Douglas, Nelson - Cat with an Emerald Eye

"I thought that was the idea?"

"For Agatha, it's not simply a world Beyond. It's a world Beyond Belief."

"Aren't you the organizer, though? Why invite her, then?"

"She was available on short notice, and lives nearby. Now. Let's talk about the real world."

He smiled, slid the ashtray toward the unoccupied seat and fixed very dark, very liquid, very under-caffeinated eyes on her. "How did your medium hunt go?"

"Sighted psychics, sank same. All I learned was that everyone is different. Why do you include Professor Mangel, though?"

"His eternal, dry-as-mummy-dust academic papers on the sub ject lend a certain legitimacy in the eyes of the media. But I wouldn't listen to much he had to say on the subject, any subject, if I were you. He's much too involved to be objective."

"And you're not?"

"Of course I'm not. I'm a journalist. I believe that you were one too."

"Oh? How do you know that?"

Oscar smiled and took her hand, turning it over to study the palm, or maybe the absence of rings. "Not by reading palms or tea leaves, that's for sure. I asked your friend Electra when everyone was setting up the psychic fair last Thursday morning."

"About me? I'm impressed."

He shook his head. "Don't be. I'm afraid it's my job to know who's booking space at a Dead Zones taping."

"You taped the seance for your TV show?"

Oscar nodded, a sleek, smiling Cheshire cat with a mustache painted on his muzzle. A very smug mustache. Temple wondered if Max would grow a mustache next in the interests of disguise.

Oscar's forefinger traced her... lifeline... loveline? When she got home, she would have to get a book from the library to find out. Seduction tickled, which was probably the idea. His, not hers. But then again, if the tea leaves decreed ... A shame she had neglected to estimate his height when he had stood up to greet her. Maybe he was the short dark man who would aid her out of the blue Beyond rather than the medium-tall dark man who would sweep her off her feet. Suspecting the future was worse than suspecting murder. At least you never expected to see murder suspects again.

"What else did you discover about our circle of psychics?" he was asking a little too casually.

Who wanted to interrogate whom here? "Mynah is... interesting; at least she has created a fascinating environment."

"Oh, you visited her at home! Good. Quite the place. I did a half-show feature on Mynah and her way-out wonderland last season. Yes, every detail is to Mynah's specification. A fascinating woman."

Hold my hand and praise a New Age bimbo; I think not! Especially when you're not admitting having been married to her. If he wasn't Mr. Right, then Oscar Grant was definitely a candidate for Mr. Very Wrong.

Temple extracted her hand from his custody by the simple stratagem of picking up the table top plastic easel containing a lush color advertisement for the Drink of the Day. "An Under the Volcano. Clever."

. "That ersatz volcano outside is a terrific trademark," he agreed, seeming to survive the withdrawal of her dainty extremity. "Mediums could learn a lot from Las Vegas. You need the proper ambience before you can expect anything outstanding to happen. It's as true of seances as of gambling casinos."

"A novel attitude. And how do you grade the ambience of our seance?"

Oscar shifted unconsciously to work a pack of cigarettes from his side pocket. "Not as good as I had hoped when I set it up. The activity outside seemed to upset some of the more delicate psychics, like Agatha. She insisted Houdini was a shadow of himself, quite literally. But the old boy looks pretty impressive on tape."

"How did you tape the session? Only the cameraman/photographer from the Scoop was there--Oh!" She had caught his apologetic smirk as he lit the long, thin spike of cigarette with a long, thin gold lighter. "He was a double agent, filming for Crawford's Hot Heads segment, and yours."

"Very good."

Temple hated people who rewarded correct deductions with "good dog" type comments. Oscar must be a villain in disguise. He nodded, as if agreeing with her thoughts, when he was only confirming her guess, " Hot Heads --dreadful name--only needs a few sound bites. I can drop in some real segments. It'll help Wayne's career to get a credit for my show."

"But what's to show? I hear Crawford's vaunted 'scoop' the other night was fakey photographs on fog. And I agree with you about the name Hot Heads . I think they meant to imply hot headlines about 'hot' talking heads in the entertainment industry. Instead it sounds like it's about blow-dryers plugged in too long."

Grant's laugh was flatteringly hearty and went on a tad too long.

"What a sharp cookie you are, Temple. If you want to move to the ghost beat, just let me know. I bet you look cute as a cupcake on camera."

"Sharp as a gingersnap and jolly as a jellybean," she answered, smiling.

He took her hand again. "So what did you think of our psychics?"

"Professor Mangel seemed sincere, but he's hardly a psychic. I got the impression he's hoping to be there when one of them hits pay dirt."

"A hanger-on, but useful."

"And D'Arlene Hendrix is so normal she could run for mayor."

He shook his head.

"No?"

"No. That lady is a human bloodhound when it comes to finding murder victims. They may be half there, but she's never been wrong about where they were. Says she 'hears' them calling to her. They direct her. If so, she's in touch with the most terrifying of after-death phenomena: spirits who have made no peace with their disembodied state. What did she say about the seance?"

"She was.. .reticent. Said she saw something, but won't say what. Won't even indicate if it was tangible or, you know.. .doo-doo doodah." Temple hummed the ancient Twilight Zone theme music.

"That's why Dead Zones doesn't use any gimmicky theme music. Just a quick montage of past pieces and a quick cut to me as the reporter. I do come off pretty 'documentary,' don't I?"

"Oh, Geraldo couldn't do it better."

"Thanks." He looked down to flick a half-inch of ash into the banished tray. The coat sleeve on the smoking hand had pulled up, and Temple glimpsed a tattoo of... She peered. He noticed.

He chose to mistake curiosity for personal interest.

"You like my bracelet?"

The bracelet, which Temple had not noticed, was a suitably masculine (whatever that was) gold-chain affair worth a cool couple grand from a discount jeweler, but it obscured the tattoo.

Not enough, however, to have hidden a ragged, two-color homemade look that didn't go with anything else on Oscar Grant's body. Oh, if only Molina were on this case! Temple could have dangled that tattoo in front of her until she became so irritated she growled back an explanation. Temple's own scenario was not particularly romantic: prison or gang days. She detected a lot of unsanded edges behind Oscar Grant's Gillette-smooth exterior.

"Very nice," she said finally, not sure whether she referred to the bracelet and was lying, or referred to the tattoo and was thinking how nice it was to have spotted it. Agatha Welk had mentioned nothing about a tattoo, not even on the "Hell's Angel" Temple was supposedly dating. The next idea (Matt Devine with a tattoo) was so ludicrous that she couldn't help smiling.

"What is it?" Oscar shook her hand playfully, thinking she was smiling with the pure joy of his company, or perhaps that of his fancy gold bracelet.

If only he knew! She could picture Matt with a huge red outline of a heart over his heart: instead of reading "mom" it said "Mother Superior." Her smile struggled to become a grin. Or ...

"Born to Raise Relief Funds." Or ... better yet, "Born to Bless."