Cat In An Aqua Storm

Then things commence to get hectic. In no time flat, a couple of brave souls peek in to verify the Puke-cannon claims. They retreat. I am forced to bid my Lost One a long goodbye (which has certain compensations).

I no sooner desert the dressing room for a bird’s-eye view atop a costume cabinet in the hall than I hear the hysterical approach of little pink feet: the extremities of the Divine One’s so-called owner (a convention my kind accepts only to lull human companions into the proper state of ignorance as to who really has the upper mitt in such arrangements).

Miss Savannah Ashleigh proceeds to wail in the hall and demand that someone enter the dressing room and extract “her Darling" from the awful place. Cooler heads point out that the police will want to see the scene untouched.

She does not care, Miss Ashleigh declares, pacing back and forth, what the police want to see. Her Darling must not be subjected to such stress. She clutches her throat, a gesture I find tasteless given the likely means of the deceased's death, but then I also find Miss Savannah Ashleigh is untalented enough to give even tastelessness a bad name.

At length another old friend from the ABA strides onto the scene. I could jump down on her head from here, and contemplate that, considering the bad time Lieutenant C. R. Molina saw fit to give the delightful Miss Temple Barr in that instance.

Instead I eavesdrop, yawning. The sound of yammering, excited humans is hard on the ears. Eventually I drop into a meditative state, repeating a soothing mantra, tuuu-nah... tuuu-nah... tuuu-nah” (Carp is a personal favorite of mine, but its short, sharp name does not lend itself to musing upon.) With such a password to psychic peace, I could snooze at a dogfight, and often have.

I stay only long enough to see the Divine Yvette borne from the room at the hands of Lieutenant Molina herself.

“The carrier has to stay until our technicians are done with it,” she tells Miss Savannah Ashleigh, who is draping her right shoulder with Yvette’s languid length and making much over her. (Meanwhile, Yvette is making blue-green goo-goo eyes at me atop the cabinet.)

“Oh, thank you, Lieutenant,” babbles Miss Savannah. “See how the Poor Baby is purring with joy at reuniting with Momsy! Please tell me what you think happened to My Darling in that awful room. We will be in the private dressing room next door.”