Cat Spitting Mad (7 page)

F
rom Harper's
kitchen, the smell of coffee drifted out across the porch as the cats watched through the screen, Joe Grey fidgeting irritably, rocking from paw to paw, his ears back, every wary alarm in his feline body clanging, as he listened to Max Harper, at the kitchen table, giving his formal statement to Detective Ray.

Harper's long, Levi's-clad legs were stretched out, his thin, lined face was expressionless, his brown eyes shielded in that way he had—a cop's closed face—so you could read nothing of what he was thinking.

From the time he had left the Marners and Dillon at the restaurant, until he arrived at the station three and a half hours later, an hour after he was due to go on watch, he had been in contact with no one. As far as Harper knew, no one had seen him.

“I left Café Mundo at about one twenty-five, maybe five minutes after Dillon and the Marners. I rode home along Coyote Trail, around the foot of the hills. That's the shortest way. The Marners and Dillon headed north
up that steep bridle trail behind the Blackwell Ranch.”

“And Crystal wasn't with you?”

“No, the horse she was leasing was to be shod today. I got home about two, unsaddled Bucky and cooled him off, sponged him and rubbed him down. Cleaned his tack and did some stable chores. Fed him, gave the dogs a run, and fed them. I had just come in the house to shower and change when the phone rang.

“It sounded like a woman. I couldn't be sure. Husky voice, like someone who has a cold. She wouldn't give her name. Said she thought I'd be interested in Stubby Baker because I was the one responsible for his going to prison. Kathleen, do you remember Baker?”

Officer Ray looked up at him. “Paroled out of San Quentin about three months ago. Mile-long list of scams.”

Harper nodded. “She said Baker had come back to Molena Point to work a land scam involving the old Pamillon place. Said there was a problem with the title, one of those involved family things, and that Baker thought he could manipulate the records. Work through a fake title company, pretend to sell the land, and skip with the money. She said he had fake escrow seals, fake documents. Said he was working with someone from Santa Barbara, that the buyers were a group of older people down there, professionals wanting to start their own retirement complex.

“I'd seen Baker up around the Pamillon place, I'd ridden up there several times because of those cougar reports. And I knew Baker had been nosing around in
the Department of Records. That, with her story, made me want to check him out.

“Baker's staying in a studio apartment over on Santa Fe. The informant said he was scheduled to meet with his partner at four that afternoon, at Baker's place. That they were getting ready to make the transaction. That the buyers were going to put a lot of money up front, that they had complete faith in Baker.

“The last scam he pulled here in Molena Point was so shoddy I can't envision anyone trusting him. But I caught a shower, dressed, and went over there. I thought if I could make his partner, get a description and run his plates, we might come up with enough to search the apartment, nip this before those folks got taken. I drove the old Plymouth.”

Some months earlier, Harper had bought a nondescript 1992 Plymouth to use for occasional surveillance. Usually the detectives picked up a Rent-A-Wreck, a different car for every stakeout, so the local no-goods would find them harder to spot.

“I parked at the corner of Santa Fe and First behind some overgrown shrubs, sat with a newspaper in front of my face. Watched the apartment for over an hour. Not a sign of Baker. Only one person went up the outside stairs—the old woman from Two D. Baker's in Two B. No one came down, no one left any apartment I could see, and there's only the one entrance, there in front, except fire escapes. Even the garbage is carried out the front. I could see all of the second-floor balcony, could see Baker's door and window. Didn't see
any movement inside, no twitch of the curtain, no light burning.

“Maybe Baker made me and had a quick change of plans. I left at ten to five, swung by my place to pick up my unit, got to the station at five.”

Detective Ray pushed back her long, dark hair. “Did anyone see you, anyone you knew?”

“If they did, they didn't speak to me. I didn't notice anyone, just a few tourists.”

“Did you know the woman who made the call? Recognize her voice?”

“As best I could tell, she wasn't anyone I've talked with in the past. No, I didn't recognize her.” Harper frowned. “It wasn't that woman snitch who bugs me, at least not the way she usually sounds. That woman speaks so softly, with a touch of sarcasm…”

Outside the screened door, the soft-voiced snitch twitched her whiskers and smiled.

“This one—yes, probably disguised,” Harper said. “Sounded older, rough and grainy. If it
was
a disguise, I bet it gave her a sore throat.”

And both cats watched Harper with concern. This giving of a formal statement and all that implied had them more than frightened, left them feeling as lost as two abandoned strays in a strange city.

Max Harper was the one human who made their sleuthing worth the trouble, who, when they helped to solve a case, would see the perps successfully prosecuted—the one law enforcement type who made their sneaky feline efforts worth the trip.

And Harper was more than that to Joe Grey. Joe had a deep and caring respect for the police captain—for
his hunting abilities, for his dry humor, which was almost as subtle as the humor of a cat, and for his general attitude of quiet power—all traits that the tomcat greatly admired.

But now, crouched in the dark beneath the deck chair, Joe imagined with painful clarity Max Harper facing Judge Wesley not as a witness for the prosecution but as a prisoner about to be prosecuted. The thought made his belly queasy and his paws sweat.

He might torment Max Harper, might be amused by Harper's irritable response to certain anonymous phone tips—amused by Harper's unease at never being able to identify the source of certain information. But he would gladly rip apart whoever had set up this scam.

And there was no doubt in either cat's mind that it was a scam. Some lowlife was out to ruin Harper, with the help of the American justice system.

During Harper's statement, Charlie had not left the room. When he was finished, she poured fresh coffee for him and Detective Ray, and dished up the breakfast she had kept warm. Harper was wolfing his scrambled eggs when the blacksmith arrived.

The cats followed Harper and Turrey to the stables, again streaking into the feed room. In the rising dawn, it was harder to stay out of sight.

Clyde's yellow car was gone from the yard. Whether he had left to give Harper privacy or was angry at Charlie for mothering Harper, the cats couldn't guess. Clyde and Harper had been friends ever since high school, and Clyde was the only non-law-enforcement type Harper hung out with. For Clyde to see his own
girlfriend mooning over Harper—if he did see it, if he was even aware of Charlie's feelings—was enough to make anyone mad.

Well, Clyde had had plenty of girlfriends before Charlie; it wasn't like they'd been seeing each other forever. These human entanglements were so—
human
. Filled with subtleties and indirect meanings and hurt feelings. Awash in innuendos. Nothing like a good straightforward feline relationship.

From the shadows of the feed room, the cats watched as Turrey pulled Bucky's shoes, the small, leathered man easy and slow in his movements. As he pulled each shoe, he dropped it into an evidence bag that Detective Davis held open for him. Captain Harper stood aside. Already he had taken an arm's-length position, directing his people but handling nothing. He had approached Bucky only to bring the gelding from his stall and put him in the cross-ties, then stepped away.

The cats watched the blacksmith clean out the dirt from each hoof, and scrape it, too, into the evidence bags. Watched Turrey fashion a new pair of shoes for Bucky. Dulcie had a hard time not sneezing at the smell of burning hoof as Turrey tested the metal against Bucky's foot—the seared hoof smoldered as hot as Joe's anger at Max Harper's unknown enemy.

Of course Harper had been set up. What else? All Joe could think was, he'd like to get his teeth into whoever had hatched this little plot.

But while Joe wanted to slash the unidentified killer, Dulcie just looked sad, her pointed little face grim, her green eyes filled with misery.

Charlie seemed the last one to admit the truth. When Turrey left, and the cats followed Harper back to the house, Charlie said, “Maybe there was some mix-up. Maybe the photos and casts were made where you did ride, before the murder—maybe days before.” She stood at the sink washing up the breakfast dishes, her face flushed either from the steam or from stifled tears.

“I haven't ridden up there in weeks,” Harper told her. “And the evidence was
not
taken from where I rode last night.”

“Maybe two separate shoes got scarred. Maybe some piece of dangerous metal is half-buried in the trail, and both horses tripped on it. If we could find it…”

Harper patted her shoulder. “Leave it, Charlie.”

“But…”

“There's more here than you're seeing.”

She looked at him, red-faced and miserable.

“I have good detectives, honest detectives,” Harper said softly. “We'll get this sorted out. And we'll find Dillon.”

But the cats looked at each other and shivered. Someone wanting to destroy Max Harper had killed two people and might have killed Dillon.

Still, if Dillon was alive, if they were holding her for some reason, the twelve-year-old would be a hard prisoner to deal with. Dillon wouldn't knuckle under easily.

Dulcie's voice was hardly a whisper. “What about this Stubby Baker? Harper said he's been in town only a few weeks. What if Baker
was
in his apartment? What if he saw Harper watching? What if he could tes
tify to Harper's presence there on the street between four and five?”

“Oh, right. And an ex-con is going to step right up and testify for a cop he hates.”

But he sat thinking. “What day was it that the kit had that encounter with Baker?”

“How do you know that was Baker?”

“She watched him through the window. Don't you remember? Saw his name on some letters.”

Dulcie smiled. “I do now. The kit is not a great fan of this Baker.”

A week before the murder, the kit ran afoul of Baker as she was licking up a nice bowl of custard in the alley behind Jolly's Deli.

Jolly's alley, to the kit, was a gourmet wonderland. The handsome, brick-paved lane, with its potted trees and benches, offered the village cats a nirvana of imported treats. And that particular afternoon she had been quite alone there, no bigger cats to chase her away. Had been up to her furry ears in cold boiled shrimp and a creamy custard when a tall, handsome man entered the alley.

He was dark-haired, slim, with dark, sparkling eyes, a movie star kind of human of such striking magnetism and appeal that the kit was drawn right to him. She sat up, watching him.

“Hello, kitty,” he said with a soft smile.

In a rare fit of pleasure and trust she had run to him and reared up beside his leg—never touching him but curling up in an enticing begging dance, asking prettily to be petted.

The man kicked her. Sent her flying. She landed
against a shop wall, hurting her shoulder. She had been shocked at his unkindness. Only in that second after he kicked her, when she landed staring up at him hissing, did she see the evil beneath his smiling mask. When, laughing, he drew back to kick her again.

That man's smell had burned into her memory. Within the dark side of her mysterious cat mind, she invented vast tortures reserved for this human, exquisite pain that she longed to visit upon him. Oh, she had told Joe and Dulcie in detail how, when he left the alley, she followed him, keeping to the shadows cast by steps and protruding bay windows. Followed him to an apartment building, where he climbed its open stairs from the sidewalk to a second-floor balcony tucked between tall peaked roofs and shaded by an overhanging tree. Swarming up into the branches, the kit peered past wooden shutters into a lovely apartment of white walls, tile floors, and soft leather that matched the way the man looked.

The mail on the coffee table told her his name was Baker. She watched this Baker and hated him. Tried to think of a way to hurt him. Her nose was inches from the glass when he swung around and saw her, and his eyes grew wide. The kit swarmed down the tree and ran.

“A mean-tempered dude,” Joe Grey said. “With his record, and Harper having sent him up, you can bet he's connected.”

“You may be right, but…”

“Baker's part of this mess, Dulcie, you can wager your sweet paws. And I mean to nail him.”

A
hundred
miles north, in San Francisco, the morning after the Marners' murder, Sunday morning, Kate headed again for the Cat Museum, feeling upbeat and determined.

If she had known about the grisly deaths of Ruthie and Helen Marner, she might not have left her secure apartment.

She hadn't read the paper or turned on the TV or radio since last Saturday, when the headlines so upset her. She didn't care to know any more about Lee Wark or about the local rash of cat killings—but it was silly to put off doing something she wanted badly to do.

She was, after all, only two hours from home, from Molena Point and safety. She could run down there anytime. Hanni wanted her to go.

Anyway, Lee Wark was probably hundreds of miles from San Francisco. Why would he hide in the city, so close to San Quentin? Why would he stay in California at all, with every police department in the state looking for him? Wark had spent plenty of time in Latin Amer
ica, likely that was where he'd gone. She had, for no sensible reason, let the newspaper's sensational muckraking terrify her.

Heading up Stockton, walking fast in the fog-eating wind, resisting any smallest urge to turn back, she had gone five blocks and was beginning to feel better, was telling herself what a lovely outing this would be, how much she would enjoy the museum, was happily dodging people who were hurrying along in the other direction—to church, out to breakfast—when she noticed a man on the opposite side of the street keeping pace with her, his black topcoat whipping in the wind, the collar turned up and his black hat tipped low like the heavy in some forties' movie.

When she slowed, he slowed.

When she moved faster, he swung along just as quickly, his reflection leaping in the store windows.

He did not resemble Lee Wark; he was very straight rather than slouched, and broader of shoulder than Wark. His black topcoat looked of good quality, over the dark suit, his neatly clipped black beard and expensive hat implying a man of some substance. The very opposite of Wark. A man simply walking to church or to an early appointment, or to work in some business that was open on Sunday, maybe one of the shops near Fisherman's Wharf.

She turned up Russian Hill, disgusted with herself, angry because her heart was tripping too fast; she was letting fear eat at her. Behind her, the man continued on up Stockton, never looking her way. She felt really stupid.

Yet something about him, despite the broad shoulders and beard and nice clothes, left her sick with fear.

Had she caught a glimpse of his eyes beneath the dark brim? Lee Wark's cold gray eyes? She couldn't help it, she was overwhelmed again with that terrible panic.

Maybe she
should
drive down to the village with Hanni, for the week. Hanni had business there, and her family had a weekend cottage. They were so busy at work, it would be difficult for both of them to go.

“So we take a week off,” Hanni had said. “While we wait for fabric orders and the workrooms. That won't kill any of our clients. Relax, Kate. I'm the boss, I say we drive down. You know the movers and shakers in the village better than I. You can help me, it's for a good cause.” Hanni had whirled around the studio, kicking a book of fabric samples, twirling her long skirt, her short white hair and gold dangle earrings catching the studio lights, her brown Latin eyes laughing. “We need the time off. We deserve it!”

Kate had known Hanni only slightly in Molena Point when the family was down for weekends. She had always envied Hanni's looks, her prematurely white, bobbed hair, a woman so sleek and slim—those long lean lines—that even in faded jeans and an old sweatshirt, she could have stepped right out of Saks's window.

Strange—if Hanni hadn't been involved with the Cat Museum, very likely they wouldn't be considering the trip home just now.

It was Hanni who had awakened her interest in the Cat Museum, who had shown her photographs of the galleries. Hanni was on the board, deeply involved in the charitable institution's pending sale.

“We have to move somewhere, we're about ready to
go into escrow. Twenty million for that Russian Hill property—and the taxes are skyrocketing. And so much pressure from the city—from some friend of the city, you can bet, who wants to build on that land.”

Hanni shrugged. “For that kind of money, why fight it? We can build a lovely complex of galleries and gardens, and I think the old Pamillon estate, those old adobe walls and oak trees, might be perfect. That's the way the present museum was built; McCabe started by combining four private homes and their gardens. You need to go up there, Kate. You need to see it.”

“Did you say McCabe?”

“Yes. You've read about him? He—”

“I…suppose I have. The name's familiar.”

Only since she'd moved back to San Francisco had she tried to trace her family, from information the adoption agency was finally willing to release. Her grandfather's name had been McCabe. The agency said he'd been a newspaper columnist and an architect; they said he had not used a first name.

“If we don't find a place soon,” Hanni had said, “the art collection will have to go into storage, and we'd rather not do that.” Taking her hand, Hanni had given her that infectious grin. “Come with me, Kate. Jim and the kids don't care if I go, and you don't have an excuse. Come help me. You know Molena Point, you know realtors there. I want your opinion of that land.”

“But I don't need to go there to tell you what I already know.”

“You need a vacation.”

Hanni, the mover and shaker. Kate's boss was a topflight interior designer and a more-than-shrewd busi
nesswoman. Kate loved working with her, she loved Hanni's enthusiasm. She loved telling people she was assistant to the well-known designer, Hanni Coon. And if Hanni wanted a week in Molena Point, what better excuse than a multimillion-dollar real estate deal?

Striding up Russian Hill, she saw no more “suspicious” men. The morning was bright, the blowing clouds sending running shadows before her across the pale, crowded houses and apartments. Climbing, she was short of breath. Out of shape. Had to stop every few blocks. If she were back in Molena Point for a week she'd walk miles—along the beach, through the village, down the rocky coast.

It would be so embarrassing to go back. She hadn't been home since the afternoon she threw her clothes in the car and took off up 101, escaping Lee Wark. And escaping her own husband. It was Jimmie who had paid Wark to kill her. That came out in the trial.

Everyone in the village knew her husband had gone to prison for counterfeiting, for transporting stolen cars, and as accessory to the murder for which Wark had been convicted—and for conspiracy to kill his own wife.

How had San Quentin let those killers escape? How could a maximum security prison be so lax? The three had overpowered a guard, taken him hostage, using prison-made weapons. A garrote made with sharpened silverware from the kitchen and strips of blanket. That must have embarrassed prison authorities. The guard was not expected to live. They had dumped him in a ditch in Sausalito, where authorities thought the men had split up. Two had apparently stolen cars, and may have taken clothes from the charity Dumpster of a
local church.

Had Lee Wark come across the Golden Gate bridge into the city? He could have walked across.

Well, he wouldn't go to Molena Point, wouldn't show his face in the village while Max Harper was chief of police. Harper had come down on Wark with a vengeance, had seen that the prosecuting attorney was aware of every dirty detail, every smallest piece of evidence.

I could go back for a few days. So safe at home. And none of my real friends care that Jimmie's in prison—not Wilma, certainly not Clyde.

The thought of Clyde gave her a silly little thrill that surprised her.

Well, there
had
been something between them, an attraction that she'd never let get out of hand while she and Jimmie were married.

And then when she left Jimmie, Clyde had learned about her double nature, and that had turned him off big time.

As she climbed higher up Russian Hill, the steep sidewalk turned brilliant with sun; the sun on her back felt as healing as a warm, gentle hand. Hurrying upward, stopping sometimes to rest, she fixed her attention on the subtle tone combinations of the many-colored Victorian homes. San Francisco's painted ladies. But, nearing the crest, she stopped suddenly.

He was there. Stepping out from between two houses. The man in the black topcoat.

She swallowed and backed away, ice cold. Wanted to run. Wouldn't give him the satisfaction.

She couldn't see his face. Black hat, pulled low.
Black topcoat, collar turned up even in the hot sun so his eyes were nearly hidden. Swallowing, trying to make her heart stop pounding, she casually crossed the street.

Maybe he was some harmless ogler. Nothing more threatening than that.

As she drew opposite where he'd stood, he moved back between the two houses and was gone. Peering across, into the narrow side yard, she saw only a hedge and a patchy scruff of lawn.

And now, up the hill, rose the red rooftops and huge old oaks of the museum. She hurried up toward them, eager to be among people.

But then, as she turned into the museum gardens, it wasn't people who surrounded her, it was the museum cats. Cats sunning under the flowers and bushes and atop the low walls, all of them watching her as she entered along the brick walk and through the wrought-iron gate.

What kind of cats these might be would not be public knowledge—would be the museum's most sheltered secret, if even the museum staff knew.

She wandered the paths for a long time among lush masses of flowering bushes, tall clumps of Peruvian lilies, densely flowering tangles. The scents of nasturtium and geranium eased her nerves. She felt so uncertain about asking to see McCabe's diaries. She was sure they had them, yet had been reluctant even to ask if Hanni knew—because she would have to give Hanni an explanation. And she might, in a weak moment, confess to Hanni that she thought McCabe could be her grandfather. It was all so complicated.

I will simply ask,
she told herself.
Ask, and look at
what is there, and not
make
it complicated.
Moving toward the door, she pinched a sprig of lavender, sniffed at it to calm herself, stood looking in through the museum's leaded windows at the white-walled galleries.

But as she turned toward the main entrance, she was facing the man in black. He stood just beyond the door, beneath an arbor, his features in shadow, his muddy eyes on her.

Catching her breath, she hurried in through the glass doors and fled to the reception desk, begging the pudgy woman curator to call a cab. She felt hardly able to speak. She stood pressing against the desk, waiting for the taxi to arrive, then ran out to it, sat stiffly in the backseat, unable to stop shaking. She was so cold and shivering that when she got home she could hardly fit her key in the lock. Safe at last in her apartment, she threw the bolts on the doors and turned up the heat.

It had been Lee Wark. She'd seen him clearly. His eyes, the same muddy-glassy eyes.

What if he'd followed her home, in a second cab? Or maybe he took her cab's number, would find out from her driver where she lived? She had to call the police. Report that she'd seen him. Wark was a wanted felon, a convicted killer.

Most of all, she had to get out of San Francisco.