Lilian Jackson Braun - Cat 11 Who Lived High

"Come anyway on Friday. There'll be champagne, hors d' oeuvres, live music, and valet parking." "What are the hours?" "From six o'clock until the well runs dry." "Thank you. I'll be here." Qwilleran started toward the door and turned back. "Tell me frankly. How do you feel about the future of the Casablanca?" "It's a lost cause," said Todd without emotion. , "Yet your partner was convinced it could be saved." "Yes... but... the picture has changed. The building is being razed to make way for the new Gateway Alcazar, which will be the missing link between the new downtown and the new Junktown. I'm moving the gallery there. I've signed up to lease space twice the size of what I have here." Qwilleran consulted his watch. It was time to meet the architect at the Press Club. "Well, thanks for your time, Mr.

Todd. I'll see you on Friday." As he walked to the Press Club he told himself that the book project, born on the spur of the moment, was not a bad idea. As for converting the apple barn, that sounded good, too. It would be ten times roomier than his present apartment in Pickax, and the Siamese could climb about the overhead beams.

The Press Club occupied a grimy stone fortress that had once been the county jail, and as a hang-out for the working press it had maintained a certain forbidding atmosphere for many years. The interior had changed, however, since Qwilleran's days at the Daily Fluxion. It had been renovated, modernized, brightened and - in his estimation - ruined. Yet it was a popular place at noon. He waited for the architect in the lobby, observing the lunch-time crowd that streamed through the door: reporters and editors, advertising and PR types, radio and TV personalities.

Eventually a man with a neatly clipped beard entered slowly, appraising the lobby with curiosity and a critical set to his mouth. Qwilleran stepped forward and introduced himself.

"I'm Jeff Lowell," said the man. "So this is the celebrated Press Club. Somehow it's not what I expected." He gestured toward the damask walls and gilt-framed mirrors.

"They redecorated a couple of years ago," said Qwilleran apologetically, "and it's no longer the dismal, shabby Press Club that I loved. Shall we go upstairs?" Upstairs there was a dining room with tablecloths, cloth napkins, and peppermills on the tables instead of paper placemats and squeeze bottles of mustard and ketchup. They took a table in a secluded comer.

"So you're interested in the Casablanca restoration," said the architect.

"Interested enough to want to ask questions. I've done my homework. I spent last evening reading the Grinchman & Hills report. You seem quite sanguine about the project." "As the report made clear, it will cost a mint, but it's entirely feasible. It could be the most sensational preservation project in the country," Lowell said.

"What is your particular interest?" "For one thing, I lived in that building for a few years before I was married, and there's something about the place that gets into a person's blood; I don't know how to explain it. But chiefly, my firm is interested because the Casablanca was designed by the late John Grinchman, and we have all the original specs in our archives. Naturally that facilitated the study immeasurably. Grinchman was a struggling young architect at the turn of the century when he met Harrison Plumb.

Plumb had a harebrained scheme that no established architect would touch, but Grinchman took the gamble, and the Casablanca made his reputation. In design it was ahead of its time; Moorish didn't become a fad until after World War One. The walls were built two feet thick at the base, tapering up to eighteen inches at the top. All the mechanical equipment-water pipes, steam pipes, electric conduits-were concentrated in crawl spaces between floors, for easy access and to help soundproof the building. And there was another feature that may amuse you: The occupants could have all the electricity they wanted!" "What do you know about Harrison Plumb?" Qwilleran asked.

"His family had accumulated their fortune in railroads, but he was not inclined to business. He was a dreamer, a dilettante. He studied for a while at L 'Ecole des Beaux Arts, and while he was in Paris he saw the nobility living in lavish apartments in the city. He brought the idea home. He dreamed of building an apartment-palace." "What was the reaction from the local elite?" "They tumbled for it! It was a smash hit! For families there were twelve-room apartments with servants' quarters.