lynx in mock horror. “Wot, and mar me perfection?
Crikey, why would you want to muss up me perfect self?”
He started to turn, abruptly leaped at the monitor.
The lynx wasn’t slow, but Mudge was a brown blur in
the dim light. The whip snapped down and cut across the
back of the otter’s neck. Mudge’s sword was faster still,
slicing through the.whip handle just above the big cat’s
fingers.
The monitor bolted for the open door. “Mudge, no!”
THE DAY OF THE DISSONANCE
169
Jon-Tom yelled, but Mudge didn’t hear him in time. Or
perhaps he did. The short sword spun end over end. It was
the hilt that struck the lynx in the back of the head with a
gratifyingly loud thump. The monitor dropped as if poleaxed.
Jon-Tom breathed a sigh of relief. “Smart throw, Mudge.
We don’t need a murder complicating our departure.”
Mudge retrieved his sword. “That’s right, mate, but I
can’t take the credit. I was tryin’ to separate ‘is ‘ead from
‘is shoulders.”
“Quick now!” Jon-Tom instructed the youngsters as he
headed for the storage closet. “Everyone out, before
someone else shows up to check on you.” He led them
through the storage closet. “Don’t push, everyone’s going
to get out… don’t shove in the back….”
Roseroar strained to see better as shadows moved against
the open window. So far no one had appeared to spot the
dangling rope of pastel linen, but it would take only one
passing pedestrian to give the alarm.
She expected to see Jon-Tom or Mudge or even the girl.
What she did not expect to see was the silent column of
cubs who began descending the sheets. Some species were