Cat In A Leopard Spot

I lean over the back roof of the van just in time to see a pennant of black fur whisk out of sight into the cool dark below.

I leap down to the metal floor—an iron iceberg—and nip behind a few haunches of what I hope is beef. It is odd how we become accustomed to certain incivilities of life. Or death. I would never be hungry enough to eat a horse, despite the saying, but I would have a cow.

I almost have a cow right there when a sharp-featured appendage curls into my shoulder.

“Get behind the prime rib, Daddio. The meatheads are coming to see if the standing rack of lamb has the heebie-jeebies.”

I hunker down, toes curled against the cold, biting down hard to keep my fangs from chattering. If I had to claw my way out of here for some reason, my shivs would probably snap off like icicles.

We arrive at our desert destination during the apex of the day’s heat, but must wait many icy minutes while our chauffeurs wrestle frozen meat onto carts and out of our way.

Finally, sensing a lull in the action, I stumble to the open van door and drop down to blessed, and solar-heated, terra firma.

A moment later Louise lands beside me. We cold-foot it farther under the vehicle, obnoxious as the shade is to our chilled bodies.

“It was warmer when I was with the Yorkies,” I mention.

“Overheated, hyperactive canines.”

I roll…er, swagger to the raw edge where shadow and sunlight meet. As soon as my toes defrost, we can make a run for the big cat compound.

Meanwhile, Manny and Vinnie tramp back and forth, slinging hash, so to speak.

My stomach unfortunately objects audibly to the downloaded edibles disappearing from sight.

Manny’s engineer boots pause but a foot from my nose. “Vinnie, you will have to have that looked into.”

“Maybe one of the tires is losing air,” Vinnie says.

I hear knees creaking and scramble to hide behind an opposite wheel.

“Nope,” says Vinnie. “Tires are all pumped up.”

Midnight Louise lets out a hiss of exasperation as the boots thump away. “You and your Ghost of indigestion act. A plain old yowl would have been less intriguing to these mutton-heads. Okay. Tootsies toasty? Let us head for some cover that matches the air temperature.”

She is gone like an eightball caroming across a sand beige pool table. I streak after her, expecting toes to snap off, and am pleasantly surprised when they do not.

By an ever-handy Dumpster we catch our breaths.

“So where is this secret witness of yours?” Louise asks. “Are we heading for the house or the hills?”

It is so tempting to mislead the little snip, but my toes, frankly, are not up to laying false trails.

“The compound.”

Stalking like shadows on ice, we pad over the hot sandy dirt toward the now-familiar row of cages in the outbuilding.

“Looks like you have been busy,” Louise concedes. “You seem to know your way around this place.”

“I have hoofed this terrain from here to the Animal Oasis.”

“Animal Oasis. What is that?”

Before I can answer her, I stop to stare in shock.

It is the same old, same old, all right. Lions and tigers and…and bare cages.

Two of them.

Not just Osiris’s but the one that contained my secret witness.

Even Midnight Louise is frowning at the lineup, counting noses and coming up one too few.

“Looks like another Big Boy is AWOL,” she notes. Then she looks over and sees my expression. “Oh, no, Daddio Darnedest! Is the missing person your secret witness?”

I nod glumly.

The witness is definitely not here to see us.

I can only hope that is not a permanent condition.

Chapter 43

The Black and Blue Max

Four-thirty.

Max had been watching the world through the view screen of a video camera for so long that he felt like he was looking through the Cloaked Conjuror’s mask.

At the moment he was basking snakelike atop the artificial rocks forming the skeleton for a simulated waterfall, his black clothing so dust covered it had gone gray.

He had managed to procure a Jeep Laredo the color of mud. Driving a security-force vehicle look-alike got him fairly close to the compound. The Laredo was parked in a thicket of paloverde trees. His circuitous way to the ranch house area had been booby-trapped by so many fellow prowlers that it was almost laughable, like a scene in a Pink Panther film farce.

The three earnest hunt breakers were out there, armed with binoculars and flare guns. They too had managed to come very close, despite the patrolling security guards. That made Max more nervous than the pairs of guards that rode or walked both near and far from the ranch house. The protesters were as unpredictable as lizards, and in their safari khakis, as easy to overlook.