cat in a crimson haze

by Carole Nelson Douglas

However, human offspring do not sport any claws worth worrying about, and their teeth are decidedly tardy in coming, not to mention dull in the extreme.

  It strikes me that a return to the Crystal Phoenix might save Midnight Louie from domestic dissonance.

  Besides, I always had a fondness for birds, legendary or not, as well as fish.

  Chapter 5

  A Temple Too Many

  "This is so much more than we bargained for, Miss Barr," Van von Rhine was saying in a flabbergasted tone.

  . "Temple," Temple replied with a smile that could sell broccoli to George Bush and maybe even green beans to Hillary Rodham Clinton. ''Yes, I know you were just looking for a market repositioning, but--with all the high-powered competition on the Strip--I concluded that you need something concrete to sell."

  Nicky leaned over his wife's pale-suited shoulder, bracing a hand on the desk to read Temple's proposal.

  "Not concrete, glass," he noted. "You went for glass.'Phoenix Under Glass.' I like it." He flashed Temple a smile whose wattage matched her own.

  "But . . . the construction. The cost." Van von Rhine frowned at her husband and Temple as if suspecting a conspiracy of spendthrifts. "We put a fortune into restoring the Crystal Phoenix just a few years ago. And where--?"

  "Out behind the pool," Temple said quickly. ''It's a perfect site, not too close to the hotel.

  Listen, this is just a raw concept, but I doubt it would cost the moon. It would be worth hundreds of thousands in publicity value alone."

  ''And cost millions," Van added. "All right, describe this . , . terrarium again, with more detail."

  Temple smiled again. "I don't do detail. I just come up with grand schemes. Anyway, I visualize a huge glass dome over an exotic cactus garden, with lots of neon. At night little fairy lights on the cactus light up and the place becomes an exotic setting for dinner--call it 'Al Fresco's.' "

  Nicky winced.

  "Something wrong?" Temple asked.

  Van shook her head. "The name veers a little too close to Nicky's shadowy antecedents, that's all."

  "But what's the draw for kids?" Nicky asked.

  "That is the whole point of this campaign," Van reminded Temple, her blue eyes cool under arched pastel eyebrows.

  Temple grinned. "First, the kids can tour the cactus garden in the daytime; it's educational.

  Second, the dome also houses a petting zoo. Kids love that."

  "Petting zoo?" The disbelief in Van's voice was almost comical. "What kind of petting zoo?"

  "A classy one, with attendants to educate kids and care for the animals. And all of the animals will be indigenous."

  "They usually are," Nicky muttered, wrinkling his nose.

  "Indigenous is not a dirty word, Mr. Fontana; it just means native to Nevada. Critters who get a bad rap, like lizards and spiders and snakes--"

  This time Van von Rhine made a face.

  "Little boys love them," Temple said with the blithe authority of the childless. "We'll also have furry creatures like jack-rabbits, fox and coyote, maybe even a mule. Oh, and you know what would be great? A camel. The government tried camels as military mounts out here in the nineteenth century. You could give the kids rides."

  ''We know," Nicky and Van said in pained concert with an exchange of glances, "about the camels."

  "Well, then, you can see how logical it all is. A few animals can't be too expensive to maintain."

  ''What about the keepers?" Van asked.

  "Volunteers from local schools, supervised by a couple of experts. This is the nineties.

  Ecology is in. Nobody can say that the exhibit isn't classy. I don't know what it would cost, of course, but it's worth looking into,"

  Nicky's dark head was nodding. "What about it?" he asked his wife.

  She shrugged elegant, Armani-clad shoulders. "An intriguing idea. I realize that the hot new hotels have raised the stakes on the Strip." She glanced at Temple. "My only problem is that I don't know how to pay you. Miss Barr. Coming up with a concept for a major attraction is more than I expected of you."

  "Look into the idea. If it works out, you can worry about rewarding me later. Meanwhile, I'm still on a PR retainer. And my name is Temple,"

  This time Van's smile was like hot caramel melting the almond icing of her demeanor.

  "Temple. Except for the spelling, just like Temple Bar landing on Lake Mead; have you ever considered opening a theme park there in your honor?"

  "Really? There's a place on Lake Mead called 'Temple Bar?' "

  "Only one 'r' in the 'Barr,' alas," Van answered.

  "I never knew that, although I did know about the one in England,"

  "Wait a minute." Nicky's dark Italian glance was playing ping-pong between the two women.

  "What are these places and why have I never heard of them?"

  "The site on Lake Mead," Van said, "is off-the-beaten-path, a landing for boats. Boating is not one of your vices, Nicky dear, thank God,"

  "And the one in England," Temple added, "was a gateway closing the entrance to the City of London from the Strand, near the Temple where British barristers have practiced law at the Inns of Court for centuries. That one I looked up, and it doesn't have a double ^r' in it, either.''

  ''Why do you suppose your parents named you that?" Van asked a bit pensively. ''A sense of humor?"

  ''Because," Temple answered wryly, "they were just like Nicky; they didn't know a thing about the other Temple Bars. Ignorance, not wit." When Nicky winced, she added, "Neither do most people, which is fine with me. But I never knew there was a Temple Bar around here--"

  "I can hear her PR wheels turning," Nicky told his wife with a laugh. "You shouldn't have mentioned it."

  "Speaking of things I shouldn't mention," Van said, "did I see Midnight Louie loitering by the doors to the grounds today?"

  Temple grimaced. "Oh, that Louie. He just strolls out to the car with me and waits by the door. It seems mean to leave him behind. I hope it's all right if he looks over his old stomping grounds."

  "Maybe," Nicky suggested, "he can start excavating for Phoenix Under Glass."

  "He's big," Temple admitted, "and strong. But not that big."

  She gathered her papers and thrust them into the tote bag of the day, a bronze metallic quilted number that matched her Via Spiga pumps.

  "I've got a business lunch up top at the Fontana," she said nodding to its namesake as she stood up.

  Nicky unleashed his smile again. "More empire-building?"

  "No, just a little unofficial snooping."

  "Another murder?" Van asked with interest.

  "No, only intent to commit."

  "Who's the committer? Anybody we know?"

  "Me," Temple said with a grim smile, making her exit and leaving them, if not laughing, at least as curious as hell.

  ************

  Sunny Cadeaux was tall, thin, blond and waiting at a window table when Temple reached the 14th floor circular restaurant that was Nicky Fontana's namesake.

  Trust Sunny to charm a desirable table out of the head waiter in Hades.

  Temple waved off the maitre d' and joined Sunny, navigating the tables and chairs by guiding her bulky tote bag around them. When she arrived at the table, Sunny lifted her purse--

  a wafer-thin fold of cobalt leather that could hold one letter and several very thin dimes--from the empty chair.

  Temple collapsed into the seat, slinging her tote into the well between herself and the window.

  "We missed you at the last WICA meeting," Sunny said.

  WICA had nothing to do with witchcraft, but stood for Women In Communications, Associated, an organization that included PR and media women. Sunny was a television reporter with a local channel, a woman so unflappable that she was sometimes suspected of being an attractive corpse. Temple knew her impassive air wasn't impartiality, but rather an attempt to keep wrinkles from her pale, porcelain skin.

  'I've been a tad busy," Temple admitted.

  "We've
read about it. Isn't your job to get news of your clients in the paper, not yourself? Or your cat's puss in print?"

  ''Can I help it that Midnight Louie is so darn photogenic? And I wish they had cropped me out of that fire rescue photo. I looked like Little Orphan Annie fresh from a spin-dry."

  ''You looked adorably rumpled. I wish I could look adorably rumpled."

  Temple eyed Sunny's blond chin-length hair, smooth as satin except for the pert flick at the ends. "Believe me, rumpled is not your style, even in life-threatening situations."

  "You've been prone to those lately," Sunny noted, leaning back to make room for a padded vinyl menu cover large enough to play checkers on.

  Temple cracked hers open, then peered over its top. "This is as hefty as the Ten Commandments and it's just the luncheon menu. What do they offer at dinner--an encyclopedia?"

  "The waiters probably wear sandwich boards." Sunny snapped the impressive volume shut.

  "I'll have the usual. Why did you want to see me?"

  As the waiter approached, Temple desperately eyed the menu. She was having her usual identity crisis about what to order from a strange bill of fare. The banana, papaya and kiwi fajitas sounded truly intriguing, but then so did the swordfish quiche.

  She caved in and ordered what Sunny always did: salad, but a fruit version instead of the house greens.

  ''Are you doing anything for the Gridiron this year?'^ Temple asked.

  Sunny's pale blue eyes grayed with wariness. ''Maybe. Usually I play a bit part in the show.'*

  Sunny's bit parts always involved wearing filmy lingerie, if the male skit writers had anything to do with it.

  "I meant, are you writing anything?'' Temple said.

  "No. I seldom do."

  "Well, I always do, and I just realized I never got an announcement requesting skits for the show. I've been a little stressed out lately," Temple added modestly, referring to her moment of disheveled glory on page fourteen of the Las Vegas Sun.

  "Really?" Sunny unfolded her napkin and sipped from her goblet of spring water, in which floated the obligatory lemon slice.

  "Really. Sunny, you're always on the fringes of the Gridiron group. What's going on?"

  Sunny's long, pale fingernails nudged the silverware this way and that while her eyes considered the panorama beyond the window, the familiar flock of Las Vegas hotels grazing along the Strip like a colorful exhibit of architectural dinosaurs.

  "Sunny!"

  Temple was at last rewarded with a direct glance, one that quickly dodged again to neutral territory. "I didn't know you hadn't heard anything. Temple. Honest. But, if you didn't, it might have something to do with this year's chairman."

  "I've always participated in the Vegas Gridiron Show, just as I used to in the Twin Cities."

  Temple's tone of voice wavered between puzzlement and a grumble. "My song satires are usually chosen for the opening and closing production numbers, for heaven's sake. Why would they forget to tell me about it? They need my stuff. What chairman?"

  Temple was forced to interrupt her tirade in order to make way for a platter of leafy greens topped with such exotically sliced and contorted fruit that they appeared to have come fresh from the hands and meat cleaver of Chef de Sade himself.

  ''We should have split one," Sunny said ruefully, gazing on her own humongous house salad.

  ''Sunny! What chairman?"

  Sunny did what she seldom did, so Temple knew the situation was really serious. She sacrificed her deadpan composure and her rice-paper complexion to make a face.

  "Well, who is it?" Temple demanded.

  "Crawford Buchanan."

  "What? Who would make him show chairman? He doesn't even write for a real newspaper--"

  "Neither do I; I broadcast. And you're not in media anymore."

  "Still, I'm a Gridiron veteran, and nobody ever had any problem with my participation before. So Crawford has blackballed me?"

  "Maybe it's not personal. Nobody who usually writes for the show has been notified of a skit deadline."

  "Nobody? When's the show this year?"

  "October eighteenth."

  "That's less than a month away! Rehearsals will begin any day now. What can Awful Crawford be thinking of? Even he isn't crazy enough to . . . oh, no!"

  Sunny nodded as she nibbled a leaf of undressed romaine. "Um hmm. The word is he's going to write the show himself. Solo."

  "So low" Temple corrected her with feeling. "That egotistical...worm. He's written a skit or two before, but what makes him think he can come up with ninety minutes of topical satire--

  funny topical satire--all by himself?"

  "Male ego?" Sunny suggested.

  ''That answer insults males everywhere. Crawford has the ego for a stunt like this, but his qualifications in the other department are very iffy."

  "Temple, I know you don't care for him, but maybe he'll do all right."

  She shook her head, rejecting the possibility that Crawford Buchanan could come up smelling like anything other than an' onion. "How did he get named to the job? Why doesn't the Society of Journalists' committee ever name a woman show chairman? Don't answer: apparently women aren't as overbearing as Crawford Buchanan."

  "I heard he made a pitch to the board about how he could do it better than anybody. Cited his experience covering the Vegas entertainment scene."

  "Crawford doesn't 'cover' it, he oozes all over it."

  "Why do you hate him so much?"

  "It's not him, Sunny, it's the principle of the thing. Although, when Crawford Buchanan's involved, principles usually have zilch to do with it." Temple sat back to view her truly awesome salad from a distance. She picked up a convoluted curl of kiwi. "Buchanan is incompetent, self-important, sexist, greedy and utterly thoughtless, hardly a candidate for Man of the Year."

  "You've got no argument from me about the creep, but don't let him get to you."

  . "I can't help it. He offends my sense of justice. Maybe it's what a friend suggested: I secretly envy him for getting away with being so useless. God knows what the subjects of this year's skits will be, much less the quality."

  Sunny smiled. "Especially without your socko openers and I closers. You're a whiz at that."

  "Thanks."

  "I suppose you won't do your annual stint on stage either this year?"

  "You mean if I even get asked? Will any of us WICAns be asked? Knowing Crawford, he'll recruit the night shift from the Lace 'n' Lust. I wouldn't appear in 'Crawford's Follies' for anything. I do hate to see a good tradition sink under the overweight ego of a featherweight like Buchanan."

  Temple pushed away her untouched plate, kiwi curl and all. ''Anyway, I have bigger salmon to saute. I just presented the owners of this hotel, with a hot new scheme to pump up their popularity with the family traveler."

  ''Really? A whole concept? That's a big commission, Temple."

  Television reporters seldom sounded impressed, even off the job, but Sunny did now.

  Temple decided to let Crawford Buchanan crawl away into the back of her mind where he belonged, like a scorpion in the sun on a faraway wall where it couldn't hurt anyone.

  "Yeah." She managed a smile now that she had digested the shocking Gridiron news, if nothing else. "I'll have my own show to stage-manage, if Nicky and Van go for it."

  "That's the spirit!" Sunny's smile lived up to her name, then softened to a certain slyness as she leaned across the table and lowered her voice. "I told you what you wanted to know, however unpleasant. Now you tell me about that great-looking blond guy I saw you having dinner with a couple of weeks ago."

  Temple ordinarily believed in a free exchange of information, but this subject was highly privileged.

  "That," she said firmly, "is a story-in-progress and strictly confidential. Shall we ask for doggie bags?"

  "Whatever will your heroic cat say about that?"

  "Nothing complimentary." Temple eyed her exotic plate as she snapped her credit card to the tabletop. "Besid
es, Louie wouldn't deign to scrape kitty litter on this lettuce extravaganza if he were starving. And I doubt he is, because he was last seen today in the vicinity of the hotel koi pond."

  Sunny broke tradition twice in one day and grimaced again. "Please. Not after lunch. I hate blood sports."

  Chapter 6

  Past Imperfect

  ''How'd you hear about me?" the old guy asked.

  "A semi-satisfied client." Matt knew the smile that accompanied his statement would mystify the man, but Eightball O'Rourke was supposed to be a detective, wasn't he?

  Let him figure it out.

  ''All clients are 'semi-satisfied,' "the guy riposted without pause. ''They think private dicks are fairy godmothers in a trenchcoat, that we wave a wand--or a gat--and whatever we dig up will stop or start a divorce, help them duck a gambling debt or a child support payment. Most people don't really want to know what I find out. You don't act too sure about wanting to find this 'missing person' yourself--"

  O'Rourke glanced at the spiral-bound notebook on his pool-table-sized desk. The lined pages crinkled at the corners as if the pad had been forgotten in a drawer for thirty years.

  Maybe it had.

  ''This person is missing only to me." Matt admitted.

  Eight ball drew a box around the name on the note pad. ''All you've got on him is a history of coming to Vegas to gamble. Must be sixteen million guys who fit that profile over the past thirty years. You don't even know whether he uses his right name here. If he's ever welshed on a gambling debt, you can bet he doesn't,"

  "Regulars get known around town."

  "Maybe, but the casino personnel changes from year to year, sometimes from season to season. You know his hangout of choice?"

  "No," Matt said.

  "Any friends he might have here?"

  "No."

  "Hell, given the hot new gambling spots opening all over the whole U.S. of A. these days, he could have bid Vegas a fond farewell years ago."

  "Anything is possible."

  O'Rourke's ballpoint pen was drawing rings around the box that surrounded Cliff Effinger's name. "Parents sure liked 'f s,' didn't they? He have a nickname?"