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Twenty-seven

The gun was no longer at her head when Rose drove the car onto the first available car ferry after a long delay. It was stuck in her side, so the ferry crewman loading the boat couldn't see it. The man with the gun had been in such a hurry to make the ferry that they were the first to board, despite the fact that this morning only one car ferry was making the commuter run and the 6:40 did not run that morning, while the 7:40 ran almost an hour late and didn't load until almost 8:26. She knew the time precisely. The gunman kept asking her for the time as he prodded her. Despite the winter wind outside the car, she was sweating so badly her hair was soaked. Normally inside the car she took her coat off on the way to work, but of course, the gunman wasn't particularly concerned about her comfort.

She tried, briefly, to establish some rapport, to do what the experts suggested and get him to think of her as a human being rather than as some thing which was in his way.

"I understand why you're doing this—that my phone message about your license number threatened you, but honestly, that's all it was, a threat. If you hadn't rifled my purse, the whole thing would never have escalated the way it did."

"I didn't take it," the gunman said. "He did. And I'm damned if I'm going to take responsibility for his stupidity. As for you, you should have minded your own business."

"I was," she said. "I'm a social worker. Really, I had absolutely nothing on anybody, except that the way your conversation was going made me think of a case I've been working on with a friend of mine who's a policeman. I'm sure you're a perfectly nice man who would never dream of harming a child . . ." Right. And she was Mother Teresa. He was such a nice man he had a gun in her ribs.

"That's right. I don't harm children, I love children, something you self-righteous busybodies never consider. Children like to be loved—who doesn't? They crave contact, ask for it, beg for it, only because you think it's wrong, because you're afraid of the competition from the smooth skin and the clear eyes and the soft hair . . .there's nothing wrong with loving children, no matter what laws you man-haters manage to have passed. After all, we feed and support them, clothe them, pay for their schooling; why shouldn't they love us? If you think I'm going to let you ruin my life because you feel threatened by my sexual preferences, you're quite mistaken. And if Hopkins thinks he will survive watching my ass get fried without getting burnt himself, he's mistaken as hell."

"I see."

"Do you? You gave the police my license number, but I know a thing or two about evidence, my dear, and if you aren't there to present it yourself, there's nothing but hearsay . . ."

"There's the tape on the answering machine of my police friend . . ."

"If he remembers to save it. And even then, what else is there? No, you will cost me my photograph collection, which I will have to destroy or hide, but I'll be all right. Especially since I am going to see to it that Hopkins is forced to help me take care of you and will therefore be only too happy to assist in seeing that those who would persecute both of us are able to harm neither of us."

She didn't ask what he intended to do about her. She didn't want to know.

By the time the ferry came, it had been a very long two hours and her bladder was about to burst. Maybe she could get him to let her use the head below decks, if not on the passenger deck.

"No tricks," the gunman warned as she nosed the car forward, stopped where she was told, just behind the chain separating the car deck from the cold, olive-green waters of Puget Sound.

"No worries," she said.

"See that there aren't," he told her. "I can't kill you here, but one peep out of you and I lock you in the trunk."

She didn't see how he could really do that, but if he got lucky she supposed he could get away with it. The crew didn't frequent this end of the boat until the end of the run, when they tied up at the dock, and at this hour, passengers who weren't upstairs on the passenger deck were catching extra sleep in their cars or were deeply sunk into early-morning-commuter hypnosis and paid little attention to what was happening around them. She could scream, maybe. Somehow, with the gun trained on her at close range, that didn't seem an option.

Once they were parked, she said, "I have to pee. Bad."

"Hold it," he told her.

"I can't hold it anymore. It's going to be really messy and stinky in here pretty soon. If we're stopped, it'll be suspicious," she added.

"Don't be cute," he said. "If you think I'm letting you go up to the powder room to discuss our relationship with the other ladies, you must have formed a very low impression of my intelligence."

"No, but there's a head between the staircases. You can stand guard. Please. I really have to go."

She hadn't used this head very often. The interior was battleship-gray and the fixtures extremely utilitarian and rather grubby. It was just a long, narrow closet with the toilet at the back and a basin in the middle. Mops and pails were often stacked to one side.

He came in with her. "Okay," he said, facing her. "Go."

"I—can't," she said. "Not with you watching."

"Then do it in the trunk, I don't care," he said, opening the door and motioning her through it."No, really, I have to but I can't . . ."

"Out." He pointed the gun at her. This was the most extreme case of piss-or-get-off-the-pot she'd ever heard of, much less been in, she thought, but discomfort and desperation won out over fear.

"No. You get out. Shoot me in here or drag me out screaming, but you're going to make a lot of noise and draw a lot of attention to yourself. I don't know what you think you're accomplishing by all this, but I'll be damned if I'm going to die from a busted bladder or humiliation."

"I could just shoot you through the knee or the arm," he said, and she could see that her rebellion was going to cost her. As long as she seemed docile, he might relax around her. If she caused trouble . . .

"Or you could just go outside and let me do this in peace," she said, and it was no effort to allow a pleading note to enter her voice.

"I have bullets that will penetrate this door," he told her.

She just stared at him. He fumbled with the door and backed out, pocketing the gun.

Damn, too bad this was a ferryboat bathroom without a handy window to sneak out of. The first thing she did was to lean over and turn on the faucet, allowing the water to trickle; then she relieved herself, after which it was much easier to think of an escape plan.

She could just start screaming, but the bathroom was encased in the heavy steel of the interior hull, the ferry's engines were loud, everyone but the few crew members below decks was locked behind closed car doors and rolled-up windows. If she made a run for it, this nut might start shooting through cars to get her and hurt other people. If she led him upstairs, where there were more people, possibly she could get away, get help. Didn't any of the senior crew carry a weapon for security?

What she needed was, as they said in the movies, a distraction, but she didn't think throwing a rock to make noises elsewhere was going to do the trick this time. What she needed more was a SWAT team, but she would have settled for Felicity, who was AWOL just when she most needed a fairy—or even a ferry—godmother.

 

* * *

 

As soon as Felicity emerged from Raydir Quantrill's sound room, where she had used an ancient Tibetan technique similar to that used by Yoda in Star Wars to make the musician overlook her presence and heed only her words, she sensed Rose's distress. She also sensed Fred's, since at one time he had been as close to her as Rose was now. There was so much pain, so much suffering, so much despair and desperation in a city the size of Seattle, that even she could only differentiate between the general miasma of anxiety and anguish and the specific difficulties of her own associates. She stood in Quantrill's Japanese garden overlooking the Sound and listened with her heart and mind.

She heard Rose, quite clearly, across the water, and Fred somewhere near it. She had to get to them. Her car was still at the mechanic's. Perhaps she could use a bit of her magic to nudge things a little, maybe even have the mechanic deliver her completely repaired car to her here in the next minute . . .

"What do you think, Bobby?" she asked, patting her pocket, which, to her surprise, was empty. In her concentration on concealing her presence, she hadn't noticed the toad's defection.

From behind her, someone coughed politely.

Felicity turned and groaned when she saw who it was: a woman, like herself of indeterminate age, with carefully coiffed pale hair, wearing a gray-and-moss-colored Harris Tweed business suit with a Nottingham lace collar and cuffs peeking out of the jacket and a clean handker-chief of similar make in her breast pocket. Silvery half-glasses perched on her nose, though she certainly could have afforded contact lenses, and she carried a briefcase and wore dark tights and sensible walking shoes.

"Dame Prudence, how very nice to see you!" Felicity greeted the chairperson of the Godmothers' Accounting Committee with less than her usual sincerity.

Dame Prudence raised carefully penciled brows over eyes that were pencil-lead gray rather than Felicity's own opalescent silver. "I'm delighted that you think so, Flitters. I was afraid that after our last encounter, your enthusiasm for my appearing in the middle of your projects might have been somewhat diminished."

"Nonsense, Prudence; we all have our jobs to do, and your intervention taught me a valuable lesson."

"Then I'm a rather poor teacher," Prudence said acerbically.

"Wha—Oh, dear, you don't mean I've done it again?"

"Yes. You've reached your limit for this project."

"But I've been so careful!" Felicity wailed. "Really, I've been extremely strict. Really, really strict."

Prudence cast a cold, gray eye at the now-empty pocket. "Have you? Transformations rather than simple stasis spells to protect yourself?"

"It wasn't a real transformation, simply a little personality migration."

"Giving an alley cat the power of speech so it could indoctrinate a homeless and rather simple-minded young man into its amoral mode of behavior?"

"Puss is not that sort of a cat, Prudence. I know you dislike cats, but if you didn't always have your head in your ledger you'd know very well that I didn't create Puss. As for the amoral behavior, I wonder what Her Majesty would say if she heard you talking such perfect rot. You've been reading too many of Georgie MacDonald's bowdlerized versions of your own escapades."

"Getting huffy with me will avail you nothing, Flitters. You're cut off. Starting now."

"But the assignment isn't over, and I'm just receiving signals that my current goddaughter as well as a former godson with whom Rose has every chance of finding true love are in desperate trouble."

"You should have thought of that before you went about giving human speech to stray cats."

"But it isn't fair," Felicity protested. "Rose needs me . . ."

"She should have wished more wisely."

"More selfishly, you must mean. Because up until now she hasn't wished for anything for herself. She wanted me to help the people she serves in this city. She is a remarkable young woman . . ."

"What about the true love, your former godson?"

"That required no magic on my part whatsoever, not even an introduction. They did it all themselves. But now I'm afraid something terrible may be happening to Rose while you detain me with your spell-pinching pettifoggery."

"Felicity Fortune, that is unfair! I want to serve as much as your goddaughter, by using my own talent for stretching the remaining magic as far as possible so that more people can have a bit of luck now and then. I simply can't allow you to go squandering it to spoil one girl. I have a duty to the sorority to rein you in, and you've admitted yourself that you need checking."

"But it isn't just one girl. Don't you see? And she's certainly not spoiled. On the contrary, she's so unselfish it's nearly pathological. She hasn't wished for anything at all herself. Please, Prudence. My vehicle is being repaired . . ."

"By an ordinary mechanic? Flitters, how could you?"

"He won't notice, honestly. I, uh—"

"You used magic for that too? My point exactly! I can give you a lift to wherever your goddaughter is, but that's all."

They rode in silence for some time, while Felicity picked up increasing signals of distress not only from Rose and Fred but a wildly frightened one from someone she didn't recognize—a child, though, she was sure it was a child. What could she do to help at a distance? Surely there was someone she could call on . . .

"Flitters!" Prudence drew her up sharply.

"You surely don't intend that I shouldn't make use of the magic I've already set in action, Prudence?" Felicity asked. "That would be wasteful."

"I suppose so."

So Felicity reached out with her mind until its waves were intercepted by the alert whiskers and questing curiosity of one of her established allies.

 

* * *

 

Puss was way ahead of Felicity. Figuring she'd been temporarily abandoned by her counselee, she was not about to starve. The territory around Pioneer Square was new to her, but she was enterprising. Unfortunately, she realized—a lacerated ear and a painfully torn claw later—that other cats were equally enterprising and did know the territory around every restaurant and any other establishment containing either food to steal or both food and people to bestow it.

She patrolled a bit farther afield—though not so far that she couldn't meet Dico again when he returned, as she hoped, with a share of the food from dinner with Ding.

Down at the foot of Jackson Street, where it met the Alaska Way under the viaduct, she saw a long line of cars stopped, waiting, all heading into one parking lot. There were people in each of the cars. Surely most of them liked cats and many had something to offer in the way of tribute.

She sprinted across the near lane and leaped onto the hood of a car and down, and she was across the road. She followed the cars as they surged into a parking lot bounded on the far side by the gray-green waters of the Sound, which smelled deliciously as always of salt and fish.

Hopping up onto the walkway near the terminal as the cars filed in and parked, she watched. One big white boat was already halfway out in the water, and the drivers and passengers of the cars were settling down as if they expected a wait. And to help them wait, right beside the terminal, was a fast-food restaurant, a place from which came the lovely aromas of frying meat and ice cream. Sure enough, the driver of the first car, a man by himself—not an awfully good risk, Puss thought—climbed out of his car and strode back toward the restaurant. But there was a very tall fence, and he didn't come out again.

She decided after smelling the goodies in the restaurant for a few more minutes that perhaps more direct action was required. After all, people were impressed by a cat who could speak their language, and the godmother had never said that Puss could only use her skill to help Dico.

She certainly had observed enough human panhandlers to know the lines, which she would modify for her own purposes.

She saw a car with a man and a child in it. Now, this was a good setup. If she played hide-and-seek with the child, the child would cry when Puss seemed to have disappeared for good and the man would buy it ice cream. Then the child, overjoyed to see the kitty reappear, would share the ice cream. Some cats were afraid of children, because they ignorantly petted too hard or sometimes you found a bad one who would try to hurt you purposely. Also, they ran in packs. Puss figured being able to talk to them ought to shock them out of any ill intentions until she could get away. Besides, she was basically an optimistic creature and firmly believed there were lots of cat-loving witnesses who might come to her rescue and even offer her a home. Not that she needed or wanted one. She did all right on her own, and now she had Dico to look after. It was different back in the days when she was having kittens, before she'd had her hysterectomy. Kittens needed homes, a proper start in life. She had adopted cat-mad families then long enough to have them take responsibility for finding homes for her children.

The last one had taken her to the vet when her kids went for their checkups, and that was the end of her career as a mother. After that, there was no reason really to accept the restrictions humans imposed, even for expediency's sake. She was a bit ambivalent about humans, actually. She loved eating regularly but hated the monotony of a cat-food diet, loved being petted, hated being restricted to one family who could come and go as they chose while making sure she didn't have the same options.

Really, the free life was better, and with Dico she had the best of both—plenty of pets, a new gift that ensured she could always get something to eat, and companionship. He might have a hard time finding warm places to sleep, but she never did, and with him as a security guard or at least a watchperson, she could now sleep in many spots that weren't safe for her before.

She approached the car with the child and the man, very cautiously going to the child's side. She rose on her hind feet and put her front paws on the windowsill, looking over the top with only her ears, eyes and nose showing. The child, who had been turned away, curled against the window and was, as Puss expected, both shocked and pleased to see her.

"Shhh," Puss told her, and the little girl—it was hard to tell sometimes, but Puss felt that this was a little girl—nodded very slowly, as if she too had a secret. She didn't seem a bit fazed to be addressed by a cat, but children were more practical about such things than adults, as Puss was well aware. Adults wasted a lot of time trying to figure out how and why a cat could be talking to them, whereas a child simply figured that if a cat was talking to them, then cats or at least some cats must be able to do so, and that was that.

Puss's plan was only spoiled because this child was already crying and the man wasn't doing anything. Probably the best thing to do would be to move on to the next car, but Puss had that quality that cat-haters failed to realize was a trait of her species—she was inherently sympathetic to human misery. Her instinct was to curl up beside this child and soothe her with purrs. This child was very upset, and Puss sensed that it was over nothing trivial.

"Why are you crying, child?" Puss asked through the glass. The little girl looked fearfully behind her.

"Ah, the man. Your father?"

The child shook her head.

"I don't suppose ice cream would help?" Puss asked.

The child shook her head again. She was very quiet, for a child. She must be quite frightened indeed.

"Help," the child said through the glass, so quietly that had Puss not just said the last word herself she'd not have recognized it.

The man beside the child roared then, and Puss reluctantly hopped down lest he see her. He did not seem like her kind of person. Poor child.

Oh, well. She saw misery every day. She had better luck two doors down at cadging a bit of a breakfast muffin with cheese, ham and egg enclosed. Two cars later she began to feel she had been unfair to single men, as one spotted her, opened his door, and quite voluntarily and without any prodding on her part, deposited a lovely dollop of ice cream on the pavement for her edification.

Naturally, she was not intending to speak to this person at this time, since it appeared to be unnecessary, but as she was licking her paws clean and contemplating rubbing against the trouser legs that hung out the door as the man watched her, she received a message.

"I beg your pardon?" she said aloud, without thinking about it, looking up from washing behind her ear as the summons entered her mind.

"Ah, Puss! I've found you. Now listen carefully. Rose is in trouble out on the water, and I don't know why. I need you and Dico to look for her and also—there's a child in trouble there somewhere. I—um—I'm going to be a while getting there but I'll be down soon, and I shall require assistance from you and Dico."

Puss, having had little chance to develop her psychic abilities beyond an uncanny knack for finding food and sunny spots, was confused about how to respond to the mental touch until it was gone. Fortunately, so was her ice cream. With a brisk whisk against the trouser legs, she bounded off in search of Dico.

She found him where he had left her. He looked a bit guilty and quite sleepy, but glad to see her.

"Hey, Puss. Look what I brought you."

Fish! And there was no time for it now.

Quickly, she apprised him of the situation and led him back to where she had received the mental summons. The cars were just beginning to drive onto the ferry as the two of them ran past the toll booths and into the parking lot.

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