Cat Pay The Devil

16

“E ven if Dallas finds the safe,” Dulcie said, peering from the pine tree, into the basement, “he won’t open it if the warrant is just to look for Wilma and Cage.”

The kit’s yellow eyes narrowed. “He needs to know Greeley’s looking for something in there, just like Cage searched Wilma’s house. If we had a phone…There’s a phone in the kitchen, we can slip back in the house and call his cell…”

“No way,” Dulcie hissed. “Phone Dallas while he’s in the house with us? We push our luck, and…I don’t like to think about that.”

Kit sighed and settled reluctantly among the branches, watching Dallas search through the boxes and abandoned furniture, his hand never far from his weapon. When he opened the empty closet where the safe was hidden, the cats hissed with surprise: The closet had been empty, just the loose linoleum with the safe beneath it sunk into the floor. Now it was filled with boxes, a bucket of tools, the old rusted fan that had lain atop a trunk, and a tangle of old boots. Dallas stepped back, looking. He knew that clutter hadn’t been there when he’d searched the house earlier. The detective turned, his back to the wall, taking another long look into the shadows and dark spaces. He stepped to the door that led to the stairs, closed it, and shoved a heavy carton against it. Then he searched the garage.

When he found no one, he moved to the windows. Finding the unlocked window, he examined the sill, then slid it open, looking out into the dark woods. Above him, the cats crouched, unmoving. Leaning out the open window, he used his flashlight, in the darkening evening, to study the earth beneath the sill. Dulcie and Kit were glad they had trod only on pine needles. At last Dallas eased himself out the window and shone his light back and forth across the yard, looking for footprints.

“Did Greeley cover up the safe like that?” Dulcie whispered. “Or did Lilly? Is there something in it she doesn’t want found? Did she put that stuff on top after she heard noises and came down, thinking someone was in there?”

“Someone was there. We were.”

“Someone human,” Dulcie said. “Maybe she thought it was Greeley. But what would she hide in there? Her jewelry?” Dulcie smiled. “She doesn’t look like the type to ever wear fancy jewelry…And would Greeley go to all this trouble for a few pieces of an old woman’s jewelry? I don’t think so.”

“And,” Kit said, “what does all this have to do with Cage?”

Dallas was moving the boxes and trash from the closet; when he’d emptied it, he knelt, lifted the loose linoleum, and pulled it back out of the way. Yes, he’d known the safe was there, the cats could see that. And now that someone had taken the trouble to cover it, his attention was keen.

He tried lifting the lid, then turned the dial until it clicked, and tried again. Maybe his warrant covered this, maybe not. The detective was as curious as a cat, himself. When spinning the dial once didn’t work, he remained crouched, lightly fingering it.

“Does he know how to crack a safe?” Dulcie whispered, and the tabby smiled. “Looks like he’s tempted.”

“Would that be legal?”

“To finger the tumblers, and crack a safe?” Dulcie twitched her whiskers. “Not likely,” she said, enjoying Dallas’s temptation.

They watched him resist, and at last he rose and began to replace the clutter that had been piled on top, putting everything back just the way it had been, his tanned, square Latino face drawn into a frown. Then he headed for the stairs, moved the barrier, and disappeared. As his footsteps ascended, the cats scrambled up again to the roof and softly across it, then crouched above the front door listening to Dallas and his officer taking their leave, Dallas thanking Lilly for her courtesy and help with a dry sarcasm that was rare for the laid-back officer; the cats watched them head for their squad car as Lilly closed the front door hard with a chill finality, a clear message that she was tired of people tramping through her house. As the officers’ car made a U-turn and headed back down the hills toward the village, Dulcie and Kit streaked away across the rooftops, heading home, their minds a tumble of new facts and more than a few questions.

Racing from shingles into pine or oak trees and down across more roofs, up and down over a jumble of peaks, Dulcie hoped Max Harper was still at the cottage, and that by now there was news of Wilma-good news. Dulcie let herself think of no other kind. The evening was warm, as soft as velvet, the late sky holding more light, now, than the dark village streets below. But when the courthouse clock struck nine, her heart sank. On a normal evening Wilma would be home, they’d have finished supper and would be tucked up together on the velvet couch, or, on cold nights, in bed by the woodstove, contentedly reading.

Dulcie’s creamy stone cottage shone out of the darkness, and there were lights at the windows. The tabby ran so fast she hardly hit the shingles, and twice she tripped over her own paws. But, then, warily they stopped on the roof of the next-door house, looking.

There were only two police units, now, at the curb. And two officers stringing yellow tape around the edge of the garden. As if this is a murder scene, Dulcie thought sickly. As she approached the house, she began to shiver.

But of course Harper would want to mark the premises off limits, to preserve any possible evidence they might have missed. Taking heart, she leaped from the neighbors’ roof into the oak tree by Wilma’s living room window.

Just beyond the open window, Max Harper sat at Wilma’s desk, busy with paperwork. Dulcie drew nearer along the branch, and could see that he was filling out a report. Both cats tried to read it upside down. Behind them a car pulled to the curb and Dallas stepped out, alone; perhaps he had swung by the station to drop off his officer. He hurried in through the open front door. The whole house seemed to be open, though the heat that had collected within would take half the night to dissipate; the walls would stay hot long after the late breeze had cooled the rooms. Dallas drew up a chair beside the desk, glancing inquiringly at Max.

Max shook his head. “Nothing. You?”

“No sign of Wilma, and Lilly doesn’t seem to know anything. One or two details were strange; I’ll fill you in later. Anything on the Tucker and Keating murders?”

“Reports just came in,” Max said. “Linda Tucker case, the only sets of prints besides the Tuckers’ belonged to the cleaning lady and to a plumber who was in the house three days before.

“The Keating case, Elaine’s husband had a poker game last week. All we got were the Keatings’ prints, and those of five poker players. We’ll need a day or two to get that bunch in for questioning.”

Harper didn’t seem terribly interested in those possible suspects, and the chief’s indifference shocked Dulcie. “What’s he thinking? Is he off on some other track?”

But Kit’s yellow eyes had widened with dismay. “Does he think…” She looked at Dulcie and shivered. “Does he think the husbands did it? Oh, that would be too bad.”

Dulcie watched Kit with interest. The young tortoiseshell cat, after helping gather information on so many cases, and hearing about other murders from Joe and Dulcie, should be inured to such matters-but she was not hardened to the thought of a husband killing his wife, and Dulcie understood. The fact that these men might have murdered the partners they had vowed to love and cherish, seemed to hurt something deep and tender in the young tortoiseshell. Kit had never, as a kitten, known a loving and nurturing family; did not remember her mother or her littermates. A close and loving family seemed to Kit rare and wonderful; she looked on family as having a sacred bond of love and decency, and the thought of murder within that family bond hurt her deeply. Dulcie looked at Kit, hunched miserably on the branch, and she licked Kit’s ear, trying to soothe her; but suddenly both cats startled to attention as Max, pushing back his chair, stood up from the desk.

He shoved his papers in a folder and looked at Dallas. “I’ll stop by the Greenlaws, see if they’ve heard from Wilma, if they have anything that could help.” The lean lines of his face fell into a deeper dismay. “They have to be told she’s missing; I don’t want them hearing it on the news if some reporter picks it up. Will you call Ryan again? I’ll keep trying Charlie. Those two…They get off with the horses, they never turn on their phones, the rest of the world doesn’t exist.”

“I’ll keep trying,” Dallas said. “Or I’ll take a run up there.”

Max nodded. “Maybe by the time we get hold of them, we’ll have better news.”

Dulcie and Kit watched Harper head up the walk to his squad car; as he pulled away they were already racing across the roofs, heading for Kit’s house. Kit wanted to be there with Lucinda and Pedric, to be close to comfort them when Max told them that Wilma was missing. She wanted to be there for them just as, when she was little and lost and frightened, Lucinda and Pedric had comforted her, had held her close, petting her; had snuggled her in their soft bed and given her nice things to eat. Now her humans would need comforting, would need what Pedric called “a wee bit of moral support.”

Though Kit couldn’t bring them good things to eat-unless Lucinda and Pedric had developed a taste for fresh mouse.