The Cats that Stole a Million (The Cats that . . . Cozy Mystery Book 7) (4 page)

A stampede of rambunctious cats thundered up the attic stairs, and raced to the turret windows, jumping on the sills and looking out.  The seal-point kittens, Dewey and Crowie, struggled for position on the middle windowsill, but Lilac and Abby pushed them aside.  Iris trotted over to Katherine, and cried a sweet yowl. 

Katherine had her hands full.  Abra began struggling to be put down, and shrieked in a loud, Siamese voice.  “Abra, quit it.  You’re scratching me.”

Jake was on his hands and knees, beaming the light into the hole in the floor.  “Katz, I see her.  She can’t get any farther.  There’s some kind of wood panel there.  Look around and grab anything that will cover this hole.  I’m going to reach in for Scout.  When I pull her out, we need to cover it before any more of the cats decide to leap down.”

“Got it,” Katherine said.  She moved to the interior of the attic, and found one of her great aunt’s trunks — the smaller, lighter weight one, and with one hand, she dragged it over to Jake. 

“Okay, that works,” he said.  “Get ready,” he advised.  He reached in and seized Scout. 

“Waugh,” the Siamese sassed.  She was covered from head to tail with cobwebs.  The cat sneezed, then sneezed again.

Jake hurriedly moved the trunk and placed it on top of the missing floorboard.  “That was a close one,” he said.  “It wouldn’t be fun prying up floorboards looking for a very inquisitive cat.”

Scout sneezed again.  Jake brushed the cobwebs off the cat’s fur.

“We’ve got to get them out of here,” Katherine advised.  Let’s take Scout and Abra down first.  Maybe the other cats will follow us.”

“That will be the day,” Jake said in a disbelieving tone.

“Oh, yeah.  You think so.  I know the magic word.  Treat,” Katherine announced, and the other cats raced around her, and fled to their cat room.  “Works like magic,” she said to Jake who had thrown Scout over his shoulder.  Scout blinked an eye kiss. 

At the foot of the attic stairs, Jake said, “I thought you closed the door behind you.”

“I thought I did, but even if I did close it, Scout can pick any lock.  That’s why there are three locks on the door. But when the human forgets to engage them, Houdini-cat gets in.”

“It’ll be different once we remodel the area.  Then the cats can come up here anytime. Cokey can make the windowsills in the turret area wider like he did in the kitchen.”

Once the cats were safe in their room, Katherine waded through anxious felines to the armoire, where she removed a bag of treats.  The noise in the room was deafening as each cat jockeyed to be first.  “Inside voices, please,” she gently asked.

Once she’d handed out the treats, Jake said in a quiet, agitated voice, “Katz, we need to go back up there.”

“Why?  I turned the lights out on the way down.”

“I think I saw something in the hole.” 

Katherine’s skin began to crawl.  “Judging by Scout’s and Abra’s reaction, whatever is there, can’t be good.”

“I agree.”

Chapter Five

After the amorous mailman left, Madison wondered with disgust.
Why would that creepy man think I’d be interested in him?
  She picked up her cell and called her on-and-off boyfriend, Vinny.  Vinny answered in a don’t-bother-me voice, “Yeah?”

“Why the tone?”

“Mad, can I call ya back.  I’m right in the middle of somethin’.”

Madison could hear loud laughter and music playing in the background.  “Geez, Vinny, are you at the pub?”

“One second.  I’m cashing a check.”  The bartender came over and counted off several one hundred bills, and then left to take care of another customer.  “All right, I’m back. How’s the love of my life?  Still mad about me?”

Madison snickered.  “I’m keeping a list of your phony lines.  Maybe I can get enough of them to write a book.  Listen, are you doin’ anything tonight? I know this is short notice, but how would you like to take a trip to paradise?”

“What do you have in mind?” he asked suddenly, with interest.

“I’ve got a ticket to Chicago.  Three glorious nights at a four-star hotel.”

“You win the lottery?”

“Nope, I just got a call from my agent.  One of the models is sick with the flu, so they need me to take her place.  The shoot is Monday morning.  Say, how about it?”

“I’ve gotta work Monday.”

“Are you insane?  Just call in sick!  This is perfect for us.  You know how you like those little bottles of booze in the hotel room.  Besides, this hotel has a manager’s reception.  Two free drinks, plus an incredible Italian restaurant nearby.”

Vinny laughed cynically.  “Incredible Italian restaurant means a chain run by Italian wannabes.”

Madison sneered.  “I can’t talk forever.  My boss will see me.  Is it a yes or no?”

“Okay.  Tell me when and where, and I’ll be there, baby.”

“I’m making the reservation now.  Meet you there after seven.  I’ll send the itinerary to your phone.”

“The things you talk me into,” he said.  “Ciao.” 

Madison made the second reservation, then waited until six to leave the front desk.  Everyone had left, except her boss, Mr. Zhukov, and the security guard.  She buzzed herself onto the showroom floor, and walked to the back locker area to extract her purse, a large party bag stuffed with sparkly pink paper, and her coat. 

Mr. Zhukov came up to her side and took his coat off a hanger.  “Madison, before you leave, I need to ask you a question.  Did you receive a package with a postmark from Australia?” he asked in his thick Russian accent.

Madison looked directly into his eyes, “No, the only package we received was addressed to me.  You know I’m a shopaholic,” she smiled.

Mr. Zhukov nodded.  “Yes, judging by the number of packages you get, you must be.”

Madison’s face reddened.  “Is it okay?  I mean I only have items shipped here because if I use my apartment address, I’m afraid they’ll be stolen.”

“No problem,” he said, then asked, “Did you hear from our Down Under friend?”

“Yes, he called a few hours ago.”

“Did he say he was sending the shipment by registered mail or FedEx?”

“I’m sure he said FedEx.”

“Okay, I’m leaving now.  My wife and I have dinner reservations. I’ll see you Monday.  Enjoy your weekend.”

“Yes, definitely,” she said dutifully.

“Oh, would you mind waiting around for a few minutes in case the package comes,” he said, turning.

“Yes, Sir.  But I can’t stay past 6:30. I have plans.”

Mr. Zhukov put his coat on, buttoned it down the front, and said nervously, “If you do get the package, take it to the security office up the street, and have them store it in their vault.  I don’t trust the one here.  Dimitri will accompany you.”  He looked at Dimitri and spoke in Russian. 

The guard nodded, got up from his chair and said, “
Da.  Spokoynoy Nochi
,” he called after Mr. Zhukov, who hurried out the door.  He walked over to Madison and said in broken English.  “You no have to stay.  I wait.”

“Youare
a
lifesaver,” Madison said with a big smile, holding up the party bag.  “My best friend is having a party for he
r
seven-year-old.  I’ve got to grab a cab and head downtown.”

“Ah,
da. Partiya
.  No problem. 
Nochi
,” he said.

“Night,” Madison answered. 

Madison finished putting on her coat and watched as Dimitri ducked into the men’s room.  She was relieved that he wouldn’t see her leave. 

Heading to the reception desk, she quickly removed the package from her bottom drawer.  She put it in the party bag and slipped out of the store.  With a conspiratorial grin, she hailed a cab.

A yellow cab whizzed up.  She couldn’t believe her good luck. 

“Where to?” the driver asked.

“La Guardia Airport.  And there’s a big tip, if you can get me there as soon as possible.”

Chapter Six

Jake led Katherine back to the attic.  In one hand, he held a flashlight, in the other he carried a floor lamp. “I swore I saw something lying in there,” he said.  “It looked like some kind of wood box.”

“Scout and Abra were over there. Maybe they batted the box into the hole, and that’s what we heard.  That’s probably why Scout jumped in to check it out.”

“Could be.”

Holding a long extension cord, Katherine rolled her eyes, “Please, I hope it isn’t another box of rare coins.  That’s just what we need is more money.”

Jake handed the flashlight to Katherine and set the floor lamp close to the opening.  He took the extension cord and snaked it around to the other side of the small room, plugging the cord into the only outlet on that side of the attic. Returning, he got down on his hands and knees and moved the lightweight trunk aside.  With both hands he tugged on the damaged floorboard until the nails gave way.  He carefully set the board next to the trunk. 

Katherine laid on her stomach and peered into the hole.  “I see it,” she said excitedly, beaming her light on the box.

Jake reached in and pulled out a battered jewelry box.

Katherine stood up.  “Maybe it’s the family jewels,” she said, wondering why a jewelry box was placed in a hole in the floor.  Then she had a terrible premonition.  “Don’t open it,” she warned.

“Why?”

“Because of Scout’s and Abra’s death dance.  They only do that when something bad is going to happen.”

“I know, Sweet Pea, but I don’t think anything bad is going to happen here.”

“Jake, no, please don’t open it.  Maybe it’s Pandora’s box.  Maybe it’s something we don’t need to see.  Whoever put it there was hiding it from someone.  Let’s just put it back.”

“Now that doesn’t sound like the curious Katz I married. It’s not locked.  See,” he said, handing it to her.  The bottom of the box fell open and a set of rusted keys dropped to the floor.

Katherine’s jaw dropped. “You didn’t.”

“I didn’t do it intentionally,” he said defensively.

Katherine reached down and picked up the keys.  “In this old house, with tons of locks, it could take us forever to find out which door they unlock.”

“Check the door.”

“Which door?”

“The one to this room, silly goose.”

Katherine gave Jake a skeptical look.  “You call this a door?  I’ve learned enough from Margie that this is called a beadboard panel with enough layers of Kermit the Frog green paint to last a million years.  How can there be a lock when there isn’t even a door handle?”

“Close the door, panel, whatever.  Is there anything on the back of it?”

“Just a painted-shut piece of metal.”

“Maybe it’s a plate cover to hide a lock.”  Jake moved over, pulled out his pocket knife and began prying the edge of the brass plate.  When finished, he jiggled the plate back and forth until he could pivot the plate aside, revealing an old bolt lock, rusted and dusty with years of disuse.

“Cool,” Katherine said, trying one of the keys.  “Nope, this one doesn’t work.”

“Let me see the other one,” he said, taking the key from her hand.  He inserted it into the lock, gave a hard twist and the lock disengaged.  “Takes a little muscle,” he teased.

Katherine gave an amused look. “Seriously, what was the purpose of this room?”

Jake scratched his chin.  “I think it was a secret room.”

“What?”

“Did you ever see that movie
Panic Room
?” Jake asked.  He often made references to movies to describe a point.

“No.”

“It’s about this townhouse in Manhattan that had a secret room for the owner to hide in case of a home invasion.”

Katherine laughed.  “Surely you jest!  This room is built with wood.  Anyone with a saw could get in.”

“Wait.  Maybe it wasn’t a room to hide in, but a room to escape from.”

“How?”

Jake shone the flashlight back into the hole.  He felt underneath the floorboard on the left.  “I found a handle.”  Pushing the handle up, he lifted a section of the floor and set it aside.

“How did you know to do that?”

“My parents and I once lived in a ranch house built in the 1950s.  The panel to the crawlspace was like this, only the recessed handle was on top.  Whoever built this one, didn’t want anyone on the floor to see it.”

“Secret, I get that part,” Katherine said. 

Jake stepped down several feet into the opening.

“Be careful.  The floor could be rotten.”

Setting his flashlight on the floor above, next to the opening, he crouched down and began pressing the walls.

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to see if there’s a hidden catch to open it.”

“To what?”

Jake continued pressing the walls until a panel on his right popped open.

“What is it?”

Jake was quiet for a moment, then said, “It’s an entrance of some sort.  Quick, hand me the flashlight.  I’ll check it out.”

Handing Jake the flashlight, she warned, “Be careful!”

“Katz, come down.  It’s a landing.”

Katherine stepped into the hole.  “Landing to what?”

Jake beamed the light on a set of stairs.

“Wow,” she said, amazed.

“There’s no hand rail.  Be careful going down.  I’ll go down first.”  At the base of the stairs, Jake stopped.

“Why are you stopping?” Katherine asked, trying to look around him.

“It’s a dead end.” An unpainted wood wall, from floor to ceiling, stood in the way. 

“That didn’t get us very far,” Katherine complained.

“No, look.  There’s a lock notched into this wall.  It’s a door.”  Jake beamed his flashlight on the ancient lock. “Try that other key and see if it fits.”

Katherine inserted the key, turned it to the right, then to the left.  The door slid open a few inches. 

“It’s a pocket door,” Jake said, sliding it open.  Outside was another landing, only the wood floor was of better quality, and the outside panel was the same oak wainscoting used in other rooms of the mansion.

“I had no idea this was here,” Katherine said.  “Let’s find out where it goes.”

“Wait, let me go first,” Jake said. 

“Aye, aye, captain!”  Stepping down the stairs after him, Katherine joined Jake on the landing. “This must be the first floor, but why no door?  Is there another hidden pocket door?”

Jake began pressing on the walls.  “Yes, but . . .”  He slid the panel open to a plastered wall.

“It opens to a wall?  Who does that? Why wouldn’t the builder cut an opening for the first floor?  What’s the point of having stairs that lead nowhere?”

“Keep going, there are more stairs,” Jake said, sprinting down.  “Okay, here’s the end . . .” Jake stumbled and fell into a dark space.

“Jake, are you all right?” Katherine screamed, beaming her light into the area. 

“Yeah, I’m good.  Only my ego has been bruised.  Some idiot sawed off the rest of the stairs. Be careful.  Don’t go any farther.  There’s stuff down here you don’t want to see.”

“Like what?”

“Can’t say,” Jake said, looking at several dead mice skeletons.  “We need Cokey to replace these stairs, that is, if we ever want to have a fully operational second stairwell.”

“Jake, are you sure you’re not hurt?  You’re six-feet-tall—”

“I landed on both feet.  No worries, my love.  Throw down your flashlight.  I’ve gotta see if I can get out of here.”

Katherine tossed the flashlight down.

Looking around, Jake said, “Katz, there once was a door here — well, there still is — but now it’s an opening to something metal.”  He tried to push it. “Hey, I know where this goes. It’s underneath the stairway to the basement.  This is that big, old cabinet that holds tools.”

“Some secret passageway,” Katherine kidded.  “You have to move the tool cabinet to get out.”

Jake brushed the cobwebs out of his hair.  “Probably in the Victorian days, this used to be the servant’s stairs to the basement.”

“How long are you going to stay down there?  I’m chilled to the bone.”

Still trying to solve the puzzle of the cut-off stairs, Jake noted, “This would have been a perfect escape for your bootlegging great-uncle.  If he ever got busted, he could get out of the house this way.”

“Why wouldn’t he just run out the back door?”

“If he was upstairs when the cops arrived, he could easily take this stairwell, run downstairs, and flee out the basement —”

“Or through the tunnel to the speakeasy next door.  It’s possible.”

Jake shrugged.  “I don’t know.  It’s a mystery.”

“Should I have Cokey come over and move the cabinet?”

Jake walked over and threw the flashlight back to Katherine.  “I don’t think so.  I don’t lift weights for nothing.”  With both hands, he grabbed the bottom tread of the cut-off staircase and pulled himself up.  “See what I mean?”

“Wow, impressed.  Well, I’ve seen enough of the stairway to nowhere.  Let’s go back to the attic so we can lock the door to the secret room.  Oh, and Jake, when the attic becomes your new office, Scout will figure out that lock in a New York minute, so we better have a locksmith replace it.”

The two reached the third floor landing when Jake took Katherine by the arm.  “What about the box the key was in?  It’s pretty cool.  Just needs to be cleaned up.”

“Add it to your project list,” Katherine grinned.

“Sure, I’ll do it when I come back from Chicago.” 

Katherine fell into Jake’s arms.  “I wish you didn’t have to go.”

“I’m the guest speaker.  I have to go.”

“I know, but I want you to drive my Subaru.”

“Why?  The Jeep’s fine.”

“Just humor me.”

“I’ll think about it.  Wish you were going.”

“We just moved back into the house.  I don’t want to further stress the cats by leaving them for four days.”

“Katz, I understand why you’re apprehensive about leaving them with a cat sitter — I mean, Elsa.  Maybe in time, Sweet Pea, you’ll be able to go away from the house without — ”

“Worrying that another explosion will take out the back half of the house,” she finished.  “It seems like it just happened yesterday.”

“Understood.  Let me kiss that frown off your face,” Jake said tenderly, taking Katherine’s face into his hands.