The Big Meow

Urruah sat down beside her, looking strangely pleased as he started to wash his face. “The look of him I don’t know,” he said, “but anyone studying this land in this time would have heard his voice. That’s Hhwalher Hhwinhel’lh. A newspaperman once, as the Silent Man was. But then he did something unusual: he invented the gossip column. Now he’s beyond famous – his column is in two thousand papers across the country, and he does a rah’hio show every night….fifty-five million listeners. In this time, he’s a superstar. And he and the Silent Man have been great friends for some while…which is interesting, since Sheba tells me that once they were great enemies.” He put his whiskers forward. “But since the Silent Man got sick, Hhwalher’s had a change of heart. Makes you think there’s some hope for ehhif after all.”

“So he’s safe there for the time being…”

“Yes. I’ll keep an eye on him for a while, if you like. We’ll all take turns at it. Meanwhile, you go make the oysters feel unsafe for a few minutes! The team’s doing what it’s here for. Arhu and Sif are out looking and listening, and taking Hwaith’s advice when it’s needed. Go on, stop micromanaging…”

Rhiow put her whiskers forward and, to please him, did as she was told. She was on her fourth oyster, obligingly fed to her by a tall dark tom-ehhif in a tuxedo, when she suddenly heard that laugh like glass going tinkle, tinkle, tinkle out of a tipped-over garbage can. Oh no, Rhiow thought, but there was nowhere to escape to: Anya Harte was heading straight for her. The queen had on another of her flouncy little dresses, in a deeper blue this time – more a peacock’s feather color – all scattered with a brittle glitter of rhinestones; and she was collared in a choker of what might or might not have been diamonds, but in any case made her look to Rhiow like a Park Avenue Peke. The little high heels came tap-tap-tapping off the ballroom floor, where she’d apparently been dancing with some tom. “And look there,” Anya cried to several of the group of toms who’d followed her out of the ballroom, “there’s one of the darling kitties! Oh, aren’t they all so adorable? And that’s the prettiest one, absolutely dead black, unlucky for most people of course, but not for me — !”

Rhiow threw a horrified glance at Urruah, who was sitting exactly a foot to the right of where he had been – safely out of tripping range, and sidled. It’s a good thing, Rhiow said silently as Miss Harte snatched her up, that I’m not so paranoid that I’d ever suspect you of setting this up.

“What a sweet face he has! Isn’t he lovely? And such big golden eyes! And – oh, my, his breath smells so fishy! Is it a fishy wishy kitty then?”

Rhiow closed her eyes in what she hoped would be mistaken for a lazy friendly expression. “Woman, you reek!” she said softly. “It’d make anyone’s eyes water.” The overpowering scent was mostly that of roses, but other rather mismatched scents seemed to have been haphazardly added to this basis — as if the wearer had mixed the bottle-remnants of several expensive perfumes together, assuming that the result would be all right just because they’d all been expensive. “Oh, Queen Iau,” Rhiow said, “please let her just put me down before I have to shred her tatty dress. Oh, not upside down!”

“But they’re dear Mr. Runyon’s friends, so we have to be nice to them,” Miss Harte said, in one too-expert move inverting Rhiow and holding her cradled on her back in her arms, exactly as Hhuha had used to do. But Hhuha hadn’t squeezed her as if she was a rag doll, and had spent her time holding Rhiow talking to her; whereas Miss Harte was talking over Rhiow’s head at the crowd of toms who were using the excuse of admiring Rhiow to admire the parts of Miss Harte she was being squeezed against. Rhiow opened her eyes again – had to, they felt like they were popping — and looked up into that pretty face, all smiles, but not a smile-line in sight, and all wide blue eyes, though those eyes were only looking into the toms’ eyes for the purpose of seeing her own reflection there. “They’re the only friends he has now, I suppose, though everybody does their best to help him along. It’s so nice that he has some company at home, it must be so hard for him to be alone so much after that dreadful woman ditched him, though I suppose everybody was expecting it, we all know what those types are like! But you wouldn’t believe the terrible kind of people he’s been keeping company with, I ran across him at lunch at Musso and Frank’s today, and the whole back room was simply aghast, because…what?”

Miss Harte trailed off, slowed down by what Rhiow thought was the only thing that could have done it, short of Iau Herself appearing in Her glory and starting in on the buffet: the toms’ faces turning away. All around them, another stillness like the one the Silent Man’s entry had produced now fell, but this one much differed in quality, as about fifty tom-ehhifs’ breaths went in and didn’t come out.