Cat In An Alien X-Ray

“See, Pops. You have totally tuned out,” Louise is whispering in my ear.

“Why should I tune in to nonsense when I have just spotted a major criminal on the scene? If the person under that white makeup and gown is not Miss Kathleen ‘the Cutter’ O’Connor preparing to attack Mr. Max and my Miss Temple and all those near and dear to her, I am the cat that ran away with the spoon.”

“The dish,” Miss Louise says in her best schoolmarm tone. “The dish eloped with the spoon. The cat just fiddled away.”

“This cat is not fiddling around.” I give a fearsome battle cry along the lines of Tarzan of the Apes vocalizations.

Then I leap three feet forward into the open as Miss Midnight Louise cries behind me, “Pop. Stop! What are you doing? Stop! You will humiliate yourself. Stop! You will cost me my job. Stop! This is my turf. Stop! They will think you are me, oh no.”

You would think Miss Louise had gotten a job as a telegraph operator with all those “stop” commands.

I am about to unveil the psychopath among us, and nothing will stop me.

I barrel toward the albino bridal couple at full speed, watching their composure crack as I near and throw myself two-thirds up the bride’s full skirt, clinging like a giant burr until my weight pulls a huge tear in the material.

“Stop!” a male human voice yells.

“Louie,” Miss Temple wails.

“This cat is crazy,” my stauesque victim screeches.

“Louise!” Miss Van von Rhine calls out, having indeed taken me for the house detective.

I leap higher to catch my shivs in the long trailing bridal veil, hoping to bare the black locks of Miss Kathleen O’Connor, human chameleon and Most Dangerous Woman Alive.

I pull down yards and yards of a cloud of tulle, that airy netted stuff, and uncover a … head of pinned-up brown hair.

Brown. That is not the hair color of a femme fatale.

I stand abashed, while human feet and shoes encircle me and human voices drift down in admonishment and anger.

In all the excitement, the living statues broke character and tried to escape my onslaught. Can an individual mount an onslaught? I do not know, but I am pretty impressive in ninja mode, especially against an all-white background.

“How did a rabid cat get in here?” The flour-decked groom’s makeup is cracking. “We will sue.”

“I am so sorry,” Miss Van von Rhine is saying, wringing her hands.

“Oh, Louie,” my Miss Temple is whispering. “He must have had some fright,” she says in a louder tone.

Me? Subject to a “fright”?