Cat Sitter on a Hot Tin Roof (20 page)

Hal nodded somberly. “Jeffrey needed Mazie too.”

I looked at my watch and saw that two hours had passed since we’d left Mazie in Jeffrey’s room.

I said, “We should go now.”

With creaking sounds from the chair and his knees, Pete got to his feet and headed toward Jeffrey’s room. I followed, with Hal walking beside me. Pete opened the door and we all stopped to look at Mazie and Jeffrey. He was sleeping soundly, and she had moved so she covered both his legs like a blanket. When she saw us, she lifted her head as if she knew her time with Jeffrey had ended.

Hal said, “Hi, girl.”

Mazie’s tail wagged, and Hal went over to stroke her head. Meeting his wife’s eyes over Mazie’s head, Hal said, “Pete and Dixie are going to take Mazie home now.”

Pete said, “If it’s okay, I could bring her back tomorrow.”

Gillis gave him a radiant smile. “That would be great, Pete.”

Hal lifted Mazie and set her on the floor. Pete took her leash, and we all said awkward goodbyes. Silently, Pete and I went down the hall with Mazie walking between us. At the elevator, Mazie whined and strained against the leash when Pete led her inside.

He said, “She wants to stay here.”

As the elevator descended, Pete and I met each other’s eyes. Something about this visit hadn’t gone right, and we both knew it.

We made it all the way to the parking lot before Mazie jerked away and tore back to the hospital.

28

S
treaking to the side door where we’d come out, Mazie ran full out and determined. She had her mind set on going back to Jeffrey, and she wasn’t waiting for any human to go with her. Pete and I ran to catch up. At the door, we met Hal.

He said, “Jeffrey’s crying again. Worse than before.”

Pete and I met each other’s eyes, both of us afraid the seizures had returned.

At Jeffrey’s floor, Mazie scrambled forward the minute the elevator doors opened, moving ahead so strongly that Hal had to run while he vainly tried to slow her to a walk. Jeffrey’s door was open, and we could hear him crying before we got there. It was the same droning sound I’d heard him make before, the same sound Mazie was accustomed to hearing when he was on the verge of a seizure. Jeffrey’s legs were kicking, and his face was grimly twisted like an old man’s. Dr. Travis was beside the bed, and the room seemed to contain a lot of other people wearing bunny smocks and anxious looks.

Mazie jerked away from Hal and leaped onto Jeffrey’s bed and settled her body against his side. Abruptly, the crying stopped, Jeffrey’s legs went still, his eyes closed and his face became calm. Everybody in the room smiled.

The only one who didn’t seem happy was Mazie. Pulling herself up on her elbows, she cocked her head and stared into Jeffrey’s passive face with an odd fierceness.

A couple of nurses whispered to each other that she was checking him out to make sure he was okay, but I didn’t think so. Something else was going on in Mazie’s mind, but I wasn’t sure what it was. Hal and Gillis exchanged a look, and I knew they also thought Mazie had some perceptive knowledge the rest of us didn’t have. Whatever was causing Mazie’s determined study, it gave her the invigilating look of a scientist inspecting a new find.

My own body hairs suddenly stood upright with a realization. Seizure-alert dogs recognize a change in body odor that presages a seizure, but maybe people with seizure disorders
always
have a unique odor that only dogs can detect. If that were true, and if surgery had removed the cause of Jeffrey’s seizures, there would have been a subtle change in his normal odor. To Mazie, that would be extremely puzzling because it would mean Jeffrey was no longer the same Jeffrey she knew.

As if she had come to a firm conclusion, Mazie got to her feet and stood on the bed with her legs braced beside Jeffrey’s feet. Lowering her head, she put her nose to his toes and licked them.

Jerking his feet away, Jeffrey’s eyes flew open and he giggled. “Stop it, Mazie!”

Beside the bed, Gillis covered her face with both hands and sobbed quietly. Hal moved to put an arm around her shoulders, his own eyes wet. They didn’t need to say that they’d had secret fears that Jeffrey would never laugh in his old way again. It had taken Mazie to harmonize the Jeffrey who’d had seizures with the Jeffrey who didn’t.

With an ear-to-ear grin, Dr. Travis said, “I think Mazie should stay here with Jeffrey.”

I felt like telling him that it didn’t take a brain surgeon to figure that out. Instead, I almost gave myself whiplash from nodding.

Leaning to give Gillis a quick kiss, Hal said, “I’ll just walk to the elevator with Pete and Dixie.”

In the hall, Pete put a fatherly arm around Hal’s shoulders. “The boy’s going to be fine, just fine.”

I managed to make some squeaky sounds of agreement, but I was afraid I’d blubber if I tried to talk.

By the time we’d got to the elevator, we’d decided that Pete and I would go to a pet supply store, get the things Mazie would need, and bring them back to the hospital before we headed back to Siesta Key. For the rest of Jeffrey’s hospital stay, Mazie would spend part of her time in the hospital room and part of her time in the hotel with Hal or Gillis. When it was time for Jeffrey to come home, either Pete or I would go back and help transport Mazie.

Pete and I sort of floated out to the parking lot, grinning like idiots and wishing somebody would ask us why just so we could tell them that Jeffrey was okay.

I used my cell phone’s convenient locator service to find a pet supply store, and we were walking its aisles within fifteen minutes. We got a water bowl, a food bowl, a bag of kibble, some doggie treats, and a sleeping cushion. As we went down the aisle toward the checkout counter, we passed the store’s cat-food section, and I noticed a box of cat food like the one Laura had set out on her counter as a reminder. Something about that box of cat food set off little clanging bells in my head, but I didn’t know why.

The checker totaled up our purchases with a cheerful pinging sound, and I paid her and pocketed the receipt. Pete picked up the bags and we headed for the parking lot and the Bronco. At the hospital, I waited in the parking lot while Pete hustled in the doggie supplies to Hal. When he came out, he was almost bouncing.

“Jeffrey’s sitting up. Not in a chair, but they’ve got his bed cranked up and he’s talking. Mazie is lying next to him, and he’s got a grip on her like he’s afraid she’ll leave him. The doctor says he’ll send him some real food pretty soon. All he’s had so far is clear soup and Jell-O. They always give you Jell-O. The Jell-O company must make a mint off hospitals.”

I laughed. Pete laughed. We would have laughed at the Jell-O itself if we’d seen it. We were high on sheer happiness. We didn’t look ahead. All that mattered was that Jeffrey was alive and alert and that he was going to eat real food. Life is really very simple when you narrow it down to the things that really matter. I was so elated that I forgot to be nervous when we went over the Skyway Bridge.

After we’d passed the tollbooths, Pete turned in his seat and faced me.

“I’m not going to work for you anymore, Dixie. I can’t take another case like this one.”

I couldn’t blame him. He’d expected a calm week or two, and he’d had emotional chaos.

I said, “I’m sorry it’s been so trying.” “I’ve been thinking about that cat. What’s going to happen to him?”

“Celeste has given me authority to find a home for him. She’s going back to Dallas and she doesn’t want him.”

“Could I take him? I think we’d get along just fine.”

I smiled to myself. Pete would probably play saxophone for him.

In the interest of full disclosure, I said, “He has a long tail that he leaves in doorways. You’d have to be careful that he didn’t trip you.”

“Honey, I’ve worked with circus monkeys that had tails so long they could wrap them around your waist. They were always leaving their tails looped around too, that’s just their sense of humor. That’s not a problem for me.”

“Then you’ve got yourself a Havana Brown named Leo. As soon as you’re ready for him, I’ll bring him to you.”

“Do you think it would be okay if I changed his name? I worked with a guy named Leo one time, and he was a bad apple.”

I laughed. “A lot of cats start out with one name and end up with another. Leo’s first name was Cohiba.”

“Well, that’s dumb. I was thinking more of Percy. Like P-U-R-R-C. I always kind of wanted a cat named Purr-C, spell it like that.”

We didn’t talk much after that, both of us caught in our own thoughts.

Back on Siesta Key, I drove to Mazie’s house to drop Pete off so he could clean the house, wash his sheets, and generally erase all signs that he’d been there. Home owners are glad to have somebody watching things when they’re gone, but they don’t want reminders of you when they return.

I was tired and sticky and unshowered, and my eyes felt like boiled tomatoes. I was also hungry. Nevertheless, it was time for my afternoon rounds.

Before Pete got out of the Bronco, he said, “Do you think you could get that cat today?”

I stared at him.
“Today?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking, that cat hates being cooped up, that’s why he runs away so much. So he must really hate being in a cat hotel, all squeezed in a tiny little room. If I were him, I’d want to get out of that hotel and move to a new house.”

Pete lives in an old Florida cracker house tucked away on one of Siesta Key’s tree-lined streets. It has a front porch where a tranquil cat could sit and watch the world go by, and a quiet garden where a contented cat could have fun chasing butterflies and birds. Leo had been neither tranquil nor contented at Laura’s house, but now that I knew more about the fireworks that had been going off inside her mind, I had a feeling he might have a personality change when he was with Pete.

I said, “When I’ve finished with my last call, I’ll go to the Kitty Haven and get Leo and bring him here.”

“Purr-C, not Leo.”

He looked toward Laura’s driveway and frowned. “Who’s that next door?”

I looked too and did a silent groan. The locksmith’s truck was at the curb, and Celeste’s rented Camry was in the driveway.

I said, “That’s the car Celeste drove.”

We both stared at the Camry.

Pete said, “Maybe now’s the time to ask her about me taking the cat.”

“We don’t need her permission for you to take Leo. She’s given me authority to find a home for him. It’s none of her business who gives him that home.”

Pete lifted one of his woolly eyebrows at my snarkiness. “Whatever you think.”

I sighed. “I just don’t want to talk to the woman.”

“Don’t blame you, but maybe she’s not such a pain in the patootie when things are going okay. It must have been a terrible thing for her to have to identify her sister’s body.”

I knew he was right. Of all people, I should have been more sympathetic to Celeste Autrey. I had been the one who had gone apeshit in front of a bank of cameras at Todd and Christy’s funeral, and I had been the one who had been fueled by consuming rage for a long time after their deaths. I hadn’t been such a sweet person either, and I didn’t have any business being so judgmental about Celeste’s attitude.

I said, “I’ll talk to her, but I’m not going to mention who’s taking Leo.”

Pete patted my shoulder. “You’re a good girl, Dixie.”

As he walked to the house he gave me a backward jaunty wave, and for a minute I wasn’t seeing his tall elegant frame but Laura’s body, flipping Martin a backward finger as she left him. Martin had said he’d been furious at Laura, but that he wouldn’t have hurt her. But from what I’d seen of Martin Freuland, he would say anything that served his purposes and do anything he thought he could get away with.

29

I
eased out of the driveway, drove the short distance to Laura’s house, and pulled behind the locksmith’s truck at the curb. As I walked up the driveway, I saw Celeste and the locksmith in front of Laura’s front door, and from the way they were glaring at each other, it didn’t seem like a friendly meeting. When Celeste saw me, color rose in her face and her eyebrows drew together in a furious frown.

“Oh, this is perfect! The pet sitter has come to join the party! I suppose the Sheriff’s Department sent out a special invitation to you. Did they give you a key to the house too? They won’t give me one, but they’ll give one to anybody who lives in this godforsaken dump! I couldn’t even go through my sister’s house by myself, had to have a deputy watch while I got her jewelry and some of her clothes. She was my sister, you know, and we were close—even with all I had to put up with, we were close. I didn’t take anything she wouldn’t want me to have. Not that I don’t have nice things of my own, because I do, but there’s no point in leaving these things here. In any civilized town, the neighbors would have helped me carry things, but not here. Here the cops keep the keys to my sister’s house from me.”

The locksmith heaved a huge sigh. “Ma’am, as I’ve told you probably a hundred times now, the cops aren’t keeping the keys from you, I am. You can have the keys as soon as you pay me for changing the locks. You’re the one who ordered the change, you’re the one who has to pay for it. As soon as you pay me, I’ll give you the new keys.”

“I’m not paying you for something I have the right to have. It’s my sister’s house. I had the right to have her locks changed.”

“Yes, ma’am, but I have the right to be paid for changing them. You’ve made three appointments to get the keys, and you missed all of them. Now you want the keys for free. Sorry, not gonna happen.”

Whirling to me, Celeste said, “And exactly what is your purpose here?”

Mildly, I said, “I just came to tell you I’d found a good home for Leo. I thought you might want to know.”

“That
cat
? You think I care about that stupid
cat
?”

“He was your sister’s cat, so I thought you might.”

It didn’t seem like a good time to tell her that the Kitty Haven charged fifty dollars a day for boarding a cat. Legally, the charge should go to her sister’s estate. In reality, I would pay it.

Even allowing for the shock of learning that her sister had been brutally murdered, Celeste’s behavior was bizarre. She was not a stupid woman. If she were Laura’s legal heir, she surely knew she had a right to everything in her sister’s house, no matter when she returned to Dallas. But she must also know that the house was devoid of art and had extremely modest furnishings. Any valuables would be jewelry or furs, which Celeste had apparently already taken.

She said, “You think I’m a selfish bitch, don’t you? Both of you think that.”

Neither the locksmith nor I answered, at least not out loud.

With her face the color of new radishes, Celeste dived into her handbag and took out a leather wallet. As if she were thumbing out playing cards, she slipped some bills from the wallet and flung them at the locksmith.

“Here’s your money.”

The money fell to his feet and he left it there while he pulled a small paper packet from his pocket. “Here’s your key.”

She held it on her open palm. “Just one?”

“One comes with the lock change. You want more, you pay for more.”

Her head jerked backward, and in the next instant she spat at him and threw the key against his chest.

“Take your damn key and to hell with you!”

Brushing past me, she stomped to the Camry and got in with a loud door slam. When she pulled out, she came within inches of hitting both the truck and my Bronco on the street, and left with a loud revving of her engine. The locksmith waited until she was out of sight before he picked up two hundred-dollar bills at his feet.

He said, “That woman is a nut.”

I couldn’t disagree.

He said, “You want this key?”

I shook my head. “I’m just the pet sitter. I’ve got the cat that belonged to the woman that was killed here, that’s all.”

“She left a cat?”

“A Havana Brown. Beautiful cat. I’ve found him a good home.”

He handed me the key. “You might need something for the cat.”

I didn’t want the key, but I could see his quandary. He’d changed locks on the house and been paid for it, and he felt duty bound to leave the new key with somebody, even if the somebody was just me.

I said, “I’ll give it to Lieutenant Guidry. He’s handling the murder investigation.”

“Okay, that’ll work.”

He stuffed the bills Celeste had thrown at him into his pocket and went out to his truck. I followed him. I had been tired and sweaty and hungry before, now I was tired and sweaty and hungry and totally disgusted with Celeste Autrey.

The locksmith had been only half right. Celeste wasn’t just a nut, she was a vicious nut. She and Laura must have been two halves of one disturbed whole, but while Laura had been disturbed and sweet, Celeste had soaked up all the bitter.