She lifted to make sure no one was listening. “I mean scared. Did you know a couple of Los Angeles guys are in town?”
“What guys?”
“From some porno operation out there. The sort of creeps who don’t feel complete unless they’ve got a gun on. Armand may be acting relaxed, but inside that robe, he’s twitching and jumping. I’ll tell you when I decided it was time to split. One fellow, who I always thought was around the Warehouse because he dug the scene, he carries a guitar with him everywhere. Except it isn’t a guitar, it’s a shotgun with the barrels cut off. When you see something like that, it makes you think.”
The tanned youth in the ponytail was standing over them. He had taken off both his armband and his shirt, but psychologically he was still on duty.
“I know you,” he told Shayne.
Shayne said easily, “Where are you from, New York?”
“No, here. Miami.”
Shayne shrugged. “I’ve been in town two weeks. Stoned most of the time, I’m happy to say.”
“Jack, will you bug off?” Lib said irritably. “I’ve been rowing upstream all day, and I want to drift. Go watch them make movies.”
“The thing of it is, when I recognize somebody and I don’t know from where, it bothers me.”
“We were thinking about going,” Shayne said.
Lib sat up. “Honey, we can’t yet, before Armand talks to you. He’s looking for somebody to play a part in a picture. That’s why I got you to come.”
“Luckily, I know you’re not serious. I don’t want to look back twenty-five years from now and see how it was.”
“Honestly, it’s easy after the first few minutes. We were supposed to look for somebody with specifications. I was thinking about George, but you’d be better. Let’s go upstairs. We can’t talk with all these people around.”
“You’re wasting your time if you think you’re going to get me into a skin-flick,” Shayne said. “It’s not one of the things I’ve always wanted to do.”
“Let Armand tell you about it. You can always say no.” Standing up, she wriggled her dress down over her hips. “There’s a water bed. Have you ever tried one?”
“Do you feel like making it three?” the security youth said when Shayne came to his feet. “Or I could get somebody else, for four?”
“Won’t you believe me?” Lib said. “I’m tired.”
Shayne followed her to the circular staircase. He passed a small heap of clothing, which included an orange armband. He picked it up and took it with him.
Upstairs, Lib took him to the end bedroom, where she turned with a shiver.
“This is getting heavy. But I need traveling money. A private detective! When they find that out, I want to be thousands of miles away. I wish I was the type of person who saves money, but it seems to slip through my fingers.” She was taking off her dress. “I’d hate to tell you how little I’ve got in the bank, it’s pitiful.”
“Do you really think all this is necessary?” Shayne said.
Her earrings jangled. “I really do. You don’t have to do anything, and to tell you the truth I sort of hope you don’t. I couldn’t take another miss right now, and that’s probably what would happen. I wouldn’t be concentrating on it, I’d be thinking about that shotgun in the guitar case. I hope you’ve got the two-fifty in cash. Look, get undressed in case anybody comes in.”
Shayne repeated that to see how it sounded. “Get undressed in case—”
“Come on, Mike,” she said impatiently. “You want me to fink on them, don’t you? I’ve got to start thinking of my own skin.”
The skin she was worried about was rapidly emerging from her clothes, which she left where they fell. “Do you want the light on or off? I think off. Then if somebody does walk in they won’t wonder how come we’re just lying there.”
“I’ve got a picture to show you first.”
He selected the clearest of the photographs his client had given him. Lib studied it for a moment.
“Who is it?”
“Mrs. Tucker, I’m told.”
The light went off just as the title of a book on the bedside table registered on Shayne. It was a Modern Library edition of Anna Karenina, the novel Gretchen Tucker had told her husband she was recording for the blind. The door was not altogether closed, and enough light came in so he could see the girl arranging herself on the shifting surface of the bed. He lay down beside her and lurched into a kind of equilibrium.
“Mrs. Tucker?” she said. “Congressman Tucker?”
“For a minute I didn’t think I was going to get a reaction. She’s left home. He wants me to find her.”
“I might be able to help, a little,” she said slowly. “About the bread?”
“Above the two-fifty, I have to be the judge of how much the information is worth.”
“That’s a hell of a deal, Mike. What if you decide it’s only worth a nickel?”
“I buy information all the time. I wouldn’t stay in business if I got a reputation for stiffing people. Plus the fact that it isn’t my money, it’s Tucker’s.”
“Damn it, if I didn’t need it so bad. Armand still hasn’t paid me for the vampire picture.”
She thought they needed another joint. He shifted weight carefully so he could reach the matches. When he struck the match, the bed nearly threw him.
“Mrs. Tucker,” he said. “Have you seen her at the Warehouse?”
“A couple of times. Armand was looking under stones for people with money, and I thought that was it. Now I think she had something to do with X Project.”
“What’s that?”
“He shot it on a closed set. The technical crew was cut way down. He did the sound and lighting himself. We’ve been wondering, naturally, but people remember other times when it happened. Everybody tries to steal ideas in this business. Armand’s been first a lot of times, and when he has something new he plays it close, so the competition can’t beat him out with a quickie.”
“Is the picture finished?”
“I think it must be, or Armand wouldn’t be here. He does his own cutting.”
“Was she on the set?”
“I guess some of the time. I saw her coming out once.”
“Dressed?”
“I didn’t notice. Yes, I did, too. She was in a marvelous striped suit, cool as a gin and tonic. Do I hate women who look cool in hot weather.”
“I hope that’s not all you’re going to tell me about this project. Who else was on it?”
“Funny thing, they were all from away, none of the regulars. He shot long hours, all night sometimes. Frankly, I thought it might be something Tucker and those would be interested in if I could find out, but I couldn’t. The only guy I managed to contact was a fat fellow from New York. And that’s funny in itself. I mean, he looked like an ordinary person you’d see on the street. And maybe that’s the idea, to make it seem more real by using ordinary-looking people.”
“What did he tell you?”
“All he wanted to talk about was his off-Broadway roles. I kept trying to get him back to Project X. What was the plot, the theme? He didn’t notice. He just did what they told him. Stand up, lie down.”
“Do you know the names of any of the other actors?”
“One, Maureen.”
“What’s she look like?”
“About my height, dark hair pulled back tight. Somebody said she came in from the coast. I didn’t think she was anything special. Twenty-eight or nine, anyway.”
“Practically through,” Shayne commented.
“Well, in this business, unless the idea of using ordinary people catches on, which I don’t think it will.”
Shifting balance carefully, Shayne worked his pants nearer to the bed and got out his wallet. He turned on the light briefly and found the slip of paper he had taken from Frankie Capp: “M. (from LA) — Rm 14, Modern Motel, after 8.” The M might stand for Maureen.