How To Tail a Cat

by Rebecca M. Hale

  “I slipped a little something in their water before they got to the Academy,” he explained as he motored through the stop sign without the slightest decrease in speed. “That’s what turned their skin a different color.”

  “Sam,” the woman sputtered, clenching the armrest. “Did you see that . . .”

  “Poor Dr. Kline was totally fooled,” Sam continued, grinning at the success of his covert operation.

  The van squealed through two more heart-stopping turns.

  “Uh, Sam,” the niece tried again as they approached the busy thoroughfare of Columbus Avenue.

  “Don’t get me wrong—I like Dr. Kline,” Sam added, oblivious to the looming cross traffic. “She’s a nice lady, all right.”

  The woman paled as the van careened into the wide intersection, drawing the ire of multiple car horns.

  “She just doesn’t know much about frogs.”

  Gulping, the niece nodded at a bobblehead figure of the Current Mayor stuck onto the van’s dashboard.

  “Does Monty know you’ve been borrowing his vehicle?”

  Sam winked mischievously.

  “He thinks it’s parked in the alley behind the chicken restaurant.”

  Gripping the handle above her window, the woman double-checked her seat belt.

  “He really should be more careful about where he leaves his keys.”

  • • •

  AFTER SEVERAL NEAR misses that the niece wasn’t sure how the van managed to escape unscathed, she and Sam finally arrived at Golden Gate Park’s east entrance. With few traffic impediments to avoid within the park’s boundaries, Sam guided the van without incident down a curving road and parked near a forested area a couple hundred yards behind the Academy of Sciences complex.

  A streetlamp wrapped in fog dripped a small puddle of light onto the pavement. Otherwise, the area was completely dark.

  Grabbing her tote, the woman climbed gratefully out of the front passenger seat. She met Sam at the van’s rear doors and waited as he leaned into the cargo area.

  He pulled out a ventilated glass carrier with a handle on its lid.

  “I’ll be laying low for a while after tonight’s caper,” he said, gesturing with the carrier as he locked the van. His tone and expression suggested he was looking forward to his banishment.

  “Where will you go?” the niece asked as they turned and walked through the trees toward the Academy’s rear entrance.

  “Oh, someplace deep in the woods,” Sam replied vaguely. He pointed at the green logo sewn onto his vest. “Someplace good for frogs.”

  • • •

  A FEW MINUTES later, Sam clomped up to the Academy’s back door and removed a set of keys from a pocket in his vest.

  “What about the guards?” the woman whispered as he held the set up to a security light mounted over the door, selected a key, and fed it into the lock.

  “We’ve got about twenty minutes until the security team passes back this way,” Sam replied, glancing at his watch.

  He pulled open the door and stealthily stepped inside. Gripping her flashlight, the niece slipped through after him.

  Sam paused before heading for the stairwell entrance marked “Steinhart Aquarium.” Bending toward her ear, he whispered, “I’ll meet up with you in a few.”

  He nodded toward the Swamp Exhibit. “Good luck.”

  • • •

  THE NIECE SET her flashlight to its dimmest setting and took a quick glance around the Swamp Exhibit’s darkened perimeter, circling the beam of her flashlight over the artificial banyan tree, the moss dangling from its branches, and then down to the brass seahorse balcony.

  The seahorses had been depicted in sharp detail on the picture embedded in the brass lamp’s ceramic shade. Maybe, she thought hopefully, she could avoid a dip in the tank after all.

  The woman bent to her knees and began working her way around the exhibit’s upper rim, testing each brass seahorse, searching for some slit or crack in the casting. They were remarkably well crafted, and each one was stamped with the date of the Steinhart’s original opening: 1923. But she reached the end of the circuit without finding anything of note.

  The seahorses, the niece had to concede, were far too exposed to the visiting public to contain whatever Steinhart treasure had been hidden in the Swamp. Besides, there would have been no need for her uncle and his team to remove Clive from the exhibit if the treasure were that easy to access.

  “If it’s not up here,” she mused, pushing her hair back from her eyes, “it has to be . . .”

  She aimed the flashlight’s beam down into the tank. The turtles’ dark, boulderlike shadows moved through the water, swimming slow circles around the heated rock. Several large catfish snaked along the bottom.

  She gulped, hesitating. Then she closed her eyes and took in a deep breath.

  If the treasure was hidden down inside the Swamp Exhibit, there was only one way to find out.

  She whipped off her eyeglasses, quickly exchanging them for a pair of goggles from her tote bag.

  She had to move fast. She was running out of time.

  • • •

  THE NIECE WRAPPED her hands around the balcony’s top railing and swung a leg over the bar. As she teetered back and forth, trying to regain her balance, she glanced down at the tank. It suddenly seemed like a much farther drop than she had envisioned while studying the image on the lamp.

  “Starting to wish I’d thought to ask Sam how he got in there to remove Clive,” she muttered. Pursing her lips, she slid her second leg over the railing. It was too late now for regrets.

  Carefully, she rotated her body so that she faced the balcony. Then she slowly dropped her feet down until they met the tank’s upper wall. Easing herself off the top railing, she shifted her hands to the brass seahorse brackets.

  After swinging from this halfway point for a long moment, she dropped her grip a little farther, adjusting her hold so that she was hanging from the balcony’s bottom railing. The row of decorative tile ringing the tank’s upper rim ran directly in front of her face; her legs dangled about ten feet above the water.

  Just as she was about to release the bar, she tilted her head to make one last check of the area directly beneath.

  “Oh, come on, buddy,” she moaned as a turtle meandered into her drop zone.

  Despite the niece’s urgent hissing sounds, the turtle took his time wading toward his next destination.

  “Okay,” she said when at last the space below had cleared. She took in a deep breath. “This is it.”

  She kicked back from the wall and fell into the tank.

  • • •

  “HERE YOU GO, little fellas,” Sam cooed as he leaned through the rear opening of the terrarium holding the special-exhibit frogs from South America. Cupping his hands, he gently lifted the pale-looking trio into the ventilated glass carrier.

  “You’re going to love the place where I’m taking you next,” he said as replaced the exhibit’s back cover. “Best frog accommodations ever,” he assured the carrier’s occupants. “I promise.”

  After tiptoeing down the long corridor behind the exhibits, Sam peeked out the black-painted doorway at its end. Hunched down, he crept into the aquarium’s main foyer. He was about to head for the stairwell leading up to the Academy’s main floor when he heard a loud splash.

  He turned toward the glass-ceilinged tunnel and squinted through to the opposite end.

  In the lower-level view window for the Swamp Exhibit, he spied Oscar’s niece, her hands and feet treading through the water, her long hair swirling around her face—accompanied by a large turtle, who was curiously inspecting the tank’s new specimen.

  Chapter 53

  THE OBSERVERS

  A GROUP OF four gathered in the trees near the Academy of Sciences’ rear entrance, watching the goings-on at the Swamp Exhibit through the building’s back wall of windows. All eyes focused on the building’s interior as, after a moment’s hesitation, the niece began crawling
around the seahorse balcony on her hands and knees.

  At one end of the line, Mr. Wang sat in his wheelchair, thoughtfully stroking his chin. Dilla stood behind him, nervously gripping the chair’s handles.

  When the woman slung her legs over the balcony’s top railing and began easing herself down toward the tank, Dilla pulled off her flowered hat and used it to cover her face.

  “Oh, I’m afraid to watch,” she said with a shudder.

  Beside her, Harold Wombler let out a disapproving snort as the niece’s body dropped from the balcony and splashed into the water. “Why didn’t she just use the service door at the bottom of the tank?”

  The fourth member of the group silently rubbed the scruff of his chin.

  “I think we’re done here,” James Lick said, a smile creasing his worn face as he turned and walked toward the road, pleased at the evening’s result.

  Chapter 54

  THE MARCHING HORSES

  THE NIECE PLUNGED into the water, sinking several feet into the tank. The Swamp Exhibit was far deeper than she had expected, and her feet floundered, searching for the bottom.

  Trying not to panic, she pushed her body upward. Unlike her previous drowning delusions with the spider toxin, this time the water did little to resist her efforts. With a great deal of relief, her head broke the surface, and she gasped in a deep breath of the swamp’s moist, fishy-smelling air.

  Treading water, the woman tilted her goggles away from her face to clear their interior compartments. Then she slowly spun herself in a circle, studying her surroundings.

  “See now this isn’t so bad . . .” she assured herself—before stifling a scream as a turtle bumped his head against her knees.

  • • •

  PUSHING HERSELF AWAY from the turtle, the niece tried to think back to the image on the lamp and the glowing white alligator lying on its rock.

  But then she stopped and reconsidered.

  Was the glow from the alligator or the rock underneath?

  Quickly, she paddled toward the center of the tank. Taking in another deep breath, she ducked her head beneath the water and scanned the heated rock’s lower support structure. Other than a half-eaten post, she didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary.

  Resurfacing, the woman hoisted herself up onto the rock. She paused for a moment, appreciating the radiant heat, as she pulled off the goggles and wrung some of the water from her shirt. Then, she bent to inspect the surface.

  At first glance, the rock appeared to be solid, but as she felt her hands around the base, she realized there was a small cache located just beneath. She leaned over the edge, trying to see into the hole, but darkness and water blocked her view.

  “There’s something in here,” the niece said, straining to reach her arm into the space.

  The service door at the far edge of the tank grated open, and Sam leaned out into the Swamp Exhibit.

  “Psst. Are you about done?” he whispered.

  Before she could reply, a piercing siren blasted through the air.

  “Time to go,” he yelled over the noise. He waved his hand, motioning for her to swim toward the service door.

  The woman looked back at the rock. Grimacing, she thrust her hand through the water and into the crevice. Her fingers wrapped around a small cloth-wrapped package, and with a slight tug, she yanked it out.

  There wasn’t time to inspect the package. She hopped back into the tank, crossed to the service door, and followed Sam through an interior stairwell to the first floor.

  • • •

  FORTY-FIVE SECONDS LATER, the niece scooped up her flashlight and tote bag from the floor beside the seahorse balcony. Leaving a trail of wet footsteps, she chased after Sam, who had tucked the glass carrier under his arm like a football as he chugged out the Academy’s rear door.

  The woman looked over her shoulder at the Swamp Exhibit as she sprinted away.

  A cloud shifted in the sky above the exhibit’s translucent ceiling, sending a dim glow down onto the artificial banyan tree with its clinging strings of moss. The brass seahorses glinted in the dim moonlight as they marched across the balcony.

  But as the niece squinted at the water below, it seemed to her that the flat surface of the heated rock had lost a little bit of its glow.

  Chapter 55

  THE STEINHART REWARD

  ABOUT A HALF hour later, the niece placed the soggy package from the Swamp Exhibit on the table in the kitchen above the Green Vase showroom. The woman stood on the kitchen’s tile floor, a damp towel wrapped over her wet clothes, while Rupert and Isabella occupied the chairs on either side of her.

  All three were intensely focused on the package—Isabella and her person wondering what treasure might be hidden inside, Rupert holding out hope for a chicken-related reveal.

  • • •

  USING A PAIR of scissors, the niece carefully began cutting off the package’s outer layer. The fishy-smelling fabric soon fell away from a small plastic box.

  The niece bent over the container’s modern design, perplexed. Given its pristine condition, it couldn’t have been submerged in the water for very long, perhaps no more than a few days. The box’s plastic construction certainly wasn’t anywhere close to an early 1900s-era vintage.

  Both cats leaned over the table as the woman wedged open the box and lifted out a sealed plastic bag.

  “Oh, Issy.” The niece sighed. “I think we’ve been had.”

  “Mrao,” Isabella concurred.

  Rupert, however, began sniffing energetically at the bag’s contents. It was filled with a scent he had tracked down before—in the mattress springs beneath the bed, in the crevice behind the clothes dryer, and, most recently, in a tissue box on the living room end table.

  The niece unzipped the bag and pulled out a wad of cash. Each bill contained a heavy fried-chicken scent.

  It was a reward from her uncle for following his clues, more than enough to pay the bills for the next several months, but an indication, in her mind at least, that he didn’t yet trust her with one of his valuable antique treasures.

  As Rupert hopped up on the table and began rooting through the money, the niece unfolded a single sheet of paper that had been included with the pile.

  Her uncle’s familiar handwriting scrawled out a location and the following message: “Make sure Clive gets home safely.”

  Chapter 56

  A STRANGE DUCK

  THURSDAY MORNING, SAN FRANCISCO awoke drenched in fog, its once bright sun now demoted to a translucent disc in an otherwise empty sky.

  The city shouldered up and soldiered on, slogging through the wet commute. The sluggish pulse of traffic coursed along the main thoroughfares, drawing influx from the outlying neighborhoods.

  The inbound rush across the Golden Gate split at the foot of the bridge, with one portion of the transit curving along the shoreline, the other half slicing through the Presidio and passing by the northern edge of Mountain Lake.

  Despite close proximity to all this hustle, the lake existed in a quiet, isolated bubble, nestled beneath the hill of the Presidio’s challenging golf course.

  A feathery breeze creaked through the trees surrounding the water, bending the reeds that grew up along the lake’s southeast corner. The occasional muttered curse floated down through the mist from the golfers on the hillside above. Every so often, a small child shrieked on the jungle gym near the parking lot. Otherwise, there was little to disturb the lake’s inhabitants.

  It was a swampy, secluded area, the perfect hideaway for an albino alligator seeking a little R & R from his duties as the Academy of Sciences’ most prominent public ambassador.

  • • •

  A LITTLE-USED PATH circled the lower half of the lake, leading to a worn wooden bench positioned in front of an opening in the reeds. The few pedestrians that routinely traveled the path were typically either running or riding a bike, headed toward the Presidio’s extensive trail system, and didn’t stop long enough to search the wate
r for the telltale ripple of an alligator’s snout. Consequently, Clive’s presence in the lake had gone unnoticed since his late-night arrival a few days earlier.

  On that particular Thursday morning, however, a slow-moving woman in a jogging suit and sneakers rounded the south corner of the lake. She was perhaps not as energetic as most, her pace hampered by her own physical limitations as well as the small lapdog attached to the leash she held in her right hand.

  “Now, now, Fluffy,” the woman said sternly as the dog began yapping furiously at the water. “You know you’re not allowed to chase the ducks.”

  The woman stopped near the bench and looked out across the water.

  “That’s strange,” she thought. “I don’t see any ducks out there in the lake.”

  She glanced down at her dog, who was emphatically pulling against his leash, and then returned her gaze to the water, where a trail of bubbles had begun moving toward the shoreline.

  Something was swimming beneath the surface . . . something large and white . . .

  “Fluffy,” the woman screamed, yanking the dog’s leash. She scooped up her pet just as a large jagged mouth emerged from the water.

  Chomp.

  • • •

  A HOBO LYING in the grass about fifty yards from the bench raised himself up on his elbow and whispered into a receiver tucked into his tattered sleeve.

  “Wang, this is Lick,” he said, watching the woman fleeing toward the gravel parking lot in a far more expeditious manner than she had left it minutes earlier.

  “It’s time for another distraction.”

  Chapter 57

  AN ANONYMOUS TIP

  HOXTON FIN STRODE briskly up Market Street, heading toward City Hall, where the board of supervisors’ meeting was about to get under way.

  The selection of San Francisco’s interim mayor was a serious matter, one in which he would ordinarily have been deeply vested, particularly since he still had no idea who the board would eventually choose. He had dismissed the Previous Mayor’s suggestion of Montgomery Carmichael as pure lunacy, and yet, no other sources had been able to provide a credible alternative.