Catacombs by Anne McCaffrey Read Free Book Online Page A

dozen naps today but I’m getting tired. We had an early morning. I’m turning in
.
    Chester looked down.
You’re right. I’m not tired. I’m going to check out the places Pshaw-Ra sent our friends and make sure everyone is comfy
. And he disappeared through the ceiling flap.
    Jubal turned on his side, away from the door.
    A few minutes later he was awakened by a yowl and a cat’s scream. He sat up.
Chester?

CHAPTER 6
    J anina Mauer, former Cat Person to Thomas’s Duchess aboard the
Molly Daise
, had felt like cheering when the ships carrying the fugitive Barque Cats, including her Chessie, blinked out of sight and out of reach of the pursuing Galactic Government attracker vessels. She’d felt like cheering again when the council ruled that the epidemic had in fact been caused by premature panic among the overly cautious and that all of the animals that survived their quarantine in good health would be allowed to return home.
    Then the loneliness set in. Chessie would not return home—maybe not ever. Would the
Ranzo
, the ship of her rescuers, stop running long enough to discover that it was safe to bring back the cats? Would they fear prosecution for the illegal nature of their rescue mission and just stay hidden? That would be terrible. Without Chessie she felt incomplete. To her surprise, the new closeness she shared with the young veterinarian, Dr. Jared Vlast, was no substitute. In fact, it was difficult to enjoy at all when she always felt there was something missing—the part of her that Chessie had filled for most of her life.
    Jared was kind and caring about the animals, but he didn’t quite understand what the loss of a cat meant to a Cat Person. And it wasn’t
only
Chessie—she missed the
Molly Daise
, her home for so many years, and the crew who had been her family. Hers andChessie’s. She had lived with them since the age of ten when she first came aboard to care for her special kitten.
    It didn’t help Jared or her either that they were right when they exposed—or caused the authorities to expose—the recent epidemic as a hoax. Quite the opposite, in fact. While the council admitted to each other and even to their accusers that mistakes had been made and wrong had been done, they did not quite come clean publicly. To do so, Jared told her, would have cost the government far too much money in reparations to farmers whose livelihoods had been destroyed, not to mention everyone else whose valuable and loved animals had not survived the council’s little “oops” moment.
    Jared was allowed to return to Sherwood Station, but at first there was little work for him there, since many of the animals he would normally have screened or treated had been destroyed.
    Janina, shipless and catless, found work at the same station with a maintenance crew. Since she was needed only part-time, she was sometimes free to accompany Jared when he flew down to the planet’s surface. This had been the case when he was called to leave the space station for George Varley’s ranch. The trouble had actually started there, through no fault of the rancher or his animals.
    Nevertheless, they had suffered for the greed and foolishness of others.
    Mr. Varley’s extensive herds were no more. The relief vets who replaced Jared when he was sent to Galipolis had disposed of all but a few of the beautiful horses, condemning them for the glitter in their secretions, which was nothing more than a by-product of the shiny beetles they’d ingested.
    Now, Varley came out to meet them when they arrived. His step was as vigorous as ever but there was a hardness in his face Janina hadn’t noticed before.
    “Glad you’re back, Doc,” he said, and nodded to Janina. Shewasn’t sure he actually knew her name, but he did not seem to mind her presence. “Those butchers who replaced you ruined my spread.”
    Jared just shook his head. “Are the horses you want me to check in the barn?”
    “Yeah, and believe it or not, they’re more