almost everyone who had their mugs plastered over the ice cream parlor wall and a whole lot of people who didn’t. I read the list twice and when I was done it looked like me and the milky bar kid here were the only two people in town without a speaking part.
All the major studios cooperating with each other seemed like a pretty big deal. It would take quite a bit of cash money to get everyone temporarily out of their exclusive contracts and working for the competition. The competition who also happened to be co-producer of the motion picture.
Sounded like a real headache to me.
Then again, maybe money wasn’t quite the issue it used to be for some people these days. Just look at Eva McLuckie. She had a habit of carrying her bank balance around in gold bars in a fancy athletic bag.
Well. Somebody’s bank balance.
“I hope she turns up,” said the kid.
“Yeah, me too,” I said.
And then I said thanks and left a two dollar tip and headed for the Temple of the Magenta Dragon.
***
As I walked down the block towards the Temple I contemplated my plan to get in. As plans went it was pretty simple: I was going to walk up to the door and see what happened. It was a plan, I had to admit, largely dependent on how well disposed the man on the door felt about the fact my face was made of metal. A flash of my detective shield usually did the trick when I had to get in somewhere but chances are the Temple would be a different proposition if it was as exclusive as Ada said it was.
The doorman was there behind a purple velvet rope hanging from two golden stands that were placed on the sidewalk around the club’s door. The door was closed. There was no line to get in but there were some peepers hanging around on the street wearing not enough clothes, perhaps ready to throw themselves at their favorite movie star or casting agent should either cross the threshold.
It turned out that the doorman, a gorilla wearing a tuxedo and a permanent scowl, was called Robert and he was a swell guy who thought it was a real pleasure for the club to be entertaining the last robot in the world. Before I even had a chance to pull the shield from my inside pocket he grabbed my hand with one that was about as big and he shook it and then he unclipped the velvet rope and knocked on the black door. The door opened and I turned to Robert with my steel fingers touching the brim of my hat. He saluted in return and then went back to guarding the approaches.
In front of me stretched a black corridor and down that black corridor came the sound of people talking, laughing, drinking, laughing some more, talking some more. Music too. Something with a beat. All those sounds got louder as I got closer. I kept walking.
And then I was in the Temple of the Magenta Dragon.
The room was large and square and had a low ceiling that was painted a flat matte black, as were all the walls but the far one, which was instead upholstered like a Chesterfield sofa in oxblood leather. The room was dark and smoky, and what light there was came from a blend of white and pink spots that mixed with the smoke to make the Chinese décor pop off the black walls. There were dragons and intricate pierced lattice work and some more dragons. The low ceiling was supported by an arcade of pillars that resolved when I got closer into carved bamboo stems that weren’t black but were a deep jade green. The overall effect was of being outdoors on an ancient Chinese terrace under an ancient Chinese sky on a warm and foggy night.
The so-called Temple was full of people. The servers were Chinese men and Chinese women, the women dressed in black silk wraps with red trim and with their black hair pulled back into buns skewered into place with long black sticks tipped in red, the men dressed in more or less the male equivalent. They balanced trays and skirted the club patrons with an elegance as smooth as the silk they were wearing.
The patrons were another story altogether. They
All the major studios cooperating with each other seemed like a pretty big deal. It would take quite a bit of cash money to get everyone temporarily out of their exclusive contracts and working for the competition. The competition who also happened to be co-producer of the motion picture.
Sounded like a real headache to me.
Then again, maybe money wasn’t quite the issue it used to be for some people these days. Just look at Eva McLuckie. She had a habit of carrying her bank balance around in gold bars in a fancy athletic bag.
Well. Somebody’s bank balance.
“I hope she turns up,” said the kid.
“Yeah, me too,” I said.
And then I said thanks and left a two dollar tip and headed for the Temple of the Magenta Dragon.
***
As I walked down the block towards the Temple I contemplated my plan to get in. As plans went it was pretty simple: I was going to walk up to the door and see what happened. It was a plan, I had to admit, largely dependent on how well disposed the man on the door felt about the fact my face was made of metal. A flash of my detective shield usually did the trick when I had to get in somewhere but chances are the Temple would be a different proposition if it was as exclusive as Ada said it was.
The doorman was there behind a purple velvet rope hanging from two golden stands that were placed on the sidewalk around the club’s door. The door was closed. There was no line to get in but there were some peepers hanging around on the street wearing not enough clothes, perhaps ready to throw themselves at their favorite movie star or casting agent should either cross the threshold.
It turned out that the doorman, a gorilla wearing a tuxedo and a permanent scowl, was called Robert and he was a swell guy who thought it was a real pleasure for the club to be entertaining the last robot in the world. Before I even had a chance to pull the shield from my inside pocket he grabbed my hand with one that was about as big and he shook it and then he unclipped the velvet rope and knocked on the black door. The door opened and I turned to Robert with my steel fingers touching the brim of my hat. He saluted in return and then went back to guarding the approaches.
In front of me stretched a black corridor and down that black corridor came the sound of people talking, laughing, drinking, laughing some more, talking some more. Music too. Something with a beat. All those sounds got louder as I got closer. I kept walking.
And then I was in the Temple of the Magenta Dragon.
The room was large and square and had a low ceiling that was painted a flat matte black, as were all the walls but the far one, which was instead upholstered like a Chesterfield sofa in oxblood leather. The room was dark and smoky, and what light there was came from a blend of white and pink spots that mixed with the smoke to make the Chinese décor pop off the black walls. There were dragons and intricate pierced lattice work and some more dragons. The low ceiling was supported by an arcade of pillars that resolved when I got closer into carved bamboo stems that weren’t black but were a deep jade green. The overall effect was of being outdoors on an ancient Chinese terrace under an ancient Chinese sky on a warm and foggy night.
The so-called Temple was full of people. The servers were Chinese men and Chinese women, the women dressed in black silk wraps with red trim and with their black hair pulled back into buns skewered into place with long black sticks tipped in red, the men dressed in more or less the male equivalent. They balanced trays and skirted the club patrons with an elegance as smooth as the silk they were wearing.
The patrons were another story altogether. They
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