She did not intend to steal-as she had, in the past, stolen silky garments from her neighbors. She meant only to get nearer the lovely wares, to sniff and feel and enjoy.
Swarming up a purple-blooming bougainvillea vine that climbed the shop wall, forcing up between its tangle of rough, woody limbs, she clung above the back door, clawing at the narrow transom until the hinged window dropped inward. It stopped halfway, held by a chain.
Crawling through on the slanted glass, she jumped down to a stack of packing crates, then to the floor.
She was in the shop's storeroom. It smelled of packing straw and the sour scent of the raw mahogany crates that had been shipped from South America.
Trotting into the big showroom, she was surrounded by primitive weavings and carvings and paintings, was immersed in a gallery of the exotic, every tabletop and display case filled with unusual treasures. Leaping to a counter, she nosed at straw figures and clay beasts, at painted wooden animals and medieval-looking iron wall hangings and applique pictures made from tiny bits of cloth. Lying down on a stack of wool sweaters as soft as the down of a baby bird, she rolled luxuriously, purring and humming a happy, half-cat, half-human song of delight.
It had been a long time since she'd coveted anything so fiercely as these lovely creations.
Choosing the softest sweater, a medley of rust and cream and black that complemented her own tabby coat, she forgot her good intentions. Dragging it between her front paws-like a leopard dragging an antelope-she headed across the floor to the storeroom. There she gazed up toward the high window, her head swimming with the heady pleasure of taking, all for herself, something so beautiful. She was crouched to leap when a sharp thud made her spin around, bristling.
She could smell him before she saw him. In the inky gloom, he was a whisper of black on black, his amber eyes gleaming, watching her. Sauntering out of the darkness, he smiled with smug superiority. "What have you stolen, my dear?"
She crouched, glaring.
"My, my. Would you report me and Greeley to the police, when you're nothing but a thief yourself? Tell me, Dulcie, where are you taking that lovely vicuna sweater?"
"I'm taking it to nap on it," she lied, "in the storeroom, away from the display lights. Is there a law against that?"
The tomcat sat down, cutting her a wicked smile. "You don't steal, my dear? You have never stolen from, say, your neighbors? Never slipped into their houses and carried away silk underwear, never stolen a black silk stocking or a lace teddy?"
Her heart pounded; if she had been human, her face would have flamed red.
"My dear Dulcie, I know all about your little escapades. About the box that your Wilma Getz keeps on her back porch so the neighbors can retrieve their stolen clothes, about Mr. Warren's chamois gloves that were a present from his wife, about Wilma's own expensive watch that was 'lost' under the bathtub for nearly a year."
She watched him narrowly. Where had he heard such things? All her neighbors knew, but… Mavity. It had to be Mavity-she could have heard it anywhere. She'd probably told that cute little story to Greeley, having no idea she would hurt Dulcie.
"Mavity thinks you're charming," Azrael told her, "dragging home the neighbor's underwear."
The tomcat twitched his whiskers. "And Greeley, of course, was most fascinated by your display of, shall we say, perspicacity and guile."
He looked up to the shelves above them, drawing her gaze to a row of ugly black carvings. "Those figures up there, my dear, those ugly little feathered men-you do know that those are voodoo dolls?"
"So?"
"That dark voodoo magic is of great importance." His smile was oily.
"It is that kind of darkness in you, Dulcie, that entices you to steal. Oh, yes, my dear, we are alike in that.
"You know the tales of the black cat," he said softly, "of the witch's familiar. Those are the tales of the dark within us-that is the darkness that invites the joy of thieving, my dear. That is the darkness speaking within your nature."
She had backed away from him, her paw raised to slash him, but his golden eyes held her, his pupils huge and black, his purring voice drawing her, enticing her.
"You and I, Dulcie, we belong to the dark. Such magic and passion are rare, are to be treasured.
"Oh, yes, the dark ways call to you, sweet tabby. The dark, voodoo ways." He narrowed his eyes, his purr rumbling. "Voodoo magic. Black magic. Shall I say the spells for you, the dark spells? The magic so dear to your jungle brothers? Come, my Dulcie…" and he slid close against her, making her tremble.
She spun away from him hissing and crouched to leap to the transom, but he blocked her way. She fled into the showroom. He followed.
"In the jungle, my dear, the voodoo witches make dark enchantments, such exotic and exciting spells-spells to sicken and waste your enemies-and love spells, my dear…"
She leaped away but he was there pressing against her. When she lashed out at him, his topaz eyes burned with amusement and his black tail described a measured dance.
"My dark powers fascinate you, sweet Dulcie. My cunning is human cunning, but beneath my black fur, my skin is marked by the spots of the jungle cat.
"I have teased jungle dragons as big as two men and have come away unscathed. I have hunted among constrictors twenty feet long, have dodged snakes so huge they could swallow a dozen cats." And the tomcat's words and his steamy gaze filled her with visions she didn't want.
"I have hunted in the mangrove trees, dodging hairy beasts with the faces of ghosts, creatures that hang upside down among the branches, their curving claws reaching as sharp as butcher knives, their coats swarming with vermin." The black torn purred deep in his throat. "I have witnessed human voodoo rites where an image of Christ is painted with goat's blood and common cats are skinned alive, their innards…"
"Stop it!" She twisted away, leaping to the top of a cabinet- but again he was beside her, his eyes wild, her distress exciting him. "Come run with me, Dulcie of the laughing eyes. Come with me down the shore under the full moon. Come where the marsh birds nest, where we can suck bird's eggs and eat the soft, sweet baby birds, where we can haze the bedraggled stray cats that cower beneath the docks, the starving common cats that crouch mute beneath the pier. Come, sweet Dulcie…"
His words, frightening and cruel, stirred a wildness in her, and the torn pressed her down, began to lick her ear. "Come with me, sweet Dulcie, before the moon is gone. Come now while the night is on us." His voice was soft, beguiling, dizzying her.
She raked him hard across the nose and leaped away, knocking sweaters to the floor, tipping a tall wooden man that fell with a crash behind her as she fled through the storeroom and up the pile of crates and out the transom.
Dropping down the vine to the mist-damp sidewalk, she fled up the side lane and across Eighth, across Seventh and then Ocean past the darkened, empty shops, never looking back, her heart pounding so hard she couldn't have heard a dozen beasts chasing her, certainly couldn't have heard the soft padding of Azrael's swift pursuit.
But when, stopping in the shadow of a car, she crouched to look behind her, the sidewalk and street were empty. Above her, along the rooftops, nothing moved.
What had happened to her back there? Despite her anger, she had been nearly lost in a cocoon of dark desire.
Pheromones, she told herself. Nothing but a chemical reaction. His sooty ways have nothing to do with real life.
Shaken with repugnance at herself, she spun away again racing for home, speeding past the closed shops and at last hitting her own street, storming across Wilma's garden, trampling the flowers, up the back steps and in through her cat door, terrified of the dark stranger and terrified of herself.
Crouching on the linoleum, she watched her door swinging back and forth, unable to shake the notion that he would come charging through.