Unknown - 15_Cat_In_A_Neon_Nightmare

Temple had to admit that she had a prince, or two, in her life, and a witch or two, as well. She also had to admit to herself that she hadn’t wanted Kitty dead, not really, although maybe the woman was dead because two men were determined that Temple wouldn’t be hurt by her. In olden days, women were thrilled to have men fighting for their honor and their lives. Temple wasn’t thrilled with the uneasy guilt she felt now. She was particularly queasy about Matt’s unspoken willingness to sacrifice his most personal well-being for her. Oh, he was concerned about a host of other women in his life, but they were all incidental, weren’t they? And she wasn’t. Had Max guessed that? Of course. He wasn’t a jealous man, but he had always been worried about Matt since he had returned to find a new neighbor in Temple’s building and life. She couldn’t complain about either man’s sincerity in thinking of her safety, but she wished she weren’t so darned guilty about, and impressed by, both of them.

Nowhere in the book of fairy tales did it mention two Prince Charmings. Come to think of it, both Max and Matt had been involved in the retrieval of the glass slipper, aka the Midnight Louie shoes. Modern life, not dreams, was what fractured fairy tales are made of, Mr. Ariel.

So now, fairy tale-wise, one witch was dead. An evil witch who had looked as glamorous as Glinda the Good Witch of the North in the Judy Garland movie, all Southern-belle skirts and glitter and magic wand.

The evil witch was a bony hag in a pointed hat with grossly striped stockings and granny lace-ups in villainous black. Why, then, had she wanted the ruby red slippers? For the power they conferred, of course, but maybe somewhere in her evil black cinder of a heart she had simply coveted something beautiful for its own sake.

Temple had to wonder if Kathleen O’Connor had coveted innocence that way, Max’s teenage chastity, Matt’s post-priesthood delayed-adolescent possession of the same. Kathleen had wanted to destroy both boys. Men. And maybe she yearned for the very innocence she sought to destroy. Maybe it was her own.

Two women dead only a couple of days apart. The mysterious call girl (to Temple anyone who followed that line of work would always be mysterious) and the mysterious stalker-girl.

And here she was, trying to avoid either extreme, trying to be a real girl the way Pinocchio ached to be a real boy.

Three clicks of her heels and maybe she could be back home in Minnesota, where call girls were few and under wraps and wicked witches froze their long noses and toes and peaked hat tips off.

But, no, she couldn’t leave the Emerald City of Las Vegas yet. There was still too much to solve about herself and everyone around her.

She was too melancholy to move on. She glanced at the sparkling shoes on her feet. Her high-heel addiction had always been the bravado of a short girl, a small woman. I am walking on hot spikes, hear me roar. Except I’d rather whimper sometimes.

But didn’t everybody?

Even Vassar. Even Kitty the Cutter.

That’s what got to Temple. Between them, these women so different from her had forced two men she cared about to the bitter edge, making them commit to unwanted sex in one instance, and unwanted death in another. You couldn’t ask for any more dire consequences.

Was her gender really so destructive? Or so frustrated?

And then there was Molina, gloating over it all like a legal vulture bent on picking away at everybody’s bones and insecurities.

Temple watched Karloff’s cadaverous features in his black-and-white world. Films were better before color. So was newspaper photography. Color cluttered up the scenery, distracted the eye, made everything a moral morass, shades of the rainbow.

Midnight Louie stirred against her hip, uttered a cross between a meow and a purr.

“You’re right, boy. I’m in a very bad mood tonight. I guess cats don’t have moods. Just territorial disputes.”

He seemed to nod as he licked away at one forepaw, head bobbing up and down.

It was pretty bad when she was discussing her emotional state with a cat. A large, intelligent, amazingly handsome cat, but a cat nonetheless.

A knock came on Temple’s door. Her eyes streaked to the clock on the portable stereo. Eleven-fifteen. Who on earth … Max had already been by.

She rose and clicked over to the door, peering through the tiny peephole.

The hall was dark and the sidelight only distorted the view.

She opened the door but kept her chain lock fastened. “Matt!”

The mechanism resisted her fingers for a moment, but then her door was wide and he was hesitating on her threshold like a Fuller Brush salesman, if there still were Fuller Brush salesmen.

“What is it?”

“I’ve got to get to work,” he said, “but do you have a minute?”

“Sure. Come in. What’s going on?”

“I had to tell you some good news.”

He was checking out her apartment, spotting Louie still on the sofa—looking most annoyed at losing his lap pillow—hunting for signs of Max, she supposed.

“Are you alone?” he asked.

“No. Louie and you are here. That’s all.”

He paced a little in the entry hall. “I just wanted to let you know, so you wouldn’t worry.”

“What, me worry?”

“You’ve been doing it. I can tell. I’ve just seen Molina.”

“This should stop me worrying?”

“At the Blue Dahlia.”

“Worse and worse.”

“And I told her that I heard from a counselor of Vassar’s, who was on the phone with her and probably heard her fall. After I left. It was an accident, Temple. Molina knows that now.”

“An accident. How … great. I mean, not great that she fell, but … for you.”

“Yeah. For me. For Molina.”

He stopped, ran a hand through his blond hair, turning into a punk bedhead. Looked at her.

“Vassar … died … planning to reinvent her life. Oh, God.”

“A happy death,” Temple said, remembering the phrase from somewhere.

“A happy death,” he repeated. “I’ve got to get to work. I can’t be late … what am I now, some kind of White Rabbit? Oh, Temple.”

“Aren’t you glad? If I understand all this, no one’s to blame for Vassar’s death and even she was upbeat at the time. That’s the way I’d like to go, that everyone would, fast and happy.”

“Fast and happy. Better than slow and sad, that’s right. Temple.”

“Thanks for telling me, Matt. I won’t worry now. Not much.” She didn’t lie well.

He glanced down, and frowned. “Why are you wearing those shoes now? It’s almost midnight.”

“Maybe I was expecting Prince Charming.” She didn’t know why she’d said that, except that she was mistress of the flip quip and she was feeling a very confusing need to be inappropriately flip at the moment, her and her tiny feet and big mouth …

Matt put a palm to his forehead as if he was trying to play mind-reader, or hold his thoughts in. But it didn’t work, because his next words came out of left field, the left field of his inner anxieties.

“I didn’t sleep with her.”

“You don’t have to tell me this. I mean, it’s none of mybusiness. Except … maybe it’s relevant to the case.”

“What case?”

“Well, all of them. The unsolved cases. The things that are none of our business. Except Molina’s. So … who?” Temple wanted to be very precise on this fact.

“Who what?” Matt was looking more confused now than she was.

“Who didn’t you sleep with? Besides anybody in the past seventeen years.”

“Seventeen? How do you get seventeen?”

“Well, from since you went from high school to the seminary.”

“You’ve been keeping track of my non-sleeping-with timeline?”