"You're saying she's spoken with someone new? That she's talked to some new human? That she's given away our secret?" His eyes burned into hers. "I don't believe that."

"I'm not saying she told anyone. I'm not suggesting she talked with anyone. I'm saying maybe someone's in trouble, and they made it clear that others mustn't know. That maybe Dulcie-"

"What trouble? What secret?"

Charlie just looked at Joe. He was such a big, dignified cat, all hard muscle and gleaming silver coat, and his white markings were polished like new snow. But now his yellow eyes burned with such deep hurt and wounded pride and anger that Charlie wanted to pick him up and hug and cuddle him.

But she didn't dare. Joe had always been too dignified to tolerate hugging.

And how could Joe's beautiful tabby lady keep secrets from her tomcat? How could his lovely and talented coconspirator in matters of criminal investigation, his skilled hunting partner, whether it be human felons or four-legged rats, how could his true love intentionally hurt him?

Wanting so to stroke Joe Grey and comfort him, Charlie shyly drew her hand away. She could no more cuddle this tomcat than she could pick up and cuddle Detective Dallas Garza. Than she would, at one time, have cuddled Chief of Police Max Harper-before she knew Max better. Instead, she rose. "Get some sleep, Joe. Get something to eat. Shall I come in and make you an omelet?"

"There's stuff in the fridge. Half a chicken," he said ungratefully. "Damn kitten. No more sense than to go off by herself after an armed-"

She reached to block his cat door. "Why would the guy shoot her? Why would he even guess what she is? Get a grip, Joe."

He stared back belligerently. "She's so nosy. Irresponsible. No telling what she might-"

"Give Kit some credit, Joe. She found that meth lab up in the hills, and she didn't give herself away. She…" She stopped talking and reached diffidently to scratch his ear. "She'll likely be back when you wake up. Call me on my cell, I'll come help you look; at least I can offer wheels. I'm just headed up to the seniors' to dig up some flowers."

Joe stared at her and yawned, and slid in through his cat door. Charlie remained crouched on the porch looking around at the houses across the street, praying that some neighbor hadn't seen them talking. Well, she could talk to a cat all right without causing raised eyebrows. As long as they didn't see the cat talking back.

But the neighbors' windows all looked empty, curtained and serene; she saw no one looking out. Rising, pushing back a loose strand of hair, she headed for her van and the senior ladies' house, armed with her shovel and empty pots and plastic bags. Maybe Wilma would be there, maybe Wilma would tell her the kit was home with Lucinda and Pedric-then maybe this queasy nervousness in her stomach would go away.

7

Dulcie had that same sick feeling about the missing tortoiseshell that Wilma or Clyde must feel when she and Joe were gone for several days; surely it was the same uneasy worry that filled her now. They had looked everywhere for the kit; no one knew where else to look.

And she felt edgy about Joe, too. A dozen times last night as they searched for the kit, she'd wanted to tell him the secret that lay between them, tell him where she'd been going for the past two weeks. But every time she started to mention Lori, she reminded herself that she had, in her own heart, promised the child. That when Lori whispered, "You won't tell anyone, Dulcie," she had, by her purring and cuddling, really promised Lori, just as much as if she had whispered, "I'll never say a word."

Now, agonizing, all she did was get her mind in a muddle. She went into the library at last, not through Lori's secretly unlocked basement window, but through the open front door. As library cat, she had as much business padding in through the main entrance as had the head librarian-and there had been times in the past, with another head librarian, when Dulcie had been more welcome. Her appearance in the library always generated smiles and greetings and pets, and today was no different. Except that she made quick work of the petting and cuddling, only pretending to linger. Purring and winding around the patrons' reaching hands, she sidled toward the stairs in an oblique dance until she was able to disappear among the stacks. And in an instant she was down the steps and into the basement workroom.

She had been visiting the runaway child for nearly two weeks, but she still hadn't learned much about her. Lori's casual, disjointed remarks were only frustrating. And how maddening were their one-sided conversations, when Dulcie had to remain mute, when she couldn't ask questions.

She'd fared no better listening to conversations around the library and watching the daily paper. She heard nothing about a runaway child, and no missing child was reported anywhere near Molena Point. No mention on the local radio station or TV And surely the Molena Point Gazette would jump on that kind of story.

Certainly there was no recent police report; she would have heard about that from Wilma or Charlie or Clyde-from Max Harper's own wife and his two closest friends. Max had grown up with Clyde; they were like brothers, brothers who had indulged in a good deal of beer drinking and bar fights during their young days on the rodeo circuit, Dulcie thought, smiling. It always amused her, and amazed her, to imagine either of the two men crouched atop the chute, settling down onto the back of a bull as the gate was opened; to imagine them riding the lunging, twisting, hard-landing bulls. Though she didn't like to think of the end of the ride, of the terrible, lunging horned danger, when they were on the ground once more.

In the basement, two librarians were working on a book order, sitting at the big, scarred worktable. The room was cool, its concrete walls emitting a perpetual chill that on a hot day was delightful, but was not so pleasant in the winter. Both ladies were wearing heavy sweaters. Dulcie, leaping onto an empty table, lay down between the stacks of new books where a slant of watery sunlight seeped in through a basement window. Five basement windows opened into deep wells that were cut into the sidewalk. All but one was securely locked, although all of them appeared to be locked. Settling down for a light nap, waiting for a chance to get in to Lori, Dulcie sleepily watched the librarian at the computer preparing orders. She was worn out, what with keeping Lori's secret from Joe and with worry over the kit.

Well, she could do nothing about Joe at the moment; he would just have to sulk. And they'd have to trust the kit. Just as she herself wanted Wilma to trust her and not always to be calling her and hovering. Kit was a big cat now; she would have to take care of herself.

But the worst of her tiredness came from her pain over Patty's death. Patty Rose, who would have hurt no one. No one… She was nearly asleep when the two librarians rose from their desks, picked up their purses, and headed for the stairs to go to lunch. She waited for some time, to be sure they didn't come back, hadn't forgotten anything. When neither hurried back down the stairs, she squeezed behind the small bookcase; there was barely room between it and the wall.

She didn't try to shove the bricks aside to reveal Lori's hidden entryway. Instead, pawing at the loose heat vent, she reared up, pushing the swinging grid aside. Crawling up and in, scrambling through where the big plastic pipe had fallen away from its connection, she entered the hidden part of the basement.

She had always known that grid was loose, hanging by one rusty screw, the other three screws not secure in the soft, old plaster. Long ago she had sniffed around there for mice but had never found fresh scent. She was more likely to find the occasional unwary mouse in the workroom itself, drawn by a candy bar left in a desk drawer, or upstairs among the books and the reading-room couches, both of which offered delightful nesting material for a mouse family. While she had long ago eradicated the main populations of library mice, an occasional optimistic newcomer would venture in, only to find itself summarily dispatched and on its way to mouse heaven.