Cat In An Indigo Mood

Chapter 11

Heard It on the Grapevine

Matt stopped at a discount electronics store to buy a shelf unit stereo.

He had never heard that phrase until he got there, and he wasn't sure what he had bought when he left after arranging for the item's delivery to Electra Lark at the Circle Ritz. Motorcycles weren't useful for bringing home big, heavy sound equipment boxes.

What Matt needed had been a machine to record and play back Ambrosia's show on the radio.

What he thought he got was a combination tape player, CD player, juke box, and Atari slot machine, a high-tech melange of buttons and digital light-up visuals with two accompanying speakers that looked and sounded like Darth Vader's helmet-head: black, bristling, and booming.

The setup also came with an instruction book a quarter-inch thick. Matt hoped that was because it was in three languages, none of which he could seem to translate, including English.

Matt suspected that all he had really needed was a cheap boom box, but even the term

"boom box" had sounded immature and obnoxious. The earnest yet superior salesman had eagerly pointed out the advantages of the mini-tower system, so Matt had nodded and produced plastic. By the grace of Chase Manhattan Bank and his own ignorance he was another four hundred dollars poorer.

But . . . for poorer, for richer.

The first thing he did when he got back to his apartment was to get out his address directory--a notepad with a pharmacy phone number logo that had been dropped into his grocery store bag--and dial most of the few numbers recorded in it.

First was landlady Electra Lark, to see if she'd mind accepting delivery on the mini tower unit in the next couple days.

"l love getting packages!" she insisted, as if he had offered to do her a favor.

Then he called Chet Humphries, director of the ConTact hotline, to discuss a change in hours to accommodate his audition tomorrow.

"Is this because of that radio station inquiry ?" Chet's scholarly voice asked over the phone.

Chet was a retired college psychology professor who Found running the hotline fended off the retirement blues.

"Yes. They sound pretty serious at the radio station. Want to use my ConTact 'handle.' l don't know how you feel about my . . ."

"Great idea! We need to reach out, not just 'be there' for those who know where to find us, or have the will to call."

"But . . . the underlying motive is completely commercial."

"People learn a lot about interpersonal dynamics even from those freak-show TV talk shows.

Eighty percent of it's mummery, but that twenty percent of classic dysfunctionalism comes through loud and clear."

"Very loud," Matt said dryly. "So it wouldn't bother you if I did this . . . show?"

"Not at all. It is media, my dear boy. Any sophisticated listener knows that's always to be taken with a grain of salt."

"I didn't think their target audience is the sophisticated listener. If I do commit to this midnight show, I'd have to work ConTact from--"

"Three to eleven PM. instead of seven to three A.M.," Chet said promptly. He managed shifts for a variety of full and part time workers. "You'd have to finish up a full workday with another hour of the talking cure. That okay with you?"

"Yeah, if I can get used to the idea of helping people as entertainment. Doesn't exactly fit my previous calling. But I'm used to working nights now. Kind of like it."

"You're a good counselor; you should do fine with a radio clientele. They need someone with real ethics, like you."

"But am l a good showman? That's part of the job."

"Do your best, youngster; that's all any of us can do."

Having taught for so many years. Chet had an arsenal of fondly avuncular titles suitable for students. Some people would have found the habit condescending, but Matt enjoyed the sense of being back in school again, in a very real sense, he was. Civilian school. Secular school.

He hung up, multiplying figures on a blank page of the note-pad. Another essential item of civilian life he didn't have: a pocket calculator. Luckily, he still knew his multiplication tables, and his scratching pencil had come up with a mind-boggling formula: At two hundred dollars an hour, five nights a week, Matt would be making four thousand extra a month!

Hey! He'd have his Christmas present buying spree paid off in . . . three weeks, not including the belated present of Temple's necklace.

He grimaced as he looked at the figures. She hadn't given it back yet. He hoped she wouldn't, but could understand her reluctance to keep it. She was engaged to another man now; he'd have to get used to the idea.

His gaze lingered on her phone number, one of three on the all-important first sheet of the notepad: his boss, his landlady, his. . .no words could summarize what Temple was to him.

He turned to a fresh page and carefully printed in Leticia Brown's name and phone number.

Door number four: the radio station. What would lie behind it? A brave new world? Or a booby prize?

While he was sitting there, being wistful, the phone startled him by ringing.

My, he was getting popular.

"Hello?"

"Frank here. Bucek."

"Oh, Frank. I'd almost forgotten I'd called you."

"I get around, out of the office. Anyway, I was able to look into that party you wanted checked out. I got intrigued when you suggested she might have something to do with that scam to rip off the casino. You know, when I first came to Vegas and ran into you again."

Matt knew. The shock washed over him again: his spiritual director from St. Vincent Seminary, the formidable Father Frank Bucek, aka Father Frankenfurter, a civilian himself, with a wife and job in the FBI.

"I probably shouldn't have asked--" Matt began, falling into the guilty mode of a confessee.

"No problem. We're always interested in that kind of terrorist activity, especially after Oklahoma City. But we came up pretty empty on this Kitty O'Connor, at least under that name.

Some activity in Ireland years ago. Some hints she showed up in South America. All pretty innocuous. She's not a major player. Sorry."

"I'm sorry--sorry I bothered you."

"Don't be. You're in good company."

"Company?"

"Your Lieutenant Molina contacted me for a rundown too."

"She's not my lieutenant."

"Your local city cop, then. She's pretty tenacious."

"I thought all law enforcement people were."

"Nope."

"Thanks. I appreciate the information."

"He?! I'm not done. I also ferreted out a subversive group in your neighborhood."

"IRA?"

"Naw. Ex-pat priests. The Corpus organization for former priests doesn't have a chapter in your area; not too many ex-priests hang out in Las Vegas, but there's an informal group that meets in Henderson. Got a pencil?"

"In my hand."

"Write this down: Nicholas Benedict, 555-9543. Got it?"

"Got it. So. They, like, meet?"

" 'Fraid it's tonight. Just heard there's something going Look into it. It can't hurt."

Yes, it can, Matt thought. It can always hurt.