Dear Elliott,
Good to hear from you and to know you're settled so quickly and back at work. The new book sounds fascinating. You're to be commended for being able to finish writing the novel and oversee production of the play-two very distinct projects- when you're feeling under the weather.
Yes, there are several collectors in the bay area. I'll put together a list, try to get it off to you at the end of the week. All my good thoughts are with you. I hope the casting and rehearsals go well. Hope the treatments are not too uncomfortable. Sounds to me like you're doing very well. Give me a call if you and Vivi want to come up for a talk with these people, or if you simply want to get away for a weekend.
Very best, Harlan.
When she heard the Traynors returning, she had dropped the envelopes and letter hastily into her trash bag. But it was the next day that she faced real temptation, when Traynor's manuscript pages began to appear on his desk, one new chapter each morning, printed out, lying beside the computer.
Alone in Traynor's paneled study with its leaded windows and pale stone fireplace, she had guiltily reached for the first pages, telling herself she wanted just a peek. Because she loved his work. Because she longed to see his work in progress, still forming, see how he accomplished his smooth and exciting prose. The guilt she should normally feel took a weak second place to the artistic hunger that rose in her, a keen fascination at the proximity of this fine writer.
Traynor's study looked the same each morning when she entered, the desk immaculate, no paper left out. The little footstool pushed just so, to the corner of the desk against the bookcase, its loose, tasseled pillow aligned perfectly on top. She thought perhaps he used the pillow to ease his back as he worked. The books he had brought with him from New York were few, and all on California history-a row perhaps two feet long standing neatly on the otherwise empty shelves, beside a stack of photocopied research material. The bookshelf stood at right angles to his desk, close enough to be reached from his chair. It was flanked by a window directly at the end of the desk that looked out on the drive and front garden.
Charlie's aunt Wilma, who was a research assistant at the Molena Point library, had mailed a thick package of machine copies to Traynor nearly a year ago, all research on local California history, much of it family journals collected over the years by priests at the nearby mission, and a history of the mission itself as well as the surrounding land, which had been divided by grants into huge cattle spreads. Because of Wilma's thoroughness in her assistance, Traynor had sent quite a nice, and welcome, donation to the library's book purchasing fund.
Alone in Traynor's study, eagerly picking up the pages, Charlie had thought, Why am I doing this, why am I so interested? I'm not a writer, I have no professional curiosity. Her animal drawings were quite demanding enough of her creative skills; there was plenty to learn studying bone structure and doing quick sketches of moving animals. She had no time to divert her attention to a second discipline, no matter how much the beauty of the written word made her want to try. And yet any work of art, in a state of becoming, was fascinating stuff, seeming to her vividly alive. She had begun to read eagerly, glancing out the window in case they might return.
She'd had no idea how Traynor's prose would affect her-no notion of the sudden, perplexed unease that would wash over her.
She had laid the pages down, had stood beside the desk staring out at the empty drive, confused and puzzled, not understanding why he had written this-how he could have written this.
This was not the lyric prose she had so admired from Elliott Traynor; his sentences were awkward and confused. The experience had shocked and saddened her. There was no other explanation than that his illness had affected his work. She had turned away filled almost with a personal loss. And ashamed, too, that she had pried-and she was touched as well with a cold little fear for herself, with a sharp sense of helplessness, that creative skills might so suddenly be diminished.
8
Clyde woke in the dark predawn when he felt Joe drop off the far side of the bed. He hadn't slept well, had just managed to drift into sleep, and wasn't happy to be jerked awake again. He'd dreamed of Kate, not pleasant dreams. Why did she insist on staying in San Francisco? Jimmie was safely in prison, he couldn't hurt her now. In the dream, she'd been so- distant. So removed, darkly preoccupied, not at all like the bright, sunny Kate Osborne he knew.
He could feel the warmth at his back where the tomcat, moments before, had been curled up asleep before he thumped softly to the wood floor, apparently trying to be silent. Why all the stealth; what was he up to? Joe's usual departure was a four-star performance, tramping across Clyde's stomach with those big, hard paws, dropping to the floor with all the finesse of a truckload of rocks.
In the near-dark, Clyde watched Joe pad softly around the end of the bed, a shadow sneaking across the Sarouk rug, heading away down the hall.
In a moment he heard Joe's cat door slap, swinging against its metal frame.
Between Joe's unusual behavior and his own unpleasant dreams, Clyde was wide awake. Leaving the warm bed, he stood at the open window, peering out from behind the curtain like some little old lady spying on the neighbors. The sea breeze was cool against his skin. In the faint moonlight that filtered through the blowing oak leaves, he could see Joe fast disappearing up the sidewalk, his gray coat nearly lost among the leafy shadows, only his white paws clearly visible, flashing along with swift determination.
Joe went out every night to hunt rabbits or, if he was obsessed with some police business that was none of his business, to peer into windows or slip into people's houses, poking and prying- Clyde had ceased to ask for details. But the tomcat was seldom silent in his nocturnal departures. And it wasn't like there was some big crime under current investigation-nothing but that break-in at Susan Brittain's place. No jewel heist or bank robbery, no murder that they knew of. Well, the damn cat wouldn't leave anything alone. Let someone steal a pencil, Joe was on their case.
Wide awake and angry, he had half a mind to pull on his jeans and shoes and follow Joe. He could see him, almost to Ocean now, hardly visible in the blowing night. Clyde reached for his jeans but didn't pull them on. If he tried to follow, the tomcat would simply take to the roofs and vanish.
His dream of Kate was still vivid; he'd been with her in San Francisco, walking the windy midnight streets. She told him she wasn't coming back to Molena Point ever, that she wouldn't see him again, that they didn't belong together, that he wasn't right for her.
But they had been right for each other, they'd known it long before she left Jimmie, though neither did anything about it. And then suddenly Jimmie was involved in murder and car theft; those days came back to him sharply. A killer loose in the village, hired by Jimmie to murder Kate-an incredible scenario, and the Welshman killer also had personal reasons for stalking Joe Grey and Dulcie.
That was when Clyde first learned that Joe Grey could speak, and Joe himself first became aware of that alarming talent-as if the shock of seeing a man murdered had thrust Joe from one facet of his existence into a deeper consciousness. That was when Joe's true nature had come to light, and of course Dulcie's hidden abilities as well.