How To Tail a Cat

by Rebecca M. Hale

  Rupert paused for a moment and turned his wobbly blue eyes to gaze into her hazel ones.

  “All right, all right,” she relented with a sigh.

  Lifting the large cat over her lap, she slid herself sideways and dropped down into the scalloped-out cushion.

  Rupert immediately flopped onto his back in the preferred seat. The plump of his distended stomach swelled upward as his legs splayed out on either side.

  It wasn’t a very dignified position, but Rupert didn’t care. After gobbling down his serving of fried chicken—and checking Isabella’s bowl for any leftovers—he was the most contented cat in the universe. On top of all that, he’d just secured one of his favorite places to sleep.

  Scooping up the day’s newspaper, the niece settled into her spot. With a sigh, she propped the heels of her running shoes on the edge of the long wooden trunk positioned in front of the couch. Her hand drifted over to rub Rupert’s belly as her feet slid into the same scuffed divots her Uncle Oscar had worn into the trunk’s top planking.

  This had become their regular end-of-day routine. The niece, scanning the headlines as she recuperated from her run; Rupert, crashed out on the firmer side of the couch as he digested his afternoon chicken snack; and Isabella, lording over them both with noble disdain.

  • • •

  ALL THE WHILE, the brass lamp sat on its end table, within arm’s reach of the niece’s seat on the couch. The image of the Steinhart Aquarium’s original alligator Swamp Exhibit remained darkened and unseen, stoically waiting to be discovered.

  Chapter 7

  THE MISSION

  NEAR THE ACADEMY of Science’s rear entrance, Sam Eckles ducked behind a stone column to catch his breath. After gathering his wits and calming his pulse, he slowly peeked around the edge of his hiding place.

  His eyes slid back and forth, studying the near perimeter. He didn’t see any of his tiny tormentors lurking in the wings, but he couldn’t be sure.

  Of this, he felt certain: he was still on someone’s radar.

  Crouching near the column’s base, he waited, listening for the telltale thud of little feet, but the area had fallen silent. The afternoon penguin-feeding session at the opposite end of the building had created a momentary lull in the rush of pedia-traffic.

  After several seconds of ambient noise and more than a few concerned stares from nearby adults, Sam pushed out a steadying sigh. He couldn’t stay hidden forever. Perhaps, if he moved into the open, he could draw out the spy.

  All of his senses on high alert, Sam stepped from behind the column and took stock of his surroundings.

  His eyes widened when he realized where he’d ended up.

  As luck would have it, he found himself near the aquarium’s signature Swamp Exhibit, a multilevel feature that spanned the width of the Academy’s rear entranceway and sank two levels down into the basement below.

  This was, after all, the reason his team had concocted the frog diversion in the first place.

  This was the target of his covert operation.

  • • •

  PAUSING SEVERAL TIMES to look over his shoulder, Sam cautiously crept up to the Swamp Exhibit.

  A brass balcony surrounded an opening in the floor, providing a vertical support for patrons looking down on the occupants of the open-roofed tank below.

  Still wary of potential spies, Sam began a visual sweep of the exhibit. He turned his attention to an artificial tree with a ribbed banyanlike trunk that rose from the base of the tank all the way up to the first floor’s elevated ceiling.

  His eyes searched through the reams of fake moss that hung from the limbs, but he found nothing more than the Academy’s regular arsenal of artificial greenery.

  No one hid behind the tree’s thick trunk; no eyes peeped through its branches.

  His gaze slid down toward the brass balcony that surrounded the upper ring of the sunken exhibit. The balcony’s facing was made up of a row of vertically aligned seahorses. The flattened bodies had been artfully arranged in close parallel alignment to prevent any of the Academy’s smaller visitors from slipping through the slats.

  A few foreign tourists leaned against the railing on the opposite side of the tank, and a homeless man rested, half asleep, on a nearby bench. But no one unusual appeared to be lurking about the exhibit’s top floor, Sam quickly concluded. He could find nothing to explain the persistent and unsettling sensation that he was being watched.

  Satisfied that he had cleared the upper level, Sam leaned over the railing to look into the tank.

  A trimming of decorative ceramic tiles, each one depicting an aquatic image, ran just beneath the balcony’s footings.

  In the water below, a boulder-sized snapping turtle climbed clumsily over a half-submerged log. The awkward, lumbering creature had a wart-covered head that looked as bony as its shell. A second turtle floated, motionless, a few feet away, its short, stumpy appendages pulled inward as if it were impersonating a rock.

  Sam lingered briefly on the turtles before shifting his focus to the exhibit’s main attraction, an albino alligator that, according to a plaque posted by the brass balcony, was named Clive.

  He stared down at the creature, intrigued by its unusual coloring. He’d never seen anything quite like its scaly, segmented skin, which held just enough pigment to give off a yellowish, almost neon glow. Creamy leather squares filled in the flat length of the animal’s back; the center of each segment of skin tufted up like the baked whipped topping on a meringue pie.

  Mist began pumping out of spigots mounted onto the sides of the tank, a mechanism used to increase the humidity at the water’s surface. As the tiny droplets coated the gator’s body, the corners of his mouth curved gently upward, giving the impression of a smile.

  Slowly, Sam met the alligator’s bleary gaze, and one of the gray-pupiled, red-tinged eyeballs blinked back. For a moment, Sam forgot the paranoid fear that had gripped him minutes before.

  This was a peaceful, gentle beast—Sam could tell. He felt an instant kinship with the reptilian misfit.

  • • •

  JUST THEN, A stampede of pounding feet emanated from a distant corridor. The accompanying chorus of high-pitched screams signaled the end of the penguin-feeding session in the building’s opposite wing.

  Sam flinched, and his hands instinctively clenched the brass railing. He watched the gator’s lids sink down over its eyeballs, as if he were trying to shut out the irksome noise.

  Standing there, pressed against the seahorse balcony, staring down into the alligator’s tank, Sam felt a renewed commitment to the day’s mission.

  His voice whispered his thoughts, his tone soft but resolute.

  “Don’t worry, Clive. We’re going to get you out of here.”

  • • •

  ON THE OPPOSITE side of the Swamp Exhibit, the old man in tramp’s clothes stood up from his bench. He watched as one of the Academy’s frog scientists hurried across the atrium to greet her amphibian expert. Still bent over the seahorse balcony and staring into the tank, Sam didn’t appear to hear the woman call out to him.

  Seemingly satisfied with the turn of events, the hobo transmitted an update into the microphone tucked into his sleeve. Then, he skirted the edge of the exhibit area and crossed to the atrium.

  Thoughtfully stroking his stubbled chin, he took one last glance back at the seahorse balcony before heading toward the Academy’s front entrance.

  A little girl looked up at her mother as the old man passed by the dinosaur skeleton.

  “Mommy,” she said, lifting her tiny nose into the air. “I think I smell fried chicken.”

  Chapter 8

  A PENDING VACANCY

  OSCAR’S NIECE TILTED the newspaper, angling it to catch the rays of the setting sun coming in through the window overlooking Jackson Street. Gripping the paper’s edges, she straightened the top sheet to read the headlines on the front page’s upper fold.

  The main story, predictably, focused on the recent elect
ion of San Francisco’s mayor to lieutenant governor and the speculation about who would succeed him at City Hall.

  The Mayor had won the race with a comfortable margin—despite his penchant for hiring questionable life coaches, his well-documented frog phobia, and his two emotional breakdowns while in office (the first after the infamous frog invasion of City Hall, the second after a less publicized frog sighting on his office balcony).

  Though not overly popular with the state’s voters, the Mayor had benefited from the sweeping coattails of the incoming governor. Soon, he would be headed to Sacramento to begin his new job.

  If pressed, few, including the Mayor, could say for sure exactly what duties were required of the lieutenant’s post—other than maintaining his status as a living human being so that he could step in, should the governor become incapacitated or otherwise unavailable.

  For a man who had once been seen as a potential candidate for national office, it was a marked step down in prestige and stature. Regardless, after two tumultuous, frog-plagued terms in San Francisco, the Mayor appeared eager to leave his troubles—and the city’s pesky amphibians—behind.

  • • •

  ALL THAT REMAINED was the tricky matter of naming the Mayor’s replacement. It was a year until the next citywide election, so a temporary appointment would be needed to fill the intervening void.

  Under the city’s constitution and bylaws, the exiting Mayor had no formal role to play in the selection of his successor. Procedurally, that issue was left solely to the board of supervisors.

  The Mayor was, however, receiving a great deal of pressure from his political party to exert whatever influence he had left on the board members’ decision. Conventional wisdom assumed that whoever became the temporary nominee would have an edge over the other contenders at the next election.

  The process promised to be contentious. The number of candidates vying for consideration grew by the day. Anyone and everyone who had ever dreamed of running the city had begun lobbying the board for votes.

  With a special board session to decide the matter scheduled to be held later that week, San Francisco was abuzz with speculation over which of the contenders might succeed.

  Pushing her bifocal glasses farther up the bridge of her nose, Oscar’s niece adjusted the newsprint so she could read the full story.

  As usual, Hoxton Fin, San Francisco’s longtime political reporter, had the latest scoop.

  Chapter 9

  HOXTON FIN

  HOXTON FIN STRODE into City Hall’s marbled foyer, a man on the prowl. He jerked a nod to the security guard, who waved him through without screening.

  Hox, as he was known throughout San Francisco, had been covering local politics on and off for more than twenty-five years. The veteran reporter was a near-permanent fixture in the building, and the guards had long since bored of inspecting the contents of the backpack he carried slung over the shoulder of his rumpled tweed jacket.

  Other than the pack, Hox’s regular reporter’s ensemble included a collared shirt, typically unbuttoned at the neck; denim blue jeans, neatly belted around the waist; and a pair of sensible brown walking shoes.

  His once jet-black hair had started to pepper with gray, but the lightening color around his temples had done little to soften his dark, brooding expression. He spoke quietly, sparingly, and with a seething intensity. He was prone to outbreaks of temper, for which he rarely apologized, and an obsession with facts, in which he took great pride.

  Many were put off by the reporter’s direct questioning; his sharp probing stare and often sarcastic remarks tended to rankle those with sensitive dispositions.

  Hox was unsympathetic to criticisms of his investigative approach; such complaints merely caused him to probe further.

  Only a few trusted colleagues had managed to penetrate the man’s stiff outer shell. Most of those would say that an even harder surface lay beneath.

  Somewhere within that dry emotional desert, however, Hox carried a wry sense of humor and a fondness for practical jokes—so long as he wasn’t the butt of them.

  “Howdy-ho, Hox,” the guard called out as the reporter shifted his pack to the opposite shoulder and marched through the scanner.

  The greeting earned the guard a silent but withering look.

  “I mean, hello, Hox . . . Hox . . . Mr. Hoxton, sir,” the guard stuttered, before stuffing a half-eaten sandwich into his mouth as a means of deflecting attention.

  With a last iron stare, Hox turned and walked out of the security area. As he turned from the still-blushing guard, the thin crease of a smile appeared on his rugged face.

  In a voice that was barely audible to the sandwich-munching guard, he replied, “Hox is fine, thanks.”

  • • •

  THERE WAS A slight hitch to Hox’s gait as he crossed beneath the dome of City Hall’s ornate rotunda and headed toward the central marble staircase leading to the building’s second floor. The hobble was due to an injury he’d sustained several years earlier while visiting the Los Angeles Zoo with his then movie-star wife.

  Because of the zoo administrator’s fondness for one of his wife’s films, the couple had been invited to a behind-the-scenes visit with a rare komodo dragon. Prior to entering the cage, the reporter had been cautioned by zoo personnel to remove his white tennis shoes, lest they be confused for the mice that were routinely included in the dragon’s meals.

  Unfortunately, removal of Hox’s shoes had done little to deter the dragon from the tempting morsels at the end of his feet. No sooner had the couple stepped into the beast’s enclosure than the wily lizard nipped off the end of Hox’s left big toe.

  There were conflicting reports about the melee that followed the attack. Some sources alleged that the terrified movie star fled the cage, leaving her husband alone to wrestle the komodo for his missing digit. Others, primarily associated with the starlet’s publicist, claimed that she fiercely defended her husband against the rampaging lizard and had to be forcibly dragged from the cage by the zoo-keeping staff.

  This much was certain. After the unsuccessful reattachment surgery and the couple’s subsequent divorce, Hox’s already brash demeanor had become far more abrasive.

  The only thing that made him crankier than standing for long periods of time on the ampu-toed foot was the sight of an advertisement for his former wife’s next movie.

  • • •

  A WINCE TWITCHED the corners of Hox’s face as he continued to climb City Hall’s central marble staircase. Halfway up the steps, he pulled a small, tablet-sized notebook from his inside jacket pocket and whacked it against his left thigh.

  The action was primarily meant to be a distraction from the piercing pain in his foot, but it also served a second, more aesthetic purpose.

  Hox preferred the old-fashioned way of reporting. The scratching sound of a pencil scribbling on paper, the sight of coded notes scrawled across a page, the pride of reading his byline laid out on traditional broadsheet newsprint—this was what he lived for. But the most satisfying sensation of his trade, bar none, was the smarting pop of a notepad slapping across his leg.

  Sadly, these physical embodiments of his life’s work were quickly disappearing. Whether he liked it or not, he was slowly but surely being dragged into the new age of digital media. His City Hall beat now included blogs, tweets, chat rooms, and, the most onerous on the list, television appearances.

  Hox groaned, thinking of the last item.

  The paper had recently formed an unorthodox—and, in his view, ungodly—alliance with one of the local television news stations. Touted as a means for streamlining and efficiency, the end result had been the creation of a regular “man about town” video feature in which he, unfortunately, played a starring role.

  During his long and prestigious journalism career, Hox had won several awards and commendations. In addition to his local political beat, he had covered military conflicts in overseas war zones, political races at the state and national level, and criti
cal public policy issues such as health care, education, and the justice system.

  The newspaper’s joint media venture was only a few days old, but already he had been forced, under vigorous protest, to do a fluff piece on San Francisco’s local albino alligator—along with a sourdough replica that a bakery by the wharf had cooked up as a tribute.

  “Sourdough Clive,” Hox muttered with an extra forceful whap of the notepad. “Lowest point of my career.”

  • • •

  AT THE TOP of the stairs, Hox veered left toward the supervisors’ hall of offices. A few steps later, he paused to glance at his reflection on a glass wall outside the main corridor. Groaning, he ran his hand over the top of his head.

  To add insult to injury, the station had recently assigned him a stylist, a wispy little man named Humphrey whose first order of business had been to give the reporter a haircut.

  Hox was still bitter with the results.

  Humphrey had somehow convinced Hox that a new hairstyle would help cover the growing bald patch at the back of his head. Hox hadn’t really understood how combing his hair toward the center of his head would accomplish this feat, but he had, begrudgingly, allowed Humphrey to proceed.

  “What a disaster,” Hox grumbled under his breath as he gingerly poked at the quarter-inch spike running down the middle of his scalp.

  The new hairstyle had disrupted his entire morning routine. It had taken him half an hour to comb it into place, and he still wasn’t sure he’d performed the maneuver correctly. Not once in his entire life had he been coiffed in such a ridiculous fashion.

  With a sigh, he stepped away from the glass.

  Instinctively, he dropped his hand to the thick mustache that covered his upper lip, taking comfort in its familiar coarse stubble. So far, he’d managed to fend off Humphrey’s efforts to trim his thick eyebrows and overgrown mustache, but that, he sensed, wouldn’t last much longer.

  “I’m too old for this nonsense,” he muttered as he prepared for the inevitable round of gibes he was about to receive in the next room.