How To Tail a Cat (6 page)

Chapter 10

A SPIDER’S INTUITION

“OKAY, JIM. OKAY,”
Hox pleaded gruffly after several minutes of teasing commentary about his new haircut. “That’s enough, already.”

The President of the Board of Supervisors wiped several tears from his cheeks, which had pinkened from his laughter.

“Be sure to let me know when this Humphrey fellow starts working on your mustache,” he replied. “Maybe I can e-mail the station some suggestions.”

Hox rolled his eyes at the ceiling as yet another round of jokes commenced.

• • •

A WELL-KNOWN ENVIRONMENTALIST,
formally associated with the Green party, James Hernandez—Jim to his numerous friends—had served as the president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors for the last seven years.

An attorney by trade, Jim had a closet full of expensive suits, silk neckties, and fancy footwear—an extravagance expended for naught. Despite the diligent efforts of his tailor and the constant niggling adjustments of his wife, he routinely gave the impression of being wrinkled. His poor posture and lumpy physique negated all attempts to professionalize his rumpled appearance. The matter wasn’t helped by the floppy hair that he wore just long enough to cover what he self-consciously perceived to be elephant-sized ears.

Jim shrugged this off with a good-natured grin. He was a perpetually happy man, and a smile was never far from his lips.

All of these features combined with his soft baby face to complete a roguish image, one that allowed him to charm the toughest of opponents—save the Current Mayor, with whom he’d been feuding for the better part of the last decade.

• • •

PRIOR TO HIS
last two terms as supervisor, Jim Hernandez had dallied in national politics, serving as the running mate for a fringe presidential candidate. There had never been any question of the pair winning the election, but the stint had served to elevate his profile in local San Francisco politics.

It was no secret around City Hall that the board president desperately wanted to be awarded the pending mayoral appointment. Few odds makers, however, put any stock in that happening.

As a likely front-runner in the mayoral election next fall, Hernandez was unlikely to garner enough support from his fellow board members to obtain the caretaker slot. Although a majority of the supervisors had voted to make him the board president, those allegiances only went so far. Substantively, the mayor of San Francisco was a less powerful position than that of the president of the board of supervisors, but the former was a much more glamorous title than the latter.

The interim-mayor appointment would require a great deal more clout than Hernandez could possibly muster, leaving a chaos of would-be contenders seeking to fill the void.

Regardless, Hox still viewed the supervisor as a valid source for predicting what the board might decide at their upcoming meeting. Hernandez knew his fellow supervisors better than anyone else. Moreover, as board president, he controlled the gavel and, with it, the agenda. Given the unique circumstances of the vote, Hernandez could still influence the voting process, if not the eventual outcome.

This was the only reason Hox had suffered through the supervisor’s twenty-minute monologue on his new haircut, but he was fast running out of patience.

• • •

HOX GROANED AS
he deflected yet another hair comment. He glanced around the room, searching for anything that might facilitate a change of subject. Jim Hernandez could keep this up for hours.

The reporter’s eyes latched onto a black plastic picture frame resting on a bookcase behind the supervisor’s desk.

“Still driving that shoe box, I see,” Hox said sourly, pointing to the vehicle captured in the picture.

Jim turned in his chair to beam proudly at the photo.

The supervisor was religiously devoted to public transportation and rode one of the city’s Muni trains to work each day. When necessity forced him off the public grid, he got around in a neon green hybrid-electric compact car.

Hox had once tried to squeeze his burly frame into the vehicle’s front passenger seat—he had been complaining about the cramped experience ever since.

“Hamster-mobile,” Hox grumbled as Jim spun back around.

Before the supervisor could get off his next retort, Hox leaned forward and, with a grunt, rested an elbow on his right knee. Bending toward the desk, he carefully opened his reporter’s notebook and pulled a pencil from its spiral.

“Can we talk about something other than my hair?”

Jim smirked impishly. “I can’t imagine another topic that would be anywhere near as interesting.”

Hox glared testily and then intoned in a low voice, “The Mayor’s replacement?”

The supervisor sat back in his chair and looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling. “Hmm, yes, I suppose that issue has been getting some airtime of late.”

Hox licked the pencil’s lead point. Holding it poised over the paper, he prodded, “Of course, you’ll be throwing
your
hat into the ring?”

Jim shrugged his shoulders, an unconvincing display of indifference. “I will if I’m asked.”

Hox pushed away from the edge of the desk and stroked his grizzly mustache. “How many of the other supervisors are angling for the job?”

Jim brought his hands together in front of his chest. Wiggling his fingers in the air, he replied, “All of them.”

Hox pumped his thick brows inquisitively. “All of them?”

The supervisor nodded, his floppy bangs emphasizing his response.

“Well then,” Hox said, popping his notebook against the top of his thigh. “We’re in for quite a circus.”

• • •

AS HOX CONTINUED
his hushed discussion with the board president, the glass wall around the corner from the supervisors’ office corridor took on a new reflection.

A young man in gray-striped coveralls and high-top canvas sneakers shuffled past the glass, casually pushing the handle of a dust mop. Although he kept his head tilted downward, he paid little attention to the mop’s path across the polished marble floor, frequently sweeping over the same spot multiple times while leaving other portions untouched.

A blue baseball cap pulled down over the young man’s forehead hid the upper portion of his dark-skinned face, shadowing his eyes as they darted furtively to the left and right.

During his six months of employment at City Hall, he’d rarely ventured to the second floor. As one of the Current Mayor’s low-level staffers, he spent most of his time sequestered in a basement cubicle.

Still, he thought apprehensively, surely someone up here would recognize him.

Suddenly, he heard the sharp
click
of a woman’s high-heeled shoes approaching him from the rear. It was the unmistakable step of Mabel, the Mayor’s administrative assistant. He saw the woman almost every day—she was the one who delivered the staffer assignments to the basement. She was bound to see through this disguise.

As the footsteps drew nearer, he felt his cheeks begin to blush. The palms of his hands started to sweat against the dust mop’s worn wooden handle. The Previous Mayor had assured him this would work. Why had he believed him? He looked ridiculous in this janitor’s outfit. How could he have been so foolish?

Cringing, the young staffer caught a whiff of Mabel’s distinctive perfume, a sweet lemony scent she sprayed each morning against the sides of her neck.

Any second now, he would be exposed. He would probably lose his job over this silly prank.

Mabel clipped to a stop next to the edge of the dust mop as the sweat spread to the man’s brow, dampening the brim of his baseball cap. Flushed with embarrassment, he kept his face turned to the floor. He could just imagine the confusion in her voice as she spoke his name.

“Spider Jones?”

But those words never came.

“Excuse me, sir,” she said smartly, tapping him lightly on the shoulder. “I think you missed a spot.”

Then she pulled open the door to the supervisors’ offices and strode off down the hallway.

• • •

SPIDER STOOD WATCHING
Mabel’s departing figure, his mop frozen to the floor as he shook his head. He couldn’t believe it.

His gaze dropped to his gray-striped coveralls. He couldn’t possibly be that invisible . . . or could he?

Slowly, he began to slide the mop forward. Calmly concentrating, he focused on making regular, even sweeping movements.

His confidence growing with each gliding step, he felt himself falling more and more into character. He wasn’t a junior staffer
posing
as a janitor, he told himself. He actually
was
a janitor.

• • •

ANOTHER SET OF
footsteps sounded against the marble floor—a man’s heavier stride in flat-soled dress shoes.

Spider risked a quick glance at the incoming figure. It was one of the supervisors, returning from an off-site meeting.

Amazed at his own brazenness, Spider swept himself into the supervisor’s path. Tilting his head at a slight angle, his eyes tracked the man as he passed.

Even when the supervisor had to skip sideways to avoid the mop, he never gave Spider a second glance.

• • •

FILLED WITH A
renewed respect for the Previous Mayor, Spider pushed the dust mop toward the hallway that held the supervisors’ offices.

Not far down the corridor, he spied the closed door to President Hernandez’s office. He could just make out the heads of the two men sitting at the desk inside. The PM had told him to be on the lookout for something like this—a shut door was the sure sign of an attempt to cloak a confidential conversation.

Proceeding cautiously but deliberately, Spider sidled up to the door and pretended to discover a particularly resistant piece of dirt stuck to the floor. He pushed the dust mop vigorously back and forth, trying to decipher the murmur of the hushed voices inside the office. His young face twisted with concentration as he strained to hear the words.

Finally, after checking up and down the empty hallway, he cupped his hand around his ear and pushed the edge of his palm against the door to amplify the sounds from the opposite side.

As the junior-staffer-turned-fake-janitor processed the details being discussed inside the president’s office, his demeanor became more and more animated.

After listening for several minutes, Spider issued a vigorous fist pump and then took off down the hallway, the dust mop now zooming across the floor with no regard for the appearance of cleaning efficacy or discreet janitorial conduct.

Out past the glass wall, he ditched the dust mop, leaving its handle propped against a marble column. Nearly losing his baseball cap from the top of his head, he sped around a corner and dove into one of the building’s enclosed stairwells. The rubber soles of his sneakers squeaked against the slick marble stairs as he sprinted to the first floor, clearing the last three steps in a single leap.

After flying down one of the main hallways flanking the building’s center rotunda, Spider spun into a granite-walled vestibule located beneath the central staircase.

A light flickered on, illuminating a row of empty pay-phone stations.

Fingers trembling, he pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his chest pocket and read the number scrawled on its front. He punched in the digits and waited anxiously as the phone began to ring.

“I’ve got something for you,” he whispered excitedly when the PM answered.

“No,” he added with a confident
pshaw
. “Of course no one saw me.”

Chapter 11

THE DOCTOR IS IN

DR. KIMBERLY KLINE
scanned the Academy of Sciences’ front entrance, searching for her missing frog expert.

Not five minutes earlier, the attendant at the front ticket booth had called down to her office, alerting her to Sam’s arrival. Kimberly had proceeded directly to their meeting spot beneath the dinosaur skeleton, but the burly frog aficionado was nowhere to be found.

A petite woman in blue jeans, sneakers, and a dark blue Academy T-shirt, Dr. Kline wasn’t much taller than many of the schoolchildren exploring the museum that day. Her light blond hair was cut in a short bob that bounced when she walked. A nonstop bundle of energy, she fit in well with the Academy’s youthful patrons.

She had joined the aquarium’s cadre of herpetologists—or, to use Sam’s terminology,
frogologists
—just a few months earlier, but she was already acquainted with the eccentric Frog Whisperer from their previous consults at his field camp. She knew he was prone to distraction, along with several other odd behaviors.

Perhaps, she mused, he had wandered off.

Turning a slow circle, Dr. Kline studied the front atrium area once more before reaching for a walkie-talkie hooked to a belt around her waist. Pushing a plastic button on the side of the device, she brought its mike to her mouth.

“Has anyone seen Sam?”

• • •

WITH A LITTLE
help from a curator who happened to be walking past the Academy’s Swamp Exhibit, Dr. Kline quickly honed in on the location of her wayward frog expert.

She found Sam bent over the brass seahorse balcony, staring down into the tank at Clive, the Academy’s famous albino alligator, who was resting comfortably on his heated rock.

“There you are, Sam,” she called out with relief.

He didn’t appear to hear her greeting; his attention remained focused on the colorless creature in the tank below.

She approached the balcony and tried again.

“Hello there, Sam.”

Still receiving no reply, she leaned over the railing, trying to intercept his gaze.

“Sam?” she repeated, aiming the full volume of her voice at the big man’s left ear—to no effect. His shoulders dropped another inch or so over the side of the balcony.

Standing on her tiptoes, she reached up and tentatively tapped him on the shoulder.

“Sam?”

At her touch, Sam’s whole body convulsed. The scientist ducked as he jumped and spun around, a startled, wild-eyed expression on his freckled face.

“Hey there, Mister Frog Whisperer,” she said, grabbing hold of his vest to keep him from flipping backward over the balcony. “Thanks so much for coming.”

“It’s my pleasure . . . ahem . . . Dr. Kline,” Sam mumbled with an awkward grin as he straightened his shoulders, centering his weight on the concrete floor.

“I’m so glad you’re here.” She sighed, taking a short step away from the railing. “I’ve tried everything. I just can’t figure out what’s wrong with them.”

“Mm-hmm,” Sam nodded, absentmindedly fiddling with the green button sewn onto his vest as he glanced over his shoulder at the Swamp Exhibit.

“They won’t touch their food,” she persisted. “And their color is off. They seem a little pale.”

“Mm-hmm,” he repeated, still preoccupied by the alligator.

Dr. Kline paused, perplexed. It was unusual for Sam to act so disinterested in an important frog-related matter.

“Would you like to take a look at them?” she asked hopefully. “They’re downstairs on the aquarium level.”

Immediately, Sam turned to face her. “Why didn’t you say so?” he replied briskly. “Let’s go.”

Without further hesitation, he set off toward a large stairwell leading to the basement.

Brow furrowed, Dr. Kline chased after him.

Moments later the pair disappeared through an entrance bearing the label “Steinhart Aquarium.”

• • •

DR. KLINE STRUGGLED
to keep up as Sam clomped down the concrete stairs, his long legs taking two and three steps at a time.

“They’re just off to the right,” she panted as they entered the basement level.

Abruptly halting, Sam swung his arm out in front of his chest.

“After you.”

Dr. Kline hurried off down a tank-filled corridor. Sam took two strides to follow and then veered sharply off course. By the time the scientist looked back to check on him, he had disappeared into the maze of exhibits.

He had one more thing to do before visiting the frogs.

• • •

SAM CROUCHED IN
front of the nearest display to get his bearings, and a pair of ten-year-olds soon packed in around him. The boys were captivated by the neon-striped ribbon eels in the display’s tank. Sam briefly joined them in staring up at the eels—their thick, wiggling arms of clothlike skin looked for all the world like sock puppets. Then he pulled an exhibit map from his pocket and held it up to the tank’s light to search for his location.

He was now in a dramatically different environment than the Academy’s upstairs level. The floor above had been a light, airy place with high ceilings, numerous open water features, and an abundance of live plants.

In contrast, the aquarium’s underground domain was a dark, cavelike theater, a network of narrow passageways with blanketed walls that absorbed all sound, dampening even the most excited of young voices to a hushed murmur.

Tanks lit by strategically placed track lighting featured a dazzling array of exotic sea life. Delicate creatures with intricate spines and elaborately painted fins inhabited alien landscapes. Black velveteen backdrops behind each display further enhanced the illusion of an underwater grotto with an endless supply of nooks and crannies to explore.

After a quick study of the exhibit map, Sam stood up from the ribbon eels display and set off down the nearest hallway.

Somewhere within this dank labyrinth, he knew, was the viewing station for the lowest level of Clive’s Swamp Exhibit.

• • •

HALFWAY TO HIS
destination, Sam caught a glimpse of Dr. Kline’s blond-headed blur passing to his right.

“Oops,” he whispered guiltily.

Pulse racing, he ducked behind the closest available cover: a wide partition wall at the junction of two narrow hallways. A pair of oval-shaped reliefs hung on the nonstructural wall, the large ceramic discs depicting the heads and shoulders of the aquarium’s original benefactors, Bavarian brothers Ignatz and Sigmund Steinhart.

Sam hunched behind one side of the display while Dr. Kline circled the other. Holding his breath, he watched the blond halo of her reflection in an enormous glass tank on an angled wall a few feet away.

When at last she trotted off down another corridor, he was once more on the move.

• • •

A FEW MINUTES
later, Sam entered a glass-roofed tunnel that provided a view through the bottom of the aquarium’s largest water exhibit. Craning his neck, he glanced up at the passing undersides of several large tarpon.

“Whoa,” he murmured as the layers of streaming fish parted to give him a glimpse of the tropical rain forest that spanned several stories above the tank.

But a flash of white at the far end of the tunnel soon captured his attention. He rushed through the remaining glass-roofed passage and hurried over to the basement level of Clive’s Swamp Exhibit.

• • •

THE LOWER VIEWING
station provided a window into the submerged portion of the alligator’s tank. From this position, Sam could see the moss-covered pilings that Clive used to heave his long body up onto his heated rock. The nearest supporting post was missing a large, triangular-shaped chunk from its side, as if Clive or one of his alligator predecessors had taken a huge bite from the wood.

Sam watched as one of the turtles sank to the exhibit’s sandy bottom. The creature’s bony head, nearly indistinguishable from its boulderlike shell, turned toward the crowds looking into the tank. The turtle’s face was expressionless, the eyes those of a living fossil.

As the turtle came to rest on the tank’s floor, a plump catfish curled past the foot of the pier and sneaked into the shadows beneath. Its long, tubular whiskers trailed across the sandy bottom, causing small puffs of debris to float up in its wake.

Slowly taking in every detail, Sam raised his eyes toward the upper portion of the glass window. The alligator had apparently decided to take a short break from his rock. His albino body now floated just below the water’s surface, all but the tip of his nose submerged. His front and rear legs hung limply, passively, while his thick tail drooped downward.

“Just hang tight, Clive,” Sam said as his eyes focused on a service door on the lower side of the tank. “We’ve got a plan.”

• • •

AS SAM CONTINUED
to study the service door’s details, Dr. Kline’s exasperated voice sharply pierced his eardrums.

“Sam! Where have you been?”

Wincing, he turned to find the blond-headed woman standing, hands on her hips, directly behind him.

“Oh, there you are, Dr. Kline,” he replied with a sheepish grin. He shrugged apologetically. “I got a little lost.”

Throwing her hands up, she sighed and pointed toward the glass-ceilinged tunnel. “It’s right this way.”

She gave him a stern sideways glance.

“This time, I’ll follow
you
.”

• • •

KEEPING A FIRM
grip on his sleeve, Dr. Kline guided the Frog Whisperer, who was acting far more eccentric than usual, away from the basement-level view of the Swamp Exhibit. A few minutes later, she ushered him toward a prominently marked glass terrarium mounted into a wall next to a hands-on experimental station for young children.

“Here we are,” she said with exhausted relief. “As you can see, the little guys just don’t look right . . .”

Sam leaned in toward the glass, his green eyes squinting.

“Do you have the keys?” he asked, holding out his hand. “To the rear of the tank,” he added in response to her questioning expression.

She eyed the children congregated around the display. “Are you sure that’s necessary?”

Sam straightened to his full commanding height. “Absolutely,” he pronounced, deepening his voice with as much authority as he could muster.

“We’ll have to go in by the shark exhibit,” she said pensively, pulling out a large set of keys.

Glancing back several times to check on Sam, Dr. Kline led the way down a short hallway to a black-painted wall. Triggering a penlight attached to the key chain, she waved the beam across the dark surface until she illuminated a small handle. A second later, she had unlocked a black door, beyond which lay a narrow opening that ran behind the rear of the exhibits.

Motioning for Sam to follow, she proceeded into the walkway. A line of removable placards hung from the back side of each exhibit, identifying the species occupying the adjacent tanks. Halfway down the line, she inserted a second key into a slot in the wall and removed the rear paneling from the large glass terrarium.

Dr. Kline stepped aside as Sam stared at a trio of tiny frogs sitting beneath the fronds of an artificial fern. He rubbed the red scruff on his chin, sucked in his breath, and then rotated his head toward her.

“We’ll need a little privacy,” he said, knitting his brow. “Doctor-patient confidentiality. I’m sure you understand.”

Her face flushed with confusion. “Well, ah . . . I don’t . . .”

Somberly, Sam arched his red eyebrows.

“Yes, of course,” she replied dubiously, tentatively stepping away from the terrarium. “I’ll be at the other end of the hall.”

Sam waited until she had disappeared down the walkway before bending back into the exhibit.

A group of children crowded past on the opposite side, their eyes widening at the sight of the man behind the glass. He gave them a short wave, and then motioned as if to encourage them to move along.

“Do you ever get the sense you’re being watched?” he asked as the frogs waddled toward him.

The nearest one blinked its eyes, conveying its agreement.

Sam’s mouth flattened into an understanding grimace. Then he flipped through the key chain Dr. Kline had left hanging from the terrarium’s rear facing, found the set that would unlock the Academy’s main doors, and unhooked them.

Sliding the pilfered keys into his vest pocket, he whispered conspiratorially into the tank.

“You guys are doing a great job. Keep it up.”