While my Miss Temple is playing tour guide on Mr. Max’s homecoming trip down No Memory Lane, aka Mojave Way, I need to reconnoiter the exterior of the former Gandolph homestead, and fast, or I may face a long, lonesome hitch or hike back to the Circle Ritz.

Getting myself out of the tiny space between the Miata front seat backs and the door makes my much-put-upon limbs as shaky as Mr. Max’s.

Call it the feline equivalent of a transatlantic flight.

I am really annoyed that my kind is kept out of restaurants. Just think of the wasted food that could be saved if every one came equipped with a “house” homeless feline on the premises.

(I realize that this system would not work for homeless dogs. Even when on their best behavior, they are hopelessly unmannerly. Restaurant patrons would not put up with panting, begging, yapping, drooling, and all the other unattractive canine habits. Nor should they.)

However, I am living proof that the feline moocher is quiet to the point of stealthy and as subtle as a shadow.

So I shake out my cramped legs and gimp around to the house’s shrub-sheltered side. This neighborhood is established to the point of being old, and the owners can pay for watering the greenery, although it is a matter of local ecological debate whether they should.

I make good use of the concealing options of oleander bush and canna lily plantings. I do not much go for the native thorny cactus plants, although I run into one of that ilk not more than ten feet along the house side. So to speak.

It whaps me right on the sensitive black nose leather I aim to maintain unscarred, like Miss Temple’s pristine caramel-colored leather upholstery in the Miata.

Of course, I am related to it.

“Nice of you to finally drop by, Go Daddy-o,” Miss Midnight Louise says, welcoming me to the scene of auld lang syne. “While I had to hop a ride in a Vito’s Vegetarian Pizza delivery car, you were cruising the Strip eavesdropping on Mister Max’s traveler tales and visiting high-end dining venues. I could smell the steak on your breath from the moment you put paw and claw on the desert dirt up front.”

Not one to hold back, our Miss Midnight Louise.

“Nothing rare, medium, or well-done has crossed my lips on this most uncomfortable trip, Louise,” I answer virtuously, although a snicker flirts with my fangs. It is her bad luck to have to ride in a vegetarian pizza-mobile.

“I was forced,” I add in an injured hiss, “to share the meager area behind the Miata’s front seats with Miss Temple’s unfortunately named ‘doggie bag.’ Fortunately, she sets her seat far forward.”

“She has nerves of steel,” Miss Louise says, purring with admiration. “She meets her ex-lover after he has barely escaped death and with his mind a blasted ruin, yet she does not hesitate to bring home tidbits from their first reunion feast together. That girl has her priorities right. Most humans in such a situation would have pled ‘no appetite.’”

“Miss Temple is the pillar of practical,” I say, with a certain pride. “She took him to a costly steak house at Planet Hollywood. Why should she not get all that she paid for?”

“Why indeed.”

“And, my esteemed partner in private investigating, Mister Max’s mind hardly seemed a ‘blasted ruin,’ from what I overheard. I myself would not mind forgetting to remember certain episodes of my past.”

“My existence being one of them.”

“Now, now, my dear Louise. I have grown quite accustomed to your skills as an expert ‘tailer.’ I will be able to rest easy after my cramped travels tonight in the Miata, knowing you will be on patrol here, keeping an eye or two on Mister Max.”

“Nothing will happen here … if your Miss Temple decides to leave. If not, we have front-page news.”

“I know you favor Mister Max Kinsella over Mister Matt Devine, but I see no signs that you are in for a happy ending there.”

“It is not a matter of ‘favoring’ one human male over another. I strongly felt you failed to follow up on Mister Max’s chilling fall at the Neon Nightmare and thereby let the trail of the Synth grow cold while you were swanning after another of your roommate’s causes.”

“It would not be wrong to state that your … doggedness … in considering the Neon Nightmare central to all our long-term concerns was well placed.”

“I should think so.”

“That is why I depend on you to keep an eye on Mister Max now, though the site and situation looks pretty barren from an investigator’s point of view. Most of it is wait-and-watch work, Louise. You know that.”

“I know that you know Miss Temple will give you her doggie-bag steak, cut into bite-size pieces served over your never-eaten eternally full bowl of Free-to-Be-Feline.”

“Perhaps,” I say, trying to avoid visibly salivating.

“And I will have a hot, dark night crouching among the fire ants and lizards while Mister Max goes beddie-bye alone inside.”

“Ah. I heard the front door cracking open. I must be gone, anon.”

“Oh, shut up, Shakespeare, Jr. I know you will have nothing to report in the morning but a full stomach and a long nap.”

A consummation devoutly to be wished, but I do not say so aloud.

Miss Midnight Louise is not in the mood.