Tiger by the Tail

by Lucille Perkins Robinson

I slipped the picks out of my pocket. As I put the gloves on, I glanced around. The moon hid behind a dark cloud and only a few stars studded the night sky. No close neighbors meant smaller chance of being seen in the back of Susan's home.

No lights were on inside the huge plantation-style house, so evidently Susan was gone as anticipated. I had to do this job by feel mostly and it was slow, but I eventually chose the right picks. I grasped the tension tool in my left hand and the rake pick in my right and began working on the lock.

It was an old tumbler lock and it took some fancy maneuvering with the rake tool, but soon there was a soft click as the lock gave and the door swung open. I glanced into the dark room to study the shadows. Nothing moving.

I glanced behind me, but I was alone.

I tiptoed inside and stood for a moment, orienting myself with the thick dark shadows that were furniture, small tables and all the ordinary accoutrements of a sitting room.

Susan and I had met at a Mardi Gras ball last week and she'd had some impressive diamonds circling her neck. The perfection of these exquisite gems was out of place around that tiger's neck so, yesterday afternoon when she had called and invited me to come for coffee, I'd cased the lower floors of the house carefully, as she led me around showing me her treasures. Three Monets, a Chinese vase, a nickel sized ruby from her latest conquest who lived in New York, and the diamonds I'd seen earlier.

"I put the jewelry in the safe behind this Monet." She stepped up to a beautifully framed picture and swung it out. The 'safe' was a hole in the wall covered with a hinged metal square with ten switches laid out in a double row like an electrical switch box. She pulled up the cover to reveal a small locked box.

"What's with the switch box lid?" It seemed out of place and of no value. Certainly it wouldn't keep me, or any other burglar, from getting the treasure.

"It was too expensive to build in a regular safe," Susan said with a shrug. "I had my boyfriend cut the hole then cover it with this metal lid. Don't you think it looks like an electrical multi-breaker?"

"Multi-breaker?"

She nodded. "That's what I've always heard them called. If a light goes out or a plug in stops working, sometimes a person can look at switches like these in the electrical box and see one turned off. If the switch is turned on again the plug in or light starts working."

"Of course, you’re right," I said. She's not such a dumb blond at all, I thought. "This is a good way to fool a burglar. One wouldn't think of opening up a switch box."

On the other hand, she wasn't very smart either or she would have kept her 'safe' hidden. How much easier could a heist be, I thought. I stared at her face now clean and void of the make up she'd worn at the ball and thought of all the dumb blond jokes I'd read. Nah, she wasn't a dumb blond. She was just a silly woman and silly women do silly things.

On the night of the ball, I'd had no trouble getting to know her or even kissing her on the balcony at the hotel where the ball was held. She played dumb and passive, but proved to be a real tiger in bed. Now here she was, showing me her treasures without a suspicious bone in her body. I slipped my arms around her and pulled her against me.

"A woman living alone should have a guard dog," I whispered.

"No dog, but I do have a cat." Her laugh sounded like a silly little tinkle as her arms slid around my neck. "Jo-Jo likes to chew on people's shoes so I put him in a bedroom upstairs with the door closed when I have company. When I'm gone, he roams freely through the house."

While Susan was getting us coffee, I pulled my handkerchief from my pocket and with it draped over my fingers I checked the box behind the picture. All I'd have to do was lift it out of the hole and take it away. The patio door would take but a moment to get into. It was going to be a fast and easy job to get those diamonds.

So here I am, staring at the darkened Monet as I made my way slowly around the furniture. I didn't want to knock anything out of place. I planned to re-lock the door and then pull the drapes as I left. She wouldn't know anything was missing until she wanted to wear the diamonds again.

Suddenly, a sound of cloth brushing leather came from my right where the sofa sat in deep shadow. I paused, hand in air, one foot in front of the other, inches from the Monet hiding the safe. A shaft of moonlight shot through the patio door, landing at the doorway into the entry hall and deepening the shadows on either side of it. I held my breath. After a moment of complete silence, I figured it must have been my imagination. I grasped the Monet's edge and swung it out. Lifting the box out of its cubby hole, I silently closed the switch box cover, swung the Monet back in place and turned.

My heart fainted inside and dropped to my feet. Slipping toward me, silent and huge, crossing the shaft of moonlight was a tiger, his eyes like two huge orbs of light, his huge paws silent against the old wood floor.

The cat circled my legs and sniffed at my feet. Lowering his large body onto its stomach, 'Tiger' laid a front paw on either side of my feet and began licking my leather shoes. I swear the slurping sound of his tongue against my shoes and the warmth of it on my feet wet the front of my pants.

Sweat gathered in my palms making them slick and the box threatened to fall from my grasp.

I gripped the box against my chest, a scream bubbling up inside. As I opened my mouth, instead of the scream a gurgling sound rose. My eyes closed tightly. I felt faint. A sudden click popped my eyes open. The ceiling lights were on. Susan stood just inside the hall door. Captain Roche, the chief detective for St. Martinville Police Department stood just behind her, a smirk lighting up his craggy features.

"Gotcha, Babineaux," Roche said softly.

"Susan?" I whispered.

"Jo-Jo," Susan said in a scolding tone, "come here, sugar."

The tiger lazily rose and went to her, taking the cube of dried beef out of the outstretched hand with one slurp of the large tongue.

I slumped into the overstuffed chair near the fireplace and took several deep breaths. "How did you know?"

She knew what I meant. "I wasn't sure until you showed such interest in my diamond necklace." Susan and Captain Roche sat down on the facing sofa. She curled her legs beneath her and leaned back with a smile tilting up her narrow lips.

"Fingering the necklace while talking to her on the balcony was a dead giveaway," Roche said, still smirking.

Susan nodded. "Usually a man has his mind on other things besides jewelry when we're smooching in the dark." She laughed that silly tinkle again.

"A couple of women who you've burglarized this last month, had a vague impression of what you looked like," Roche explained. "Susan, here, was on her toes. Being the smart woman she was, she played dumb and set you up for the taking."

"Never underestimate a blond," Susan said as Roche clipped the handcuffs on me. "They're not as dumb as those jokes claim they are."