Cat in a hot pink Pursuit

murderer, and cannot think of a more deserving candidate.

    Miss Louise carps about our worthless expedition on our way back to the mirrored door.
    I make no defense, and not only let her precede me back into Miss Savannah Ashleigh’s domain, but show her the hall door with ail due courtesy.
    “I am going to inspect Miss Savannah’s shoes,” I tell her. “No sense being sexist and omitting a female suspect. You may want to do the same with Miss Sulah Savage’s closet. After all, she does use a pseudonym.”
    Off the little chit goes, dreaming of Manolos, as in Blahniks.
    Personally, I do not think Miss Kit indulges in status symbols as blatant as Blahniks. So I wait by the mirror, checking the state of my best bib and tucker and licking it into submission.
    On the room’s king-size bed, Miss Savannah Ashleigh snores softly, no doubt the result of a Beverly Hills nose bob.
    In a few moments, the unlatched door pushes open and girls silver and golden slide through. They are looking a bit mussed about the muzzle and decidedly annoyed.
    “Louie!” Miss Yvette is in fine fettle, good mettle, and superb Ma Kettle mode. “You led us on zee wild goose chase. And aftair we had done zee hokey-pokey on the intruder’s epidermis.”
    (When stressed, the Divine Yvette resorts to B-movie French.)
    “Poor fellow,” I say. “But I gathered lots of good intelligence.”
    “Somezing new pour vous, I tink.”
    Yvette is really, really mad. She is starting to sound like a voyageur. Wrong continent, wrong period.
    “Those stairs were very sudden,” her sister Solange rebukes.
    And I am duly chastised. “But you both have the impeccable French nose for strong cheeses and rank fruit. Did you trace the raspberry/strawberry scent through the tunnels?”
    “And banana,” Solange adds.
    “Banana?” I think she is making a value judgment. But non. I mean, no.
    “There was a distinct undertone of banana. I ought to know. Our mistress uses a banana-scented sun screen.”
    Banana! Of course!
    The scent that leads from the mall to here is not that of a mere ice cream treat; it is that of a healthful fruit smoothie!
    Now I have nailed the full spectrum of ingredients that will lead to a murderer. Brought down by a high-protein health-food shake.
    Somehow it is poetic justice.
    I would boast of my breakthrough, but the Divine Yvette has lofted onto Miss Savannah Ashleigh’s bed and wrapped herself around her percussive head.
    Not only dogs are devoted.
    Solange sees me to the door. “Was it something I said, Louie?”
    I allow her to polish my sides with her softest, foxiest furs.
    “Exactly. What a rare and subtle nose.” (The French love these kind of compliments.) “Brilliant! Now I must prepare for the takedown tomorrow.”
    She wafts her fulsome plume under my own nose. “I am sorry Yvette is being such a pill. Perhaps you will come to tell me the outcome.”
    Perhaps I will. I chuck her under the chin with my most flexible member.
    “Wish me luck, sweetheart.”
    “Bonne chance, Louie!”
    Having restored international relations with our allies of old, I push out into the ordinary hall, walking on air and the inescapable scent of a spilled fruit smoothie that will trip up a murderer.



No Glimpse
    of Stocking

    Max’s watch read five past midnight when he climbed the Circle Ritz’s conveniently stepped black marble facing up to the second-floor balcony of his and Temple’s unit.
    He was still officially half-owner. That’s how he could make this clandestine expedition, knowing she was gone, with a semiclear conscience. No, nothing was clear about this intrusion except the night sky, spangled with stars.
    He’d told enough necessary lies in his undercover work to recognize a story that was stapled together. Temple was gone, all right. Not to Minnesota though, and not to tend an ill father she hadn’t even mentioned to Electra Lark. No, she’d just asked the landlady to look after the cat.
    Speaking of Midnight Louie, Max had better be on the lookout for him. He wouldn’t put it past the territorial old boy to trip him in the dark, since they both always wore black and were fairly invisible at night.
    The French door lock gave to a few passes of Max’s tiny metal wand. He’d told Temple to secure these doors again and again, but she probably didn’t want to interfere with Louie’s comings and goings.
    The main room was unlit. Faint night-light glows came from the office and kitchen, another concession