Cat In An Alphabet Soup (Catnap)

Here, I swear, the man turns to gloat in my direction, even though my sixty hours have a good thirty to run. I can count. For the first time I notice that he has a squint and a hunchback. And a mouse-dropping-size wart on his chin. With a long black hair growing out of it.

“Can you carry one?” the woman asks. She has a warm, kindly face, as I say before, and cradles Baker upon her warm, kindly bosom.

Jug-ears takes Taylor and shuffles to the door.

“I am absolutely delighted,” the woman croons, patting Baker’s runty ears as she leaves. "I run the mystery bookstore in town. You will never know how appropriate to the shop these two are. I am so glad that I took time off from the ABA to come in. That stuffed Baker and Taylor exhibit convinced me I could not live without more cats.”

Off they go, my motive for being in this predicament. I find myself in the same state of disbelief as Miss Maeveleen Pearl, for it is obviously she, the capo of the Thrill 'n' Quill Bookstore, who has rescued B and T from their imminent demise on the business end of a hypodermic.

Some might think that B and T's salvation is worth my forthcoming personal sacrifice. I do not. My bacon now rides solely on the ability of Miss Temple Barr to think of looking for me in this den of death and dogs. Only the thought of another's misfortune is enough to cheer me up for a fleeting instant.

That snooty Ingram will not be pleased to share a shop with Baker and Taylor.

21

Alone at Last

ABA attendeeswere streaming from the convention center’s front entry as if five-thirty p.m. were a Cinderella deadline when Temple cruised the Storm past the Rotunda’s flying-saucer-shaped dome. She always expected the robotic Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still to issue from the entrance, but only ordinary earthlings ever did. She had to credit the ABA-goers for being a well-ordered, obedient crowd—with the single, startling exception of murder.

Even the rear employee parking lot was a checkerboard of empty spaces. The Storm’s air-conditioning fan whooshed full blast as Temple pulled into a slot, blowing the short red curls off her damp forehead.

Bud Dubbs bustled out the back door into the 100-plus, his seersucker sport coat hooked over a finger.

“ Where’ve you been, Temple? That Lieutenant Molina called for you several times.”

“I’ve been trailing the elusive Baker and Taylor. Any message from an Eightball O’Rourke? What about Midnight Louie, anybody see him?”

Bud did a dime stop and a double take. “Not that I know of. Eightball O’Rourke? You playing the horses these days? Valerie might have taken a message from O’Rourke. Forget that stray cat. Check your desk. God, it’s hot. See you tomorrow.”

Bud dived into the front seat of his Celica and punched on his air conditioner.

An uncommon quiet inhabited the center’s back halls. Most of the exhibitors must have cut out on the stroke of five-thirty, too. Temple quickened her pace. The security people wanted as few staff as possible around after closing. If she didn’t decamp by six, there’d be only one exit door that wasn’t on the alarm system, and that would be guarded.

Bud had been right; Temple’s desk was pocked with yellow memo forms. “While you were out—” they told her, she had missed calls from everyone but Midnight Louie, it seemed... P. E. O’Rourke, Lieutenant Molina, Emily Adcock, Lorna Fennick.