The Black Cats (10 page)

LATER THAT DAY, SAMUEL charged into
our front garden, crushing the hydrangeas with his immense frame. His white
chest puffed in and out with heavy panting. “Cattarina! Silas and I need your
help! Urgently!”

“Whatever
is the matter?” I asked. The toad I’d been stalking hopped away.

“Abner Arnold
is adopting another cat!”

“Goodness
gracious.” Earlier this summer, I’d told the brothers about Mr. Arnold and his
nefarious deeds, embellishing the tale with my own exploits. Now, they
possessed all the facts of the case. “How do you know?”

“He
came to see our Robert about adopting again.” A hydrangea petal sat atop of his
head. “After an alarming exchange, Robert threw him out of the house. Told Mr. Arnold
to
go home and pray for salvation
. I
think that meant ‘no.’”

“Most
assuredly,” I said. “Then what happened?”

“Mr. Arnold
laughed! Laughed, all the way down the street.” Samuel raked the petal from his
head. “That’s not the end of it. As he left, he shouted more things about cats,
things I didn’t understand. But I know he means to look for one elsewhere. I
feel it in my whiskers.”

“Your
whiskers? Oh, my.” I thought of my own, half-grown at this point.

“We
can’t let that happen, Cattarina. Mr. Arnold must not be allowed to adopt
again.”

“I
couldn’t agree more.” I walked to the gatepost and waited for him to catch up.
“Where is Silas?”

“He was
too afraid to come. But if it’s urgent, I can persuade him to leave by the hole
in our roof. That’s how I escaped. Robert is sleeping and won’t miss us for a
while.”

“Gather
George and Margaret Beal and Silas and meet me in your front garden. I will be
there when the sun is at mid-point.” I said on my way to the sidewalk.

“Where
are you going?” he asked.

“To
Rittenhouse!”

***

Midnight
needed no convincing. I had but to utter Samuel’s words, and he accompanied me
to the omnibus stop for the return trip. Coaxing him onto the conveyance,
however, took every argument in my arsenal. When words failed, I bit him in the
rump, and he boarded the horse bus without further quarrel. We arrived at Mr.
Eakins’s house in time for the meeting. Per my request, George, Margaret,
Silas, and Samuel waited for us in front garden by the zinnia patch. Mr. Eakins
must’ve still been asleep since the cat social on his lawn had not drawn him
from the house.

Once
we’d dispensed with the how-do-you-dos, I opened with a question: “How can we stop
Mr. Arnold from killing again?”

“We
show him the error of his ways,” Margaret said. “If he repents, he will be a
changed man.”

“My
dear,” George said, “even with the help of an entire meeting house, that sounds
impossible.”

“I
know! I know!” Silas said. “We find a giant cage—like the one our Robert
uses, but bigger—and we trap Mr. Arnold in it. Then we set him free in
the country.”

“He’s
not a rabbit, brother,” Samuel said.

I glanced
at Midnight and thought how very much he looked like Snip. “Does the Thief of
Rittenhouse have anything to offer?” I asked him.

“I’m
sorry to not be of help, but—” His eyes grew wide. “I’ve got it! We can
steal his shoes. Without them, he can’t leave the house and find another cat.”

“Did I
not mention Mr. Arnold is a cobbler?” I said. “And that he
makes
shoes?”

Midnight’s
tail tapped the walkway.

“We
could lure a pack of wild dogs to his house,” Samuel offered. “They would do
our work for us. I’d tie a mutton chop round Silas’s neck and—”

“I am
against violence,” George said.

“So am
I!” Silas added, his whiskers aquiver. “Listen to George, brother. Oh, listen!”

“No one
is tying meat around anyone’s neck unless it is mine,” I said. “And lunch is near.”

“What
about you, Cattarina?” Margaret asked. “You’re the cleverest molly I know. You
must have an idea you’re saving. Tell us.”

“I am
clever, aren’t I?” I cleaned my face, pretending to think. Then I really
did
think. Mr. Arnold had used
devil
and
hell
the night of the fire—two words I’d learned through Eddy’s
work—and he’d treated me like a creature possessed. Mrs. Arnold had also used
haunt
, another term of familiarity,
when she looked into the cellar. While I’d never faced these things in real
life, I understood their gist, at least in human terms, and I took the cobblers
for a superstitious couple. We cats have our own underworld, filled with fanged
demons and ragged souls, but it is largely relegated to lore, stories used to scare
kittens into behaving. After a fashion, I said, “I think you are right,
Margaret.”

“I am?”

“You
said to show Mr. Arnold the error of his ways, and I have a way to accomplish
this feat. I’m not sure he’ll repent, but he may be frightened enough to leave
cats alone. Forever. Except my plan involves a fair bit of danger...” I glanced
at Midnight. “For one of us.”

“I’ll
do it, Cattarina, whatever it is,” Midnight said. He fixed me with a round-eyed
stare. “I can’t let another cat suffer.”

“Tell
us your plan, Cattarina,” Samuel said.

I narrowed
my eyes. “Snip is about to pay Mr. Arnold a visit…from beyond the grave.”

***

We
reached agreement. Midnight would masquerade as Snip and scare Mr. and Mrs. Arnold
into giving up the notion of pet adoption. The rest of us would take turns
keeping watch over our pal from outside the home, lending a paw if danger
surfaced. How I worried for Midnight’s safety! Abner Arnold had already killed
once. If he killed again, I’d never forgive myself.

In
order for Midnight to look like Snip, he needed to undergo certain
transformations. For this, he accompanied me to Poe House. Outside our garden
gate, I asked him to stand by until I secured a route since the last thing we
needed was for Muddy to give him the sweep. I crept into the kitchen and found the
old woman at the sink scrubbing a cooking pot and talking to herself. I
encountered Sissy in her top floor bedchamber, napping. Eddy—my biggest
concern—was not home. With the women of the house busy and the man of the
house elsewhere, Midnight and I stole through the parlor window and upstairs to
Eddy’s chamber.

“You
are lucky to live here, Cattarina,” Midnight said.

“Our
home is cozy, but it is not grand like yours,” I said.

We leapt
to the desk and sat on the blotter pad.

“What
does a cat need, beyond a bowl and pillow? I’m talking about what a cat
wants
.” He blinked. “You have purpose. A
companion who sees you as an equal, not a plaything.”

I
nudged his cheek. “Your Sarah may surprise you one day. She is young.”

He
looked out the window, his pupils narrowing in the sun’s light. “She will never
treat me the way your Eddy treats you.”

I could
not disagree. “You have purpose
here
,
Midnight, with Snip. Why don’t we work on your costume?”

He
faced me again. “Where do we begin?”

I
flipped the glass stopper from the inkbottle and drew my paw through the
blackish-brown liquid speckling the blotter. Then I wiped it over the snowy
mark on his chest, thinking to cover it and make him all black. The effect was
less than convincing. The ink obscured part of the fur, leaving several visible
patches of white that, when observed at a distance, appeared to form a gallows
and noose…or a broiled chicken astride a galloping horse—I could not be
sure which. Fiddlesticks. My lack of thumbs had never been a problem before.

“How do
I look?” he asked.

“Purrrfect,”
I said as convincingly as I could. “Now for your eye.” I jumped from the desk
and nudged Eddy’s shallow closet open, following the scent of wax to hair
pomade on the third shelf. The tin opened like a steamed mussel when it hit the
floor. I dabbed a bit on Midnight’s eyelid to seal it, and hoped it would not
cause an infection later. “There we are! You look just like Snip.”

“Do you
have a mirror?”

“Er, no.
We do not believe in such things in our house,” I said. “Vanity and all that.”
I walked to the doorway and waited for him. He seemed to have difficulty navigating
with one eye closed and bumped into the chair. “Are you okay?” I asked him.

“Purrfect,”
he said.

We were
both terrible liars.

***

Unsure of
Abner Arnold’s whereabouts, Midnight and I headed to the cobbler shop first. Mr.
Arnold was not there, but we noticed his wife outside near the sassafras, a small
hand axe in her grip. It would’ve taken days to fell the colossal tree with
this implement, especially when wielded by a woman of her stature. Yet Mrs. Arnold
appeared resolute. She reared her arm back and let the blade fly. At first chop,
Mr. Fitzgerald marched from his hardware shop and into the courtyard to
confront her. He stood in the path of the woman’s swing, preventing another.
Midnight and I scurried to the mouth of the cut-through and watched the argument
unfold.

“We’ve
been through this before, Mrs. Arnold,” Mr. Fitzgerald said. “You will not
touch this tree. Not so long as I own my shop.”

“Go
away.” She circled the trunk and whacked it again.

Mr. Fitzgerald
met her on the other side and grabbed the axe handle. They wrestled over the
tool, stumbling over tree roots. Mr. Cook stuck his head from Mr. Fitzgerald’s
shop and shouted, “I say, Fitz! Can I leave payment for the purchase?” He waved
a handful of money. “Well?”

The shopkeepers
ignored him.

“Leave
me to my work!” Mrs. Arnold screeched at Mr. Fitzgerald. “Leave me, or we will pay!”
She pushed the axe toward him, almost cutting his cheek.

Mr. Fitzgerald
fell backward and, in doing so, wrenched the blade from her grasp. He scrambled
to his feet and pointed the weapon at her. “No,
you
will pay, Mrs. Arnold, if you touch this tree again! Do you
hear me?”

She picked
up a chunk of fallen bark and wagged it in his face. “Leave me to my business,”
she said, sticking it in her pocket, “and I’ll leave you to yours.” Then she
entered her shop and slammed the door.

Still
carrying the woman’s axe, Mr. Fitzgerald gave an exasperated cry and returned
to help Mr. Cook with his shopping.

“What a
ruckus,” Midnight said. “Did you understand any of it?”

“Not a
word. But Mrs. Arnold’s aversion to shade is obvious.” I approached the tree
and sniffed the newly hewn trunk. It smelled similar to the tonic Eddy
purchased every now and again—spicy and sweet.
Sarsaparilla
, that was the word. “If Mr. Arnold is not here, then
he is either at home or at the tavern. Which should we visit first?”

“I’ll
leave that to your intuition,” he said. “I trust it completely.”

We left
at once for Jolley Spirits, traveling at a slower pace than usual because of
Midnight’s closed eye. Franklin teemed with fast-rolling carriages and wagons
and gigs; it also stunk with the byproduct of progress: manure. One didn’t need
street signs to navigate Philadelphia; one only needed a nose. The sidewalks were
no less congested. Once, I lost my pal in the folds of a lady’s voluminous
skirt until he muddled through the fabric and into the light again. Oh, that
eye! We traveled east on Spring Garden, passing by the open-air market across
the street, until I spied the familiar ripped awning. Someone had placed an
empty rum barrel near the front door of the tavern, providing Midnight and I
with a platform. We sprang to the cask and peeked through the window.

“What
does Abner Arnold look like?” Midnight asked.

“He is
the cruel one,” I said matter-of-factly. “With a brooding face and eyes devoid
of soul.”

Midnight
ducked his head. “There! The old man who looks like beef jerky!”

“No,
that is Mr. Jolley. He is no friend to cats, either, but Mr. Arnold is—”
I set my paws on the glass, aghast at the figure of Mr. Arnold weaving across
the tavern floor. The fire had contorted his neck and chin, giving his skin a
molten appearance, like that of a melted candle. Bald patches, interspersed
with tufts of hair, covered his head. “He’s coming! He’s coming!” I dove from
the barrel and hid behind a stack of egg crates next to the grocer’s.

“Cattarina,
how will I know him?” Midnight asked. His closed eye weeped from the pomade.

Mr. Arnold
opened the door before I could answer. He hung onto the frame with hands the
color of rare lamb and leered at Midnight. “Hello, pusssssss,” he said to him.
“Don’t I…don’t I know you?” He hiccupped. “Why don’t you come home with me
tonight, pussssss? I could use the company.”

Midnight’s
good eye opened wide.

Mr. Arnold
looked even more hideous in the daylight. A man of competing ills, his scabby
neck and chin contrasted with the sallow tones of his cheeks, forehead…even eyes.
He laughed and gave Midnight a shove, depositing him on the sidewalk. As I shadowed
the pair to his new home—blocks from Poe House and from the help of
feline friends—dread settled in for the journey.