Guile by Constance Cooper

Author:Constance Cooper
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Yonie’s story was delayed. There were pedestrians on the way to the bridge, then the oarsman in the water taxi, and then Yonie’s utter exhaustion upon arriving home. She awoke the next morning to find LaRue pacing along the edge of her bed.

“At last! You can’t imagine the restraint I’ve exercised, letting you sleep so late. You simply must tell me everything, starting with how you handled that DesMaray man. How on earth did he end up paying you?”

The cat listened avidly as Yonie described her experience with DesMaray, interjecting tart comments about the man’s character. When Yonie came to the actual revelation, however, LaRue was uncharacteristically speechless for almost fifteen seconds.

“That will take some getting used to,” she said eventually. “I look forward to meeting the man, though I hardly approve of how he deceived you.” Her ears flicked. “Speaking of which, I found out something that might interest you about your friend Luc Lazard—”

“He’s not my friend anymore.”

“Oh? What a pity—just when I was starting to loathe him slightly less.” The cat sleeked back her whiskers with one paw.

Yonie reflected that if LaRue intended to scale back her role from a maternal to a sisterly one, it was certainly a sarcastic, bossy sister that she was destined to play.

“I followed him down to Road-end for a couple of nights,” the cat continued, “and it turns out he’s not a professional gambler at all. He waits tables at the Last Chance Saloon and does odd jobs around the neighborhood. Why he thinks that should impress girls less than gambling, I can’t imagine.”

“One of his odd jobs nearly killed me,” Yonie spat. She recounted her last conversation with Luc.

“What?” The cat’s hackles rose. “Yonie, I know you were just half drowned, but haven’t you thought about what that means?”

“It means you were right about him, LaRue. He’s willing to lie to his friends for money. You know what? He never even apologized to me.”

“I’m glad we’re in agreement about the young man’s character, but right now that’s the least of our concerns. Consider—someone sent you that thing deliberately.”

Yonie’s eyes widened. “It’s like the locket and the shop sign! But worse.” She clutched Aunt Elisa’s quilt to her, breathing in its comforting scent. “There is a guilemonger behind all this, and he doesn’t like me interfering. He tried to get me drowned! What are we going to do?”

She sprang up and began to dress hurriedly. But as she was transferring her belt and purse back onto her everyday skirt, the tension drained out of her body, to be replaced by the same warm, giddy feeling of safety that had visited her regularly over the past few days.

“It’s all right. I’ll go talk to M’sir DesMaray. If anyone can protect us, it’s him. Maybe he can even help find the guilemonger.” Yonie picked up LaRue and twirled around.

Then she noticed how tense LaRue’s body had become and how her claws had emerged even more than this sort of indignity would usually warrant. Yonie apologized and set LaRue down on the pallet.

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