Mr. Flood's Last Resort(61)

One: she hopes the old man will be buried alive by an avalanche of rubbish.

Two: the old man has stolen her valuable sphynx cat.

She has seen Mr. Flood’s gaunt shape flitting around her property late at night. She has found empty boxes of cat biscuits in her bushes.

“He has been trying to lure my baby outside for weeks,” she says. “He waits for me to slip up and leave a window open. Manolete is a house cat. One of a kind.”

She curses the eyes in Mr. Flood’s head and demands an interview with him.

“He’s in the bath at present. Is Manolete one of those bald varieties of cats?” I ask politely.

Mrs. Cabello stops mid-rant and stares at me. “What are you talking about?”

“Mr. Flood has a lot of cats,” I say patiently. “What does Manolete look like? Is he bald?”

Mrs. Cabello blinks. “No, he has down. Like fine chamois.”

“And he usually lives inside?”

Mrs. Cabello nods and, perhaps reminded of Manolete’s singular beauty, begins to cry, making resentful little sobs. She rustles in her handbag, finds a photograph, and passes it to me. It is of a singularly ugly cat. A pale gray alien with protuberant yellow eyes crawls over a satin cushion, wrinkling its brow glumly.

“I see.”

“He is very beautiful.” Mrs. Cabello puts the photo back in her bag.

“I’ll look out for him.” I glance over my shoulder and lower my voice. “You didn’t happen to know Mary Flood at all, by any chance?”

“What has Mary Flood got to do with my cat?”

I pause. “I just want to find out a bit more about the family.”

Mrs. Cabello snarls and points a long-nailed finger up at the house. “Can’t you ask him?”

I keep my voice low. “He’s not very forthcoming.”

“He’s a bastard.” Mrs. Cabello crows in satisfaction. “His wife was lovely.”

“You knew her well?”

She nods. “She gave me a rosebush when I moved in.”

“You must have been upset to hear about her accident?”

Mrs. Cabello wrinkles her nose. “It was no accident.”

I glance behind me. “You really think that?”

Mrs. Cabello shrugs. “Maybe, but what would I know?”

I lower my voice. “Did Mary ever mention feeling threatened?”

“We only talked about her garden.”

“Nothing else?”

She points. “There was an arbor there, with roses over. This was a beautiful house when Mary was here.” She shakes her head. “It is so sad, how he let all this go. Everything stopped, everything died when she died. The only thing growing here now is rubbish.”

“Did she ever mention her daughter?”

“They have a daughter?”

“Her name was Marguerite; she died very young.”

“That is sad.” Mrs. Cabello looks sad. “Mary never once spoke about her daughter.”

I duck into the kitchen and write down Renata’s number and give it to her. “If you remember anything else about Mary, however small, will you phone this number?”

Mrs. Cabello pushes the paper into the pocket of her cropped leather jacket and smiles at me grimly. “And you’ll look for Manolete?”

“I will.”

She puts her sunglasses on and picks her way back down the stairs. At the bottom she waves and retreats up the garden path.

*

CATHAL HAS spent most of the day in the bath and, with the help of a flannel and a rubber bath mat, he emerged without incident and with his modesty intact. He has put on an old dark suit with a black tie. His washed hair has been carefully combed and he is clean-shaven. He looks like a disreputable guest at a wake.

He now stands ready at the canvas watching me take my position on the chair.

“How much longer will you be dragging this painting out?” I ask.

“It will be finished by Friday. We’ll have the big unveiling on my birthday.”

“Is there anyone else you’d like to invite? Friends, neighbors, your son?”

Cathal looks at me with disdain. “You really are a gobshite.”

“I’m only asking.”

“When you know that I’m a hated man? Hated and hating. Sure what would I be doing inviting people round to detest me in person on my birthday?”

“Talking of antagonism,” I say, “Mrs. Cabello called. She’s lost her cat.”

“Has she now?”

“She thinks you might have stolen it.”

Cathal looks around him. In the conservatory there are multiple felines. Curled up between paintings, lolling at the feet of my armchair, and prowling around the legs of the easel.

“I’ve cats; she can take her pick.”

“This is a special cat. A bald one.”

“Her cat is not bald; it has a soft down, like a wrinkled gray peach.”

I frown at him. “You’ve stolen Manolete.”

Cathal dabs at his palette, his face impassive.

“Don’t try to deny it. Mrs. Cabello saw you flitting about her garden at night trying to lure him out. You’ve stolen him, haven’t you?”

He squints at his painting. “I haven’t at all. Hush your mouth from flapping.”