Catopolis

Those who looked at the place were either a far more discreet lot than usual, or these prospective buyers were all looking to install grow ops or operate escort services out of the place, because not one whiskery whisper of a ghostly cat had reached the papers.

Jethana Throneshuld had, however, sounded rich, haughty, and darned desperate on Steve’s answering machine. That desperation was real, because she hadn’t hesitated a second upon hearing his rates, and she wanted him on the job as soon as he could get from his end of the phone to hers.

Which is why we were now climbing the palatial stairs and ornate hallways of The Coachlight, heading for our client’s door. There was an elevator, but we both hated elevators, and it was only two flights of stairs. Stairs, moreover, that weren’t the usual filthy, chewing-gum and cigarette-littered, urine-reeking and otherwise spartan stairwell, but a soft-carpeted, gilt-trimmed pleasure to ascend.

I could shape human lips and throat to talk to Steve, but I made it a rule to do that only behind closed doors, on our premises. So I trotted along beside him looking like a feline domestic as he did the trenchcoat thing.

Hand in pocket as if resting on a gun, fedora pulled low. Right up to Ms. Jethana Throneshuld’s door, whose bell awakened distant grandfather clock chiming noises and then opened by itself, gliding inward with the ponderous velvet silence of something no mere mortal could ever afford.

No wonder she was facing financial ruin. The floor was deep white fur wherever it wasn’t glossy marble or set-into-the-floor bathing pools (kidney-shaped, of course, and she had three of them) and stretched away from us for what seemed the better part of a mile before being interrupted by a wall. A wall of glossy polished wood that wasn’t just panelled; it was carved, in a huge and complicated relief scene of stags chasing each other over rail fences in a deep wood. Thankfully the usual human hunters on horses-and their torrent of hounds-were absent.

Steve came to a stop, peeled off his rubber overshoes (and don’t ask what troubles he goes through to get such things, these days) and dropped them carefully into the zip-up pocket of his overcoat, to reveal spotless black dress shoes. Our client beamed at that, as she came gliding into view through an archway, festooned in some sort of designer negligée and what looked like a small waterfall of matching white diamonds.

“Ah, Mr. Abernathy!” Her face fell, as she added with considerably less enthusiasm, “Oh, and I see you’ve brought your pet.”

“My partner,” Steve said, firmly but pleasantly. “A live cat to sniff out a ghost cat. Should we set to work in here, or does your little problem appear only on the lower floors?”

“Ah, you do get to work immediately,” Ms. Throneshuld said approvingly, patting his arm in a my-but-I’ll-be-enjoying-this -soon rich Rosedale cougar sort of way as she passed him, to see to the door. Evidently it didn’t close by itself.

After the door clicked closed, she did things to a complicated alarm panel set behind a sliding miniature-an oval painting on porcelain, that is-beside it and came back to him.

I didn’t much like the look of her or want to approach her, and the feeling seemed to be mutual, but professional necessities are professional necessities, so I contrived to wander close to those shapely and overly spa-treated legs as she pranced past.

And contrived not to recoil, too. I’d been expecting her to smell of expensive perfumes, with an underlying reek of exfoliants and exotic tree oils, ylang ylang and all the other drek they put in shampoos and lotions these days. Instead, she smelt of death. Not murder or kitchen butchery, but old, dry, dusty death.

When death won’t go away, that means trouble. But then, the look in her eyes-not just the “I’ll see to you” look she gave me, but the very different sort of look she was giving Steve, was stronger trouble, and more immediate, too. It was the look a hungry cat gives to a witless canary that perches obligingly right in front of it.

“It’s probably best,” she purred, stopping against his chest and posing so that one bare leg could peek through the thigh-high slits in her designer come-hither-and-tear-this-little-frippery-off-me silks and press against him, “if we start in the bedroom. It’s been worst in there.”

I’ll just bet it has, dearie.

Yes, that was a catty thought, but then, I think everything catt-oh, never mind.

“Sam,” Steve said a little dreamily, “will you go in and ah, check things out, first?”

I turned my head and gave him an incredulous look. Had I just heard the lost-in-lust tone I thought I’d heard?

He smiled at me. Set take the man! He was falling for her! A reeking walking corpse, and-

“Well, isn’t that something!” Oh, so sweetly. “It’s as if she understands your every word! Just like a real person!”

And you’d know all about “real persons” HOW, sweetie?

She and Steve actually put their arms around each other’s hips, like a comfortable couple, to stand and watch the cute trained cat obey her master’s order.

So I obliged, of course. We’re partners, after all.

And we’re on the job, too. So…

The bedroom was every whit as horrible as I’d expected-zebra-skin throws over folding screens fashioned of beveled tall-as-a-person-in-killer-heels mirrors, only these mirrors had frames plated with gold, not brass, and the zebra skins weren’t just a textile design but were real pelts. Those screens flanked an oval pink fourposter bed topped with gilded posts holding up a pink oval overhead ring-frame, and a huge oval mirror was affixed to the ceiling above that. Four upright oval archways pierced the soft orange sherbet walls, all of them curtained off in a clashing shade of pink: bathroom, shoe closet, dressing room, clothes closet.

I batted aside the bed’s pink pleated skirting-of course it had pink pleated skirting, of a different shade than either the archway curtains or the rest of the bed-to peer under the bed and was gratified to see nothing but an unbroken field of white fur, free of the smallest speck of dust or cobweb. No ghost cat here.

Never leave unexplored territory between you and the known way out. I turned toward the closest archway to the bedroom door: the shoe closet, reeking with expensive leather and the very best dyes. Taking a deep breath while I was still far enough from those smells to keep myself from a fit of sneezing or choking, I prepared myself to come nose to nose with spooks.

Jethana Walkingcorpse probably kept her shoes in neat pairs on shelves-the ones she never used, that is. The others would be in untidy heaps on the floor, strewn all over the-

They were. I padded forward cautiously, springing over a few pairs into a little bare area of fur rug before the real heap began.

Where I stopped, nose prickling. Someone was happening behind me.

Just behind me.

I spun, silently. The Ghost Cat was fading into view and solidity right in front of me, between me and the archway out of this dead end. It-no, he-was smiling. A smile I knew all too well.

Hello, Little Meat.

I had to touch Steve, or any human, to mindspeak. We all have to, unless we use a spell.

Or we’re talking to immediate kin.

Only one of which had ever called me “Little Meat.”

The Ghost Cat opened his jaws wide, very wide-long yellow fangs, sharp and deadly as ever-and then smiled at me. Oh, yes, I knew him.

Suddenly I was struggling to breathe, fear like ice around my heart.

It’s been a long time, he observed pleasantly, looming up suddenly in the narrow closet as he gained full solidity and his true size.

Montuhotep. He Who Makes War and Is Pleased. Maralwshbekhtah, to use his later name.

He had another, more mundane title, too: my father.

I hadn’t seen him for centuries, but he hadn’t forgotten me or what he’d been trying to do to me at our last meeting, and that smile told me he was picking up right where he left off.