"Have a seat." Matt gestured to the black-and-tan plaid sofa, wisely selected to conceal dust, dirt and wear and tear, then corrected himself, "Have the seat."
He sat on a piled pair of wooden crates.
"I'm sorry to bother you, but I'm disturbed about something I can't see around."
"What's that?" he asked, instantly interested. Problems did not dismay him; in fact, they were a kind of security blanket, Temple saw. As long as he could concentrate on someone else, he wouldn't have to look too much at himself.
"I know something about somebody nobody else does," she said, realizing she sounded slightly childish.
"And you're trying to decide whether to go into blackmail or not?"
She wasn't in the mood for humor. "I'm trying to decide if I'm obligated to keep it to myself--or the opposite."
"Why is your knowledge a problem?"
"It's about someone involved with Blandina Tyler."
Speculation ruffled Matt's face like wind on water. "You're usually one to unearth information, not suppress it. Why does this instance bother you?"
"It's . . . very personal, and it's sad, and the person just poured it out to me because I happened to be there at a critical moment."
"Isn't that what crack gumshoes love?"
"I'm not a professional, Matt. I'm not even a dedicated amateur. I can't help it if I keep . . . finding out things about people. And this is so remote, so farfetched"
"Nothing about a possible murder is farfetched."
"I know. That's why messing around in one can do so much damage. And this person has been damaged enough."
Matt's brown eyes grew as distant as such a warm shade can manage. "We're all damaged enough," he murmured as if thinking of someone else. "By the age of three," he added ruefully. His gaze snapped back to her, sharp and intent.
"Look, I'm in the same boat you're in, only my silence has been invoked on professional grounds. I'm still uneasy about it."
"Someone confessed to you?"
"In a manner of speaking. It's not official, but ethically my hands are tied, so I guess I'll just keep sitting on them."
Temple felt her eyes widen and her voice lower. "Matt, do you suppose we're both talking about the same person?"
"I doubt it," he said dryly, "but you've got me awfully curious about who your confider is. You aren't bound by the confessional, Temple. You're free to serve your conscience or your civic duty or your instincts--"
"Or my curiosity," she finished in brittle tones. "Why do people keep telling me things?"
He laughed at her exasperation. "You don't seem like you'll harm them."
"That could make me the most dangerous of all," she said.
He nodded. "Let's hope none of your 'confiders' figure that out, especially if your suspicions are correct."
"Oh, I don't know. I don't seem to be doing much of anything right lately."
"Why do you say that?"
Temple lifted her hand and then let it fall despondently to the sofa cushion she was sitting on. "Oh, Midnight Louie's been gone for a long time. I'm afraid that it's that Humane Society cat I brought back from the cat show."
"You're not surprised about that?" Matt sounded shocked. "No, Louie wouldn't like that. Cats are very territorial."
"But she's such a little darling, and all black, too."
"Color coordination does not soothe the savage beast when his territory is involved. Is she spayed?"
"Not yet."
"Then Louie might overlook the obvious, but you could end up with kittens on your hands."
"Just what I don't need. Poor Caviar! I don't know what to do. Maybe I can find another home for her. Louie will come back, won't he?"
Temple's voice took a sudden, husky dive as she contemplated driving Midnight Louie off for good by bringing a rival home.
Matt watched her for a long moment, looking shocked again. Then Temple realized how much her fears of Louie's desertion echoed her earlier desertion by a black-haired, much bigger, two-footed male roommate--Max Kinsella.
Only this time, she may have brought it on herself.
"I'll get the other cat out of the place as soon as possible," she swore, already distracted from her moral dilemma.
Matt proved what a superbly insighted counselor he was by forbearing to point out that it might be too late.
Chapter 32
Cross~examine Not the Cat
I take a long, long walk while I count the follies of my youth.
Then I take an even longer stroll while I enumerate the follies manufactured during my middle age. This brings me up to the present day, and by chance to my old stomping grounds, the Crystal Phoenix Hotel and Casino.
Though it is the usual hot day--say a hundred and ten in the shade--a cold chill has me in its icy grip. When the precocious Caviar, aka Midnight Louise, inquired where I was going, I told her I had business of a spiritual nature to conduct. She looked the usual dubious, so I informed her importantly that I am working on a case involving the welfare of hundreds of cats, and that I cannot be expected to sit around and chat with some wet behind- the-ears upstart.
Perhaps I was hard on the little doll, but I had to get out of there and think. Never have my past sins come back to haunt me so unexpectedly. In fact, I have never thought of my past activities as sinful until I have seen what my devil-may-care ways have wrought: an utterly unnatural female feline. Obviously, this misguided young doll is in desperate need of a protective male influence. In the past, I have regarded a protective male influence (mine) in a completely different light. Now I am saddled with the sudden responsibility of a . . . sire.
No doubt scads of my unacknowledged--even unconsidered--offspring run to and fro in Las Vegas. However, I have never confronted one in the flesh and fur before. This new, mature responsibility gives me the willies. It is as if I have seen my own ghost; in a sense, I have.
I slip around the side of the Crystal Phoenix and to the lush landscape between the hotel's two embracing white-stucco wings out back. Broiling tourists turn French-toast brown around the light-dappled pool, but I ignore the roar of the crowd and the of the grease--cocoa butter--with which they are well basted.
Under the tall calla lilies I shift like a shadow until I reach my Waldon Pond, my still, mysterious center, my place of contemplation and retreat.
Carp glide just beneath the pond's shining surface--a golden argosy of glittering scales and tender, hidden flesh. Also orange, black, blue-and-white, et cetera. These carp are very showy fish, especially when they are called koi.
Yet even their flashing fins do not distract me from my black mood. I think over my options and decide that the only noble course is to proceed to the scene of the crime and redouble my efforts to save the orphaned cats. When a dude is down and out due to some domestic upset, there is nothing like hard work to clear his brain and conscience. Well, there is nothing like work.
Who knows? According to recent events, some of these abandoned felines may be my kin. In fact, if I tote the mathematical odds of my lifelong activities of the procreative sort, most of them may be kissing cousins to a carp-lover of my all-too-close acquaintance.
Day has turned to dark by the time I arrive at the residence in question. Not only does the lack of light match my mood, but it suits my investigative m.o. This "m.o." stands for a fancy Latin phrase, "modus operandi," which I believe has something to do with computer communications and cool operators like myself.
I am determined that these household types will not elude my incisive questioning this time, even if I have to resort to my incisors, which are sometimes called "canines," a lousy word to hang on a fellow of another species entirely.
I have overheard a good deal about this case, one way or another. In addition, I am the recipient of the mystic Karma's confusing hodgepodge of clues. Most of these latter are closer to chopped liver than useful hints, but one incoherent bit has got me thinking. This is not always easy to do, especially when I am under a severe personal strain. I have not even had a chance to publicly spurn my Free-to-be-Feline in more than twenty-four hours.