Sleight Of Paw

3

Mary stood, trying to look innocent and not quite getting there. There was a twinkle in her eyes and a smile was pulling at the corners of her mouth. In one hand she was holding a thin pink ribbon. The other end was attached to a helium-filled balloon. A helium-filled pig.

“Bad timing?” she asked.

“No, no, your timing was excellent,” Roma said. She looked at me and started laughing again.

Maggie had the back of her hand pressed against her mouth. It didn’t hide the fact that she was shaking with laughter.

“This is not a sign,” I said sternly. I turned to Mary. “Can we help you with your . . . pig?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s the mascot of the Horton Meat Company. They’re providing the ham for the supper Friday night.” She made a face. “Sam promised we’d display the pig during the supper and who knows where else, but I don’t know what to do with the thing.” She looked at Maggie. “Please, Maggie, do you have any ideas?”

Maggie squinted up at the balloon. “Maybe,” she said. “Which door are you going to set up at?”

Mary pointed to the double doors that led in from the front hall.

“Okay, I need to take a look.” Mags headed across the floor, Mary and the pig right behind her.

I turned to Roma. “So, aren’t you going to say something? You know you want to.”

She shook her head. “I think the flying pig pretty much said it all.”

I stuck out my tongue, which only made her laugh.

While Maggie walked around in a circle, studying the ceiling by the hall doors, Roma and I gathered the empty boxes, stacking them by the parking lot entrance. By the time we had our coats and hats on, Maggie walked back over to us. I knew by the distracted look on her face that she had more than one idea brewing in her head.

“We’ll drop the boxes at your studio and I’ll drive you both home,” Roma said.

Maggie smiled. “Thanks.”

“I think I’ll walk,” I said, grabbing an empty carton.

“You sure?” Roma asked. “It’s cold.”

“It’s always cold,” I said, putting on my boots. “I did paperwork all day and I could use the walk.”

“You want to have breakfast at Eric’s in the morning?” Maggie asked.

I yawned and nodded at the same time. “Sorry,” I said. “Long day.”

Maggie turned to Roma. “Can you make breakfast?”

Roma looked up from lacing her boots. “Can’t,” she said. “I have a couple of surgeries in the morning.”

We clattered down the stairs and stepped into the parking lot. I put the box I was carrying into the back of the SUV.

“Thanks, Kathleen,” Maggie said, wrapping me in a hug made puffy, thanks to our heavy coats.

“You’re welcome,” I said. “I’ll see you in the morning.” I flapped my mittens at Roma. “See you, Roma.”

I cut diagonally across the parking lot. I hoped Harry had met up with his sons. And I couldn’t help wondering where Agatha had gone. I pulled the hood of my jacket over my hat and stuffed my hands down into the pockets of my parka.

The cloudless sky was shot with stars, but I knew snow was still coming. My left wrist ached with a bonedeep tenderness. I’d broken it last summer, and lately it seemed to ache right before we got snow. I was getting good at knowing the weather in my bones.

By the time I’d made it up Mountain Road I was happy to see my little house. I banged my heels together before stepping into the porch and kicking off my boots. Then I unlocked the kitchen door and stepped inside, flipping on the light. I didn’t even have to yell, “I’m home.” Owen stuck his furry gray head around one side of the doorway to the living room. Hercules, on the other hand, walked in languidly, as though he hadn’t missed me at all; then he sat in the middle of the floor and began to wash his face.

I hung up my coat and set my hat and mittens over the heating vent. Roma’s roll of duct tape was still on my arm. I slid it off and stuck it in my jacket pocket.

“How was your evening?” I said to Hercules as I passed him. The little tuxedo cat looked up, almost seemed to shrug and went back to cleaning his face. Owen was still watching me, looking a bit like the disembodied head of Alice in Wonderland’s Cheshire cat.

“Want a piece of toast?” I asked.

“Merow?” Owen said.

“Yes, with peanut butter.” He came galloping into the kitchen to supervise. Hercules abandoned all pretense of face washing and sat expectantly by the table.

Once the toast was made and generously slathered with peanut butter, I sat at the table and broke off bites for each cat, occasionally taking a bite for myself. Roma had warned me more than once not to give Owen and Hercules so much people food.

In my defense, they weren’t exactly ordinary cats and the rules didn’t exactly seem to apply to them.

“I saw Harrison,” I said, licking peanut butter off my fingers. They both lifted their heads and looked at me. “He’s fine,” I said. “The boys were at an auction. Harry was . . . well, he was out doing something.”

I leaned forward and offered Owen another crumb of toast. He took it from me, set it on the kitchen floor and sniffed suspiciously, the way he did with every piece of food before he ate it.

“Remember the woman from the other day?” I said to Hercules.

He lifted one paw and shook it.

“Yes, the woman who carried you up the driveway so you wouldn’t get your feet wet.”

Hercules made huffy noises in his throat.

“Her name is Agatha Shepherd. She was Roma’s teacher.” I yawned. “Roma was a juvenile delinquent,” I said. “Well, almost.” Owen looked at Hercules. Hercules looked at Owen, and I swear they were grinning just a little. Roma was not their favorite person. Because they’d been feral, just giving them shots and basic medical care was an ordeal. “I figured you’d like that,” I said. I probably talked to the cats too much. It wasn’t that I really thought they understood me. But they were good listeners.

It made me really uncomfortable to think about Agatha picking up Hercules. The cats didn’t normally let anyone other than me near them. If a cat could have a crush on a person, Owen certainly had one on Maggie, but he didn’t let her touch him.

The first time I’d met Harrison Taylor, I’d been flabbergasted when both cats had climbed onto his lap. Then Rebecca, my neighbor, told me Harry was dying. It made his encounter with the boys all the more unsettling.

Both Harry and Agatha were old and clearly not well. Did Owen and Hercules know something, or was I just being paranoid?

Owen reached over and patted my leg with his paw, his way of saying More toast, please. I loved the little fur balls, but somehow I couldn’t quite believe they knew who was going to live and who wasn’t. Granted, they had some unexplainable talents, but I just didn’t think that Death Psychic was one of them.

Owen woke me in the morning, about a minute or so before the clock went off. I opened one eye and stared into his wide golden ones. “I’m awake,” I said. His response was to head-butt my forehead. There was no point in trying to sneak in an extra few minutes.

I sat up and stretched. “I’m up,” I said to the cat, who still stared at me without blinking. “Happy?” It seemed he was, because he dropped back to the floor and padded to the door.

Both cats were sitting by the refrigerator when I went downstairs. I fed them, leaning against the counter as they ate. Owen took a morsel of food from his dish and carefully moved it to the floor, the way he always did. Hercules was about to eat when he suddenly stopped and looked up at me, his eyes going from where I was slouched by the sink, to the table and back to me. He meowed softly, tipping his head to one side.

“I’m meeting Maggie for breakfast.”

He looked at the dish of food in front of him and covered his face with a paw.

“Oh, come on,” I said. “You know I can’t take you to Eric’s. How would I explain taking a cat out for breakfast? People would think I was crazy.”

Hercules continued to stare at me. Owen being Owen, he didn’t pay any attention at all; he continued taking food out of his bowl one bite at a time and then eating it.

“You have a perfectly good breakfast in front of you.” I rubbed the back of my neck. I already was a crazy cat lady. Someday, someone was going to catch me having a conversation with the cats and my secret would be out. Of course, as far secrets about the cats went, the fact that I talked to them like they were people was pretty tame compared to some of the other things I was hiding about them.

Deciding he’d won the stare-down, Herc dropped his head and started to eat.

I zipped around the little house, tidying up, while the cats had breakfast. Then I pulled on my boots and jacket and grabbed the broom to sweep away the snow that had drifted onto the back stoop.

Owen came up behind me and started down the side of the house. “I’m leaving in fifteen minutes,” I said. His ears twitched, which either meant he’d heard and would be back in time or he’d heard and was ignoring me.

Hercules sat by the door and watched while I brushed the stairs clear. “You need boots,” I said. “I bet the Grainery sells kitty boots.” The Grainery was where Rebecca bought Owen’s favorite catnip treat, Fred the Funky Chicken.

“They sell doggie sweaters.” Herc flicked his tail at me in the universal gesture that one didn’t have to understand cats to get. And then he turned and walked through the door. Literally through the door.

It still made my breath catch. I didn’t have a clue how he did it. In fact, the first time I’d seen him walk nonchalantly through an inch-and-a-half-thick wooden door at the library, I thought I was having hallucinations or even a stroke. Because cats can’t walk through doors or walls, can they?

Except Hercules could. Owen, on the other hand, couldn’t. What he could do was make himself invisible when it suited him. Which was usually when it didn’t suit me.

Both cats had some kind of magical abilities. Superpowers, if you will. I had no idea why or how. I had no idea if there were any other cats in Mayville Heights that could do the same thing. It’s not exactly something you can bring up in conversation. I couldn’t invite Roma over for coffee and then say, “Oh, by the way, any of those cats at your clinic able to walk through walls? Any of them go invisible on a whim?”

I couldn’t tell anyone. At best I would look like a mentally unbalanced person, and at worst someone would want to know how Owen and Hercules did what they did. I didn’t like thinking about what that might mean. Since I’d discovered what the boys could do, I’d tried to make sure no one else found out about it. Part of me kept hoping I’d discover some logical explanation, maybe some kind of genetic mutation, some leap up the evolutionary ladder. And the longer I lived with the idea the less strange it seemed.

Owen came back a minute or so before I was ready to leave. I heard him yowl at the porch door. When I opened it he darted past me into the kitchen. There was snow on his face. Unlike Hercules, Owen loved snow and had no problem sticking his head in a snowdrift if he thought there was something good in all that white stuff.

“Hold still,” I said. I grabbed a towel and wiped his face. He shook his head and took a couple of swipes at his fur with one paw. “You look handsome,” I assured him, patting the top of his head. I gave him a couple of kitty crackers and checked the water dishes.

“Okay, I’m leaving,” I said. Owen was too busy arranging his kitty treats on the floor to do more than “Murp” in my direction. “Hercules,” I called. “I’m leaving.” He stuck his head in for a second, then disappeared again.

Locking the back door, I trudged around the house and down the driveway. As I walked down Mountain Road I thought again that I really needed to buy a car. I’d left my life in Boston to move to Mayville almost a year ago, and I’d also left most of the things I owned. Because the town was small, it wasn’t that hard to get around, and all the walking up and down the hill was giving me the kind of thighs I’d always envied in more athletic women. Still, there were days when it felt like I was on the edge of the Arctic Circle as I was walking to work.

Maggie was already sitting at one of the tables by the window when I got to Eric’s. She waved at me through the glass.

Surprisingly, Eric wasn’t behind the counter, but Claire was working again. She held up the coffeepot with a quizzical look, and I nodded. She met me at the table.

“Thank you,” I said, setting my briefcase on the floor.

“Do you know what you want or would you like to see a menu?” she asked.

“I already ordered,” Maggie said. “I’m starving. Go ahead.”

“Could I have a couple of blueberry pancakes and the citrus bowl, please?” I said.

Claire smiled. “Got it. It’ll just be a couple of minutes. We’re a little slow this morning. Eric’s not here.”

“Eric’s not here?” I’d never been in the restaurant when Eric hadn’t been there.

“He broke a tooth,” Claire said, making a face.

“Ow!” I winced in sympathy.

Claire gave me a wry smile. “It’ll just be a few minutes,” she repeated, heading to another table with the coffeepot.

My right boot was untied. I bent down, redid the laces and shook a clump of snow out of the cuff of my gray pants. “Did you get everything back to the studio last night?” I asked as I straightened up.

Maggie nodded.

“And how late did you stay working?”

“Not that late.”

I looked at her.

“Okay, kind of late, but”—she leaned forward—“I figured out what to do with the pig.”

“Make a BLT?” I asked.

“Ha, ha,” she said.

“So?”

“So I’m not telling you. You have to wait and be surprised like everyone else.”

I picked up my cup, lacing my fingers around it to warm them up.

“Can I at least have a hint?”

Maggie leaned back with her own cup. “No,” she said. “If I give you a hint, you’ll figure it out and the surprise is gone.”

I noticed her eyes dart to the window again. “Are you waiting for someone else?”

“Ruby. She’s bringing the bulbs I need for the overhead lights, and she has a couple of sets of small lights I think I might be able to use.” She glanced at her watch and shook her head slightly. “New boyfriend.”

“What?” I said.

“Ruby met someone. She’s in the goofy, rose-coloredglasses stage. Remember, when you lose track of time because all you can concentrate on is the guy?”

“Yeah, I vaguely remember some kind of feeling like that,” I said, waving my hand dismissively. I drank my coffee and thought about Andrew, who I’d left back in Boston when I left everything else. Andrew with his blue eyes, broad shoulders and great laugh. Andrew, who went on a two-week fishing trip after we’d had a fight and came back married to someone else.

I blew out a breath and blew away the memory. “Who’s Ruby seeing?”

“His name is Justin. He was a counselor at an alternative school in Minneapolis. Now he’s working on some kind of project to build a wilderness camp for troubled kids.”

“I can’t picture Ruby getting all dewy-eyed over a guy.” Ruby was funny and unconventional. Her hair changed color about every two weeks, plus she had more piercings than anyone I’ve ever seen.

Maggie leaned over to look out the window again. “Where is—” She didn’t finish the thought because the door to the restaurant flew open and a blast of cold air blew over my back. Mags turned from the window, her eyes widened and she set her cup blindly on the table.

Ruby stood in the doorway, flakes of snow swirling around her. Her hair, hot pink this week, was wind tossed, her scarf was twisted and her face was ashen.

“Somebody help me,” she said, closing her eyes for a second.

I stood up. “What’s wrong?”

She held out both hands helplessly and looked over her shoulder out the door. “I think she’s . . .” She shook her head. “She’s in the alley. She’s not moving.”

Everyone was staring at Ruby but no one was moving. I pulled on my coat. “Ruby, who’s in the alley?” I said, crossing to the door. “Show me.”

She nodded and hurried down the sidewalk, half running, half stumbling. It was slippery and the snow had drifted over the pavement in places.

Ruby led the way into the alley two doors down from the café, and stopped so suddenly I banged into her. She pointed at something with a trembling hand. I put my own hand on her shoulder. “Stay right here,” I said. I could see tire tracks in the dusting of snow and crumpled fast-food wrappers.

There was something lying farther down the alley. A bag of garbage, I told myself as I eased closer, my heart pounding. A cat. An injured dog. My hands were shaking and I clenched them tightly in my heavy mittens. Then I stopped, because I could see what was on the ground. It wasn’t a bag of garbage or a dog that had been hurt. It was a red-and-black-plaid mohair coat covered with a dusting of snow. It was Agatha Shepherd.

And she was dead.