She waited.

"He's Welsh, been over here about ten years. A freelance used car agent. He deals with us, picks up special models for us across the country. Are you sure it was cats he was researching?"

"Of course it was cats. I told you, the same references we were using. What else do you know about him?"

"Not much. I think he grew up in a small fishing village on the Welsh coast. I get the impression his family didn't have much, that they were dirt-poor."

"Welsh," she said, making circles with her beer glass on the table. "The Welsh are raised on the old folktales, on Selkies, Bogey Beasts, the shapeshifting hounds."

The waiter brought their hamburgers. His English wasn't too good, he had trouble understanding that Clyde wanted mustard. He returned with catsup, Tabasco, steak sauce, and mustard, and seemed pleased with himself that he had covered all possibilities.

Clyde spread a thin layer of hot mustard on his French hamburger roll. "This is weird. Why the hell does Wark want to know about cats?"

Wilma shrugged, "I don't like coincidences. If Wark's connected with the agency, maybe I can learn something about him, some reason for him to be interested in cats, from Bernine Sage."

"I didn't know you and Bernine were friendly."

"We're not close friends, but she's useful. You've forgotten, we worked together in San Francisco."

He remembered then. Bernine had been a secretary in the U.S. Probation Office the five years Wilma was there. He wasn't fond of Bernine. She had been Beckwhite's secretary, and was the agency's head bookkeeper, a striking redhead who always dressed to the teeth, smart orange outfits, pale pink blazers. She was a woman who used the truth as it suited her, bending it for maximum advantage. At one time, Bernine had had a thing with Lee Wark. They had lived together during his swings through Molena Point.

Wilma finished her fries, drained her beer, and handed the briefcase across the table. They paid the bill and headed for her place, Clyde driving slowly, watching the streets. When he dropped her off, even before he pulled out of the drive he heard her calling Dulcie. His last view as he drove away was Wilma's thin figure in jeans and sweatshirt, standing alone in her yard calling her lost cat.

At home he dropped the briefcase on the couch and yelled for Joe. No response. He hadn't really expected any. He petted the dogs and the three cats, talked to them and gave them a snack. While the animals ate their treats he straightened their beds in the laundry room.

He had removed the door between the laundry and the kitchen, and had installed a narrow, two-bunk bed against the wall between where the washer and dryer stood and the corner. The dogs had the bottom mattress. The cats had the top; they could jump up onto the dryer, then onto their bunk, enjoying a private aerie that the dogs couldn't reach.

Both beds were covered with fitted sheets which could be easily laundered, and each bed had several cotton quilts that could be pawed into any required configuration. Finished with bed making, he popped a beer and went out to the backyard.

He called Joe, certain that the tomcat wasn't anywhere near. The stars looked very low, very large. The sea wind was soft; the distant surf pounded and hushed. The sound was steady, reassuring. He sat down on the back steps and thought about Joe Cat. He thought about the old Welsh tales, about cats which were more than cats.

He sat for a while staring at nothing, then drained his beer and went back in the house.

The three cats lay upon their bunk, the white cat's paw and muzzle draped over the side, looking down at him and purring. Rube and Barney were in their lower bed lying on their backs, all legs up, in a tangle of quilt. He rubbed their stomachs and said good-night, then poured a brandy and took Wilma's briefcase to bed.

Half-reluctantly, half-fascinated, he sat in bed sipping brandy and reading again the results of their search. Reading about hillside doors into unknown caverns, about strangers appearing suddenly in a small, isolated village. About the sudden appearance of dozens of cats in a little Italian town, as if from nowhere. He read about hidden doors into Egyptian tombs built for the exclusive use of cats. Doors to where? Why would a live cat need a door in a tomb?

Twice he got up, pulled on a robe he seldom wore, and stood in the open front door calling Joe. Three times he picked up the phone and listened for the dial tone to be sure it was working. When he fell asleep, with the light on, he slept badly.

12

Kate gave a final lick to her paws and rolled over on the lawn in front of her house, letting her clean feet flop in the air above her, the fur bright now, and soft, a pale creamy shade.

The rest of her was still filthy. She couldn't bear to lick off all that dirt. She had clawed the worst of the caked mud from her tail but it still looked like a dirty rope. She rolled back and forth, trying to rub dirt off on the grass, then rose and checked the street for any sign of Lee Wark.

There was no one on the shady street. Beneath the oaks, only two cars were parked, both belonging to neighbors. When she was sure Wark hadn't followed her, she got up, stretched, and trotted around the side of the house and down the little walk between her flower beds. How strange that the yellow and orange flowers of her gazanias reached to her chin, and her irises towered above her.

Leaping to the back porch, she jumped up the screen door, snatching at the latch. She pulled and kicked until she had forced the screen open, and slid in between the screen and the solid door; the screen hit her hard on the backside.

Trapped between screen and door, she leaped again, gripping the knob between her paws, swinging boldly until it turned.

She was in, dropping down to the cool floor of her own bright kitchen.

The room seemed huge. The skylight rose incredibly high. Far above her, through its curved plastic, the late afternoon sun sent slanting shadows down her pale oak cabinets and yellow walls. Time to start dinner.

The thought hit her with a knee jerk reaction.

She lashed her tail, amused. From now on, Jimmie was fixing his own dinner.

But she guessed he had been fixing his meals-the kitchen stank of dirty dishes. She wondered how long she'd been gone.

Didn't he know how to rinse a dish, how to open the dishwasher? The floor tiles needed scrubbing, too. They were incredibly sticky. She sniffed at a spot of catsup near the refrigerator, and at a smear of jam. Every stain was magnified, both in smell and by her close proximity. People who owned cats ought to think how a dirty house looks to someone ten inches tall.

She had an unbroken view of the undersides of cabinets, and of the dust under the refrigerator. Far back beneath the stove lay the handle of a broken cup; she remembered throwing that cup in a fit of temper.

She had been alone. She hadn't thrown it at Jimmie, though he had been the cause of her rage. She seldom let him see her anger, seldom let him know how he hurt her.

But that was past. Now, he could go torment some other woman.

When she leaped to the counter, her paws stuck in something he had spilled. It smelled like pickle juice. The sink was piled with dirty dishes. She stepped over egg-caked plates and pawed at the faucet handle until it released a drip of cold water. Hadn't he cooked anything but eggs? Maybe his cholesterol would do him in, and good riddance. She was thinking not at all like Kate Osborne.

Being a cat was more than liberating, it was salvation, a lovely reprieve.

She licked at the thin stream of running water until her thirst was slaked, then sniffed at her canning kettle, which Jimmie had dumped in the sink with dried applesauce clinging. There was no sign of the golden jars of applesauce that should be standing on the counter. She wondered if she'd already put them away. Or if Jimmie, in a fit of rage because she was gone, had thrown them out.