How to Moon a Cat (18 page)

“Well,” I replied, struggling to strike a conciliatory tone. “At least the picture is sure to make all the local papers.”

Monty was not amused by this prospect. He threw a towel over his head and collapsed into the passenger seat’s cushions. “Wake me up when we get to Sacramento,” he moaned plaintively.

It is not unusual, here in the Wild, Wild West, to come across free-spirited individuals with an unorthodox approach to style, fashion, and, yes, even the necessity of clothing. On a warm spring day after a long rainy winter, certain young Californians find themselves overwhelmed with an exuberance that can be released, it seems, in only one way—particularly when the lowering of their inhibitions is encouraged with the promise of some extra weekend drinking money.

 

 

A FEW BLOCKS
off Broad Street, several young college students gathered around Harold Wombler’s rusted-out pickup. As the recently reclothed men handed back the rubber Mayor masks, Harold grumpily peeled off dollar bills, doling out twenty-five per streaker. One by one, the young men disappeared with their payments into a nearby bar, eager to convert the morning’s earnings into glasses of cold beer.

Harold counted out a final wad of cash and handed it over to the last of the streakers. There was a faint fried chicken scent in the air as he folded up his wallet and tucked it into a pocket of his overalls. He added a few more crickets to the frog terrarium on his front seat; then he climbed into the cab and rumbled off toward Sacramento.

WILL SPIGOT’S VOICE
described the scene as television cameras panned the Sunday afternoon crowd waiting for the riders to arrive.

“Welcome back, folks. It took some doing, but we’ve made the journey here to downtown Sacramento. We’re stationed across from the State Capitol, right above the finish line for Stage One of the Tour of California.”

The camera briefly switched frames to a wide shot of the broadcast booth before focusing in on the commentators.

Harry Carlin smiled warmly to the viewers. “I must say, it’s a beautiful spot we’ve got here. As we look up L Street where the riders will be coming in, we see a gorgeous row of palm trees, and beyond that, Capitol Park, which is absolutely blooming right now with all manner of brightly colored vegetation.”

Spigot arched a wary eyebrow. “Do you know, Harry, there are orange trees sprinkled throughout that park? Shady characters, those. You’ve got to watch your back in there. The fruit is enormous, and the trees don’t give you any warning when they decide to let go of one. If you hear a rustling above your head, it’s time to duck and run for cover.”

“Yes, well, hmm,” Carlin replied. “I’ll keep that in mind. Meanwhile, the weather conditions for the race couldn’t be better. The sun is shining down on this lovely boulevard, but the temperature is still relatively mild. There’s a light breeze in the air, but it won’t do more than give the riders a nice cooling as they make their final laps through the downtown area.”

Spigot stroked the point of his narrow chin. “What do you think of the run in to the finish line, Harry? Are we going to see a sprint today?”

“It’s three circuits around the downtown loop, flat, with plenty of room for the teams to line up their sprinters. I’d say we’ve got perfect conditions for a real neck-and-neck all the way to the line.”

Spigot leaned forward eagerly. “Yes, we’ll tell the crew to get their cameras ready, because this might well be a photo finish.” He glanced at a sign being held up by their producer and cleared his throat. “Now, let’s catch you up on the action out on the road so far.

“After the, ahem,
delay
getting out of the starting gate, there was an early breakaway of about ten riders. The peloton—that’s the term we use for the main group of riders—has kept them on a tight leash, though. There’s never been more than about a twelve-minute time gap between them, and with the flat terrain of the last fifty kilometers, the peloton should have no trouble catching them before the finish.”

Carlin glanced slyly at Spigot. “Is that your prediction, then?”

“That the peloton will catch the breakaway?” Spigot nodded his head emphatically. “Yes. Absolutely.”

Carlin smiled warmly. “I think we’re in agreement there. Can’t see it playing out any other way today.” His expression grew more serious. “Let’s see. We also need to brief you on a bit of a mishap the riders ran into on the road outside of Auburn.”

“Oh, this was a spectacular crash,” Spigot said luridly as he hunched forward and tapped the arm of a production assistant. “I think we have the video to show you . . . Ah, there it is. See that rider in the bright pink shirt? He’s right in the middle of the pack. The road takes a slight turn coming around the bend. There must have been some loose gravel on the surface and . . . oh! Down he goes!”

Carlin somberly cleared his throat as the television screen zoomed in on a thrashing pile of bodies and bikes. “Yes, well, as you can see, he took a good part of the peloton with him. Luckily, everyone was able to piece themselves back together again. A couple of bikes had to be switched out, but the team cars are always prepared for that. There were a few scrapes and bruises on the riders, no doubt.”

Spigot was still plastered to the gory picture on the monitor. “Ooh, see there? That one’s got a nice-looking rash on his upper thigh. That’s going to hurt in the morning.”

“You know, William,” Carlin said professorially. “This crash happened very near a place of great historic importance to the state of California. Do you know what that is?”

Spigot turned toward his broadcasting partner, his narrow face flattening into a cynical expression. “No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“They were but a few kilometers away from the sawmill where James Marshall discovered the first gold nuggets that set off the California Gold Rush,” Carlin said enthusiastically.

Spigot smirked wryly. “Perhaps that’s what that pinkshirted rider was thinking of when he miscalculated that turn. Shame, that. Well, as we said, everybody made it safely out of the pileup, and the riders are now approaching Sacramento. Soon, they’ll enter a loop that will make three laps through the downtown area. The breakaway is still out in front of the peloton, but the gap has gone down dramatically over the last half hour. Harry, how much of a lead have they got now?”

Carlin bent over a small computer located on the side of the broadcast booth that collected data from the riders’ progress out on the course and used it to calculate their predicted finish times.

“Let me check the computer . . . there it is. The peloton is trailing the breakaway group by just under two minutes.”

Spigot shrugged confidently. “Ack, they’ll be caught. Does the computer say they’ll be caught?”

There was a pause while Carlin fiddled with the keyboard. “The computer thinks they’ll be caught,” he confirmed confidently.

Spigot nodded wisely into the camera. “Don’t tell that to the boys up front. They think they’ve got a shot at staying away to the finish line. They’re still dreaming of victory.”

Carlin switched his attention to the color monitor transmitting the live feed from the course. “We can see from the picture on the video cameras that the lead riders are now turning the corner at L and 26th to begin their first downtown lap,” he said, squinting at the screen. “That building in the background is Sutter’s Fort, I believe. Say, that’s another historic venue I meant to tell you about . . .”

 

 

WITH ISABELLA’S DIRECTIONAL
assistance, I managed to navigate around several race-related roadblocks to find a shaded parking space for the van on the far side of the park that held Sutter’s Fort.

Monty was still snoozing loudly when I cut the engine. I turned back to Isabella and put my finger to my lips. She reached out her paw to tap on her carrier’s metal grate.

After rolling down the driver’s side window a couple of inches, I carefully opened my door. I stepped quietly out and, holding my breath, gently pressed it shut. I hurried around to the rear of the van and gripped the back door handle.

With a hopeful grimace, I pulled the lever toward me. There was a slight clink of metal and a low squeal of hinges, but Monty appeared to still be fast asleep when I reached into the cargo area and lifted out the stroller. Once I’d reconfigured it to cat-carrying mode, I crawled back in to get Isabella.

“
Wrao
,” she demanded impatiently as I unhooked the latch to her door.

Rupert was dozing peacefully, so I decided to leave him in the van with Monty. He let out a wheezing snore as I opened his carrier and set a bowl of water on the floor beside it. Then, I scooted a retreat out the back.

With a last check on the van’s two sleeping occupants, I cracked open a second window and locked the doors. Several tall redwoods blocked the overhead sun, shading the van. I felt confident the interior would remain cool for the short time it would take Isabella and me to check out the fort.

A group of ten furiously pedaling cyclists zoomed by on the cordoned-off race route as I began pushing the stroller down a sandy path leading into the back side of the park. A sandwich placard set up on the grass next to a clump of redwoods caught my eye.

WE FOLLOWED THE
inevitable trail of teaser placards around the park to the front of Sutter’s Fort. Isabella called out an alert at each one to ensure I didn’t lose my way.

Surrounded by green grass and yucca plants, the historic state park was a frequent day-trip destination for local schoolchildren. A large group of short-statured munchkins milled around the fort entrance as I approached.

Constructed in the early 1840s, these whitewashed brick walls had formed the cornerstone of Swiss immigrant John Sutter’s ambitious trading and agricultural enterprise. In its heyday, the stronghold of Sutter’s Fort provided a fullservice rest stop for travelers through the region—those depleted from the trek over the Sierras and those gearing up for the climb. Sutter was well on his way toward achieving his vision of a new Swiss empire when he lost it all in the sweeping social upheaval of the Gold Rush.

Soon after the discovery of gold near a watermill in the nearby Sierra foothills, Sutter’s vast estate was overrun by hordes of fortune-hunting Forty-Niners. Sutter was besieged from all sides: he couldn’t keep gold-seeking trespassers off his property, and he couldn’t persuade his gold-infatuated employees to stay on it long enough to complete their work. Sutter’s once-vast manual labor force abandoned their posts to search for gold, leaving fields unplowed and stock untended. The estate crumbled before his eyes. That which wasn’t ransacked by vagrant miners quickly fell into ruin from lack of maintenance.

I paused to survey the thriving city surrounding the park square. What had once been the focal point of an agricultural empire encompassing some fifty thousand acres now sat, incongruously, in the middle of Sacramento’s downtown business district. A sizeable medical center, a church, and several office and apartment buildings looked out on the remnants of the square sentry and cannon portals Sutter had positioned atop each of the fort’s four corners.

In addition to his vast estate, I reflected as I dodged a spontaneous game of tag that had broken out near the fort’s flagpole, Sutter had also been known for his eccentricities. In the years before his precipitous downfall, Sutter paraded around Northern California as a self-proclaimed general, an assertion that no doubt irked the territory’s Mexican rulers. But since the closest Mexican troops were over a hundred miles to the south (under the command of the legitimately titled General Castro), there was no formal objection to Sutter’s delusional proclamations.

As the Sacramento Valley began to attract increasing numbers of independent-minded Americans, however, the Mexican authorities became more and more wary of Sutter’s growing spread. It was at Sutter’s Fort, after all, where locals first heard rumors that the Mexican government was planning to tighten its loose apron strings on the region, send in troops to round up the American immigrants, and force them all to either declare their allegiance to the Mexican authorities or leave.

Many suspected U.S. Army Captain John Frémont was the one responsible for spreading these inflammatory rumors—the explorer made several stops at Sutter’s Fort during his mapping expedition of the Oregon Territory. Frémont had high expectations about both the future of California and the role he would play in bringing it into the American fold. The Pathfinder’s blustery entrance to the scene triggered a chain of events that would forever change control of the region—whether the American government was ready for it or not.

 

I PUSHED THE stroller up to the ticket counter as Clem’s resonant stage voice echoed from inside the fort. While fishing through my shoulder bag for the admittance fee, I caught a glimpse of Clem’s linen-clad figure standing on the flat top of a horse wagon in the fort’s open center area. He was about to begin his act for an audience of enraptured schoolchildren and their adult caretakers.

I slid my five-dollar bill across the counter to the park attendant manning the ticket booth, thankful that she was too distracted by the next busload of children queuing up behind me to notice the feline passenger in my stroller. Isabella sat quietly but attentively in the carriage compartment as I pushed the stroller into the fort’s rectangular courtyard.