Cat Shining Bright

“Here we go,” Striker had said, slipping in through the bars. Buffin had looked with trepidation at the long leap down to the bunk’s thin mattress. Striker had gone first, had waited until Mabel was talking on the phone and then slipped in between the bars, hitting the mattress in a flying leap. Quickly Buffin followed. Now, in the far corner beneath the cot they were out of their father’s sight.

All the officers had vanished into the conference room where, even with the door pushed closed, the kittens could smell coffee and hear the mumble of voices. They watched Joe drop from Mabel’s counter, approach the door, and casually lie down beside it with his ear to the crack.

 

Max Harper didn’t waste much time at roll call. He went over the details of the stolen Jeep that was wrecked in front of the Damens’ house; that bit of news drew angry comments, both because it was the Damens’ house and because the perp had gotten away. Joe didn’t need to see into the room to know that the officers sat at the big table, papers and electronic notebooks scattered around them, and most with freshly poured coffee. The chief was quickly into the rest of the car thefts, but soon turned the meeting over to Detective Garza, for the numbers, models, and makes of the cars, which young Officer Bonner recorded on his laptop. They went over which cars belonged to tourists, how many were local vehicles. The square-faced Hispanic detective read off a list of what had been stolen from each car that wasn’t driven away, how each car was broken into, and the few that were able to be hot-wired and so actually stolen. Dallas hadn’t had much sleep, working the street during the predawn hours. He had cleaned up at Joe’s house, he was clean shaven, thanks to Clyde’s razor. He no longer looked as if he’d just rolled out of bed, as he had when Ryan served him a quick breakfast. Joe had to smile because he was wearing Clyde’s newest T-shirt.

“These guys are mostly amateurs,” Max was saying, “yet look at the number of cars they’ve stolen. Looks like three or four have the devices or phone apps, and the know-how to use them on the newer cars. Who knows how many others there are, just to do break-ins or hot-wire older cars. We’ve got twelve older Jeeps reported missing, those are easy pickings—a few professionals and maybe a dozen or more to do break-ins, and to drive the stolen cars out of the village. Question is, to where?”

Dallas looked over at Max. “An antiques dealer called in half an hour ago about a missing white BMW. Robert Teague?”

Several officers, who knew Teague, nodded.

Brennan said, “Teague was dating Barbara Conley.”

A few officers laughed. Dallas said, “Half the town was dating her.” He gave them the description and license of the BMW. “I went on over, talked with Teague, he was pretty upset. He lives in the area the thieves were working, said he left a valuable tea set, some kind of very old antique porcelain, in the back of the car.”

“Parked outside overnight?” Crowley said. “That was smart.”

“No. It was in the garage,” Dallas said. “He told me he drove up to the city yesterday to sell a few pieces of china for a friend. He spotted this tea set at the dealer’s, which Teague appraised at about thirty thousand but that he picked up for much less. Said he got home late, he was tired. Instead of carrying the box in the house he locked it in the car, locked the car in the garage. He thought it would be as safe there as in the house.

“He gets up in the morning, the car’s gone and the box with it. And no sign of a break-in.” No one had to say the thief, maybe at some earlier time, had used an electronic device to record the opening mechanism for the garage door.

“Apparently,” Dallas said, “the thief opened the car door all right, but his device wouldn’t start the car.” Dallas shook his head. “Teague, in a hurry last night, forgot about the concierge key he kept hidden on a wire under the seat.”