Cat In An Alphabet Soup (Catnap)

No one is happier than yours truly that this ABA thing is over. For one thing, I no longer have to worry about being nabbed on a homicide charge. Although I sport a couple fistfuls of switchblades, few even in this town would confuse any one of them for a knitting needle.

I have also reached a satisfactory arrangement with Miss Temple Barr on my domestic accommodations. She now leaves the guest bathroom window open just enough so that I can shimmy in and out of an evening.

At first I am afraid that Baker and Taylor’s close call in the city pound will encourage her to curtail my, ah, movements. But she lightens up once the wrong-doer is caught—and even more once Mr. Matt Devine makes a friendly overture—and I have no trouble swaying her to my way of thinking.

So I am out and about these days and even stroll up the

Strip to the Crystal Phoenix, where I am made much of, seeing as how even a little of Midnight Louie goes a long way.

I am doing fine, but I am not too sure about my pal Ingram. His muzzle turns a shade lighter in one day, I swear. The close call with Baker and Taylor preys upon his mind. He is not one to share his territory. His person, Miss Maeveleen Pearl, has severely undermined Ingram's confidence in her good taste and sense. He is often to be found curled upon those noxious tomes known as self-help books, such titles as People Who Love Pets Who Love Their Creature Comforts and When Good Things Happen to Bad Dogs.

“Uncivil accents, Louie,” Ingram rails when I come around for a stoopside chat. “No decent ears to speak of. Called me ‘laddie.’ In my own place!”

I can see the whites of his eyes.

It does not help that Miss Temple Barr, in one of the diplomatic gestures she is known for, has bestowed Baker and Taylor—the shills—on Miss Maeveleen Pearl, whose whimsy it is to arrange their floppy bodies in various spots throughout the Thrill ’n' Quill. Ingram is never sure where they will turn up next, perhaps in his very own bed.

Desist, I tell him, after hearing these complaints for the nth time. It is no use telling him that discussions in stir with the live Baker and Taylor on their abductor’s apparent gender—as well as the Scottish name Ian, and its kinship to the Gaelic Eoin and the Welsh Owen—enabled me to nail the ABA murderer.

Some might marvel that I, in my usual toothsome way, should emphasize as a clue the very word that is the culprit’s long-forgotten baptismal name.