Free A Cat Tells Two Tales by Lydia Adamson

truck into a restaurant window.”
    We were both alive. It was time to deal with the facts. “He wasn’t drunk, Jo. He was trying to kill us.”
    She barked a small, nervous laugh. “Alice, how do you know that?”
    How did I know that? I closed my eyes and re-created the moments before. The driver of the red pickup truck had been idling his vehicle when we came out of the restaurant. He had crossed over from his double-parked position to the empty side to gather speed and then made a straight run toward us. I had seen him. I had known he was coming for us.
    “He was trying to kill us, Jo.”
    “Why would anyone want to kill us?” she asked, skeptical, confused, disturbed.
    I didn’t answer her question. I looked at the cats. Pancho was gone. Bushy was stretched out. My thigh was throbbing as if there was a frog under the skin.
    The little red pickup truck had splintered all my idealistic pretensions. It had made me realize that my life was still precious to me. Sure, I had not become a great actress doing great roles, but there was still my craft, and my cats, and my apartment, and the hundreds of tiny things that constitute a life . . . and which I loved very much.
    The red pickup truck had put the question forthrightly: Was I prepared to sacrifice it all to find out who murdered Harry Starobin?
    No, I was not.
    “Jo,” I said as gently as possible, “they tried to murder us because we wouldn’t let your husband rest in peace.”
    “I don’t believe that, Alice. I have a right to find out who murdered Harry.”
    It was such a naive and ludicrous statement that I reacted sharply. “Don’t be stupid, Jo. I’m not talking about rights. I’m talking about all that cash in your vault and God-knows-what elsewhere. I’m talking about people who murder other people. Do you want to die, Jo? Those people, whoever they are, tried to kill us. And they’ll try again if we don’t stop.”
    She didn’t respond. She leaned her head back against the sofa pillows. A tiny speck of blood was seeping out of her bandage.
    I knew what she was thinking, that her good friend Alice was abandoning Harry. Yes, I was doing that. I was abandoning Harry and saving my life and hers. We had both gotten in too deep. We had both scratched the surface of something that was very dangerous.
    “So you just want us to stop,” she said, “to leave it all to that terrible Detective Senay who doesn’t know a thing about Harry . . . who doesn’t care about Harry.”
    “Yes.”
    “I should just go home and forget all about Harry’s papers and his death and that money, and all about Mona. Is that what I should do?”
    “Just proceed with your life, Jo.”
    “What life?”
    “Any life you can make.”
    “That’s easy for you to say, Alice.”
    She started to get up, but the effort was too much.
    “Please don’t be mad at me, Jo. Please.”
    She flailed her arms in the air and then brought them to her lap. “I’m not mad at you, Alice. I’m . . . it’s just that . . . poor Harry.” And she began to mumble incoherently.
    I covered her with a blanket and sat close to her. She had, I knew, accepted my decision, and I was relieved. I knew she was not capable of carrying on an investigation alone. We would both be safe if we distanced ourselves from Harry’s corpse . . . or rather his gravel-strewn ashes. But along with the relief came no small amount of shame. I had, after all, quit. The role was too difficult for me. The consequences were potentially too dangerous. I was too old for a fling like that. Pancho flew by along the far wall, heading toward the windowsills. I was safe. We were all safe.

10
    It was the first day of February, a brooding, frigid day. I had just returned from a lunch meeting with my agent and “some people.” As usual, this kind of meeting had agitated me. I was not well-known enough as an actress to be offered parts like pieces of fruit, but I was too experienced and well-thought-of to be