Carole Douglas: Cat in an Alphabet Soup

Her quarry was at last within grasp. Temple tackled a fat black shadow, throwing herself full-length, such as it was, indifferent to impediments, as she handled most situations.

The cat, cornered in the dimness, sat regarding her prone body. Someone yanked back a curtain, admitting a swath of light.

“Don’t let him get away,” Temple murmured, feeling for her glasses, which had decamped during her flying tackle.

“Oh-my-God,” someone said.

Temple patted the assorted lumps upon which she reclined until she found her frames. She assumed the glasses to glare triumphantly at the cat.

“Holy cow,” Lloyd murmured behind her.

“Someone help me up,” Temple ordered, “and don’t let that cat get away.”

She had noticed by now that the escapee was solid black; from their publicity pics, Baker and Taylor were parti-colored. And this animal’s large, fully perked ears were nothing like the missing cats’ stingy “Scottish fold” earmarks.

The heels of Temple’s hands pushed down for purchase. Then she realized that they pressed a man’s suit jacket, that her recumbent length was, in fact, badly wrinkling cold- cocoa-colored worsted.

“So sorry, sir. I’ll just—” She thrust herself halfway up, palms digging into a hard irregular surface. “Ohmigod.” Temple gazed down into a man’s eyes. He was in no condition to protest her presence—or that of additional suit wrinkles.

Someone grabbed her elbows and yanked. Upright, Temple stared at what had already mesmerized the crowd, and even, apparently, the cat: a man lay face up amid the booth’s backstage litter, a hand-lettered sign reading “stet” askew on his immobile chest.

“Well.” Temple turned as the crowd began buzzing behind her. “Lloyd, secure the area until the authorities arrive. And put that cat”—she pointed, if there were any question—-“in this bag. Please clear the area, folks. There’s been an accident; we need to let the proper people attend to it.”

Anyone minded to argue didn’t. Temple had pumped her tone with equal amounts of brisk authority and hushed respect for the dead. The crowd edged back. Moments later a dead weight hung from the Time-Life book bag Lloyd slung over Temple’s forearm. Becalmed green eyes blinked from the bag’s midnight-blue depths.

Temple went to the front of the booth, the cradled cat swinging from her arm. It weighed a ton. A copper and black Pennyroyal Press sign glinted in the exhibition lights. So did the graphic image of a skull and crossbones rampant over an Rx prescription symbol.

Temple studied the booth’s macabre illustrations before glancing nervously at the cat in her bag. Its yawn revealed a ribbed pink upper palate soft as a baby sweater, but its mouth was equipped with rows of sharp, white teeth.

2

An Editor Edited

Irate bookpeople—editors, sales reps, publishing bigwigs—milled in the aisles, but there was no helping it.

Two rows were cordoned off indefinitely. With police permission, maintenance employees were emptying nearby booths, moving the displays into whatever space could be squeezed from the packed-tight exhibition area. On easels bracketing the cordoned zone, signs announced Keep Out, Filming Area—Temple’s idea. Filming was indeed going on, she thought, watching police cameras snap and whir.

Detective Lieutenant C. R. Molina frowned down at Temple. “You were chasing a cat when you found the body?”

“We couldn’t have one loose in the exhibition area; besides, I thought it had escaped from a booth that features cats.”

“Live cats?”

“Well... dead cats would be kind of tacky.”

“What kind of convention did you say this was?” Lieutenant Molina’s skeptical blue eyes squinted at a visual cacophony of illustrations and type styles.

“The ABA—oh, not the American Bar Association. Booksellers. The American Booksellers Association.”

“So you found the deceased by accident?”

“I assure you.”

“And disarranged the body.”

“Hey, he was as stiff as Peg-Board already, the Man in the Iron Suit. Must have been... dispatched late last night, but I guess the coroner will determine exact time of death—”

“Where is the cat now?”

“The cat? In the PR office. In a carrier. The cat didn’t have anything to do with it—”

“And that’s the only reason you were in the area at that time, pursuit of the cat?”

“I’m a PR person. That’s my job: to keep things running smoothly. To round up stray cats, if necessary.”

“Stray? I thought you said the cat was missing from an exhibit.”

“Um, it had ‘strayed,’ hadn’t it?”

“I get the idea, Miss Barr, that you’re concealing something again. That’s part of a PR person’s job, too, isn’t it?” Lieutenant Molina prodded with weary logic. “Speaking of concealment, you ever hear from that missing boyfriend of yours?”

“Not a word. Why do you think he’s called the Mystifying Max?”

“Not just for a good vanishing act, I’ll bet.”

Temple said nothing, waiting for the tall police lieutenant to finish eyeing the scene of the crime. Temple was withholding guilty knowledge—the continuing absence of Baker and Taylor. But that had nothing to do with... possible murder.

“How was he killed?” Temple was unable to resist asking that.

Eyes the color of a midnight margarita iced over. “We don’t know that he was killed; could have been natural causes.”

Temple rolled her eyes. “With that sign acting as a tie tack?”

“Who has access to sign materials?”

“Everyone. The ABA centers on the printed word; everybody here wants to leave messages, sign a book, write orders. We’re just lucky only the thirteen thousand exhibitors were allowed in today; tomorrow the other eleven thousand hit. Even so, must be twenty thousand Magic Markers on this floor, easy.”

Lieutenant Molina’s professionally stoic face puckered. Was the homicide detective annoyed because Temple had identified the object used to write on the dead man’s chest? Yo, ho, ho and a bottle of Magic Marker ink. “You know what this ‘stet’ means?”

“Sure. To any journalist or copy editor it’s an abbreviation used to mark text. It means, ‘Let it stand.’ ”

Lieutenant Molina waited, tall, patient and as implacable as an island god.

Temple explained further. “ ‘Stet’ means that copy that’s been deleted or changed should be restored to its original state.” They turned as one to view the body. “In this case,” Temple observed, “ashes to ashes.”

“Not quite yet,” the lieutenant remarked. “How will you handle the press on this?”

“Discreetly.”

“Good luck.” The lieutenant grinned significantly and moved on.

Lloyd leaned close to Temple. “That broad sure likes to throw her weight around.”

“Any woman who stands five-ten in flats scares the living Shalimar out of me,” Temple admitted. She shivered dramatically. “On the other hand, if Lieutenant Molina hangs around we won’t have to worry about the air-conditioning breaking down—she could cool the Sahara single-handedly.”

“I swear, Temple, you even chitchat like a PR woman, in snappy press-released superlatives,” a familiar voice slipped in. It was not a compliment.

She eyed the approaching Crawford Buchanan, who eyed her back. “And you talk like a DJ, with capital I ’s every fifth syllable. What brings you here from the Ivory Tower of the Daily Snitch?”