All three captives nosed against the bars sniffing at the key, their eyes wide and expectant. None of the three spoke.

Bending his head, Joe placed a paw on the dangling key fob and fumbled the key into position between his front teeth. He had the key in position-but when he guided the key into the hole in the dangling padlock, immediately the lock swung away.

He looked at his three silent observers. But how could they help? The bars of the cage door were too close together to allow even a paw through, to steady the lock. And the way the lock dangled, every tiny movement sent it shifting.

Rolling down onto his shoulder, on the four-inch strip of table, he peered up from that angle, hoping he didn't swallow the key. Reaching up with careful paws, humping up as close as he could get, he tried to line up the key.

Voila! It was in position! Carefully he eased the key in, his heart pounding. He was starting to turn the key when it fell out, fell into his mouth and nearly into his throat, scaring him so badly he flipped over, coughing and hacking.

Spitting the key out, he sat trying to calm his shattered nerves. But he took the key up again, tried again. Again it fell, again he nearly choked. Again and again, a half dozen frightening failures before, on the seventh try, slowly, carefully twisting his head with the key in place in the lock, it turned!

The lock snapped open. He wanted to yowl with triumph. Employing his claws in a far more natural operation, he hooked the padlock, lifted it, and twisted it out. It fell with a thud, the key still in it. Six round eyes stared at it, and stared at him with wonder. Eagerly they pressed against the door, as Joe clawed to free the hasp.

A sound in the hall; a shuffle behind him. The bedroom door flew open, banging against the wall. Hands grabbed him, big, hard hands. He flipped over fast and sunk his teeth and twenty claws into Luis Rivas's arm, biting, raking, tearing him, tasting Luis's blood.

Dulcie padded soundlessly behind Chichi down the stairs to the lower floor. She watched the blonde in her tight sweater and tight jeans stretch up to the highest bookshelves and closet shelves, searching, then crouch to peer under chairs and dressers, to feel beneath cushions and to open drawers. What was she looking for? If Chichi's job was to help Luis and Tommie scope out their hits, to assess the number of staff and the best times to make those hits, then what was this stealthy search? Chichi seemed most interested in small niches, small drawers, cubbyholes. Not until Chichi had entered the small laundry room did Dulcie catch a whiff of what she might be seeking.

Dulcie did not want to go into the laundry and be trapped in that tiny space with only one way out. She crouched in the shadows beside the door. The concrete room stunk of dirty laundry from the overflowing hamper that stood beside the washer, and of laundry soap and a whiff of bleach. But Dulcie caught, as well, another scent. A pungent oil, a smell she knew. She sniffed deeply.

As sure as she had whiskers, that was gun oil. The same as Wilma used to clean her.38, the same smell that was always present around the PD, the smell of well-oiled handguns.

The smell came from beneath the washer. Chichi was crouched on the concrete floor looking under, pressing her face against the washer, squinting into the dark; she was bound to smell it.

But apparently not, with the other stinks in the room, and with Chichi's own sweet perfume, which carried considerable heft. Dulcie waited, tensed to race away. Chichi squinted and looked, but at last she rose and left the room, heading down the hall. Slipping into the laundry behind her, Dulcie peered under washer and dryer into the same shadows Chichi had scanned.

The gun lay far back beneath the washer, where maybe only a cat would be able to make out its dim shape. So far back that a human, even if he found it with a flashlight or knew it was there, could only fish it out with a stick.

Slipping behind the dryer, pressed in between it and the wall, she crept back behind the washer. Making sure the gun was pointed away from her, she lay down and reached a paw in, and gingerly fished it out by the grip, careful not to turn it toward her or touch the trigger.

There it lay, under her nose, in the dusty dark space between the wall and the washer. A blue-black revolver with a roughly textured wooden grip and, on the side of the grip, a round embossed metal seal that showed a rearing horse and read Colt. A revolver very like Wilma's Colt.38 special.

This had to be what Chichi was searching for. What crime had the revolver been used for? How did she know, or suspect, that it was here in this house? And what had she intended to do with it? Or, after all, was she searching for something else, and not the gun?

Carefully pushing it out of sight again, as far under as she could, she backed out of the tight space, shook off the dust, and hurried to catch up with Chichi.

Like two mimes, one silently mimicking the other, she followed the young woman in her futile search. Padding unseen through the dim rooms, Dulcie was Chichi's shadow.

Only when the blonde had exhausted every crevice, or thought she had, did she head back upstairs. She was halfway up when shouting erupted from above: Luis's enraged yells coming from Abuela's bedroom, accompanied by furious tomcat yowls as if Joe was being strangled.

Streaking past Chichi up the stairs, Dulcie fled for Abuela's bedroom, which rang with Joe's yowls and Luis's screams. She burst through the open door into a storm of swinging arms, flying fur, and Spanish swearing. Pausing for only an instant to sort out the action, she leaped straight into Luis's face, clawing, clamping her teeth on his ear, trying to make him drop Joe.

Luis tried to pull Joe off his arm, but the enraged tomcat clung and slashed and bit. As Luis fought to knock him loose, Dulcie glimpsed the cage door where the three cats pressed frantically. It was unlocked, the padlock was gone, but the hasp was still in place, held tight by the swivel eye where the lock had hung.

The three cats were so close to the swivel eye, just inches from it. But they could not reach through, no paw could fit between those tight bars. She was crouched to leap to the table when the old lady joined the fray. Estrella Nava, with a cry of dismay, rose from her rocker and flew into action, beating at Luis with her cane, shouting Spanish expletives that sounded as vile as those Luis was yelling. Luis turned on her, lunging against the cage so it rattled and slid, and Dulcie and Joe clung to him raking flesh, bloodying Luis with claws and teeth-until the bedroom door banged open, hitting the wall, and Tommie burst into the room.

He grabbed Dulcie, tore Joe off Luis, making Luis scream with pain. Jerking open the cage door, Tommie shoved Joe and Dulcie in, forcing the captives back against the bars.

Slamming the door, Tommie turned the swivel, effectively locking it. The five of them were jammed inside like kippers in a sealed can.

But Tommie couldn't find the lock. He searched the floor and under the table and in the corners, swearing; then he ripped off his belt and stuffed it through the swivel eye.

Standing back, he smiled. Not his carefree Irish grin, but a cold leer, his red hair on end, his freckles hardly visible in his red, excited face. Tommie stared at Luis, and turned to look at Abuela.

Estrella Nava had slipped back to her rocking chair; she sat glaring at the two men, her eyes, defiant and angry, reflecting passions Dulcie wished she could read. But as the old woman turned in her chair to look out the window-as if dismissing the two men-Dulcie glimpsed a flash of metal in her hand. She saw it for only a second, then it was gone.