Once Ryan had answered Davis's questions she sat in the garage on the inner steps, keeping out of the way, her hands folded on her knees, her expression closed and glum, so distressed that, across the garage in the shadows, Dulcie reached an involuntary paw to comfort her. But soon the sound of a car in the drive sent Ryan eagerly out the side door. The cats followed, slipping into a jungle of pink geraniums as Detective Garza swung out of his Chevy Blazer next to the coroner's car.
9
Detective Garza stood with his arms around Ryan but looking past her at Rupert Dannizer's body. He studied the stacked windows, the garage itself, the drive and Ryan's truck and the front of the building, his photographic detective's mind recording every smallest detail, though he would record it all again in careful notes and perhaps in photographs of his own. Dallas Garza was, the cats had come to learn, a meticulous investigator, his nature as stubbornly prodding as that of any feline.
Yet despite the detective's thoroughness, there was sometimes information to which a human cop had no access, private doors he couldn't legally enter, crannies and niches a human couldn't squeeze into-clues, in short, that a clever cat might snatch from the shadows. Joe Grey's fascination with police investigation was not in lieu of human talent, but was adjunct to that talent.
They watched Garza move inside the garage where he conferred with Davis and the coroner, carefully observing the victim and asking Dr. Bern questions. Garza's position was indeed awkward, with his niece as prime suspect.
"Will he have to stay off the case?" Joe said softly. "Apparently not, or he wouldn't be here at all."
"The papers are going to love this," Dulcie said dourly. "Even the Molena Point Gazette. I can just see it: Police detective's niece arrested for murder. If they put a reporter on it who doesn't like Garza, he'll have a field day."
Joe flicked a whisker. "And from what Clyde says, Rupert Dannizer was well known in San Francisco. This will be big news, with Dannizer dead before the property settlement, with Ryan standing to inherit…"
"No one would believe that!" she hissed.
"We don't believe it. And the papers don't have to believe it; they'll print what sells. Their readers will eat it up."
"If Ryan wanted to murder him, would she do it in her own garage?" Dulcie laid back her ears, her green eyes narrowing. "Question is, who hated Rupert Dannizer and Ryan enough to kill him and frame her for the crime?"
They watched Officer Bonner string crime tape around the garage and yard, while the coroner sat in his car making additional notes. But when Bonner and Detectives Garza and Davis escorted Ryan upstairs for a look at her apartment and for questioning, the two cats scorched around the building, to slip inside.
The steep hill at the back rose four feet away from the wall of the garage apartment. Crouched in the tall grass looking across to Ryan's bathroom window, Joe Grey leaped. Hanging from the sill, he scrabbled with his hind claws while, with one white forepaw, he finessed open the sliding glass.
The cats had discovered this access when young Dillon Thurwell was kidnapped and they had rescued her from the garage below, from the little airless storage closet beneath the stairs. Because the window was too small to accommodate any human, no one had ever thought to lock it. Now, dropping down into the bathroom, they slipped past the tub and into Ryan's closet-dressing room, to crouch among her jogging shoes and work boots.
The room was large enough for a chest of drawers, a bench with storage underneath, and a six-foot clothes rod that held little more than jeans and work shirts. A single, zippered garment bag appeared to hold a few dress clothes. Her good shoes, like the strappy sandals that she had worn to the wedding, must be tucked away in the plastic boxes they could see atop the closet shelf. The closet smelled faintly of rose perfume. They could hear Ryan and Dallas in the kitchen, talking. But Davis and Bonner were quiet. Very likely they were there as witnesses to prevent the close relationship between uncle and niece from any taint of collusion. At some point Davis would, the cats thought, have to take over the investigation from Detective Garza.
There was a flash of light from the studio, and another, and the cats peered out of the closet to see Davis photographing the apartment, seeking to record any smallest detail that might later fit into a jigsaw puzzle of evidence. As Davis turned toward the closet they drew back behind Ryan's boots, closing their eyes so not to catch a flash of light, Joe ducking to hide his white face and paws and chest; all that remained was a gray mound. Davis took several shots in the closet causing the cats to pray that a stray paw or tail wouldn't show up on the film-not that it mattered, Dulcie kept telling herself. We're only cats. What if they were in a photograph, or if Davis did spot them? Dulcie could never overcome her fear of being discovered, never shake the feeling that the truth about them would be as clearly detectable as fresh blood on whiskers. Her need for secrecy overpowered all reason. Such fears were so foolish. After all, Ryan did have a cat door in the garage. If they were discovered, Clyde's mouse hunters were simply on the premises doing their appointed job.
From the kitchen they heard a cup rattle as if Ryan had poured the coffee that had, from the smell of it, steamed in the pot for some time. Dallas asked, "When did you see Rupert last?"
"I haven't-hadn't seen him since early July. I caught sight of him here in the village. That startled me, he never came down here. I don't think he saw me. I'd had dinner with Clyde-Clyde Damen. We were coming out of the grill when I saw Rupert at the bar with a tall, sleek blonde. Long, gleaming hair. I didn't see her face but Rupert turned and I saw his profile. I have no idea what he was doing down here, he has no friends in the village that I know of."
"And he didn't see you?"
"I don't think so. I practically dragged Clyde out of there. We… a divorce and lawsuit are not pleasant. Rupert hadn't been very pleasant."
The cats listened to Ryan describe when and how she had found the body, and what she had done afterward, how long it took her to go upstairs and call 911.
"Did you touch the body?"
"I touched his leg. I just… reached out before I thought. I was sure he was dead, the dried blood, and he was so white, but I… something in me had to be sure-that there wasn't life there, that there was nothing I could do. He… he was so cold…"
"And what would you have done if you'd thought he was alive?"
"The same as I did, call the department-unless I'd thought CPR would… I suppose I would have tried that."
"What did you tell the dispatcher?"
"That a man was dead in my garage. And I answered her questions."
"You came upstairs to call?"
"Yes."
"Do you own a gun?"
"Yes."
Behind Ryan's boots, the cats glanced at each other. Of course Dallas knew she owned a gun, but he was committed to asking all the necessary questions. He made her describe the black.38 Smith and Wesson, made her tell him where she kept it, where it had been that morning and where it was at that moment. The cats didn't need to watch him to know he was carefully recording her answers both on tape and in his log- recording not to incriminate but to protect, to have the record straight.
"I forgot to bring my gun upstairs when I got back from San Andreas. Normally I would have put it in my nightstand. It… it's been locked in my truck since I got back, night before last. I… just forgot about it."