about enlarging our place?”

“I’d like that. And I’d like to work with her on the project. That could save us a little money, and would be good for my carpentry skills. What if we find Hurlie Farger? Do you have cause to arrest him?”

“I don’t have a warrant, but I sure have one for Gramps Farger. Maybe Gramps is in Molena Point as Dallas was told, and maybe he’s not. And if I have cause to think Hurlie had something to do with the bombing, I can get a warrant in a hurry. Now watch for Little Fish Road. I’d like to bundle up the whole Farger family and take them out of circulation.”

At his words, the same icy chill touched Charlie as when she’d heard the blast and saw the church wall broken out. She was filled again with fear for him. And with cold anger. Because Max had done his job well, had seen Gerrard Farger sent to prison, the Fargers had begun this nightmare.

But she’d known the shape of their future together. Had known it far too well after the Marner murders last winter, when she realized the killer had set up Max to take the rap. She knew what Max’s life was about. She meant to be a part of his world, exactly the way he wanted to live it, and she didn’t intend to back off. She would not let herself cringe from what the future might hold.

She spent the rest of the morning, and midday, sitting happily in the cab sketching whatever she found of interest, as Max made his calls at every general store, feed supply and hardware, returning to the truck to fill out his field sheets. They ate lunch at a ma-and-pa cafe of questionable cleanliness, but with wonderful berry pie. Around 2:00 they headed for Little Fish Creek, on a road that dropped suddenly down between steep hills, through tall yellow-dry grass.

Below them, little shacks were scattered among animal pens and old car bodies, the small wooden houses and sheds bleached pale, the fences wandering and leaning. The occupants had been creative, though, fashioning some of their fences from rows of old bedsprings wired together, or old camper covers placed on their sides, each concave interior floored with scattered straw as a shelter for pigs or chickens. The whole settlement looked bone-dry and scrubby, except for the vegetable gardens. These were dark with rich earth and green with luxuriant crops, though some of the rows were fading to brown now in the September heat. Each property boasted a mixed collection of mongrel dogs and nondescript farm animals too, with scruffy, dust-dulled coats. Charlie glanced slyly at Max. “Which is the honeymoon cottage? Did you make reservations?”

“You can take your choice.” But his tone was cool. Something about her remark didn’t sit well, and she was sorry she’d said that. Max didn’t like that kind of sarcasm. As a matter of fact, neither did she. Not everyone in the world had a choice about where they lived, certainly the children didn’t. When she glanced at Max, he looked back at her grinning, knowing very well what she was thinking.

Sitting in the truck while Max went from door to door talking with different families trying to get a line on Hurlie, she watched the mangy dogs and dirty children and thought about Curtis living there and wondered uncomfortably about his life. If Curtishadrun away from his mother, what had his life been like, with her? And as the afternoon dulled and began to dim, Charlie felt sad, and unaccountably angry.

20 [��������: pic_21.jpg]

At each small, paintless shack, Max stepped out, hallooed the house, then asked the same questions of the occupant, about where he might find Hurlie Farger. He had already found Hurlie’s farm, from the directions the sheriff gave them. The place seemed deserted. No sign of anyone home, no resident animals, no recent footprints across the dirt yard, the garden dried to the color of scorched paper. Though Max had not been fully satisfied that Hurlie wasn’t living there among the rubble he could see through the uncurtained windows. He had continued to look, wading through the dust of countless yards making nice to a motley assortment of suspicious dogs, and cajoling their scowling masters who didn’t trust a stranger and could smell a cop ten miles away even when he was wearing jeans and wrinkled boots. Charlie sat in the truck watching Max and making quick sketches of the assorted livestock, pausing only to wipe sweat from her forehead; the thermometer was in the nineties.

Far above them, up the last dry hill of Little Fish Creek, Hurlie Farger sat in his old truck looking down the falling land watching Harper ply the narrow roads and switchbacks. He had been there for three hours, killing a six-pack of beer and wagering with himself how long would it take the tall skinny cop to grow discouraged and leave, not accomplishing what he had come for. Knowing cops, he expected Harper might keep looking until nightfall, until it was too dark among the hills for any cop with good sense to hang around, when he was out of his own jurisdiction.

Hurlie Farger, at thirty-eight, was the spit’n image of how his gramps had looked at that age. And he could almost be the twin of his younger brother Gerrard. Certainly anyone running across Gerrard down in San Quentin, and knowing Gramps Farger from the old man’s sojourns in various California prisons, would see at once that the sullen, wiry inmate with the muddy brown eyes and pitcher ears was a Farger, and they’d know Hurlie just as easily. All the Farger men had the same chicken-thin neck, the same narrow bony shoulders and lank, muddy hair. Maybe the Farger clan wasn’t handsome, but the family genes were strong. In the long haul, Hurlie knew, it’s blood that counts.

Watching the newlyweds ply the Little Fish Creek neighborhood, Hurlie had eased down comfortably in his old, rusted-out Ford truck drinking a warm Coors and cradling his cell phone, following Harper’s progress not only with binoculars but via the wonders of modern electronics. From his good neighbors he had received a running account of all conversations. He had watched Harper circle his own place peering in the windows, and knew that Harper had gotten the address from Sheriff Beck. But Hurlie had made very sure that the visiting law would find nothing of interest.

Though Harper had the rural-route mailbox numbers of Hurlie’s two cousins, he learned nothing from either, or from their kids. Hurlie spoke with and laughed with each of them after Harper left the premises. When Harper drove out of Little Fish Creek, surely hot and thirsty and short-tempered, and headed up the mountain in the direction of the Landeau place, Hurlie tucked the phone on the seat under his folded jacket, started the rattling Ford and headed down the road to meet him.

“They’re covering for him,” Max said with an amused grin as he turned onto the upper road the sheriff had described. “The laughter hidden down behind those sour faces. Hurlie’s cousins nearly busted a gut trying not to laugh at me.” He glanced over at Charlie. “See that occasional flash of sunlight up there atop the hill, see where that old truck’s sitting?”

“You’ve been watching it.”

“I’d say that’s Hurlie up there.” Max eased the truck steadily up the rutted, one-car road. Five turns later he slammed on the brakes.

The rattletrap truck sat in the road crosswise. Hurlie stood beside it resting on the fender like the heavy in an old B movie, a small-caliber rifle leaning beside him. Max touched his holstered Glock, wishing he’d left Charlie at the inn. He stepped out of the pickup. “Good morning, Hurlie. You want to move your truck out of the way?”

“I heard you was looking fer me. Thought I’d save you any more driving around, in this hot weather. What exactly did you want? You some kind of law?” Hurlie glanced in at Charlie with an insolence that made Max step closer to him.

“Right now I want you to move your truck. You’re blocking the road.”

Hurlie stared, his chin jutted out, his eyes on Max but glancing down at the Glock. “You were lookin’ fer me you musta had a reason. I do somethin’ wrong?” Gently his hand eased toward his pants pocket.

In one move Max grabbed Hurlie, spun him around and shoved him against the rusted truck, kicking his rifle into the dust. Pressing the Glock into Hurlie’s ribs he patted him down, removing a snub-nosed Saturday night special from his pants pocket, two hunting knives and a straight razor from various pockets.

Hurlie, facing the cab of Max Harper’s pickup, his hands pressed against the vehicle’s roof, looked around at Harper. “So what’s this about. I ain’t done nothin’.”

Max glanced at Charlie where she sat with her hand on the phone. He nodded.

As Charlie called the sheriff, Hurlie’s expression remained one of puzzled innocence. Max arrested him for impeding the duties of a police officer, and cuffed him. “Sit down on the ground, Hurlie.”

“It’s dusty. Dust makes me cough.”

“Sit down now.”

Hurlie sat, stirring a cloud of dust.

“Why were you waiting for me? Why were you blocking the road?”

“You’re that police captain from over to the coast.”

“So?”

“So I heard you wanted to talk to me. I was just being cooperative, waiting here.”

“Where’s Gramps Farger?”

Though Dallas had a lead on Gramps, he hadn’t found him yet, and there was no harm in shaking Hurlie up, see what he could jar loose. “Gramps staying with you, Hurlie? You’ll feel better if you don’t lie to me.”

“What you want with him?”

“Is he living with you?”

“I ain’t seen him since you sent my brother to prison.”

“I don’t believe that. And I know Curtis has been living up here with you.”

“Ain’t seen neither one. Can I get up? Like to smother in dust down here. Ain’t no call to make me sick.”

“Your shack is full of dust. You have everyone in that hollow covering for you. If I find Gramps up here, I’ll lock your ass up for good, along with his. How long was Curtis here? Why did he go home? Be straight with me, Hurlie.”

“You can’t lock me up for nothin’.”

“Harboring a delinquent, for starters. How long was Curtis here? What was he doing up here?”

“He wasn’t here. I ain’t seen him.”

“You working up at the Landeau place?”

“What’d I do up at that fancypants place? Polish the silver? Where’d you get that notion?”

“Are you working for them up there?”

“Doing what?” Hurlie snapped. “Them high mucky-mucks wouldn’t have me.” As he scowled up at Max, a dust cloud appeared down the hill, the sheriff’s car at its center winding up the twisting road.

The kit might be in exile, but her luxurious accommodations quite suited her. Wilma had left work at the library early in order to get her settled, and to visit with Cora Lee. She had brought Dulcie along for the ride, though Dulcie wouldn’t be staying.

Following Cora Lee through the big, high-ceilinged living room, Wilma looked around with pleasure. The tired old hillside house, under the ministrations of its four new owners, was more charming each time she saw it. The four senior ladies were doing wonders, most of it by their own hard work.

The two women made an interesting contrast, both tall and slim, both in their sixties. Wilma’s gray-white hair was done in a long, thick braid wound around her head. She was dressed in jeans, a red turtleneck T-shirt and red blazer. Cora Lee wore pale cream chinos and a mocha sweater that complemented her dusky complexion. She never understood why women of her coloring liked to wear plum and purple, the very shades that picked up all the wrong highlights. Moving toward the stairs, she was eager to see Wilma’s reaction to how she had decorated her own room. The four ladies had drawn straws to choose their rooms, but Cora Lee suspected the outcome had been fixed. The upstairs room was the only one that offered a large alcove off the bedroom, which she could use as studio space.

The house belonged in part to Wilma; she and the other four ladies of the Senior Survival Club had bought the property together as a private retirement retreat. The structure was large enough to give each a spacious room and bath, and to accommodate as well a housekeeper and perhaps a practical nurse or caretaker when that time arrived. It hadn’t yet, for any of the ladies. While each woman’s room was designed to her own taste, the common living, dining, and kitchen areas were a triumph of compromise, a fascinating eclectic mix that the ladies had put together with a minimum of harsh words. In their intelligent cooperation Wilma found great encouragement against the time, far in the future, when she would sell her own home and move in with them.

The raftered great room with its raised fireplace and long window seat was done in a combination of wicker and leather, with contemporary India rugs, white plantation shutters and, scattered among the books in the wall of built-in bookcases, a collection of local, handthrown ceramics. Whoever had built the house had loved fireplaces; there was a raised wood-burning fireplace in nearly every room. Following Cora Lee up the stairs, Wilma was not prepared for her friend’s decorating approach to her own large bedroom.

Because the apartment Cora Lee had recently vacated had been all in shades of cream and white and cafe au lait, Wilma expected the large, sunny upstairs retreat to be much the same.

But this room was wild with color, as bright as the Dixieland jazz that Cora Lee and Wilma loved. The walls were a soft tomato red. The long, cushioned seat that filled the big bay window, the wicker armchairs, and the bed, were piled with patterned pillows brighter than the artist’s paints that Cora Lee favored. The room was a medly of reds and greens and blues and every possible color, all in the smallest and most intricate patterns. Pillows like jewels, like flower gardens; and Cora Lee’s paintings on the walls were just as bright.

The kit, crouched on Cora Lee’s shoulder, looked and looked, then leaped into the heap of cushions on the window seat rolling and purring.

“I think,” Wilma said, “that she likes it. Ilove it!”

Cora Lee stood in the center of the room caught between laughter and amazement. “She does like it. Well, new things always smell good to cats. But� look at her pat at the brightest colors. Cats don’t see color?”

“Maybe they do,” Wilma said uneasily. “The world of science hasn’t discovered everything yet.” She glanced at Dulcie who stood beyond Cora Lee admiring every detail, and the two shared a look of delight. The private chamber was jewels set in cream, flowers scattered on velvet. The minute Cora Lee sat down on the window seat the kit stepped into her lap, nuzzling her hand, looking from her to Wilma so intelligently, so much as if she meant to join in the conversation, that Wilma stiffened, and Dulcie leaped to the cushions to distract her.

But the real distraction was the tea that Cora Lee had set out on the coffee table before the blazing fire. As the two women made themselves comfortable, the cats looked with interest at the lemon bars and shortbread; and Wilma fixed her gaze on the kit. ‘This is your home for a little while, Kit. You are to behave yourself, you are to mind your manners.”

Cora Lee grinned at Wilma’s stern tone, but Wilma’s look at the kit was serious and cautionary.Don’t speak, Kit. Don’t answer by mistake. Don’t speak to Cora Lee. Don’t open securely closed doors or locked windows. Don’t under any circumstance forget. Do not talk to Cora Lee or to anyone. Keep your little cat mouth shut.

The kit understood quite well. She smiled and purred and washed her paws. Certainly she was content to behave herself, at least until late at night. Only then, if her wanderlust grew too great, who would know? If, while Cora Lee slept, she lifted the window latch and roamed, who was to see her?

Meanwhile the bits of tea cake that Cora Lee fixed on two small plates were delicious. The kit, finishing first, eyed Dulcie’s share but she daren’t challenge Dulcie. She listened to Wilma’s half-truths about how she had had a prowler and was worried about the kit because of her reputation as a highly trained performing cat, how she thought it best to get her away for a while.

Early this summer when the kit’s surprise appearance onstage with Cora Lee had turned out to be the sensation of the village, Wilma had gone to great lengths to make Kit’s appearance seem the product of long hours of careful training. But even trained cats were valuable.

“I’ll keep her safe,” Cora Lee said. “We all know the doors must be kept shut. I have no theater sets to work on now, not until close to Christmas. I’ll be right here most of the time, working on the house. We still have the two downstairs apartments to paint and recarpet. Kit will be up here, two floors away from the paint fumes, and with the windows just cracked open-she can’t get through those heavy screens. I’ve hidden some toys and games for her around the room, that should keep her entertained. Well, she’s already started to find them.”

The kit, exploring the bedroom, had discovered an intricate cardboard structure with many holes where, within, a reaching paw could find and slap a Ping-Pong ball. Next to it, hardly hidden but blending nicely in the fanciful room, stood a tall, many-tiered cat tree that led up to a high, small window. She found a tennis ball beneath Cora Lee’s chair, and a catnip mouse under the bed.

“You will,” Wilma told the kit again, sternly, “behave as we expect you to do. You will mind Cora Lee and stay inside this room, you will not slip away on some wild midnight excursion.”

Cora Lee laughed. “I’ll see that she behaves.”

But the kit’s look at Wilma was so patently innocent that all Wilma’s alarms went off-alarms just as shrill as when, during her working career, she had assessed a parolee’s too-innocent look and listened to his honeyed lies.

The sheriff pulled up beside Max’s pickup, drowning them in dust. He was a heavy man, maybe six-four, with a prominent nose and high cheekbones, and in Charlie’s opinion an overly friendly smile. He loaded Hurlie into the backseat of his unit, behind the wire barrier. “What charges?”

“Interfering with the duties of a law-enforcement officer,” Max said. “Harboring a felon.”

“Fine with me.”

“And obstructing justice. I’ll want his prints.”

The sheriff nodded. “You want to toss his place? You have a warrant for the old man. Or I can do it on the way down.”

Max considered. “Let’s run down together and have a crack at it.”

The sheriff made Hurlie hand over his keys, and moved Hurlie’s truck onto the shoulder; Max and Charlie followed him down toward Little Fish Creek. As the two men entered the cabin, Charlie waited in the truck. Max had parked where she could see in through the window of the one-room shack. A single bed, covers in a tangle. An easy chair so ragged that not even Joe Grey would tolerate it, far scruffier than Joe’s clawed and hairy masterpiece. One plate and cup on the rough wooden sink drain. A door open to a fusty-looking little bathroom that she imagined would be dark with mold. Max and Sheriff Beck were in the shack for nearly half an hour; she watched them going through the few cupboards, checking under the mattress, pulling off wallboard and ceiling tiles in various locations. They performed similar searches in the two scruffy outbuildings. The sheriff’s unit, parked directly in front of the shack, afforded prisoner Hurlie Farger a direct view of her. She sat sideways, with her back to him, but she could feel him staring. Max came away from the search looking sour. He stood a moment in the dusty yard beside the truck, with the sheriff.

“You ask questions around those estates,” Beck said softly, “you might want to watch yourself. DEA seems interested in that area. They took out two small marijuana plots up in the national forest, day before yesterday, and they still have a plane up. I haven’theardof anything on those estates, but they’re all big places and there’s sure plenty of money up there.”

“I’ll be careful,” Max said, studying Beck. He nodded to the sheriff. And the officer stepped into his unit and pulled away, chauffeuring Hurlie Farger to a cleaner bed man he was used to.

Swinging into the pickup, Max grinned at Charlie. “What?” he said, seeing her uncertain look.

“I half thought you were going to ask me to ride back with the sheriff. So you could run this one alone.”

“Would you have gone?”

“I wouldn’t have gotten into that patrol car with Hurlie Farger, even with the sheriff there, if you gave me a direct order to that effect.”

Max studied her with a small, twisted smile. “I don’t think I’d want to try giving you a direct order, Charlie Harper.” And he headed up the hills and across a forested plateau approaching the Landeau estate.

But sitting close beside Max, Charlie was quiet, trying to rearrange her thinking. Hurlie Farger had scared her. Something in his eyes, as well as his bold challenge of Max’s authority, had left her chilled. And the sheriff’s attitude hadn’t helped.

Well, she had to learn to live with this stuff, learn to accommodate the ugly, adrenaline-packed moments. In fact, she guessed maybe it was time for a down-to-earth assessment of the way she looked at the world.

She had never been hidebound in what she expected of life. Life was what you made of it, and you sure didn’t have to knuckle under just because there were bad guys around. But marrying Max had made her far more aware of that element. Had shoved people like Hurlie Farger right in her face.

Well, she’d experienced some unsettling changes in her thirty-two years. And every one had called for a change in attitude. The adjustments she must make now would be the hardest-but every one would be worth it.

She just wanted, right now, to get through this visit to those estates, to the Landeau place, get through the day and be alone again with Max.

Maybe the aftermath of the church bombing was still with her. The pain of the last few days mixed with Hurlie’s attitude had hit home unexpectedly. Laying her hand on Max’s knee and leaning to kiss his cheek, she looked ahead to the tall, marbled-faced Landeau mansion with its high forbidding wall. This was just a routine visit. It would soon be over. They’d soon be alone again cuddled before the fire at the inn, ordering in a hot, comforting supper.

21 [��������: pic_22.jpg]

Clyde’s attic,once a dark tomb for generations of deceased spiders, was now free of cobwebs and dust and ancient mouse droppings, and swept clean of sawdust. The last rich light of the setting sun gleamed in where the end wall had been removed, and a soft breeze wandered through, sweet with the scents of cypress and pine. The attic was silent too, the power tools and hammers stilled, the carpenters gone for the day-it was Joe’s space now. He lay stretched out across a sheet of plywood that was propped on two sawhorses, lay relaxed and purring, digesting a half-bag of corn chips that had been abandoned by one of the carpenters. The wind off the sea caressed him. The buzz of a dispossessed wasp distracted him only faintly, humming among the rafters. He was nearly asleep when footsteps on the temporary stairway forced him to lift his head-though really no action was required, he knew that step. Clyde’s head appeared at the north end of the attic silhouetted in the bright triangular space. Rising up the last steps, Clyde ducked beneath the apex, walking hunched over. By this time tomorrow evening he would be able to stand tall, would be able to reach up and not even touch the ceiling-barring some delay in construction, Joe thought. Barring some accident. What if, tomorrow morning, the roof-jacks didn’t hold until the newly raised walls had been secured? What if�

But such thoughts belonged to the more human aspect of his nature. Humans loved to fret over the disaster that hadn’t happened and likely wouldn’t happen. Joe’s more equitable feline persona lived for the moment and let the future fall how it might, pun intended.

Yawning, he considered Clyde with interest. Clyde stood with his back to Joe, looking out toward the sea, his short black hair mussed up into peaks the way it got when he was irritated. Was he not seeing Ryan tonight? Certainly he wasn’t dressed for an exciting evening or even a casual dinner. Arriving home, he had pulled on his oldest, scruffiest polo shirt, the purple one with the grease stains across the front and the hole in the sleeve. And when Clyde turned to look at him, his scowl implied, indeed, an incredibly bad mood. Joe licked his whiskers. “You look sour enough tochewthe roof off.”

No response.

“This is more than a bad day at the shop. Right?”

Nothing. Clyde’s body was rigid with annoyance.

“You have a fight with Ryan? But she’s doing a great job, the new room will be something. I love that you can see right down to the beach, between the roofs and trees.”

A slight shifting of shoulders.

“And the new tower,” Joe said. “That’s going to be some kind of elegant cat house.”

Clyde continued to glare.

“What did you fight about?” Joe studied Clyde’s ruddy face trying to read what exactly that particular scowl might mean. “She’s too hardheaded and independent?” he asked tentatively-as if he were Clyde’s shrink drawing him out. “She wants to install pink flamingos in the front yard with fake palm trees?”

Clyde sat down on a carpenter’s stool, a boxy little bench used for tool storage, for cutting a board, for scabbing two boards together, to stand on, or to sit on while eating lunch, a very clever little piece of furniture. He glared. “She’s going out with that guy tonight. Out to dinner. The guy who broke into her truck and switched her billing. She’s goingoutwith him.”

“Why would she do that? The guy’s a crook. He tried to set her up. Why would she�” He stared at Clyde. “She’s going to sethimup? But what does she�?”

“She wants to see what else he might try. He doesn’t know she switched the billing back to the original, he’ll think the fake bill is in the mail. She wants to see what he’ll talk about, what questions he might ask her. She thinks she can figure out what he’s after.”

“Oh, that’s smart. What ifhekilled Rupert? Say he murdered her husband. Shot him in the head. So she goes out to dinner with him.” Joe looked hard at Clyde, assessing his housemate. “You couldn’t stop her short of locking her up. And you’re scared for her.”

Clyde nodded, looking miserable.

“So, follow them.”

“She figured I might. She said that would blow it, said maybe he knows me and would certainly know my yellow roadster. That I might put her in danger.”

Joe sighed. He licked his paw, waiting. But Clyde was silent again-far be it from Clyde to come out andaskfor help. “So, where are they going?”

“She’s meeting him at the Burger Basher at seven. She called me at work, broke our date for dinner. Asked if I’d keep Rock for a couple of hours. I thought I’d�”

“What? Just happen in for a beer? That’ll fix it.”

“I plan to wait outside. In case she needs someone. In case he tries to strong-arm her, get her in his car.”

“That’s so melodramatic.”

“And a dead body in her garage is not melodramatic.”

Joe washed his right ear. “And that’s why you drove that old brown Hudson home. I wondered what that was about.”

“She’s never seen that car, and certainly Williams wouldn’t have seen it.”

Clyde had in his upscale automotive shop, in a private garage at the rear of the complex, enough rare old cars to run surveillance in a different vehicle every night for a month. Clyde’s assortment of classic and antique models, all waiting to be restored, might seem to some a monstrous collection of junk. To Clyde Damen those old cars were CDs in the bank, gold under the mattress.

Clyde looked at him a long time.

Joe licked some crumbs from inside the ripped-open corn chip bag. “Burger Basher. Seven o’clock. Okay. So you owe me one.”

“How would you go about it without getting-without them seeing you?”

“Feeling guilty already?”

“Burger Basher is all open, just that little low wall around the patio, then the sidewalk. And Ryan knows you. If she sees you schlepping around there, she’ll have to wonder. She already thinks you’re a bit strange.”

“Strange in what way? Why would she think me strange? And what’s she going to wonder? If I’m running surveillance? Oh, right.”

“That little trick with the mice on her doorstep, you think I didn’t have to stretch to make that little caper seem even remotely unremarkable? What made you�?”

“Do you want my help or not? I have a hundred ways to spend my evening.”

Clyde shrugged, looking embarrassed.

“And,” Joe said, eyeing Clyde closely, “I have a hundred ways to listen to those two without being seen. In return, if you want to contribute a little something tasty to my supper plate before I undertake this risky venture�”

“Tastyis such a crass word, even for a cat. It isn’t a word. I’ve never heard you use such a common expression.”

Joe smiled. “Dulcie couldn’t agree more. She thinks that word is incredibly crude. Let’s put it this way. I’m hungry. I’d like something for my dinner that is in keeping with my elevated status as your newly hired private investigator.”

Clyde moved toward the stairs. “I just happened to bring home some filet. I’ll go on down and slap it in the skillet.”

Clyde’s skillet-broiled steak, rare and juicy in the middle, crisp and dark on the outside, suited Joe just fine. Leaping past Clyde down the stairs, he headed for the kitchen to sit in the middle of the table as Clyde put supper together. “What time is he picking her up?”

“They’re meeting there, at seven. She wanted it to seem as little like a date as possible, just friends meeting for dinner.”

“You better park a block away. If she’s in immediate danger I’ll slip out and alert you. I wish, at times like this, that I had access to a walkie-talkie or a small and unobtrusive cell phone.”

“Don’t you think a cat carrying a phone around the village is going to attract attention?”

“Not if an enterprising firm would make one that looks like an electronic flea collar. It wouldn’t have to ring, it could just vibrate. And�”

Clyde turned away to dish up supper.

And Joe, savoring his steak, looked forward with great anticipation to the evening. There was nothing, absolutely nothing as satisfying as sharing your professional skills with those who were less talented.

At seven in the evening Burger Basher’s patio was crowded to overflowing: people had gathered out on the sidewalk and sat on the two-foot high wall of the patio, waiting for their names to be called. Ryan and Larn sat on the wall, drinking beer from tall mugs. Half a block away, Joe watched them through the windshield of Clyde’s old Hudson. Beside him Clyde had slouched down in the seat with a cap pulled over his eyes, a real B-movie heavy, so ludicrous Joe nearly choked, laughing.

“So what are they doing?” Clyde said, his voice muffled.

“Still waiting for their table. From the looks of the crowd, I’d say about twenty minutes. Williams parked just down the street. He’s driving a white SUV, not the gray hatchback.”

“Hope they don’t decide to take a walk. Maybe I should move the car.”

“Don’t fuss. No one’s going to spot you, you look like an old wino gearing up for a big night of panhandling. Turn on the radio. Listen to a tape. Play some nice hot jazz and let me concentrate. I need to figure where I want to land, in there-the place is about as accommodating as an airport terminal at rush hour.”

“I told you it was too open. And why would I turn on the radio? I can hear the restaurant tape just fine. How about that little service counter? You could hide behind the coffeepots.”

“And if I suffer third-degree burns? We don’t have pet insurance.” Studying the crowded dining patio, Joe picked out four possible refuges, none of which looked adequate to hide a healthy mouse. Listening to the sweet, rocking runs of Ella Fitzgerald, he considered the layout.

Maybe the best method was the direct one. The in-your-face approach. Why not? A mew and a wriggle.Well, hello, Ryan, fancy seeing you here.A good loud purr.So what are you having for supper?

The moment Ryan and Larn were shown to their table, Joe slipped through the open window of the Hudson, dropped to the sidewalk, and headed for the jasmine vine that climbed to the roof beside the kitchen.

The couple was seated nearly in the center of the patio, not his preferred location. From high up within the vine, he watched them peruse their menus. He could feel Clyde watching him-the same sense of invasion as if Clyde were looking over his shoulder while he worked a mouse hole.

Ryan was wearing a handsome pair of faded jeans, a pearl-gray sweatshirt, expensive-looking leather sandals, and gold earrings. Her color was high, her makeup more skillfully applied than Joe had before seen, her dark hair curling fresh and crisp. A nice balance between the casual and self-assured village look, and feminine charm. A very effective statement:Idon’t care,but still a come-on designed to intrigue Williams.

Williams, in contrast, had made a conscious and awkward effort to impress. He was not an attractive man, and his too-careful attire didn’t help. He might be thirty-five or so. It was hard to tell, with humans. He was thin-shouldered, his hair mousy and lank around his shoulders, his thin face resembling a particularly sneaky rodent. He wore crisply pleated brown slacks of some synthetic fabric that had an unpleasant shine, and an expensive paisley print shirt beneath a brown tweed sport coat-all just a bit too much, particularly in Molena Point. His shiny brown shoes were meant for the city, not for a casual village evening. As a waiter approached the couple, Joe slipped down the vine, meandered across the bricks in full sight between the crowded tables, stepped beneath their table, and lay down.

Staring at Ryan’s sandals and at Williams’s hard, cheap shoes he sniffed the heady aroma of charbroiled burgers. If Ryan was aware of him she gave no sign-until suddenly, startling him, she draped her hand over the side of her chair and wiggled her fingers.

Maybe she did understand cats, Joe thought, grinning. He rubbed his face against her hand, wondering why she didn’t make some joke to Williams about the freeloading cat. Wondering, as he listened to them order, if he might be able to cadge a few French fries.

While Joe ran surveillance on Ryan Flannery and Larn Williams, and Clyde sat in the old Hudson with his cap over his face ready to leap out and protect Ryan, or maybe even protect a certain tomcat, two hundred miles away Max Harper, standing in the high-ceilinged white marble entry of the Landeau mansion, was kept waiting for nearly twenty minutes after the short, stocky, white-uniformed housekeeper admitted him.

According to the Landeaus’ sour-face maid, Mrs. Landeau was out of town but Mr. Landeau would soon be with him. She did not invite the captain in past the cold marble entry, but motioned with boredom toward a hard marble bench. As if he were one of an endless line of door-to-door hustlers selling magazines or some offbeat religion.

Accompanied by a white marble faun and two nude marble sprites, Harper waited impatiently, wondering at the architecture and decor the Landeaus’ had chosen in selecting this particular mountain retreat. There was no hint of the natural materials that one expected in a country setting, no wood or native stone to give a sense of welcome. He had cooled his heels for seventeen minutes and was rising to leave when Landeau made an appearance.

Sullivan Landeau was tall and slim, with reddish hair in a becoming blow-dry, an excellent carriage, a moderate tan that implied tennis and perhaps sailing but some concern for the damages of the harsh California sun. He was dressed in immaculate white slacks, a black polo shirt and leather Dockers. His gold Rolex, nestled among the pale, curly hairs of his wrist, caught a gleam from the cut-glass chandelier. His smile was cool, faintly caustic. “Mrs. Landeau is not at home. As a matter of fact, she’s down in your area, on business. Staying in Half Moon Bay tonight, then on down to Molena Point early in the morning to attend to some rental property. I hope you are not here because of some problem with one of our tenants.”

“Not at all,” Max said, looking him over.

Landeau waited coolly for Harper to state his business, his expression one of tolerance with which he might regard a slow bank teller or inept service-station attendant.

“Perhaps I should be speaking with an estate manager,” Max said. “Someone who would be familiar with your employees.”

“I am familiar with my employees.”

“I’m looking for information about Hurlie Farger, I’d like some idea of his work record, what kind of service he’s given you, how long he’s been with you.”

Landeau looked puzzled. “I’m afraid I don’t know the name. Are you sure this person worked here? When would that have been? We’ve had the estate only three years. In what capacity would he have been employed?”

“My information is that he works here now, part-time, odd jobs on the grounds crew and filling in as a mechanic.”

Landeau shook his head. “We don’t have aFarger.You had better speak with my estate foreman. He’s working east of here about four miles, up that back, dirt road. They’re cutting timber.” He glanced at his watch. “But of course they’ll have quit for the day.”

Max slipped a mug shot of Gerrard Farger from his pocket. The brothers so closely resembled each other that a person would have to know them very well to see a difference. “You may not recall his name, but as owner of the estate you would remember the faces of those who serve you.” Max smiled. “I see he looks familiar.”

Landeau had let down his guard for an instant, lowering his eyes as if deciding which way to play his response.

“My information,” Max said, “is that he’s worked for you for several years.”

“The face, yes,” Landeau said smoothly. “I believe I recognize this man. If I’m correct, if I have the right man, I believe he was fired six months ago. Something, as I recall, about an arrest, which I won’t tolerate. I believe he got into some kind of trouble down in San Andreas. Burglary or shoplifting, or maybe it was something to do with a woman, I don’t recall.” Landeau looked levelly at Harper. “We don’t condone that kind of behavior, it leads to trouble for the estate. Has he been into more trouble? I hope nothing too serious. But it must be serious,” Landeau added, “for a chief of police from the coast to come all the way up here.”

“Not at all,” Harper said. “We’re on vacation, heading home. Thought it expedient to collect what information we could, not lay more work on your sheriff.” He had no way to know whether Landeau was aware of the bombing in Molena Point. “You say Hurlie Farger hasn’t worked for you in six months.”

“To the best of my knowledge.”

“Would you say that if we show otherwise, you would be open to a charge of obstructing justice?”

“I certainly wouldn’t want that,” Landeau said. “It may have been less than six months.”

“Or perhaps you only considered firing him? Perhaps you changed your mind and let him stay on?”

Landeau shook his head. “It’s possible my wife may have done so, in a fit of charity. You know how women are.”

“What can you tell me about Farger?”

“If you would care to come into my study, I’ll see what I can remember.”

Harper moved with Landeau through a vast sitting area whose windows overlooked the top of the darkening pine forest. The mirrored walls reflected chrome-framed chairs, chrome-surfaced tables, and chrome-framed couches upholstered in silver-dyed leather, all straight from some futuristic space movie. The white marble fireplace boasted a huge gas log that either had never been lit, or was scrubbed clean after each use. The black marble floors were unadorned except where the furniture formed “seating areas,” each set off by an ice-blue shag rug that made the chrome above it look blue.

“This is my wife’s part of the house,” Landeau said, watching Harper. “The portion reserved for entertaining.” He led Max into a cypress-walled study furnished with natural-toned leather couches, framed antique maps, and a dark oriental carpet, a room that seemed to Max equally posed and out of character, planned for effect, not for any personal preferences. There were no papers on the desk, nothing of a personal or business nature visible, no photographs, no books, no shelves to put books on. Even Landeau’s offer of brandy seemed a tired line from a tired old movie. Declining a drink, Max couldn’t decide what kind of man Landeau might be. Everything about him seemed studied and timed for effect.

Stepping to a walnut credenza below the window, Landeau poured himself a Scotch and water, and turned to regard Max. And as the two men faced each other, outside on the large parking apron Charlie sat in the pickup studying the house and listening for any smallest sound from within. To her right stood five tennis courts, the heat from their green paving rippling across their chain-link barriers. She could see behind them a pool and ornate pool house in the Grecian style, set against the heavy pines in an idyllic tableau. She could imagine bathers there, beautiful women with figures as sculptured and polished as marble themselves, each woman’s skimpy bikini costing more than her entire wardrobe. In the dimming afternoon, the carefully trimmed lawns and precisely shaped bushes seemed as artificial as the house. The six-foot concrete wall that encircled the acreage gave her not a feeling of security but of confinement. Far to her left stood ten dog runs with a kennel at the back of each. The three dogs she could see pacing behind their fences were German shepherds. Maybe the guard dogs had been acquired after the breakins the sheriff had mentioned to Max.

And Ryan had told her that the Landeaus entertained some high-powered investors up here too, that apparently they had bought the mansion to accommodate Sullivan’s real-estate clients. The timbering and whatever else the estate was involved in, Ryan had thought, was secondary to its prime purpose as an elegant business write-off.

Max said the Landeaus had had more than breakins. That there’d been some trouble from local groups who didn’t want them to raise and cut timber, that they had in fact suffered considerable loss from arson. Charlie supposed if she were rich and someone burned her property, she’d have guard dogs too. As she idly studied the kennels, two rottweilers appeared pacing inside their runs, their blunt heads down like bulls ready to charge. All five dogs watched her more intently than she liked. She’d feel easier when Max was out of there, when, safe together in the truck, they were headed back to the inn to a nice private supper before the fire, to a night of lovemaking and let the rest of the world go hang. She was watching for Max, watching for the black-lacquered front door to open, when behind the pool house a white van appeared moving along a service road or drive, parking behind the house.

At that distance, in the falling light, she couldn’t read its logo; she could see a crown, with dark lettering beneath. They had passed two vans as they came up the narrow country road, both heading down, one belonging to a dry cleaner, one to a catering service, both seeming out of place in the backwoods setting.

Max had handed her the field book to jot down company names and license numbers. She had a sudden desire, now, to slip out of the car and take a look at this vehicle.

But something stopped her. She wasn’t sure what Max would want her to do. This was not the kind of home where one was welcome to wander about the gardens for a friendly assessment of the flower beds. She imagined walking along the side of the mansion setting off some kind of electric eye that would open the kennel gates and bring that brace of hungry mutts charging out in a timed race to see who got the juiciest supper. She heard car doors open, and in a few minutes close again, and she watched the van head away, up a back road into the woods until soon it was lost from view. She sat looking after it, disgusted at her own hesitancy.

She wouldn’t tell Max she’d been afraid and uncertain. She hadn’t spent time with a dozen police wives, at various backyard cookouts and parties, hadn’t seen how laid-back and cool those women were, not to be ashamed of her sudden timidity-surely there was nothing that would so seriously cool their romance, as to let fear intervene.

Though Max was the most monogamous and straightforward of all possible husbands, she knew that. She knew a lot, from Clyde and from the people in the department, about Max and Millie’s marriage, which had ended with Millie’s death. She knew enough to be certain that she had a lot to live up to, in that hard-shelled and loving lady detective.

She could never replace Millie. But she could give Millie the compliment and respect of trying, and in so doing maybe she could make Max happy.

A figure moved behind the house where the van had disappeared. Charlie, turning the key that Max had left in the ignition, hit the window button and rolled down the glass, to listen.

There was no sound. The early evening air was heavy with the scent of pine and with a less pleasant smell from the kennels. Somewhere behind the house a car started, she heard it move away, the scrunch of tires on gravel and the engine hum soon fading. She thought of Hurlie Farger and his old truck, but this vehicle was newer, purring softly. Anyway, this wasn’t her business. This was department business. She was a civilian, she needed to behave like a civilian. Max had collected some valuable information today concerning large sales of bleach, fertilizers, iodine, antifreeze, glass bottles and jars and propane, among the local stores. She didn’t need to do anything to distract him or to complicate his work.

But,Come on, Max. Come out of there. I want you safe. I want you to myself for a little while, and safe.

22 [��������: pic_23.jpg]

The brick-pavedpatio of Burger Basher was lit by lanterns placed along the perimeter and by shifting washes of moonlight beneath fast-running clouds. Though the sea wind was brisk, the forty-by-forty-foot space was comfortably warm, heated by six outdoor gas burners suspended on poles overhead. Joe Grey, sitting beneath Ryan’s table, tried not to lick his whiskers at the scent of broiling burgers. Though he’d had filet for supper, who could resist a Basher’s double? Encouraged by Ryan’s petting, he stood up on his hind paws, looking as plaintive as a begging beagle into her amused eyes.

“Come on, Joe Grey. You want to sit up here? We have an empty chair.”

Larn Williams looked disgusted. But Joe was aware of other diners watching him and smiling. Beneath a nearby table, a springer spaniel whined with interest. Leaping into the chair, Joe watched appalled as Williams slopped on mustard, ruining a fine piece of meat. Ryan, sensibly waving away the condiments, cut off a quarter of her burger and dissected it carefully into cat-sized bites. Placing these on a folded paper napkin, she set the offering on the chair before him. “There you go, big boy. See what you can do with that.”

Rewarding Ryan with a purr and a finger-lick, Joe sampled the char-grilled confection. This was the way surveillance should be conducted, in plain sight of the subjects while one enjoyed life’s finer pleasures. He tried to eat slowly but he didn’t come up for air until every morsel had vanished. Yawning and stretching, again he fixed his gaze on Ryan, licking his whiskers.

She cut her eyes at him as she devoured her own burger. “No more. You’ll get fat, lose your handsome tomcat figure.”

Williams watched this exchange coldly. “I didn’t ask you out to dinner-such as it is-to watch you feed some alley cat.”

“He’s not an alley cat, I know him very well.”

“When did you get home? I swung by the Jakeses’ place up there but you’d already left. I didn’t know you were leaving. One of your carpenters was still there, that old redheaded guy with the beard.”

“I don’t consider Scotty old. I consider him handsome and capable. I got home Saturday night, in time to go to a wedding on Sunday, and start a new job this morning.”

Williams nodded more amiably, seeming actually aware of his surliness. “Seems like, if you’re gone a few weeks, everything piles up, the laundry, the junk mail.”

When she didn’t respond, he began asking questions about the new job she had started. Her answers were as vague as she could politely make them; Joe hid a pleased smile. Somewhere in the conversation, Williams edged his way back to his primary interest.

“It’s that backlog of paperwork I really hate. Every real-estate sale-a landslide of forms to be filed. I don’t have to tell you, the paperwork gets worse every year. That, and the billing. And then it’s time for taxes.”

If, Joe thought, the evening was to be filled with such gems as this, he might as well be home eradicating the front lawn of gophers. Stretched out across the chair, he yawned so deeply that he almost dislocated his jaw; and he lay observing Williams. The guy had a face as bland as yogurt, his pale brown eyes soft-looking and seeming without guile. Gentle, submissive eyes-as if there was no way this good soul could bear to swat a fly. The kind of expression that made any sensible cat uneasy.

And when Joe glanced at Ryan, she was watching Larn with the same distaste, her dislike thinly veiled-though she appeared to take the bait. “At least,” she said, sipping her beer, “I caught up with my billing, and got it in the mail. Didn’t have any choice. No money coming in, the creditors will be at my throat.”

Williams didn’t turn a hair. “The building-supply people in San Andreas are pretty good about letting a contractor ride over a month or two.”

“That’s nice, but I don’t do that, I don’t work that way. And the Jakeses are good about paying, they were very prompt on the two San Francisco jobs that Dannizer Construction did for them. I expect I’ll see their check before the end of the week.”

No change of expression from Williams. “I never quite trust people whoalwayspayalltheir bills on time. Makes me wonder why they’re so careful.”

Ryan made no reply. Was he trying to be funny? Joe had never heard any of Clyde’s friends talk that way.

Certainly not Clyde himself, Clyde valued his prompt-paying customers, and he let them know it.

“Did you say your father was on the East Coast? I imagine you miss him just now, with this unfortunate murder to deal with. I was sorry to hear about your husband’s death, in that ugly way. I hope things have-not been too rocky.”

“He’s on the East Coast, yes,” Ryan said, smiling. “I’m doing fine. Thanks for asking.” She was trying hard to be nice to Larn. Joe wondered that Williams didn’t detect her veiled effort-or didn’t seem to.

“Hot weather back there just now. I hope he took something light. Cotton’s best, in the humidity. But I suppose he knows all about that.”

Joe narrowed his eyes, studying Williams. This guy was strange.

“Do the police have any line on a suspect? On who would do such a thing?”

Ryan just looked at him.

“I don’t understand much about the circumstances, but I hope they’ve made some progress in locating the killer. What a terrible shock, to find� Well, I am sorry.”

And youaregoing on about it, Joe thought, curling up with his back to Williams.

“I hope they have enough evidence so you are no longer a suspect. I would hate to be suspected of a murder, even though everyone knows better. It would be so� demeaning.” Williams was not keeping his voice down. People at the nearby tables had begun to watch them. Ryan looked increasingly uncomfortable.

“Do they have fingerprints, or anything on the weapon? That would certainly make you feel easier.”

“I really can’t discuss these matters, Larn. And we’re attracting attention.”

“I only meant�” He looked suitably stricken. “I only thought� You know, hoping there was something to ease your mind, to take the pressure off,” he said, lowering his voice. “Hoping you’re able to feel more comfortable about this ugly mess.”

“I was told not to discuss it.”

“Well, if there’s anything I can do to be of help, I just want you to know you can call on me.”

“Nothing that I know of.”

“When will your father be home?”

This guy was so damned nosy Joe wanted to claw him. Or, he wasn’t quite steady in the attic.

“1 really don’t know, Larn.” Her voice was decidedly cooler, as if she were sorry she had come tonight.

But Larn didn’t seem to get the drift. “He has a good reputation in the city. I don’t know many folks in law enforcement, but people say he does a good job.I certainly don’t believe the gossip, I don’t pay attention to that kind of thing.”

Ryan had stopped eating. “What gossip?” she said softly. “What are you talking about?”

People at the surrounding tables had turned away making an effort not to stare. Williams lifted his hand in embarrassment, as if he realized he’d made a blunder. But Joe could see under the table Williams’s left fist on his knee beating a soft, energetic rhythm, his body language laying out all too clearly his cold deliberation.

“What gossip?” Ryan repeated, her eyes never leaving Williams. “You’d better explain what you’re talking about.”

“Well, Iamsorry. I thought of course you’d heard it like everyone else� It’s common� Oh, hell, I thought� Can we just drop it? Forget I said anything?”

“Of course we can’t drop it,” she said raising her voice, not caring if people turned to look. “What is this about?Whathave you heard about my father?”

“It’s only gossip, it doesn’t mean anything. Let’s forget it.”

Joe didn’t need to look up into Ryan’s face to see her rage. Every angle of her body was tense and rigid. She waited unmoving for Williams to explain.

“Well,” he said reluctantly. “It’s just-the women� you have to know about the women.”

Her silence was like thunder, so volatile that Joe thought the air around her might explode.“Whatwomen?What exactly are you talking about! And where did you hear such a thing!”

Larn sighed, his pale eyes shifting. “Don’t be so loud. People are staring.” This guy was far more than a nut case.

“Well?”

“It’s common gossip in the city, Ryan. I can’t believe you never heard it.”

“What, exactly,is common gossip? You’ll have to spell it out.”

He sighed again, implying that this was all very painful. “You have to know that Flannery had plenty of women.”

Ryan only looked at him.

“And that� Well,callit gossip, that Flannery had affairs with more than a few of his female parolees. Most of that, the way I hear it, was before he was appointed chief. I thought of course you’d heard this. But gossip doesn’t make�”

Ryan was white. “That is so patently a lie. I have never heard a hint of such a story. I certainly would have heard that from Rupert, he’d have been the first to pass on such a tale, would have been delighted to repeat that.” She was almost shouting at Williams. “This is not a story that anyone in San Francisco has ever heard. Why are you telling me this?” People around them were growing uncomfortable. Two couples, hurrying through their meals, rose to leave. “Where did this come from? What is your purpose in saying such a thing?”

Larn looked totally apologetic, really crushed. Joe was so fascinated he had to remind himself to stop staring. Turning away, he began to wash again, watching Williams with occasional sideways glances.

“I don’t know where I heard it. Everywhere. And then just this week I heard it in conjunction with the murder,” Larn said embarrassedly. “The implication was that� that maybe Rupert had been talking about one of Flannery’s affairs, spreading around names and details, and Flannery had-”

Ryan gaped at him then was out of her chair jerking Larn up-he came up under her grip as limp as a doll, looking shocked but making no effort to resist her. She spun him around with surprising strength, forced him between the tables and out through the patio to the street, his arm bent behind him. Forced him down the sidewalk away from the restaurant. As Joe leaped to follow them the thought did cross his mind that someone ought to pay the bill. Well, he sure couldn’t. One of the perks of being a cat, you never got stuck with the bill.

Half a block down, she shoved Williams into an alley. Joe glanced across the street where Clyde sat in the Hudson, poised as if ready to move. Joe peered around into the brick alley where Ryan had Williams backed against the building. The man was totally submissive. Was he enjoying himself? Getting it on with this woman’s rage? Torn between disgust and amusement, Joe settled down between the trash cans to watch.

Ryan looked like she was about to pound Williams when the scuff of shoes made Joe spin around. Clyde stood with his fists clenched as if he wanted to pile into Williams. But Ryan’s display of anger held him frozen.

The hint of a grin ticked at the corner of Clyde’s mouth as he studied Williams’s pallor and Ryan’s businesslike grip on the man’s collar. She glanced at Clyde, her face coloring.

“What was he doing?” Clyde said, amused.

She said nothing, but turned back to Williams. “If Ieverhear that kind of talkanywhere,I’ll know it came from you. I swear I’ll pound you, Williams, then sue your pants off for slander. I have four top attorneys in the city, and I would like nothing better than to see them take you down.”

Jerking Williams away from the wall, she shoved him hard. He stumbled and half fell out onto the sidewalk. “Go home, Larn. Go back to San Andreas. I don’t know what your purpose is. But you pull anything more-anything,and you’ll be cooling your ass in the slammer.”

Larn rose from an off-balance crouch, stared at Ryan and at Clyde, his face unreadable, and headed away fast. Ryan watched until he reached his car and had driven off, then she collapsed against Clyde, her face buried against him. Her shoulders were shaking, whether shivering with nerves, or rocking with laughter, Joe couldn’t tell. The gray tomcat, sitting among the garbage cans in the dark alley, was sorry that Dulcie had missed this one.

23 [��������: pic_24.jpg]

A week earlier, Joe Grey would have sworn that this would never happen, that he and Clyde would never go undercover together running surveillance, tooling along in Clyde’s old Hudson behind Larn Williams’s Jeep like a pair of buddy cops. But here they were, slipping up the hills through the night behind Williams’s white SUV.

Clyde had waited, in front of Burger Basher, as patiently for Joe as Holmes waiting for Watson while Joe played electronic bug underneath Ryan’s table. Then that little affair in the alley that had left Joe weak with laughter, and left Clyde wired for action, ready to move as Ryan headed for Clyde’s place to pick up Rock. Clyde had told her, in the alley, that he was just passing, that he had an errand. Whatever she believed, she’d grinned at him and thanked him nicely for coming to her rescue; no harsh word for following her. Gave him a buss on the cheek and said she’d see him in the morning.

So here they were following Williams, Clyde dawdling in traffic so not to be noticed, then panicked when Williams turned a corner for fear they’d lose him.

Joe did his best not to laugh. Watching Clyde practice his surveillance skills was an absolute and entertaining first.

And it was, as well, an occasion that Joe suspected he would deeply regret. First thing he knew, Clyde would be telling him exactly how to conduct every smallest detail of his private business.

“Where’she headed?” Clyde said, frowning.

“I could be wrong. I’m guessing the Landeau cottage. Watch the road,” Joe hissed as Clyde turned to look at him.

“Why would he go there?”

Joe himself was surprised. But maybe he shouldn’t be. There was nothing to show a connection between Williams and the Landeaus, but they did live in the same small town of San Andreas, they could know each other.

Or, Joe thought, maybe this was the meaning of Gramps Farger’s remark,Them San Andreas people.

The Fargers and the Landeaus? Talk about an unlikely mix.

Once they were above the village the residential streets were black, where the moon had dissolved above pale clouds. Joe glanced at Clyde. “Better turn off your lights.”

“I’m not driving with my lights off. And hit some animal?”

“He’ll make you, otherwise. There’s not a car per square mile moving up here.”

Clyde cut his lights. The street went black.

“Drive slower.I can see the street, I can see if there’s an animal. Maybe he’ll think you turned off. He’s not moving very fast.”

“Why would he trash her father? Why would he go to the Landeau place? What’s the connection? What’s this guy up to?”

“Slow down, he’s turning in.”

Easing to the curb a block before the cottage, Clyde cut the engine. Williams had pulled onto the parking close to the cottage door, making no effort to hide his car. On the dark granite paving, the white Jeep stood out like snow on tar. “Roll down your window,” Joe said softly. “You’ll stay in the car like you promised?”

“Didn’t I promise?”

“That’s not an answer.” Joe glanced at Clyde. “He sees you, you could blow everything-and could put me in danger.” Before Clyde could answer, he leaped across Clyde’s legs, dropped out the window, and beat it up the street. He had no idea how long Clyde would remain patiently behind the wheel or, in his new investigative enthusiasm, come sneaking along the street like some two-bit private eye. Surveillance was easier with Dulcie. No human in their right mind would suspect a pair of cats.

He was just in time to see Williams let himself in with a key. Swiftly Joe slipped into the house behind his heels, just making it through as Williams slammed the door, and sliding behind the Mexican chest.

Williams didn’t pause as if getting his bearings, nor did he turn on the light. He headed straight for the bedroom, knowing his way. Moving up the four steps he sat down on the bed and pulled off his shoes. The bed was unmade, the brightly patterned designer sheets and spread tangled half on the floor. Dropping his shoes, Williams picked up the phone. As he dialed, Joe crept past through the shadows, and hightailed it into the kitchen.

Leaping to the dark granite counter, slick as black ice beneath his paws, he searched frantically for the extension. The counters were nearly empty. A set of modern canisters. Nothing behind them. Bread box, but no phone inside. Did they keep the phone in a cupboard?

Or was there only one phone, and Williams had moved it to the bedroom at some earlier time?

Yes, behind the bread box he found the empty jack. Was the guy staying here with the Landeaus permission? Or without their knowledge? Why else would he not turn on the lights?

Dropping to the floor as silently as he could manage, he slipped into the bedroom in time to hear Williams say, “Yes, but I don’t see the point. So the Jakeses sue her. So what does�?”

Pause� Behind Williams’s back, Joe slid across the room and under the bed.

“Why is it none of my business! If I’m going to do the work, I� Does this have to do with her divorce?”

Joe could make out a faint metallic reverberation from the other end. Sounded like a woman’s voice, sharp with anger. Creeping along under me bed, gathering strands of cobwebs that made his ears itch, he crouched directly beneath Williams. Amazing how fast these little busy spiders could set up housekeeping.

“Of course I did.Yes,a code she won’t find. What do you think? So the Jakeses hit the fan, what then? So what’s the purpose?”

Angry crackling. Definitely a woman.

“Thanks.I go to all the trouble, to say nothing of the risk, and all you can say is,Don’t sweat it! Youtellmedon’t sweat it!”

Crackle, hiss�

“She’s what? What time in the morning?”

A terse response.

“Whattime? That’s the crack of damn dawn.Well, isn’t that cute�Of course I’ll be out of here. When did you find this out? Why didn’t you� Well, allright.Don’t be so bitchy� No, I won’t leave anything lying around!”

Crackle, crackle�

“All right. And what if I spill aboutMartie?”

The voice at the other end snapped with rage. Williams listened, drumming his fingers on the bedside table. “Well, it’s just between you and me,” and he brayed a coarse laugh. “Just between us andMartie! Martie Martie Martie.“He pounded on the night table.“Martie Martie Holland…” then banged the phone down, giggling a laugh that made Joe’s blood curdle.

This guy was one weird player.

And Ryan had gone out with him. Ryan had, Joe thought with a sharp jolt, Ryan had beat up on him� this guy who was, in Joe’s opinion, first in line for the nut farm. And, first in line as having killed her husband.

For instance, what would most men do if a woman tried to beat up on them? Grab her arms and get her under control-or knock her around and pound her. Williams had done neither. How many men would just stand there and take it, as limp as a decapitated mouse? No, Larn Williams, in anyone’s book, was a long way from normal.

And what did he mean to do to Ryan later? What might he be saving up to do?

Furthermore, if that was Marianna on the other end of the line, why would she want to cook Ryan’s books? What did Marianna have to gain by framing Ryan?

And who was Martie Holland?

Above Joe on the bed, Williams shifted his weight, still giggling and muttering. Joe heard him pick up the phone again, heard the little click of the headset against the machine, heard the dial tone then a fast clicking as if Williams had hit the redial.

Laughing that same crazy laugh, Williams shouted the name over and over,“Martie Holland Martie Holland Martie Holland,“then he slammed the phone down again, rose, and padded into the kitchen. Joe heard him open the refrigerator, then the cupboard, heard the icemaker spitting ice cubes into a glass, and could smell the sharp scent of whisky. While Williams mixed a drink, Joe lay under the bed trying to make sense of his phone conversation. Williams brought his drink into the bedroom, set it on the nightstand, and stretched out on the bed so the springs creaked above Joe’s head. He heard Williams plump the pillows then straighten the covers as if perhaps preparing for sleep. The tomcat was about to cut out of there when he heard, outside the window, the faintest rustling of bushes.

Scooting on his belly to the window side of the bed, he peered up at a familiar shadow dark against the glass-then it was gone.

He didn’t wait to find out if Williams had seen Clyde. Leaving the bedroom fast, he leaped at the front door, praying the dead bolt would give before Williams heard him-wondering if he’d beableto turn the bolt.

There was not a sound from the bedroom except Williams shaking the ice in his glass. Joe leaped again, and again. Dead bolts were hell on the paws, most of them stronger and with less leverage than a cat could manage. Had Williams heard him? Why was he so quiet? Joe was swinging and kicking when, glancing across the living room where moonlight slanted down against the mantel, he saw something that made him drop to the floor, looking.

Something about the three smooth black indentations that held the three pieces of sculpture wasn’t right. Two were smooth and properly constructed. But in the angled moonlight, the right-hand rectangle looked rough and unfinished. Someone had taken less than the required care in smoothing the concrete, had left a ragged line and rough trowel marks.

Considering the perfection of detail in the rest of the house, that did seem strange. Considering Marianna Landeau’s reputation for demanding perfection, it seemed more than strange. He was about to slip closer, for a better look, when beyond the front door he heard Clyde’s whisper.“Joe? Are you there? Joe? “

In the bedroom, Williams stirred, sending a shock of panic through Joe. He turned, watching the man. He didn’t think he wanted to play innocent lost kitty with this guy.

Leaping for the lock in huge panic, driven by desperation, he just managed to turn the dead bolt, seriously bruising his paws-the door flew open. Clyde loomed, his familiar scent filling Joe’s nostrils. Joe glanced to the bedroom again, but Williams had turned over and seemed to be dozing off.

“Wait,” Joe said. “Pull the door to and wait, I just want to�”

“Wait, hell. Come out of therenow.”

“One second,” Joe said, and he was across the room rearing up, staring up at the moonlit mantel.

Yes, definitely flawed. Sloppy work that Marianna should never have permitted, or for that matter, Ryan either-though possibly you couldn’t see this in the daylight; Joe hadn’t seen it then. Only now did the sharply angled light pick out clearly the thin, ragged line that ran diagonally across the black concrete.

Wondering if such a flawcouldhave gone undetected, he heard Williams stir again and push back the covers. Taking one last look at the rough black concrete, Joe fled for the door. Clawing past Clyde’s feet, he was out of there racing ahead of Clyde across the yard into the dark, concealing woods, where they crouched together among the bushes like two thieves.

“What was that about?” Clyde snapped, snatching Joe up in his arms. “Why did you go back? That guy�”

“I� something I needed to look at.”

Behind them there wasn’t the faintest sound, the front door didn’t open. Rising slowly, holding Joe half-concealed under his jacket, Clyde slipped out of the woods and headed fast for the car. Jerking open the driver’s door of the Hudson, he tossed Joe on the torn seat, slipped in and locked the door behind them. “You’re risking your neck in there and risking mine, you sound like a herd of bulls jumping at the door, but then you just have to go back-for another look at what? Did it occur to you that this guy might snatch up a cat and�”

“It occurred. It occurred. It was something urgent.”

Clyde started the engine. “I endanger life and limb playing bodyguard to a demented gum-paw, and something in there is so important you risk both our necks, going back.”

“We didn’t risk our necks. That guy’s a wimp.Ryanbeat him up.”

Clyde sighed and headed down the hills, turning his lights on the instant he was around the first curve. Watching him, Joe felt almost bad that he wasn’t sharing what he’d seen with Clyde.

But for the moment he wanted to keep that puzzling glimpse of the fireplace to himself, wanted to think about it without Clyde’s take on the matter, without anyone’s input. When something strange nagged at him, he liked to let it fall in place by itself. Let it rattle around with the rest of the mismatched facts and see how they shook out; see what his inner thoughts would do, without outside influence.

He’d had the feeling, when he looked up at that black recess, that this was the moment of truth. That he stood teetering on the brink of one big, momentous discovery.

Beside him, driving down the dark and narrow, twisting streets, Clyde was nearly squirming with curiosity. “So besides whatever you went back for, whatever you’re keeping so secret, what else went on in there? Did I hear him talking on the phone? I thought sure he’d find you, I was ready to smash a window.” He looked sternly at Joe. “This stuff’s hard on a guy’s blood pressure, you ever think of that?”

Joe smiled. “He was talking to a woman. I’m guessing it was Marianna, that he’s here with her permission, that they’re friends.”

“That would be a twist. So what was he shouting about?”

“I think the guy’s crazy. Kept shouting the name Martie Holland, over and over, wasn’t making any sense. You ever hear of a Martie Holland? Harper or Dallas, or Ryan, ever mention that name?”

“Not that I recall.”

Joe frowned. He didn’t like when the pieces wouldn’t add up. Heading home in the Hudson beside Clyde, he thought he’d catch a few hours’ sleep until Williams left the Landeau cottage and then, if Ryan or Hanniwasto be there early in the morning-and who else would it be?-he’d play friendly kitty with those two, and get a closer look at the flawed mantel.

24 [��������: pic_25.jpg]

When Ryanleft Burger Basher heading for Clyde’s place to pick up Rock, she was still steaming with anger; playing back Larn Williams’s words about her dad, she was mad enough to chew nails. Clyde had hurried away in his old Hudson on some errand, and just as well. She was in no mood to be civil for long, even to Clyde, though she had greatly appreciated his coming to her rescue-he might have followed her, and that was okay. He might have rescued her from killing Williams, the way she’d felt at that moment.

As she pulled to the curb before Clyde’s house, Rock heard the truck and began to paw at the gate. Hurrying back to release him, reaching to open the latch, she stopped. Rock had backed off from her, snarling with a cold, businesslike menace.

“What’s wrong?” She reached for him. “Come, Rock.” He dodged away growling. She thought of rabies, and shivered; but quietly she moved toward him. He showed his teeth, focused on something she couldn’t understand.

Last night he’d been this way. Leaving Lupe’s Playa after Williams switched the contents of the envelope on the seat of her truck, following Clyde home, opening this same gate, Rock had been delighted to see her-but when she opened the truck door and told him to load up, he’d pitched a fit, smelling the scent of someone strange in the cab. And when they got home and Rock encountered the stranger’s smell there in the apartment, he’d nearly torn the place apart, looking for the intruder.

The smell of the intruder, of Larn Williams. Now that smell was on her. She stared at her hands where she had marched Williams into the alley and shoved him against the wall. And, stepping into the yard past the growling, puzzled weimaraner, she moved around to the outdoor sink and washed thoroughly, scrubbing to her elbows.

Then again she approached Rock.

He cringed low but came to her. He sniffed again at her hands, and he grinned up at her and began to dance around her, all wags and kisses, whining and licking and loving her.

Putting him on the lead and shutting the gate securely behind her, she settled him in the truck and headed home. He watched her seriously, his pale yellow eyes puzzled, as if he couldn’t understand about the smells. In the passing lights, his sleek silver coat gleamed like satin. She scratched his ears. “You not only have a very good nose, my dear Rock. Considering the source of your anger, you have superior judgment.”

At her lighter tone, Rock grinned and wagged, his long, soft ears thrust eagerly forward. Smiling to herself, she wondered what Rock would do, face-to-face with Williams. And again she saw Williams in the alley, his white, shocked expression as she backed him against the wall. The incident, thanks to Clyde, hadn’t turned as nasty as she’d expected. She really wasn’t sure how the encounter would have ended if Clyde hadn’t appeared so suddenly.

She didn’t often lose her temper like that, and tonight was certainly not the time or the place. She would most likely regret later her public display of rage.

What was the source of Larn’s remarks about her dad? There could be no source. Sick words from a twisted mind. Williams was riding a loose rail.

Or was it more than that?

And what a bizarre twist, that Clyde’s tomcat had been in the restaurant with her and Larn, then had apparently followed them to the alley; she’d caught just a glimpse of him as Clyde snatched him up, heading for his car. “A very peculiar cat,” she told Rock. “I don’t like to insult present company, but he really does act more like a dog, if you could manage to take that as a compliment.”

Rock grinned and wagged, happy for her improved mood. But then as she turned into her drive he stiffened again, watching the stair and her studio windows and glancing at her as if for direction, the hair along his back rising in a harsh ridge.

Scanning the yard and the upstairs windows, she slipped Hanni’s gun from her glove compartment. She wondered if she dare let Rock out of the truck? If someone was there, would she be able to control him?

Or was he simply wired again after sniffing the scent of last night’s intruder on her hands? She would have to learn to control the dog, andsoon,if she meant to keep him.

Slipping the loaded, unholstered gun into her jeans pocket and putting Rock on leash, she moved quietly up the outside stairs. Rock, walking at heel, almost slunk along, silent and wary. She had unlocked the door and stepped in and turned on the light when the phone rang. She didn’t pick up but stood looking around the apartment, letting the machine answer.

The room didn’t seem disturbed. The kitchen was as she’d left it, cups and glasses in the drain, an inch of stale coffee in the pot. The studio windows all closed and locked. She moved with Rock to the hall, approaching the closet-dressing room and bath. Together they cleared the apartment, and she checked the lock on the door of the inner stairs. When all seemed secure she released Rock. He continued to prowl, perhaps making certain the intruder’s scent was not fresh. Sitting down at her desk, she hit replay.

It was Hanni. She was wired, laughing with excitement. “The rug’s in! Delivered this afternoon while I was out installing the Brownfield house-I just got home. Starved. Exhausted. The kids hardly know me, I haven’t had time to breathe. Jim and the kids unpacked it, we couldn’t wait. It’s in the living room, one end draped over the couch.It’s fab, Ryan! Just fab! Are you there? Pick up the phone!Can you meet me in the morning? I was going over anyway, early, to take some Mexican planters. I’m glad we ripped out the old carpet. It won’t take us a minute to put this down, just a little two-sided tape. It’s going to be sensational. Eight o’clock too late? Call me. I know you’ve started a new job. Call me please before I go to sleep, and let me know!”

Stripping off her jeans and sweatshirt, Ryan washed her face and brushed her teeth then pulled on her robe and crossed the studio. Pulling the curtains, she made herself a drink, and turned her bed back, removing the hand-printed spread to reveal its matching comforter. Carrying the phone to the bed, she made herself comfortable propped against the pillows. Immediately Rock stepped up onto the foot of the bed looking questioningly at her.

“It’s okay,” she said softly. Who would know if she spoiled him? If he was going to be her dog, she could spoil him as she pleased. All her childhood, one or another of the hunting dogs had been allowed to sleep on her bed. After her mother died, that nighttime companionship had been important. A warm, caring creature to lie across her feet or to snuggle with.

Easing back into the pillows, sipping her drink, feeling the last of her gritty anger at Larn Williams ease away, only then did she pick up the phone and call Hanni.

Hanni had turned off her tape. Letting it ring, Ryan sat enjoying the high-ceilinged studio, taking pleasure in its plain white angles and tall, open space. Someday she’d want paintings, more furnishings, bright and intricate accessories maybe to the point of crowding. But right now the open, nearly empty interior was deeply soothing. The only real luxury items were her handblocked spread and quilt in shades of black and white and tan, a primitive Australian pattern on which, at the moment, one long, lean, silver-coated freeloader reclined, his short pointer’s tail gently thumping as he looked shyly at her, not totally certain that she meant to let him stay. Hanni answered.

Ryan said, “We’re working on Clyde’s attic, ready to jack up the roof first thing in the morning. Can the rug wait?”

“I can’t stand to wait. It’s so beautiful. You can’t imagine how elegant and rich. I’ve already added it to Marianna’s insurance policy, and I� I could lay it myself, but I don’t want to use the stretcher. Could we do it at seven? You don’t start work until eight.”

“If I can be on the job by eight.”

“It won’t take long. You’ll be so thrilled. See you at seven.”

Ryan sighed and hung up. She had to remember that Hanni had designed that rug, that she had indicated the placement of every hand-knotted piece of yarn, that the rug was Hanni’s painting, her latest masterpiece. Of course she was excited-and Hanni was never one to quell her passions.

Turning out the bedside lamp she sat going over tomorrow’s work to see if she’d forgotten any detail. Against her feet Rock was like a furnace. The fact that he was taking half the bed, that she would likely sleep with her feet hanging out, or twisted up like a pretzel, didn’t off-balance her satisfaction at having him there. Maybe, when she had a little break in Clyde’s job, she’d put a couple of her men up here to fence that steep backyard, maybe bring some heavy equipment in to terrace it. Finishing her drink she stretched out with her feet tucked securely against the big weimaraner.

But then she couldn’t sleep.

She lay wondering if Larn had killed Rupert, wondering if she had had dinner tonight with the man who murdered her husband.

She had gone out for that casual dinner drawn by curiosity, just as Larn had meant her to be. Manipulated like a puppet. And she had learned nothing true about her father, had learned only that Larn Williams was driven by motives she didn’t yet understand.

Dad had had woman friends over the years since her mother died, good friends, women he’d dated and whom he’d brought home for dinner or picnics or to hunt with them. Maybe in all those years, no more than four or five woman friends. He’d never been serious enough to think about marriage, he’d always let his daughters know that no one ever would replace their mother. And certainly none of his dating had been of the kind that would embarrass himself or his children. He had never,wouldnever have dated any parolee or probationer. Her father was too much a stickler for professional behavior to do such a thing, he would fire any of his officers caught in such a situation.

So what was Williams trying to accomplish?

Larn Williams was, as far as she knew, no more than a small-town realtor who had, she’d thought, been interested in her work in San Andreas. She’d made it clear that she’d only just left her husband, and wasn’t dating. That she would have dinner with him to discuss possible remodel work for his San Andreas clients.

What if it turned out that Larn had killed Rupert?

But what connection could there have been?

If Larn were arrested for Rupert’s murder, how would that look to the dozens of people who had seen them having dinner, and heard them arguing? Two conspirators having a falling out? She had turned on her accomplice in anger?

She imagined she was drifting off, she was trying to drift off, when the phone jerked her up and startled Rock so he stood up on the bed with one hard foot on her leg barking loud enough to break eardrums.

Hushing him, she picked up the phone, answering crossly, wishing she’d let it go on the tape. Rock, watching her, hesitantly walked up the length of me bed and lay down beside her.

“It’s Clyde. I just� wanted to be sure you’re okay.”

“I’m fine. Was nearly asleep. Thanks for pulling me out of that, no telling what I might have done. That man� I’ll fill you in later, more than I did. I may be late in the morning, would you leave a note for Scotty and Dave? I have to meet Hanni at the Landeau place at seven, to lay the new rug. She’s so excited, I couldn’t put her off. Do you have company? Who are you talking to?”

“The damn cat. Insists on hogging the bed, sprawling all over my pillow. Guess he likes the sound of the phone.”

She laughed. “Don’t knock it. It’s nice to have a four-legged pal to warm your feet. What ever made me think I wouldn’t keep Rock?”

“I never thought that,” Clyde said, laughing.

Hanging up, she burrowed into her pillow. She was deeply asleep when the phone rang again encouraging another round of barking. Hushing Rock, she wondered how long it would take to teach him the futility of barking at the phone, while not discouraging his other alarm responses.

The voice at the other end was Dallas. “You asleep?”

“No, not now.”

He chuckled. “Thought you’d like to know that Davis and I picked up the old man, up at the Pamillon place. That we’ve got enough on him, for drug making, to go to the grand jury and maybe enough for a bomb-making charge.”

“What did you find?”

“Has a lab up there, all right. We had to suit up like astronauts to go down into it. Talk about stink. It’s in a cellar under some chicken houses.” Ryan could hear the smile in his voice. “All kinds of stuff with his prints on it, glass jars, retorts. Old man must have thought we’d never find the place.

“And he’d dumped mountains of trash down in the estate, in a cellar, again with his prints on everything-including some electrical parts and a bag of ammonium sulfate that could relate to the bomb. We’re taking prints from samples of the trash, and listing the brands, to compare with Max’s list of purchases in San Andreas. Should tell us quite a lot.”

“That’s really great news. That’s one down�”

“And one to go. I’d sure like to thank our tipster. Hope we have as good luck with the murder, with these women we’re talking to. You can be sure that Wills and Parker are getting all they can.”

“You don’t have anything, this soon?”

“In fact, I think we can scratch three. Parker called me an hour ago. Three of them have pretty solid stories. That leaves seven, with two of those out of the country, as far as we know.”

“I’m keeping my fingers crossed. I’m sure glad you have capable friends when you need them.” She yawned, and rubbed Rock’s ears.

“Go to sleep,” Dallas said, laughing. “Keep the good thoughts.”

She hardly remembered hanging up. She was deeply asleep when the phone rang again. Again, the loud, frantic barking jerking her awake along with the ringing, making her cringe at what her neighbor, on the other side of the duplex wall, would be saying-she hoped they didn’t call the department.

“Ryan, it’s Dad. Sounds like I woke you. I’m in San Francisco, just got back, checked into an airport motel. Catching the early shuttle down to the village in the morning. You want to meet my plane?”

“I� I’d love to. You’re coming because of me, because of the murder. You haven’t been home.” How strange she felt, talking to her own father. How uncertain-because of what Williams had said. But how silly.

“I’m coming because I have a few days leave and need to rest up after running that training session, before I go back to work. Can you meet my plane or shall I�?”

“Yes, I can meet it. What time?”

“If it’sontime, five a.m.”

“I’ll be there but I can’t wait past six-thirty, I promised Hanni. An early installation, one she refuses to put off.”

“If you’re not there, I’ll take a cab or call Dallas. You sound-tired? A bit stiff. You okay? You’re not letting this thing get to you? I haven’t talked with Dallas. What kind of leads is he getting?”

“It’s not that. I� He’s working on it, has a couple of guys in the city checking out Rupert’s� Rupert’s women. And, they know my gun didn’t kill Rupert.”

“Then you should sound very up, not like you just lost your last friend.”

“I’m fine, really. Very very up. Just� dead tired, Dad. That’s all. I’ll see you in the morning, bright and early. We can have breakfast, if you’re on time.” But her voice caught, and the tears were just running down. What was wrong with her?

“Ryan? What?”

“Nothing. Honest. Pancakes and bacon. See you at five. G’night.” She hung up, choking with tears. She wanted to bury her face against her father’s chest and hear him tell her that everything Larn said was lies, that everything about her father was just as she had always believed, just as it should be. She felt like she was six years old again, badly needing comforting by her dad. Did anyone ever get too old for such comforting?

But the worst thing was, he’d heard exactly how she felt. He’d heard all the dismay and uncertainty that she didn’t even know was there, all the stupid questions.

This wasn’tlikeher, to let Williams lay this kind of trip on her. Williams was lying, there was no way she was going to believehim.

And, suddenly, she buried her face against Rock and bawled.

25 [��������: pic_26.jpg]

It was 4:40 in the morning when Ryan pulled into Peninsula Airport, parking in the short-term lot. She left Rock in the cab of the truck, cracking the windows and locking the doors, and hurried into the lobby hoping Dad’s flight was on time. She didn’t like leaving Rock very long on that expensive leather upholstery.

The big dog hadn’t offered, so far, to do any of the damage his breed was famous for, but she couldn’t forget the horror stories. Before she entered the small terminal she removed a police badge from her purse and pinned it on her jacket, a procedure highly irregular and illegal. Entering, she nodded to several security people, gave over her purse for perusal when requested, glad she’d remembered to remove Hanni’s gun. She stood reading the schedule, then approached the security desk. The guard on duty was maybe thirty, good-looking, clean shaven, with nice brown eyes and no wedding ring.

“I have a security dog in my truck, I’m meeting his handler.” Ryan widened her eyes, looking deeply at him. “This is� a sort of surprise for him. Mike worked with the dog for a year and then� well, he was wounded on the job and now he’s coming home.” She took a step closer to the counter. The guard did the same. “Would it� would it be okay if I bring the dog inside, just until flight six-oh-two-seven lands? My boss will be so thrilled. I promise the dog won’t be a problem, I’ve been training him since Mike was hurt�”

The guard grinned at her and waved her on in. She touched his hand briefly, smiling up at him and headed for the truck.

Rock was as thrilled to see her as if she’d been gone for weeks. She hugged him extravagantly because he hadn’t torn up the upholstery then leashed him and slipped the yellow vest on him that she had made with felt and a marking pen, neatly letteringWorking Dogon both sides. Commanding Rock out of the truck she told him to heel, praying that he wouldn’t let the strange sights and sounds of the terminal undo him. She didn’t yet know this dog very well, he might have all manner of behavior problems that could surface suddenly in the very different environment of the airport.

Before taking him into the terminal she walked him a block up the sidewalk and back. He honored every command. Heading for gate B she glanced across at the guard. He gave her a bright smile and a thumbs up, openly admiring Rock. Outside the gate she settled down at the end of a bench, feeling strangely nervous at meeting her dad, trying not to hear Larn Williams’s words:I don’t believe the gossip� I thought of course you ‘d heard� It’s common knowledge� The women� you have to know about the women� I can’t believe you never heard� Flannery had plenty of women� affairs with more than a few female parolees�

None of that was common knowledge, none of it ever happened. Not Mike Flannery, who had been totally committed to raising his girls the way their mother would want, totally committed to their high morals and to keeping alive the memory of their mother. Not this thoughtful man who had said to them a thousand times,What would your mother have done at your age, in that situation?Not Mike Flannery who had spent every free minute with his daughters working the dogs or hunting or riding, who had never had any free time unaccounted for, not Mike Flannery who had never given Ryan or her sisters any tiniest cause to doubt him. Growing up in a law-enforcement family, Ryan and Hanni and their older sister were not naive, they had all three been wise beyond their years, any of them would have noticed, would have known if their dad was fooling around.

She startled suddenly when Rock whined. Looking down at him, she realized she’d been rubbing his ears so hard she’d hurt him. She stroked his head softly and apologized. He whined in return, never offering to move from the sit-stay command she had given him almost ten minutes ago. Ten minutes� and as she looked out at the empty runway here came a plane landing.

As it taxied out of view to the south, she waited, heart pounding, for it to return up the long field. Watching it slowly pull up to gate B, she felt queasy in her middle.

This wasn’t going to be easy, telling him what she’d heard. But then it wouldn’t be easy, either, facing her dad with a murder charge hanging over her, a charge that, even if it was a setup, could affect both Dad’s career and Dallas’s, could ruin both their futures.

Standing out of the way she watched people flock as near to the doors as they were allowed, watched and waited nervously with her hand sweating on Rock’s leash. She felt far more nervous than when, at twelve, she’d struck a ball through the neighbor’s window, or when she’d let one of the pups run off and nearly get hit by a car, or the time she had accidentally fired a round through the roof of the firing range. She was far more nervous now, at seeing her own father.

Make a fuss over him, Rock. A fuss and a diversion. And don’t make a liar of me, in the eyes of that security guard.Who knew when she might need to rely on that guard for some yet unimagined emergency? When he looked up, watching her, she smiled and petted Rock.

Her dad was among the first off the plane, right behind the first-class passengers. She waved to him but kept Rock out of the crowd, letting Dad come to her winding his way through, his tall, lean frame easy in a suede sport coat and jeans and boots, his familiar grin, his pleasure at seeing her.

He didn’t hug her or touch her until he knew what the dog was all about.

“Make a fuss over him, a big fuss, he’s supposed to be your dog. I’ll explain later. His name’s Rock.”

Mike Flannery took in the badge on her lapel, and Rock’s vest, and let Rock smell his hand then talked softly to him until Rock was dancing around him, whining and so happy with this new friend that any minute he might start barking. Dad glanced at her, laughing. “This better be good. I’ll get my bags. Where’s the truck?”

“New� red Chevy king cab. Short-term parking, aisle three.” She grinned at him and headed for the door, the big dog looking back longingly at Mike Flannery-and so did she. Just being with Dad had chased away her stupid doubts.

She had settled Rock in the backseat when Dad came across the lot with his all-purpose, scarred and battered elk-hide bag. She stowed it in the backseat beside Rock, but where Mike could keep an eye on it so the big dog wouldn’t chew. “We have plenty of time for breakfast. We’ll go to the Courtyard where Rock can lie under the table-he doesn’t need elk-hide for breakfast.” Wheeling out of the airport, she headed for the freeway.

“So why is he supposed to be my dog? What’s with the working dog getup? All that fuss just so you could take him into the airport?”

She grinned. “Weimaraners are famous for tearing up the inside of a car.”

“So I’ve heard. This is the stray Dallas told me about? Looks like he’s not a stray anymore.”

“I guess.”

“You’ve had him vetted? Had his shots?”

“Urn� Not yet. Haven’t had time.”

Her father looked at her sternly.

“It’s just two days. Maybe I can-”

“You want me to do it? I’m hanging around for a few days. I can drive one of Harper’s surveillance wrecks.”

She turned off the highway into the village. “Would you? It’s Dr. Firetti, up near Beckwhite’s Automotive.”

“I know Firetti. Shall I have him check for an ID chip?”

She was surprised at the sinking feeling that gave her, that maybe Firetti would find Rock’s owner with that simple electronic scan. “I guess you’d better.” As she pulled up before the Courtyard, Flannery looked intently at her, and patted her knee. “It’ll be all right. Outside of being afraid you’ll lose your fine hound, what else is bothering you? Besides, of course, Rupert’s murder?”

She swung out of the truck, saying nothing, and unloaded Rock, moving ahead of her father into the restaurant. When they were seated, he gave her a questioning look. “You don’t want to talk about it, this early in the morning.”

“Not really. Not here. Just� gossip.” The longer she put it off, the harder it would be.

“Gossip about you, because of the murder? Well I wouldn’t-”

“Could we talk about it tonight?”

“Shall I pick up some steaks?”

“Perfect.” Fishing in her purse, she found the extra key Charlie had given her, and watched him work it onto his key ring. They talked about the remodel she was starting for Clyde, about Scotty moving down to the village to work for her, about the rug she and Hanni were laying and how excited Hanni was, about all the inconsequentials. They enjoyed waffles and sausage and quantities of coffee then she dropped her dad and Rock at the police station. But, heading for the Landeau cottage, she was again tense with unease. Too many things going on, too many problems butting at one another.

Scotty said life wasn’t full of problems, it was rich with decisions. He said a person was mighty lucky to have the privilege of making choices, even hard ones. That the more carefully you thought out your decisions, the more the good times would roll. All her life Scotty had told her that if you did nothing but worry, if you were indecisive and scared to make decisions, then the good times would escape like a flock of frightened birds.

She guessed she’d better listen. If she got herself into a knot, she wouldn’t conquer any of the present tangles. They would conquer her.

It wasn’t yet dawn when the three cats arrived at the Landeau cottage, Joe fidgeting and pacing, consumed with getting inside for a look at the mantel. The kit too was wired, so excited to be out and free again and on an adventure. She had been home at Wilma’s since the night before, when Cora Lee reluctantly returned her and was pleased to stay for dinner. Now that Dallas had arrested Gramps Farger, now that the old man was safely tucked away in jail, it had seemed all right to bring the tattercoat home.

The kit loved Cora Lee, and certainly she had loved Cora Lee’s extravagant attention, but the kit easily grew restless. Cora Lee said she’d been peering out the windows with far too keen an interest. Having promised not to let the kit out, Cora Lee had worried at her unrest.

Now behind the Landeau cottage in the dark woods where the three cats crouched, the kit’s tail lashed with excitement. Her eyes burned round and black, she could hardly remain still.

“Cool it, Kit,” Dulcie said softly. “We’re not set to charge that cottage like a platoon of commandos.”

The kit eased the tail action to a slow twitch. But her eyes remained wide and burning. If they’d been hunting rats, her enthusiastic vibes alone would have cleared the premises. As the cats watched for Ryan and Hanni, above them the sky faded from black to dark pearl. The moon hung low in the brightening sky, circled by a nimbus of mist. Within the cottage, beyond the floor-to-ceiling glass, there was no sign of Larn Williams. The bed was neatly made. The sunken sitting area shone like a softly lit stage. Joe watched intently the flawed black niche in the fireplace, but the moon’s diffused fight, from a different angle at this later hour, showed him nothing. He could smell on the breeze the stink of exhaust from the departed Jeep. The cats were dozing when Hanni pulled onto the granite parking.

She wasn’t driving her powder-blue convertible but a white van with the dolphin-shaped logo of her design studio. Certainly the Mercedes wasn’t made to haul the ten-foot rug that stuck out the back where the rear doors stood open and tied together. Swinging out, she began to unload some huge, Mexican ceramic pots that were wedged in beside the rug. She was dressed this morning in faded designer jeans and a tomato red velour top that set off her short, windswept white hair and her flawless complexion and dangling gold earrings.“Smashing,“Dulcie whispered. Hanni Coon had a wonderful talent for elegance. If Dulcie were a human, she’d kill to look like that.

Hanni had the pots unloaded when Ryan’s truck turned in. Ryan swung out dressed in her usual nondescript work jeans, a navy flannel shirt over a cotton blouse, and rough work boots. Hanni looked her over, a quick assessment of how Ryanmightdress herself, how Ryanmightlook, a hasty glance that seemed to the cats little more than habit. “Where’s Rock?”

“Dad’s back, he called last night, I picked him up this morning. He’s getting Rock vetted.”

“He came directly here? Because of Rupert! We could have dinner. He’s staying at the cottage?”

“I� There’s something I need to talk with him about.”

“Personal? About the murder?”

Ryan looked at her helplessly. “That okay?”

“Of course it’s okay. Can I help?”

“No, just� Could I explain later? It’s� Makes my stomach churn. I’m trying to be cool.”

Hanni looked at her quietly, and began to ease the wrapped rug out of the van. They carried it into the house, one at each end as if, Joe thought, they were toting an oversized cadaver. Ryan opened up the sliding glass walls of the sunken sitting area while Hanni vacuumed the wood floor. Then, kneeling, they unwrapped the rug, stripping off the heavy brown paper. When at last they had it laid out on the wood floor, even Joe was dazzled. Dulcie caught her breath, creeping closer to the window through the fallen branches.

“I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” she whispered. She and the kit stared and stared at the medley of brilliant colors, the thickly woven, intricate patterns. The kit crept closer still, watching the rug and watching Ryan and Hanni where they knelt in the middle pressing the rug gently toward the walls securing the edges with two-sided tape. Kit was so fascinated that her nose was soon pressed against the screen of the open window. Hanni’s masterpiece, handwoven in England at a fortune per square yard, made all three cats want to sink their paws in and roll with purring abandon. Silently Dulcie reached a paw, as if hypnotized, sliding the tall screen open, and padded delicately into the room.

The kit followed. They were poised among the pillows looking down at that sea of colors and sniffing the scent of clean wool when Ryan and Hanni looked up.

Ryan lifted her hand as if to stop them, but Hanni laughed. Any other designer, confronted with cats on her costly installation, would have shouted and chased them away. Hanni simply watched them, watched Joe Grey pad in too, stepping diffidently among the pillows.

“What harm can they do?” Hanni said. “Come on, cats. Are your paws clean?” She looked where they had trod and saw no dirt. “Come on, have a roll before the grande dame arrives. It’s your only chance. Marianna would eat you alive.” She grinned at Ryan. “Can you imagine? Cats on her hundred-thousand-dollar masterpiece?”

“Don’t you worry they’ll pull a thread?”

“It’s a well-made piece, the English know how to make rugs that last-the Englishknowthere’ll be cats on them. And Joeisa perfect gentleman. Kate and I kept him for a week, at the cottage, when we were down looking at the Pamillon estate. Something about Clyde painting his place. The cat had perfect manners then. Why would he be different now?”

Beneath the cats’ paws, the wool was softer than a featherbed. Dulcie and the kit rolled deliriously, wriggling, sinking into the thick pile, the kit flipping back and forth lashing her long, fluffy tail.

But Joe rolled for only a moment. He came to rest lying on his back, his white paws waving in the air as if in total abandon while he considered the flaw in the fireplace.

In the morning light, from this angle, he couldn’t see that out-of-place, ragged scar. Rolling across the rug as if crazy with play, he looked again.

Nothing. The rising dawn light coming from every direction showed the black recess as smooth as the other two. But last night hehadseen the diagonal scar running down the right-hand rectangle, as sure as his name was Joe Grey. Rolling again, he tried another angle.

“See,” Hanni said, “they’re not doing any harm. But, oh boy, wouldn’t Marianna flip!”

“You love doing something that would enrage her.”

“She’ll never know, as long as they’re out before she gets here.”

“She’s coming down? This morning?”

“She’s in Half Moon Bay-or was, last night. She called me about something, I told her the rug was here. She sounded pretty excited, for ice queen Marianna. Said she’d be down early, that she had some business in the village. One of their rentals, I suppose.” Sullivan had, several years before when the real-estate market was soft, made some excellent investments in Molena Point.

“There, that’s the last of it,” Hanni said, smoothing the corner of the rug. Standing, she stepped up to the tiled entry with Ryan for a full view. They could see, even with the three cats sprawled across the rug, that it lay smooth and flat, a perfect fit, a meadow of color as fine as any painting.

“I’d like to roll on it, myself,” Hanni said.

“Go ahead, you earned it. It truly is magnificent. You can-”

Both women turned as a car pulled into the drive. They couldn’t see it from the entry, that wall and the door were solid. Hanni, stepping into the bedroom to look through the window, hurried out again. “Get the cats out! Come on Joe Grey, Dulcie. Move it, she’s coming.”

Her excited voice would have startled even the dullest cat. But as Joe and Dulcie leaped for the open screen, Marianna, with her usual dispatch, was out of the car and through the front door, her tall, slim figure frozen in the doorway.

The cats, crouched among fallen branches, looked for the kit, but she had vanished. They peered back toward the bright room, where Marianna stood on the landing. She was dressed in a severe black suit, long gold earrings, black stockings, black sandals with four-inch heels. Her eyes were fixed on the fireplace, her expression unbelieving.

Staring back at her from among the freshly split logs, the kit crouched unmoving, her black-and-brown coat hardly visible against the pine bark, but her yellow eyes wide with fear.

Having apparently, in her panic, bolted straight through the mesh curtain, she was trapped. When Marianna approached the firebox, the kit backed deeper, shivering, too frightened to bolt past her and run.

26 [��������: pic_27.jpg]

Kit stared out of the fireplace at the tall, black-suited, spike-heeled blonde with all the fear she would exhibit facing Lucifer himself. And from the woods outside, Joe and Dulcie watched with the same fear of the woman. Even Ryan looked uncertain.

But Hanni moved into the empty silence, laughing. “One little cat, Marianna. Look at her, she couldn’t resist your lovely new rug. Your English weavers would say that’s good luck, to have a little cat bless their creation.”

Marianna gave Hanni a look that should have reduced her to a grease spot. Hanni took Marianna’s hands in her own and tried to ease her down the steps onto the thick, bright rug. Marianna resisted as rigidly as if cast from stone; and Hanni smiled more brightly. “Slip off your sandals, Marianna. Come, sit on it, isn’t it a wonder?” Hanni sat down cross-legged on the bright weave. “I am just so thrilled. Tell me you’re as pleased as we are.”

“There was not one cat in here, Hanni, mere were three. I can’tbelieveyou would letcatsinto my home to make their messes on a brand-new, hundred-thousand-dollar, one-of-a-kind handmade rag, to leave filthy fleas, and very likely ticks.”

“We didn’tseethem come in,” Hanni said, smiling. “We didn’t see them until just as you pulled into the drive, they can only have been in here for a second while our backs were turned.”

Beyond the screened windows crouched among the forest’s foliage, Joe and Dulcie looked at each, laughing at Hanni’s chutzpah, but frightened. The kit was still trapped in there, crouched in the firebox staring up at Marianna. From the look in the kit’s eyes, Marianna would not be smart to reach into the fireplace meaning to snatch her out and evict her.

As they watched, Ryan knelt, reaching in to the kit. The kit came to her at once. Ryan picked her up, carried her to the long windows, set her through and gave her a Utile pat, then closed the screen.

Kit was a streak, fleeing to them. Behind her, Hanni laughed. “What harm did she do? Just a pretty little neighborhood cat.”

Pressing between Joe and Dulcie, the kit shivered with the residue of fear, but lashed her tail with anger. “I would have slashed her, I would have bloodied her.” But soon she began to wriggle, to scratch at something in her fur. Turning, she licked her back, fidgeting as if she itched all over.

“What?” Dulcie said. “What did you do?Didyou pick up a tick? Don’t get it on me. Let me have a look.”

“Hard,” the kit said, licking again and spitting something into the dry leaves and pine needles. “Not a tick. Rocks in my fur.”

Joe nosed at the bit of debris that had fallen among the leaves, and peered closely. He turned it over with his nose, then looked at the kit. “Are there more of these in your fur?Don’t shake them off!Come out to the drive. Don’t spill any! Walk carefully. Hurry, Kit! Comeon!”

Puzzled but obedient, the kit followed. Joe nudged her to a spot on the drive not visible from the living room, and licked at her fur until he had dislodged three more rough pebbles. On me smooth drive he pawed at them, turning them over until each piece lay with its smooth side up, the surface painted jet black. They were bits of broken cement, each with one smooth surface.

“Did you feel those before you hid in the fireplace?”

The kit shook her whiskers. “No.”

Carefully Joe pawed the fragments onto an oak leaf, and slid that beneath a bush. When he turned to look at them, his yellow eyes burned with excitement. And quickly he moved to Ryan’s truck. “Watch for me, Dulcie, in case anyone comes.”

“But you�”

“It’s the only phone handy.” Slipping under me truck to the far side, he was up through the window in a second and punching in information. Another minute and he had rung the Coldiron number and was talking with Eby. “This is a neighbor of me Landeaus�”

He peered out once, but the three women were still inside; and Dulcie sat watching the door, the tip of her tail twitching. When he’d finished explaining to Eby Coldiron what needed to be done, he dropped from the window. “Go home, Dulcie. Go call Dallas, I’m afraid to do that from this phone.Hehas caller ID. I’ll be along soon.”

She looked at him with suspicion.

“It’s safe, trust me. Would I do something foolish?” He brushed his whiskers against hers.

She widened her eyes, and cuffed him. Of course he would do something foolish.

“Tell Garza, if he’ll get over to the Coldirons pronto, they’ll give him a rug from the Landeau cottage, that it’s vital evidence. They’re waiting for him. Tell him to look for little bits of concrete with black paint on them, and to check for blood. My guess is, the DNA will match that of Rupert Dannizer. Tell him the rug has been sponged, then doused with wine.”

“You’re building a lot on a few little bits of concrete.”

“And a scar on the fireplace. Go on. If Dallas isn’t there, talk with Davis.”

“Of course I’ll talk with Davis.” But she gave him a whisker kiss, and a nudge for luck. “Come on, Kit, get moving.” And as she and the kit headed at a gallop toward the village and home, Dulcie wondered: with Garza checking on Rupert’s lovers, would this call about the fireplace tie in somehow? Would it, she thought shivering, tie in with his ballistics report?

Joe was not the most patient of tomcats. Waiting in the bushes by the front door, he kneaded the dry leaves, and scratched his ear. He wanted to yowl at the three women to get on with it, finish their business and leave. But when at last Ryan’s truck pulled out, Marianna and Hanni stood in the doorway-not three feet from him, just above the holly leaves-indulging in incredible inanities as both women tried to smooth over their earlier confrontation. Hanni would make amends because Marianna was her client. Marianna’s motive, in being nice, was less clear.

He tensed as Hanni turned to leave, and crouched.

The instant Marianna turned back inside he was through the door behind her like a shadow easing behind the Mexican chest.

He heard Hanni’s van start and pull away. He was alone with Marianna Landeau, locked inside the cottage. Any route of escape would take at least a few minutes to accomplish, perhaps under conditions he didn’t want to consider. He could hear her rummaging in the bedroom as if she was shifting the clothes in the closet, maybe one of those pointless rearranging orgies to which all women seemed addicted. When he heard her go into the bathroom he strolled through the bedroom door and slipped under the bed, frightening a little spider, wishing someone would dust under there. Didn’t she have a cleaning crew?

A light shone under the bathroom door, and the closet door stood open, the big walk-in space all fitted out with sleek white shelves and drawers and zippered garment bags. Absolutely neat. No place in there for a cat to hide. The hanging rods contained minimal wardrobes, his and hers. He supposed if one had three residences, it would be convenient not to cart suitcases back and forth.

The bathroom door opened and Marianna’s elegantly sandaled feet appeared inches from his nose, her stiletto heels suggesting formidable weapons. He listened to her rummaging in the closet again, heard a zipper close.

Stepping out, she dropped a small duffel by the bedroom door then crossed the tile entry to the sunken sitting area. He heard her close the long windows and lock them, then she stood at the top of the steps with her back to him, as if admiring the rich new rug.

But then she moved swiftly to the kitchen, returning with one of those little plug-in hand vacs designed for quick cleanup, for those moments when someone scatters coffee grounds or cookie crumbs across the kitchen floor. With the brand-new rug, what was there to clean up? Joe went rigid, watching.

Kneeling before the fireplace, her tight skirt hiked up around her thighs, Marianna slid the mesh curtain back and reached in to vacuum the corners of the firebox behind the clean, stacked logs. Surely removing the same debris that the kit had picked up on her fur.

She did a thorough job, forcing the nozzle into the back corners. But when she returned the little machine to the kitchen, Joe smiled. She’d forgotten something. Retrieving the duffel bag from the bedroom, and shutting the closet door, she jingled her keys and was out of there, locking the front door behind her.

Not until he heard her car pull away, did he come out from under the bed.

First he tossed the bedroom, working open the night table drawers, then the drawers of the television armoire. He checked between the mattresses, poking a wary paw in, then crawling deeper, but he found only lint. Swinging on the closet-door handle, he was in within seconds, leaping at the bank of built-in drawers, gripping and kicking.

Forcing each one open in turn, he pawed carefully through. Dulcie would love Marianna’s expensive lace undies, the silk and satin perfumed with fancy little sachets. The last drawer contained half-a-dozen evening bags and as many compacts, all of them expensive looking. Crouched on the edge of the drawer, Joe frowned. Should he?

Well, why not? What could be more opportune? Pawing half-a-dozen compacts into a quilted evening bag, he snapped closed his prize and carried it in his teeth to the front door. There he began the tedious, paw-bruising, leaping contortions necessary to slide the dead bolt, turn the knob, and escape from his self-made prison.

Lashing her tail with amusement, Dulcie pushed the phone back onto its cradle and rolled over on Wilma’s bed, her paws in the air, a Cheshire cat-smile lighting her tabby face. Oh, she did enjoy these anonymous phone calls. Dallas had not only assured her that he would drive over to the Coldirons’ cottage at once, to pick up the brown shag rug, but he thanked her. He knew as well as she that it was futile to ask her questions.

Though at first, he had argued with her. He said the concrete crumbs in the rug could be simple debris left over when the fireplace was built. Dulcie reminded him that the black recesses had been painted some time after the fireplace was built, and the fragments had black paint on them. Then Garza said that the three sculptures had been installed in those niches only recently, andthatprobably accounted for the black-painted chips. He’d gone silent when Dulcie informed him that the sculptures were fitted with special tension brackets at the back, so they had no need of bolts to hold them in place.

Garza hadn’t asked how she knew so much about the sculptures and about the interior of the Landeau cottage. Like Max Harper, Detective Garza had learned that it was useless to ask such questions, that he’d best take what he was offered and run with it. So far these anonymous tips had been 100 percent; both cops knew that. And maybe, she thought, this information might dovetail with lines of investigation that Garza was already pursuing. That would be interesting.

And, she thought rolling over and purring,thismorning, withthisphone call, Detective Garza had almost taken orders from her. He had agreed to collect the rug right away, absolutely trusting her, never once making light of her instructions. Oh, she couldn’t wait to tell Joe.