And, Pan thought now, watching through the window as Courtney curled up on a blanket on the Seavers’ couch, Courtney has magic, too. But it is a different magic. Like my father had—like Misto still has now, living a mysterious new life in another dimension. I know Misto remembers his past lives and everyone he loved—and Courtney remembers her past lives just as he did, she can tell them just as if she sees them again, and that is the greatest wonder of all.
Sitting close to the corner of the window trying to keep warm, intending to watch Courtney the rest of the night but tired and hungry and cold, the orange tomcat, despite all attempts at vigilance, was soon sound asleep. He didn’t hear the apartment phone ring. He didn’t see Courtney wake suddenly and sit up, listening.
21
Joe Grey arrived home to a dark house. From the roof, slipping in through a window of his tall glass tower, he waded through his pillows and nudged open his cat door to the inner rafters of the master bedroom. He could hear from just below the comforting rhythm of Clyde’s snoring, and that eased his nerves. It had seemed a bitter night, Courtney being prodded to do tricks that she refused to do, his young calico so distressed that Joe could see tears in her amber eyes; and on his way home it had started to rain, hard little drops piercing his coat and driving into his ears—the whole night seemed to have turned sour. Even the Luther apartment across the street looked grim, dark, and silent. The wet street below was deserted, both Thelma’s and Varney’s cars gone. All the house windows were black except for one tiny, blurred light behind Mindy’s curtain; a sheltered glow as if, left alone, she didn’t want to be noticed from outside. Looked like she had turned on a flashlight beneath her quilt and was reading, pushing away her loneliness.
How long had they left the house empty, Mindy vulnerable to whoever might want to break in, no one to watch over her? He wondered if they had even locked the front door? Did either one of them care what happened to the child? And where the hell were they at this hour?
Into some kind of trouble, you could bet. At least Varney would be. Likely out robbing some poor citizen or knocking around a pair of lovers in a parked car, taking their petty cash and cell phones.
It wouldn’t surprise him if all the scattered robberies that had occurred on the outskirts of the village over the last months were Varney’s doing, or Nevin’s. Maybe even DeWayne, maybe he’d been in town longer than anyone knew. If so, he’d been slick, to evade Harper and his men.
Joe was used to Varney being gone all hours of the night. As for Thelma, she was no better, likely up to the same thefts as the Luther brothers—scattered crimes at the edges of the village that had gone on for months: assaults totally different from the slick and professional daytime thefts right in town: fast, well-planned heists and the thief gone so quickly that no one but the victim knew anything had happened—then suddenly, those snatch-and-grabs had ceased altogether, and that was puzzling.
As he settled among his pillows licking his fur dry and watching Mindy across the way, she sat up sleepily, pushed back her quilt, and peered out through the curtain. The rain had eased. Could she see him watching her? She was staring straight at him. Rain-smeared moonlight shifted across his face, maybe causing his eyes to flash yellow, maybe that had drawn her attention. He turned away and curled down deeper. Was she wishing, all alone, that she could be in his cozy tower with him cuddled close and warm, soothed by his welcoming purrs? Wishing she wasn’t shut up by herself in that dark and empty apartment?
So many souls closed up alone tonight. Mindy. Courtney locked upstairs after her disgraceful performance. Maurita huddled inside Juana’s condo, although at least her guards were friends.
Someday, the way the world seemed to be traveling—more crime, more fear, less joy—would everyone isolate themselves alone? No more friends or groups of friends, no more loving families? Was that what life would be like in the future, a multiplicity of electronic horrors to run what was left; living creatures cast aside, abandoned as afterthoughts? Was that how the world would end?
Well, hell, didn’t that make him feel great! Angry at his own stupid ideas, he pushed deeper into the pillows and turned his mind to how to free his own young captive, how to help Courtney escape, how to spring her without human help.
He and Clyde had argued more than once about that. Clyde wanted to barge in when the store was open, charge up the stairs, bust through the door and grab her—or wait until midnight, break out a showroom window with a sledgehammer and order her straight out of there.
“Sure,” Joe had said, “you can do that, and have the Seavers after you, maybe with a gun. And what if she runs from you, if she doesn’t want to come? They call the cops, you’d be hauled into the station, you’d have Harper, your best friend, in a hell of a mess. The judges . . .”
This had gone on with increasing heat, over several uncomfortable meals and in between, until Ryan put a stop to it, read them both off with amazingly colorful language. She told Clyde that Joe was right, that human interference would put Clyde and the department in trouble, and could get Courtney hurt. She had left the table, Clyde glaring after her as snarly as a mad possum, only Joe Grey hiding a smile.
Now, from under her quilt, Mindy peered out at Joe again. A little earlier, she had watched the gray tomcat come across the rooftops nearly invisible in the rain and moving fast, his white paws, the white strip of nose and chest like pale moths winging above the shingles. The Damens’ cat heading home for his tower.
Slipping back beneath her covers, still she looked out admiring the tomcat, wishing that she, like that free soul, were out in the small hours, free and on her own.
But more than admiring Joe Grey’s freedom, she coveted the tomcat’s tower. She wished that was her elegant little house, she knew she would feel safer there, with Ryan and Clyde present in the room below. Two people and the gray cat whom she was sure cared for her and would love her. She’d like to crawl across to Joe’s roof and in through his window and snuggle up against his soft gray fur. The tower would be plenty big enough for her and Joe if she curled up just right among the pillows. It had glass windows all around, at least one unlocked, she’d seen him go through. Her mother always closed Mindy’s bedroom windows at night even when it was too hot, she said it was dangerous to leave them open, that someone might break in. So why was it all right to leave her alone and leave the downstairs windows and doors unlocked?
She watched Joe Grey turn over yawning. She got out of bed and looked up and down the street below. Empty, no cars. She pulled on a dark sweater over her pajamas and put on her slippers. She unlocked and opened her window, unlatched the screen and stepped out onto the wet roof.