Reserved for the Cat

Alan smiled crookedly. “I expect so,” he replied comfortably. “When a Scotsman butchers a pig, he uses everything but the squeal. When presented with a monster, he’ll find a way to make someone pay to strain his eyes looking for it. I’d be very much surprised if this didn’t make the papers, or at least, the pages of the annals of fantastic occurrences. Once that happens, every landlady and publican will be re-chalking the order boards with new prices for those who come to gawk.” Then he laughed. “And every man jack of them will be lamenting that the little castle by the Loch is too ruined to rent out, and crying pity that you can’t charge for taking or painting pictures of it.”

Nigel turned to his friend. “Did you manage to pry Jonathon and Ninette away from the new trick?”

Arthur rolled his eyes. “Pry is nearly the right word. Something or other got misaligned or malfunctioned or something, and Ninette was trapped in it for a bit.”

Nigel frowned. “That couldn’t be—”

“No, it was not caused by magical interference,” Wolf assured him. “Jonathon and Arthur both made sure of that. It was nothing more sinister than the usual business with one of Jonathon’s contraptions. Evidently when he tested it, he hadn’t allowed for the weight of someone inside.”

Nigel shook his head. “Poor Ninette.”

Arthur shouted with laughter. “Poor Ninette! Poor Jonathon, rather! He had every stagehand and half the acts clustered around him while he tried to get her out, all of them offering advice. We had to restrain Bob Anderson from hacking the thing open with a fire-ax. I swear to you, a vein was throbbing on Jonathon’s temple by the time he got her out.”

“Ninette wasn’t helping, either,” Wolf said merrily.

“Well, it is a very good thing that Ninette is not afraid of the small places,” said the lady in question, causing all the men to rise out of politeness. “It was not tres amusant, but at least I was not feeling that my breath was being stolen.” She shook hands gravely with Alan before taking a seat. The cat promptly curled up at her feet and watched the newcomer with unblinking eyes. “I am Mademoiselle Dupond, as you know, and this is the cat, Thomas.”

They had only just gotten settled when the last of the party showed up. Nigel immediately felt sorry for him. Poor Jonathon, indeed! The magician’s collar was half off and unfastened, his shirt sleeves rolled up, and the knuckles of his right hand were scraped and a little bloody. “Damn genius mechanics to perdition!” he swore bitterly. “Give me an honest craftsman who isn’t too concerned with being clever!” He offered his right hand to Alan. “Forgive my shabby appearance, but I have been wrestling with someone else’s Muse.”

The Muse almost won, the cat remarked. I was beginning to think Bob was going to have to use that fire-ax after all.

“If I hadn’t got the catch to turn, I would have been the one using the ax,” Jonathon replied.

“All is well as ends well, n’est ce pas?” Ninette said calmly. “You have discovered the trick of it, and I was able to abuse you most amusingly and you could not touch me!”

Jonathon shook his fist at her and scowled fiercely and she laughed. “You frighten me not at all, magician! Where else would you find an assistant of my sort? But we should not waste this good young man’s time with our silliness,” she added. “Pardon. Now, you are the Water Master, yes? And good Nigel has told you of the plague I have brought upon his house?”

“I am and he has,” Alan nodded, and Ninette smiled warmly on him. “And I have some ideas I would like to share with you all—because this will need you all before we are through.”

“Then say on,” said Wolf, bobbing his head rapidly. “You will never have a more attentive audience.”

19

NINA reflected slyly that one of the many, many advantages of being what she was, and not a human dancer, was that she never had to trouble herself with the tedious work of classes and rehearsal if she didn’t care to. Of course, when she was dancing with a ballet company, she had to attend the company rehearsals. It would have looked odd had she not. She had not gotten as far as she had by slipping up in so careless a manner. She faithfully attended all company rehearsals and all rehearsals with her partners, but her mornings, given by mortal girls to round after round of endless classes and exercises and the solitary practice of tricky parts in the ballets then being performed, were entirely free. Ostensibly, as the great prima, she was taking very private lessons and doing her exercises in her own comfortable studio, well lit, well ventilated, warmed by good stoves in the winter and catching cooling breezes through opened windows in the summer. And of course, she always took care to have such a studio, with a gramophone in place of a pianist. All very grand. But of course, she never used it.