Showin Off Fer a Gurl

Mom Says:

It is said that La Table du Lancaster offers fine dining that is intimate, understated and contemporary. Naturally, no one actually ever says that it’s easy.

Agent Octavian sat staring at Zora the kittee entrepreneuse, until she chuckled.

“O! Mon ami, yu arrr so quiet! It is sutch a plaisir to be weeth someone whu eez not alwaez barrkeeng all the tim!”

The spell was broken. “Barkin?” said Octavian. “Yu gots doggeez werkin fer yu?”

“Mais oui. RRRR an D peeplez, an testrrrz, an tranzlaytorrrs, of cors… Many doggee peeples. An they arr all sooo enthooziastique! Waggeeng their tailz, an barkeeng, all dae looong.”

“Huh. That mus becom annoyin aftr a whil.”

“C’est vrai! But eenugf about me! How hav yu ben, Octaviannn?”

“O, yu noe. Can’t complayn. Biznis is helthee an I’m gettin a chans to see the werld.”

A young waiter approached with two martini glasses on his tray. “Mademoiselle, Monsieur, the manager expresses his welcome with a complimentary Catnip Royale, eh?” He placed the drinks on the table. “Would you like to consider the menu now, or wait a while?”

Zora nodded aristocratically. “Latayr for the entrée, garçon. Merci.”

Octavian watched the red-vested man stroll away. “Nys Inglish. Is he ‘Merikan, do yu thingk?”

“Probablee Canadien, a Quebecois.”

“Ah!” said Octavian, wishing he’d studied geography that was closer to home. He took a sip from the straw in his martini. “O mai! That ‘Nip is fresh! Ar they growin it in their gardin out bak or somthin?”

Zora purred. “Not qwyt! Eet coms frrom Chateau de Fourrure, thee Neepyard of mon ami, Christophe. Yu lik?”

Octavian sipped again, more carefully and then sniffed the sprig of catnip. His eyes watered a little, though he knew that some of this reaction had to do with the vodka in the drink. He sat back in his chair and curled his plumy black tail around his feet.

“Hmm. It hav hints of lavndr, wift som of that woody smell, but not the heavee kind we gets in the Stayts. I wud almos call it leafee… But ther also seem lik froot ovrtonz, yu noe, that froot wift the funnee naym I nevr remembember… An an undrton of chickpeaz.”

Zora’s eyes widened. “I am—I meen, yu arr—Yu surpryz me, Octaviannn. I hav herd that ‘Merikans do not hav the noz for telleeng the trrru qwalliteez of fine ‘Nip, but yu…”

But Octavian was concentrating, his eyes half closed. “Whut the doggee is that froot? Starts wift an A. Avokodo?”

“Yu meens apricot?”

“That’s it! Thank yu. Mai nex gess wud hav ben arugula, yu noe, an I’m pertee shur that not a froot at all!”

“Er, yes…” She flicked her tail and the red-vested waiter materialized beside them. “Garcon, wud yu tell us whut Chef Meeeshel has for us tonigt?”

The young man warmed to his task. Without taking the pad out of his pocket, he recited, “Our menu tonight at La Table du Lancaster, purposely brief, is organized by theme, based on products chosen by Chef Michel for their intensity, freshness, and slightly sour notes. As the base to these works of the master-chef’s art, for Le Menu pour les Chats, we also offer the choice, tonight, between the chef’s special quail and the tronçons de sole de petit bateau cuit au plat, purée d’artichauts camus et autres crus jus de cuisson réduit, caviar Beluga.”

“So hard to desyd,” murmured Zora

But Octavian was on a roll. “Ah quail… I hav herd egsellint thins of la caille française. I shall hav the quail. Ask yer Chef Meeshel to mayk it sparkul wift the wit of the tomato– the burst of lemon–the tang extraordinaire of the ‘Nip buds--”

The waiter was scribbling busily. Zora purred loudly. “I shall hav whut he’s haveeng, s’il vous plait.”

On the Rod wift a Verree Happee Kittee

Mom Says:

Agent Octavian leaped into the old blue pickup truck driven by a tabby cat who seemed really quite relaxed. Once Octavian had slammed the door shut, the tabby accelerated, and Octavian admired the contraption that allowed him to drive the truck.

“Ah, si,” said the Tabby, and he babbled at Octavian until the LingwaTron was buzzing to keep up. Its screen read: “My previous truck had bicycle bits, but this pully system is quite an improvement!”

Octavian said, “Ah! Fenómeno!”

“Si!” And the screen was kept quite busy as they drove into late afternoon and evening along the green highway. “Muchas personas creen que…”

And Octavian read: “Many peeples thingk that cats should not to drive the car and especial, the truck! Hah. But I believe betterer! I has the ingenious friends who create the admirable pully system that you see before us. This allow, however the short legs of my latter half, to engage the system of transportation more than all cats in the Spain! I am Loco-Motor-Kittee! Heh heh heh…”

And Octavian thought to himself, Loco, yes. Motor, yes. Kittee, yes. Out loud he said, “Loco! Si, si!”

Meanwhile, back at the shrine, Alek and Perro had jumped into the Mysiz car and burnt rubber as they followed Agent Eight’s advice to skedaddle. Dust rose on either side of the car to show how fast they were going! Gato lay on the back seat, giggling softly, while above him Perro looked out the back window and barked, “We’r sayf! No followrz! We’r sayf!”

Still, Alek pressed his foot down on the accelerator, not sanguine about their prospects. After all, if their protagonist wasn’t actually with them, he reasoned, how good were their chances for survival, really? He knew that a spy’s “thumbs” wasn’t cannon fodder, and the Guild of Narrators knew it, but did this strange order of humans and cats? From the little he had seen in the past few hours, it seemed that the order followed no rules but their own.

“Hey!” Perro barked as Alek accelerated further. “Whatchu doin? Ees not lik them monks follr us, eh? Ees onlee a blak van full of hombres, but not so muchos thos monks.”

Gato giggled, and batted at the seatbelts.

Alek squinted into his rearview mirror. “Hombres? But how do you know they’re not monks?”

“O, ees eezee,” said Perro. “The monks we saw wer wayrin the red an the brown robz, yu noe? But theez hombres wayr the blak.”

Alek wiped the rearview mirror with the back of his free hand, then changed gears and pushed his foot all the way down on the accelerator.

“Hey! Bark bark bark! Yelp!”

“Whoa, yu cowboy!” giggled Gato.

Alek barked a little himself. “Perro! Do you know what a ninja is?

“Huh! Ninja! Lik in mooveez?”

“Yes!”

“O, but them aren’t reel. They’z jus monk-lik actrz whu playz assassassinz wayrin the funnee blak—O NOOOES!!!”

“Speshul Ajint Octavian Smift”

Musashi Sez:

This yer littrbox warnin. Anothr long blog. Sorree.

Mom Says:

Agent Octavian received his Catnip Royale (stirrd, not shaykin) with the aplomb that Jimbond had studied long to achieve, but the drinking of it was another matter. The waiter had conveniently included a straw, but Octavian had nowhere near the automatic resistance to alcohol that Jimbond had built up over many years. So Octavian wisely drank only in very small sips. Gatto watched him closely.

“What? Yu not lik yor drink?” murmured the strange cat.

Octavian huffed. “This a Islamic contree. I can’t egzaklee get drungk heer, now kin I?”

The dog’s eyes opened and blinked. He said something in Spanish, and Gatto answered him in English. “This eez ourrr nu frrend, I’m soree, I deed not catch yorr naym, Senor….”

Octavian sat up straight and curled his tail over his front feet. “Smift. Octavian Smift. At yer servis.”

The dog said, “Smeeth? Inglés? Americano?”

Octavian said, “Yes, I am. So I unnerstan that yu ar consernd that we may not hav mutch tim to figgr out whut yer ‘Northern Contact’ is sayin about…the werld an its leedrz… How kin I halp?”

There followed a muttered dialogue between the dog and his friend, but Octavian dare not turn on his LingwaTron 9001K. However, his gut instinct told him that they were speaking in some tough-guy dialect anyway, which his LT wouldn’t even begin to translate correctly. What had Jimbond said about moments like this? “When in doubt, sip your drink very slowly and pretend to be supremely confident.”

Well, thought Octavian, cats are very good at that.

Musashi Sez:

Is verree tru. In Merika, they sez, “Fayk it til yu mayk it.” Also, is verree halpfl to noe that the peeples yu’r talkin to can’t yooz gunz an lik that. (Not havin thumz an all.) I’m jus sayin.

Mom Continues as if No One Had Interrupted:

The dog rose from his side of the table, and he was bigger and heavier than Agent Octavian, and when he smiled, his teeth were considerably longer and somewhat… pointier. Octavian flicked his tail nervously, ready to jump, but kept himself from trembling by a tremendous act of self-control.

“Yeah?” he said to the dog. “Watchu want?”

And the dog laughed. Octavian nearly leaped away after all, but part of his brain told him to stay, so he sank his claws into the cloth of the couch.

Perro said, “Yu arr OK, littul kitteee. I likes yuu. Yu has the cajones.”

“Um, what that?”

Gatto said, “Ees lik catnip mousseez, egsept they roll around thee florr. Ees conseedrd a verreeee guuud thin wher we com from.”

“Um. Oh. Grayt! So….?”

Perro barked imperiously at Gatto, who sighed and said, “Yu meet us on the west syd of the prizn tomorro, yes? Jus befor dawn. Then we see whut we see, eh?”

Octavian sipped deeply from his drink and blinked rapidly. When he had recovered, he said, “Jus befor dawn. Urf, urf. Yah. OK!” And he leaped down from his couch and trotted out the door to Ibrahim.