Cat In A Diamond Dazzle

Chapter 20

Long John Louie

Greater love hath no cat for his human, than that he should get wet in her service.

Wet? I am waterlogged in the first degree.

At least it is an artificial body of water, so my own torso is not subject to fish-nips, leeches and other things that go glub in thedeeps.

Much as I like to give my finned friends the occasional love-nip, the truth is that they do bite and my terminal member looks much like a black caterpiller fallen on hard times.

So I sit in the semi-dark atop this somewhat wooden, naked and truncated lady known as a figurehead (why a head when her most prominent figure feature is somewhat lower, I do not know), tending to my grooming. I am relieved that Miss Temple has finally gotten her wits about her and noticed both my heroic actions on her behalf, and my long, slow recuperation afterward.

How I got here and did what I did is simple. When Miss Temple Barr leaves the scene of the crime these days--and these days the scene of the crime is my beloved alma mater, the Crystal Phoenix, sad to say--she is off on errands of a peculiarly repellent nature: looking for love in all the wrong places, such as a shoe store.

I do not know what the big deal is all about with my little doll and the two dudes at the Circle Ritz.

The solution is simple, as my old friend Sassasfras would say to her many suitors: You got the dime, I got the time.

I do not understand why humans are so addicted to the notion of exclusivity. If we felines followed that creed, we would be on the verge of extinction. True, I have been wounded by the darts of that Persian enchantress, the lissome Yvette. But this does not mean that Midnight Louie is off the romance shelf and stamped "Expired." No, siree. I am free to come and go, and do a good bit of both.

It seems to my beknighted mind that Miss Temple would do better in her relationships with the opposite sex if she would adopt a feline point of view. Obviously, the Mystifying Max is a roamer who should be taken on his own terms and enjoyed when he is in town. Mr. Matt Devine is more domesticated, although he is unaccountably persnickety about the rules and regulations for activities that are best pursued in an improvisational frame of mind. So Miss Temple can have her cupcake and eat it too, if she would only see that it takes two to tango, and they are often both asking her to dance.

However, I am not about to meddle in these complex human hormonal matters. Where I hope to lend a helping hand, so to speak, is in a smaller area of operation: Miss Temple's devotion to footwear.

Although I myself eschew decorative accessories, far be it from me to sneer at another's obsession, especially when it is a leather fetish. Yum-yum. I like nothing better than a good chew now and then, a long-standing masculine pleasure, and Miss Temple has the leather goods to keep my habit humming.

(Although she does wax indignant when I slobber on her suede.)

Now that I know that a master of the shoemaker's art has been enlightened enough to use an image reminiscent of me on some of his creations, I can only extend all the powers at my command in assisting Miss Temple to obtain these rare objects.

This is why I followed her from the Crystal Phoenix, this is why my lightning-swift brain immediately surmised that her interest in things nautical had more to do with greed (as is usual with pirates then and now) than with wanderlust. This is why I risked body and soul by boarding the pirate ship. Who else could run so neatly over the rigging? Could cling so doggedly to the treasure chest, until all its tawdry contents had been exposed and dropped to deck?

Who else could face the burning deck without getting his whiskers singed? Who could be the last man ... male ... to desert ship? Who could paddle through the dark, disgusting water until he made shore safely, then find a high and dry refuge in plain sight of my distraught roommate, who by then had, to her credit but my underestimation, presumed me dead?

Only Midnight Louie is equipped to handle these kinds of crises. Please do not try these feats in your own home. There could be consequences and an investigation by the Federal Communications Commission.