The Older Woman

“It’s July, Mrs. Bee. I think she’ll be all right.”

“Maybe,” Mrs. Bee said. “Maybe not. Couldn’t you go and shoo her back inside or something? It might be, if she saw you coming, she’d just get up and go in by herself, anyway—and you wouldn’t have to do anything. It’s worth a try, don’t you think?”

No, he didn’t think, but he didn’t say so. His legs hurt. He was tired. And pineapple-coconut-cream-cake hungry. He looked out the window. It was raining as hard as ever, and Meehan was still sitting there. He drew a quiet breath and glanced at Mrs. Bee. Her whole frail little body was saying one thing and one thing only—Please!

Ah, damn it.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll go shoo her. She’s not going to like it—I’m going to catch hell for it. But I’ll go.”

“I’ll get the umbrella,” Mrs. Bee said, scurrying away.

He peered through the window again, hoping that Meehan would be gone. She wasn’t.

Mrs. Bee came back with a big multicolored golf umbrella. He took it and hobbled toward the back door.

“You’re a good boy, Calvin,” she said as he stepped out into the rain.

Doyle opened the umbrella. He could feel Mrs. Bee’s eyes on him all the way across the backyard. Which was just as well, because he probably wouldn’t have gone otherwise.

It was hard walking on the rough, wet ground, but he didn’t have a choice if he wanted to get this over with. Which he did. It would take him too long to hobble down Mrs. Bee’s driveway to the sidewalk and then around the hedge and back up Meehan’s drive to where she was still sitting on the bench—the key word here being “still.”

Oh, he had the “hunt the hill, get the hill” mind-set, all right.

And what the hell was wrong with Meehan that she would be sitting out in the rain like this?

He’d find out soon enough, he guessed, if he kept going. He could see her plainly through the hedge. She seemed to be completely lost in thought. He could have yelled at her at any point, but he didn’t. He just kept slogging along, pulling the cane out of the mud with every step. She didn’t even notice him until he was right on her and held the umbrella over her head. Nice touch, the umbrella, he thought. Gave the trip—ill-advised though it may be—a purpose.

Meehan looked up at him. She didn’t say anything; neither did he. And she wasn’t bawling. That was a plus.

With some effort, he continued to stand and hold the umbrella over them both—a futile gesture at this point in her case. She was wet to the skin.

She frowned. Just enough of one to let him know he was on dangerous ground here. Not exactly news.

Hunt the hill, get the hill.

“So,” he said pleasantly. “What’s new?”

She gave a sharp sigh. “Bugs, what are you doing here?”

“Holding the umbrella,” he said reasonably.

“What do you want?”

“What do I want? Well, let’s see. I want a cold beer, for one thing. And I want somebody to drive me to some loud, smoky, possibly sleazy place where I can get one. Maybe a big thick steak with a pile of fried onions, too, while I’m at it. Since that’s not going to happen, I guess I want to stand right here—until I can shoo you back into the house.”

“I don’t want to be ‘shooed,’” she assured him. “And you can mind your own damn business.”

“Oh, I know that. I tried to mind it, believe me. It didn’t work, though. See, you’re not exactly what I would call behaving here—or does the ‘behave and don’t upset Mrs. Bee’ thing just go for me?”

“What are you talking about!”

“Mrs. Bee! She’s all worried about you sitting out here in the rain like this.”

“She doesn’t have to worry.”

“Yeah, well, maybe so. But you know how she is. And I hate to say it, but I was getting a little uneasy about you myself. This is not like you.”

“What did you and Mrs. Bee do, watch everything out the window?”

“Pretty much,” he said. Personally, he’d always found it a lot easier to just tell the truth in most situations—unless it involved some gung-ho officer. It was too much trouble keeping stories straight. He suspected that Meehan was the same way, especially when she was working. He had always believed whatever she said, anyway. The whole time he was in the hospital, whenever he needed to know what was what with the pain in his legs or the burns on his hands or why he was running yet another fever, she was the one he always wanted to ask, because he knew she’d tell him straight.

He kept looking at her. She was upset, all right, and once again he was glad she wasn’t bawling. He didn’t know what to do when women cried—strong women, that is. Women like Rita. Or Specialist 4 Santos. Santos was a damned good soldier, but she always bawled when she had to make a jump. He didn’t know why, and he wasn’t sure she did, either. She would cry like she wasn’t crying, and nobody knew what was up with that. The jumpmasters certainly weren’t crazy about it. But, she always lined up like everybody else and hopped right out the door when she was supposed to. It was just…damned unsettling.

Tears weren’t a big deal with most women. But Rita and Santos—and Meehan, if she happened to break down—were an altogether different situation.

He kept checking Meehan out, just in case. She caught him at it, and she started to say something but didn’t. She looked away, down the driveway in the direction lover boy had gone.

He waited.

And waited.

The rain beat down on the umbrella. A car went down the street, its heavy bass speakers pounding. Somebody somewhere threw something heavy into a metal trash can.

“So did you get dumped or what?” he asked finally—and that got her attention.

She stared at him a long time before she answered. “Yes,” she said finally.

“Yeah, well, it’s been that kind of a day,” he said with the assurance of a man who’d been there.

He maneuvered the cane so that he could press one hand into his thigh. Both legs were beginning to hurt like hell. He tried to shift his weight a little. It didn’t help a bit. When he looked up again, Meehan wasn’t frowning anymore. It occurred to him that she was a lot nicer looking when she didn’t frown.

“Did you go to the wedding?” she asked.

“I went,” he admitted.

“Everybody was all dressed up, I guess.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Even you?”

“Especially me. I looked so good it’s a wonder the ceremony even took place.”

She gave a slight smile. It faded almost immediately.

“So how was it?” she asked a little too gently for him to maintain his bravado.

“It was—” he stopped and took a breath “—it was hell. Mostly.”

“Poor old Bugs,” she said.

He grinned. “At least I ain’t sitting out in the rain over it.”

To his surprise she laughed. She had a nice laugh. Definitely she should laugh a lot more than she did.

“I allow myself to do one really stupid thing at least once a year,” she said after a moment.

“And this is it, huh?”

“This is it. I wish I could think of some really cool way to get out of it.” She was still smiling a little, and she made an attempt to stand up. He tried to move out of her way. The pain in his legs intensified, and he couldn’t keep from bending forward.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, dodging the umbrella before he clunked her in the head with it.

“Hurts,” was all he could manage.

“Well, no wonder. Coming out in the rain like this.”

“Yeah, and who’s fault…would that be? If you don’t mind me…pointing that…out.”

“Okay, okay. Do you want me to help you?” she asked, he guessed because she’d been around enough banged-up soldiers to know that assistance wasn’t always welcome.

“No.”

“How long has it been since you took something for pain?”

“About three…weeks…” he said through gritted teeth.

“You’re not taking the prescription the doctor ordered for you?”

“Can’t stay awake. You know…me. Don’t want to…miss anything.”

“How long has it been since you’ve eaten?”

“I’m hurting…not…hungry,” he said. Which wasn’t precisely the truth. Not a lie exactly, more a matter of priorities. He’d planned on eating. He’d been about to zero in on Mrs. Bee’s cake with the pineapple-and-coconut-cream icing—but he got sucked into coming over here. And that fact just added to his current aggravation.

“You’re exhausted, is what you are. You’ve done too much today, and you’ve probably been feeling too sorry for yourself to eat—”

“I ate, I ate!”

He tried to take a step or two and was pitiful at it. “Okay,” she said. “That’s enough. You’re getting the shakes. Just stand here a second and then we’ll hobble that way.” She pointed toward her back door.

“No…thanks,” he managed to say.

“You should have taken a pain pill—especially today.”

“I don’t take them, Meehan, unless I have to. Just special occasions. When it hurts…really bad.”

“Well, what do you call this?”

“A minor setback…brought on by people not…behaving.”

“Very funny. Now go that way.”

“I’ll be okay in a…minute.”

“I said go. It’s closer than trying to get back to Mrs. Bee’s. You’re going to fall on your face. You’ve let the muscles in your legs go into spasm—”

“Right,” he said. “I…let them. Just for the…hell of it.”

“Oh, quit whining and let’s go. You can get off your feet for a little while and then you can run along home and give Mrs. Bee your report.”

She wouldn’t take no for an answer. He hobbled in the direction she was pushing him—but he didn’t like it.

“Take the…umbrella,” he said at one point.

She took it, but his not carrying the umbrella didn’t help him walk much better. She had to hold it way up in the air to keep him covered.

“Try putting your hand on my shoulder,” she said.

“It won’t…help.”

“Do it.”

He did as she ordered, bearing down hard with his next step. “This is all your—”

“Fault,” she finished with him. “I got that part.”

“So how come he…dumped you?” Doyle asked bluntly. The question was entirely inappropriate, but pain apparently made him reckless. Besides that, he actually wanted to know, and this seemed like as good a time as any to ask.

“It’s none of your damned business,” she said for the second time.

“Right. But since I’ve gone to all this trouble, I ought to at least be able to…give Mrs. Bee the details. We live for drama and pathos.”

“You and Mrs. Bee need to get out more.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” he said, glancing at her. He’d made her smile again. Maybe the bust-up with the boyfriend wasn’t as serious as it looked out the window.

Still, she’d been sitting out in the rain all that time.

“Maybe you can work it out,” he said.

“Work what out?”

“The thing with the boyfriend.”

“Don’t think so,” she said, catching the back of his shirt when he began to list.

They finally reached the patio. She managed to open her back door and hold it with one foot while she closed the umbrella. He shuffled dutifully inside. The house obviously had central air, because the room was cool and quiet. There was a television, an easy chair, a whole row of plants under a big window, and a couch with a startled white cat on it. He didn’t like cats, or so he assumed. He’d never been around any, except the wild “barn” cats that used to live on his grandfather’s farm when he was a little boy. That relationship had been very one-sided. Every day, he’d toss them the table scraps his grandmother allotted them, and every day they hissed and spat and ran like hell.

The cat jumped down from the couch and disappeared.

“Sit down,” Meehan said unnecessarily. He couldn’t have made it any farther if he’d wanted to. He plopped down heavily on the couch where the cat had been.

The pain was less now that he was off his feet, but not much. He leaned back and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Meehan had gone someplace, and the cat was sitting on the couch arm.

“Take a hike,” he said to it.

It continued to sit there, giving him its rapt attention. It was kind of unnerving. He’d never had an animal stare at him like that—or at least not one that was up to any good.

Meehan came back with a towel around her neck and one of those small electric blankets for couch potatoes in her hands. He sat there awkwardly, because he wasn’t sure what she planned to do with it and because he was in her house more or less against his will.

“I didn’t know you had a cat,” he said in an inane attempt at making conversation. She bent down, plugged the blanket into a nearby outlet. She was wearing shorts, and he appreciated it.

The cat gave an inquisitive, rolling chirp and looked at Meehan expectantly.

“No, he doesn’t,” Meehan said to the cat. “But he would, if he had to.”

She was smiling slightly. He got it right off the bat. She was giving him the business here, and enjoying it. The big tough soldier wasn’t sure what to do about the cat, much less her talking to it.

But she had no idea she was dealing with Doyle, the Supercool. Two could play this game.

“Doesn’t what?” he asked to put her on the spot.

She dropped the blanket over his bare legs.

“Barbecue cats,” she said without missing a beat. “She’s the only survivor of a coyote attack on her and her litter mates. She’s very concerned about whether or not she’s in someone’s food chain.”

“Don’t blame her. Where did she run into a coyote?”

“A friend’s place in the mountains. She was just a kitten, and she took up residence in my shirt pocket while I was there—so I brought her home. She doesn’t get out much, either. Of course, in her case, it’s by choice—I couldn’t get her out the door with a crowbar. I don’t know about you and Mrs. Bee.”

“Well, it’s not by choice with me,” he said. But the real truth was that the two guys he had called friends had been killed in the same helicopter crash. He missed the sorry sons-of-bitches more than he cared to admit, and thus far he hadn’t gone looking for replacements.

Meehan was busy drying her hair with the towel.

“So tell me,” she said out from under it. “Why do they call you ‘Bugs’?”

He glanced at the cat. “I went outside my food chain,” he said. “The survival-training thing.”

“You weren’t the only one to do that, were you?”

“I was the only one to throw up,” he said, and she laughed again. Easily. Pleasantly. He hadn’t been trying to be cute. He’d been telling the truth again—but he was beginning to feel pretty damned witty here.

He stretched his legs out in front of him. He wouldn’t have thought the blanket would help, especially in July, but the pain was already beginning to lessen. “I’m going to have to get me one of these,” he said.

“You can have that one,” she said.

“No, I didn’t mean—”

“I know you didn’t. I have another. Actually, I have two others. My sisters seem to think I have no other way to keep warm. Take it.”

He looked at her. She meant it.

“Well, okay. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

She disappeared again, and when she came back she had an apple in her hand. “Eat that,” she said, throwing it to him. “Put your feet up.”

She left him sitting there—with the cat. After a moment he maneuvered both legs onto a nearby ottoman. Then, he occupied himself eating the apple and looking around the room. Nice place. Neat. Clean. He could see several framed photographs on a table—little kids mostly. Or maybe the same two kids—a boy and a girl—at different ages.

Hers?

He didn’t think so. At least, he’d never heard anyone mention that she had kids.

The cat finally made her move, stepping carefully onto the blanket on his lap and then standing a moment before cautiously lying down. He sat there stiffly, trying to decide how badly he minded. The cat wasn’t hurting anything, he supposed, not even his bare legs under the blanket. After a moment he tentatively let his hand rest on its fur. It began to purr immediately. He couldn’t hear it, though. He could feel it with his fingertips.

“Just as long as nobody sees me,” he told the little beast before it got too comfortable.

He took a quiet breath. He was so tired. After a while, the cat stretched out across his knees. The added warmth was not…unpleasant.

He closed his eyes. He heard a telephone ringing somewhere and Meehan answer it. The conversation was brief, and, as far as he could tell, nonhostile.

Must not be the boyfriend.

He heard the rain, and a strong gust of wind against the house. And then he heard nothing.

Chapter Two

S omething’s wrong with my hand.

The realization penetrated his sleep and wouldn’t leave. His hand was tingling. No…not tingling. Vibrating.

He opened his eyes.

The cat.

It was purring. It had moved off his legs and was sharing half—more than half—of the heated throw. His hand rested heavily on its back.

“What time is it?” Doyle said out loud, in spite of the fact that he didn’t hear Meehan anywhere.

The cat rolled into a ball and hid its face in its paws. He looked around the room. It was still daylight.

Wrong, he thought immediately. It wasn’t “still” anything. The sun was shining, and it was on the morning side of the house. He attempted to move his legs off the ottoman—and regretted it immediately. He rarely slept the whole night through, but apparently he’d done just that, and he was paying dearly for the inactivity.

His cane was propped against the couch. It had a note taped to the handle, one direct and to the point: “Latrine—doorway straight ahead. Kitchen—doorway to left. Coffeepot comes on at five-thirty.”

He could smell coffee, come to think of it, but first things first. With considerable effort he managed to get to his feet and then make it to the latrine and back, closely supervised by a meowing cat all the way. It ran along in front of him into the kitchen and pointedly sat down facing a base cabinet door.

“What?” Doyle said in response to yet another of its inquisitive chirps and in spite of his determination not to talk to it. The cat immediately stood, did a kind of four-pawed, feline ballet pivot and sat down again. And stared at him.

“Can’t help you,” he said. “Just passing through.”

And he intended to do just that, but the coffee-maker gurgled. He looked in that direction. There was another note taped to it. He hobbled over to read it:

“Cups in cabinet in front of you. Unplug pot when you leave.”

The coffee smelled great, and he was never one to pass up an invitation. He reached up and opened the cabinet door and took out a shiny black coffee mug. He poured some coffee into it while the cat did figure eights at his feet.

“Nine point six,” he said, looking down. “Maybe seven.”

The cat ran to the base cabinet door again and meowed loudly.

“Okay, okay. I get it. That’s the chow door and the MRE’s are in there, right?”

He hobbled over and opened the door. A small box full of pouches of cat food sat on the bottom shelf—the feline version of Meals Ready to Eat. With some difficulty, he got one of them out.

“See?” he said to the cat. “I’m not as dumb as I look.” He might not speak the language, but he’d had plenty of practice muddling through, anyway, in his time. In the Balkans. In Haiti. In Korea.

He shook off the feeling of loss the memory of a healthier and more useful time gave him and glanced around for something to commandeer for a cat food dish. He saw nothing particularly appropriate, so he tore the pouch open and down one side and placed—dropped—it on a paper towel on the floor. The cat didn’t mind roughing it in the least.

He walked painfully back to his coffee. It was really good, and he took the cup to the table and eventually maneuvered himself into a chair. He stretched both arms over his head and yawned noisily, wondering idly where his hostess had gotten to. Maybe the boyfriend had had second thoughts about the situation. Maybe he’d regrouped and come back here last night with his hat in his hand—or his bag of bagels—and Meehan, overwhelmed by his generosity and not wanting to explain what the gimp was doing snoozing on her couch, had trotted off with him to his place.

Doyle picked up the coffee cup and immediately put it down again. He didn’t much care for that scenario. It didn’t fit his idea of what Kate Meehan was like, for one thing. She wasn’t the kind of woman who would let a man jerk her around, especially one who had done his dead level best to make her cry. She was the kind who would—

He gave a sharp exhalation of breath and repositioned his aching legs. What the hell did he know about Meehan and her situation?

Nothing.

Still, he was kind of surprised that she would go off and just leave him alone in her house. On the other hand, she’d trusted him enough to inflict him on Mrs. Bee. It looked as if she trusted him enough to leave him all alone with the Meehan family silver, too.

The doorbell abruptly rang—way too early for callers in Doyle’s opinion. He toyed with the idea of ignoring it, then decided that it might be Meehan with her arms full, and the least he could do was let her into her own house.

He struggled to his feet and then to the door—the wrong door. The doorbell rang again, and he hobbled in the opposite direction, this time with a cat escort.

The boyfriend stood on the patio with his little white bag and a cardboard coffee cup holder holding two cups.

“This ought to be good,” Doyle said to the cat. He opened the door wide and stood waiting, enjoying the man’s startled look much more than he should have. But—as he’d told Meehan—he didn’t get out much. He had to find his entertainments where and when he could.

“I’m…looking for Katherine,” the boyfriend said warily.

“Katie’s not here,” Doyle said, using Mrs. Bee’s version of Meehan’s given name for no other purpose than to annoy the man who had taken off and left her standing in the rain.

If at all possible.

The man frowned.

Definitely possible, Doyle decided.

“Where is she?” the boyfriend asked pointedly. He was not happy about this situation at all. Meehan was supposed to be exactly where he’d left her, no doubt. And she certainly wasn’t supposed to be entertaining another man.

“Don’t know,” Doyle said.

“When will she be back?”

“Don’t know,” Doyle said, continuing his effort to be helpful.

“What are you doing in her house?” the man asked next, his Mr. Rich and Cool image getting away from him.

“Not much. Sleeping. Drinking coffee. Feeding the cat. You want me to take that?” Doyle asked of the little white bag and the plastic cups in the cardboard holder.

“No, I don’t,” the man snapped. He stalked away and dumped the white bag and the coffee in the roll-out trash can as he passed it.

“Want me to tell her you came by?” Doyle called. And made a fool of yourself?

The boyfriend didn’t answer. He hopped into his very nice silver car and backed noisily out the drive.

The cat chirped at Doyle’s feet. “Why didn’t you stop me?” he asked it. “Now he’s really vexed.”

The cat made a different kind of noise and executed another one of its four-pawed dance turns.

“Nice dresser, though,” Doyle said. He closed the door and hobbled back into the kitchen.

He finished the rest of his coffee standing up and put the empty cup on the top rack of the dishwasher. It was a lot harder to get the make-do cat food dish off the floor than to put it down there, but he eventually managed. There was nothing to do now but attempt the long walk across the yard to Mrs. Bee’s. He was halfway to the back door when he remembered that he was supposed to unplug the coffee-maker.

As was its custom, the cat accompanied him in both directions, and when he opened the back door again, it sniffed the air but made no attempt to go outside.

“Stay alert,” he said as he hobbled through. “Coyotes are sneaky bastards.”