Trouble the Cat Read online

  Scholar Ambrose was a man in his middle years, older than Martin looked to be, but like her teacher, he was slender and appeared to enjoy good health and full vigor. In his youth, he must have been startlingly handsome. He was comely still with hair so black that it almost gleamed and piercing eyes of the same color. His complexion was olive and his features almost as perfectly chiseled as those on a statue of yore. Only his mouth spoiled him a little. That was tight and hard and was framed by lines that gave him a harsh, even an implacable, look.

  He reached the wall in a matter of seconds and came to a stop at the place nearest to her perch. “You make a singularly attractive spy,” he observed. His speech was cultivated without affectation, his voice pleasantly modulated.

  “You have a singularly attractive house,” Dory countered. She held up the sketch her arts had just created so that he could view the largely uncompleted picture of his dwelling with its elaborate tracing of vines covering its walls.

  His smile was devastating. Dory swallowed hard. She wanted to scramble down the tree and race for her house but know that she must hold her ground. The twelve-year-old she had been would have run. The woman she had become could not.

  That woman should know what to do, what to say next, but Dory simply did not. How could she? She had missed the experiences, the normal, slow acquisition of the social skills that should have fitted her for this encounter. The man was too attractive, and he was not looking at her the way Martin did...

  “Trust your instincts, foolish kit!”

  “Simpler to say than do!”

  He was right. The human forcibly calmed and cleared her mind. The ability to function in her new life had come along with it. She must keep herself open to that inner guidance, however difficult it was to do when she was this nervous.—That was it. She need be no other than herself. Be courteous. Grow interested in the person himself...

  Ambrose fetched the ladder he used for pruning and set it against the wall. With its aid, he gained the top of the barrier. He half sat on the six-inch flat surface. “I’m Ambrose,” he announced since they had never been introduced despite the proximity of their dwellings.

  “Doreen,” she replied, using the formal name Martin had given her. “I’m pleased to meet you, sir. I hope I haven’t disturbed you too much, but you do have a lovely courtyard. I enjoy drawing views of it.”

  “Yes, it is pleasant,” he agreed with obvious pleasure, “and it’s as unique as it is attractive.”

  “Scholar Martin told me that you supply medicines for physicians like Doctor Solomon,” she ventured.

  “The raw materials mostly, except in cases where my greater knowledge of the substances involved makes it significantly safer for me to produce the entire preparation myself.”

  “What a fascinating business!”

  He smiled, a trifle indulgently, she thought. “The plants are interesting. Business is business, and I confess to having little love for that. Otherwise, I would have kept on running my father’s after his death instead of selling it off. It was profitable enough.”

  “What kind of trade did ye follow?” Dory asked. She found it impossible to imagine this man making candles or cobbling boots.

  “Luxury imports. We brought the things in from the Mainland and peddled them to the noble and rich. We didn’t call it that, of course. It was all handled in a very sophisticated manner, but it was peddling all the same. I preferred a scholarly life among my plants with visits to the capital now and then for cultural recreation.”

  “But you do have an occupation,” she pointed out.

  He nodded. “To supplement the income from my investments. I’m independent enough that I do not have to deal in common spices and herbs and other readily available commodities. If I wanted to make a real go of this, I should have to provide for all a physician’s or a nature healer’s needs.”

  Ambrose eyed her speculatively. “Now, young woman, I’ve told you all about myself. What is your story? I take it that you are Martin’s pupil?—I’d heard that you were attractive, but I confess I did not imagine you would prove quite this comely.”

  Dory’s eyes fell, and she colored slightly. “It was felt that I would do well to study with someone like Scholar Martin for the sciences and mathematics.”

  “Has he proven a good teacher?”

  “Indeed, yes. I am learning a great deal.”

  “No doubt.—About botany, too?”

  “Of course. I do very well with it, actually. I like studying living things more than abstract figures.”

  She could feel his eyes examining her, searching her face, although his expression did not alter. Did he believe her? Surely, he could not imagine the one course of study she had carefully refrained from mentioning...

  The man gave her a winning smile. “I suppose it would be considered improper if I offered to give you a tour of my collection,” he remarked. “I have the afternoon at my disposal.”

  Dory looked up sharply. “It would be highly improper.”

  Trouble’s growl sounded in her mind. “Just try bringing those black eyes up here, human. I’ll scratch them out for you.”

  “Trouble!” she exclaimed, horrified.

  “And don’t you dare even think of climbing down to him! He’s reeking like a courting tom.”

  “I have no intention of going down there, fur brain, as he knows full well.”

  Ambrose accepted her refusal without sign of surprise or protest. “Perhaps I can invite both you and your teacher one day?”

  “I’d really enjoy that,” she assured him.

  The man started to turn away but stopped suddenly. “I’ve told the local young people about the perils of sampling my crops. I don’t suppose it’s necessary to issue the same warning to you?”

  She drew herself up. “I assure you, sir, that I do not go sneaking over fences to pilfer my neighbors’ berries and fruit.”

  He laughed. “No, I imagine it is safe to assume that you don’t.—Farewell, Doreen. I shall call upon your Scholar Martin soon.”

  * * * *

  Dory watched until he went inside once more. “How handsome he is!—Well, how did I manage?” she inquired of her companion.

  “You did fine,” he told her. “Now let’s get out of here before he changes his mind. I don’t like that one. His eyes don’t match his smell.”

  “You said he smelled…like a tom.” Her face turned scarlet as she spoke.

  She should not be surprised. Dory knew the sort of education she was supposed to be receiving was often that sought by women desiring to become courtesans, and the irregularity of her present position and dress could only have reinforced that impression in the botanist’s mind.—Damn. This was a complication she did not want or need.

  Dory dropped lightly out of the tree onto the table. She jumped to the ground, thoroughly startled by a snarling hiss of unparalleled fury.

  Jasmine was crouched on the table. Her ears were pinned flat against her head. Her eyes were slits. Her body was taut, ready to spring at the hint of provocation.

  The human stared in astonishment at the usually docile little cat. “Jasmine, whatever is the matter, baby?”

  “That monster is not to come here. This is Martin’s territory.”

  “Ambrose?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why do you dislike him so much?”

  “When I was a small kitten, I got into his garden and nibbled some of his accursed plants. Fire was exploding in my belly when he found me. That cruel one knew what was wrong with me because he examined the leaves I had chewed, but he only laughed. ‘Bad choice for you, cat,’ he said. ‘It will be interesting to watch how long it takes’.”

  Dory swore, calling up a phrase she had heard her former guardian’s husband use, but the tabby went on with her story as if she did not hear. “I’d have been finished then, but someone called him back into his house, and I was able to crawl off to die.”

  She purred suddenly. “Instead, I worked my way righ
t through a hole in the fence into this courtyard. My distress had reached Martin, and he was already looking for me. That’s how we met.” She purred more loudly still. “He found me and made me well. My Martin stayed awake night after night to save me.”

  “Poor little lady. No wonder you throw up if someone looks at you sideways. What did Martin do when you told him what had happened?”

  “I didn’t tell him, or anyone else, either. I-I was afraid of what Ambrose might do.”

  The woman’s brows raised. “Do to Martin?”

  “Something sneaky.”

  “That would probably in character for the bastard.”

  Dory did not find the botanist attractive any longer. She recalled the hard cast to his expression and realized there was good cause for it. His character and his soul were rotten through with cruelty. Anyone who could laugh at the suffering of a helpless little animal would use a child just as viciously...

  She blinked. “How is he working it?” Dory whispered. She was certain now, as certain as she was of life itself, that Solomon’s little son had not contracted some dire disease, that his symptoms were being intentionally induced through the direct wish and will of Ambrose the Scholar. Why he had turned his spleen against the child of an insignificant village physician was irrelevant. All that mattered was how he was administrating his venom and how to stop him before he killed Sammy.

  “His reason will be very important to Martin,” Trouble pointed out.

  The woman bit her lip. So it would. No one could be accused of so heinous a crime on gut feeling, even with a story like Jasmine’s to back it up. Despite her frustration, Dory did agree with the rightness of that, but now Sammy could die, would die, if Ambrose could not be stopped. “If we could catch him in the act or at least show how he’s doing it, the motive could be beaten out of him later.”

  “I hope you’re not thinking of exploring that house?” the tomcat demanded severely.

  She shook her head emphatically. “I’d only get caught if I went physically, and I definitely can’t hold a sufficient level of concentration to spy out the whole place, not in real detail.—I don’t even know what constitutes evidence. The mere presence of dangerous plants and compounds doesn’t. He makes his living, or a good part of it, out of those.”

  “As you said, we have to catch him at it, or Jasmine and I do. Our eyes are better suited for such work, and we have an infinity more patience than you.”

  “But how?” his human exploded.

  “Why, we just watch him, and we’re not alone in this town. The local cats don’t like Ambrose. He’s not kind himself, and I’ll venture Jasmine was not the first or last kitten to fall victim to his plantings. We’ll have plenty of help. We’ll know everyone who comes to his house and where his visitors go after they leave, and no one except ourselves will be the wiser.”

  “Trouble, are you sure? I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you or Jasmine or any of the others.”

  “Of course I’m sure, scatter-brained kit! Who would be suspicious of cats doing what they always do—napping, grooming, looking off into the distance? Our foe doesn’t even realize we can think,” he concluded contemptuously.

  “All right, but do be careful. If we’re right, he really is dangerous.”

  “Kitten,” the tom explained patiently, “cats are not humans. We do not court danger, and we never engage unnecessarily in unpleasant, strenuous behavior. Just continue botanizing. We’ll get you the information you need to bring the whole matter to Martin.”

  * * * *

  Despite that assurance, three weeks passed without result, although all the neighboring felines had readily joined in the surveillance. There was simply little activity of any sort to report. Ambrose’s life was nearly painfully quiet. A few messengers or physicians’ pupils or, occasionally, a healer himself came and quickly left again with an assortment of vials and packets. None approached Solomon the physician’s house or child.

  Trouble dozed on the window ledge that was his nightly post, one eye half open, fixed on their enemy’s domain. It was not a bad chore, certainly not a demanding one for any cat.

  He shifted his position a hair’s breath. That was the problem with it. He had anticipated playing a rather more significant role by this time than that of a perpetual window ornament.

  He snapped alert. There had been a flicker of movement, not in the house or courtyard but on the wall separating the property from the alley beyond. As he watched, a shadow-figure lumped onto the top of the barrier. It remained a moment silhouetted against the broad cat-faced moon before scrambling down the thick growth of vines and branches into Ambrose the Scholar’s garden.

  “Dory! Out of bed!”

  The woman was racing for the window before his warning had finished sounding in her mind. “What’s happening?” she whispered.

  “An intruder.—Look there among the bushes at the foot of the wall. He has a light of some sort.”

  She squinted, trying to pick out detail, but distance and the deep shadows negated the bright moonlight for her frail human senses. “I’m no cat to see in the near dark,” she grumbled.

  “Use your mirror, then, fluffhead.”

  Swearing at herself for her stupidity, Dory took the glass from its silk-lined box and set it on her lap.

  She forced her excitement to recede. Once she felt fully in command of herself, the apprentice sorceress concentrated on the scene beyond and then turned to the mirror itself.

  Gradually, an image formed and enlarged within the glass, dark still, but not nearly so black as it had seemed at a distance. Better, but she still could not adequately see the intruder. He, or she, was crouched down in the midst of the berry bushes and was screened by the dense foliage. As Trouble had said, he had brought a small light with him, probably a tiny votive-type candle in a glass container, certainly nothing much larger. Its glow was sufficient to reveal his progress but little more than that.

  He was working slowly. The plants were no longer as heavily laden as they had been in late spring and very early summer. Berries were still to be found, but not without a careful branch-by-branch search, especially in the dark like this.

  Her brows drew together. Who in all creation would want to gather this particular harvest and want it desperately enough to go to such lengths to obtain it?

  She had her answer in the next moment. Dory’s heart seemed to freeze in mid-beat. “Dear Lord Above!” she whispered in horror.

  What was she to do? Martin was away at Doctor Solomon’s again...

  This could not wait! “Trouble, call Jasmine! We’re going down there!”

  “Wait! He doesn’t seem to be eating much.”

  “He’s only a baby! How many of them would it take?”

  The woman composed herself. Once more, she studied the scene below and the glass.

  Driven by her fear and the intensity of her need, the resulting image was startling in its clarity, terrifying in the precision of detail it revealed. They could discern the weak glow of candlelight on the berry the intruder dropped into the stiff-sided purse he wore slung around his neck. At least, he seemed to be storing his finds rather than devouring them outright. If only they knew that for a fact...

  She frowned. “If we try to come at him through the courtyards, he could spot us and bolt.”

  “Grab him when he goes back over the wall,” Trouble suggested. “You’d have him before he even knew you were there.”

  “He might just sit down and start eating once he thinks he has enough berries,” Dory argued desperately.

  “He should hold off until he’s safely away since he’s waited this long, but you’re right. Young kittens will all eat just about anything they shouldn’t. I’ll slip over the wall and keep an eye on him.—Whatever you plan to do, move! That pesky kit won’t stay picking berries forever.”

  * * * *

  The alley backing Ambrose’s courtyard was narrow and dark with three-story buildings on either side. The wall separa
ting it from the scholar’s property was some fifteen feet tall, but a number of wooden boxes and crates had been piled against it. Neighborhood children had used them for a fort, climbing area, and meeting place throughout the spring and summer, and, apparently, for a ladder.

  The sorceress positioned herself beside the stack, concealing herself in its shadow. Jasmine went to the top, ready to assist Trouble if he should call for help.

  The tom slipped over the edge. Kittens, he grumbled to himself as he scrambled down, endeavoring to make the most of the cover provided by the vegetation and the wall itself. Four feet or two, it made no difference. Not one of them possessed half a reasoning brain, and what cerebral power they did have functioned solely to get themselves and everyone around them into the deepest possible difficulties.

  They were also as unpredictable and fast as little mice, and he did not intend to allow this particular specimen to pull any surprises on them.

  He had come none too soon.

  “Get set!” he called to his comrades. “He’s on his way!”

  The small trespasser was not long in scaling the thick lacing of sturdy plants covering the inner portion of the wall. He topped the barrier, delayed momentarily to position himself for the descent, and twisted over the outer edge.

  There was a slight space to the first box, and that measured scarcely a foot square, but the child showed no concern as he dropped onto his target. He landed true, in good balance, and immediately scrambled down to the next, much broader crate.

  Jasmine was waiting for that. She sprang.

  Catching the strap of the purse holding the deadly hoard of berries in her teeth, she deftly drew it over the boy’s head and leaped away again before her victim quite realized what had occurred.

  “Wonderful!” Dory exulted in delight and relief. “Bring it to Martin, Love.”

  The child let out a yowl of mingled fright and dismay, but by that time, Dory had reached him and swept him into the imprisoning safety of her arms.

  The woman carried her struggling captive to the mouth of the alley where the light from the street lanterns augmented the brighter shine of the moon, permitting her to see him clearly.