Stanley had been with me for only a few weeks when he vacuumed up his food even faster than normal, came back into the living room, tottered, and keeled over, eyes closed, the tip of his tongue protruding pinkly through his teeth.

People gathered round, since it was something of an event, their MP, in his bespoke pinstripe and red tie, clutching an old Wellington boot and about to hurl it through the air.

I picked up the cordless from the table next to my chair. It was Dolores. Her voice was thin and brittle.

Like streetwise residents in underpoliced neighborhoods, copwise individuals learn to reinterpret the mundane scenarios, spaces, and people found in the neighborhood.