Carole Douglas - Cat in an Alphabet Soup

“What last name?” the woman drawled, letting her eyelids droop over the electric irises.

“Jaspar. Earnest Jaspar. J-A-S-P-A-R.”

“Not too many j’s,” she said grumpily, as if annoyed that she wasn’t being put out as much as she could have been by a Smith, say, or even a Wesson. “The Riviera,” she announced shortly after consulting an encyclopedia-thick computer printout.

“On the Strip?” Temple was startled. There were closer hotels.

“It hasn’t moved since Thursday.”

Temple went on tiptoe and leaned over the shoulder-high (on her) countertop. “Does it say how long he’s staying? Whether he’s still there?”

“Sorry.” The data sheets were suddenly accordion-pleated into a closed book. “You’ll have to ask at the hotel.”

Temple checked her watch. Mid-afternoon, the cusp of checkout time. She might just be too late.

19

Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Thief

T emple raced backto the office area, people’s heads turning at the passing clatter of her high heels, and didn’t stop until she reached the employee lot in the building’s rear. The Storm sizzled in the sunlight. A trip to the Riviera would barely get its air-conditioning going, but it was too far to walk.

Luckily, all the Strip hotels had humongous parking lots. Las Vegas was a city made for private wheels, even though buses duly plied the Strip at twenty-minute intervals. Unluckily, the lots were so large that one usually hiked the length of a football field to get out of the sun and into the building.

Temple’s shoulders sagged with relief as she trotted through the Riviera’s always open doors into a wall of icy air-conditioning. Inside, the hotel was luxe and dusky, like all Las Vegas hostelries. The ambiance offered a deliberate contrast to the heat and glare of the sidewalks. This dim, forever-bistro world of glitter and gaming chips was always a refuge from the harsh hand of nature.

At the Guest Information desk, Temple waited in line while slot machines chirped and clanked and whirred in the hotel lobby behind her. No foot of the city’s floor space was wasted that could support a one-armed bandit with oranges and cherries for eyes and a stainless steel gullet for a mouth.

Slot machines occupied grocery stores and laundromats; they wore the first familiar face you saw in the airport lobby when you came and the ultimate one to kiss your last nickel goodbye when you left. Unless you liked vistas of endless scrub and you drove to Vegas.

“Jasper,” the clerk complained, about to say, “it doesn’t come up on the computer.”

“A-R,” Temple said.

Clerkish eyebrows elevated. “Here it is. No, he’s not checked out, miss. If you want to ring the room, his extension is 1517. The house phones are—” He had not looked up while delivering his data; Temple had left as soon as she had what she needed.

She clutched the receiver in both hands and braced one high heel against the wall while the extension rang once, twice. Lord knows why she had a hunch that Jaspar was an important person to talk to, but she did.

On five the phone was answered with a simple, “Hello.”

“Mr. Jaspar? This is Temple Barr from the ABA. I’d like to talk to you about Mr. Royal. Can you meet me in the lobby?”

He could, and did. Easy as pineapple pie. She’d described herself rather too thoroughly, but paced in front of the long banks of elevators nevertheless. This was her last chance to dig up an ironclad motive. The ABA was in its death throes. It could very well fade away without revealing the killer of Chester Royal.

That would be a blot on Molina’s record—but Temple wasn’t worried about Molina’s ass. When was that Nazi in pantyhose ever civil to me? she thought heatedly. Yet she didn’t really need to find the murderer first, if only the murderer were found. Why was she so determined to do it herself? She would hardly be righting an injustice in the emotional sense; Chester Royal’s death seemed more an act of justice than anything else. So why bother some elderly stranger for what might be nothing?

Because someone had messed up her convention, damn it. She was responsible for everything going smoothly, and murder was definitely not smooth. She had to know why—and who.

Jaspar was older than she’d expected, certainly over seventy, with a stiff frailty that made her feel like a rotter. No wonder the old boy hadn’t visited the ABA floor much; it would have done him in. She had begun looking around for a quiet place to talk when Jaspar squinted in the direction of the lounge.

“I could use a drink. This climate dries out my gullet until I feel like an overbaked turkey on Christmas morning.”

“Sure.” Temple scurried alongside as Jaspar struck out at a stooped but snappy pace.

The lounge wasn’t quiet, but at least they had a table the size of a pizza all to themselves.

“Who’d you say you were?” he wanted to know first.

Lord, she hoped he wasn’t half-deaf. “Temple Barr—”

“I know the name. What do you do for the ABA?”

“Public relations.”

“What does public relations have to do with Chester’s death?”

“I’m helping the local police get a fix on the dramatis personae.”

Jaspar looked blank.

“The people who knew him that are here.”

“I knew him, knew him over forty years.” Jaspar hoisted his beer at the TV high on the wall that no one could hear.

The President was on-screen, giving a press conference. Temple wondered what hell was breaking loose where, then brought her mind back to Jaspar. “You acted as an agent for several of his writers.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“I beg your pardon?” They were shouting by now. It sounded like an argument, although it was only the usual attempt to communicate in Las Vegas.

“I just dealt with the writers now and again, eyeballed the contracts. Chester was doing me a favor, throwing a little business my way. Wasn’t much to the job, but he paid okay.”

Another dupe of Chester Royal’s? Temple couldn’t believe it. “But... why?”

“We go back a long time. I helped him with a spot of trouble years ago.”

“In Albert Lea, Minnesota?”

Jaspar looked surprised. “Yeah, I was working out of Albert Lea, but Chester’s difficulties were in Illinois. Lots of folks wondered why Chester got an out-of-state lawyer. For one thing, we went to college in Milwaukee together—I was older because of World War Two by the time I got to college. For another, I was a good lawyer and he knew it. Everybody thinks there’s nothing in Minnesota but snow.” Jaspar grinned. “That’s not quite true, but it sure’s not as hot as this place.”

“Why’d you come to the ABA if you did so little?”

“Chester. He wanted me to be around if a writer needed a little reassurance.” Jaspar leaned close and enunciated every word. “They’re kinda temperamental, writers. Chester explained it to me. Artistic snits. He sure went through a lot of rigmarole to keep ’em happy. I don’t know much about this publishing stuff, but if I was you, I’d get out of it.”

“I’m not in publishing, I’m in PR.”

“PR? Not many Puerto Ricans in Minnesota. Vietnamese, though.”

“Tell me about the case you helped Chester with.”

“In Illinois?”

“Yes!”

“It was back in the fifties. Sad situation, nasty pickle. You couldn’t do things like that in those days, but Chester was always breaking rules. Chester was the ultimate Indian giver.”