Cat On The Edge

6

Clyde sat on the edge of his bed staring at the receiver of the telephone he held in his shaking hand. He felt as if he'd taken a blow to the midsection. The voice of the caller reverberated as if from some unseen dimension, replaying back to him an impossible message.

It's me. It's Joe Grey … I thought you'd be worried. … I am your cat. Bedtime Buddy. Favorite Feline… Cream and Wheaties with chopped liver… I don't like that woman. It sickens me to watch you in the shower washing her back…

Some joke. Some twisted, sick joke.

Who had that been? Whose voice was that? Which one of his idiot friends? Who had the talent to pull off that kind of phone call? To make it sound so much like Joe Cat, and to tell him that personal stuff. Who knew that personal stuff? Who did he know who could pull that off, and not break up laughing?

He dropped the phone on the bed and stood up, looking around the dim bedroom. The rush of adrenaline generated by the phone call was making his stomach flip.

The drawn shades were awash with sunlight, bright rays creeping in around the edges.

He turned, stared at the phone. Maybe the phone hadn't rung at all. Maybe he'd dreamed that it was ringing. Probably he'd dreamed the whole damned conversation.

That was it. He'd dreamed that the phone rang, and he snatched it up in his sleep. He'd dreamed he was talking to Joe. That had to be the explanation. The only logical explanation. It couldn't have been one of his friends; no one else knew the things the caller had told him.

And no one-no one in the world could know exactly what he had shouted at Joe yesterday morning when Joe was pacing and muttering. For Christ sake, Joe, stop it! It's too damned early to be horny! No one in the world could mimic the exact, irritated sound of his own voice at that precise moment, his own angry, half-asleep growl.

It had been a dream, a figment conjured out of his own warped mind.

For a minute there he'd really bought it. He could still hear the caller's voice, so familiar, rasping and coolly amused, its harsh tone exactly like Joe Cat's insulting yowl.

He got up, staring at the phone, then picked up the receiver and dropped it back in its cradle.

But the next instant he snatched it up again and threw it on the rumpled bed. He didn't want it to ring. He wasn't answering any more phone calls. The receiver buzzed for a moment, then a taped female voice told him to hang up and dial again.

"I didn't dial!" he shouted at the taped voice. "And you can go to hell!"

He had to have some coffee. And he'd better get in the shower, get dressed for work.

It took him several minutes to realize that this was Saturday and his day off, that he'd still be asleep if Joe hadn't called.

If Joe hadn't…

He'd better get hold of himself.

Cats did not make phone calls.

Cats did not speak human words.

Cats communicated with body language. Cats said things with angry glares, with tail lashings and butt wiggles. They let you know how they felt by squinching their ears down or poking you with a paw. By hissing at you, or flipping their tail and stalking away. That was cat talk. Cats did not speak the English language.

He stood scratching his stubbled chin, knowing in his gut that the phone call hadn't been a dream. Knowing that the ringing of the phone had waked him. Remembering the sunlight slashing beneath the shade into his eyes as he rolled over and grabbed the phone. Hearing that rasping voice.

The morning sun beat relentlessly against the window shades, thrusting its bright fingers more powerfully underneath like some nosy neighbor. His face itched; he hated it when his face itched. Staring at the demanding sunlight, imagining the bright day beyond the blinds, he got an unwanted mental picture of Joe stretched out in the sunshine somewhere, maybe beside someone's pool, talking over the poolside phone.

He flipped up a window shade, causing the stiff fabric to spin dangerously on its roller. He stood at the window, staring out at the street praying he would see Joe come strolling down the sidewalk.

And knowing he wouldn't.

Where the hell was the cat?

He needed coffee. He needed to talk to someone. He needed to see if the rest of the animals were different this morning.

What was he going to find in the kitchen? A tangle of chattering dogs and cats complaining about the quality of their breakfast? Bitching because he was late getting up?

He shuffled down the hall in his shorts; as he opened the kitchen door, a barrage of leaping canines hit him. The two warm, whining dogs pummeled and pushed. The cats yowled and wound around his bare ankles, tickling with their twining, furry greeting.

Neither the cats nor the dogs spoke a word. All remained satisfyingly mute. He petted Rube gratefully. The black Lab smiled up at him, then bent to lick his toes. Barney pushed against them both, growling as he competed for attention.

He scratched the dogs until they calmed down, then picked up all three cats, cuddling them in a huge hug, letting them rub their faces against his bristly cheeks.

When the cats began staring down from his arms at the counters, looking for some sign of breakfast, he put them down again on the floor. Stepping over the furry tangle, he filled the coffeepot with water and got the can of coffee from the cupboard. But he was still so upset by the phone call he spilled half the coffee grounds, then lost count of how many scoops. He ended up dumping it all back in the can and starting over.

That call was the perfect end to a rotten week. First the break-in at the shop, when his automotive tools were stolen along with a collection of shop gauges that would be hard to replace. The senseless burglary enraged and puzzled him. The thief could just as easily have entered the main showroom instead of the shop, could have broken the lock on the big showroom overhead doors and driven off with several million dollars' worth of new, and vintage, foreign cars.

Why, with that fortune sitting in the showroom, had he chosen to burgle the shop?

Then three mornings later, Max Harper had shown up at the agency just before opening time, and that was when the real nightmare began.

The police chief had pulled his patrol car into the covered drive between the showroom and the shop. Harper's thin, lined face had been more than ordinarily glum.

He'd known Max Harper since they were in high school; they had done some ranch work together, summers, and had rodeoed together, riding the bulls. Harper had joined the police force after four years at San Jose State. He'd married while still in college; his wife, Millie, had been in the criminal justice program at San Jose, too, and had gone into law enforcement. She died two years ago, of a brain hemorrhage. The pain of her death was still raw for Harper. You could see it hidden behind his natural wariness.

Harper didn't get out of the squad car, but sat behind the wheel frowning at him. "Beckwhite won't be in this morning."

"So? How come you're relaying the message?" But he'd felt a chill begin. "What happened?"

Harper reached into his uniform pocket for a pack of cigarettes, and shook one out, and gave him a level look. "Beckwhite's dead. He was killed last night." Harper watched him carefully, at the same time seeing every movement within the shop where three mechanics were laying out tools preparing for their morning's work.

His first thought, a trite reaction, was that Beckwhite couldn't be dead, that he'd seen Beckwhite only yesterday. No, any minute now Beckwhite would come strolling into the shop from the showroom, carrying a paper cup of coffee from the machine, his close-cropped military haircut catching a gleam from the overhead lights, his grin self-satisfied even at this early hour. No, Samuel Beckwhite wasn't dead.

"George Jolly found his body this morning, in the alley behind the deli. He'd been hit on the head, his skull cracked." Harper struck a match and cupped his hand around the flame, though there was no wind. He blew smoke out through the opposite window. "No sign of anything that Beckwhite could have hit his head against. And it was too hard a blow for that. The coroner's looking at it. He's been dead since eight or nine last night."

It had taken him a while to respond. "Has-has someone told his wife? Told Sheril?"

Harper nodded. "I went on up there." He got a funny look on his face, but said nothing more.

The shock of Beckwhite's death had left the agency staff confused, had thrown the conduct of day-to-day business into chaos. The murder had been all over the papers, local and San Francisco.

And the murder, for various reasons, had left him feeling uneasy. That unease was heightened considerably when, yesterday morning as he was looking for Joe Cat, he discovered that someone had tried to break into the house through the living room window.

When he saw the splintered wood, he had barged outdoors in his shorts and found a larger hole on that side, ragged and broken as if gouged by a tire iron or by a large screwdriver.

He had hurried back inside, staring around the living room. Nothing was gone-TV and VCR were there, CD player, all the electronic equipment. And then, because Joe Cat wasn't nearby yowling for his breakfast, he grew concerned for all the animals. He headed for the kitchen; but when he flung open the kitchen door, the dogs were rarin' to go, charging past him straight for the living room. Leaping at the window, roaring and snarling, they had put on an amazing surge of adrenaline for two fat old farts.

The window was so freshly splintered that it still smelled like new lumber. He had found no other damage to the outside of the house, and no sign that anyone had gotten inside. When he checked the study, nothing was amiss. The one item that concerned him was still on the desk, the small notebook lay in plain sight beside his checkbook. He had stuffed it under some papers, intending to hide it later.

The attempted burglary, just after Beckwhite's death, had disturbed him enough to make him load the.38 snub nose he kept for traveling, and slip it into his night table. He could not help equating the burglary in some way with Beckwhite's murder.

He'd known Samuel Beckwhite for six years; they were business associates though he did not work for Beckwhite. He rented the big repair shop portion of the agency in exchange for maintenance and repair on the agency's foreign cars, and he serviced the vehicles belonging to the agency's regular customers. A friend from his high school days, Jimmie Osborne, had brought him and Beckwhite together originally, suggesting the business arrangement. Jimmie was agency manager; he had worked for Beckwhite since a year after Jimmie and Kate were married.

He never could figure out why Kate had married Jimmie. Golden-haired Kate Anderson had been some catch for sour, humorless Jimmie Osborne.

Standing in the kitchen waiting for the coffee water to suck up into the machine, he finally realized he hadn't turned on the coffeemaker. He flipped the switch, the red light came on, and the machine gasped a pneumatic wheeze. He yawned and adjusted his binding shorts. He hadn't slept well. Every little noise had brought him up listening for the scrape of claws or the slap of the cat door.

And of course the early phone call jerking him from sleep, and that rasping voice, hadn't helped.

I am your cat… It's me, Joe Grey.

Forget it. Get your mind off it.

He removed the glass carafe and poured a cup of coffee, but the machine hadn't quite finished. In insolent defiance at his meddling it dribbled coffee down onto the heating unit. The animals kept pushing at him, wanting breakfast.

He wondered who would eventually take over at the shop, or if Beckwhite's would be sold.

Jimmie Osborne was next in command, though Sheril Beckwhite, of course, was the new owner. Since Beckwhite's death, the office was chaotic. No one seemed able to carry on efficiently. There were endless glitches in the paperwork, unnecessary rewriting of sales contracts. And the relationship between Sheril and Jimmie didn't add to agency morale. Who could have confidence in Jimmie's managerial functions when they were conducted mostly in bed?

Everyone knew about the affair. He'd wondered whether Beckwhite had known. He felt sure that Kate didn't know. Kate wouldn't dream that Jimmie would cheat on her.

He wouldn't have remained friends with Jimmie, except for Kate. He and Jimmie had had little in common, even in high school. But he enjoyed Kate, saw things in Kate that Jimmie didn't see or didn't care to see. She was wry and funny, and he liked her comfortable empathy for animals. She really loved his two old dogs and the cats, and she shared with him a kind of warped, animal-centered humor that bored Jimmie. He and Kate always had a good time together, while Jimmie yawned.

He would never overstep the bonds of friendship with the Osbornes, he had never touched Kate. But she was beautiful and fun to be with, and without Jimmie their relationship might have evolved into a good deal more.

It surprised him sometimes that Jimmie put up with their evenings together, with their potluck barbecues and casual spaghetti dinners; and with the animals, particularly the cats. Jimmie said he was allergic to animals, but he never sneezed. The animals avoided him, though, all but Joe Cat.

Joe always went straight to Osborne the minute they arrived, rubbing against his pant legs, methodically covering Jimmie's freshly cleaned slacks with gray and white hairs. And Joe liked to sit on the couch beside Jimmie. He would remain close as Jimmie fidgeted. But before Jimmie got up the nerve to shove him off he would leap on the coffee table, deliberately spilling Jimmie's drink.

Cats loved to do that stuff-they found high amusement in tormenting those who disliked or feared them. And Kate watched Joe's pranks with a little secret laugh. Though she would never deliberately hurt Jimmie.

Given Kate's beauty and charm and her obvious enjoyment of life, he thought it incredible that Jimmie would pursue this affair with Sheril Beckwhite. Some men couldn't deal comfortably with the blessings of a beautiful wife; they had to find a cheap stand-in, someone flawed to make them look better by comparison.

He had known about the affair for months. He'd been surprised when Jimmie called him four times this week, looking for Kate, saying she hadn't been home. He was surprised that Jimmie would care enough to call anyone. He hoped Kate had finally left Jimmie, and not just gone down to Santa Barbara as she sometimes did, to get away.

Kate deserved better than Jimmie Osborne, her blond good looks and blithe spirit and her bright outlook were wasted on Jimmie. He thought sometimes that Kate's perceptive, almost fey qualities frightened Jimmie.

He refilled his coffee cup, letting his thoughts return to the subject he'd been avoiding, playing over again in his mind this morning's phone call. I can't come home. Someone is following me… Trust me. When I get this sorted out, I'll be home. I am your cat… I guess I miss you.

The dogs pushed against his bare legs, demanding breakfast. He pummeled them absently, letting them chew on his hand, then opened the cupboard and lifted out assorted cans. If Joe Cat were here he'd be up on the counter clawing open the cupboard himself, yowling and raking cans onto the floor, his bomb raid narrowly missing his companions, though they knew to stand out of the way.

The shaky feeling started again.

He needed to talk to someone.

Someone who wouldn't say he was nuts, who wouldn't laugh at him.

When the dogs had finished scarfing up Kennel Ration and began to slobber on him, smearing dog food down his legs, he pushed them outside into the backyard. The three cats looked up at the open door, but continued to eat.

The only person besides Kate who would listen to his crazy story about the phone call and not fall over laughing was Wilma.

He'd known Wilma Getz since he was eight, when her parents moved next door, up on Harley Street. She was in graduate school at USC, having returned to college after breaking off a bad marriage. She'd stayed with her folks during vacations while she interned in various law enforcement agencies. A tall, slim, stunning blond, she was his first love, her warm smile and her easy ways sending his eight-year-old libido into a wild juvenile spin.

Even then, when he was eight, Wilma had always had time to listen to him, always had time for a game of catch or to toss a few baskets in his driveway. Over the years, she had never lost her ability to listen and to ease him.

Wilma's passion for law enforcement had taken her from USC to State Parole, then to Federal Probation and Parole in San Francisco, and then to Denver. She had retired from the Denver office five years ago. Returning to Molena Point, she had gone to work in the understaffed village library, where her thorough, almost picky approach to a problem was put to good use as a reference assistant.

He had to talk with Wilma. There was no one else who, upon hearing his description of that phone call and the reasons why the caller couldn't have been any of his friends, wouldn't suggest an appointment with a local shrink.

He poured the last of the coffee and carried his cup into the bedroom. He phoned the library to see if Wilma was free for lunch, but she'd taken the day off. When he called the house, there was no answer. Annoyed, he decided to run by. Maybe she was only out walking. He hung up the phone, tossed his shorts in the laundry bag, and got in the shower.