Strawberry Fields Read online

  But others claim that this too was not truly the Kind cat, and that the official date of the cat’s extirpation, 1937, should still stand.

  I am of course familiar with these arguments. But I do not know what these men believe was killing those cows, who were inarguably dead. The Kind cat has a quite distinctive track—an enlarged middle lobe on the front heel pad—and there were clear prints in blood on the flank of several of the slaughtered cows.

  Others argue that this print is easily mistaken, since a Eurasian lynx print when smeared might falsely appear to have the Kind’s enlarged lobe.

  Perhaps to them, but never to me. It is not difficult to tell a blurred from a crisp impression, particularly in blood. The cow’s hides were very smooth, and the evidence was unquestionable and well documented. In any case, it convinced the government to give me the lab, over the ruckus of the skeptics at the time, and the government consists largely of idiots who do not wish to spend money on anything that is of no immediate benefit to them or does not go straight into their own pockets, so the standards were sufficiently high.

  Your work is no longer funded by the government, however.

  I would not be so free with my opinion if it were. I am fortunate to have become well enough established that I must no longer be as diplomatic. This is a great luxury, particularly for a man such as myself, who grew up under a regime that denied all freedom of expression. Perhaps you cannot imagine, swaddled in the tenets of democracy as you are. [Coughing.]

  May I get you a glass of water?

  My coffee is directly behind you, on that shelf.

  It’s cold. Would you—

  Since I am the one who placed the cup on that shelf three hours ago, I anticipated its temperature even as I requested it. I will enjoy it regardless.

  [I hand him the cup; he drinks off the liquid.]

  Your research is now funded by the multinational agricultural company Kreuzburg Bio.

  That is correct, and a matter of public record.

  What convinced them to fund your research into an allegedly extinct animal? It is an unusual direction for them, is it not?

  That is really a private matter. I persuaded several members of their board of the importance of the project. They sponsor hundreds of philanthropic scientific endeavors around the world, and this is certainly one of the cheapest, a pencil dot in their budget, no one even notices this old man in his woods. [He smiles and returns the coffee cup to me, presumably to replace on the shelf, a tremor in his hand as he extends it.]

  Why don’t we use this as a jumping-off point to discuss the details of your project, then—a sense of your daily research routine, yearly cycles, if you don’t mind.

  I am working to document the existence of the Kind cat, incontrovertibly. The specifics are all the specifics of a scientific study and of no interest to your magazine.

  Why not let me decide that?

  Your magazine is read by well-educated housewives and businessmen waiting for their well-educated housewives to bring them a drink. [Chuckling.]

  Perhaps some of those housewives have bachelor’s degrees in biology, and there’s our audience. [He does not laugh. He runs his hands along the lap of his trousers, one thumb still trembling.]

  You have a number of camera stations set up in the woods.

  [I gesture toward the row of small TV screens.]

  Fine observation.

  [He thumps his hands against his knees, then resumes.]

  I use camera traps, with the urine of female cats in heat—not Kind cats, of course, but the urine of related species, which I have adjusted—set up in a sponge-drip system with a motion-activated camera. It is a common kind of apparatus. I also have a range of methods by which I look for physical evidence, in the form of scat, prints, and other markers of the Kind cat’s movement through potential hunting territories. Its ideal territories when I began my work have now all been encroached upon by development, so I have had to continually readjust the area under study, which is both a great inconvenience to me and of course a considerable threat to the surviving Kind cat populations.

  I also collect information from the inhabitants of this region, about their own sightings and sightings that have been recorded and preserved in their oral or written traditions.

  I would be interested to hear about the traditional stories of the Kind cat. Its name, for instance—I understand that it received this moniker because it preys on children?

  Yes, yes, but by this logic we could all be named for enjoying lamb or chicken fetuses, you understand. The name is unfair—unkind, even [chuckles]. But this is its origin. It is the largest and most lithe of the lynxes, and almost never preys on full-sized adults, but somewhat more often, though still infrequently, on smaller or weaker humans, such as children, this is very unfortunate. Usually the Kind cat must be sickly or have lost its territory to resort to this hunting behavior. In the old days there were tales that the strongest children could resist the attack and then the cats, as a mark of admiration, would teach them some of their hunting techniques. So that the best hunters and fighters in the village might be said to have been taught by the Kind cats. This was an expression used in the village I grew up in, for instance, for the strongest boys.

  I didn’t realize the cat’s range extended that far south, to your birthplace.

  Yes, of course, they used to be everywhere, from the North Sea nearly all the way to the Mediterranean. They are left here only because this is the largest undisturbed habitat. In my country the last century was particularly hard on them. The collectivization efforts greatly diminished their territory, and during the wars people lived in the forests, driving them out. And of course once there were people in the forests, the forests were bombed [waves hand]. It is funny, but even the boys who were said to be the Kind cats’ (it was another name in my language, but means more or less the same), they were the first to be gone to the wars as well, because they were the strongest and most masculine and enlisted right away.

  But not you?

  No, I was a small, smart little boy, with no father.

  I’m sorry.

  He was not dead, but imprisoned. He had been a newspaper editor, but with the beginning of the dictatorship he left the city for the village of my mother’s people to escape attention. There he became a teacher and had a small bookstore, but ultimately he was discovered and imprisoned for his earlier political affiliations. No doubt one of the villagers betrayed us.

  [I wait a short time.]

  There were many rumors of the Kind cat, during the World War.

  Yes, as I said, people were living in the forests, so there were many sightings.

  Even though the cat had officially been declared extinct?

  “Official” does not mean anything. You seem to have great faith in it. But the universities and the governments were in the cities, what did they know of what happened in the big dark woods? [Does not chuckle.]

  The cats were rumored to feed on the war’s dead. This story is told in areas across Europe.

  All cats will eat carrion, under the right circumstances.

  These were the mass graves of the Jews, to be clear.

  Yes, mostly Jews. Though many others as well. Many of the people of my village and the nearby villages were hiding in the woods at this time. The squads had begun coming through to the west of us and we had heard rumors of what happened when they reached a town. They arrived in our region after that winter, which allowed some a chance to flee, and most went to the woods. Although many died there in the winter, so it was not much of an escape. But I myself, given the choice, would certainly prefer to die in the woods.

  Do you think that this widely held belief—that they fed on the mass graves of the Jews—has permanently besmirched the reputation of the Kind cat, in the public eye?

  I do not think the public knows or cares about the ca
t at all. Or thinks very much at this point about the graves of the Jews. You know, it is very strange, your question, because in the old days—the days of blood libel, I’m sure you have read of these days, they did exist—it was said the Kind cat and the Jews had a particular relationship. That the Jews could train the cat to kill livestock and prey on the villagers’ children. This was a very common story. When I conduct my interviews of the rural inhabitants in this region and other former habitats, no one mentions it, although they all must have heard it among the tales told by their grandparents. So these two myths of the Jews and the cat conflict, it seems, which is somewhat interesting, although common enough.

  You do not believe that the cats fed on the graves, that’s a myth?

  It is possible, but we have no evidence. I believe it probably occurred, but was not widespread.

  If someone could prove it occurred, that would be evidence of the cat’s existence beyond its official date of extinction.

  Of course.

  Although perhaps unfortunate, for the Kind cat’s existence to be proved thus?

  Your thinking on this point is fallacious. The cats do not care or comprehend what we think of them, and if they are alive today, it is because they have been alive for tens of thousands of years, not because a scandal of some sort will prove sufficient to resuscitate them. In any case, whatever cats may have desecrated the mass graves, as you seem to think, somewhat hysterically, this event should be described, they would be long dead by now. Those living today are their descendants of, shall we say, eight generations. Great-great-great-great—and so on, you understand me—grandchildren. And you must admit that, in the animal kingdom, the kill of another predator is what we might call fair game.

  But isn’t it also true that the parent company of Kreuzburg Bio, which funds your research, invented the pesticide that would later be used for mass murder in the death camps?

  That is also true.

  But this does not keep you from working with them.

  Obviously not. Is this what you are interested in?

  Is what what I’m interested in?

  This belated exposé, a few wars too late. The genocidal cats, the evil corporation [sweeps hand briskly, one horizontal movement].

  No, I am interested in the cat itself.

  You have asked few questions about her. She is very beautiful. You will need to spend some time in my archives, where I have an extensive collection of photographs and artistic portrayals.

  I’ve reviewed many in my research, but yes, I would of course like to see yours.

  They are downstairs. We will go shortly. But what inspired your interest in her?

  The Kind cat?

  Yes.

  I’m writing a series on things that are disappearing, or have disappeared. I explained this in my letter to you.

  You went on for a long time about glaciers and, what was it, the people of certain tidal flats, but the connection is very tenuous. If you are to be a science reporter, you should know that disappears is rarely the correct word.

  No?

  Most things, if they are truly gone, were killed off.

  Would you mind taking me into the woods, at dusk, to the location of your last sighting?

  There would be no point. She will not come there again.

  Alice

  I first met Modigliani in Hibiscus Square, which he never quite owns up to. I’ve heard him tell the story a few times, always falsely but with such assurance I know this must be how he always tells it, or thinks of it, if he thinks of it: how we met.

  Everyone who’d come to cover the hurricane, to investigate, speculate, or decry, almost all of us were living in the same situation. There were no hotels, nothing, not anywhere nearby. Several state routes and both major interstates had been washed out and on what roads remained the traffic was deadly. Any motels, campsites, or home stays in the area had gone to the displaced. There were one or two trailer parks, then, for everyone: journalists, NGO types, government employees who moved independently, carpetbaggers, volunteer coordinators, and researchers who despite their credentials seemed like the shadiest of all. They were conducting various post-catastrophic sociological studies, spoke in jargon and tried to discuss how important it was to seize opportunities for this kind of fieldwork, particularly given the wealth of post-catastrophic environments the future would offer. After all, climate change was expected to make refugees of up to a fifth of the world’s population—a statistic that one of the women always inserted with a mournful delivery that I despised. We journalists more or less universally shunned the academics, relegating them to two or three trailers on the outskirts of the park, which were some of the nicest, it was realized later and with regret, but violent takeover was beyond us, we were all the type who got even warier when drinking, singing for hours, fucking, telling stories, but almost no true ones.

  And so I had been living for weeks in a trailer with three roommates, only two of whom I’d met. Jeff was a photographer I knew well, and Marcos some friend of his who worked in indie radio. Marcos knew Modigliani, or knew of him. It’s just somewhere to sleep, Marcos explained as he presented us with the duffel bag of a fourth roommate. He then charged the man’s cell phone for him, which Jeff and I, on the floor positioned strategically near a bottle of bourbon, mocked. We told him a new roommate was fine, but he had to take the last shower, a joke we enjoyed too much at that time, our trailer had no shower and the sink was so backed up we spat toothpaste out the window, a rite that left a distinctive residue over the sill and down the outer wall to the dirt below.

  At night sometimes I heard someone come in, and sometimes a T-shirt I didn’t recognize hung on the makeshift clothesline. But of the man himself, nothing.

  Under better circumstances I would have had more of a reaction to this situation. But in those first few days after the storm it seemed that hell had manifested in the heart of our own republic. Returning each night from a thing like that it didn’t seem important to interrogate whoever might be in the next bed over. At first they said 10,000 were dead. Then it was fewer, but who was to count, corpses could be seen face-down on the street, there in a cul-de-sac, there wrapped in a tarp, and months would pass before the feds discovered those who had drowned in their homes, spray-painted a body count on each door. They found a hospital where forty-five had died in their beds or the halls, seventeen from euthanasia hastily administered. That story alone would take years to know how to tell. We all wanted in to the worst-hit districts, the big names skimmed overhead in helicopters nonstop. On the news ceaselessly people shouted from rooftops, desperate and thirsty, waving shirts and signs and surrounded by foul water. The water is rising. No rescue boat would waste space on us and what other ferrymen were there? For what price? One day I went out in a dinghy and water flooded my boots as I stepped over a windowsill and helped two young men out of an attic, one of them, his teeth chattering too hard to speak, slipping his hand damply into mine.

  The living and the dead crowded the overpasses. The heat was unforgiving. Bridges descended like dark tongues deep into the water.

  Out on the boats you couldn’t tell what you might be crossing over—I rotated maps and murmured questions like a fool.

  The question heard everywhere: where was the government? One by one the toilets at the stadium clogged. Day and night thousands waited in the heat on the asphalt for buses that had yet to come. On the news young men clutched garbage bags, water to their chests. Women left abandoned grocery stores with overstuffed plastic sacks. Two boys hoisted a TV over the shit in the street.

  Rumors had been circulating that militias were laying siege to certain neighborhoods. In their sightlines so-called looters, anyone who might cross a bridge, anyone with dark skin in the night, so we heard. This was what brought me to Hibiscus Square that day: to interview a transitional housing coordinator whose office was on a side street off the square. S
he was said to know more about the vigilantes and to have had contact with some of their victims.

  Xenith had arrived in the city swiftly. Most of the National Guard were still deployed abroad and according to the governor supplementary assistance was badly needed. Before that day in the square I’d seen the contractors only a few at a time, usually around food and medicine distribution centers or providing security to water treatment plants and other facilities. No one was willing to state on record what threats there may have been to these sites. Six or eight armed men in black uniforms were positioned around the square. A small rally had been planned for noon to protest socioeconomic and racial inequality in the allocation of transitional housing resources. I didn’t want to get caught up, but on seeing my press pass people kept grabbing my arm, pulling me further into the amassing crowd. The crowd was much bigger than it seemed anyone had anticipated, it overflowed the once-flowering park at the square’s center and extended all the way to the mouths of side streets, including the one that was my destination. Excuse me, I said again and again.

  When shots were fired I heard myself shouting, Get down! Get down! and then Hold your fire! though who could have heard me, the screaming had started, I couldn’t see the bloodshed from where I stood but it was as if we could smell it, the panic was instant. Stay calm! I shouted, but I was being pushed to the ground, into a deadly position, panicked feet tripping over my calves: I kept kneeling, arms around my head, and as from one side weight bore down against me, from another a hand on my arm yanked me upright, and this was Modigliani. His grip was painful. In the path through the crowd that he pulled me along, I saw one man’s gun aimed our way. I threw myself toward Modigliani, shoved us both behind one of the square’s enduring dogwoods. I don’t know if the bullet would have hit him, and in any case we would learn that the bullets were rubber: many had been injured but no one killed. We stood pressed close to the tree for a long moment, sirens arrived, the screaming quieted and things seemed to calm. I turned to him, extended a hand and said, Thank you.