Chapter 14
I had, in fact, made a checklist while I’d been waiting for élise, which listed all the requirements for equipping a second cat shelter.
We spent much of the day securing additional cages, which required us to trudge through the snow to a farming supply store on the outskirts of the city, where we arranged to have them delivered to the shelter.
Ordinarily I’d never have been able to afford so many new cages, not without scrimping and saving for months, but the recent increase in adoptions had brought with it an increase in donations, which gave us just enough to cover the cost.
On our way back to the Sainte-Sophie shelter, I convinced élise to pass through an alley where I’d found cats sheltering before.
There we met another orange tabby, who came barreling out of the cardboard box he’d been living in with an air of having expected us, then circled around me, screeching, as if I were monstrously late.
He was a ragged little thing, not quite full grown, shivering in the cold.
He did not like to be picked up, evincing the contrariness that would be notable by its absence in any cat, but after I tucked him into the warmth of my coat he seemed to see the advantages, and dug his claws into my sweater.
We walked the last mile back to the shelter thus, me cradling the cat with his head poking out of my coat, and him making an endless ruckus, mewling sonorously with what seemed like a combination of delight and terror.
Well, I could understand that feeling well enough.
His voice was remarkably loud and grating for such a tiny creature.
Needless to say, élise and I attracted stares the whole way home, as well as laughter and shouted remarks.
“He’s Banshee’s opposite,” élise remarked during a brief moment of silence while the beast caught his breath.
“It’s like having an ambulance down my coat,” I grumbled, and thus Ambulance we named him.
The grim reality was that, with winter setting in, the city’s cat population would begin to decrease without our assistance.
Soon we would be inundated with reports of cats sheltering on balconies and landings in the hopes of snatching tiny scraps of warmth, and we would not be able to help them all. But with a second shelter?
“We easily have space for another fifty here,” I told Mina the following morning—I’d sent her a telegram directing her to our new location.
“I’d like you to telegram all our volunteers, past and present—I want people out searching no later than tomorrow.
And I’m going to speak to Havelock about paying you a salary. ”
The girl looked astonished. I’d told Mina the truth about our landlord’s identity and the threat we were facing, for I trusted her.
Her reaction had surprised me—far from being terrified, she’d merely grimaced, then nodded with a dubious sort of acceptance.
More than once I’d wondered what sort of life the girl had lived before our paths crossed.
“You’ll speak to—him?” Mina repeated.
“Of course,” I said, ignoring the little shudder that coursed through me. “I daresay he owes us some remuneration for the danger he’s put us in. And I’ve no doubt that horrible shop of his turns a healthy profit.”
I opened the curtains, hung the Cat Friends sign in the window, and unlocked the shelter at nine o’clock, resigning myself to the ludicrousness of the situation.
I half expected to be accosted by representatives of the bank, or perhaps the restaurant, objecting to the proximity of such an unsanitary establishment.
I’d no idea what business we’d replaced, for Havelock’s spell had superimposed the shelter over everything that had been here before, upstairs apartment and all, but I highly doubted it had been anything so humble as a charity.
Fortunately, though, nobody took immediate offense; most of the well-heeled passersby simply did a double-take.
After barely ten minutes, the door swung open and an older man shuffled inside, stamping the snow from his boots.
He was dressed in the same woolen finery as all those bound for the bank next door, and carried an expensive briefcase.
Before I could even offer a greeting, he surprised me by gesturing to His Majesty, who was perched on the windowsill, surveying the street with leonine condescension.
“Bonjour, mademoiselle,” the man said, then added in English, “How much?”
It took me a moment to understand what he meant. “Oh! That one’s not for sale. It’s for the best, I promise you.”
“Shame,” he said, casting another look at His Majesty. “I had one just like him when I was a boy. A big black-and-white monster—half-wild and ill-tempered, but he took to me for some reason.” A smile touched the corners of his eyes.
“I see.” I mentally ran through our inventory, then motioned the man over to the cage belonging to Juliette, a long-haired brown tabby who came close to rivalling His Majesty in bulk.
Thankfully, the cats had returned to their former colours over the course of the previous day, the enchantment draining from them like wet ink.
“She’s not the colour you preferred,” I said, “but she has a fiery streak. She likes to be carried from place to place like royalty, and has more than once fallen asleep in my arms.”
“That sounds like my Sam,” the man said with a laugh. “And that’s quite a throne you’ve made for her. She looks positively mystical, like some magician’s familiar.”
I forced a laugh. Juliette’s bedding, like that of the other cats, comprised one of the former tenant’s cashmere scarves.
Juliette’s was particularly luxurious, double-layered and woven with gold thread in a houndstooth pattern, which sparkled becomingly against her fur.
The scarves were undeniably useful, not only saving us money on bedding but setting the cats off to advantage, though I did feel guilty every time one of the exotic garments was the victim of a snagged claw or hair ball.
I opened the cage a little nervously, for I hadn’t been lying about Juliette’s temper—the beast was just as likely to claw strangers as condescend to be petted—but I need not have worried. After sniffing the man’s fingers carefully, Juliette arched her neck and pushed her forehead into his hand.
“Would you like to hold her?” I enquired, trying not to sound too eager. Juliette had been at the shelter almost as long as Thoreau, owing mostly to her temperament, but she was also ten years old, and more likely to be passed over than the younger cats.
The man nodded, anticipation stealing over his expression, making his wrinkled face look years younger.
I hefted Juliette and placed her carefully in his arms. The cat gave a yowl, but it seemed only an obligatory assertion of pride, for she began almost immediately to purr.
The man looked her over, offering many soft-spoken compliments on her stripes, and her eyes narrowed to contented slits.
“I’m fully booked with meetings this morning,” the man said, then glanced down at Juliette. “But meetings can be postponed, can’t they?”
“Of course,” I said, and the two of us exchanged mischievous smiles, like children.
I filled out the paperwork for him, for Juliette seemed disinclined to budge from his arms. He was Roger Fairwood, with an address in the wealthy neighbourhood at the foot of the mountain.
He seemed to expect me to recognize his name, which put him in the same class as most rich men, but then seemed relieved when I did not, which made me like him better.
He also insisted on paying double the adoption fee, which only increased my delight.
Ten minutes later, he was out the door with Juliette—loudly protesting the affront—contained within a cardboard box, and a paper bag of food and other essentials.
“Back down to forty-five,” I said to Mina, who was grinning at me from the counter. Like me, she’d long despaired of Juliette ever finding a home. “That was a stroke of luck.”
“Luck,” Mina repeated in a musing voice. She had one of her history textbooks propped open in front of her, for she liked to do her coursework in between clients. “Maybe. But I think this location will be good for us.”
“Let’s hope so,” I said, my mood bolstered by Mina’s confidence. Though she was a quiet person by nature, whenever Mina did voice an opinion, it tended to be proven correct.