Once is enough, Steve thought, but he said nothing. He had accepted the reality that Fletcher was more likely dead than lost. It’s cats that always come home. Cats are drifters, gangsters. If a dog runs away from home, it turns into one of those dramatic episodes that almost never has a happy ending. The faithful old pooch who wouldn’t hurt a fly but chases a rabbit into the woods and ends up in a trap and dies. The beloved hound who never runs off but climbs out of his basket one day and gets run over on a busy road. It’s gruesome, the way a dog meets his fate. It almost seems predestined