At twenty minutes to one, Chloe Chadderton — naked except for high-heeled shoes and a silvery fringed G-string — stepped up onto the bar at the far end of it. The dancer she was replacing, the one who’d wiped the black man’s glasses over what the Vice Squad would have called her “privates,” patted Chloe on the behind as she strutted past her and down the ramp leading off the bar top. A new rock record dropped into place on the turntable. Smiling broadly, Chloe began dancing to it, high-stepping down the bar past the black man with the steamy eyeglasses, shaking her naked breasts, thrusting her hips, bumping and grinding to the frantic rhythm of the canned guitars, and finally stopping directly in front of Carella. Still shaking wildly, she began kneeling before him, arms stretched above her head, fingers widespread, breasts quaking, knees opening — and suddenly recognized him. A look of shocked embarrassment crossed her face. The smile dropped from her mouth.
“I’ll talk to you during your next break,” Carella said.
Chloe nodded. She rose, listened for a moment to recapture the beat, and then swiveled long-leggedly to where the black man sat at the other end of the bar.
She danced for half an hour, and then came to the small table where Carella was eating the sandwich he’d made at the lunch bar. She explained at once that she had only a ten-minute break. Her embarrassment seemed to have passed. She was wearing a flimsy nylon wrapper belted at the waist, but she was still naked beneath it, and when she leaned over to rest her folded arms on the tabletop, he could see her breasts and nipples in the V-necked opening of the gown.
“I want to apologize for last night,” he said at once, and she opened her eyes wide in surprise. “I’m sorry. I was trying to touch all the bases, but I guess I slid into second with my cleats flying.”
“That’s okay,” she said.
“I’m sorry. I mean it.”
“I said it’s okay. Did you look at George’s notebook?”
“Yes. I have it here with me,” he said, reaching under his chair to where he’d placed the manila envelope. “I didn’t find anything I can use. Would you mind if I asked you a few more questions?”
“Go ahead,” she said, and turned to look at the wall clock. “Just remember it’s a half hour on the bar, and a ten-minute break. They don’t pay me for sitting around talking to cops.”
“Do they know your husband was killed last night?”
“The boss knows, he read it in the newspaper. I don’t think any of the others do.”
“I was surprised you came to work today.”
“Got to eat,” Chloe said, and shrugged. “What did you want to ask me?”
“I’m going to start by getting you sore again,” he said, and smiled.
“Go ahead,” she said, but she did not return the smile.
“You lied about this place,” he said.
“Yes.”
“Did you lie about anything else?”
“Nothing.”
“Positive about that?”
“Positive.”
“Really no trouble between you and your husband? No unexplained absences on his part? No mysterious phone calls?”
“What makes you think there might have been?”
“I’m asking, that’s all.”
“No trouble between us. None at all,” she said.
“How about unexplained absences?”
“He was gone a lot of the time, but that had nothing to do with another woman.”
“What did it have to do with?”
“Business.”
“I jotted some names down,” Carella said, nodding. “Got them from his appointment calendar, people he had lunch with or meetings with in the past month, people he was scheduled to see in the next few weeks ahead. I wonder if you can identify them for me.”
“I’ll try,” Chloe said.
Carella opened his notebook, found the page he wanted, and began reading. “Buster Greerson,” he said.
“Saxophone player. He was trying to get George to join a band he’s putting together.”
“Lester... Handey, is it?”
“Hanley. He’s George’s vocal coach.”
“Okay, that explains the regularity. Once every two weeks, right?”
“Yes, on Tuesdays.”
“Hawkins. Who’s that?”
“I don’t know. What’s his first name?”
“No first name. Just Hawkins. Appears in the calendar for the first time on August tenth, that was a Thursday. Then again on August twenty-fourth, another Thursday.”
“I don’t know anybody named Hawkins.”
“How about Lou Davis?”
“He’s the man who owns Graham Palmer Hall. That’s where George—”
“Oh, sure,” Carella said, “how dumb.” He looked at his notebook again. “Jerri Lincoln.”
“Girl singer. Another one of George’s album ideas. He wanted to do a double with her. But that was a long time ago.
“Saw her on August thirtieth, according to his calendar.”
“Well, maybe she started bugging him again.”
“Just business between them?”
“You should see her,” Chloe said, and smiled. “Strictly business, believe me.”
“Don Latham,” Carella said.
“Head of a company called Latham Records. The label is Black Power.”
“C.J.,” Carella said. “Your husband saw him — or her,” he said, with a shrug,” on the thirty-first of August, and again on September seventh, and he was supposed to have lunch with whoever it is today — I guess it was going to be lunch — at twelve noon. Mean anything to you?”
“No, you asked me that last night.”
“C.J.,” Carella said again.
“No, I’m sorry.”
“Okay, who’s Jimmy Talbot?”
“Don’t know him.”
“Davey... Kennemer, is it?”
“Kennemer, yes, he’s a trumpet player.”
“And Arthur Spessard?”
“Another musician, I forget what he plays.”
“Okay, that’s it,” Carella said, and closed the notebook. “Tell me about George’s brother,” he said abruptly.
“Santo? What do you want to know about him?”
“Is it true he ran away seven years ago?”
“Who told you that?”
“Ambrose Harding. Is it true?”
“Yes.”
“Ambrose said he may have gone back to Trinidad.”
“He didn’t go to Trinidad. George went there looking for him, and he wasn’t there.”
“Have any ideas where he might be?”
Chloe hesitated.
“Yes?” Carella said.
“George thought...”
“Yes, what?”
“That somebody killed his brother.”
“What made him think that?”
“The way it happened, the way he just disappeared from sight.”
“Did George mention any names? Anybody he suspected?”
“No. But he kept at it all the time. Wasn’t a day went by he wasn’t asking somebody or other about his brother.”
“Where’d he do the asking?”
“Everywhere.”
“In Diamondback?”
“In Diamondback, yes, but not only there. He was involved in a whole big private investigation. Police wouldn’t do nothing, so George went out on his own.”
“When you say his brother just disappeared, what do you mean?”
“After a job one night.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“I don’t know what happened, exactly. Neither does anyone else, for that matter. It was after a job — they used to play in a band together, George and his brother.”
“Yes, I know that.”
“George and two other guys in the band were waiting in the van for Santo to come out. He’d gone to the men’s room or something, I’m not sure. Anyway, he never did come out. George went back inside the place, searched it top to bottom, couldn’t find him.”