Cat in a hot pink Pursuit

here was killed by something chemical, not a gun or a knife.”
    “Still plenty of that out there,” I grumble, for the chit is right. It is science not horse sense (though I have never known an equine with much of it) that rules modern crime-solving circles.
    While I am hunkering down, contemplating the demise of the lobo detective (as witness my own cravenly alliance with Midnight Louise herself), I cast an eye to see what Mr. Rafi has brought to the side of Miss Savannah.
    I stiffen with surprise, all over.
    He has brought two canvas bags, one pink and one purple, both with mesh sides, each containing an Ashleigh sister.
    I cannot contain myself, although I try to not let Miss Louise see that.
    “Must go interrogate a couple of witnesses,” I mutter under my breath.
    “Witnesses! Daddy-O! What would these two floozies ever witness except their mistress’s indiscretions?”
    “Exactly, Louise. A starlet of Miss Savannah Ash-leigh’s stature—”
    She snorts but I step aside before my coat is sprayed.
    “—of her stature is sure to hear all the latest gossip. Of course, the Persian girls overhear it all. Stay here. Two of us might look suspicious.”
    At this, I make an end-around approach to the Ashleigh lounge chair, for the woman is highly prejudiced against me, even though she knows I am a totally sexually responsible dude since my enforced operation at her hands. Well, at the hands of her plastic surgeon.
    Now the V-word is my byword. Not Viagra, Bast forbid, but for V as in... vasectomy. I am a thoroughly modern male, even if by mistake.
    Soon I am huddled under the lounge chair again, picking up tidbits of information from the girls.
    “Our mistress is so unheeding,” Yvette complains. “She likes to swelter in the UVs, so she assumes we would like it. With our luxuriant fur coats, of course, we prefer cool dark places.”
    “Me too,” I say.
    The paired purrs from the carriers nearly drive me crazy. “So what is happening with your mistress? She must surely be uneasy that a contest advisor has been offed.”
    “Mais oui.” Only it sounds like “meow” to the uninitiated, i.e., humans. Solange presses her piquant face to the mesh so that several of her long curled vibrissae protrude and tickle my own whiskers. “She has been uneasy for some time. Someone has been lurking around, and it has gotten worse now that we are here at the Teen Queen Castle.”
    “Hmmm,” I purr. I would normally think Miss Savannah was imagining this stalker or making it up for publicity purposes. Yet I glimpsed a dark figure in her room with my own night-vigilant eyes. “What will the death of one of the advisors mean to the show, once the police free the murder scene and shooting can begin again?”
    “Shooting?” The Divine Yvette bats her black mas-caraed lashes as a prelude to a swoon. “You think there will be shooting?”
    “I meant cameras.” But of course shooting is not impossible with a murderer among us.
    And I recall Miss Temple telling her Aunt Kit about a notorious shooting death in this very house many years ago. I have not led Miss Louise astray. Eavesdropping is the low-key operative’s biggest asset, and you cannot get a lower operative than me.
    I glance back to where I left the young sourpuss, my partner. The spot is vacant. I cannot understand why she did not wait around like a good girl for me to return and make my report, but frankly, I am glad not to have her cramping my style with the sisters Ashleigh, now that I have them to myself.
    She might blow my cover and refer to me by some demeaning nickname like “Snoozer” or “Geezer” or, heaven forbid, “Daddy-O.”



Wolfram and Heart

    Matt wore a Carl Sandburg T-shirt, baggy khakis, loafers without socks, and a Chicago Cubs cap on backwards.
    He’d arrived at eight A.M. and spent the day lurking in the halls and emergency stairwells of the building that housed Brandon, Oakes, and McCall. Just an ordinary guy, staking out who came and went through the doors of the prestigious law office.
    He’d wanted to look like a guy who’d gotten lost in the lobby and was still trying to find his way out. Nobody questioned him.
    Around two P.M., after he’d watched the noontime exodus return to the law firm, he bought lunch at the lobby coffee shop and pumped the waitress.
    Even in his instant scruffies, his looks won smiles and chitchat and information. The coffee shop provided latte, yeah, they had a machine for every variety of