An air raid siren goes off under my arse. I jackknife forward, and a bolt of black furry lightning hurtles out from under me and lands in the corner by the door, its back arched and tail fluffed out like a bog-brush. It gives me the evil eye as I hyperventilate, then slowly lower myself back down onto my chair seat.

“That’s all right, pay no attention to me, just make yourself at home,” I tell the self-propelled whoopee cushion, then audit the itemized receipt with a sinking heart. Judging from the bottom line, cats fall somewhere between a new Porsche and a used Lamborghini in running costs, and I’ve got a nasty suspicion that I’m not going to be able to expense this claim. I mean, I might be able to concoct an experimental protocol that involves hosting one all-black specimen of Felis catus in the lap of luxury before sacrificing it on a summoning grid—but I suspect that would annoy Trish, and one should always avoid pissing off the departmental secretary.

The potential sacrifice-to-be stares at me mistrustfully, then sits down and begins to wash its left hind leg, which it stretches out in front of it. I examine it from a safe distance. It’s a generic short-haired black cat, slightly tattered about the edges and a bit skinny. There’s a kink in its tail as if it was broken once. Gradually the blob of darkness works its tongue into the gaps between its claws, and I realize there’s something odd about its paw. Cats don’t have opposable thumbs, do they? Unless there’s some medical condition . . .

I shake my head, unlock the computer, and haul down a shiny new VM from our classified information repository. (It seems a bit excessive to create and download a whole new Windows Vista guest instance in order to open a new notepad document and type a few notes, but that’s how we’re supposed to roll these days.) I’m partway through typing up some notes on the DRESDEN RICE mess and Angleton’s advice pertaining thereto when there’s a knock on the door. “Come in!” I call. As the door opens, the cat looks up in sudden alarm and scrambles for cover under my desk. Oh great. It’s Andy. “Well?” he asks, with the expression of a friend who can’t quite bring himself to ask how the blind date he fixed up on a dare went.

“Come in and sit down,” I suggest, “but watch your feet.”

“Watch for”—Andy spots the litter tray—“what?”

“It’s the stray that was hanging around the dumpsters; it followed me in.” Andy sits down. “I was going to take it to the Cat and Dog Home at lunchtime but Trish has unilaterally decided I’m adopting it.”

“She probably thought you needed the humanizing touch,” Andy agrees as he sits down. There’s another knock on the door.