Cat Raise The Dead

17

As the cats crouched on the moonlit hillside, above them the high grass stems thrust black and sharp as knives against the moon. Through the grass they looked down onto the rooftops of Casa Capri, the sloping tiles struck into patterns of curving shadow. Far down beyond the retirement villa and beyond the village roofs, the moon's path cut like a yellow highway across the dark Pacific.

Nothing moved. No wind. The night was still and bright.

Just above the main building of Casa Capri, the rows of small retirement cottages climbed up toward them, their moonlit roofs gleaming pale, their little streets lit at intervals by the decorative lamps spaced along the winding lanes. But the cottages themselves were dark. No light shone, no curtain stirred where retirees slept. The time was 4:00 A.M.

The main building of Casa Capri was dark at the front. Along the sides, a thin glow from the softened hall lights seeped out from the residents' rooms. At the back of the building, in the Nursing wing, bright lights burned. One imagined sleepless patients suffering late-night changes of IV bottles, or perhaps restless with pains and discomforts and with the fears which can accompany old age.

Glancing at each other, the cats slipped on down through the grass, down between the dark cottages, and across the little narrow streets. Pausing in a geometrically neat bed of pansies, they studied the Nursing wing.

The windows in Nursing were high and securely closed, as if perhaps those shut-in patients disliked the cool night air. There was no access there, through those windows. They had crossed the last street into the shadow of the building when suddenly a clashing explosion of sound hit them, loud as the crash of wrecking cars. Metal clanging against metal. They crouched belly down, staring wide-eyed, frozen to the earth, ready to run.

But then they identified the harsh metallic music of a radio booming out from the Nursing wing, a blare of Spanish brass, of trumpets blasting and snorting, and they crept on again, ears tight to their heads, slinking.

The next instant someone turned the volume down, and the noise subsided to a nearly tolerable decibel level.

Eight cars stood in the parking lot, their metal bodies pale with dew from having been parked most of the night. Not a car among them was more than two years old, and they were all top-of-the-line Buicks, Chevys, even two Mercedeses. Skirting the parking lot, the cats headed for the Care Unit, and there, slipping in through the wrought-iron fence that guarded the little terraces, they searched for an open glass door, for access to a bedroom and the hall beyond.

Most of the glass doors were closed. The two that had been left open a few inches were secured in place by a bar, and the screens were latched. As if the occupants worried seriously about human intruders scaling the six-foot fence and strangling them in their beds.

The cats could hear the soft breathing of the shadowy sleepers, but some of the occupied beds looked hardly disturbed, the covers nearly flat and only a small, thin mound where the sleeper lay. Other occupants had tangled their covers and twisted them or thrown them on the floor. One old man, wrapped in a cocoon of blankets, snored like a bulldog with bad tonsils.

Trying each door and screen, they were nearly to the end of the row before they found a glass standing open and the screen unlatched, or perhaps the latch was broken. The room smelled of cherry cough syrup. Slipping inside, they crept past the bed and its mountainous occupant. A metal walker with rubber feet stood beside the open door to the hall. They crouched beside it, looking down the empty corridor, then fled along it toward the social room.

In the darkness, the room seemed huge, the hulking shapes of couches and overstuffed chairs looming like fat, misshapen beasts. Beyond their hunching black forms, the white-clothed dining tables were moonlit, the moon itself shining in through the glass. To the left of the dim room, the patio gleamed pale through its glass doors. They leaped to the back of a dark sofa, listening.

From down the hall, toward the admitting desk, two women were talking; and the cats could smell coffee. Leaping from the couch to a chair, and to a couch again, they moved in that direction, then quickly through the open doors and down the hall.

At the parlor they slipped into the deep shadows beneath a chair. Staring out, they studied the brightly lit admitting desk and the open doors of the two lit offices.

The admitting desk was deserted, but in one of the offices the two women were laughing, and a coffee cup rattled. The cats fled past and down the hall, toward the closed door of Nursing, where they could hear the brassy music playing softly. Sliding into the nearest darkened bedroom, they sat close together, looking out through the crack of the door, studying the secured entrance to Nursing.

The door was one of those pneumatic arrangements which, the cats knew from past experience, was beyond their strength to open. If they waited long enough, someone had to come through; all they needed was patience. Behind them, in the dark bedroom, the sleeper moaned and turned over; the room smelled sour, of sleeping human, and was too warm. Soon Dulcie began to fidget, and then a flea began to chew at Joe's rump. He bit at it furiously, easing the itch, trying in vain to catch the little beast. Lately he'd begun to think of his minor but stubborn flea infestation as a serious breach of personal hygiene, a scourge on the civilized being he had become, a source of deep embarrassment.

Clyde had suggested that if he hated flea spray so much, he might try a daily shower. Well, of course, Clyde would offer some incredibly stupid solution. Joe was surprised Clyde hadn't bought him a razor, encouraged him to take up shaving; certainly that would get rid of the fleas.

They waited, watching the lit crack beneath the door to Nursing for what seemed an endless time before suddenly that space darkened, and footsteps hushed on the carpet within.

The pneumatic door sucked inward, and a nurse hurried out past them, her white shoes flashing along, inches from their noses. Before the door sucked closed they bolted through.

They nearly rammed into the heels of a second nurse. Crouching behind her, their hearts pounding, they stared around for a place to hide, but the best bet, the only real option, was the cart beside her. She stood with her back to them, arranging something on its metal shelves. They could smell hot cocoa and buttered toast, and, as she turned toward a counter, they fled underneath, between the chrome wheels.

Soon they were creeping along beneath the moving cart as she pushed it down the hall, their ears flicking up against the cold metal. The rubber tires made a soft pulling sound on the carpet, like tape being ripped from a fuzzy surface. Around them they could see only the wheels, the wooden molding along the wall, and the bottoms of the evenly spaced doors. If there were charts on the doors presenting the patients' names, they could see nothing of these. They might be passing Jane Hubble's room at this moment and never know. This procedure wasn't going to cut it. If they could ride on top the cart, that would be an improvement. Dulcie glanced at him with impatience, her tail twitching nervously against the metal wheel.

Some of the rooms were dark, but most were lit, and in some the voice of an elderly occupant groaned or called out. The smells of medicine and of sick people made them both want to retch. They could see the bandage-wrapped feet of one patient who was out of bed sitting in a chair. Halfway down the hall the cart stopped, the black rubber tires were stilled, and the nurse's white shoes padded away into a softly lit room. Behind her, they crept out to look

Through the open door, a bedside lamp threw a narrow glow across the metal bed and across the thin, wrinkled occupant; he had an obedient, gentle face, as if he had long ago resigned himself to the entrapments of old age. As the nurse turned to straighten his nightstand, the cats slipped in behind her and under the bed.

Crouching beneath the dusty springs, they were only inches from her size five white oxfords, so close they could smell the mown grass through which she must have recently walked. This blended pleasantly with the smell of cocoa and buttered toast, and they could hear her arranging a tray before the patient, could hear the plate slide on the metal surface. She spoke to the old man in Spanish, but he answered her in English. Both seemed comfortable with the arrangement. They could hear her fluffing his pillows, then she braced her feet as if helping him into a sitting position. When she had him settled she left the room, wheeling her cart away.

The patient ate with little sucking and clicking sounds, as if his teeth didn't fit very well. They could see no chart on the inside of the partially open door, to tell his name. They had started to creep out when another nurse came down the hall.

Retreating again beneath the bed, Dulcie hunched uncomfortably, her paws tight together. She didn't like this part of Casa Capri-the Nursing wing was a fullblown hospital, reminding her too sharply of the vet's clinic. The disinfectant and medicinal smells and the cold, hard surfaces brought back every dreadful moment of her five days in Dr. Firetti's animal hospital, when she was sick with a respiratory infection.

She had, over in the social room, been able to maintain the illusion of happy days for these old folks, in a comfortable little world set aside just for their nurturing. But suddenly illness and the failure of the body were too apparent. In this wing of Casa Capri, all she could think of was sickness and dying.

Still, though, the old people were cared for, their meals were prepared, and they were warm and clean. If they had no one at home to look after them, and if they could not care for themselves, then where else would they be happier?

The cats remained beneath the bed until the hall was silent again, until they could no longer hear the rubber tires of the cart working its way from room to room. Above them, each time the old man set down his cocoa cup, it rattled as if his hand was shaky. He spilled a few crumbs of his toast, which rained down over the edge of the bed. He coughed once, then gulped cocoa. When he picked up the remote from the nightstand and turned on the TV, when presumably his attention had become fixed on an ancient John Wayne film, they slipped away, streaking out of the room.

Surely he hadn't seen them; behind them he raised no cry of surprise. Gunshots cut the night, and a horse whinnied.

They fled down the hall without the cover of the cart, repeatedly looking behind them, and quickly scanning the charts affixed to the patients' doors. Looking for Jane, Lillie, Darlene, Mary Nell, Foy Serling, and James Luther. They were just at the corner where the hall turned to the right when someone spoke behind them. Joe careened against Dulcie, shoving her down a short, side corridor.

The voices came closer, two nurses speaking casually as they approached on some routine business. The end of this little hall was blocked by a door which must lead back to the Care Unit. They sucked up against the wall as two nurses passed, their white-stockinged legs and white oxfords marching in rhythm. One heel of the taller woman's size nine shoes had a minute speck of dog doo. The cats wrinkled their noses at the smell. Speaking Spanish, the women turned down the longer hall, passing a fire door. As they moved away the cats followed. Joe paused at the heavy, closed door.

"Teddy went out here. Spice shaving lotion."

"So?"

"So when Dillon was dragging me all over, I saw wheelchair marks going out the fire door and into the parking lot."

"Mae Rose said he drives a car, one of those specially equipped cars. If he's Adelina's cousin, probably he comes and goes as he pleases."

"Then why does he live here? Adelina Prior is loaded. Why wouldn't she get him a nice apartment and hired help? Or why doesn't he live on that big estate with her?"

"Maybe he's sort of unofficial social director. Mae Rose says most of the old people like him, that he's always doing little favors, asking for the special foods they want, remembering their birthdays. He doesn't seem as sarcastic with the others as he is with Mae Rose."

Someone changed the Spanish radio station to hard rock, and the thudding drummed at the cats' nerves like a distant demolition crew. Over the din they heard another nurse coming, the sticky sound made by her rubber-soled shoes on the carpet, and quickly they slid into a darkened bedroom.

Immaculate white shoes and red-tasseled sox passed them at a trot, trailing the scent of Ivory soap. Then two more nurses, their snowy Oxfords flitting like two pairs of white rabbits hopping along the hall.

When the way was empty again the cats moved fast, looking up at the names on the charts. The hall formed a rectangle around a block of center rooms, so that only the outside rooms had windows. By the time they had rounded the last corner and could see the nursing station again, they had found not one of the six residents that Mae Rose claimed were missing.

The nursing station ahead was so busy they might never get past it and out the door. Nurses moved swiftly between two counters, which were covered with medicine bottles and boxes and cartons and a stack of paper towels, with a large stainless-steel coffeepot and a tray of ceramic mugs. As they slipped into yet another darkened room, they were beginning to fidget with impatience. Staring out at hurrying feet and listening to disjointed snatches of conversation, both in English and in Spanish, they felt completely surrounded. Trapped. They grew so irritable they nearly hissed at each other.

Someone changed the radio station back to Spanish music. One of the nurses began to sing with it in a sultry voice. When at last the hall was clear for an instant, they fled for the nursing station, running full out, pausing only to scan the remaining charts, then slide beneath the counter.

Crouching under the crowded shelves that lined the back of the counter, they were hardly out of sight when Size Nine returned, moving in near them, smelling of dog doo. She had only to glance down beneath the shelves to see them huddled. Standing inches from their noses, she began to stack papers, tamping the stacks against the desk. The air under the shelf was hot and close. They heard the pneumatic door to the hall open, and someone wheeled the food cart away, presumably back toward the kitchen.

A nurse came to the counter, there was a short conversation about medications, then Size Nine went away with her, down the hall. The instant she left, they reared up to examine the contents of the shelves, looking for some record of the patients' names.

They found boxes of syringes, tongue depressors, small packets containing artificial sweetener and fake coffee cream. There was a row of nurses' handbags lined up, fat and wrinkled, smelling of peppermints and makeup and tobacco; but no files, no list of patients.

"Come on," Joe said. "Check out the other counter. You watch the hall while I look." Leaping to the counter among the medicine bottles and IV tubes and the makings for a hot cup of coffee, he sorted through the tangle, patting irritably at the boxes.

"Here we go," he said softly, pawing a small file box out from behind the coffee canister.

She leaped up, watching the hall, watching him impatiently as he clawed through the alphabetized tabs. The cards contained patients' names and their medication information, the dosage, times per day, and for how many days.

They found no Jane Hubble, no Darlene Brown or Mary Nell Hook. They had no time to look for the others. Dulcie hissed, and they leaped down, dived back beneath the shelves as three nurses appeared.

"I'm beginning to feel like a windup toy," Joe said. "Programmed to jump at the sight of a human. I need a good run, need to clear my head."

"Shh. They're coming."

The nurses moved back and forth. Medicine bottles clinked. Someone sneezed. Coffee was brewed, and the radio station was changed again. They waited nearly half an hour before Size Nine returned to pick up her stack of papers, thumped them on the desk again, and headed for the pneumatic door.

They followed behind her heels and fled into the hall. For an instant, behind her, they were as visible as dog turds on a white sidewalk If she had turned to look back, it would have been all over; they'd have had the whole staff chasing them.

They dodged into a bedroom, and in the dark, Joe paced. He couldn't settle. When something furry touched his nose, he jumped and raked at it, hissing.

But it was only a furry slipper. He shook it and shoved it aside. Out beyond the glass the moon was setting, its slanting light fading into the blackness of predawn. When the nurse vanished down the hall, they fled for the admitting desk.

In less time than it took for the moon to sink beyond the windows, they had searched not only that tall counter but two nearby file cabinets, clawing open the drawers, pawing through the folders. The procedure gave Joe fits-he'd been creeping and stealthy too long. All this snooping made him feel as if he was going to jump out of his skin. He needed to storm up trees, yowl at the moon. His mood would be considerably improved by a good bloody tomcat brawl.

But Dulcie pressured him on. She was most interested, of course, in the one office that was locked. They could smell Adelina's scent beneath the door, the same expensive perfume that had accompanied her into the entry the first time they saw her. The same scent which had already settled faintly into the leather upholstery of her new red Bentley the day Clyde took them for that memorable ride. Dulcie tried the door, leaping and fighting the knob, but at last she turned away.

In the two open offices they clawed open the desk drawers and file drawers, pawing through, flipping the file tabs with their claws.

They found the patients' full-sized record files, each set of documents in its own manila folder, but they found no record of any of the six missing residents. If those people had ever really existed, they weren't here now. Or at least their records weren't here.

"Maybe Jane took off for Tahiti, booked a cruise. Maybe right this minute she's paddling her feet in some balmy tropical bay, eating coconuts."

"Very funny." Dulcie leaped down from where she had been balancing on the last file drawer.

"There have to be records, even if those people aren't here. Dead files." She shivered.

"Whatever secret this place is hiding. I'm betting it's in Adelina's office." She leaped up onto a desk. "That would be the…"

She paused, looking down between her paws at the glass-covered desk top. Beneath the glass, the desk was overlayed with photographs.

"Movies-they're movie stills. All the old reruns. Look at this, here's Clint Eastwood before he had any wrinkles. And Lindsay Wagner-she can't be more than twenty."

Joe leaped up. Strolling across the desk, he nosed at the pictures. "Who's the washed-out blonde? She's in every shot."

The thin woman appeared in the background behind Clint Eastwood, and at a restaurant table with a very young Jack Nicholson. Joe twitched a whisker. "She looks familiar, but I…"

Dulcie studied the lank-haired woman, frowning. "That's Adelina's sister."

"Come on. Why would Adelina's sister have her picture taken with Clint Eastwood?"

"It is her, only younger." The pale blond appeared as a maid standing stiffly beside a fireplace, appeared in several group scenes, and in the backgrounds behind the stars. "She's a bit player. Or she was-she's really young, here."

Beyond the office windows the wind had quickened, and the sky was beginning to pale, the branches of the oaks twisting black against the running clouds. Joe turned, watching the office door. "What time does the shift change?"

She shrugged, lifting a tabby shoulder.

"I don't relish getting caught in here. Like flies stuck to the chopped liver."

"We can have a little nap in the parlor while we wait. We can see the front door from there."

"While we wait for what?"

"For Adelina to get here. Don't you want to search her office? As soon as she unlocks her door, we-"

"Sure, we'll nip right on in, she'll be so pleased. Dulcie, I want into that woman's office like I want into the rabies lockup at the city pound."

She gave him a cool look, leaped down, and trotted away toward the parlor. Bellying beneath the damask sofa, she curled up yawning.

He gave it up and joined her. Far be it from him to back out. If they ended up murdered by Adelina's stiletto heels, there was always, presumably, another life. Unless, of course, they'd already used all nine.

They were cuddled together dozing beneath the sofa when Joe glimpsed movement beyond the black glass. Waking fully, he watched something shiny flickering through the heavy shadows beneath a lemon tree. Quickly he slid along beneath the couch for a closer look, pulling himself across the Chinese rug. Why did people make couches so low? How many cats in the world had to scrape their backs every day, every time they crawled under the family sofa? Where were people's minds? Didn't they think about these things?

Again the movement, glinting and dancing through the dark: the metallic flash of spokes.

Chrome spokes-the spokes of a wheelchair. He watched the chair turn and wheel away into the heavy shadows of the dark, predawn garden. Dulcie was beside him now, peering out. They could see, deep within the blackness, a figure standing, facing the wheelchair, as if the two were talking softly, their voices inaudible through the glass.

The cats looked at each other and slid back deeper under the couch. "I didn't hear the wheels," Joe said nervously. "And I didn't hear footsteps. I don't like when I can't hear something that's moving."

Dulcie stared out at the patio. "Maybe Teddy doesn't sleep well at night; maybe he and some other patient like to roam the halls." Uneasily, she curled up close to Joe, trying to purr, to calm herself. And at last they slept.

Joe woke to the first chirping of birds from the garden. The leaves of the lilies and azalea bushes shivered with activity, forcing Joe's eyes open wide, his metabolism to swing into high, and he crept out from under the couch.

The branches were full of birds. Flitting wings, hopping little bodies. Rigid, his muscles geared immediately into the kill mode, he crouched, staring out at that fluttering feast, at that brazen display of fresh meat, inches from his waiting claws. These birds, reared in that sheltered garden without a cat in sight, would be as stupid and tame as pet chickens.