I put a notebook in my purse and was on my way through the door when Caron said, “That man called again.”
“When?” I demanded. “What did he say?”
She’d moved behind the counter and was eyeing the cash register with an enigmatic glint. “It was so dumb. When I answered the phone, all I heard was this heavy breathing. I didn’t want to waste my time, so I asked if it was an obscene call, and he-”
“You asked if it was an obscene call?” I said carefully. “Why should the line be tied up if all he was going to do was breathe, Mother? Someone might have been trying to call to arrange a My Beautiful Self session. Anyway, he kind of harrumphed and said it certainly was not and he didn’t appreciate being accused of tacky behavior I pointed out that he was the one doing the hyperventilation bit, not I. He said he was thinking about what to say. I told him he should have done that before he called, and then I hung up.”
“But he called back,” Inez inserted bravely, then faded behind the science fiction rack. Caron, like any temperamental star, does not care to be prompted by an understudy.
“He called back?” I said.
Caron had taken a compact from her purse and was examining the tip of her nose with the intensity of a microbiologist. When I repeated my question, she snapped it closed and sighed. “About two minutes later, if you can believe it. He did admit that he should have decided what to say before he called, although he was still huffy about my perfectly reasonable question.”
Her perfectly reasonable mother was too bemused to do more than murmur “And…”
“He said that if you didn’t stop butting into his affairs you’d find yourself on the sidewalk selling burnt offerings. It was So Dumb. I mean, hasn’t he ever heard of fire insurance? You do have adequate insurance, don’t you?” Her green eyes turned the precise shade of mint ink. “Would there be enough left over to buy a used car?”
“No! There most definitely would not be enough left over to buy anything. I have some insurance, but-” I held in a groan as I looked at the old, dry wood of the rafters, the numerous racks of flammable paper products, the cardboard cartons stacked alongside the wall, the stacks of invoices and order forms, the catalogs. I could have renamed the place Tinder Box Books, had I been in a whimsical mood. I was not. “Did this man say anything else?”
“Not really,” Caron said, still appraising the possibilities of a lovely check from the insurance company. “He said something about if you had the negatives, you’d better give them to him.”
“What negatives?”
“He didn’t say, and frankly, I was getting pretty tired of him. I said I wasn’t your private secretary, told him to call you himself if he had any more obtuse messages, and then Inez and I left before he could call a third time. That’s why we were late getting here.”
“What about his voice?” I said. “Could you tell anything about his age? Did he have an accent?”
“He wasn’t a kid, and he didn’t have an accent. He was trying to be clever by talking in a whisper, which meant I had to keep asking him to repeat things until I was ready to scream. If you don’t have decent manners on the telephone, you shouldn’t be allowed to use it.” She crossed her arms and gave me a cold look. “Don’t you need to go do whatever it is? Inez and I don’t have all afternoon, you know. We’re supposed to be at Rhonda’s at six, and we have to do our hair”
I walked back to my apartment in a daze of confusion and anger. Who was this anonymous jerk? I resented being threatened in such a manner; if nothing else, it wasn’t sporting. I could do nothing in retaliation until I knew who he was. I didn’t have his damn negatives-of what? It was possible Ed Whitbred had them, or had them until Arnie was turned loose once again on an insufficiently leery society. There were other cameras in Farberville. There were plenty of cameras in the Kappa Theta Eta house, if the number of coy photographs was indicative.
I sat on the edge of my porch. If the prowler was also my caller, he might have been searching the third floor of the sorority house for the mysterious negatives. Was he being blackmailed by one of the girls who’d gone home for the summer? The last thing I needed was another Kappa Theta Eta cluttering up my admittedly tenuous scenario.
Next door, Winkie came out onto the porch, holding an unhappy cat. She looked almost comical in a fussy pink broad-brimmed hat that seemed to have settled on her head of its own accord and refused to leave. After carefully locking the door, she headed for the sidewalk.
“Any word from Debbie Anne?” I called as I approached her I stopped out of reach of Katie’s teeth, although I was in range of her malevolent gaze.
“No, nothing at all. It’s been three days now, and I do hope the police will take her disappearance more seriously. Her mother has been calling me at ail hours of the day and night, and there’s nothing I can tell her Rebecca and Pippa are quite sure Debbie Anne doesn’t have a boyfriend. I called those few girls who were her friends during the year. They could suggest nothing, and none of them has heard from her This is by far the most inconsiderate stunt she’s ever pulled. That girl will never be a Kappa.”
“Do you have a copy of her class schedule? I thought I might speak to her professors and see if any of them have any ideas.” I held my breath and smiled with the shiny expectancy of a rushee.
“I suppose I do, but it’s inside and Katie has an appointment at the vet’s office.” She hesitated, then said, “I’ll go get you a copy. It certainly can’t hurt to speak to them, and if we don’t find her soon, I’m going to lose my temper and be brusque with Mrs. Wray. You hold Katie while I go back inside.”
The cat was thrust into my arms in a manner not unlike that I’d utilized with the camera. “Don’t do this! Please!” I said, but Winkle was already on her way to the door, muttering about late-night calls and inconsiderate girls. It took the eat only a few seconds to realize what treachery had befallen her, and she let out a yowl of outrage that emphasized her shared ancestry with jungle cats. Less than a second later, she bit me on the hand so viciously that I instinctively flung her to the ground as I stumbled backward.
I gaped first at the blood welling from the jagged wound, and then at a flash of white as the cat vanished into the shrubbery. Blinking back tears, I fumbled in my purse for a tissue and tried unsuccessfully to stop the blood. The wound throbbed so sharply that I began to feel light-headed. I sank down on the lawn and cradled my hand, oblivious to my surroundings, and therefore was startled when Winkie said, “What happened? Where’s Katie? Why are you behaving so oddly?”
I showed her the bite and grimly related the story. “And she ran that way,” I said, gesturing with my uninjured hand. I did not continue with a description of what I dearly hoped the animal would encounter on its escape route.
“This is dreadful,” Winkie said. “We must take action immediately, Claire.”
“The bleeding has stopped, and I don’t think I’ll need stitches. I have some iodine at my-”
“We must find Katie,” she interrupted sternly. “Her appointment at the vet is in less than an hour. I was taking her there so that she can be rendered incapable of reproduction. An irresponsible individual knocked the screen off my window several days ago, and Katie spent the night outside the house. I don’t intend to have kittens underfoot in that cramped apartment.” She went to the pertinent shrub and called, “Here, kitty kitty kitty. Come on, Katie; that woman won’t hurt you again. Come to Winkie.”
I stood up, the tissue still pressed to my hand, and tried to stir up a trace of sympathy from her “She bit me once before. I tried to tell you when you shoved her at me.”
“That’s ridiculous. Katie doesn’t bite.” She held out a piece of paper. “Here’s Debbie Anne’s class schedule. I think I’d better go back inside and have a glass of wine. Being a housemother isn’t easy by any means, but this is becoming more than I can bear. Eleanor will have to find someone else for the remainder of the summer term. The pressure’s entirely too much for me.” She went into the house without so much as a glance at my bloodied tissue. Kappa Theta Eta housemothers were not, apparently, instructed in the gentle art of first aid.