Cat Out of Hell (14 page)

(
Pause
)

Roger

I’m giving you notice. I’m making it nine.

Prideaux

Look. You know you can’t kill me, Roger. You can’t kill the Cat Master! Roger – ?

Roger

I can if I read that book.

Prideaux

Roger – !

Roger

All Hail, Beelzebub, and all that. See you in hell.

Prideaux

Roger! Roger? Oh,
bugger
.

Email from Wiggy to Alec

Sent: Tuesday, January 20
,
8:45 AM

Subject: Nine Lives

Dear Alec,

I hope this reaches you. I have been reading this bloody pamphlet for hours now and you’re right about how absolutely
wanky
it is – but it’s also weirdly plausible, you know. Remember that story you found on line about the old man who lived near Harville Manor whose cat came back with a physical aversion to
Songs of Praise
? I can’t explain it, but I’m really bloody haunted by that.

Sorry I forgot to send that link to the other bit of footage on YouTube. I’ll do it this time. You really ought to see it, Alec. It’s dynamite.

I think the best thing about this pamphlet, you know, is the way it implies that ALL cats are basically bastards like Roger deep down, but have gradually lost the ability to practice real evil as the centuries have worn on. Did you pick up on that? The exceptional cats, like Roger and the Captain, aren’t the product of some sort of miracle, Seeward says – they just haven’t degenerated the way all the others have. I
think
that’s what he’s saying, anyway. If it is, I think this explains such a lot about cat behaviour, don’t you? When they hiss at us, you see, you can tell that they really
expect
us to fall over and die – because that’s what used to happen. So when we just stand there, unharmed, and laughing in their faces, they’re completely miffed! Huffy, that’s cats for you – always got the hump. But why? We’ve always asked ourselves, “Why are cats so pissed off all the time? They get all the best seats in the house, they have food and warmth and affection. Everything is on their terms, not ours. They come and go as they please. Why aren’t they permanently ecstatic?” Well, now it’s explained. It’s because they’re conscious of having lost their ability to do serious evil, and they feel bloody humiliated.

Also, it turns out, the majority of everyday cats feel they’ve been unfairly abandoned by the Devil! Seeward seems to have taken a sort-of cat opinion poll. They
all
still worship him, apparently – but at the same time they know that he doesn’t care; that he’s too busy cooking up really big evil things like internet banking and double-dip recessions to bother with little furry minions whose only service to him is killing innocent (and insignificant) wildlife. Oh, and that’s the other thing! The way they kill birds and mice, and bring them home for us to see!
Apparently it’s all bollocks about cats bringing us mice and birds because they believe in some childish way that we’re their big upright parents who will pat them on the back or something. They do it for only one reason: because birds and mice are their limit, but
they think they’ll get their big evil powers back if they only do enough killing
. Anyway, it was fascinating, all of this stuff. Say what you like about Seeward; he really knew his onions about cats. You know the way cats do that trampling thing on your lap, sort of kneading your groin? Well, that’s one of these “vestigial” things as well. It was how cats used to kill people by pretending to be friendly and then severing their femoral arteries! Purring was the way they sent people into a trance, you see – and then, when their prey was sort of paralysed and helpless, the cats would set to work with their claws! That’s what all cats are still trying to do, apparently, but not succeeding. I really love an evolutionary explanation for weird things like that, don’t you?

Alec, I have to tell you a couple of things and I hope you won’t be cross. The first thing showed quite a bit of initiative and pluck, I think. In your last email, you mentioned you were “going after” the Grand Cat Master, but you weren’t everso specific, and I was just reading and re-reading the bit in the book (at the end) about the “great debaser” and it suddenly occurred to me what it was. And I knew you didn’t have it, and I thought you’d bloody well want it, if at all possible. I’ve never explained to you that by sheer coincidence I live just three streets away from the library you used to work in – above the local Kall-Kwik, as it happens. It gave me quite a start when you mentioned the office downstairs as part of your plan for last Saturday night! I never mentioned this before because – well, you didn’t ask, Alec, did you? You didn’t say, “And where do you live, Wiggy? Not in Cambridge?” And besides, I wasn’t sure at first that I wanted to get involved.

Anyway, I studied the library plan you’d sent me, and this morning I thought I’d bloody well risk it, so I got myself into the library on a rather clever research pretext, and I found Staircase B after getting lost a couple of times, and in the end I found Prideaux’s office! I had it all prepared, what I was going to say if I found him in there – how I’d got lost looking for the old “bindery” office (whatever that is). I thought I might even comment on the awful old cardigan. But anyway, he wasn’t there, and I got it. Alec, I got the Great Debaser! No idea what to do with it now, of course. But I do have it in front of me as I write this, and I do feel proud.

The other thing I have to tell you isn’t quite such a positive type thing. It’s that I’ve remembered something Roger said to me – as you requested. You may remember that you wrote the other day:

It occurs to me that although the life-story tapes in the folder took him only up to his wartime experiences in the British Museum, he might have told you more – only off the record, as it were
.

Well, what I’ve remembered is that Roger said he knew how to access my emails. Sorry. I know I should have mentioned this before, but it kept flashing into my mind to tell you – especially when you were begging me at the beginning to be your special mate and “repository” and all that – but then I’d always forget it again.

I’m really sorry, Alec. I mean, I’ve no idea if Roger
has
been reading every single thing you’ve sent me. But just in case, my advice would be,
don’t tell me anything important from now on by email
. Wx

Email from Alec to Wiggy

Sent:
Tuesday, January 20, 8:45 AM

Subject:
Out of Office Auto Reply Re: Operation Seeward

I am currently rather busy and mostly away from my computer. If this is Wiggy, I am going to Harville Manor, but don’t tell anyone.

Email from Wiggy to Alec

Sent:
Tuesday, January 20, 8:48 AM

Subject:
You should change your auto reply

Alec, You probably ought to change your auto reply. Sorry. See previous email. Wigs x

PART FOUR

DORSET

It has been hard to know where to start with this final instalment of the story. In fact, I have stared at a blank screen for a day and a half, attempting to organise all my impressions of the last act (so to speak) – and simply failing. Perhaps I should wait? Perhaps it’s too soon? It was only a week ago that it all happened, after all; and it was traumatic, too, by anyone’s standards. But if I wait, won’t the impressions fade? Won’t I forget? And isn’t it my duty to get this right? I am beset by questions whose answers are just a matter of opinion. On balance, my feeling is that I should be a man and tackle it now, and put it all behind me. So that’s what I will do. I will have another cup of tea, and then I’ll pull myself together (and try not to repeat the unfortunate expression “be a man,” which I’ve never used before in my life) and press on and just pray that I remember to get everything in.

To get me started, I thought it would be helpful to establish a few basic things about the outcome; to set the guidelines, as it were. I have answered the multiple choice questions below with absolute honesty, which has not been easy. As you will
see, there are some aspects of the story that I can’t yet quite confront – see my answer to question 3, in particular. But question 2 was by far the hardest for me, and I may yet cave in and change my answer from the pathetic “Not really” to “Yes, I feel terrible.” Because, was it all my own fault? Take Watson. It was certainly my fault that this innocent creature – a friend to all the world, and the bravest of souls – accompanied me to Harville. It was my fault, also, that Dr Winterton put himself in the Captain’s way outside the library on that fateful Saturday evening; likewise, Wiggy would hardly have turned up when he did, if I hadn’t absolutely insisted on his getting involved in my investigations. However, as much as I want to take the blame for everything, I do remind myself that, when you boil it down, Beelzebub and all his demonic feline deputies (from the seventeenth century onwards) are much, much more culpable in all this than I could ever be.

Anyway, here are the questions.

1. Did things turn out well, generally speaking, Alec?

Yes, very well
No
Not really
Don’t ask