Cat Telling Tales

30

Kit didn’t join the other cats high on the balcony of the Aronson Gallery as they looked down on the auction party nor, in the soft evening, did she slip in with Lucinda and Pedric when they entered among the jostling crowd; nor did Pan appear. Misto arrived in style riding from the Firettis’ van on John’s shoulder. But as John and Mary approached the front door, the old cat left them, leaping up into a tangle of jasmine vine that climbed the stucco wall. Clawing his way up to the high little window that opened above him, he could see Dulcie looking out. He disappeared inside, onto the gallery’s balcony, and there he sat with Dulcie looking down through the railing, watching the party crowd below. “Where’s Joe Grey?”

“Out in Ryan’s truck,” she said. “He’ll be along shortly. He’d never miss supper.” She glanced down at the fine buffet laid out below, licking her whiskers at the aromas that rose up to them.

The Aronson Gallery, along with the café and bookstore that joined it, was a favorite meeting place for the villagers. Wide archways linked the three airy shops, and a walled patio opened through glass doors at the back of the café. The gallery’s high white walls featured tonight not a carefully selected art exhibit, but the items to be auctioned: five vibrant oriental rugs that hung on the exhibit panels, flanked by small pieces of handmade furniture, some intricately carved, some painted in vivid patterns by one of the cats’ human friends. There was sporting equipment, even a canoe. Charlie Harper’s animal paintings and etchings occupied one long wall and included portraits of several of the rescue cats—while out on the patio the rescue cats themselves were housed in oversized cages among the potted flowers and little tables, each of the ten cages featuring two to three friendly felines looking for new homes.

As the auction party gathered, out on the street Ryan and Charlie sat in Ryan’s truck, Joe Grey on the seat between them as Charlie passed on what Max had told her as they’d headed for the auction. “Autopsy’s finished on the second body. They don’t have a positive ID yet, but they’re pretty sure it’s Alain Bent. They found a .32 slug that had entered near the temple. Same riflings as the .32 slug Kathleen dug out of the acacia tree, which appears to have passed through Sammie’s throat.”

She looked down at Joe. “Those white marks on Sammie’s back? CSI’s photographs of them, and Kathleen’s shots of the acacia tree roots, are a perfect match. Looks like the killer shot her there as if maybe she was hiding from him. Left her lying there for several hours. As the body cooled, her blood pooled around where the roots pressed in, that’s what made the white marks, pressure from the roots, pressing all the blood out.”

“Maybe he left her there until dark,” Joe said, “then dragged her into the cellar.”

“That’s what they think. Pathologist says the blood on the acacia roots is O positive, same as Sammie’s, though that type’s common enough. You know how long it takes to get DNA, with the lab backed up.”

Joe knew some two- and three-year-old cases were still waiting. Outside the truck he could hear folks talking and laughing as they hurried inside. “What about the cell phone Kathleen dug from under the tree?”

“It’s Sammie’s, all right,” Charlie said. “Complete with photos to add to the evidence. Kathleen printed out five shots of a tall, lean man dragging a woman’s body across the yard—that could be the first victim. From the angle of the shot, looks like Sammie might have taken them from the cottage window. Kathleen made some enlargements where you can see a portion of the woman’s face, and an old scar on her upper left arm, and it sure looks like Alain. CSI has contacted Alain’s dentist for a positive ID. The man’s face wasn’t visible, only his back. Dark hair, tall. From his haircut, and the angles of his body, looks very much like Erik Kraft. Forensics is working to lift prints from the victim’s clothes.”

“No gun?” Joe said.

“Not yet,” Charlie said.

“You want it all, right now,” Ryan said, laughing, unceremoniously picking Joe up. “Come on, we’re missing the party.” She and Charlie swung out of the truck, Ryan carrying Joe over her shoulder. Going in through the gallery door, she stopped just beneath the balcony—gave Joe a little toss, and he leaped up to the second floor, scrambling through the rail, where Dulcie and Misto sat looking down on the crowd, still eyeing the buffet, and Dulcie assessing the women’s attire with as keen an eye as any fashion model.

Joe settled down between them and, in whispers, repeated what Charlie had told him; and didn’t that make Misto smile. The old cat liked their clandestine role, he liked helping the cops. He liked the mix of human skill and electronic techniques, with the skills that only a cat could have offered.

“Where’s Kit?” Joe said. “Where’s Pan?”

“Not a clue,” Dulcie said innocently.

Misto looked at them and smiled. Beyond the windows, the evening was balmy, the sky so clear that every star shimmered. “A perfect night for a hunt in the hills,” the old cat said. “Or, for a bit of romance on the rooftops?” he said thoughtfully.

Dulcie gave the two toms a sly little smile.

“She’s a charming lady,” Misto said.

“She’s very young,” Joe said in a fatherly manner that made Dulcie laugh.

But in truth Kit and Pan weren’t preening and flirting, not at the moment. Nor were they hunting the starlit hills—though they were stalking some human game, following Erik Kraft.

Did anyone know he was back in the village? Had they spotted him before even the cops had? They had been on the roofs, wandering in the direction of the auction, when they saw lights on in Kraft’s second-floor condo; they had galloped across the roofs to the rear of his penthouse, where the little walled terrace shut away any ugly view of roof vents and heating units and of the narrow back stairs that led down to the street.

When they peered in under the low, wide arches that had been left along the bottom of the stucco wall for drainage, a soft light shone out through the wide glass doors, and the closed curtain shifted in the breeze where the slider stood open. They could see the flickering light of a television, too, and could hear its tedious recap of yesterday’s snowfall, details already far outdated, on this balmy evening.

They could see a round teak table against the terrace wall with two folding canvas chairs, and three flowerpots containing dead geraniums as dry as old hay. They saw no movement beyond the glass, no shifting shadows. “Come on,” Kit said, and bellied under, emerging to paw roofing gravel from her fur, shake gravel from her paws. The air drifting out smelled of steam and shaving soap. Kit reached her nose to push the curtain aside, sniffing at the aroma of lime soap and at the scent of male human. Carefully they peered in.

The apartment was stark, very modern and not to either cat’s taste, all done in black and chrome against cold blue walls: chrome headboard, chrome chairs with black leather slings, a glimpse of chrome kitchen cabinets beyond the bedroom. They could hear him in the bathroom, where a brighter light shone through the cracked-open door with a glimpse of black marble floor, mirrored walls, they could see his shadow moving about. Warily they pushed on into the bedroom, their paws sinking into the deep black carpet. They paused with the curtain still across their backs, listening.

The bedcovers were tumbled in a heap, white silk sheets, soft black comforter, a sleek black phone on the nightstand beneath a chrome lamp. A closed suitcase, made of expensive black leather, sat on a chrome stand near the closet doors, just below the recessed TV that was still belaboring bygone snow scenes. A pair of jeans lay dropped on the carpet beside a pair of black Italian boots, worn and dirty. Brown shirt thrown over the back of a chrome chair, black leather jacket folded across the chair’s arm. When Kit approached the clothes, they smelled of smoke and ashes, smelled exactly like the burn. As she pressed forward to look closer, Pan’s hiss stopped her; the sound of a sliding door made her dive beneath the bed.

But then they heard the shower come on, water pounding. As a cloud of steam ghosted out to them, Kit approached the clothes again, sniffing. His boots smelled of ashes, and were streaked with gray. The pounding of the shower was broken by the sluicing sounds of someone vigorously washing. She said, “He’s been at the burn, he’s been up at Hesmerra’s, so what was he looking for? The papers she stole?” Then, “Oh!” she said, as she turned. Rearing up, she peered at the top of the dresser. “Oh my, what’s this?” she said, smiling.

On the dresser stood a thin black laptop, its case open, its cord plugged into the wall, its lighted screen not as bright as the TV, writhing in an abstract pattern of purple and red squares that changed and retreated and appeared again as the screensaver did its work. Leaping up, Kit reached out a paw, then warily drew it back, looking down at Pan. “You any good with these things?” She wished she had Dulcie’s expertise.

“I never had the chance, Erik was as secretive with his computer as he was with his files and papers. I can adjust a patient’s oxygen, I can work some of the levers on a folding bed and ring the alarm for a nurse. But computers, no way—I could erase everything.”

Kit was afraid she’d do exactly that. The laptop was not at all like Pedric and Lucinda’s big computer at home, everything seemed different, there wasn’t even a proper mouse. One wrong stroke, and whatever evidence it might contain could vanish forever. She studied the keyboard. Uncertainly she reached out again, and drew back again, looking down helplessly at Pan.

But she had to do something. It wasn’t in Kit’s nature to back away. She had to make something happen.

Carefully she pressed the flat space that she thought might be the built-in mouse. The screensaver vanished, and a page of e-mails flashed at her: two short messages, the first signed by a Betty. Could that be Alain Bent’s cousin? But why . . . ? The second was signed by Alain herself, dated three days ago, long after she was murdered. Kit caught only a few words when the pounding of water stopped, “ . . . Toronto, promise to be home next week and we can . . .” They heard the shower door slide open. As the bathroom door opened, she dropped to the floor and under the bed expecting Pan to follow. He didn’t, she heard him hit the bed above her and burrow under the covers. As she peered out, Erik came out of the bathroom naked and headed for the closet as if to retrieve clean clothes. He moved quickly, tense and in a hurry.

When he slid the closet door back, the rod and shelves were nearly empty. He removed one of three shirts and the only pair of jeans. From behind the fallen covers she watched him jerk the suitcase open, grab a pair of black Jockey shorts and black socks, and begin to hurriedly pull on his clothes. Why the rush? Was he afraid a police patrol would see the light, find out he’d returned? Why had he come back at all?

As nervous as he was, and with a suitcase packed and waiting, this time might he be gone for good, taking with him the evidence to fraud and murder? What, in fact, could be more damning than that he’d been faking Alain’s e-mail—while she lay rotting in her grave?

She wondered if he had just now heard about the fire? If he had poisoned Hesmerra’s whiskey months earlier, had he just now learned that she was dead? Had he come back to find the papers he knew she’d stolen, papers he’d searched for before she died, and had never found?

The laptop lay on the dresser just a few feet above her. Once Kraft vanished again, even as efficient as MPPD was, there was the chance he’d somehow evade them. If she knocked the little computer off the dresser onto the soft carpet, she and Pan could drag it, between them. She was trying to think how to get it out the door unseen when Erik finished dressing and turned to the bed; silently she slid deeper out of sight.

She heard him throw the covers back, perhaps meaning to lay the suitcase on the bed and open it. With a swish of sheets, the quilt fell to the floor—she thought Pan would leap clear of it and run, maybe distracting Erik so she could snag the laptop.

Pan didn’t run, she heard him hiss and growl, and knew he must be standing boldly where Erik had jerked the covers away. She slid out behind Erik, to look. Oh my. Pan stood facing Erik, snarling like a cougar, his claws bared, his daggered paw lifted to strike.

Kraft backed away. Clearly he recognized the tomcat, this cat he had tormented—clearly he thought that if the cat was there in the village, Debbie must be there, that she must have brought the cat with her. His puzzlement made Kit want to laugh, but his rage scared her so bad her paws began to sweat.

Was he wondering if Debbie had come back because of her mother’s death, if she suspected he’d killed Hesmerra? Seeing Pan seemed to ignite all his anger at Debbie. When he lunged for Pan, the tomcat struck, his bared claws tearing long slashes down Erik’s arm and hand, then he leaped away and fled for the open glass door, Kit beside him looking back, reluctant to leave the laptop.

But Erik was fast, he blocked the opening, kicking at them, jerked the door closed, and lunged to grab them. They vanished under the bed, waiting with claws lifted for his hand to reach under. He kicked the bed and swore, but he didn’t kneel down and reach in. When he couldn’t drive them out by kicking and pounding on the bed he turned away, as if to waste no more time on stray cats.

Peering out, they watched him snatch a handkerchief from the suitcase, wrap it around his hand, and toss the last of his clothes in, watched him fetch a batch of papers from the top dresser drawer and drop those in on top. Before closing the suitcase, he returned to the bathroom. Kneeling before the vanity, he removed a drawer, and then slid a portion of the cabinet’s inner wall aside.

A small metal safe was set into the wall. Deftly he worked the dial, swung the little door open, and began to remove thick packets of money, bills bound together with paper strips. From behind these he pulled out a dozen plastic tubes, each half as big around as a tiny cat food can, but longer and made of pale, thick plastic.

“Gold coins,” Pan whispered, his words barely a breath. “He had cylinders like that in Eugene, I watched him count out the coins, each one as bright as the sun.”

As Erik tucked this fortune into the suitcase and locked it, Kit crept out from beneath the bed and hid among the black folds of quilt. She watched him turn off the laptop and unplug it, watched him wind the cord and slip it into a side pocket of the computer case, watched him zip the case and set it atop the suitcase. As he returned to the bathroom to lock and conceal the safe, the cats were a blur. They leaped on the suitcase, dragged the laptop off and to the door, and they were out of there, their hearts hammering as they fought the door open and hauled the laptop through, their teeth deep in the leather case. They dragged it across the patio, noisily across the scatter of gravel, and out of sight beneath the patio wall. Kit was ready to race away with it, when Pan set down his end and vanished under the wall again into the terrace. She peered under.

Kraft was still in the bathroom, she could see his moving shadow. She watched Pan take a roofing pebble in his mouth, leap to the glass door, and push the pebble down into the bottom track, wedging it in just where the door would shut, a tiny black pebble that might never be noticed within the creases of the dark metal track.

Pan returned from beneath the wall, saying nothing. He picked up his end of the laptop, and they carried it between them, their teeth firmly in its padded case. They dragged it across the roofs and up a sharp peak, and down again within a sheltered niche where three roofs joined—down into a dark and shingled crevice not easily accessible to a human, only to someone smaller and more agile. Sliding the laptop into deep darkness, they scrambled out again and ran. Erik Kraft wasn’t likely to climb up those peaks and look down.

They raced down the stairs and up the street into the shadows of a narrow alley, and there they waited for Kraft to appear. “He’ll think it fell on the floor,” Pan said. “Black laptop, black carpet, black folds of comforter. Take him a minute to realize it isn’t there. When he sees the slider open . . .” He went still, listening. They heard the glass door open, heard Kraft race across the terrace, heard the patio table rattle as he scrambled over the wall. They didn’t run. Backing deeper among the shadows, they wanted to see what he would do, listened to his footsteps pounding across the roof and down, watched from their dark recess as he raced up the sidewalk stopping strangers, asking questions, looking for an escaping thief. Watched him peer into parked cars, race from one little alley to the next, stop to stare in through the doors of closed shops.

“When he gives up,” Kit said, smiling, “when he knows he won’t find it, what’s he going to do? Call the cops? File a report for one stolen laptop, that’s ripe with evidence?”

Pan gave her a satisfied look as they followed Kraft around the corner, watched him double-time up the front stairs.

“He’ll grab his bag and be out of there,” Kit said. “We need to see his car, get his license, then we call the station.” She turned to look at Pan, her green eyes widening. “The pebble!” she said. “That’s what the pebble was for? So we can get back inside.”