Cat In A Quicksilver Caper

Rushin into Trouble

“Any idea,” Temple asked Randy after meeting him in the New Millennium lobby the next day, “why the honchos called this top-secret meeting?”

“Other than murder?”

“Shhhh!” Temple eyed the hotel’s Spaceport entry now behind them. It looked like a flying saucer, the fifties’ riveted-silver-metal variety. Crowds of squealing people were still pouring through the doors that goosed them with a whoosh of air as they decompressed into the hotel’s interior.

Silver-skinned and clad robot types directed the tourists to various areas, including an upward-flowing water slide that would take them to the external roller-coaster ride that circled the hotel’s solar system every half hour.

Between the exotic elements snaked the usual lines of bag-toting tourists checking in and checking out.

“Shhhh!” she repeated. “In Vegas hotels, even the crystal chandelier drops and robot valets have ears.”

“We’re meeting in one of the high-roller suites. Those have the least access and the most security.”

Temple was glad she wore what passed for a power suit in Vegas: white silk suit with a cropped and fitted jacket and slim skirt, with high-heeled gold sandals. With her red hair the outfit was spectacular. With her hair blond these days, it was stellar.

“You look very Heather Locklear today,” Randy commented in the private elevator. Temple didn’t consider that a compliment. At least the gilt woven-leather tote bag on her shoulder proclaimed her as another kind of working woman. She normally didn’t wear metallics but was finding that blond hair dictated a certain style. No wonder they all looked alike.

Her heels clicked on the marble lining the halls on the suite level. They weren’t going to sneak up on their bosses.

Randy had donned a tie for the occasion, a sure sign that this was a serious pow-wow. They both had better report positive ways of spinning the recent murder.

The suite’s entry mimicked a real front door, like Temple’s Circle Ritz condo, but this one had double doors, stained-glass sidelights and transom, with entry torches shining even during daylight hours.

Randy rang the bell.

The door took its own sweet time about opening, probably because there were so many honchos inside, no one was lowly enough to tend to practical matters.

The door opened into a wall of dark navy polyester suit and black shirt with a white tie. What did the museum muscle think this was, a touring company of Guys and Dolls?

“Da,” he said.

Temple was always tempted to answer “da,” as in Da-da. Or Dada, the art movement. Or da-DAH, the theatrical presentation syllables.

All of these creative possibilities were lost on Boris, whose broad peasant face never showed its teeth. He stepped back, drawing attention to his unimaginative brown shoes.

She and Randy crossed a foyer paved in a mosaic of multicolored marble and stepped down onto the living room’s thick off-white carpet. A wall of distant windows framed the very tops of the Strip’s highest landmarks against a background of vivid blue sky.

The pale cream grasscloth walls hosted paintings from the hotel owner’s private collection of French Impressionists.

Such huge and luxe suites went for $30,000 a night, or more, but were often given gratis to major domestic and foreign high rollers called “whales,” visiting ex-presidents and film stars. A lot of Las Vegas insiders had never seen such a layout, and Temple was making her debut as one who had.

The usual suspects had gathered in the huge dining room under a pair of vintage Lalique crystal chandeliers. Natasha, the muscleman whose Prince Valiant haircut grazed the bottom of his rear suit collar, stood guard by the granite-topped sideboard loaded with various samovars, plates and napkins, and finger food so elegant it defied description.

Temple always avoided that kind of spread, not wanting to discover mid-mouthful that she was eating an exotic pet . . . like a snake or a tarantula. One could never trust high-end chefs in their race to be edgy and unexpected, especially since the Fear Factor reality TV show had made the public mass consumption of living vermin its main dish.

Being an animal lover, although not a vegetarian, Temple often walked a fine-line foodwise: raw unadulterated body parts were off her list, so none of the no-doubt pricey varieties of caviar on the buffet were for her. But truffles were all right. Also chocolate. And Strawberries Romanoff. Deviled eggs were iffy.

Everyone nodded at the new arrivals and continued eating voraciously. All had red-rimmed eyes and furrowed brows. Obviously the higher-ups really had been up . . . all night, discussing whatever crisis this was: bungled theft, tragic accident. Or murder. She’d been up worrying too, and not only about the public relations fallout of sudden death. She was haunted by her first impression that the dark, dangling body was Max’s. His midnight visit the other night proved that he was out prowling somewhere in the service of counterterrorism. Could this Russian exhibition be connected to his shadowy current concerns? The Synth? Shangri-La?

The lowly flacks had just been called in for the post-decision duty roster.

Randy shrugged at Temple, having come to the same conclusion, and attacked the buffet with gusto and little or no conscience for the contents of the platters.

Olga Kirkov, the ex-ballerina turned exhibition director, already sat at the boardroom-long dining table with its malachite top and pale beige travertine stone base. Correction: she sat at the head of the table, in one of the cream leather captain’s chairs.

Gradually, they all took their plates and cups and settled at seats flanking her down the fifteen-foot expanse. Temple and Randy chose seats opposite each other, in the exact middle, so they could parry questions from each end.

Dimitri Demyenov, the Russian government representative, was backed by his bodyguards now that door duty was over. Temple watched him, thinking that he wasn’t as ignorant of the English language as he appeared to be.

Ivan Volpe, the Parisian descendent of fleeing White Russians during the nineteen-teen Revolution days and curator of the exhibition, remained standing, the obvious spokesman. Temple began to realize that this ritzy secret meeting was for her and Randy’s benefit. It was a pre–press conference strategy session.

“Mr. Wordsworth, Ms. Barr,” the aristocratic curator began, “we are faced with a terrible crisis. We haven’t invited the emissaries from the co-sponsoring corporations, or the art media that are covering this installation and debut. Given the uncertainty about the nationality or motive of our personal Hanged Man, who had the rather bizarre name of Art Deckle, are we to forge ahead or admit to the tragedy and say it was . . . a personal act, having nothing to do with the exhibition? I report directly to the owner and executive board of the hotel consortium, which promises to do anything necessary to safeguard this exhibition and see that it continues its mission to foster international culture and accord.”

Temple had withdrawn her reporter’s notebook (slim and lined) and made notes on the last bit of gobbledygook. Volpe always spoke as if every syllable was quotable, so he would appreciate attentive underlings.

Opposite her, Randy was assiduously doodling in a way that passed for rapt recording.

So, if this was “Murder on the Siberian Express” . . . how much dodging and burning could even the most pompous museum curators do to hold back the inevitable tide of media interest? Temple may have been a bit hard-headed on this subject. She’d faced the disruption of murder on more than one assignment. Between living in one of the fastest-expanding areas in the U.S. with an annual tourist influx pushing toward forty million a year, the odds in Las Vegas for serious crime, including murder, were staggering.

It was a miracle the place was as safe and secure as it was. And it was, basically, thanks to hotel-casino security forces backing up local law enforcement. The city was Oz on the Mojave, and the “palace” guards were rigorously trained and employed to make sure it remained safe for Dorothy Tourist and the Gang. No Wicked Witches ruled here, if you excepted Shangri-La and her performing Siamese, Hyacinth. But Temple was a little biased on that account.

She dared to ask a question. One she regarded as fairly safe.

“Sir,” she asked Volpe during a pause when he downed the steaming contents of one samovar that smelled slightly festive. “Murder will out, but this death is clearly ambiguous. It could be just a tragic accident.”

The aristocratic white fuzzy eyebrows lofted while the dark eyes beneath sized her up. Oh, God. She couldn’t help that she looked like the Sugar Plum Fairy as a blonde.

“You’re right,” he surprised her by saying. “The death is indeed ambiguous. The police and coroner haven’t declared a cause, and the coroner’s office, thank God, is far behind on its case load. So we may be lucky enough not to get a determination until after the exhibition moves on to the Frick.

“However . . .”

Temple stopped basking in her good-student mode and held her pen poised above a blank line, ready to record the nitty-gritty that was about to issue from those pale, wrinkled Russo-Parisian lips.

“The excellent police in this city have identified this man, at least under his alias, and have informed us of his criminal career here. We do not know his real identity and, whatever the cause of death, we feel we need to know if he was connected with someone else. Perhaps they may discover an international connection, even with such as Chechen rebels. I merely mention the more dire international possibilities.”

Temple’s pen hit paper, making a period on the notebook sheet.

She was inclined to object that simply being a Chechen made anyone a “known” criminal, but there was no doubt that Chechen rebels had been making it as hot for the Russian government as unknown anarchists had for the czars in the bad old days a hundred and more years ago.

A possible dead Chechen swinging from a bungee cord in the New Millennium wouldn’t be just a would-be jewel thief but a possible political gauntlet slapped across everybody’s face. And as a PR problem, he would be a top-drawer nightmare. It would take a pile of artful public relations to salvage a situation like that. No wonder she often ended up solving crimes as well as creating press releases. It was the only way to protect her clients from the law’s delay. She had to do it herself.

Well. A big cold, slimy salty mouthful of dead fish eggs might be just the thing to snap Temple out of the serious PR funk Monsieur Volpe had just put her in.