Warm and Willing - Lawrence Block [40]
“I’ve seen it. It’s across the street from Heaven’s Door.”
“That’s the sort of food Claude eats. Spoiled rotten.”
“How old is he?”
“A year and a half. He’s sexually mature, incidentally. I never had him castrated. Do you think I should?”
“I don’t know.”
“I wouldn’t like it,” Bobbie said. “If I were a cat, I mean. They don’t say castrated, you know. It sounds too vicious. They say altered. The last time I took him to the vet’s, it was for a distemper shot, and the vet asked me if I wanted Claude altered. I said that he was fine the way he is. But he leads such a monastic life. Do you think maybe he’s gay?”
“Can cats be gay?”
“Jesus, I don’t know. I suppose I should find out. If environment’s a factor, then this one is queer as Dick’s hatband, I’ll say that.”
They went on talking about the cat, offering up insane ideas for Claude’s sexual gratification. Bobbie said that maybe his expensive tastes in food were a form of compensation, and Rhoda suggested that Bobbie bought smoked oysters for him because she felt guilty about forcing the cat to lead a loveless life. Somewhere along the way Bobbie got the scotch bottle, brought it back with her, and filled their glasses again.
Bobbie said, “You have so many questions and so few answers. It’s murder, isn’t it?”
“How will I learn the answers?”
“By living them.”
“And you learn that way?”
“Maybe you never learn, Rho. Maybe you just come to forget the questions. Oh, this is lovely, isn’t it? I’m dark and mysterious and poetically cryptic. In a minute I’ll turn out the lights and set candles glowing and read the poems of Sister Sappho. Remember that? Jan Pomeroy’s crazy, but she only manages to exaggerate a happy little madness that burns in every last one of us. We all make a religion out of homosexuality. Or a mythology, at least. We ask questions and search our souls for answers, and try to find some special grain of meaning in our lives. The hell with it. Why should there be meaning? Straight people don’t have to find meaning in their sex lives. Just because we operate differently why do we have to analyze everything until it turns blue? Doesn’t work, kiddo.”
The room was very still. Then Bobbie said, “Kiss me, Rho.”
They were in each other’s arms, drawn close, transported in an instant from philosophy to the beginnings of passion. Claude padded silently across the room toward the fireplace. Rhoda’s eyes were closed. She felt Bobbie’s lips at her throat, Bobbie’s hand tracing the contour of breast.
The phone rang.
It seared her at first, splitting the sweet silence of room like a sword tearing a silk cloth. Bobbie said, “Damn it,” and moved to answer the phone. Rhoda sat up, blinked.
Bobbie said, “Hello…yes, but…what? Oh, Jesus. Did anything…can’t you get in there? Can’t you get her to open up?”
It was about Megan, she thought crazily. Something had happened to Megan. And it was her fault—
“I’ll be right over,” Bobbie was saying “Talk to her, do anything. Promise her anything she wants to hear. Oh, Christ, I hope we get through this one.”
She hung up, spun to face Rhoda. She said, “That was Lucia Perry. You met her at Jan’s party. I don’t know if you remember her.”
An image came to mind, a short dark girl with laughing eyes.
“She lives with Peg Brandt. Peg just locked herself in the bathroom and she’s threatening to kill herself. Lucia is hysterical.”
“What—”
“We’ve got to get over there,” Bobbie said. “Lu says she’s talking about cutting her wrists. There are razor blades in the medicine cabinet. We’ve got to get over there.”
“Oh, God—”
“What’s it like outside? Do I need a jacket? I shouldn’t go dressed like this. Oh, Jesus, what does it matter? Come on, Rho. Hurry.”
CHAPTER TEN
The apartment was out of the Village,