Cat in the Dark (26 page)

But when they came down, it was lying in plain sight on the steps, flecked with dirt and grass seed.

“When we started looking for where it might have been buried—worked down the hill where the grass was bent and broken and found the loose dirt—and dug there, we found the brick, too. The dirt and grass matched the debris on the screwdriver, and of course the traces of blood on it were Jergen's.

“It had been wiped hastily, but there were two partial prints, both Hoke's. Whoever found the weapon,” Harper said, “saved the court considerable time and money, and certainly helped to strengthen our case.”

He knew he should be fully satisfied with the case against Hoke—they had plenty to hang the man—but this business of the screwdriver, of evidence turning up in that peculiar way, gave him heartburn. This was getting to be a pattern, and one he didn't live with easily.

No cop liked this mysterious stuff, even when the evidence led to a conviction. Unexplainable scenarios were for artists, for fiction writers, for those who dealt in flights of fancy. Not for law enforcement who wanted only hard facts.

 

The cats, having finished their fish and chips, lay stretched out on the bricks sleepily licking their paws, staring past Harper but watching with their wide vision Harper's frequent glances in their direction. Dulcie, washing diligently, carefully hid her amused smile. Joe, rolling over away from the police captain, twitched his whiskers in a silent cat laugh.

The morning after the murder, just moments after Wilma deposited an angry Dulcie at Clyde's house and Wilma and Clyde and Charlie headed for Salinas Medical, Joe and Dulcie had bolted out his cat door and double-timed up the hills to the apartments, where they settled down to wait for the FBI investigator. How often did one have a chance to observe a Bureau specialist at work?

Crouching in Jergen's kitchen, they had watched the thin Bureau agent deftly scrolling through Jergen's files using the code words
Cairo
and
Tiger
that Dulcie had given to Harper, tracing each money transaction that Hoke/Pearl Ann had hidden. Only when they
heard the crackle of a police radio, and a car door slam, did they slip back down between the walls, trotting into the patio in time to see Harper going up the stairs.

Leaving the patio, wandering down the hill to hunt, they had caught Pearl Ann's jasmine scent and followed it with interest through the tall grass. The trail was fresh, maybe a few hours old, the grass still sharpcented where it had been trampled.

Where they found the earth disturbed, Pearl Ann's scent was strong. Digging into the loose soil, they had pawed out the screwdriver, then the brick. The brick smelled of human blood. They recognized the screwdriver as Pearl Ann's, a long Phillips with a deep nick in the black plastic handle. Gripping the dirt-crusted handle carefully in his teeth, Joe had carried the weapon up the hill and halfway up the stairs, where he laid it on a step in plain sight. They figured, as thorough as Harper was, he'd search for where it had been buried and discover the brick, as well.

But as for the village burglaries committed by Greeley and Azrael, those crimes were another matter. Joe and Dulcie had given Harper no clue.

Maybe Greeley would confess and return the stolen money. If not, the cats still had plenty of time to nail him—Greeley and Mavity would be leaving early in the morning to take the bodies of Dora and Ralph home to Georgia. The funeral had been arranged through the Sleuders' pastor. Dora and Ralph had been active in their church and would be buried in the church plot they had purchased years before.

Mavity and Greeley would remain in Georgia long enough to sell the Sleuders' home and belongings, reserving whatever mementos they cared to keep. Whatever moneys of the Sleuders' might be recovered from Warren Cumming's hidden accounts would be divided
between brother and sister. The moneys proven to be Mavity's would of course come to her, once the FBI accountants finished tracing each of Jergen's individual account transactions and Hoke's transfers.

The cats watched Charlie take the lid off a plastic cup of hot tea, handing it to Mavity. “Will Greeley be taking his cat with you on the plane? It seems…”

“Oh, no,” Mavity said. “He doesn't need to take it. He'll come back with me when we're finished in Georgia—he can get the cat then. He's flying on one of them elderly coupons, so his fare's all the same even if he goes home through Molena Point. And a very nice lady, that Ms. Marble who has the South American shop, she's going to keep the cat. Why, she was thrilled. Seems she's very taken with the beast.”

Dulcie and Joe exchanged a look.

“I didn't think,” Charlie said, “that your brother knew anyone in the village.”

“Greeley went in there because the cat kept going in, made itself right at home. They got to know each other, being as they've both lived in Latin America. It's nice Greeley has found a friend here. Well, she does keep those awful voodoo things…”

Mavity stirred sugar into her tea. “I'm sorry Greeley wouldn't come with us tonight. Said he just wanted to walk through the village, enjoy the shops one more time. I've never known Greeley to be so taken with a place.”

The cats, imagining Greeley gazing casually into one of the village's exclusive shops while Azrael slipped down through its skylight, rose quickly and, feigning a stretch and a yawn, they beat it out of the patio and across the street, heading fast down the hill.

 

Watching them, Charlie rose, too, and slipped away.

Standing under the arch, she saw them disappear
down the slope, watched their invisible trail shivering the grass as they hurried unseen toward the village.

They had certainly left suddenly.

But they were cats. Cats were filled with sudden whims.

Except, she didn't think their hasty departure was any whim.

From somewhere below she heard faint voices. The girl's laugh sounded exactly like the female voice she'd heard the night she watched Joe and Dulcie on the rooftops.

She shook her head, annoyed at her wild imaginings. Molena Point was a small village, one was bound to hear familiar voices—probably from one of the houses below her.

But she felt chilled, light-headed.

Hugging herself to steady her shaken nerves, she was gripped by an insight that, until this moment, she would not have let herself consider.

An insane thought.

But she knew it wasn't insane.

A footstep scuffed behind her, and Clyde stepped out from the shadows. He put his arm around her, stood hugging her close, the two of them looking down the hills. After a moment, she turned in the moonlight to look squarely at him.

She wanted to say,
I've suspected for a long time.
She wanted to say,
I know about the cats. I didn't know how to think about such a thing.

But what if she was wrong?

Leaning her head against his shoulder, she felt giddy, disconnected. She recalled the night she'd walked home from dinner and saw Joe and Dulcie racing across the roofs so beautiful and free—the night she heard those same voices.

And suddenly she began to laugh. She collapsed against Clyde laughing, tears streaming. What if she was right, what if it was true? She couldn't stop laughing, he had to shake her to make her stop. Holding her shoulders, he looked down at her intently. He said nothing.

After a while, as they stood gazing down the empty hill, he said, “Were you really jealous of Bernine?”

“Who told you that?”

“A friend.” He took her face in his hands. “So foolish—Bernine Sage is all glitz. There's nothing there, nothing real. She's nothing like you. What's to be jealous of?” He kissed her, standing on the moonlit hill, and whispered against her neck, “My friend tells me I'm not romantic enough—that it takes more than a few car repairs to an old VW van to please a lady.”

Charlie smiled and kissed him back. It was a long time later when she said, “Doesn't your friend know how to mind her own business?”

“Oh, meddling is her business. That's how she gets her kicks.” He held her tight.

Down the hills, not as far away as Charlie and Clyde imagined, the cats stood rearing among the tall grass, looking up the hill and watching the couple's hugging silhouette, and they smiled. Humans—so simple. So predictable.

Then Joe dropped down to all fours. “So what will it be? We find Greeley and blow the whistle on those two thieves—and maybe open a real can of worms for Harper? Or we find them, try to talk them out of this one last burglary?”

“Or we let it go?” Dulcie offered. “Let this hand play without us?” She went silent, thinking of dark Azrael: Satan metamorphosed. Beast of evil.

Portender of death? Was he really that—really a voodoo cat? A bearer of dark, twisted fate?

“When we charged out of the patio just now,” Joe said, “hot to nail Greeley—that was a paw-jerk reaction.” He waited to see the effect of his words, his eyes huge and dark in the moonlight.

She said, “I don't think we can stop them. Why would Greeley listen to us? And if we call the station…”

If Greeley was arrested and went to jail, and Azrael stayed on with Sue Marble, they might never see the last of his criminal proclivity, of his cruel nature.

She studied the village rooftops, the moonlit mosaic of shops and chimneys and oaks, so rich and peaceful. And she thought of Azrael moving in with Ms. Marble and all her voodoo trappings, and she wondered.
Was
there, unknown to Sue, evil power among those idols? A wickedness that Azrael could manipulate?

Joe said, “Greeley's all that Mavity has. It would break her heart to see him arrested.”

“Maybe they'll go back to the jungle,” she said, “if we let them go. If we don't interfere. Maybe they'll go where they belong—back to the jungle's dark ways.”

Joe considered this. “Maybe,” he said, and twitched a whisker. “And good riddance to
el gato diablo
.” He looked down at Dulcie, and winked. And where moonlight washed the tall grass, their silhouettes twined together: one silhouette, purring.

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