Cat In A Quicksilver Caper

“That is because you have a verbal contract with your mistress. Never a good idea. You need someone between her interests and your interests.”

“My only interest is serving her.”

“Tsk.” I sit down and slick down the hairs between my nails. “An admirable, self-sacrificing attitude but short-sighted.”

“I am not short-sighted,” she declares, so angry that she crosses her pale blue eyes, thus proving my point.

“Every performer of every stripe should have a personal representative. An agent. Are you willing to take humans at face value? At their so-called word? There is no more slippery species on the planet. I give you Enron, Worldcom, Tyco.”

“I know no cats of those names.”

“Of course not! These are predatory humans called CEOs. I think it stands for ‘Cruel Evil Owners.’ They make man-eating tigers look tame! Of course there are way more of them than there are man-eating tigers left in the world.”

“So. Are you one of these ‘representatives’?”

“Yeah. I could be yours, if you were looking for something in the representative line. What kind of contract do you have with Miss Shangri-La?”

Hyacinth hunches sourly into her shoulder blades again. “She owns me and I pretend to let her think she ‘trains’ me.”

“That is it? No terms on length of contract? No bonuses for good behavior? No hazard pay for high-wire work?”

Where physical threat stands no chance against a spitfire like Hyacinth, she positively caves under the burden of legal language.

“None of that. Should I have it?”

“Absolutely. What about disability pay when you are sidelined and a double like Squeaker subs for you?”

“That namby-pamby, wishy-washy no-papers excuse for a Siamese! She is Melanie to my Scarlett. If I hadn’t strained my spine recently . . . er, during rehearsal, of course.”

Of course not. I know precisely when she sprained her spine: under the tender attentions of a spitfire masseuse named Midnight Louise.

Her eyes cross again as another thought occurs. “ ‘Pay’? Did you use the term, ‘pay’?”

“Pay. That’s what I got when I did a couple of TV commercials for some cat glop. All specified by contract, seven pages of contract.”

Hyacinth’s forehead furrows. It looks like bleached moss. “Maybe you should be my agent, Louie.”

I see my opening and I take it. “Sure thing, Princess. My cut is only fifteen percent.”

She rouses herself from her troubled reverie and snicks out eight purple-enameled shivs from her forepaws, plus two scimitarsize dew claws. “Your cut is ten percent, one for each of the trails I will leave in your hide if you try to cheat me.”

I see that even her strong, long lavender-enameled nails are flexed for quick action. I cannot swear that curare is mixed with that nail polish, but I would not want to test the theory on my own hide.

“Ten,” I agree. Besides, I am not in this for the commission. “Being your agent will entail my hanging about up here—secretly, of course. We never want to warn humans of impending legal obligations—and observing what you contribute to the operation and what would be just compensation. Grandfathered in, of course.”

“What does my grandfather have to do with this? He is retired from stud duty on a farm in New Hampshire.”

I am astounded that she knows the whereabouts of her grandfather, but most of these purebreds have nothing better to do than tote up their family tree back to Bast, no doubt. For all I know, my grandfather may be the Cheshire cat.

“ ‘Grandfathering in’ is a legal expression, meaning, um, your compensation must be paid retroactively.” I am not at all sure about this, but when in doubt, sound confident.

I watch her baby blues cross again. It is a rather fetching habit.

I am on a roll. “ ‘Retroactively’ means it goes back to when you first began working with Miss Shangri-La.”

“You mean she would owe me?”

“Indeed. I think she owes you quite a lot. You are the only performing housecat in the magic game.”

“How would I be paid?”

“Any way you like. Fancy Feast coupons. Bejeweled collars. French nail enamel. It would all be specified in the contract.”

“And could I trust an agent who maintains sleeping arrangements with a human who rubs my mistress the wrong way, and vice versa?”

“Business is business. A commission on a hot act is a commission.”

“Well.” Miss Hyacinth (formerly the evil Hyacinth, but a dude needs to show proper respect for a client or how will he get any for her in negotiations?) rises, stretches with only a trace of painful hesitation, and bares her fangs at me, in a friendly way. “I will show you all my hidey holes, for when I am having an artistic tantrum over the choreography. Perhaps not all, Louie. A girl needs her secrets.”

She is back to her flirting, fickle self and I feel pretty relaxed myself.

One does not wish to get too cozy with a deadly enemy, especially if one is using her for a higher purpose, but I have declawed the one creature up here who might blow my cover.