"Even if Kit did see Chichi spying, and heard them talking about the burglaries… Chichi did help us."
"Chichi had a close friend in L.A.," Joe said. "Frank something. I guess he was part of the L.A. gang. He was killed during that bank job Harper was talking about." The tomcat scowled. "It's frustrating when all you can do is listen, and can't ask Harper or Dallas what you want to know. Sometimes…"
Clyde set down his drink. "If you two start asking questions! If you…"
Joe smiled. He loved steaming Clyde, he could always get a rise, even when Clyde knew he was only goading him.
Clyde poured himself another drink. Wilma shook her head. "No more, I won't sleep." She looked at the cats and thought about what they had told her and wondered if she'd sleep anyway. She wondered how much more they hadn't told her. Though Joe and Dulcie were seldom as secretive as her parolees, she was too often aware that the two cats did not share everything, that too often they kept their own counsel.
Or, she thought generously, maybe they just wanted to clarify unanswered questions before they shared their information.
She was certain that, first thing in the morning, the cats would show up in Harper's office, to try to fill in the facts. She imagined them crouching high in Max's bookcase, listening or reading over Max's shoulder. She said, "Where is the kit? You haven't told me, and I need to call Lucinda."
But immediately she saw the dismay on all three faces.
"She didn't… She didn't come back from that house with you," she said slowly. She looked intently at Dulcie. "She… she went away with the ferals? Oh, she didn't go off with the ferals, with the wild ones?"
"They wouldn't run far," Dulcie said. "Not tonight. Those three were exhausted. They wouldn't take off into the cold night and the dangers of the hills without rest and food and fresh water. Kit wouldn't let them do that, they can't be far away. They were weak with stress, from being in that cage." She put a soft paw on Wilma's hand. "She's just gone along for a little while, to take care of them, find them a safe place to rest. And maybe," she said, smiling, "maybe to Jolly's Deli?"
Wilma said, "Would she take them home to Lucinda? To her own safe haven, to eat and rest before they run again?" And before Dulcie could answer, Wilma picked up the phone.
Lucinda answered out of breath, as if she'd been hurrying. Wilma punched the speaker button as Lucinda was saying, "… out on the veranda calling Kit. I swear, that cat… Is she there, Wilma? Have you seen her? Have Joe and Dulcie…?"
Immediately Wilma was sorry she'd called. What was she going to say? But now her foot was in it.
It took her a while to fill Lucinda in. Lucinda took it better than Wilma thought she might. The older woman was silent only a second. "The tree house," Lucinda said. "Our new house is empty, there's no one around. It would be safe there. Kit loves that tree house, she…"
Before Lucinda had finished, Clyde and the cats were out the door. "I'll call you," Clyde shouted back at Wilma; and they piled in the car and took off up the hills.
Wilma, alone in the house and strung with nerves, considered making herself another drink. Instead, she got a piece of cheesecake from the freezer and fixed herself a cup of cocoa. Sitting at the kitchen table waiting for Clyde's call, she could only think how incredible life was. Since Dulcie and Joe discovered their latent talents, and Kit appeared out of the wild, life was more amazing than she had ever dreamed.
She thought, amused, that one way or another, those three cats with their keen intelligence and insatiable hunger for criminal investigation would destroy the last of her sanity. Drive them all mad, either with the stress of keeping their secret, or with worry and fear for them.
But she couldn't be angry. She could only shake her head and smile.
33
From her wheelchair, Abuela stared defiantly up at Luis, her angry scowl matching his own. "They're gone! What could we do? We could do nothing. The man broke in, came through the window bold as brass and started sawing at the lock. When Maria tried to get out the door to get help, he swore and tied us up. Where was Tommie? Why didn't he hear us! He didn't come to help! That man threatened to kill us, and no one to help us. All that, over your mangy stray cats!"
"You're lying, old woman!"
"Who then tied us up? We didn't tie each other. And what do you think that is?" Abuela pointed at the severed padlock that lay on the floor among a scatter of cat litter. "Pulled those cats out, stuffed them in a bag and hauled them out the window. Said if we yelled or tried to use the phone, he'd do us, whatever that means. What did he want with cats? Why would he break in here, for cats? What did you want with them? Even you don't know!"
Behind Abuela, Maria remained silent. She was very pale, rubbing her arms where the belts had bound her. Luis stared at his sister and at his grandmother, picked up the lock and studied the severed pieces. "Where's the saw, Maria? What did you do with the saw! Why would you do this thing! You threw a fortune out the window! I swear, I should kill you both."
"I didn't cut the lock! Where would I get a saw! What did I do, cut the lock and then tie myself up?" Maria glared at Luis until she saw a spark of uncertainty. "Get out of here, Luis! Give us some peace! That was not a pleasant experience. There's not an ounce of sympathy in you." Putting her arm around Estrella, she peered down into the old woman's face as if afraid her abuela would collapse from fear and shock. "Go away, Luis, and leave her alone. You've done enough harm."
Luis turned away, muttering, and left them. Maria shut the bedroom door and leaned against it. She was amazed that she'd stood up to Luis.
It was the man who had come in the window and freed the cats, it was his boldness that had given her the strength to face Luis like that. Imagine, that man going to so much trouble to save a cage full of cats. Why would he do that? Maybe, Maria thought, there was something valuable about those cats. Or could it be, she wondered, that there really was such gentle goodness in the world that a man would risk his own safety to free the miserable beasts?
She could hear Luis and Tommie arguing out in the hall, then the front door slammed. She heard them tramping around the house through the bushes as the beams of their flashlights careened across the blinds. "Run, cats!" Maria whispered. "Run!"
At last they heard Luis's defeated swearing, heard his car doors slam, heard the car start and peel out into the street. As if they'd gone to search elsewhere. That made them both laugh, that Luis thought they could find terrified cats running scared out in the night.
But Abuela touched her rosary and closed her eyes, her lips moving. And Maria prayed, too, prayed for that good man. Then she crawled back into bed and lay imagining those cats racing free, far away from Luis. And she smiled.
”My tree house," Kit said, scorching up the thick trunk of the oak tree ahead of the three ragged-looking escapees. "My house, where you can hide and rest."
Willow and Coyote paused on the threshold, looking in at Kit, taking in the snug shelter. But Cotton pushed right in past them, bold and curious.
There were no cushions yet on the cedar floor, but the pile of dry oak leaves that had drifted into the corner of the cozy, square room provided a soft, warm bed. There was no ladder leading up the thick trunk of the oak to alert a human to the presence of the little house hidden high among the leaves. And though the cedar walls broke the wind, providing welcome warmth, there was nothing to confine them. The three open windows and open door offered easy escape in all directions.
Yawning, their stomachs full of kippers and smoked salmon, of imported cheeses, shrimp salad, and rare roast beef from the alley behind George Jolly's Deli, the three escapees curled up among the leaves in purring contentment. They were deep down into the most welcome sleep when a lone car woke them, slowing on the street below and pulling to the curb.