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.Whatabout your cat?" Blubbering brokenly, the "old lady" was pointing as she sobbed.Then, tottering along,she led the way to the extreme other end of the platform, pointing up.Sure enough! There was a cat there!It was white and orange and black.It had on a small red harness.And it was hanging by the harnessfrom the top of the ten-foot, open wrought-iron fence! The rods curved in at that height and the cat wasoutside the fence!The cat was meowing pitifully as it dangled over eighty-six stories worth of empty space."It jumped,"falsettoed Silva."It got frightened and it jumped!" To get to it, one would have to climb the three-footconcrete parapet and then seven or eight feet of spaced wrought iron and then go over the inward bulgeand reach down outside.Silva had obviously been tailing Heller and under other guises had learned of this silly habit ofclimbing things.Exactly how he was going to do this hit, I could not even guess.To leave bullets in abody makes people suspicious.Heller looked up at the yowling cat.Then he backed about twenty feet from the fence toward thecentral snack bar and souvenir stand outside wall.There was a seat there and beside the seat were twosuitcases.He looked at the "old lady" and then at the huge purse.Some balls of yarn were sticking out of thetop of the purse."Sit down here," said Heller and the "old lady" sat down, sobbing away. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.htmlHeller sat down beside her."I don't have any rope.I need something to drop a loop over the catfrom the top of the fence.Otherwise it might leap again."He reached for the yarn and began, with rapid hand motions, to make a rope by weaving it."A cat'scradle is what we need," he said.And he was quickly making one.I vividly remembered Bury's warning about being kind.Here was an awful example.Heller wassitting next to death, complete even to widow's weeds!The night winds blew.The lights of New York rose upward with a blue fatality.Heller wove the cat's cradle.The "old lady" sobbed.Finally Heller was through.He had a very open basket on a long cord."Everything will be all right in just a moment now,"he said."Oh, I hope so," falsettoed Silva.Heller went over and stepped up on the parapet.He nimbly went up the inside of the fence.Hemoved over the top bulge.With a deft cast he dropped the basket below the cat and pulled up.The cat's legs extended throughthe open weave but it was securely meshed.He drew it up. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.htmlSome sound must have caught his ear above the wind.Teetering on top of the fence, he turned hishead and looked.Silva was just that moment ten feet away, laying something down upon the pavement!Heller saw what it was.A Voltar concussion grenade.I recognized it at the same instant.It was one of those I had given Terb! It would make a fantasticconcussion blast without a single fragment.It would blow Heller off that fence and into the depthseighty-six stories below.Silva's hand left the grenade."And one," whispered Heller.He was going to count!Silva straightened up.Heller threw the cat!"And two," said Heller.The cat hit Silva in the face!It was screeching and clawing!Obviously, Silva had meant to withdraw behind the barricade of suitcases and chair to escape theconcussion.Beating at the cat, trying to get it off of him, he backed up! Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html"And four," said Heller.I realized he knew that that grenade had a fifteen-second lag!Down came Heller off the fence and onto the platform!Silva was still fighting the cat.But with one hand he was reaching into his purse.Out came my Colt Bulldog!The cat was still on him, screeching like a nightmare.Heller was swiftly circling."And seven
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