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She was so furious she could have kicked him on the shins, but she controlled herself admirably, she thought. She said, ‘Til get into something and come over.”

He calmed suddenly, shaking his head. “Well, I did it again, didn’t I? I’m always doing it with you.”

“You’d better do a little public relations work on yourself, Greg, instead of hiring people to do it for you.”

He stood like a boy caught robbing the deep freeze. She walked to the hutch, picked up the five-dollar bill, and handed it to him. “Here’s your five dollars. I don’t want to see you throw your money away. Nobody can do anything about your image.”

Greg took the bill as if it might snap at him. “I do care, Patti, don’t you see? Why don’t we sit down like sensible people and calmly and quietly – “

“Okay – whenever you think the description fits you.”

“If you’d keep your cat tied up

“

“And have him turn into a frustrated, neurotic old man?”

“You’d rather have a frustrated, neurotic old neighbor maybe?”

She repeated, “I’ll get into something and come over.”

As he left, he said, “All right, and be sure to bring the fire department with you, because, man, if that cat had had some­thing to hold to he’d have been the first one on the moon.”

In the glare of giant spotlights a ladder rose from the bed of a fire truck straight toward D.C., who sat swaying on the highest branch. He looked with keen interest on the equip­ment below and the mob of firemen, police officers, and neighbors. Not bad, not bad at all. Man, he really had a blast going. It was odd. Some nights he went out and couldn’t find any action, and other nights, when he was only half trying, he would hit it lucky and get a whole neighborhood out of bed.

He saw his assassin wandering around down there, and the hair from his neck straight down his backbone stood on end.

As a fireman reached for him, D.C. hissed and backed further out on the limb. He never permitted strangers to touch him. Besides, it was a long way down if he were dropped, and his springs were not exactly factory new.

The fireman beat a retreat when he saw an intent in D.C.‘s eyes that could be catalogued only as murderous. On the ground below, Greg said, “Let me up there. I’ll get the little fiend.”

“Don’t,” Patti half screamed. “He’ll murder him. He’s al­ready tried once tonight.”

Greg started up, moving fast and with the agility of an athlete. From his eyrie above, D.C. watched fascinated. With each rung Greg took, D.C. whisked his tail a little more in anticipation.

At last Greg took the final step on the ladder, which swayed in the wind. He drew a deep breath, steadied himself, and stared into D.C.‘s eyes, which observed him with a hunter’s instinct for timing. That was the secret, timing. If he were off even a second

.

Greg reached for him, which was a gross mistake since it put on display one long, narrow arm. D.C. would have sworn from a cursory examination of the exposed part that Greg was thick-skinned, but he drew blood easily in one knifelike swipe that began a little above the elbow and ran to the wrist. Greg almost backed off the ladder. Below, a fireman yelled in alarm. Greg groaned and swore, and D.C. smiled.

Greg returned to earth with the suggestion that they should fire a tranquilizer into D.C., the way humane officers do when they trap an escaped wild animal. “It’s the only way you’ll ever get him down without somebody losing an arm.”

Ingrid proved him wrong. After much pleading she was permitted to climb the ladder. D.C. followed her progress with an expression on his little face of consummate happi­ness. He had known all along that eventually she or Patti would come for him. They spent their lives protecting and caring for him, and in this crisis they would not let him be carried down in ignominy by the enemy.

He leaped to her shoulder and licked her on the cheek. He kissed her not only because he loved her but because he had the largest audience of his career. People relished little gestures like that. It simply got them deep down.

And it did. Watching below, a woman tugged at her hus­band’s robe. “Did you see that, Joe? He kissed her for saving his life.” Joe grunted.

Holding his arm, which a fireman had bandaged, Greg said to Joe, “Cats! They’ve got everybody in Hollywood beaten seven ways to kingdom come for acting. They’re all fiends in baby clothes.”

Once on the ground, D.C. reached over from his perch on Ingrid’s shoulders to lick Patti, and then the three, Ingrid, Patti, and Mike, thanked the officers and firemen profusely.

In her good nights, Patti reluctantly included Greg.

19

The next morning at breakfast Helen Jenkins remarked quietly, “I heard you talking last night.”

Sammy choked on his bacon and Dan became a study in still life. “Care for more coffee?” she asked, and when Dan nodded by rote, she poured with hands steadied by a will she never knew she possessed.