Douglas, Nelson - Midnight Louie 05-Cat in a Diamond Dazzle

"The camera probably did the rest of the costuming job for him. They all add twenty pounds."

"Is that really true?"

"Swear to Santa."

"Look!" Temple crouched at the foot of the glass case. "The carpeting is that white cotton Christmas batting that's sprinkled with silver glitter."

"Nice touch."

"No, don't you get it? It's all lumpy and rumpled. Suspiciously so. This would be a perfect place to hide the shoes! Could it be more apropos? Right at Santa's feet, get it? Merry Christmas."

"It's not anywhere near Christmas yet, Temple."

"Heck, department-store Christmas decorations go up after Halloween nowadays, and the ghosts and goblins are just around the corner. How can I get in that case?"

"This is one time you're stymied. You can't get through solid glass."

Temple pressed her lips together. "There's got to be a way." Suddenly she stood up and screamed.

Kit clutched her chest in the area of her heart, her eyes widening behind her glasses. Riveted passersby stopped to stare. And the nice cashier from the restaurant across the hall came racing over.

"Oh, my god," Temple was saying in a shaky voice.

"Are you okay?" the cashier asked.

Temple moved to support herself against the wall. Kit and the cashier crowded around, faces concerned.

"I don't want the . . . customers to hear," Temple told the cashier in hushed tones. "Is there any way to get in that Santa case?"

"Well, yes ... but it's locked."

"You've got to get in there. I was looking at that wonderful costume and right there on the white stuff at the bottom was this horrible, huge cockroach. Crawling. Waving its feelers. They must have been two inches long." Temple shuddered. "It... crawled back under the batting, but it's going to give some other unlucky tourist a heart attack. Anyone older than I is in severe jeopardy." Given that Hollywood memorabilia attracted an older clientele, this was serious news.

"Cockroach?" The cashier glanced over her shoulder at the nearby restaurant. "I can't imagine . . .

we've never had anything like that. I'll call the office immediately and they'll send someone to take care of it."

"I'll wait," Temple said in a tone of self-sacrificing heroism. "My conscience won't rest until I know that hideous bug is gone. Besides, I need to sit down and compose myself." The women followed her like Mary's little lambs to a hall bench. "Maybe you should make sure whoever comes doesn't kill it," she whispered to the cashier on second thought. "Someone sponsors a 'World's Largest Cockroach' contest, you know, and the hotel might win big if it entered that one."

The cashier grew even paler. The moment Temple and a solicitous Kit had been seated, she raced to the phone at her stand.

"Temple, that was outrageous," Kit said as soon as they were alone. "There was no cockroach."

"What will it hurt?"

"You really are amoral when it comes to a pair of shoes. Perhaps you need a twelve-step program."

"The only twelve steps I need are the ones I take in those shoes."

The cashier was back, leaning over Temple with a glass of lemonade.

"Thank you so much. Will it be . . . long?"

"No, no. They're sending a security guard to take care of it."

"Good thinking, given its size," Temple said, nodding somberly. She shuddered again, taking care not to spill any lemonade.

Not long after a new clink came from the slot machine area, toward them. It was accompanied by squeaking leather and the jingle of keys. The security guard, in medium blue uniform pants and shirt, billed cap and a utility belt hung with a beeper, walkie-talkie and a holstered gun, walked up to them.

"You the ladies who saw the ... er, insect?" she asked.

Temple nodded, while Kit committed truth by doing and saying nothing.

"Don't you worry now. I'll get rid of it."

"You're not. .. squeamish?"

"Heavens to Betsy, no." The tall, solid, sandy-haired woman looked as if she could have driven a cab or even handled twenty-six three-year-olds on an outing.

She singled out a key tiny enough to open a suitcase from the riches on her crowded ring and bent down. The case unlocked at the rear of its base.

Temple edged over to watch.

The guard hesitated. "Now you won't faint, ma'am, if we find it?"

"Oh, no. I want to see that bug gone! It was right there, near that big lump of cotton." Temple crouched down, reached into the case and depressed the lump. It flattened instantly.

"Careful, ma'am! Better leave this to me."

Rising, Temple wobbled on her high heels, fell against the case and grabbed the bottom edge for support. In doing so, she managed to flatten the rest of the rumpled cotton batting, until it couldn't even conceal a toothpick.

"Here now." The guard took Temple's arm and firmly steered her away from the case. "I'll handle this."

Madame Security Guard then proceeded to shake, rattle and roll the abused fabric until a needle couldn't hide in its folds.

No shoes. Boo hoo.

"I can't understand it! The roach was right there." Temple pointed, now so entranced by her story that she almost believed it herself.

"Those big bugs are sneaky," the guard said. "They can slip in and out of places we'd never even notice. I'll spray the case." She viewed the deflated cotton batting, which looked more like stomped-on cotton candy than fluffy fake snow. "I suppose the exhibition director will be right irritated with my housekeeping talents."

She poked and prodded the batting back into place, managing to make it look like oatmeal.

"Anything else I can do, ma'am?" she inquired in a tone that implied additional pointless tasks were not welcome.

"Nothing at all." Temple's thanks were profusely enthusiastic. "Thanks ever so much for trying to nail that horrible bug!"

Kit, who had observed the entire scene from the bench, clapped slowly as Temple returned. "Brava.

Even I was beginning to believe in that bug. You could probably develop a profitable sideline winning nuisance suits by claiming to see roaches in the radiccio."

"I don't want ill-gotten gains. I just want those fabulous shoes, darn it! At least we've ruled this place out."

"Oh, we're not swinging up on the balcony like Tarzan to check out the Duke's footwear? After all, you can't see his feet from here--whoa, never mind, Temple! I was just kidding."

"I'm not." Temple looked ready to storm the upper level, now that Kit had drawn her attention to it.

"What the plate of petunias is Eightball O'Rourke doing up there?"

"That old guy next to Liza Minnelli? It's not Jimmy Durante? It's alive?"

"Not for long." Temple was pushing her sleeves up. "Maybe he's some maintenance person."

"Liza Minnelli's feet! That would be so perfect, since her mother wore the ruby slippers! Let's go."

Temple charged the stairs near the ladies' room, almost knocking the Ann Miller cardboard cutout into an unpremeditated tap-dance down the steps.

The second floor was a maze. Finding the entrance to the balcony meant opening many false doors: one to a room where a maid was cleaning; one to a closet where the maid that was cleaning the room got her cleaning supplies; one to a service stair that brought the cleaning supplies to the closet where the maid got them before going to the room that she was cleaning ...

"Sorry." "Oops." "Wrong door." Temple sang out the appropriate formula for whatever false lead she followed, until she opened a fourth door.

"Aha!"

"Temple!" Kit warned her from the hallway. "Everybody can see you. It's like being in a department store window."

Temple peered over the balcony wall. "Luckily, nobody is curious enough to look up, like me. Drat. I'm in the wrong balcony section, and there's a solid wall. Is there another likely door in the hall?"