Cat In An Aqua Storm

6

No Love Lost

Alone at last! No sooner has Miss Temple Barr torn out of the apartment on an errand of mercy than I take the opportunity of eating the sliced turkey off the top of my tasteless pile of pet food, a veritable Everest of rabbit pellets.

My next task is to find a suitable spot for intense cogitation. After exploring the familiar terrain, I find that my hasty roommate has left an emerald silk dress flung across the bed in her flurry to find attire appropriate to the hospital.

First I pat the dress into the proper formation with my mitts, a task I manage without much resorting to my crudely clipped nails from the vet’s. Then I turn around on it precisely six times. Those of my particular breed are superstitious about numbers. Perhaps it comes of having nine lives, but we tend to do things in multiples of three.

Once the garment is nicely crumpled so the night-light reflects faintly off its subtle shades of green (the virtual twin to my own eye color), I allow my footsore nineteen-plus pounds to press the material into its new, nestlike shape.

Now I can think. And I have much to contemplate. While Miss Temple Barr's obnoxious new cuisine is most off-putting, it alone is not enough to drive a dude to a binge away from home. I am long used to feeding myself quite well without the intervention of a can opener, however convenient such a labor-saving device may be. When it comes to handouts, Midnight Louie is no slouch.

Monday morning, even before Miss Temple Barr arises, I returned to cruising the streets. I am not afraid of work if it is amiable. Within my first hour away from home I collect a sixth of a Big Mac, a melted Dairy Queen in a plastic lid and four olives.

It is while wandering from way station to way station that I pass the Thrill 'n' Quill Bookstore, its windows thronging with murderous tomes and one sleeping tom of my acquaintance.

By stretching full length I can tap the plate glass right where Ingram’s pale pink nose is pressing. He starts awake as if bee-stung, ears askew and rabies tags clashing at his collar line. When he recognizes me, he shows his teeth in a less than cordial welcome.

This cuts no ice with Miss Maeveleen Pearl, proprietress of the Thrill 'n' Quill. She bustles over to let the poor sot out. “Oh, Ingram,” I hear her croon as the door opens. (Miss Maeveleen Pearl never speaks but in a syrupy tone that would glue most people’s lips together.) “Your little friend has come calling again. Isn’t that sweet? Besides, I wanted to arrange Baker and Taylor in that window anyway. There you go."

Ingram, out the door in a jiffy, is still growling when I approach him. He sits on the concrete stoop and angrily boxes his muzzle with his mitts. This ritual of keeping his nose clean seems more along the lines of slapping some sense into himself, which he could use, in my opinion.

He is in no mood to thank me for his sudden furlough, but watches the display window sourly as Miss Maeveleen Pearl sets about arranging a pair of stuffed Scottish fold-type felines amongst the books.

Her devotion to these inert bozos, Ingram tells me, borders on the psychotic.

“A human must have her hobby," I reply, reaching out to give Ingram’s rabies tags a jingle. "Now quit whining and tell me what is happening in this town of late."

Ingram is the scholarly sort who thinks nothing of drifting off over the entertainment section of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. It is amazing what he can commit to memory without even trying.

Well, he says, spreading his toes so as to count off on his six digits (Ingram’s forebears are prone to quirky genetic modifications), the Cat’s Meow shop across from the Sands has quite a few layabouts on the premises, but the word is the proprietor is kind of a Carrie Nation teetotaler.

This is bad news. While I have no time for Scottish folds, in the flesh or the fabric, I am partial to a touch of scotch in my milk now and again.

"What kind of Carrie Nation is she?” I inquire. There is a cute kitten or two at the Cat’s Meow I have my eye on.

“She is a crusader, and not the rabbit kind,” Ingram replies. He tells me certain dudes of an uninhibited nature have been disappearing from the alley behind the Cat’s Meow and when they show up again, they are singing soprano. Not, Ingram adds snootily, that there is anything wrong with a higher register.

He is one to talk, having long since sacrificed his masculine prowess to the dubious joys of being a kept cat.

"Dudes are being swept off the street and returned minus their operative parts?” I demand in horror and something of a Magnum PI falsetto. My imagination is hitting the roof too.

Ingram nods sagely, his old-gold eyes glimmering. It is true, he says, so help him, Havana Brown. The atrocities, he goes on, are part of a pet population control program.

“If they want to control the pet population,” I growl, “why do they not stick to pets, instead of snatching innocent dudes off the street and abstracting their oysters? Have you any news that will not turn my stomach?"

Kitty City, says he, is offering a new revue of naked talent.

I report that I am not interested in transfeline entertainment.

Too bad, says he. Then you will not be interested in the fact that the Goliath Hotel is hosting a competition of striptease artists of all sexes including questionable.

“Why should I be?" I reply.

Here Ingram looks unbearably sly and runs his barbed pink tongue over his scanty whiskers. He hears, he goes on, that Miss Savannah Ashleigh, the film star, will help judge the action at the striptease competition. Is not this the same Savannah Ashleigh who visited my old stomping grounds, the Crystal Phoenix Hotel and Casino, in palmier days, along with her companion, a foxy number of the female persuasion named Yvette?

I stare at Ingram as if seeing him for the first time. The name “Yvette” hits my ears like a bouncer’s fists. Yvette. The Divine Yvette. I hear again her subtle throaty voice, see the infinitely changing kaleidoscope of her baby blue-greens, feel sable-tipped silver fur brushing against my broad shoulders....

The Divine Yvette is back in town.

Wait, Ingram yodels in his scratchy voice as I rocket down the street, headed for the Goliath Hotel, do you not wish to learn about the exotic goldfish display at the Mirage—?

I pay no mind. If there is any force on earth that can distract me from the pursuit of food, it is the Divine Yvette.

In fact, even thinking of her in retrospect as I lounge here in silken comfort in the lap of Miss Temple Barr’s luxury almost makes me forget the shocking events of the past twelve hours, in which I have slipped the gentle bonds of my little doll’s attentions. I doze off, dreaming of crystal ashtrays brimming with champagne, catnip caviar and a world-class lady friend with whom to share them.