Too full of rat himself to go home for supper, he’d headed for the shore, for the little ceremony of the evening feeding. Moving over the rooftops, he had appeared as only a gray shadow within the shadows of the sheltering oaks, his white markings dancing along like pale moths, white stripe of nose, white paws and apron as disembodied as the Cheshire cat’s fading smile.
Dropping down onto the low roof of a jutting bay window, he watched John Firetti step into the van. The vehicle was unmarked by the veterinarian’s name or the name of the clinic, just a plain white Dodge van that was almost a hospital in itself, equipped inside with cupboards, drawers of medicines and bandages, animal stretchers and cages enough to handle most emergencies, to care for sick and hurt animals while transporting them to the clinic. Joe watched Misto leap to the abbreviated hood of the van and stretch out against the windshield. He watched John, in the driver’s seat, unscrew the cap on his thermos, and he smelled the aroma of rich coffee. Joe remained still and apart for some time before he scrambled down a jasmine vine, trotted across the little road and leaped up onto the hood beside Misto.
Together they watched the traps that were just visible among the tall, yellowed grass, just as John was watching. Joe had thought, coming across the roofs, that someone had been watching him, but it was only a feeling. He saw no one, and now that sense of another presence was gone.
They watched the grass twitch and shiver as the two young cats peered out. In the cab, John Firetti was very still, not a movement, no smallest sound, only the smell of coffee, no different than if it had come from the nearby cottages. The trapping took as much patience as watching a mouse hole, patience not only to trap the cat but to care for him, doctor him, prepare him for a new home or, if he was feral, to notch his ear and release him again into his own wild world. The only changes in the cat’s life were that he would be healthier, and that he’d miss all the fun of making kittens.
Now, the two young cats slipped out from the grass, nervous and wary but yearning toward the smell of tuna. The pale silver tabby was maybe a year old, the scruffy black kitten half that age. They crept belly down toward the reek of tuna, easing toward the cages, sniffing eagerly through the mesh walls. Once they dodged away, then crept close again. Impetuously, the black kitten skittered into the nearer cage; she paused just inside, shivering. When nothing bad happened she crept toward the back where the tuna waited. The silver tabby started to follow her but tonight something alarmed him, made him draw back.
For a week, the two had been taking their supper in the traps, the tabby always wary, slower to enter the bungeed trap but at last following the black. They would clean up one bowl together, then move to the other cage and do the same. They had no notion that at every meal they walked over an inactivated trigger—cats know nothing of triggers. The kitten had no clue that tonight, before she reached the tuna, the door would spring closed behind her and . . .
Snap. It slammed down as loud as a gunshot. The kitten bolted into the wire mesh, stepped in the cat food, bolted away into the closed door and then into the side again, throwing herself at the wire, clawing frantically at it as Firetti swung out of the van and ran to drop a big, dark towel over the cage.
At once the kitten quieted. The terrible thudding stopped, all was still within. A trapped creature, a feral cat or raccoon, a bobcat or cougar kitten, will fight an uncovered cage until they are so badly cut and wounded they will die or must be killed. Even domestic cats will do the same, terrified, wanting out. They can see outside, and they fight to get out there. Only the dark cover, blocking their view, will calm them.
The pale tabby had disappeared back among the grass and poison oak, where he would be peering out. John was sorry not to have caught him—now he’d be twice as hard to capture. Carrying the covered trap, and opening the side door of the van, Firetti didn’t see, behind him, the silver tabby come out to follow him. Only Joe and Misto saw.
The young cat approached nervously, bravely following his friend. Above him, Misto looked through the windshield, back into the van, and caught John’s eye. He twitched an ear toward the tabby. John looked, and froze.
For a while, he stood immobile. Then silently he lifted the cage up onto the floor of the van and backed away.
It took a long while for the silver tabby to approach. He looked up at Misto and Joe, but seemed unafraid of them. Misto, taking a chance, dropped down from the hood, padded casually to the open door, and leaped into the van. He lay down a few feet from the cage and stretched out, purring.
The tabby, watching him, crept closer; but every muscle was tensed to run. He looked in at Misto, then at the cage. Looked up through the windshield at Joe. Looked back at John, who stood far away.
At last he hopped up into the van. Misto remained stretched out, limp, as the silver tabby nosed under the towel, where he could see the kitten. When he had made sure she was all right, he settled down halfway beneath the towel, his rear end sticking out, his striped silver face pressed against the wire, close to his young friend. This was not a feral cat, the beautiful tabby had been someone’s pet. Slowly Misto strolled out of the van, dropped to the ground, and John eased the sliding door closed.
It was now, behind them, that a shadow moved across the street among the tall bushes, a thin figure, watching them.
“Someone’s there,” Joe said softly. As John turned, the figure stepped out of the shadows. A woman, bone thin and tall, deeply tanned, dressed in ancient jeans and colorless T-shirt. The cats could see, down the street, the bumper of her battered green Chevy where it was angled into someone’s drive, half hidden by a wooden fence.
She approached the van, studying John’s face. She was just about his height, her brown hair slicked back in an untidy bun, her sun-browned face wrinkled and leathery. She peered past John, trying to see in through the van’s tinted window. “Where are you taking them? What did you mean to do with them? Those are my kittens, I’ll take them now.”
“Why would I give them to you, after you’ve abandoned them?”
“I couldn’t help it. I thought they’d be safe here with the other cats, I know you feed those cats. I live in my car, you can’t leave cats in a car, the heat would kill them. What did you mean to do with them? Who are you? Open the door, they’re mine.”
“I mean to feed them and care for them,” John said. “You haven’t done that, you abandoned them. The little one needs defleaing, and they need their shots. Kittens—”
“They’ve had their shots.”
“Which shots? Which vet? There are only two clinics.”
“Dr. . . . I don’t remember his name. The one on Ocean, behind the Mercedes agency.”
“Firetti’s Clinic?”
“Yes, that’s it. Ask them, they’ll tell you.”
“Which doctor?”
“I don’t remember. Dr. Firetti, I guess.”
“That clinic has only one doctor. I’m John Firetti.”
She looked at John a long time, her face crumpling, a dampness welling in her brown eyes. “You were going to take them somewhere that would put them down.”
“I wouldn’t take them to a shelter that kills unwanted cats. But these kittens aren’t ferals, they shouldn’t be abandoned and on their own.”
“You’d take care of them?” she said, not believing him.
“Of course I would.”
“You’d keep them safe, and I can come for them when I find another place? I lost my job, I couldn’t pay my rent, I have no place to keep them.”