Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In A Quicksilver Caper

Midnight Louise does not mince words. (When has she ever?) “She has not been seen since S. Q. and I threw ourselves into her rescue.”

“And moi ,” I point out. “I was the counterweight.”

“True. We could not have made it without you.”

Yes!

“But I am not concerned about Miss Hyacinth,” Louise says.

Why not? That is truly disturbing. Where can a pampered show cat like her go?

“Squeaker is missing also.”

Oh. My blood runs cold until it chills out my super-overheated tootsies.

I recall the shy shelter cat known first as “Fontana,” and later as “Squeaker.”

No one recalled her when clearing out the paraphernalia of the abandoned magic show. CC had his Big Cats to remove. Who spoke for the late Shangri-La? Who for her performing partner, Hyacinth, and the lowly body double, Squeaker?

“Hyacinth?” I ask.

“She can take care of herself,” Louise says.

That leaves Squeaker.

“She was shy,” I say. “We need to check all the duct work. Especially that engineered by . . . Mr. Max.”

Louise flashes me a twenty-four-carat okay from those orangegold peepers.

About half an hour later, I am beginning to think that Midnight Inc. Investigations should be renamed Mummy Central. These ducts and escape routes are as empty and dry as King Tut’s tomb.

Midnight Louise and I poke our kissers out of equally empty escape routes and compare notes.

“No Hyacinth?” she asks.

“No flowers of any description,” I report.

I must admit that this ceaseless scrambling down narrow, dark ducts is wearing me out. Again. I lay back to pant out my frustration.

And then I hear a sigh.

A shaky sigh.

I push myself as erect as I can manage (my frame, not anything personal) and sniff around for a source. The odor is faintly lavender. As in lavender Siamese.

I edge forward until I spot some ruby irises in the dark. That always gives away a blue-eyed girl. I belly crawl the last five feet and am rewarded by the sight, sound, and sniff of Miss Squeaker.

“What are you doing hidden away down here, girl?” I ask.

“They have forgotten me, Louie. And if they remember me, they will whisk me away to the nearest shelter. I do not ever want to go back to one of those places.”

“I have been there,” I point out carefully. These spooked runaways are touchy. “I do not ever want to go back there either.”

“Oh. I am sorry Hyacinth is gone. When she vanished, the others appeared to forget about me. But there is . . . nothing to eat here.”

“No. As you can see, I do not approve of a state of nothing to eat. If you will inch forward, just a little, I believe that Miss Midnight Louise and I will find you a fine Asian buffet not too far from here.”

“They will know I exist! And destroy me!”

Unfortunately, she is not too far wrong.

“Miss Midnight Louise and I have strings to pull in this town. Often those strings are wrapped around main courses for our kind. Just edge your smooth lavender stockings along this pipe, and you will soon be on your way to a free dinner.”

I ease her out, step by step.

Louise is waiting at the end of the tunnel, all purrs and velvet paws.

Yeah. Like I should get that.

* * *

Later, the guy in the white pipe-stem hat is purring over how hungry Squeaker is for his appetizers.

Louise and I consult in the corner of the busy kitchen, trying to ignore a bunch of lobsters who are held captive for the main course.

“Where can we take her?” I ask.

“She is too sensitive for Ma Barker’s gang.”

“And then some. She is a very timid individual, due to early kit-hood trauma,” I add.

“I had early kithood trauma and you do not weep for me, Argentina.”

“Huh? I have never been to Gaucholand. Or Evitaland. Or Madonnaland. I am just saying that she is not accoutered for survival on the raw edges of anything.”

“It is the raw edges of Ma Barker’s gang, or nothing,” Louise says.

“Maybe not,” I say, looking like my usual inscrutable self.

It takes a lot of paternal persuasion, but Miss Louise and I get a well-fed Miss S. Q. easing on down the road.

I will not describe the rides we have had to hitch, or lies we have had to tell to coax our charge along, but at last we are hotfooting it through a very upscale part of town.

This is where and when it gets tough. We have to prod little Miss S. Q. onto a foreign stoop, and then whip up a helluva faux cat fight right before her eyes.

I take as great a satisfaction in boffing Miss Louise in the nose as she does in giving me a Swedish massage via her toes. We howl and yeowl to beat the band and a few audience members too.

Squeaker cringes against a potted hibiscus on the porch.

Perfect!

At last, the porch lights come on, and Louise and I split for the front hedge.

A human comes out blinking into the dark. When have they ever done differently?

“What is going on out here?”

Louise and I are silent. All one can hear out here is Squeaker’s shoulder blades and teeth clicking together.

“Well.” The human, for once, has heard something more subtle than clashing stray cats.

I hear the slap of bare feet on concrete, and then bushes being brushed aside to reveal Squeaker.

“Oh, my. What have we here? No scaredy-cat, no. A pretty little thing. What blue eyes you have, my dear. No. Do not shake. Why, you are quite a fine little pussums.”

I hate the expression “pussums,” but Louise whacks me in the shoulder and I shut up. Beggars cannot be choosers, and this is Squeaker’s last chance.

“What a precious puss.” The human has actually lifted her into his arms and she is not doing a thing.

Whoops! Maybe purring.

Yes!

It is a match made in heaven and at Midnight Inc. Investigations.

Danny Dove is now crooning to the little orphan. “Would you like some Bailey’s Irish Cream, hmmm? You need a name. How about . . . I think you are a little girl, right? How about . . . Alexandra?”

Works for me.

Louise smashes me in the whiskers. “Nice going, Pater the Great,” she says.

Well, I guess I would have been a czar in another life, if life were fair.

Telling Temple

It was three-thirty in the morning when Matt knocked on Temple’s door. Loud. He figured he’d better tell her as soon as possible. He was ready to push the doorbell and make a major racket when the door opened.

The Temple of Christmas Future answered, a petite pale redhead in red-and-purple pajamas with goggle-size glasses reflecting himself.

“I want Temple,” Matt said, confused, flustered.

“I’m not a madam, don’t tell me. Tell her. I’m Kit, aunt. You’re Matt, very tasty. I’ll get her if you insist. Although the hour is extremely intemperate. I approve, you mad, impetuous boy, you. No relation to the Fontana Brothers, I presume?”

“Are you kidding? Do I look Italian?”

“Northern Italian, maybe. A girl can dream. I am, however, devastated to inform you that I am no girl. Un momento, favore.’

Matt was left blinking in the tiny entry hall.

Temple toddled out a few minutes later, wearing a robe that reminded him of nun-wear, no glasses. Apparently, he was not to see her without contact lenses.

The thought was both encouraging and heart-breaking.

“I guess you two . . . neighbors had better confer in the bedroom,” Kit said, as delicately as she could probably ever manage. “I’m camping out on the living-room couch so you surely don’t want me eavesdropping.”

Temple wove on her feet, which were attired in bunny slippers, a little. “There’s always the office,” she noted with the strange dignity of a drunk or a person drawn out of deep sleep. She nodded to her right, and Matt gratefully followed her in there. He had no desire to view the California king-size bed Electra said Max Kinsella had required.