Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In An Alien X-Ray

But I state with full confidence, if one of these so-called little gray men were found in an undecomposed state and examined, it would be proved beyond any doubt that there was a cat skeleton in that alien X-ray.

I rest my case.

Very Best Fishes,

Midnight Louie, Esq.

If you’d like information about getting Midnight Louie’s free Scratching Post-Intelligencer newsletter and/or buying his custom T-shirt, contact Carole Nelson Douglas at P.O. Box 331555, Fort Worth, TX 76163-1555 or the Web site at www.carolenelsondouglas.com. E-mail: cdouglas@catwriter.com.

Tailpiece

Carole Nelson Douglas Goes to the Dogs

Authors often donate character names for charities. Penny and her dog Rens won their names in this book at an auction at Dragon*Con science fiction/fantasy/horror convention in Atlanta, where thousands of readers and media fans congregate every Labor Day weekend.

Rens is really a mini husky Chihuahua, and here is a photo of him. I know Louie will sniff at a dog photo in his book.

Louie’s long-standing feline chauvinism has forced me to mount a defense of dogs.

Not only have they won standing as “man’s best friend,” but they have been a woman’s best friend too. Since I wrote my first novel about fifty-nine novels back, I’ve wanted to be sure that animal companions were in the picture.

Of course, if you put an element into a story, it’s going to spring into life and demand a real role. That’s how Boru, an Irish wolfhound, became a hero at the end of my first novel, Amberleigh, and a King Charles spaniel stood in for the entire doomed class of English Cavaliers during their seventeenth-century Civil War in Fair Wind, Fiery Star.

When I switched from historical adventure to high fantasy, a crabby white cat with ninety-nine lives named Felabba showed up. And she talked too. A lot.

Rambeau, the white Samoyed dog, accompanied my second fantasy heroine, Alison Carver, into the world of Veil. And more recently, noir urban fantasy heroine Delilah Street adopted a huge wolfhound-wolf cross she named Quicksilver, a good survival strategy in a postapocalyptic Las Vegas.

So I find a girl and her dog as natural a fiction partnership as a girl and her cat.

Louie has been no slouch in having close encounters with canine characters either. Consider Nose E., the tiny dope- and drug-sniffing Maltese. Nose E. showed up in a Midnight Louie short story and then appeared in the books. Louie must admit the little fellow has one of the most dangerous jobs in the law-and-order business. Louie, however, would never put up being toted around celebrity events by some burly linebacker. He might subject himself to playing purse pussycat for a gorgeous Hollywood starlet … if she was strapping enough to tote his twenty pounds around on those six-inch heels, that is.

Midnight Louie is the only one of my four-footed characters to have a narrative voice. And that’s because the real and original Louie was a koi-catching stray at a fancy Palo Alto motel, destined for the pound. An out-of-towner flew him back to my home state and put an extravagantly expensive ad in the classifieds (remember them?) at the newspaper (remember them ?) I reported for. He was on the block for a dollar bill, but only to the “right” home. When I sat down to write his saga, Louie’s voice took over, and I’ve been Louie’s collaborator ever since.

We wouldn’t have it any other way.

By Carole Nelson Douglas from Tom Doherty Associates

MYSTERY

MIDNIGHT LOUIE MYSTERIES

Catnap

Pussyfoot

Cat on a Blue Monday

Cat in a Crimson Haze

Cat in a Diamond Dazzle

Cat with an Emerald Eye

Cat in a Flamingo Fedora

Cat in a Golden Garland

Cat on a Hyacinth Hunt

Cat in an Indigo Mood

Cat in a Jeweled Jumpsuit

Cat in a Kiwi Con

Cat in a Leopard Spot

Cat in a Midnight Choir

Cat in a Neon Nightmare

Cat in an Orange Twist

Cat in a Hot Pink Pursuit

Cat in a Quicksilver Caper

Cat in a Red Hot Rage

Cat in a Sapphire Slipper

Cat in a Topaz Tango

Cat in an Ultramarine Scheme

Cat in a Vegas Gold Vendetta

Cat in a White Tie and Tails

Cat in an Alien X-Ray

Midnight Louie’s Pet Detectives

(anthology)

IRENE ADLER ADVENTURES

Good Night, Mr. Holmes

The Adventuress*

( Good Morning, Irene )

A Soul of Steel*

( Irene at Large )

Another Scandal in Bohemia*

( Irene’s Last Waltz )

Chapel Noir

Castle Rouge

Femme Fatale

Spider Dance

Marilyn: Shades of Blonde

(anthology)

HISTORICAL ROMANCE

Amberleigh †

Lady Rogue †

Fair Wind, Fiery Star

SCIENCE FICTION

Probe †

Counterprobe †

FANTASY

TALISWOMAN

Cup of Clay

Seed Upon the Wind

SWORD AND CIRCLET

Six of Swords

Exiles of the Rynth

Keepers of Edanvant

Heir of Rengarth

Seven of Swords

* These are the reissued editions.

† Also mystery

About the Author

Cat in an Alien X-Ray is the twenty-fifth title in Carole Nelson Douglas’s sassy Midnight Louie mystery series. Previous titles include Cat in a White Tie and Tails, Cat in a Vegas Gold Vendetta, and Cat in an Ultramarine Scheme. In addition to tales of her favorite feline, Douglas is also the author of a historical suspense series featuring Irene Adler, the only woman ever to have “outwitted” Sherlock Holmes. Douglas resides in Fort Worth, Texas. Visit her Web site at www.carolenelsondouglas.com.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

CAT IN AN ALIEN X-RAY

Copyright © 2013 by Carole Nelson Douglas

All rights reserved.

Cover art by Jo Tronc

Hand-lettering by Iskra Johnson

A Forge Book

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC

175 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010

www.tor-forge.com

Forge® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

Douglas, Carole Nelson.

Cat in an alien x-ray: a Midnight Louie Mystery / Carole Nelson Douglas. — 1st edition.

p. cm.

“A Tom Doherty Associates Book”

ISBN 978-0-7653-2748-2 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4299-4409-0 (e-book)

1. Midnight Louie (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Barr, Temple (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 3. Women private investigators—Fiction. 4. Women cat owners—Fiction. 5. Cats—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3554.O8237C276998 2013

813'.54—dc23

2013006414

e-ISBN 9781429944090

First Edition: August 2013