Catwalk (5 page)

eight

We had just finished
running the second course when I heard a voice say, “Who's that, the Border Collie of cats?”

I sat down on the ground to give Leo a jackpot squeeze of fish paste
and called over my shoulder, “Nah, he's better than that. He could do it in the dark.”

Goldie came through the gate. “Isn't it cold and damp down there?”
she asked.

“No, not too bad.”

She joined me on the grass. “You could do it in the dark, couldn't
you, Mister Leo?” Her face had lost some of the gauntness it had just
a few weeks earlier, and a warm sense of reprieve enveloped me as I watched her. Goldie was in remission, and I was beyond grateful.

“You look perky this morning,” I said, withdrawing the fishy tube and twisting the cap on tight.

“Perky is as perky does,” she said, holding the back of her hand out to my cat. He pushed his cheek into it, said
mmrrwwwlll,
and set about cleaning his muzzle with his paw.

We sat and chatted for a few minutes, and then Goldie got up and brushed off her pants. “Too chilly on the grass. Let me go grab a blanket to sit on.”

“No, I need to get moving anyway.”

Goldie turned and looked at me, squinting into my face. “I've been thinking about that Ratcatcher guy from last night.”

“Rasmussen.”

“Whoever.” She adjusted a bobby pin in her upswept hair. “I think he's the guy my birding group is talking about. He's a developer, right?”

“More like an investor, I think. What were they saying?”

“If it's the same guy, he's part of a consortium of some sort that wants to put up some apartments or houses or …”

“Condos.”

She gave me a look. “You know about this.”

“They want to put up condos on a small wetlands next to Alberta's house.”

“Be careful, Janet. From what I hear, he likes to get his way. And if your hunch is right about his wife, he's not averse to hurting women.
”

“Oh, come on. I'll be fine. I don't even expect to have any more dealings with the guy.” I tried to ignore the nagging memory of Alberta's message.

Goldie gave me a look very like the one my mother used when I tried to hide things from her as a kid.

“You're right, though. Anyone my dog doesn't like is someone to keep at a distance.”

“Exactly,” said Goldie, and then let the subject go. “So what kind of trouble
are
you into today?”

“None at all. I have a very routine day ahead of me.”

The words were no sooner out of my mouth than my Janet-
angel
began to tut-tut and Janet-demon sing-songed,
You'll be sorry you said that.

I took Leo inside and let the dogs out for a short game of tennis ball. I couldn't shake the image of the pond, wetland, and woods. I had seen the place in summer, had seen wild roses dancing at the edge of the woods and heard the trills of the red-winged blackbirds
that nested in the cattails. A rough estimate put the whole semi-wild
area—water and woods­—at eight or so acres. I had thought about walking the area when I was there in the summer, but had never followed up. Small places can be vast treasures. I kicked myself briefly, and decided it was time to call Alberta and go take a look.

It was my turn to leave a message, so I told Alberta's voice mail, “I want to take some photos of the pond, and the light is good this morning, so I'm heading over to your place.” I started to hang up, then added, “If you get back before I leave, I could take a few photos of the kittens, too, if you like.”

Ten minutes later I was on my way. The only sign of life at Alberta's house was a cacophony of terriers brought on by the doorbell, so I grabbed my camera and walked down the closely mowed slope to the pond. I spent about half an hour taking photos. You might think there's not much to see in the browns of late autumn, but you would be wrong. I found a dozen abandoned nests hanging from cattails, and managed to spot several cocoons. From Alberta's driveway, I had thought the pond ended before the woods, but in fact the more open water merged into perhaps a half-acre strip of marsh that extended into the woods, where a mix of sycamore, beech, and oak were, for now, standing in water.

I had just turned to walk back up the slope to my car when some
thing caught my eye in the eastern sky. At first it was indefinite, just a suggestion against the glare of morning. But then a small flock of ducks became clear. There were only a handful of them, closing fast, but I had time to get set, and clicked off a long series of shots as they came in low over the cattails and settled into the pond. I was thrilled when I zoomed in to see not the ubiquitous mallard, but a half dozen green-winged teal. The males' heads gleamed like bronze where the sun caught them. One of the drakes started to whistle and chitter, and the duck closest to him let out a series of quacks. She sounded like Daffy Duck.

I lowered the camera and scanned the sky. A movement in my peripheral vision caught my attention, and I turned to see a figure watching from the far side of the street. That wouldn't have been unusual in itself. People are often fascinated by my long lenses. But something about this person gave me the creeps. I couldn't be sure whether it was a man or woman—or boy or girl, for that matter. Any measure of identity was obscured by jeans, gym shoes, and a dark hoody. I waved, but whoever it was never moved.
Fine
, I thought, and turned my gaze back to the water.

I snapped my lens cap on and spoke to the ducks. “They can't fill this. It's a wetland.” As I drove home, I had an idea. One of my former students was a reporter for the Fort Wayne newspapers. She was always looking for good stories. I emailed her about the pond as a stopover for migratory waterfowl as soon as I got home, then decided to let it go for a while. The muscles in my neck were so tight they ached, so I thought it was time for a little self care. I took a hot shower, wrapped up in cozy old sweats, and made a pot of blackberry sage tea. The fragrance alone always calms me.

Rarely do I get to spend a whole afternoon catching up with all the small jobs and pleasures that pile up around the house in busy times, but that's how the rest of the day unfolded. I was beginning to think my angelic and demonic voices had been wrong this time—I really could have a routine day and stay out of trouble. I sat down and
started to read the latest issue of
National Wildlife
with Leo on my lap, Jay snoring, and Drake sleep-running on the floor. When the phone rang, I looked up and was surprised to see that it was nearly dark outside.

nine

“Hi you.” It was
Tom.

“Hi yourself.” That had become our telephone greeting ritual
since
…
I couldn't remember when we started that. Funny how little
things—a word or two here, a common memory there—stitch people
together. “What time is it?”

“You still haven't found your watch?” Tom sounded more concerned than I thought a ten-dollar watch deserved and I bristled, waiting for him to say something snarky.

“It's around somewhere.”
It's gone, and you know it.

“It's a quarter to six. I got held up. The meeting took longer than
it should have.”

Don't they all,
I thought, thankful once again that I work for myself.

Tom interrupted my thoughts. “I'm leaving now.” I heard a door close and a lock snap to. “I need to run home before class tonight,” he said, meaning obedience practice at Dog Dayz, “so I'll stop and get my boy. And you, too, if you need a ride.”

“Thanks, but they dropped my van off at noon.”

He never mentioned my watch again, and I heard a little scold in
my head say,
Yeah, that was the ex who never let things go, remember?
After we hung up, I toured the house and found I was a little surprised at what I'd accomplished. Laundry done and put away—sheets, towels, clothes. I couldn't remember the last time all the dirties were dealt with at t
he same time. The dishwasher was empty. The floors were vacuumed. The pile of bills and correspondence on
my desk was a fifth its usual size, and all my invoices were sent. I had
even tidied the pile of magazines and books on the dining room table. Leo and the dogs followed me from room to room.

“So what do you guys think? Too organized?”

As soon as I said the word “organized,” I realized what had been bothering me about Louise Rasmussen's painting studio. Well, other than her bully of a husband.
It was too neat.
There must be a completely organized neat-freak of a painter somewhere, but none of my creative friends are that tidy. I closed my eyes and pictured the space. There was an easel, I remembered, with a blank canvas on it. Surely I was just too distracted to notice whatever mess there must have been? I didn't think so. I don't have a photographic memory, but I do have a photographer's eye. I tend to frame scenes, and to notice and remember details and arrangements. I couldn't recall any of the things I would expect to be there—works in progress or newly completed, sketches and studies, pencils, half-empty paint tubes lying around waiting to be squeezed into service. As I recalled, everything in the studio had seemed regimented.

Drake made a gurgling noise that brought me back to the moment. He might have been agreeing with me. It was hard to tell since he had a tennis ball and a chew toy in his mouth and was banging the metal filing cabinet with his tail. Jay wriggled at me, and Leo watched from a bookcase.

“It won't last.” I scratched a dog ear with each hand. “We'll have it all messed up again in no time.” Leo meowed for equal attention.

Tom was there a few minutes later and left with Drake. I gave Jay a quick once-over with a brush, then ran it through my own hair. My brother Bill saw me do that once and was appalled, but really, I'd rather share grooming equipment with my dog than with most people. I clipped Jay's leash to his collar and grabbed my training duffle and keys and started for the door.
Phone!
I looked around, then remembered that I'd stuck it in my pocket.

When I had Jay safely in his crate and myself belted in behind the wheel, I wrestled my phone out of my jeans to check the charge. I'd become paranoid about failed batteries after having a series of them at critical moments and I checked my bars several times a day. When I opened the cover, the message light was flashing. I backed into the driveway while Voice Mail Woman retrieved the missed call, but shifted back into park as I listened to Alberta Shofelter's voice, running at warp speed.

“Janet, are you there? Are you there? Are you coming, I hope you're coming to training tonight. I'm so angry! I have to talk to you, you'll probably be getting one, oh, I just got served …” The message timed out and I closed the phone.

What in the world?
What did she mean, she just got served? Was she in a restaurant? I flipped the phone open, intending to play the message again, but saw that I had a new one. From Alberta. I listened. She still spoke fast, her voice pitched high and punctuated now with wheezing every few seconds. “That man! What kind of
…
Oh, never mind, I'll see you, you're probably on your way there
…
I'd like to just knock him
…
” and the message cut off again.

For half a second I considered calling her back, but I don't talk while I'm driving and I didn't relish being stuck in my driveway while
Alberta ranted for an hour. Besides, she sounded like she planned to be at Dog Dayz. That was a bit unusual, since it was obedience training night and she didn't compete in obedience with her Welsh Terriers. But she knew that Tom and I are both involved in the sport, so apparently she was making a special trip to see me.

I set the phone on the console, started the van again, hit the button for Northeast Indiana Public Radio, shifted into reverse, twisted around to see behind me as we started to roll, and slammed the brakes hard enough to launch my phone into the back of the van.

“What the
…
?” I blurted. A black car was parked on the street smack behind my driveway. My street is dark—too dark—because a few hold-outs keep the neighborhood association from putting in street lights. I couldn't see much except that the car's headlights were on. “If this doesn't just
…
,” I said, putting my van in park and undoing my seatbelt. As I reached to kill the engine, I heard a tapping and realized that a man was standing outside my door. A big man.

ten

The man standing beside
my car window stepped back and made a whirligig of his index finger, so I rolled down my window.

“Hutchinson! What are you doing here?”

“Hi, Ms. MacPhail.” Officer Hutchinson bent toward me and rocked mildly from foot to foot.

“Janet.”

“Right. Janet.” He held a cheap pen in one hand and was twisting the cap with the other. He didn't say anything.

This can't be good
, I thought. “So, Hutchinson, what's up?”

“I just want to give you a heads up.” A twitch tugged at his left
cheek, then stopped. “That guy, that Rasmussen, he came by the station this a
fternoon.”

I turned off the engine and stepped out of the van so Hutchinson wouldn't have to keep leaning over. “Okay.” A half-dozen thoughts were spinning like dervishes in my brain, and I couldn't get any of them to slow down enough to come into focus. “And I'm guessing that had something to do with what happened last night?”

Hutchinson cleared his throat. “Right. He lodged a couple of complaints. Against me, first. And you.”

“For …?”

“For not arresting you and Ms. Shofelter for trespassing.” Half of his mouth smiled at me. “My lieutenant told him not to waste his time.”
The smile faded. “But I think the guy has some juice downtown.” He shrugged and said, “Whatever.”

“Wow, I'm so sorry. Such a big fuss over four little cats.”

Hutchinson's smile was back with bells on. “Aren't they great? Ms. Shofelter says I can come see the kitties whenever I want to. Aren't they just the cutest little things?”

Every so often something like this—this lonely hulk of a man who had fallen for three newborn kittens—restores my hope for our species.

“Definitely the cutest little things, Hutchinson,” I agreed. I paused for a moment, then decided that I might as well reinforce Hutch
inson's position as an ally. “He wanted to kill them, you know.”

Hutchinson's hands stopped moving and a deep furrow formed between his eyes. “Who?”

“Rasmussen. He wanted to kill the kittens.”

At first I thought Jay had gotten out of the van somehow, but then
I realized that the growl was coming from Officer Hutchinson. It was hard to tell in the light coming from the porch and headlights, but his face seemed to have changed color, and his breath was coming out in audible puffs. Then there was a loud
snap
, and half of Hutchinson's pen spun skyward, hit the hood of my van, and landed with a faint clatter.

I put my hand on Hutchinson's jacketed forearm and said, “It's okay. They're safe now.”

He cleared his throat with what appeared to be some effort, then called Rasmussen a couple of spectacular names before he went on. “There's more. He said he was reporting Jay to Animal Control as a vicious dog, and was considering a civil action.”

“Vicious dog?” The accusation was baseless, but I had been involved with dogs long enough to know that such an allegation can take on a life of its own. “Jay was nowhere near the guy.”

“Yeah, I know. But he said Jay growled at him.”

My heart was picking up speed. “Yeah, he did, when Rasmussen pushed me.”

Hutchinson's face brightened. “He pushed you?”

“A little. He started to, and that's when Jay growled at him.”

“Did he actually touch you?”

“Yes,” I said, and reflexively grabbed my own arm where Rasmussen had laid his hand.

“Okay. That's good, actually,” said Hutchinson. “I mean,
…
He didn't hurt you, did he?” I shook my head. “Good. But the touching is a good reason for your dog to defend you. Legal weight and all.”

“Okay,” I said.

“Look, I'm going to have someone get a statement from you in the next couple of days, just in case he tries to do something rotten.
I don't know that any of this will go anywhere, but as I said, the man
has some friends in high places. Better to be ready for him.”

Something gurgled just beneath my sternum. “You mentioned complaints against me. Is there more, besides Jay?” I asked.

“I'm not sure exactly. Trespassing. Breaking and entering. Like that.”

“Oh, come on!”
Now you've done it
, whispered my prissy little Janet
angel, while her alter ego hooted
how stupid is that?
Just stupid enough to be a royal pain in the patoot, I thought. “The door was open.”

“Unlocked. Right. It's in my report, along with the open window.”

“No, I mean it was open. Unlatched. It opened when Jay pushed at the bottom.”

Hutchinson pulled out his ever-present pocket notebook, wrote something down, and said, “I'll amend my report. I didn't know the door was open.”

We stood in the quiet for a moment, and then Hutchinson picked
up the fallen half of his pen and said, “Well, better go. I just wanted to let you know.”

“Thanks, Hutchinson. I appreciate it, and I hope you're not in trouble.”

“Yeah. I mean no, I don't think so.” He turned to go, then turned back. “Hey, Janet, don't, you know, I mean, I don't talk about the kitties, you know …”

That broke right through all my little fears and I started to laugh.
“Oh, big tough cops don't go squishy with itty bitty kitties?” I play punched him. “Don't worry, your secret is safe with me.”

The basic pet obedience class was just finishing up and the mem
bers who come for more advanced training just starting to arrive when I got to Dog Dayz. I walked Jay around the exercise area for a
few minutes and used one of my own poop bags to pick up after some
dog-owner who was apparently too busy or fastidious or just plain
rude to do it. As Jay sniffed every square inch of the grass and marked over nine or ten other “messages,” I scanned the parking lot.
Tom's van wasn't there yet, but Alberta's SUV was parked near the back door. A blue minivan with bumper stickers that said “Parents of twins do it twice” and “I
❤
Cocker Spaniels” sat next to it. I smiled at that. I was having a lovely time watching the Eckhorn twins, Meggie and Lizzie, grow from babies into girls, and their mom, Sylvia, was something special.

I grabbed my training bag from the van, flicked the locks, and had Jay heel beside me as we entered through the back door and headed for the ring at the far front of the building. The pet owners were clumped together at one side of the back-most ring, their dogs sitting or lying or spinning in circles beside them while the instructor gave them their marching orders for the week. As I walked by, I heard her say, “You can't expect your dog to be trained with one hour of class a week. So reinforce good behavior whenever you have the opportunity.” I've always thought that it's too bad we can't follow pet owners around and hand them cookies when they are good people and help their dogs learn.

Sylvia waved at me from the front ring, where she was working with Tippy, her sweet parti-colored Cocker. The puppy that Sylvia
had kept from her spring litter was shaking the stuffing out of a toy in an exercise pen set near the wall. I staked out one of the folding metal chairs to use as home base for the evening, told Jay to lie down
and stay, and started fishing around in my bag for his dumbbell, thinking we could warm up and get in a few retrieves before the group practice session started.

A teenaged boy slouched a few seats down fiddling with a cell phone. Texting or playing a game, I guessed. He glanced at me when my training bag thunked onto the metal chair and I said hello. He grunted and returned to his gadget. I was sure I had seen him before, but I couldn't think where.

“Janet! Oh my! I'm so glad you're here!”

The voice made me jump, not so much for its presence as its panicky tone. I looked up and said, “Alberta. What's wrong?”

“Janet, I'm so worried.” She laid a hand on her chest. “About Louise.
You know, Louise Rasmussen.”

I assumed her concern wasn't based strictly on events of the night before. “Why? What's happened?”

“Oh, my. I'm just so
…
Louise walks every morning. I always see her. Always. Even in bad weather. And I didn't see her this morning, and I haven't seen her all day.”

“Did you try to call her, or go over there?”

She shook her head. “Charles was home, at least his car was. And that was just weird. He's never home on a week day.”

She stopped to wheeze, and I took advantage of the opening to reorient the conversation. “Do you know who that young man behind me is?”

Alberta peered around me and said, “Rudy. Rudy Sweetwater.”

“Candace's son?” I asked. Candace Sweetwater was in the prac
tice ring with her Papillon, Butch. I didn't know her well, but I loved
that she had not given her dainty little dog a dainty little name.

“The very one.” Alberta's tone caught me up short, and I looked a question at her. “He was probably one of the little snots in that
car last night,” she said. “And I can't prove it, but I think he egged my
car and defaced my garage door.”

I wondered whether he might have been the creepy figure who watched me at the pond.

Alberta's voice broke into my thoughts. “I think he's done something to her. Again.”

“What?” I thought she was still talking about Rudy Sweetwater.

“Charles. I think he's done something to Louise.”

I remembered the frightened look in Louise's eye the night before, and wondered again about the change in her when she came back to the studio later. That looked like a change for the good, but I couldn't help wondering if she had done something later to bring the wrath of her husband upon herself.

“Do you know her number?” I asked. “Let's just call her now.”

Alberta frowned. “No. And I didn't bring my cell,” she said, patting all her pockets. When she hit the side pocket of her jacket, she gasped and pulled out an open envelope and waved it in my face. “And this! This is wrong! That man, I could just kill him.” Figure of speech or not, her phrasing turned a few heads our way.

“Who?” I asked.
Who are you kidding, Janet? You know who she means.
Still, I had to ask. “What are you talking about?”

“Charles! Charles Rasmussen, that's who!” She shook folds
from the paper and wheezed. “Just look at this!”

So I did. I didn't read it closely, just scanned it, but that was enough
to make my whole body go cold.