DEATH in Palma

The circle of life at the Arabic Baths

FORD KNOWS will be observing “Winter Hours” in December—posts every other week while we go to Lucca and Pisa in Italy to investigate a possible move there; finishing up the story “The Fire Road” as part of the print/ebook publication of Lamb next year; and pulling together all the Post-its and threads for my upcoming writing and publishing series “The Road to Published” as a big Thank you! to paid subscribers.

I’m also working on a proofreading job for

Andrea C. Neil

’s Two Birds Author Services. (You all knew I’m a freelance editor, right?)

Two Birds even has a new Substack.

"Two Birds are my go-to people for not only editing and proofreading
but they have also given me suggestions on strengthening my writing.
I don’t think there’s a better editing service out there."
-Monty Garner, author of the Card Jordan series

---

DEATH in Palma

---

Picture it. Palma de Mallorca 2022—a weekend getaway.

---

Guillerma, as we decided to call her, accosted us in the street on the way to the Banyes Arabes. An all-black cat, except a tip of white on the end of her tail, she had a big notch out of her ear—fixed, in theory, so no kittens to feed. She dashed across the shadowy alley of the old town of Palma de Mallorca to say ‘hello.’ I’m allergic to cats so I kept my distance, but Leo gave her a good rub and tickle, fast friends, and then on we went to the baths.

The Arabic Baths were based on even earlier Roman baths on the same site we learned from the printed placards. The garden, though not big, was fragrant and lush with palms and bougainvillea, allium, oleander, pots of geraniums, ferns, ivy, and succulents. There was an old well, capped, and an outdoor kitchen under a loggia with Mallorcan pottery and tiles.

But before we could go into the baths—crumbling, mostly, but still standing, barely—who should pop up but Guillerma. She had followed us in, and of course we stopped to say ‘hello’ again, but I was soon poking around the rest of the garden taking pictures and was only recalled when I heard Leo’s cry.

“Kitty! No!”

From behind a pot, Guillerma had pounced on a baby bird scratching in the dust, now fluttering and stunned as the cat batted at it, now in her mouth—a sparrow, the usual brown. Leo grabbed the cat who let go of the bird which flopped and flitted spasmodically into a corner behind a gigantic urn.

“Hold her, will you?”

So I held on to Guillerma as she frantically squirmed, and Leo tried to get to the bird, but couldn’t reach.

“Oh. Well.” Nothing to do, so I let the cat go, and realizing that now covered with dander and fur I would soon be an itchy mess, I dashed off to the restrooms to wash my hands.

Leo met me on the way back out, quite solemn.

“Guillerma got the bird again—I grabbed her and she let it go, so I picked it up but it died in my hand.” Apparently it peeped weakly for a moment before lying still.

“What did you do with it?”

“Guillerma?”

“The bird.”

“Well, it was dead.”

“And so…?”

“I gave it back to Guillerma.”

We sat on a bench and watched in vague horror as the cat gobbled the entirety of that baby bird in a matter of two minutes, just a single tiny feather remaining which I quickly put in my wallet just in case I run across a potions recipe calling for ‘the feather of a baby bird retrieved within moments of its death.’

A German tried to kick Guillerma, and Leo yelled at him. “She’s just being a cat!” The German harrumphed.

Back at the hotel, the vegan concierge—the sweet one who loved us all the more when we expressed concern over the carriage horses standing all day in the hot sun of the plazas—listened to our plaintive tale, rapt.

“Oh! Amor,” she moaned as we described the death of the baby bird in the garden of the Arabic Baths. “Oh, amor. Amor!”

I showed her the feather I kept. Her eyes glittered.

“Amor. But how do you feel?” she asked.

“Sad,” we said, and she was in raptures.