Inside the kitchen she would drop the pretty garment, nose at it, and smile up at Wilma with delight.

Who could scold her?

Usually Wilma was able to return the stolen items to their rightful owners, digging out a necktie or a bikini top from beneath her couch or from under the claw-footed bathtub. She was far more lenient with Dulcie than she had ever been with her former clients. Never had she overlooked a parolee's or probationer's theft.

Wilma Getz was a tall, lean woman, with long gray hair she kept bound back in a ponytail. Her collection of silver and gold hair clips were of great interest to Dulcie; her jewelry box was an area for the cat's eager and delighted exploration. Wilma had been with Federal Probation until her retirement at fifty-five, an enforced retirement because of hazardous duty. She had been known among her caseload as hard-assed, an officer to pay attention to, or to be avoided.

Now that she had moved into a gentler life, with no more parolees to worry over, she could indulge her softer instincts. Could be far more lenient with her one remaining custodial charge, her loving and thieving small cat.

How could anyone scold the innocent young cat for her miscreant ways? Dulcie was so excited, so thrilled with each new acquisition, hugging and rolling on the soft, bright prize. What harm did she do? She was never malicious-her thefts grew from her pure delight in the stolen object.

Wilma kept a big wooden box on her covered back porch, and there she placed Dulcie's trophies so the neighbors could retrieve them at their convenience. Wilma Getz's back porch was known as the repository for all small, cat-sized lost items.

Because a steep hill rose behind the house, Wilma's cottage had been designed so both the back and front porches faced the street. Access to the back door was easy, the neighbors had only to come across the south end of the front yard on the winding stone path, step up under the wide roof into the deep back porch, and there root among Dulcie's treasures to retrieve their stolen garments.

Dulcie loved that box. She liked to curl up in the box among the silk and satin and the occasional finds of velvet. There, lounging on her silken contraband, she could watch the neighborhood, could see everything that went on, dogfights, ball games, the comings and goings of all the humans in her world. She did not seem to mind when a neighbor came searching for her own possessions. Dulcie would purr happily while the neighbor rummaged among the purloined sweaters and nighties, and she usually got a nice pet and a scratch behind the ears before the lady went away carrying her treasure. And before long she would find a new item to replace the one retrieved.

Dulcie knew how to get into every house in the neighborhood. She could claw open a window left ajar, could claw open a back screen door. She could leap to snatch and turn a doorknob. Molena Point was quiet, well policed; the village houses were often left unlocked in the daytime.

Dulcie, once she had gained entry to her chosen mark, would head for the bedrooms. There she would lift a pretty sweater she found lying on a chair, a slipper, a baby bootie, whatever took her fancy. With delicate paws she would remove a silk stocking from a bathroom rod where it had been hung to dry, carry it gently home, and hide it beneath the bed, where she could lie with her face on the silken gauze, purring. One young neighbor wore black satin mules that were a favorite. Dulcie took them and Wilma gave them back, but in over two dozen exchanges Dulcie never left a tooth mark on the satin. Once she entered the Jameson house at dinnertime and snatched a linen napkin from the lap of five-year-old Julie; she raced out brandishing the napkin like a flag, with the five Jamison children screaming after her in delighted pursuit.

When she stole the pink cashmere sweater that ten-year-old Nancy Coleman had bought by laboriously saving her allowance, Dulcie didn't know how Nancy suffered. Dulcie was a cat-she had no comprehension of the world of finance.

Though deep within, she sensed that taking the possessions of another was wrong. Every young cat learns quickly about territory by being slapped by larger, stronger cats. Territory should be respected. And Dulcie knew that things were territory, too.

But she stole anyway, with the same impish delight with which she would have taken another cat's bed. Stealing was a game. She stole smiling, her pink mouth curved up, her green eyes shining, her brindle tail twitching with pleasure. She once brought home a designer teddy trimmed with gold lame and sequins. But Wilma took that away from her and returned it, wet around the edges from Dulcie's licking. Another time she stole a crocheted doll dressed in red leggings. She still had the doll, hidden in a dark corner of the service porch. She liked to hold it between her paws, purring.

She was quick to leap through an open car window, too, taking whatever treasure caught her fancy, audiotapes, baby rattles, driving gloves. She was so secretive about her thefts that the neighbors seldom saw her take an item. Though an early riser like Wilma might spot Dulcie dragging something pretty across the dewy lawns, perhaps a silver spoon left on a backyard picnic table, once a small porcelain cup with bright flowers glazed on it; she got the cup all the way home unbroken and hid it under the footed bathtub. From this crevice Wilma resurrected, as well, the watch for which she had mourned for a year-and had railed at Dulcie with untypical anger.

But she could not stay mad at Dulcie. The little cat was entirely joyful in her acquisitions, so happy with them, and sprightly as a little elf. When scolded she would cock her head and smile. Wilma sometimes brought home little treats for her, a lavender sachet, a lace handkerchief, items she knew would delight Dulcie. When Dulcie saw there was a gift she would sit up on her haunches, waving her paws and reaching, her pink mouth curved up with pleasure, her green eyes so intelligent that Wilma wondered sometimes if Dulcie could be different from other cats. The rapport between them was deep, loving, and comfortable. Wilma thought, If I were rich, I would give her diamonds. Dulcie would wear diamonds. In the six-block area where Dulcie had established her territory, the little cat was laughed at and loved, and certainly no one would harm her.

Beyond the hill where Wilma's house snuggled among oak trees and other cottages, stretched an undeveloped expanse of steep bluff that looked down on the sea. To humans this was an open, wind-tossed field. To the village cats it was a jungle, the heavy grass waving high above. Within the tall grass roamed a wealth of field mice, moles, grasshoppers, and small snakes. There Dulcie hunted. Or sometimes she simply sat concealed in the blowing grass, looking out toward the sea and listening to the pounding of the great mysterious water. The rhythmic thunder of the surf seemed to Dulcie like a loud purr or a steady heartbeat, and she would imagine herself a kitten again, snuggling secure in the thunder of her mother's purr. To Dulcie the sea was rich and wise. It was there, sitting concealed in the rye grass late one afternoon, absorbing the sun's warmth, that Dulcie realized she was watched.

A man watched her. She could smell his scent on the wind, sour and strangely nervous, a predatory smell like that of a hunting animal. She rose slowly to look above the grass, flinching with apprehension.

He stood above her up the cliff, where the sidewalk cut along: a lean, pale, shaggy man staring down directly at her, his muddy eyes chill and predatory. He watched her as intently as a crazed dog will stare. And in his eyes she glimpsed a brazen familiarity. She sensed that he could see deep inside her, could see her secret self. She crouched, immobile and rigid.