The Sign of the Cat
by Edna C. Horning
“Well, then,” he asked his daughter as their call drew to a close. “does our agreement still stand?”
“It stands,” Lisette assured. “Is your sign the same?”
“No change. And yours?”
“The same.”
* * *
Upon receiving the invitation, Lisette had assumed the gathering would be a walk-around requiring attendees to juggle a drink with one hand and a plate of finger-food with the other, but how wrong she was. The full buffet was dazzling to behold, and a number of fully appointed tables — and not merely in the dining room — had been provided for the guests’ convenience.
Perhaps she should have been tipped off by the invitation’s inner envelope: there had been no “And Guest” on it, suggesting a limited number of merrymakers. And then there was the house itself: three stories, two of them balconied, and lit up brighter than La Scala on opening night.
Lisette claimed the last vacancy at one such table. It was near a velvet-cushioned bay window onto which a cat with a long, pearlescent, silvery-gray coat had hopped seconds after Lisette seated herself. Seemingly oblivious to all else, the animal fixed its enormous, unblinking eyes on her and began a vibrating, barely audible purr.
The scene brought to mind her cat-loving father and, on the heels of that reverie, a recent comment of his.
“I’ve never undertaken a proper genealogical search of our family tree, but I’d wager that somewhere in the mix we have Scandinavian genes and that you drew a hearty helping.”
“Why so?” Lisette asked, instantly curious.
“Because they are such good listeners. Norwegians, Swedes, Finns, the whole lot. It’s a cultural trait. They want to know things. They pay attention. They don’t interrupt. And that describes you. Don’t ever lose it.”
Lisette acknowledged the truth of this but suspected it was her father’s kinder, gentler way of saying, “You’re fine one-on-one but don’t exactly sparkle in a group,” and she scarcely saw how that second bit could be considered a popularity asset.
If others talked too much, perhaps she did not talk enough. Didn’t contribute sufficiently to chit-chat. Didn’t cultivate a handy stockpile of absorbing anecdotes, real or apocryphal, to keep the troops hooked. People socialize, wanting and expecting to be entertained. Disappoint them and, except for the always-welcome rich and/or beautiful, invitations tend to dry up.
In spite of renewed determination to pull her conversational weight that evening, Lisette found herself sliding into older habits and remaining largely silent as odds and ends flowed around her. It was almost akin to eavesdropping.
“And somehow the raft deployed by accident, or maybe it was a malfunction, they weren’t sure, and the airline mechanic was between it and the fuselage when it began to inflate. He kept stabbing and poking his screwdriver against it with all his might before finally puncturing it, or it would have killed him for sure. Might as well have been a brick wall coming at him full tilt. And not a week later—”
At one point, Lisette looked towards the window precisely as the cat jumped to the floor. Its keen stare still on her alone, it started rhythmically waving its plume of a tail back and forth like a signal before moving from sight.
“Kept balls in his pocket so he could drop them down his trouser leg for a better lie, and it wasn’t just the cheating that amazed everyone. It was the obviousness of it — Is that a word? — that had them shaking their heads in disbelief. People who pay a king’s ransom for membership dues take their golf seriously, and so they hired a caddy to follow him around the links to keep him honest. It was—”
“And so right at the peak of lunch hour, a guy jumped up and yelled, ‘Everybody get under the tables! There’s a tornado coming!’ The other diners just sat there looking at him like he was barmy and didn’t move a muscle. So he climbed onto his chair and screamed louder, ‘I grew up in Kansas! I know a tornado when I hear one! Get under the tables now!!’ And all those stiffs suddenly sprang to life and hit the floor as though they’d just spotted money down there. Sure enough, moments later a tornado swooped down and sheared the roof off that puppy like a giant buzz saw—”
Lisette suddenly felt gossamer-light tickles around her ankles. Mystified for a millisecond, she realized the cat was now under the table.
“Keeled over dead owing a lot of money to what you could consider ‘independent lenders’, off-the-books sorts not insured by the FDIC and, the day following the funeral, Eva Louise and her mother were by themselves in the house when three burly creeps they’d never clapped eyes on before pushed their way through the front door and began helping themselves to whatever struck their fancy: the silver tea service, a Tiffany lamp, paintings on the wall, electronics, and there was nothing—”
Slowly and deliberately the animal began caressing itself against Lisette’s legs, rubbing the full length of its body first along one side and then the other. She found the sensation pleasant but allowed it only minimal distraction from the hive of banter buzzing around her.
“Great-grandfather was a Lutheran minister in Baden when the Franco-Prussian War broke out and, even though he was German, his side got it into their heads that he was spying for the French and sentenced him to hang. So my great-grandmother parked herself at the prison gates, wailing and crying day and night, pleading for his life. Maybe they would have let him go anyway or maybe their ears ached from listening nonstop to a banshee serenade, but release him they did with the stipulation he leave Prussia for good. So he and the wailing wife and their five kiddies settled in Pennsylvania, where eventually I was born but wouldn’t have been, I guess, if she hadn’t had a set of pipes that would put Caruso to shame—”
In spite of Lisette’s indifference, the cat had not gone in search of a more appreciative beneficiary. On the contrary, it escalated its bid in frequency and intensity. On and on it went, minute after minute, caress after caress, until finally Lisette relented and, leaning forward, slipped a hand under the table to stroke the silky head now resting below her knee.
She tried to make the motion as unobtrusive as possible, but a coincidental lull in the chatter exposed it to a degree of notice. Lisette flushed slightly and, thinking she needed to explain, said, “I’ve encountered affectionate cats before but none as loving as yours. She hasn’t stopped nuzzling me since I sat down! Should I feel honored, or is she like this with everyone?”
Lisette had addressed the query primarily to the prettyish young lady sitting immediately across who had been introduced earlier as the home-for-the-holidays daughter of the household.
“We don’t have a cat,” the young woman answered. “I’m allergic.”
Lisette pushed back her chair so forcefully that the wood squeaked and bent down to peer beneath the table.
There was no cat.
Slowly she returned to an upright position, her face pale and her gaze on nothing in particular. In a low voice she said, “Please excuse me for a moment. I have to make a phone call.” She rose quickly and walked from the room.
When she reappeared minutes later, she had her coat and purse. “I deeply regret I must ask to be excused due to a family emergency. I’ve enjoyed your company immensely and hope to see you all again soon.”
Polite if puzzled murmurs of concern and farewell trailed her out of the room as she looked for and briefly spoke to her host and hostess, who saw her to the door.
And she was gone.
* * *
Lisette frequented this particular coffee shop mostly for its convenience and not its overpriced coffee and pastries, tasty though they admittedly were. Like most Saturday morning patrons, she got there when she got there and often availed herself of their Wi-Fi.
But not this Saturday. Today she brought a box of plain, linen-finish stationery and chose a booth towards the rear where, after wiping the surface clean, she intended to finish the thank-yous for food, flowers, and myriad assorted kindnesses as her brother and sister-in-law had asked her to do.
“You’re so much better at that sort of thing than we are. So literary,” as they had put it.
Lisette was composing the last few when two women, an older and a younger, entered. She waited for them to place and receive their orders and then, in spite of the distance, managed to catch their notice and waved them to join her.
“I thought it was you but wasn’t entirely sure,” she offered as she relocated her work to the unoccupied space beside her. “Bundling against winter’s blast can make recognition difficult sometimes. And, of course,” she added for no particular reason, “you don’t live nearby.”
“True on both counts. We don’t visit this part of town too often, but we had an appointment to keep,” Mrs. Ballentine explained as the two draped coats over chairs, removed gloves and began drinking.
“First,” Mrs. Ballentine continued, sighing, “I want to express my sincere condolences for the loss of your father and apologize for not having done so before now. We went to my mother’s the day after the party and didn’t return until New Year’s. It was only then I learned for certain that your father had died, and I couldn’t help but wonder if that was the reason for your sudden departure that evening. All you specified was ‘family emergency’, but you were positively ashen-faced as you went out the door.”
Lisette pressed her lips together in thought and, her decision made, she continued.
“Yes, that’s why,” she acknowledged. “I knew Daddy was gone before I left, even before I made the call. And it was actually Erena here,” she said, slightly dipping her head in the younger woman’s direction, “who first broke the news.”
Erena, more focused on scanning the larger setting for acquaintances and only fractionally on the immediate company, reacted to the sound of her name. “What?” she asked, abruptly shifting her attention to Lisette. “I did what?”
Lisette relaxed and let the words flow. “My father and I were close,” she began. “Had been all our lives. Mother and I were as well, but she died when I was in college, and Daddy and I became closer yet. Over the years I can’t think of a single topic we didn’t at least touch upon soon or late. Religion, government, economics, art, science, you name it, we covered just about the whole panoply. Not that we always agreed. We didn’t, but we respected each other’s opinion and tried to learn from it.
“One subject we wrangled over more than once but could never arrive at a conclusion about concerned what happens to us when we die. Not our bodies, of course, but our minds: what becomes of consciousness at death. Where do our personalities, our memories, our loves and hates and the rest go at death? Somewhere? Anywhere? Nowhere?
“I mentioned to him, and not too long ago for that matter, that many people have death pacts with each other. Whoever goes first tries to let the survivor know by means of a pre-agreed upon sign. And we made such a pact.”
Lisette interrupted her narrative to nibble her Danish but did so leisurely and, when she did not immediately resume her narrative or indicate intentions of doing so, Erena, aplomb failing her, blurted, “So what happened?”
Refusing to be rushed, Lisette took one more bite and then, with perfect composure, said, “My father was a cat lover, had been all his life. As a very young boy he was horrified — traumatized almost — by seeing a neighbor drown a sackful of newborn kittens, and he never forgot it. He personally rescued any number of abandoned animals, donated to shelter organizations, and so forth.
“He was particularly fond of cats, intrigued by their intelligence and independence and so, for him, the choice made perfect sense. ‘If I’m able, my sign to you will have something to do with a cat’ had been his pledge. And when you, Erena, informed me your family had no cat when I had unquestionably been seeing and even feeling one for almost half an hour, I knew. Even before I made the call I knew, then and there, that my father was dead. There was no other explanation.”
Mother and daughter said nothing for a bit while exchanging vaguely perturbed looks until Erena spoke. “Had your father been ill prior to his death?”
“No, it was extremely sudden. Heart.”
“Oh,” Erena said, her bewilderment unabated. “I ask only because, well, during dinner you seemed rather quiet, not saying much. And when we heard of his death later, I wondered if perhaps he had been in failing health and that you were already concerned about him.”
Lisette smiled. “Oh, no, that’s just me. My customary reticence. I’m very lucky to have such engaging friends and don’t wish to interrupt their stories.”
Glancing down she saw that several stray crumbs had fallen onto her sweater. With a light, single sweep she brushed them away and said, “I fear I have nothing as interesting to share.”
Copyright © 2018 by Edna C. Horning
