I looked at him thoughtfully. “Plenty of time to back out, Reg,” I reminded him.
“Don’t be funny,” he returned, his eyes sparkling. “This is just my meat. Was Wolf on the level when he said I could stick?”
I nodded. “Yeah,” I said. “It means a hundred bucks a week for you, Reg, and that includes danger-money.”
“Aw, you’re kidding,” he said. “I’d do it for half of that.”
“It’s just enough,” I said, feeling my bruised head. “If I can get this story on the streets we’ll be getting somewhere.” I stubbed out my cigarette and lit another. “I’ve found a dame to replace the old girl. I think she’ll be useful all right.”
Reg’s face fell. “Gee!” he exclaimed. “I was hoping I’d be able to pick my own secretary. What’s she like?”
“All right,” I said, “as long as you aren’t too fussy. Maybe she has bow legs and flat feet, but if she keeps them under a desk, why should you worry?”
He looked pretty miserable. “Well, I guess I’ll have to take it,” he said gloomily. “A hundred bucks a week ain’t to be sniffed at.”
“What do you know about Audrey Sheridan’?” I asked.
“More than most.” He brightened up. “What a pip of a dame! Seen her?”
I nodded. “Is it right the agency’s a flop?”
“That’s not her fault,” he said. “It’s just Cranville didn’t have any crime around until this business blew up. I don’t know how the old man kept things going.”
“Where does she get her money? She looks a million dollars to me and her joint’s better than a lobby in the Ritz-Plaza.”
“Her uncle out West passed in his pail and left her a slice of jack,” Reg explained. “She furnished the place and bought herself some clothes, hoping it’d be good for business. But business just isn’t here.”
I grunted. “She must be crazy,” I said. “It’s throwing money away. But she’s a nice looker, isn’t she?”
He eyed me kind of old-fashioned: “You’re a fast worker, ain’t you?” he said. “I’d take that lipstick off your mouth if I were you.”
I did so with a quick embarrassed wipe with my handkerchief. “I’m getting careless,” I muttered, not looking at him.
“I wouldn’t mind a taste of that,” he said, winking at me. “Yum-yum. Was it any good?”
A tap on the door interrupted an awkward moment.
Marian French put her head round the door. “What on earth do you think you’re doing?” she exclaimed. “Why aren’t you in bed?”
Reg Phipps stared at her with popping eyes. He sucked in his breath and gave a low whistle.
“Hello, Marian,” I said. “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine. There were things I had to do. Did you have a good time?”
She came further into the room. “You must be crazy to go around with a head like that,” she scolded.
“I’d be still more crazy to go around without it,” I returned with a grin. “I want you to meet Reg Phipps, editor of the Granville Gazette. Reg, this is Marian French, your new secretary.”
Reg got to his feet and turned as red as a beet. “You wouldn’t be kidding?” he said pleadingly.
I winked at Marian. “I told you he’d be all over you,” I said.
“Gee, Miss French,” Reg said, ignoring me. “This is terrific! This is the biggest moment in my life! We’ll get along fine.”
Marian said she hoped they would and looked a little embarrassed. “Don’t confuse the girl,” I said. “You don’t need to look as if you want to eat her.”
Reg scowled at me. “Lay off, can’t you?” he said. “Stop ribbing me.” He turned back to Marian. “You’ll be along tomorrow?”
She nodded. “I’m not so good at typing,” she confessed, “but I’ll get used to it if you’ll have patience.”
He drew in a deep breath. “You take your time,” he assured her. “I’m in no hurry. Anything you want to know, just ask me.”
“And be careful what you ask him,” I said. “Where’s Esslinger?”
“He dropped me and went on home,” she returned, moving to the door. “I won’t interrupt you now, but don’t you think you ought to be in bed?”
“I’m going,” I lied. “Glad you had a good time. See you tomorrow.”
Reg opened the door for her. “Good night, Miss French,” he said, making eyes at her. “You don’t know how I’m going to enjoy working with you.”
Marian threw an amused glance at me, thanked Reg and left us.
“Like her?” I asked casually.
Reg closed his eyes. “That’s the dame who haunts my dreams,” he said. “Where did you find her?”
I told him.
He suddenly looked suspicious. “What’s this stuff about Esslinger? Was she out with him?”
“She was.”
“Gee! It gives me a pain the way Esslinger finds ’em,” he growled. “That guy has every dame in Cranville running around with him.”
“Well, what of it?” I asked, smiling at his annoyance. “Esslinger’s a good-looking kid, bright, and he’s a free spender... why shouldn’t they run around with him?”
“I don’t like the guy,” Reg said. “He’s pinched too many dames from me. He’s only got to look at a dame and she flops for him.”
“I used to be like that when I was his age,” I grinned, going over to the bureau for the Scotch bottle. “All the other kids hated my guts too, but that didn’t bring me out in a rash.”
Reg sniffed and looked sour. “It doesn’t bring him out in a rash either,” he said.
I poured two fingers of Scotch into a glass. “You’re too young to drink, aren’t you?”
“Not when it’s free,” Reg returned with unnecessary eagerness.
“Maybe you’d better watch me,” I said, sitting down again and swirling the amber coloured liquor round in the bottom of the glass. “You want a steady hand tonight. A lot depends on this picture.” I took a long drink, sighed and closed my eyes.
Reg got to his feet with a snort of disgust. “When do we go?” he demanded.
I squinted at him. “Maybe we’d better slide off now. We’ll have to be careful Marian doesn’t spot us. Looks like she wants to keep me in cotton wool.” I finished the drink, lit another cigarette and stood up. “Okay?”
“Sure.” Reg opened the door and looked into the passage. “No one around,” he said, and together we went down the passage into the lobby.
Nora looked up from her magazine. “Don’t you ever sleep?” she said to me as I went past.
“I have my moments,” I said, waving to her. “Didn’t I tell you I’m tough?”
“That doesn’t prove anything,” she said, with a sneer. “I know plenty guys who’re tough, but where did it get them?”
“You tell me about it some other time,” I said, not stopping. I followed Reg out into the dark, sweltering night.
We got into a battered Ford coupe and Reg drove away from the hotel. “Put that dame alongside Marian French,” he said, “and what have you?”
“Get your mind off women for a moment,” I urged. “We’ve got a job to do. How far is the morgue?”
“Four blocks and first on the right,” he said, shouting to get above the roar of the car engine.
I looked at my watch in the light of a street lamp as we passed. It was eleven-thirty.
“Who’s in charge?”
“Johnson does the night shift. No one else’s likely to be there. Maybe we could bust in the back way unless you want to tell Johnson what you’re going to do. But photographing corpses ain’t permitted, so maybe we’d better go in the back way.”
“What sort of a guy is Johnson?”
“Little geezer. We could take him without getting in a lather,” Reg said, slowing down as the traffic light changed to red. He stopped the car and we both lit cigarettes. “Breaking into a morgue isn’t my idea of fun,” he went on as he flipped the match out of the window.