Scratch the Surface

Amy, who was holding a copy of the new Isabelle Hotchkiss hardcover, Purrfectly Baffling.
    “No one has,” Felicity said, “as far as I know. She doesn’t do signings, and she never goes to conferences.”
    “Isabelle Hotchkiss, a lady of mystery,” said Ronald, who had suddenly appeared. As usual, he spoke in a low, apprehensive tone, as if he were saying something he shouldn’t and were afraid of being overheard. With the same air of imparting a potentially dangerous secret, he added, “It’s a pen name. A nom de mystère.“
    “Ronald, we know what a pen name is,” Felicity said. In the female-sleuth novels Felicity read, the protagonist’s best friend was usually a six-foot-tall woman with red hair and a manner so dramatic as to suggest mental illness. In disappointing contrast, Ronald was of medium height and rather paunchy. His thinning brown hair was gathered in a ponytail, and if his furtive manner hinted at theatrics, it suggested a small character part in an amateur production rather than a leading role in a professional performance. Ronald’s sly and even conspiratorial style was independent of the content of what he said. If a customer at Newbright Books asked to be reminded of the author of The Cat Who... series, for example, Ronald typically shifted his eyes left and right, lowered his head, and murmured, “Braun, Lilian Jackson.”
    Their tête-à-tête with the author having been interrupted, Linda, Amy, and Melody told Felicity that it had been a pleasure to meet her and said that they could hardly wait for her next book.
    “Thank you,” she replied. “It’s with my editor. It’s called Upon Our Prey We Steal.”
    The fans smiled appreciatively and headed for the front of the store with Ronald trailing after them. Felicity removed the ruined copy of Felines in Felony that she’d jammed behind her back. Feeling no need to revisit the scene of her unintended crime of self-revelation, she did not open the book before slipping it into her tote bag. When she got home, she’d rip out the title page and burn it, and the next time she visited Newbright Books, she’d replace this copy with a fresh one from her own stock. Thus no one would ever know that instead of autographing the book in normal fashion, she’d written:
     
    Felicity Pride
    For deposit only
     

 
    The name of Ronald Gershwin’s store, Newbright Books, referred to its location near the Newton-Brighton line. The store, which sold both new and used books, was anything but new and bright. In the two decades since Ronald had opened the establishment, his redecoration had never gone beyond dusting and vacuuming. The fabric on the armchairs was threadbare, and the floorboards were worn to bare wood. As Felicity made her way to the front of the shop, she reminded herself to search for just the right moment to have a word about the decor with Ronald, whom she considered to have no business sense. Had the bookstore been hers, she’d have repainted the walls, tiled the floor, and added an espresso bar, if not a full café. She had, however, no more desire to run a business than she did to return to teaching, the day job from which writing had liberated her; whenever she sensed a drop in her motivation to continue the adventures of Prissy LaChatte, the prospect of returning to the classroom roused her ambition and set her fingers flying over the keyboard.
    When Felicity reached the area near the cash register, Ronald was replenishing the stock of Purrfectly Baffling in a prominent display stand devoted exclusively to the works of Isabelle Hotchkiss.
    After ascertaining that there were no customers in hearing distance, Felicity pointed at the rack and said, “Ronald, is that really necessary?”
    “Probably not. Her books pretty much sell themselves.” With a smile of redeeming sweetness, he added, “Her publisher gives her a lot of support.”
    “For talking cats!” Olaf and Lambie Pie, the feline stars of the Kitty Katlikoff series, spoke aloud to each other and to Kitty in a manner that Felicity found cloying. In contrast, Morris and Tabitha “communicated” with Prissy LaChatte via channels that had remained mysterious throughout all ten of Felicity’s books. One never-to-be-forgiven reviewer of Paws for Murder had commented that the ability of the cats to transmit ideas was the only puzzling element of the supposed mystery.
    “Isabelle Hotchkiss is very popular,” said Ronald, whom Felicity credited with what she