When I hear nothing more--no frantic yowls, no ring of cleaver on flagstone, no more curses, I unsquinch one peeper.
Miss Caviar has risen at the chef's approach and replied to his opprobrium with a plaintive mew.
Oh, please! This innocent act will get her nowhere. Chef Song narrows his eyes and looks Miss Caviar up and down. I cannot blame him. She is a trim piece of pussycat.
"Skinny," he pronounces.
I prefer them plump myself.
Eyes . . . gold. Not green."
Not my fault.
Miss Caviar sits again, neatly, with her feet and tail all tucked together like she wouldn't mash a mayfly.
Chef Song edges to the pond and does a quick fin count. The greedy-guts in the fish suits do a mass schooling at the pond rim, all expecting a fistful of their favorite snack, an unwholesome pellet available for a quarter from a dispensing machine installed there for the hotel guests.
Chef Song, being the boss, knows a way to get the machine to hand over without feeding it a quarter He dribbles these unappetizing nuggets over the bubble-blowing fish-faces in the water.
A few fall to the flagstones and roll away.
Miss Caviar gives a dear little cry and bounds to retrieve one, crouching beside it to chomp away.
Chef Song straightens in wonder. "You strange kitty. You do not want fish, you want fish food?"
She looks up with her big carp-gold eyes and gives a miniature meow.
"Nice kitty." He is patting her satiny little head, which is as I black and sin-smudged as her larcenous soul, with the hand that does not hold the cleaver.
She sniffs delicately at the lingering odor on his fingers and licks one.
My stomach turns. So does Chef Song. He is retreating rapidly back into the hotel, as would any self-respecting person confronted with such an unnatural feline.
Still, the minx's fish-hating act has probably saved her I skin. I can give the devil her due.
She does not rest on her laurels, or sneak a spare carp I and get out of there, as I would. No. She sits facing the door through which Chef Song has vanished as if bereft. Cut the act, kiddo; you've lost your audience, except for me, and I am not impressed by such a turn tail to the feline creed.
In fact, she has outstayed her luck, for the door springs open and once again Chef Song advances on the carp pond.
I wince. If he suspects that she has hanging-around tendencies, he will make even shorter work of her.
I do not see the cleaver, but perhaps he will resort to a trap of sorts to remove her to the animal pound.
Even as I think this, he is bending low before her. For an odious moment, it almost looks as if he is worshiping her. In fact, he has left an offering; two in fact. I spot rice bowls of blue-and-white porcelain.
Miss Caviar digs into one urged on by untranslatable coos from Chef Song.
Poison. It is worse than I thought. I rise, ready to do my duty, however odious, and warn the little skunk away.
Chef Song straightens, uncrosses his arms, and reveals the cleaver at the ready.
What can I do? Risk an extremity? These are vital to my work and leisure activities. I recall needing an antidote to poison in an earlier case of mine involving some unsavory characters from the fringes, coyotes by name. So I know a noxious plant that will make the victim throw up the tainted food. It is unpleasant to down, and even more unpleasant to upchuck, but Miss Caviar obviously needs a lesson.
As soon as Chef Song skedaddles, I will point out her error and play the hero by leading her to the nearest stand of Desert Tobacco, which is guaranteed to make the heartiest eater repel any toxic substance.
The chef, nodding and grinning like a homicidal puppet, leaves the scene at last.
I am about to do as planned, when Miss Caviar rises and trots after him. After performing some nauseating leg-rubs in the doorway, she is invited in.
Will travesties never cease? I always had to break or sneak my way in to the Crystal Phoenix.
That is the way it should be done. That is the way it was always done.
I stalk over to the abandoned bowls. Ugh. Free-to-Be-Feline salting a well chopped mixture of white chicken meat, shrimp and . . . caviar. The other bowl holds clear liquid. I sniff it, expecting to inhale turpentine or some other deadly libation. Water. Just water. Smelling faintly of minerals and other healthful natural additives. Bottled water! What kind of decadent dishes are these? Not poison, but bribes. What is happening to the species?
I stalk to the pond edge and gaze into a dozen fish eyes as glassy as marbles, all those carp pushing eagerly to the pond's edge as if dying to leap into my grasp.
Unfortunately, I have lost my appetite.
Chapter 26
Old King Coil
The cursor on Temple's laptop screen blinked faster than a racing pulse.
Nothing is more aggravating to a writer than a blank mind to match that blank screen, all while an agitated cursor itches to be off and running down the invisible pixels, spitting out letters.
She had meant to dream up a Three O'Clock Louie campaign. Every new exposure generated a flurry of new ideas. Now the flurry had flitted to the back of her brain. What dominated her mental foreground was the Jersey Joe Jackson connection to the Glory Hole Gang and the Joshua Tree, the hotel that became the Crystal Phoenix. The Ghost Suite had been his; some said it still was.
Disconnected ideas were running around her unconscious like gerbils in an exercise wheel.
The Phoenix and ghosts, ghost towns and the old days, digging for gold and silver dollars, theme parks. Nothing coalesced.
When the phone beside her rang, she snatched the receiver off the cradle, eager for distraction.
"Temple?"
Oh, no, this wasn't distraction, it was penance.
"Yes, Crawford."
"Glad to catch you at home.''
"I'm glad one of us is."
"Stay there. We don't need you nosing about the show anymore. Besides, it's dangerous."
"Danny Dove invited me to drop in on rehearsals, and he's the director, not you."
"Well, I'm uninviting you. In fact, I'm warning you."
"Warning? Is this a threat?"
"You bet. If you set one bum foot in the theater, I'll file the suit I've been considering."
"I thought all your sweat-stained suits were at the cleaners."
"Just jibe away. I'll up the numbers. I'm serious here. I've had chest pains ever since your UFO went AWOL and nearly flattened me and half the cast."
"It's not 'my' UFO, it's a stage prop. How can you blame me for a set piece that came loose because your hysterical shove forced me to jerk one of its anchoring ropes?"
"I can blame anybody, but I will sue those who have the bucks to be worth it--the Crystal Phoenix, Van von Rhine and Nicky Fontana. And Danny Dove. For negligence."
"Get real. The police think the 'accident' was arranged."
"Doesn't matter how it happened, only that it did. I figure about six mill ought to cover it."
"Crawford! Don't be an ass. Sorry. It's impossible for you not to be one. But don't be dumb, too. You'll sink the Gridiron and all your wonderful skits."
"No, I won't..Danny Dove is tossing them out right and left, anyway, and what he's keeping he's mauling into mindless mush. That little twerp is acting like Hitler in high heels, stomping all over my best lines, my best pieces. He claims they 'won't play.' What does a toad dancer know about good writing?"
"Danny Dove does jazz and tap mostly nowadays, plus he's designed and mounted several of the Strip hotel's most successful shows."
''Sure, defend him. If you're the best attorney he can get, he'll be easy pickings in this suit."
"So that's why you called ... to threaten me?"
"No, I called to tell you to stay away from the Gridiron. If you call that a threat, that's your privilege."