Now that could be Lee as in a last or first name. Or "lee" as in Levi's jeans. Or it might even be somebody talking about what nobody doesn't like, which is Sara Lee the dessert maker. Or someone could be discussing the Kennedy assassination and have dropped Lee Harvey Oswald's name into the hopper. Still, hope is a frail thing with feathers, and I go for things with feathers. I perk up both ears and smother my second, world-class yawn.
"Photos for Miss Ashleigh? I'll have a bellman take them up."
Yes! I leap up with joy, forgetting that I am reposing under a marble counter. Ouch! Then I hear the sharp ping of a bell. I wiggle down the underbelly of the counter and keep a sharp eye out for a bellman uniform.
Here I almost make a fatally wrong calculation. I am hunting for the usual uniform, navy with gold buttons, or perhaps a tasteful maroon or hunter green. What have I done? For a moment, I have failed to remember that I am in Las Vegas. Here a bellman can look like a bodybuilder and often does.
So I almost miss the guy in the thong sandals, the thong diaper and the sheet-swathed head.
But he is carrying a manila envelope and I have seen containers of that description all over Miss Temple's desk, full of photos, documents and what have you.
What I have is a lot of catching up to do before this desert-dude hops aboard one of the palanquin elevators and leaves me below, watching him defy gravity through the elevator's glass facade.
I make the same flight by the skin of my hocks and heels. Of course I am noticed, but I act like I know where I'm going and when a woman near the control panel asks, "Can I hit a floor for anyone?" I merow a very clear 'four."
She apparently does not hear me, which is lucky as the manila envelope is going much higher. In fact, it is going so high that all the other passengers exit beforehand, so while it is really hard to hide from the bellman, no one else is aware of me.
But the bellman begins doing muscle flexes in the rear mirrored wall as soon as everybody has exited, concentrating so hard on his biceps that he does not look down far enough to notice me. Miss Temple frequently bewails her short stature, but I must say that sometimes it is better to keep a low profile in this town, and this is one of them.
Once the elevator doors open at the twentieth floor, the bellman struts out, looking in every hall mirror he passes. There are quite of few of these, as the passage is tricked out li ke the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles.
(Some may wonder how an exceptionally short P.I. in Las Vegas, who has no formal education except what can be picked up on the street, can know about such ritzy foreign attractions. Quite simply, I am an autodidact, which means that I taught myself all I need to know and a good deal that I do not, but the non-need-to-know comes in handy to throw into my conversation now and then. I have read a lot of books in my time, under the pretext of snoozing on them. I use a technique called feed-reading. First I consume a meal generous enough to make me drowsy. Then I curl up on a newspaper or any old tome I can find. Once I am suspended in a state of absolute relaxation, I absorb the contents at my pawtips by a kind of osmosis.)
This is a tricky bit for me. I must "shadow" the bellman while remaining far enough behind that my mirror image does not show up in his view. This I manage until he stops at a door and knocks. Then only boldness will work. I sidle up right behind him, counting on the dim hall and the dark carpeting to camouflage me.
The resident is slow to answer. I wait, twitching my whiskers with impatience. So near and yet so far from my Divine Yvette.
At last the door is cracked open, with the chain lock still on!
"Miss Ashleigh."
"Yes," comes the breathy, foggy reply.
The front desk sent up a manila envelope for you."
"Slide it through the door," she requests throatily.
This will not do! It has been years since I have been able to shimmy through a door crack that is only as wide as a chain. Perhaps if I had been more dedicated to working out, I might manage it. But I have never embraced unnecessary movement.
What to do? I reach up with an unadulterated mitt and snag a claw on the glued flap at the envelope bottom. As the bellman reaches up with the envelope, I drag down. Bicep-pumping aside, I win, thanks to the surprise element coupled with my fighting-sharp talons.
"I dropped it, Miss Ashleigh, and the envelope is partly under the door. Maybe you could open the door just a little bit?"
"Oh, rats. Did you have to be so clumsy?"
But the door shuts and I hear the chain-lock slide being operated. The bellman bends over to lift the envelope (thus giving me an unwanted close-up of his thong diaper). By the time he straightens up, Miss Savannah Ashleigh is standing in the open doorway in a flowing black chiffon negligee bordered with black marabou feathers on every edge.
The bellman is so startled he forgets about his own anatomy for perhaps two seconds.
That is all the time I need, especially with the made-to-order camouflage I see before me. I dart through the door as the envelope exchanges hands above me, and dash into the shady shelter of Miss Savannah Ashleigh's floor-dusting negligee. In my haste I allow my tail to brush her leg, but she merely twitches a bit, no doubt assuming that the tickling marabou has wafted against her epidermis. That is the trouble with wearing clothes trimmed in the fur and feathers of animals and birds. The wearer grows accustomed to the feel of foreign bodies, and cannot discriminate between the lifeless outerwear and the real thing.
Now I must navigate the area in perfect tune with the Ashleigh doll's high-heeled baby steps. (I notice that she is wearing satin pumps with more marabou on the toes.) Tickling her gams with whiskers or tail is not my biggest problem now; I will have to be nimble to avoid being speared by those lethal satin heels. Miss Savannah minces over to a desk, where she sits to slit open the envelope.
I sit beside her, naturally, trying to make myself as small as I can, which is akin to compressing twenty pounds of muscle and bone into a five-pound bag of liquid litter.
At this juncture, when things are very cozy under her skirts, Miss Savannah Ashleigh commences to tap her dainty foot.
"Of all the nerve," she huffs, tapping the other toe.
I switch my tail from side to side like a metronome, trying to avoid a painful pinning to the floor. Unfortunately, Miss Savannah Ashleigh has not a rhythmic bone in her body. There is no rhyme or reason to her toe taps. I decide to make a break for the far wall under the desk and whisk through a fragile curtain of see-through chiffon.
"Ooh! Yvette! Is that you, sweetums?"
Any expert would never confuse the coarser, shinier texture of my black topcoat with the airy, fluffy feel of the Divine One's silver fur. But I fear that Miss Savannah Ashleigh has the sensitivity of a sponge, not to mention its capacity to retain water.
I slip along the wall while she is lifting her skirt to hunt for a phantom Yvette. Soon I am patting open the door to the boudoir. My pulse races. Here the Divine Yvette must lie. Lay?
Languish? Sure enough, I spot the familiar pink carrier and race for it. Empty! Has my lovely flown the coop before I could play the hero and release her?
I survey the fringes of the room, then leap atop the dressing-table stool for a better look. On the king-size bed, smack dab in the middle, the Divine Yvette reclines in a faint pucker of coverlet.
My heart leaps up and so do I. Despite the treacherous footing on the down comforter, I wade my way toward the feline of my dreams. Those round, aqua e yes widen at my approach.
The Divine Yvette rolls onto her back and draws her curled dainty forefeet up to her chin. What a pose! I would even buy Free-to-be-Feline from the little doll.
She yawns, exposing tiny sharp white teeth and rosy tongue and palate.
"Louie! What are you doing here so late?"