you told the police?”
He laughed. “No, but I will, I’m a realist, Julie. And an opportunist. I tell you that you haven’t any choice.”
He tried to get an arm around Julie. She shrank away from him, turned her back against the door.
“You—you were the one standing beside the door of Uncle Charley’s house that night?”
“Yes. And I was watching through the window when you hit the man with your purse. You haven’t any choice.”
The car had come to the top of a hill. At that moment, Julie saw something glowing faintly in the back seat of the car. She twisted her head, saw a single green cat’s eye watching them from the back seat.
Julie screamed. Dr. Palet was startled into jerking the wheel. He had to fight to keep on the road as the car careened down the hill.
“Screaming won’t get you anywhere,” he told her tensely. “Except maybe land us in a ditch.”
“But the cat!” she gasped. “Why did you bring the cat?”
“You’re crazy.” He laughed. “I didn’t bring any cat.”
“The one-eyed cat is in the back seat.”
At the foot of the hill, a narrow iron bridge loomed in the blaze of headlights. Dr. Palet tried to take a look back over his shoulder, didn’t dare at this speed. And then it happened.
The big gray cat sprang from the seat cushions, straight at the bald head of Dr. Palet. Its saber claws raked across Dr. Palet’s head and face. Then it tumbled upon his lap, clawing wildly at his coat pocket.
Dr. Palet uttered a hoarse, hurt cry. He made a frantic stab for the cat, but missed. The animal yowled, its eyes glowing strangely. It seemed to have dissolved into a whirling blur of fur in which that single eye was a pin-wheeling shaft of green light.
The cat kept clawing and raking at Dr. Palet’s suit. One claw slashed bloody furrows across the back of his hand. An upward leap sent another crimson track across his face.
Julie tried to close her eyes to shut out the terrifying sight of the iron bridge looming in front of them. But her eyes were irresistibly drawn to her approaching doom. Sheer desperation made her lunge for the wheel. But at that precise moment, the doctor’s arm was flung up to ward off the cat.
He lost complete control of the car. It slewed across the road, plunged head-on into the bridge. There was a rending crash of metal, the screech of tires, and the tinkling dissolution of shattered glass. Julie was hurled roughly about. A heavy weight crushed down upon her, and she seemed to drop into a black pit that had no bottom.…
* * * *
Julie was in the hospital three weeks, recovering from shock, a broken rib, and body bruises. Harvey was with her most of the time. He had obtained a leave of absence from his new job. Just as soon as she was well enough to be released from the hospital, they planned to move to Washington.
Dr. Palet had died in the accident, Harvey informed her, which was just about the best way it could have turned out.
“Because the police were going to arrest him for the murder of Uncle Charley! They’d found a pair of pliers which had been used to unlock Uncle Charley’s door from the outside. Those pliers belonged to Dr. Palet. And when the police examined Uncle Charley’s will, they knew Palet had a strong motive.”
Julie listened quietly until the nurse had gone out of the room. Then she told Harvey the truth. She explained how Dr. Palet had dropped the pliers before Uncle Charley was dead, which proved that the doctor simply couldn’t have got in to kill Charley Pedlow. She told how she had left Uncle Charley and closed the door quietly behind her.
“If you didn’t slam the door,” Harvey said, “it wouldn’t have locked. It’s that kind of a lock. From what you just told me I guess you surprised Palet right after he had forced the lock open. In running away, he dropped the pliers. He no doubt was ready to commit the murder when you came along. He must have been watching through the window when you and Uncle Charley were scuffling and saw you strike Uncle Charley on the head with your handbag. After you left, he went in and killed Uncle Charley by simply raising Uncle Charley’s head and bringing it down hard on the doorstop. He was the murderer, all right.”
Julie was still worried. A deep frown creased her smooth forehead.
“It seems to me the police are only guessing. Of course, the pliers are a clue, but I don’t think it is enough. They could still suspect me if they ever found out about my visit.”
Harvey laughed and petted her shoulder. “Forget it, darling. The police have another clue. The whole town knows Dr. Palet’s passion for flowers and particularly for heliotrope. Well, he must have been planting it that day, because when he killed Uncle Charley, he dropped a withered sprig of it on the floor beside Charley’s head. It must have been caught on his clothes.”
“Then I’m in the clear. The police can’t possibly suspect me.”
“That’s right, darling. Don’t you see? Palet knew he’d committed a murder, but he was afraid you had identified him when you saw him lurking in the shadows. He knew you had knocked out Uncle Charley. Only if he could convince you that you had done the killing could he feel safe. So he decided to play up to your suspicions, worry you. If he could make the cats hang around our house, he figured he could break your nerve.”
“But I don’t see how.” Julie protested. “Did he get Uncle Charley’s cats together and dump them on our front lawn? How could he make them stay there?”
“Didn’t you tell me he planted some flowers in our front yard the day after the murder?”
“Yes. Heliotrope.”
“Garden heliotrope is one name for the stuff. Valerian is another. Cats are wild about the foliage, the flowers and even the roots. That’s why he planted the stuff—to keep the seven cat witnesses in front of your eye.”
Julie was silent for a long moment. She still looked puzzled.
“But I still can’t understand,” she murmured, “why that one-eyed cat attacked Dr. Palet. It—it was almost as if that cat knew Dr. Palet had killed its master and—”
Julie broke off, a tremor in her voice.
“You are a silly one,” Harvey chided. “Palet guessed right about your superstitions. There was nothing funny about the cat jumping on him. It was going after the scent of valerian. It had caught the scent of the stuff and followed both of you into the car. When he turned around, the cat leaped and landed on his head and started to claw him in its wild frenzy to get at the valerian.”
Harvey came closer to the bed and leaned over Julie. “Your experiences should teach you to stay away from amorous, middle-aged men.”
Julie smiled, and her eyes sparkled.
“But I’ve no objection to the amorous advances of a certain young man named Harvey Enders,” she reminded him.
THE CATS, by H. P. Lovecraft
Babels of blocks to the high heavens towering
Flames of futility swirling below;
Poisonous fungi in brick and stone flowering,
Lanterns that shudder and death-lights that glow.
Black monstrous bridges across oily rivers,
Cobwebs of cable to nameless things spun;
Catacomb deeps whose dank chaos delivers
Streams of live foetor that rots in the sun.
Color and splendour, disease and decaying,
Shrieking and ringing and crawling insane,
Rabbles exotic to stranger-gods praying,
Jumbles of odour