But Coyote was saying, “You never saw Dulcie’s Wilma,” and the big, dark cat lashed his tail with disgust, his long, tufted ears flicking with annoyance.
“I know her from how Kit described her,” Willow said. “You heard her, Cotton heard her.” She looked at white Cotton, but that tom remained silent.
“No one can know a human from a description,” Coyote said. “There could be hundreds like that.”
“There are not hundreds like her! I do know her,” Willow hissed. “You think humans are all alike? She’s tall and slim, she has long silver hair. Look at her, her hair tied back with a silver clip. Jeans and a red sweatshirt. All exactly the way Dulcie said.” She glared at the dark long-haired tom whose black face stripes and tall ears made him resemble a small coyote. “I’m not stupid!” Willow snapped. “I know Dulcie’s Wilma.”
Coyote looked back at her uncertainly. Maybe she did know, who was he to say? He knew little enough about human creatures.
But it was Cotton who crept closer along the branch and looked in at Wilma for the longest time, saying nothing. And then, with a flick of his tail and a twitch of his ears he leaped away into the undergrowth; when Willow called softly after him, he said over his shouder, “Hunting. I’m going to hunt.”
“But-”
“What do I care for humans and their senseless problems?” And with that, Cotton was gone. Willow looked after him, hurt and disappointed.
But again, Willow peered around through the branches at Wilma, her bleached calico coat ghostly against the dark trunk. “Those men not only tied her to a chair, they blindfolded her. Well, but she’s gotten that off! Good for her! But what do they want with her?” She looked hard at Coyote. “How rude Cotton was! We have to help her, we have to free her.”
“I don’t-”
“Just like Kit freed us!” Willow hissed. “It’s payback time, Coyote. Couldn’t Cotton see that? We have to free her before they hurt her!”
Coyote stared at her, his ears back stubbornly. And Willow, swallowing, knew she had spoken too directly. It hadn’t taken much to send Cotton off. If she got Coyote’s back up, he’d leave, too, and she’d have no help at all.
Coyote was a good cat. So was Cotton. They just didn’t find any value in humans. Neither tom trusted humans, and with good reason.
Most of their band felt no connection to humans. They had all grown up feral, wild and wary, keeping to themselves. Well, maybe she was glad Cotton had gone. The white cat was so bossy, always wanted to do everything his way. At least Coyote was gentler; and Coyote had a deep social feeling for their own kind, a love of their own wild rituals. Maybe she could play on that. Maybe she could manipulate Coyote into helping-if only she knew what to do, knew how to help.
But there wasn’t much time. Those men might soon be back. If they’re coming back, she thought. She was all nerves, watching Wilma struggle. With that chair tied to her, the tall lady could hardly turn. Willow could see the knives that Wilma hadn’t found, she wanted to tell her where, to leap in and touch her hand with a soft paw and guide her.
But she could not; she could not bring herself to try the things Dulcie and Kit took for granted; she dare not try to open that window, or go voluntarily into a human’s house. Instead, she turned a limpid gaze on Coyote. “We were in that cage two weeks, captive, just like she’s captive now. I thought we’d never get out. Her friends helped get us free.
“I was so scared, locked in there,” she said, trembling. “We all three were. Now she’s trapped like we were, and she doesn’t even have anything to eat, like we did. Or any water until she managed to turn on the faucet.” She looked hard at the dark, striped tom. “She’s brave, Coyote. She’s a fighter-as strong and brave as a cat herself.”
Coyote watched her narrowly. “So? What can we do?”
“It was her friends who saved us,” Willow repeated. “It was her friend, Joe’s Grey’s human, who cut off the lock for us. We can’t leave Dulcie’s Wilma. How could we? But, how can we help her?”
Finding the blade of a long butcher knife, Wilma cut her finger. Swearing under her breath, she felt for the handle, then, bending and twisting, nearly dislocating her spine, she pulled it to her and hauled it out.
With the big knife securely in hand, she was twisting it around with the blade toward her bound wrists when she heard the overhead floor creaking, louder, then footsteps approached, echoing hollowly, as if coming down hidden wooden steps.
It sounded like the stairs might be behind the stone wall where the woodstove crouched. Frantically she cut at her bonds-and of course cut herself again, she could feel the slick blood. Angry at her clumsiness, and shaky with her effort to sever the rope, she was looking directly at the stone wall when a figure emerged from behind it.
A small figure, stepping hesitantly. A woman, young and pale and as insubstantial appearing as a ghost. A frail and displaced-looking creature, stick thin, dressed in an oversized man’s shirt and a long, faded skirt from which her white ankles protruded like two bones. White feet shod in worn leather sandals. She stood looking at Wilma, then slowly approached; and even in the gathering shadows, Wilma could see her fear, her eyes wide in the fading light. She said no word; she watched Wilma warily, then focused on the knife Wilma clutched behind her; she reached gently out to Wilma, as if meaning to cut her bonds-and jerked the knife away. Snatched it roughly from her hands and backed away fiercely clutching it, her eyes hard now.
“Please,” Wilma said. “What are you doing? Please, cut me free.”
“I can’t. They’d kill me.”
“They won’t kill you if I’m free, and we get out of here, if we run before they get back.”
The girl shook her head; something about her looked familiar, something about her frail thin body. Wilma studied her, trying to make out her age. Could this thin, pale woman be Cage’s younger sister? She looked as Wilma remembered her, but Violet would be around twenty-five. This girl looked maybe sixteen. “Violet? Are you Violet Jones?”
A faint nod, as she backed away.
Wilma looked at the cheap gold band on her finger. “Violet Sears, now? Eddie Sears’s wife?”
Another nod, tinged with a downward, closed glance of shame.
“If you leave me tied, Violet, and they kill me, you’ll be an accomplice to murder. You’ll go to prison right along with Eddie and Cage. Federal prison. For a very long time.”
“If I untie you, Eddie will kill me.”
“What does Cage want with me? If I knew that-”
“You stole from him. What he had in the safe. He told you that, I heard him tell you that.”
“What did he have? He won’t tell me anything. I have no idea what he thinks I took, no idea what he wants.”
Violet said nothing, only looked at her.
“If you free me, maybe I can help him. Find out who did steal from him. I can’t do anything tied up.”
No answer.
“I know how to help Cage. If I’m free I can help him.”
But the girl didn’t buy it. She shook her head and turned away, heading for the hidden stairs. Wilma didn’t want to believe she would leave her there, helpless. But she guessed she’d better believe it.
She hadn’t seen Violet since she was a child. She might have glimpsed her on the street and not realized who she was. She’d heard that Violet was born just months before their mother died, that Mrs. Jones had died from complications developed at Violet’s birth. Other village gossips liked to say that Violet wasn’t Mrs. Jones’s daughter at all, but was Lilly’s. That the shock of Lilly giving birth out of wedlock had killed Mrs. Jones.