Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In A Crimson Haze

Jill doffed her cowboy hat and sprang up the shallow steps to the deck. "Hey, fellas, cut your cussing. There's a lady present. Not me, gents, but the lady who shares the name of this landing.

Miss Temple Barr herself."

Temple was not pleased to have to live up to that introduction, especially in tennis shoes.

She soft-footed it over the wood planking and inside Three O'Clock Louie's.

Bare light bulbs draped the perimeter of a cavernous room filled with sawhorses, lumber, table saws and older men working away like the Seven Dwarves.

'This is what you call starting from scratch," said one, wiping a sawdust-covered hand on his baggy jeans, then coming to shake Temple's. "That's the way I cook, and that's the way I cook up a restaurant. From scratch."

"It does take a lot of scratch," put in another fellow.

They all stopped what they .were doing to ogle Temple, which was most unsettling. She had met them briefly at "Les Girls" strip club, where they also had a financial interest, but she had not had time to put faces and names together.

Now, here she was again, confronted en masse with a pack of males, trying to tell one from the other. Besides jeans, they all wore kerchiefs around their necks or foreheads, and suspenders, but some were portly, others lean. Some bald, some still hairy.

She recalled shards of the local legends about the Glory Hole Gang, who were a PR person's dream in a golden oldie package: how these senior citizen fugitives, then mere whippersnappers, had hijacked a shipment of silver dollars before World War II and buried the loot in the desert. How they could no longer find Lost Camel Rock that marked the buried treasure. How they hid out for decades at a ghost town called Glory Hole, with Eightball's granddaughter, Jill, growing up there. How Jill learned to be a crack poker player and supported the entourage when she was old enough by playing professionally in Las Vegas. How the lost silver dollars were found by some curious tourists, but the statute of limitations had run out on the old boys' heist by then, so they went scot-free after their long exile in the desert. How they turned Glory Hole into a tourist attraction and now were rich enough to expand their empire in other directions. Such as an eatery at Temple Bar.

All this flashed through Temple's mind in the wink of a butterfly's eye. History was fine, but her immediate problem, as with the brothers Fontana, was how to tell the Glory Hole Gang apart.

''You must be Spuds," she began, addressing the fellow who was still wringing her hand.

''Smart as a whipsnake, Jilly," he commented. "No wonder she catches all those murderers red-handed." He turned to Temple again. "I'm mighty pleased a big-time operator like you would bother with my little down-home restaurant. It's nothing fancy." '

"That's good," Temple decreed, stepping over strewn two-by-fours to get an impression of the place's size. "It's called 'atmosphere.' "

"Oh, we got atmosphere," another fellow said. "At our age, that's all we got, 'cept arthuritis.

Pitchblende O'Hara, at your disposal."

"Don't use that word. Pitchblende," put in yet another man. "Spuds plans to install a big, stainless steel maw of a disposal.

" You don't want to go down it by accident"

"Pitchblende," Temple said. "What a colorful nickname!"

"Mining term, ma'am. We all used to do a bit of prospecting when we was younger." He shyly ducked his bald head. "Pitchblende is uranium ore--dark, brownish black stuff, the way my hair used to be."

"When you used to have hair," guffawed a fourth man, whose own snow-white shock emphasized Lake Mead-blue eyes.

''Wild Blue Pike!" Temple guessed. At least this Glory Holer matched his name.

''So they've called me since Adam's apple was a pippin. I like to fly a bit when the weather's good."

"Yeah," Spuds suggested with long-time raillery. "Pilot that table-saw a little more, brother, and the work'll get done faster."

His words sent everybody back to their appointed tasks, which, as far as Temple could see, involved making as much noise as possible to little effect.

Spuds stuck a gnawed yellow pencil behind his ear and escorted the two women to the front porch, away from the racket.

"Jilly says you got your hands full at the Crystal Phoenix," he told Temple when all three were gawking politely at the lake, trying not to be distracted by the hammering, yammering, sawing and off-key whistling drifting from inside the building behind them. "But if you get inspired about any ways to promote this little enterprise of mine, I'd be much obliged. And we Glory Hole Boys pay well."

"Nothing much is out here," Temple said, gazing at the lovely view. "Getting people to come here will be a trick. I like the name, though--not yours, the restaurant's. It's folksy but implies life after dark. How did you ever come up with it?"

"Simple." Spud's grin showed off impeccably bright false teeth. "I did what all clever entrepreneurs do: I borrowed it."

"Oh, dear." Temple prepared herself to explain the facts of commercial life. "Not from anything copyrighted or trade-marked, I hope."

"Not unless you call me a copy-cat." He pointed to a corner of the deck.

A large solid-black cat sat there, doing his nails.

Actually it was grooming its feet, toes spread, teeth pulling at the fine hairs between the pads. Temple had seen Midnight Louie do that a dozen times, and she was seeing it now.

''Louie! How did you get all the way out here?*'

The cat looked up, revealing his trademarked green eyes. He twitched a full set of whisker-white barbs, lifted his hindquarters from the planking, then sank into a belly-down stretch.

"How did my cat get out here?" Temple asked someone who would answer this time, namely Spuds Lonnigan.

"That's your cat? I don't see how that could be. This animal belonged to a war buddy of mine, who gave up the fishing business in Puget Sound and retired to Fiji. He wanted a good home on American soil for his old seagoing mascot, but near water. So I was elected. This here's Three O'Clock Louie."

''Are you sure." Temple demanded. "He's the spitting image of my cat. Midnight Louie."

"Old Wayne came through and handed him over not six weeks ago. Must be one of those Koppelgang situations."

"Doppelganger," Temple corrected absently.

The huge black cat had risen and was ambling over to inspect the visitors.

"What does he eat?"

"Every one of these dang goldfish they planted in the lake to entertain the tourists. I can't keep him away from 'em, not even with my best cooking. 'Course, Wayne did run a salmon trawler, so I guess this old boy's used to some pretty fancy fillets of fish."

By now the cat in question was rubbing itself against Temple's calves as if they were old friends, purring like a motor-boat.

"It certainly does like you," Jill noted. "I see what you mean about a resemblance to Midnight Louie, but this must be a different cat."

"You know Louie?"

"Sure. From the Phoenix."

Temple squatted down to scratch the animal's chin. The green eyes slitted, just like Louie's, but close up his muzzle looked dipped in milk.

''No, it can't be Louie, The muzzle is grizzled."

"Just like us," Spuds said, chuckling as he ran a palm over the pale stubble dotting his jaw.

"Been working day and night on this barn, no time to shave."

"Never had much time for it in the desert, either," Jill added fondly.

"Don't have ladies calling often. Think you can do something for me and Three O'Clock Louie, Miss Temple?"

"Sure. We can hatch some plans later, when the renovations are done. In the meantime, I think I better get back to the Crystal Phoenix, pronto."

"Why the hurry?" Jill asked, sounding anxious. "There's plenty to discuss here."