If Max was back at the station, maybe he’d already called Eugene to check on Debbie’s movements, see when she had left Oregon for California. He wondered if he should call Eugene himself, to try to get a line on the red tomcat. The nursing home must have set up a temporary office, maybe even with the original phone number. Running across the roofs, with an icy wind at his back, he hurried for the station, thinking that winter had turned serious and bold. Dark clouds hung low over the village, the damp air smelled of rain and of a deeper cold yet to come. Well, but February weather on the central coast was never to be relied on. Racing beneath the wind, sailing across the occasional narrow alley, he hit the cold tile roof of the courthouse, ran its length, and dropped down to the roof of MPPD.
He was just backing down the oak, headed for the front door, when a black-and-white pulled to the curb below. Hidden within the prickly oak leaves, he watched two uniformed officers step out, force their handcuffed prisoner out of the backseat and through the glass door, into the little foyer: a young, skinny fellow, long face, long greasy hair. Even from the tree Joe could smell the oily stink of his old leather jacket. As they marched him inside, Joe hit the ground behind them and slid in, too. The arrestee looked startled to see a cat race in past his feet, but the officers paid no attention. They stood at the dispatcher’s counter, portly Officer Brennan booking the guy in, printing him, listing his personal effects that Brennan had laid out on the desk; a dirty handkerchief, a little greasy coin purse, a squashed candy bar.
Joe strolled past them and down the hall, thinking that there was a lot to be said for the ambience of a small-town police department. He couldn’t imagine being allowed this kind of freedom in the vast, impersonal complex of San Francisco or LAPD. He’d seen the pictures of those daunting establishments with their complicated security, bulletproof glass walls, locked doors. He’d heard the officers discuss the many divisions of the metropolitan hierarchies, and couldn’t envision a feline sleuth trying to function in that high-powered maze.
Surprisingly, though, cats were serving their own important role in big-city PDs. Even in L.A., feral cats were doing important work. Not sleuthing, but protecting the criminal files and records. Several L.A. precincts, whose buildings were plagued by rats, had brought in colonies of feral cats, housing, feeding, and caring for them, setting them loose among the offices to handle the out-of-control rodent population. Rats in the offices. Rats in the lunchroom. Rats running down the halls into the storage rooms, eating paper supplies and, more alarming, destroying old criminal files: a felon’s record quickly expunged, vanished into the belly of a hungry rodent. And it wasn’t only L.A. that was employing ferals who might otherwise be killed. Other large city police departments were taking notice, bringing in their own bands of ferals, working with foundations of volunteers like Alley Cat Allies or Animal Friends. Feline exterminators were now working at city offices, college campuses, all kinds of institutions—stable cat populations that did not produce unwanted kittens, but went happily about their business destroying the rats, not only saving valuable paperwork, but saving lives, too. For every rat the cats killed, they destroyed a potential carrier of hantavirus that was fatal to humans, and for which there was no vaccine and no cure. Dogs, Joe thought, weren’t the only four-legged professionals serving human needs. Those cats could be as important as Red Cross nurses, giving folks a helping paw.
Slipping into Max’s office, into what he considered his personal lair beneath the credenza, he sniffed the sweet scent of horses from Max’s Western boots. The chief was on the phone, glancing up now and then at Detective Juana Davis. She sat in one of the leather chairs, leaning over massaging her left knee where a prospective felon, now in Soledad Prison, had graced her with a well-placed kick while she was cuffing his partner. Orange cat hairs clung to Juana’s dark uniform, evidence of the kitten she’d recently adopted. Juana seemed more relaxed since the kitten had come to share her condo; the little creature was born nearly in the middle of a murder case that Juana, and Joe himself, had worked in tandem, Juana happily unaware of the identity of the snitch who alerted her to the murder, unaware of the three cats’ roles in the timely demise of the killer. Max hung up the phone, looking across at the detective.
“As far as Eugene PD can tell, Debbie did leave ten days ago, about the time she mailed Ryan’s letter. Landlord said her lease was up three months ago, but she refused to move. He called her husband here in the village. Erik was out of town, but he got him on his cell. Kraft told him he was divorcing her, said if she wanted to stay she’d have to sign her own lease, pay her own rent. Landlord went over there three times with a lease. Her car was there but she wouldn’t answer the door. Brown, 1998 Suzuki station wagon. Eugene has our BOL on her but hadn’t spotted her. Strange, if she was camping, they watch those campgrounds pretty close. Well, she’s here now, arrived last night, stayed with Ryan and Clyde. I went by this morning, talked with her, asked her to come in and get printed. She doesn’t want Erik to know she’s here, claims she’s afraid of him. Claims he’s into some kind of real estate scam.”
“If she’s avoiding him,” Davis said. “Why would she come here?”
Max shook his head. “Says he won’t expect her here, that he’ll think she’s headed north.”
“His condo’s right in the middle of town,” Davis said. “Pretty hard to keep out of his way. The Brighton, that second-floor penthouse.” In Molena Point, as in much of California where the buildings were designed to resist impending earthquakes, even a second story often rose above the surrounding rooftops. Joe knew that penthouse well; its walled back patio was a favorite for the village cats, a sunny spot out of the wind on cold days. The little terrace had no access from the roofs around it except to the pigeons and seagulls, and through open aspects at the base of the wall meant for rain runoff, where the local cats could easily slip inside. With Erik gone so much of the time, it was an ideal hunting preserve. One could enjoy a sunny afternoon nap, wake when a pigeon landed, snatch him up before he knew you were there. Warm nap and instant feast, how could any cat resist?
Max said, “Kraft’s still out of town, expects to be gone for another month or more. I talked with Fowler. Says he’s down in Orange County reorganizing the branch office there, some kind of staff shake-up. Says from there, he’s headed for the Bahamas on vacation.”
Davis smiled. “Pretty tough life.”
Max laughed. “For sure, Debbie’s current digs won’t match that kind of luxury. Ryan and Clyde are moving her into one of the cottages they bought, that dilapidated one up near the meth house we raided.” He frowned, none too happy with that operation.
“They sure saw that coming,” she said. “Empty house, nothing left but the smell. Crime-scene cleanup service should be in there this week. Took us a while to locate the landlord, the house sold six months ago to a Jarvis James, in Chicago.” They exchanged a look of disgust. Someone out of state buys an old cottage, next thing you know they’re making meth.
And, Joe thought, most likely ruining the house for future sale. Even if the house was torn down, the land could be useless if it was sufficiently soaked with lethal chemicals.
Davis said, “We have computer copies of the deed and the closing papers. Most of it was done online.” Neither Davis nor the chief liked the shift from paper contracts to those completed online, which the real estate and escrow companies had so eagerly embraced, and which made evidence harder to nail down.