Cat in a Quicksilver Caper

by Carole Nelson Douglas

  “Where did you last see her?” Garry asked.

  “At the Cloaked Conjuror’s estate. Creepy old place near a cemetery. Keeps the tabloids and the tourists away. Crazy young woman, always wears her stage makeup. We had a little talk, she and I, and it wasn’t peace negotiations.”

  “What happened?”

  “A few months ago, she lured Temple up on stage in her act in an audience-participation gig.”

  “Always a crowd-pleaser.”

  “Not that time. She did the take-the-item switch, only it was the Tiffany ring I gave Temple in New York. And not only that but she whisked Temple into a transformation box.”

  “That’s risky to do with a civilian. Going down that trapdoor in the floor.”

  “And then into another cabinet and into a departing semi trailer loaded with magic box illusions and illegal designer drugs. Also napped was Temple’s cat, Midnight Louie.”

  As Gandolph regarded him with gaping jaw, Max said, “Don’t ask. I mean it. I got them back again, but it didn’t help my low profile with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.”

  Gandolph chuckled. “Low profile was always a job for you. So, I get the lethal lady in the sky. What’s the problem on the ground?” Max shrugged in a direction that directed Gandolph’s attention down over his shoulder to a cluster of people way overdressed for the floor of a resort hotel and casino with summer coming on.

  Gandolph frowned at the men in suits. FBI? No. Open-necked shirts. Still, pretty boardroom for the New Millennium main floor. And who else? Max would never worry about executive suits. A blond head at three o’clock caught his eye.

  Garry reeled off his diagnosis. “There’s the odd one out in that crowd. That little gal. Has to wear high heels for the top of her head to reach the shortest guy’s shoulder. Cute.”

  “Don’t say that! She’d kneecap you if she heard it.”

  “That your Temple?” Gandolph straightened in surprise, even though it strained his back. At sixty and two-hundred-sixty pounds, life was not a cabaret when it came to sudden motion. Good thing he had retired from the stage. So to speak.

  “Maybe,” Max said mysteriously.

  “Ah. I saw her at the séance where I ‘died’ last Halloween. She was a redhead then.”

  “She is a redhead.”

  “Adorable girl. And she’s a blonde now because—?”

  “I don’t know,” Max said, visibly trying not to let the tension in his jaw affect his voice. “Obviously, having her on the scene is a huge kink in our operation.”

  “Perhaps you should find out why she’s here,” Gandolph said quietly. “And you last saw her as a redhead when—?”

  “Just two weeks before last and way too many nights ago.” Max tossed the drills and cords in a long metal workbox the size of a coffin for a midget.

  He glanced up to the deceptively frail female figure twirling above. That was Max Kinsella these days. Caught between heaven and hell, only hell happened to be on high in this latest scenario. With Temple on the scene, his assignment for the cadre of magicians he was infiltrating had just become three times more difficult.

  He tried not to straighten up fully as he and Gandolph climbed down and shambled out, their blue-collar shift over, right on time.

  All right, lady! he challenged Shangri-La from above. Bring it on!

  But first he had to catch up with Temple, fast.

  Brothers Under the

  Fur Skin

  I go through the usual contortions to slip into the New Millennium Hotel unobserved. The word “observed” is very apropos, as the hotel exterior is ringed by a giant neon solar system. Mars, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, and that goofy little outer quasi-planet, Pluto, shine luminescent red, blue, green, pink, white, and yellow.

  This decorative hallmark hangs about six stories above the Strip, the better to be seen. So a lightweight but heavy dude like me is risking life and limb and family jewels to be crawling around on the hotel signage in the blinding and alternating dark of night and glare of blinking neon.

  Still, I have found and used the hotel service channels before, and I do so again. Before you know it, I have slid down the interior laundry chute called a service hatch, and immediately head for the hotel’s backstage area.

  This is not hard. I need only follow my nose. Few of us felidae rove and ramble inside a major Las Vegas hotel. Luckily, Vegas hotels are built like anthills or Egyptian pyramids: high and imposing, and slicked up with impressive façades, but basically three-dimensional puzzles riddled with hidden entrance and exit tunnels.

  Instead of worker ants constantly plying these routes in service to queens of the insect world, the hotel conduits are so seldom used that I end up with a cobweb mask over my puss by the time I find my quarry.

  Calling two acquaintances of the Big Cat family “quarry” is a little nervy on my part, but my part has always been nervy, or I would not be where I am today. Which is in the belly of the beast, in the offstage areas below and above the theater and museum arena, going nose to nose with dudes who outweigh me by twenty times. At least.

  If you are going to be intimidated by the canine incisor advantaged in this detection business, you have no business being in it.

  Besides, they are caged and I am free range.

  I amble over to the bars that separate them from me.

  “Hi, boys. I was in the neighborhood and decided to check in. I hear you will be the centerpiece of another custom-bustin’ Las Vegas show.”

  “Where is the delightful Miss Midnight Louise?” Lucky, the black leopard, asks.

  He will never forget that she finessed him a fine shank of beef when he was being kept in chains and underfed for nefarious purposes during one of my previous adventures. It is one of my previous adventures, and not his, because I am the pioneering feline PI in this town and he is just a main attraction.

  “She is having a manicure at the Crystal Phoenix,” I say.

  Because she is the house detective there since I moved up to bigger and better things, like heading our own firm, Midnight Inc. Investigations, it is fair to say that her nail sheaths are getting a workout, even as we speak.

  “That is one feisty little doll,” Kahlúa, the other black leopard, puts in with a baritone chuckle.

  These Big Boys are way too indiscriminating, in my opinion. They have no idea what I have done for them. But a PI is most effective when he is most unnoticed, so I do not belabor the point. Besides, their “points” are way bigger than mine are. An effective PI is not a dummy.

  “You are still working with the Cloaked Conjuror?” I ask.

  “So far,” Kahlúa says, growling a little.

  Lucky adds a bit of a roar in support of his foster brother. I am getting the impression of discontent under the big top.

  “What is going on?”

  “The Boss has gone soft.”

  “No!” This I say with a straight puss, for there is hardly a human on the face of the planet—even the neon ones outside the New Millennium—who is not capable of leaving an animal companion down and out . . . flat!

  “He is all taken with this new dame in the act,” Lucky says with a snarl.

  “And her damn housecat—no offense,” Kahlúa adds.

  “None taken.” I am many things, but housecat is definitely not one of them.

  “I am,” so I inform them, “a street cat who happens to maintain an in-town condo and a live-in girlfriend. That is a whole different kettle of moray eels.”

  “A live-in girlfriend, really?” Kahlúa is practically panting.

  “Yeah. You have seen her around. Cute little thing. She used to be a ginger-top but she has recently gone platinum, like a record.”

  I cannot tell whether they are purring or growling. That is the trouble with the really Big Boys. You walk a narrow line with them. Irritation and agreement often sound the same.

  “We have seen nothing,” Lucky notes with a disconsolate purr turned groan. “We have been in rehear
sal, but have not been allowed to strut our stuff on the stage here. It will be our first aerial act.”

  “Aerial act!”

  I am impressed, though I do not wish to let them know it. Nobody uses these Big Boys higher than a few piled drum pedestals. This idea is so innovative, I half suspect Mr. Max Kinsella of being behind it. But he has been AWOL of late. Not even my Miss Temple knows that he has been moonlighting as the masked Phantom Mage at the Neon Nightmare nightclub. The Shadow, however, knows. That is me.

  “So,” I speculate, “the Cloaked Conjuror is going up, up, and away. He always struck me as the earthy sort.”

  “He is.” Kahlúa shows his teeth. The big white vampire fangs in front are maybe two inches long. That is almost as long as my . . . never mind.

  “It is that Oriental longhair dame he started associating with all of a sudden,” Lucky says. “We were doing fine as an all-guy act. CC is not built for aerial acts. He is all bone and boots and heavy-metal costuming.”

  “You got that right,” I tell the boys.

  If Mr. Max onstage and off as the Mystifying Max floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee, the Cloaked Conjuror thumps like an elephant and lands like a sledgehammer. His shtick is outing magical illusions, not creating them. And creation takes brains, guts, and elegance. “Outing” takes greed, anger, and envy. My opinion. So sue me. I will see you in People’s Court, where I recently won a case, paws down.

  “We think this is a mistake,” Lucky tells me.

  No kidding. “So what will you guys be doing up there?”

  “Jumping from black-painted platform to black-painted platform and vanishing.” Lucky boxes a huge black-gloved mitt over his prominent cheekbone. “In the dark. Black light. With mirrors.”

  I whistle low through my quarter-inch front fangs. “Sounds like a suicide assignment.”

  “For our faux master.”

  They are speaking of CC, for whom they actually feel great affection. He is a big galoot but he treats them well. I understand that they think little of this new act; that they are risking their own hides for his sake.

  “It is all her fault,” Kahlua murmurs bitterly.

  I know that “her” well and concur. She has done my Miss Temple and me no good. And so I tell the Big Boys, who are all eyes and ears and fangs.

  “Shangri-La,” Lucky hisses, showing his awesome fangs. “What can we do? Our faux master is besotted.”

  “It is more than a business arrangement?”

  “He is hated, threatened, masked, though feared and famous,” Kahlúa says with some fellow sympathy. “He has no friends but us, and does not understand how loyal we are. He falls prey to a capering female.”

  Well, I have fallen prey to a capering female or two in my day, so I do not add anything to their summation.

  “He is human,” I say finally. “The breed requires constant shepherding, more subtle than a mere dog’s. We will just have to do our jobs and theirs too. As usual.”

  “Amen,” the Big Cats growl in unison.

  You would think I was leading a revival meeting. But then, I am in a way.

  “I will be in touch,” I say airily. “I have a delinquent human to mind too.”

  “Awww,” they growl in sympathy.

  Kit and Caboodle

  “This is the cutest place,” Aunt Kit exclaimed as she moved from Temple’s small entry area into the living room.

  “Your mini Flatiron building in Greenwich Village isn’t anything to whistle Dixie at,” Temple said.

  “Yes, but the whole interior has been renovated. This is the real schlemiel, as they said on Laverne and Shirley. Oops! I’m dating myself, aren’t I?”

  “Aunt Kit, you will never date, only improve with time,” Temple said. “The couch unfolds into a bed.”

  “That big thing? I don’t need a bed in your living room. At my height, the sofa will be as comfy as a cradle.”

  “At our height,” Temple said ruefully, watching Kit kick off her four-inch heels and bump hips with a lounging Midnight Louie as she claimed the sofa for her own.

  It’ll be an interesting bedtime around the Circle Ritz tonight, Temple thought. “I’ve got the Porthault sheets ready,” she said, kidding. “You can use the sofa open or closed.”

  “Mr. Big Boy and I can share just fine,” Kit growled in a super-satisfied Mae West voice. “I’m sure he’ll come up and see me sometime. In the night.”

  Every naughty implication in the phrase was punched out perfectly. Kit wasn’t an ex-actress for nothing.

  “You’re sure I’m not intruding?” her aunt added, pushing her large-framed glasses atop her head.

  “No,” Temple said without thinking.

  “No, you’re not sure I’m not intruding, or no, I’m not intruding?”

  “No, you’re not intruding,” Temple said firmly. “I imposed on your hospitality in New York last Christmas.”

  “You did not impose, my dear. Midnight Louie did, as I recall. But we are old friends now, eh? And happy to cohabitate. Right, Chief?”

  Louie’s green eyes had become narrowed slits in his handsome head. He didn’t like humans to speak for him. Kit ran her long painted fingernails along his whisker-stubbly chin and down his chest hair.

  He rolled over like a kitten.

  Temple beamed on this happy domestic scene. Having her aunt here was amazingly comforting. She was bewitched, bothered, and bewildered at the moment, which she might confide to Aunt Kit later, when there weren’t feline eavesdroppers around.

  They had a microwave dinner and luxuriated their bare toes in the faux goat-hair rug under the coffee table. Louie had taken himself off somewhere through the open bathroom window, fleeing the girly ambiance.

  Their wineglasses were on the third refill.

  “So.” Kit was settling into her confidante mode. “How’s your tall, dark, and handsome fella?”

  “Fine. I guess.”

  “Not fine! A wishy-washy answer if I ever heard one.”

  “Max has . . . a lot of issues.”

  “Family?”

  “In a way.”

  “Work then?”

  “In a way.”

  “Why can’t you say in what way?”

  “Because . . . his life is a secret that could get other people killed.” “He’s mob?”

  “No, he’s hero, which is much tougher.”

  Kit kept silent for a bit. “What’s with keeping the blond hair?”

  Temple shook herself upright. Blonde was a badge of courage, in this instance, from going undercover and nailing a killer.

  “I don’t know what to do. If I dye it my natural Little Orphan Annie red, the dye job will fade as the roots grow out and I’ll have to redye it all to match. If I don’t dye it red, I’ll have crimson roots and glitzy platinum hair. Going completely white at the roots might work best, but not all of my brushes with crime and murder have scared me that much so far. No roots are showing yet, so I have a couple weeks to decide. Besides, I may discover I like being a blond bimbo.”

  “Temple! This is the little scabby-kneed roller-skating niece I knew and loved in Minneapolis?”

  “This is my glamorous Aunt Kit, who came to the family reunion picnic at Minnehaha Park with her boyfriend with the sexy convertible and the ear stud?”

  “You still remember that?”

  “The handsome boyfriend?”

  “No, the sexy convertible.”

  “Nobody in Minnesota drove convertibles. Too cold and too many mosquitoes when it was warm.”

  “Morgan,” Kit recalled.

  “The car?”

  “No, the boyfriend.”

  “How come you never married?”

  Kit sighed. Set down her wineglass. “My era. Liberation. Independence. A career. The big city. Sex and the City. Enough success to become a carousel. Some great guys, always moving on and upward. Getting ‘too old’ for acting when I was thirty-five. Finding I could write as well as act. That was a woman’s world. Any g
uys I met after that were all unhappily divorced. All needed shoulders and understanding baby-sitters. My time was past. And . . . I did what my stars allowed. I was always more, or less, Me, not Somebody’s Wife or Somebody’s Mother. But—” Kit smiled at Temple. “I have always been excessively proud to be your aunt.”

  “Kit. I . . . have a marriage proposal.”

  Kit’s hands clasped at her breastbone, the universal theatrical gesture for joy. “Max has proposed? I knew it in New York! I feel like a mother hen whose chick has landed in her own safe little nest!”

  “No. Not Max. Matt.”

  “Matt?”

  “You remember. You saw him when you were out here for the romance writers’ convention.” Temple had not sounded very sure.

  “Matt.” Kit was visibly gathering her improvisational skills. “Ah, yes! Blond, dreamy. Ah . . . I thought he was a friend.”

  “Where do you think proposals come from?”

  “I don’t think. Temple, I’m sorry. I’m in a fantasy fog most of the time. Acting, writing. Not reality. I do indeed remember Mr. Caramel Smoothie. Frankly, I’d assigned you to Max and felt free to . . . well, appropriate Matt for one of my books. So. He’s proposed. Isn’t he . . . forbidden fruit, somehow? I remember importing him as the luscious and of course forbidden first cousin in . . . er, Bayou Bewitched, a Louisiana-set romance.”

  “ ‘By you bewitched’? Quite the obvious pun, Auntie.”

  “You’d be surprised how many don’t get it. How old are you anyway?”

  “Thirty,” Temple announced in tones of doom, not mentioning that thirty-one was just around the corner, suddenly next summer, like July.

  “A chick fresh out of the egg.” Kit frowned. “But it’s true. I followed my acting career just long enough to lose out on the first round of romantic link-ups.”

  “Women,” Temple quoted a magazine article, “who don’t marry by thirty-five are unlikely to.”