He turned away as this Wilma person came out. She was actually carrying the cat, holding the animal across her shoulder like a baby. She crossed the reading room rigid with anger and disappeared through an office door.
From behind the closed door he heard her talking to someone, softly arguing. Curious, he moved closer. The other voice was so soft he could not make out the words, but both women were angry. He had a strong desire to see the other speaker, such a sudden, intense curiosity that he was tempted to push open the door.
Shutting the door behind her, Wilma set Dulcie on the desk.“That woman! How did we ever get saddled with her?”
“I’d like to slash her,” Dulcie hissed, her green eyes blazing. “Eviscerate her like a dead toad.”
Glancing at the door, Wilma lowered her voice.“She frightens me. We don’t know what she might do.” She reached to stroke Dulcie. “Won’t you agree to leave the library for a while?”
Dulcie’s eyes widened.
“She could be capable of anything. I don’t want you hurt.”
Dulcie glared, her ears flat.“I can take care of myself.”
“I know that. I know you can be all teeth and claws. But Freda is bigger, and she has the advantage of any number of large, heavy weapons. She could block your cat door and corner you, trap you in one of the offices. She might even turn on the gas. This petition movement has her in a rage. She’s livid that the town and her own staff are trying to override her.”
“You think she’d turn on the gas and risk blowing the place up? Don’t be silly. And so she blocks my cat door. You know I can open any door in this library-the back door, the front door, the door to the side street. I can turn the knobs and, with a little time, I can turn every one of these dead bolts.”
Wilma stroked her diffidently.“I know how skilled you are. And I know your hearing and eyesight are far superior, that there’s no way she could slip up on you. But you refuse to admit that, simply because of size, a human might have some advantage. She’s cruel, Dulcie. And she’s angry!”
Dulcie turned away and began to wash, every lick across her tabby fur telegraphing her disdain.
Wilma walked around the desk and sat down facing her.“Please, won’t you stay in my office during the day? Near your cat door? And stay away at night until the petitions go to the city council?”
Dulcie leaped off the desk, lashing her tail, and without another word pushed out her cat door. She’d had a difficult morning already, before Freda started in, and now Wilma. Tired and cross beyond toleration from leading Azrael around the village while trying to avoid his intimacies, she had come into the library needing a long nap, and there was Freda making another fuss. And now Wilma roiling at her. She felt as irritable as a bee trapped against the window; she wanted only to be left alone.
Azrael had pretended to enjoy her company as she gave him the grand tour, showed him the best places to hunt wharf rats, demurely led him along the shore and into the warehouses; as she showed him the meanest dogs to avoid and where the best restaurant garbage was judiciously hidden out of sight of wandering tourists-not that any village cat frequented such places. Why should they, when they could enjoy George Jolly’s offerings? But the entire morning she didn’t dare let her guard down. He had only one thing on his mind-hewouldkeep nuzzling her. She had swayed on a tightrope between seeking to distract Azrael while Joe searched Mavity’s cottage-and fighting her own distressing fascination. She didn’t want to find Azrael charming; she didn’t want to be drawn to him.
Well hewasa good storyteller. Lying in the sun on Molena Point’s fishy-smelling pier, he had told her wonderful tales of the jungle, had shown her the jungle’s mysterious, leafy world awash in emerald light, the rain approaching like a silver curtain to drench the giant leaves and vines then move on again, a silver waterfall receding, glinting with the sun’s fire.
He had shown her the steaming city sidewalks crowded with dirty children begging for food and stealing anything their fingers touched, had shown her black buzzards bigger than any street cat hunched above her on the rooftops, diving heavily to snatch garbage from the sidewalks; had shown her tangles of fishing boats tied to the wharves, then buckets of silver cod dumped flopping on the pier. His stories were so vivid that she could smell the stench of the open market where fly-covered sides of beef hung rotting in the tropical sun-and the tomcat’s soft-spoken Spanish phrases enticed her, caressed her, though she did not understand their meaning.
She had ignored the darkness surrounding Azrael, the cloying heaviness beneath his sweet Spanish phrases-until he repeated his ugly predictions of murder.
“The people in this village, that woman Bernine Sage, and this investment person, and your Wilma Getz and her niece and that auto mechanic, all of them are drawing close to death. As unable to pull away as leaves blown to the edge of a dark pool.” And Azrael had smiled as if greatly enjoying the prospect of human death. Rising, he had peered down into the shadowed world of mud and pilings below them, where Molena Point’s small colony of stray cats eked out a meager living.
Suddenly, lashing his tail, he had leaped off the pier and shouldered into the shadows below, snarling and belligerent, routing the cowering strays, tormenting and bullying those thin cats, had sent them slinking away into dark niches to crouch terrified between the damp boulders.
Shocked, she had stormed after him and driven him back with steely claws. To hell with guile and sweet smiles.
But at her attack, his amber eyes had widened with amazement.“What’s the matter? They’re only common cats. They’re not like us. Come on, Dulcie, have a little fun-they’re only stupid beasts.”
“You think they’re stupid because they can’t speak? You think they’re without feelings? Without their own sensibilities and their own unique ways?”
He had only looked at her.
“Common cats have knowledge,” she had said softly. She was hot with anger, but she daren’t enrage him-not until Joe had finished with Mavity’s cottage. “Can’t you see,” she had mewed gently, “that they have feelings, too?” All the while, she wanted to tear the stuffings out of him, he wassoarrogant-this cat couldn’t see a whisker-length beyond his ego-driven nose.
Disdainfully he had flicked his tail at her silly notions and stalked away. And she, chagrined, had swallowed her pride and galloped after him, sidling against his shoulder.
He’d glanced down at her, leering smugly again, turning on the charm, rubbing his whiskers against hers. She had held her tongue with great effort and spun away from the wharf, laughing softly and leading him a wild chase through the village. The cat was so incredibly boorish. Who needed a torn that viewed other cats so brutally, who viewed a female not as an interesting companion or hunting partner, but as a faceless object meant only to mount, only for male gratification?
And when at long last she heard the tower clock strike ten, and knew that Joe would have left Mavity’s, she gave Azrael the slip. Making a tangled way among and through the shops, through enough varied scents-spices, perfumes, shoe polish-to hide her trail, she had slipped into the library guessing that, even if Azrael tracked her, he wouldn’t follow her into that sanctuary of strict rules where he’d likely be thrown out on his lashing black tail.
Alone at last, she’d had a little wash and settled into the shelves of medieval history for a quiet nap. But it wasn’t two hours later that she woke to Wilma and Freda arguing.
Alarmed, she had leaped down and trotted into Freda’s office to rub against Wilma’s ankles-whether out of support for Wilma or out of curiosity, she wasn’t sure. And Wilma had picked her up and cuddled her, as together they took the blast of Freda Brackett’s temper.