Douglas Nelson - Cat On A Blue Monday

Matt found his lips quirk ed into the smile that he least liked, a resigned smile that tasted of spoiled milk. Temple, for all her spirit, had shown the same push-pull indecision this very afternoon: afraid to admit that she could be hurt; needing assurance that it wouldn't happen again. He tried to help-- here and there this afternoon--but he couldn't even help himself. Helping is another form of addiction, he reminded himself, only more socially acceptable than most. He ought to know; he'd made a career of it. Sheila's silver-salted, wren-brown permanent bristled around the edge of the barrier. "We're it tonight. Two of th e volunteers have some kind of fl u."

He nodded. Six booths, three employees, three volunteers, Even the employees weren't paid much. Those in the helping professions aren't supposed to help themselves to much profi t, unless they're slick society shrinks or corporate consultants.

Still it was more than he'd made at his last . . . job.

The phone rang. I t, too, was donated, a humped, old fashioned model in Crayola flesh-color that felt stick ier than Silly Putty. As soon as Matt picked it up, he set the receiver on the makeshift rest o f a horizontal Rolodex fi le. All the calls here went through the earphones, misery in stereo.

"Hel-hello?" The voice was elderly, anxious and female.

"ConTact," Matt said. "Can I help you?" His voice, he knew, was Bing Crosby smooth and reassuringly male. He was used to reassuring everyone except himself.

"I'm so worried."

"About what, Ma'am?" He hated using the hackneyed address, but there was either Miss or Ma'am for women.

"I fi nally had to do something."

He waited. Usually people who reached the brink and actually dialed ConTact were like dam waters ready to over fl ow the concrete bunkers of convention that contained them. This woman still sounded uncertain, even regretful now.

"I . . . I don't mean to bother anybody. I just mind my business and live alone. But--"

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"They're walking around my house, trying to get in."

"Who?" Sharper,

"I don't know. They come a l ot lately. I know they're there, though l don't keep a dog. I'm . . . afraid."

"Ma'am, if it's intruders you're worried about , you'd better call nine-eleven. Or I can do it for you. What's your address?"

"Not . . . really intruders. Someone, Something, Maybe the doctor is wrong, and I need a hearing aid. Maybe if I heard better, I'd know it was just the meter man."

He listened hard, to her and to the background, trying to gauge if anything might be truly wrong, if her voice would suddenly sharpen into a shriek as the call became a human drama in action and he still didn't have the address. . . .

"You can hear me just fi ne. Where do you live, Ma'am?"

A pause, "I 'm not used to telling strangers that on the phone. Security, you know--"

"If someone is intruding, I need to know your address to send help."

"Yes, I know you do. But maybe no one is there. I t's just that it's happened before . In the evening, I hear noises."

"What kind of noises?"

She was silent again, her obviously elderly voice stilled with fear and shame. Being old, being alone, made for a lot of fear, and then shame at the fact of that fear, Matt knew.

Still, he wasn't ready for her answer when it came.

"Hisses," she said at last, reluctantly. "Angry, seething hisses."

Chapter 4

Cat Burglar

It is a terrible thing to be laid off, even if it is only from a self appointed position.

While everyone else is relieved that the stripper competition at the Goliath Hotel-- and its murderous complications -- is over. I find myself with mixed feelings. Perhaps my uncharacteristic malaise is caused by the Divine Yvette's departure, though it is unlike me to get down in the whiskers over a dame, no matter how heavenly.

Speaking of Devine, I am more than somewhat worried about our neighbor of that nomenclature. The Bard of Avon is almost as famous as Nostradamus for his rhyming couplets. and I recall something abou t "By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."

Now, I do not have these opposable appendages, although I understand that they are highly regarded in some circles. However, I have a highly versatile appendage of my own, plus a full set of fairly agile digits at the end of all my limbs. I do okay. But it anything pricks when something wicked comes this way, it is the hair at the base of my tail, just where I cannot reach with anythin g, no matter how acrobatic I am, and I am a natural contortionist, among other things.

The base of my tail has been atwitter tor two days, and something tells me that Mr. Matt Devine will need my services in not too long a time.

After seeing him to his place of employment, I decide It is not much t o look at, although from Miss Temple Barr's reaction. Mr. Matt Devine definitely is. I wil l have to take her word on this, because folks other kind all look alike to me, or at least fall into certain readily recognizable types.

This is a little game I play . Miss Temple Barr, for instance, strikes me as a sprightly Somali named Cinnamon. (Somalis are long-haired Abyssinians ; besides a red-haired coat , they have a luxuriant foxy tail and are pretty foxy in other respects.) Mr. Matt Devine would be your cream Persian, pet rather than show quality. There is something effacing about Mr. Matt Devine that puzzles me. The Mystifying Max is not in the least effacing though I have never met the dude except via the poster Miss Temple Barr used to keep on the inside of her closet door. He is without doubt a Burmese. (This is a most mysterious breed, with sleek, dark chocolate-brown hai r and a hypnotic green gaze not dissimilar to my own.)

As for me, I am bits and pieces of the best of everything; the only proof positive of my superior--and haphazard-breeding is my divinely developed sense of curiosity, Flight now that itch in arrears is running rampant. By the morning of the next day, my bra in has gone full circle. I sit i n the hot cement by the Circle R itz pool--a momentary shock f or certain unmentionable part s--and stare up at the pleasing, curved shape of th is landmark so dear to my heart, or rather to my stomach. I can see Miss Te mple Barr's third-floor terrace, its potted oleanders undulating leafy green fingers over the black wrought-iron railing rather like landlady Miss Electra Lark waving "toodle-oo."

Speaking of which, I stare farther up. Two floors above my not-so-humble abode is Miss Electra L ark's penthouse, with a similar, though larger, terrace. Certain mysterious noises have emanated from the Landlady's premises since I consented to become Miss Temple's roommate two months ago. One can imagine how loud these bumps in the daytime--for I seldom hear them at night, which eliminates at least one theory, to Miss E l ectra Lark's credit--how loud these bumps must be to penetrate even my sensitive ears two floors below.

At least there is one mystery I can poke my nose into, and I intend to do it right now quite literally.

I bound to the ancient palm tree, whose curving trunk makes a long, gentle, beneficent arc over the Circle R itz. Forward motion, as the football commentators call it carries me up a bridge of super-tough bark, but these claws were made for climbing and that is what they are going to do. . . .

Momentum swings me down on a delicate palm frond. For a moment I sway perilously, so far above ground than even my fabled tour-point landing style will not save me. Then I leap into thin air and p lummet safely onto the Circle Ritz roof, five stories above the Big Splat.

I perch for a while, and preen while catching my breath, then loft idly down to Miss Electra Lark's patio. This is the most dangerous part of the venture. Her patio is crammed with bushes snipped into familiar-looking silhouettes, no doubt by an obsessive-compulsive with a large collection of manicure scissors . I land revoltingly near one silhouette teased into the shape of a poodle fresh from the groomer.