KATHRYN DUGGAN (Victoria) returns to Cats after the national tour of Miss Saigon. Prior to that, she was seen in Les Miz London, and was assistant dance captain and performed in Cats Hamburg. She wishes to thank her sister Bess and especially Ron for their support and encouragement.
“Anything interesting happen while I was gone?” Stanley asks, and slips into the seat beside him just as the lights come up again.
And now David cannot possibly take his eyes from her. Whenever she disappears from the stage, as frequently she does, he wonders where she has gone, and renews his scrutiny when suddenly she reappears. He keeps hoping she will come down into the audience as some of the other dancers do every now and then, crawling up and down the aisles on all fours, but either she is hidden behind a Siamese cat mask in the “Growltiger’s Last Stand” number — at least he thinks it’s Kathryn and therefore perhaps Kate because he spots the grayish-white leg warmers under the Oriental garb — or else she’s paying homage to the cat named Deuteronomy, sitting on his lap and stroking his aged face, or else she’s pretending to be part of a locomotive’s piston assembly in yet another number, stroking the huge piston back and forth as if it is the head of a penis, nice association, Dr. Chapman. But none of this brings her close enough for him to get a good look at the face disguised by that dead-white makeup, until — as if some cat-God high up in cat-Heaven is granting a secret wish — she comes down off the stage in the “Macavity” number, comes off from the side ramp on the right of the theater, surprising him when she crawls through the wide space in front of row K, and then in her catlike way, sits up, seemingly detecting a human presence, seemingly startled, jerking her head around and looking directly into his face, her green eyes wide.
She shows not the slightest sign of recognition.
She is a cat, thoroughly immersed in her own cat existence, and she is off again in an instant, scampering away, gray-white tail twitching.
Toward the end of the show, when Grizabella sings the searing words “Touch me,” David’s eyes fill with tears.
At eleven o’clock on Sunday morning, shortly after he’s called Helen on the Vineyard, the intercom buzzer sounds, and Luis the doorman tells David there’s a delivery for him.
“Some young lady leaves a package,” he says.
“A package?”
“Sí. But a leetle one.”
“Can someone bring it up?” David asks.
“This is Sunday. I’m here only myself.”
David is still in his pajamas. The Sunday Times is spread all over the dining alcove table. He tells Luis he’ll be down for the package later and then realizes this has to be his handkerchief, and that the young lady who delivered it was surely Kate Duggan, who last night had prowled all over the stage of the Winter Garden Theater in rather good imitation of a predatory feline. He has already decided he’ll go out for brunch in an hour or so, and he figures he can pick up the handkerchief then. Surely there’s no urgency. But nonetheless he throws on undershorts, jeans, a T-shirt and a pair of loafers, and, unshaven and unshowered, takes the elevator down to the lobby.
The package is a small clasp envelope with his name hand-printed on it in thick red Magic Marker letters. 
. Luis gives him a big macho Hispanic grin and all but winks at him as he hands over the envelope. The grin suggests that not everyone in the building has “leetle” packages delivered by beautiful redheaded girls at eleven o’clock in the morning. David ignores complicity with what the rows of glistening white teeth imply. He thanks Luis for the package, answers politely when Luis asks how Mrs. Chapman is enjoying the seashore (slight raising of a Puerto Rican eyebrow, faint suggestion again of the male-bonding grin under the black mustache) and then walks across the lobby to the elevator bank. He feels certain Luis’s dark eyes are on his back, and feels suddenly guilty of whatever crime Luis is imagining. In the elevator, he resists the temptation to open the envelope. It seems to take forever for the elevator to crawl up the shaft to the tenth floor. It seems to take forever for him to unlock the door. The keys feel suddenly thick in his hands.
He carries the envelope to the table in the dining alcove off the kitchen, and sets it down on the front page of the Arts & Leisure section. The red letters spelling out his name are ablaze in bright morning sunshine. He sits at the table. Picks up the envelope again. Turns it over. Lifts the wings of the clasp. Opens the envelope.
The handkerchief has been laundered and ironed, folded once upon itself, and then once again to form a perfect white square. He is disappointed when he realizes there is no note attached to the handkerchief. He peers into the envelope, spots a small white business card in it, and shakes it free onto the table. The card is imprinted with her name, her address on East Ninety-first, and two telephone numbers, one below the other. He turns the card over. Handwritten in blue ink scrawled across its back are the words:
He smiles.
He does not go immediately to the telephone, but he knows he will call her sometime later this morning, before he goes down for brunch — what time is it now, anyway, eleven-fifteen, eleven-thirty? He looks at his watch. It is twenty past eleven. He’ll call her later, as a courtesy, thank her for her kindness, her thoughtfulness, mention how much he enjoyed her performance last night.
He goes back to reading the Times.
His eyes keep flicking to the card lying on the table beside the freshly laundered handkerchief.
He looks at his watch again.
Eleven twenty-five.
He rises abruptly, decisively, walks into the bathroom, undresses, glances at himself briefly in the mirror, and then steps into the shower. He studies his face carefully as he shaves. His eyes meet his own eyes often. He realizes he is rehearsing what he will say to her when he calls. Naked, he pads into the bedroom and puts on a black silk robe with blue piping at the cuffs, a gift from Helen last Christmas. Wearing only the robe belted at his waist, the silk slippery against his skin, he sits propped against the pillows on the unmade bed, and dials the first of the numbers on her card. A recorded voice tells him he has reached the Phillip Knowles Agency, and that business hours are Monday to Friday from nine A.M. to six P.M. He puts the phone back on its cradle.
Oddly, he thinks of Arthur K’s sister in her blue robe, propped against the pillows in her midnight bed.
Arthur K’s arm around her.
He takes a deep breath and dials the second number.
“Hello?”
Her voice.
“Kate?”
“Yes?”
Somewhat breathless.
“This is Dr. Chapman. David.”
“Oh, hi. I just came in the door. Did you get the...?”
“Yes, that’s why I’m...”
“I washed and ironed it myself, you know. I didn’t take it to a laundry or anything.”
“Well, thank you. That was very thoughtful. Truly.”
“Considering what a lousy ironer I am...”
“On the contrary...”
“...I think I did a pretty good job.”
“Very professional, in fact.”
There is a silence on the line.
“I saw you last night,” he says.
“Saw me?”
“Your performance. In Cats.”
“You did?”
“Yes. You were very good.”
“Well, thank you. But...”