"Absolutely."
Temple had never received so clear an assignment to meddle.
Chapter 14
Every Little Breeze ...
I stand inside the Crystal Phoenix, bothered, bewildered and bewitched. Everywhere I see women scurrying somewhere, tote bags like Miss Temple carries swinging on their arms. Every bag bears an animal warning sign: g.r.o.w.l.
Luckily, the sentiment is written, not articulated. I am also bemused by the presence of several large gentleman who appear to be hard up for clothing, such as shirts, and for grooming assistance, such as barbers. I like to consider myself the hairiest dude on any scene (in both senses of the word). I am mightily miffed that these ponderous dudes are attracting all the attention, not to mention that they are often in danger of squashing me underfoot like a rug.
Given that Miss Van von Rhine has gone to the trouble to install a magnificent carpet of golden phoenixes on a navy background-- which reminds me of carp afloat on a true-blue sea--it is most inconsiderate of these overblown dudes to keep their noses in the air and ignore it, particularly when I am on it.
Although I overheard news of bloody murder on my arrival, crime is not foremost on my mind for once. Dead bodies, particularly the human kind, are a ducat a dozen here in Las Vegas, but the living presence of the Divine Yvette is a true rarity.
From the first, one fact has not escaped me: Miss Savannah Ashleigh, such as she is, will be involved in the conference. Thus I have a priceless opportunity to pay my respects to my lost love. However, this opportunity is looking more like an obstacle. Through relentless eavesdropping, I discover that Miss Savannah Ashleigh will not be required to honor the premises until the date of the actual pageant, four long days and nights away.
Yet the redoubtable (and poutable) Miss Savannah had checked in two days ago. (In plenty of time, I note, to kill the Hiawatha on horseback. Talk about a late entrance!) I would like nothing so much as for Miss Savannah Ashleigh to be found suspect of a small murder or two, as she stands in the path of my true love and I. The Divine Yvette would not dream of forsaking her spoiled and selfish mistress so long as breath still stirs the movie star's formidable frontage. Although I do not wish to see the Divine Yvette disappointed in her human, who is all that she knows of the species, I would like to see Miss Savannah Ashleigh all alone on a slow boat to China with a bad case of ptomaine poisoning.
Of this ignoble desire I must not breathe the tiniest meow to the Divine Yvette. She is most solicitous of her mistress, which I find commendable but wrong-headed.
When on the trail of a human, I must use all my wit and wisdom. When I hunt one of my own ilk, I need only the sensitive services of my olfactory apparatus. This is not as fancy a device as it sounds. I merely apply nose to the toes and sniff along the floor until I catch whiff of an appealing scent. In a hotel full of human beings, this is a rarer phenomenon than one would think.
I decide to search the hotel's public areas first. Knowing Miss Savannah Ashleigh, she may not be required to perform her duties until later, but she is sure to loll about in case an idle spotlight should turn her way. I have never seen such a camera-ready woman in my nine lives.
This is what finally leads me to the back of the hotel, where I find an army of photographers and video tapers shooting a chorus line of unarmed (and even unclad) dudes by the swimming pool.
I wrinkle my nose against the overbearing scent of body oil and tanning lotions. Beneath the obnoxious fumes I do detect the signature odor of Miss Savannah Ashleigh, which is heavy on the spice and light on the nice. Then, as I trail unnoticed among the greenery caressing the hotel walls, a vagrant breeze (is there any other kind?) wafts my nostrils with the near presence of my dear departed.
A few eager wiggles through the canna lilies, a brief belly-crawl along the sandy dirt in which they are planted, and I find myself nose-to-Naugahyde trim with the Divine Yvette's pink canvas carrier. This portable habitation sits beside a director's chair with matching pink canvas seat and back. The name emblazoned on the chair is Miss Savannah Ashleigh.
No Miss Savannah Ashleigh is about, however, and the chair is empty. I hope that is not the case with the carrier, but there is only one way to find out: basic detective work, i.e., I must see for myself.
I cautiously lift my head to the mesh screen and inhale the soft, powdery scent of my lady fair. As in a mirror, on the other side of the screen I see a dainty head rise. Then I am the beneficiary of a sharp swat across the kisser.
"Hey! What is the meaning of that?"
Silvery whisker tips pierce the mesh. "Do I know you?" a female voice demands in a low, throaty growl.
Well, this is a fine how-do-you-do... not! I trouble to make myself into a feline welcome mat and I get stepped on. Could I have the wrong carrier?
"How soon they forget," I lament under my breath.
"They?" The occupant sounds as miffed as a celibate mink in mating season. "You dare to include me with others of your acquaintance?"
"I did not lump you in with the hoi polloi when I rescued you from the Stripper Killer," I remind her.
A genteel sniff tells me the Divine Yvette is beginning to take herself too seriously. "I believe that you were most interested in saving your roommate in that instance. I was perfectly safe in my carrier in the other dressing room."
"We can debate the past later. Are you not glad to see me?"
"I have not 'seen' you yet. Come closer."
"No more swats."
"Certainly not! A person in my position must be careful, especially when my mistress is thoughtless enough to leave my carrier on the ground, where just anybody might stroll up. I was not sure of your identity ... it is Midnight Louie?"
"In purrson," I reply in my best Bogart rumble.
This time she looks before she leaps to conclusions and puts her delicate pink nose to the mesh. I gaze into her long-lashed, half-closed eyes as we go nose-to-nose for a few stolen sniffs.
"You have still been filching carp, I notice," the Divine Yvette comments, wrinkling her nose.
Dames! A dude cannot do guy things without being called to task for unpleasant smells. The female of the species will eat the fish when it is presented to her already filleted, just don't let her see too much of the capture and processing.
"Not recently," I say.
"Hmmm," she answers skeptically. (Dames are also loath to believe a dude when he speaks the truth about his whereabouts and activities.) "Perhaps I notice because I eat only one type--and brand--of food exclusively."
"And what is that?" I ask pleasantly. I would not be surprised to hear that it is truffles, an expensive delicacy rooted out by French pigs. Most French culinary delicacies would be best given to French pigs, in my experience. I do not care for tripe, brains, eel or ox tongue. Yet I know that the easily impressed will swallow any such nonsense if it is introduced as French in origin. I am afraid that the Divine One is a victim of her mistress's snobbery. "What is the tidbit of your choice?"
"Free-to-be-Feline," she announces.
I blanche. The Divine Yvette should be nibbling curled baby shrimp on jellied flounder, oysters Rockefeller, scallops on the half-shell--not those Army-green pellets full of organically grown, vitamin-enhanced pre-processed health food!
"You like that stuff?" I demand. I may have to revise my opinion of my darling's divinity.
She shrugs, a gesture that charmingly ruffles the luxurious collar of silver fur covering her neck and shoulders. "I have to like it, mon ami. I am the Free-to-be-Feline spokescat."
I hardly hear her answer. That "mon ami" has sped straight to my heart. I can hardly hear over its wild beating. Or did she say "bon ami"? "Good friend" is not as intimate as "my friend.
Also, "bon ami" is the name of a common household cleanser. Does she mean that I am only fit to wipe up the dirt that she has walked in? These pedigreed dames are a pain in the neck to interpret.
"You said something, ma cherie Let her wonder what I really mean by tha
t!
"I said that I have an exclusive contract with Free-to-be-Feline. My mistress came to the Crystal Phoenix early so that I could shoot my first commercial. They say that I will be a household name."
Now the wax is out of my ears and the ice is forming on my heart. "You are going to be a television star?"
"So they say. Frankly, I abhor the spotlight. It is hot, noisy work, Louie. But my mistress can obtain no film work lately, and someone must earn the upkeep on her Malibu beach house. You do not think that Miss Savannah Ashleigh would stoop to hostessing an Incredible Hunk pageant unless matters were serious, do you?"
Actually, I think that Miss Savannah Ashleigh would stoop to a good deal in the pursuit of a spotlight, and probably has, if rumors of her early blue-movie days are true. But I do not wish to disabuse the Divine Yvette of her commendable loyalty to her less-than-commendable mistress.
"I am sorry that you are forced to labor for a living," I say. "Especially when it means chowing down quantities of that awful Free-to-be-Feline. Can you not employ a body double to do the dirty work?"
"Alas, no one can be found that precisely duplicates my coloration and bearing."
Amen, say I, and I have seen a few.
"Also," she goes on, "I like Free-to-be-Feline."
"You like it! But it is dreck!"
"What is 'dreck,' Louie? I am not familiar with the term."
In my amazement, I have allowed a crass street expression to pass my lips, and I do my best to repair the damage to the Divine Yvette's sheltered little ears. "Dreck is ... distasteful stuff, like" --I cannot think of anything one could cite in polite company that would convey how awful Free-to-be-Feline tastes--
"like lizard droppings."
"Oh! What a vulgar thought. I will do my best to forget it. I have other things on my mind today, anyway. I am soon to meet my co-star."
"Co-star? Oh, you mean the human who pours the dreck ... that is, the culinary delicacy, into your bowl. Usually only the feet and hands are visible. Perhaps your mistress could land that part. You could refuse to cooperate with any other pourer until the producers get the idea."
"How ingenious you are, Louie! It is true, now that I am to be a star, that I should show some temperament. However, my co-star is not human."
"Not human? Is this an advertisement where an alien descends and deposits a wad of Free-to-be-Feline before your very nose? I find that appropriate."
"No, no UFOs, Louie. Just the spokescat from the company's other line of food products."
Other line?" An awful suspicion stirs my soul.
Just then I hear approaching feet and dive back into the canna lilies. The Divine Yvette is no dummy.
She curls up in her carrier as if nothing had happened, and indeed it has not.
My midday naps in Miss Temple Barr's closet have made me an expert in the styles and scents of human shoes. A jazzy high-heeled gold lame pair can only shod the feet of Miss Savannah Ashleigh.
Beyond a second, hard-shelled carrier that has been deposited beside the Divine Yvette's home-away-from-home, I spy some stodgy men's wingtips that speak of points east, like Chicago or New York.
All these feet are shuffling around, except Miss Savannah Ash-leigh's, which are doing tricks, such as arching the foot and rubbing a toe on the back of her shapely calf or on the calf of one of the wingtip wearers. Again her breathy voice is wafted down to me on a passing breeze.
"We must keep Yvette in the shade. I do not want her getting a freckle on her nose, although I suppose we could consider it a beauty mark. It was good enough for Marilyn. ... Is this the other animal?"
The words, "other animal," are pronounced in a distasteful tone I cannot quarrel with, for I suspect the identity of the Divine Yvette's performing partner sight unseen. Sometimes it is most depressing to be able to put two and two together. One comes up the odd man out. I have no doubt that I will momentarily be in this most unhappy position.
"Yes, Ma'am," answers a fellow whose voice has all the manly resonance of a hornpipe.
"Well, remove him from that... box. I want to keep Yvette protected in her carrier until we know he is reliable."
"He is very well trained, Miss Ashleigh."
"Still, I don't want that brute attacking Yvette for some reason. She is very sensitive."
"Perhaps she will not work out for the commercial, then."
"Nonsense. My Yvette always rises to an occasion. Still, I intend to see that nothing disturbs her. She is not some trickster cat bailed out of an animal shelter at the eleventh hour and kept by an animal trainer. She is a personal pet, as well as the result of decades of the most persnickety breeding."
"Yes, Ma'am," says Mr. Macho.
So I see him bend down to unleash the fate I fear awaits the Divine Yvette. The carrier's metal grill (how well I remember the other side of that noxious barrier a time or two when Miss Temple got carried away and carted me off to the House of Dr. Death for some unfortunate procedure or the other) opens.
I see a garden-variety pink nose poke through. This is not the delicate shell-pink that adorns the Divine Yvette's face. This is a big, bold tongue-colored nose in a big, bold face of yellow stripes, which clashes with the nose. Pink and yellow. Ick! A long, horizontally striped leg thrusts from the carrier. Then another. Soon all of the Divine Yvette's co-star is catching rays.
"He is so big," Miss Savannah Ashleigh complains. "And ... yellow. And ... striped. I had hoped for a more elegant cat."
"He makes a hundred-fifty thou a year," Yes-man answers, with feeling. "I guess he does all right. He has his own fan club, calendar and video. We plan to release a 'Cat Carols' cassette for Christmas, featuring his meows and a chorus of sleigh bells. Your Yvette will be lucky if she tickles the public fancy like our plain old alley cat Maurice here."
I am still toting up the probable dimensions of the fellow's financial empire when out slips the name I love to loathe. Maurice. Of course it is he. What other commercial cat is so infamous? That lolling-about, unemployed camera-hog who represents Yummy Tum-tum-tummy feline food. Have you ever heard a more obnoxious brand-name? All this, plus a singing career. It is enough to make an ordinary alley serenader, well... spit hairballs from here to Needles.
Maurice stretches until his belly touches concrete, then ambles past Miss Savannah Ashleigh's trim ankles (though they are not so well-turned as my roommate's). He gives her the brush-past, then sways over to the main event: the Divine Yvette's carrier. After an initial sniff along the side seams, he pokes his big mug up against the screen.
The Divine Yvette peeks through. I see the blue-green glimmer of her gemlike orbs.
She reaches up a silver velvet paw.
Then she swats Maurice across the intrusive nose, and follows up with a savage hiss.
That is my girl!
Chapter 15
Hocus Focus
Temple came to a dead stop just inside the hotel lobby, her mind in public-relations brochure mode: Picture this.
Picture walking into a Las Vegas hotel and casino.
Picture twinkling lights and clinking slot machines.
Picture Frank Sinatra leaning over a lobby balcony to greet the clientele.
Caesars Palace, you say? The new MGM Grand? Some other high-profile Strip hostelry?
No.
This is the only Las Vegas establishment to bear a woman's name, a woman whose forty years of film, song and dance put the E in entertainment of the old school: glitz before grunge, talent before attitude.
Aha! Shirley MacLaine, you think.
No, it isn't that Rat Pack token woman of yesteryear turned
New Age guru. It's--
"Debbie Reynolds's Hotel and Hollywood Museum," Temple mused aloud as she and Kit gazed up at Frank, who gazed right back without blinking a blue glass eye. "Why are we meeting your author friends so far from the Crystal Phoenix?" she asked her aunt.
"Security," Kit said. "This hotel is off the Strip, so convention-goers aren't as likely to
wander over here. We want our instant little focus group to feel free to dish dirt. Besides, the group will adore touring the hotel's Hollywood costume museum after our little cafe-au-lait conference."
"I see," Temple said, though she didn't, "but here, even the walls have ears." She gestured to other celebrities lining the upper level.
"But deaf ears." Kit glanced at the well-attired mannequins. "Isn't that the Duke? In a tux? He really didn't have to dress for us."
"This is neat." After gazing up at the celebrity mannequins lit by a triad of massive crystal chandeliers, Temple returned her attention to the first floor, wading through a moat of slot machines toward a hallway guarded by Mae West in full feather. "Hollywood Walk of Fame," a light-bedazzled marquee above their heads announced. At the hall's opposite end, the glitz was multiplied by a theater marquee whose round flashing lights beckoned like Broadway on a Saturday night. Cardboard cutouts of Laurel and Hardy on the left wall welcomed them with hats in hand.
"I knew you'd like it." Kit hurried after. "I was only guessing what it would be like, though. You haven't been here before, really? And you a resident!"
"I can't keep up with everything in this town. When's lunch?"
Kit squinted at the thin, elegant watch decorating her wrist. "The others are coming in three different cabs, so as not to stir suspicion. Should be along any minute."
"You're sure these security measures are required?"
"Absolutely. The Phoenix is crawling with media and other eager ears ready to overhear and report.
You can't expect our . . . expert witnesses to spill their guts when they might end up on Candid Camera, or--even worse--that tacky tabloid TV show Hot Heads. "
Temple shook her own hot head of blistering red hair. "I can't believe that romance writing is such a dangerous game."
Midnight Louie 05-Cat in a Diamond Dazzle Page 14
