"Yes. It's a great pity, all I can say," said Alison. "I expect you're right, and how silly."
"On the contrary," said Mendoza, "very good business. You make people feel there's something a little devilish about a thing, they'll fall over themselves to buy it. Human nature. Prohibition created more drinkers than we'd ever had before. Same principle as banning a novel-everybody reads it to find out why."
"It's still silly. I can't find my cigarettes, have you got one?"
"Only," said Mendoza, groping in his pocket, offering her the pack and lighting one for her, "because you and I were born at par. I got this from Sergeant Farquhar-it's a Scottish proverb, haven't you heard it, and you half Scots? ‘Some people are born two drinks under. They need the drinks to get up to normal?"
"Certainly I've heard it, and my father used to say that redheads-oh, well, never mind, it wasn't very genteel now I come to think."
"If it was about redheads," said Mendoza as the waiter brought their drinks, "I might guess what it was."
"I wouldn't put it past you. Well, in polite language it was to the effect that they're born two drinks over. And he was, certainly. Did I ever tell you about the time he challenged the governor of Coahuila to a duel? It was over a dam up in the Sierra Mojadas-the governor kept saying if Providence had intended people to have the water, the dam would have been created in the first six days, you know, but as it was the whole thing was immoral and contrary to God's wishes-I've never seen Dad madder-but in the end the governor backed down and they never did get to the duel. I think myself somebody told the governor the pedazo rojo norteamericano was a crack shot."
"These effeminate Latins, all cowards," said Mendoza. “ Salud y pesetas! " He tasted the rye. "You and I are the unconventional ones, we don't need this to enjoy life… And another thing about these places," he added over a roll of snare drums, "if they can persuade you to drink enough they can save a lot of money on what they call entertainment-anything goes if you're sufficiently high."
A blue spotlight circled a painfully thin girl in silver lame, on the little low platform at one end of the room, above what was revealed as a five- or six-piece band. On the edges of the light, white blurs of faces, tables crowded close. A tenor sax spoke mournfully, and the girl clasped her hands at her breast and began to moo nasally about missing her naughty baby.
"Oh dear," said Alison. The spotlight, moving with the singer, dimly showed them the Voodoo Club: fake handdrums and shrunken heads for wall-decor, zebra-patterned plastic on chairs and banquettes, and the waiters all Negroes in loincloths. There was also a postage-stamp dance floor.
"Yes," said Mendoza. "Hardly combining business with pleasure. We'll get to the business as soon as the waiter shows up again." Which he did as the girl stopped mooing and the spotlight blinked out. The band went into a soft blues and a few couples groped their way onto the dance floor.
"Re-peat, suh?"
"No, thanks. Tell me,"-Mendoza flicked his lighter over the blown-up print of Twelvetrees-"have you ever seen this man in here?" The waiter bent closer and looked at the print. In the little circle of unsteady light, he was very black, very Negroid; out of the dark his hand came up to finger his jaw, a long, slender hand with oddly intellectual-looking narrow fingers. "Well, I jus' couldn't say offhand, suh. An' we ain' supposed to gossip about customahs, y' know."
"Just take another look, and be sure."
"Don' know nuthin' 'bout him, suh. Anythin' else I can do for you, suh?"
Mendoza shook his head. "So, we'll have to get at it official," he said when the man had gone, leaving the check behind as a gentle hint. "See the manager. I don't suppose there's anything in it, or not much, but you never know-he must have had acquaintances in other circles than the Temple. By the little we've got on him so far, I think he looked on that just the way the Kingmans do, as a soft racket, and he'd hardly find the sect members to his social taste. Except for Mona Ferne-and that was for other reasons. I could wish his landlady had been the prying, suspicious kind who took more notice of his callers. Oh, well. Are you finished with that? Let's go."
They groped their way out to the better-lighted foyer, and Mendoza reclaimed his hat and Alison's coat from the check girl, paid the cashier. As he held out the coat for her, the slab door in the opposite wall opened and there emerged a slender little man who looked exactly like a film gang-boss, from his navy shirt and white tie to his fancy gray punched-pigskin shoes. He had black hair slicked back into a drake's tail, cold black eyes, and a cigarette dangling out of one corner of his mouth. Behind him was a big black Negro wrapped in a white terry robe like a boxer between rounds.
"This them?" snapped the gang-boss.
"Yes, sir," said the Negro.
"O.K.," said the gang-boss, walking up to Mendoza, "what you asking questions for, buddy? Who are you? Got any identification on you? What's this all about?"
"I told you, Luis," said Alison, sliding behind him. "Every time I go out with you in new stockings-why you drag me to these dens of iniquity-"
"Hey," said the gang-boss angrily, "what you talking about, lady, den of iniquity? We don't pay a grand a year for a liquor license to go foolin' around with that kind of stuff! Just what the hell-"
"You're the manager-good, just the man I want to see," and Mendoza brought out his credentials.
"Oh, police," said the gang-boss, and his toughness fell away from him like a cloak. "Gee, I'm sure sorry, Lieutenant, but I didn't know! Anything at all I can do for you-"
"This man." Mendoza gave him the print. "Regular in here? Or a casual?"
"Yeah, well-" The manager rubbed his ear and exchanged a glance with the Negro. "It's him all right, isn't it?"
"I thought so," said the Negro tranquilly in an accentless, rather amused tone. "I didn't know you were police either, Lieutenant. Sorry, but one way and another I thought Mr. Stuart ought to hear about it."
"You better come into my office," said Stuart abruptly. "You too, Johnny." He led them into a little square room furnished in excellent modern taste. "Sit down. Offer you anything to drink?"
"No, thanks." Mendoza glanced from him to the Negro quizzically.
"I'll apologize," said the latter, "for the-er-costume, sir. In the dark in there, it's one thing, but you feel a little naked out here, you know."
"Customers, they go for the damndest things," said Stuart. "Not that that was my idea-I only manage the place. Excuse me, this is Johnny Laidlaw, your waiter."
"You know how it is," said the big Negro apologetically, "we're sort of expected to stay in character on a job like this-"
"Matter of fact," said Stuart, "unless the bomb falls or something, this time next year it'll be Dr. Laidlaw. Right now he's got more schooling than I ever had, which don't necessarily say he's any smarter, but anyway I guess his evidence is as good as mine."
"A medical degree runs into money these days," said Laidlaw amiably, "and you'd be surprised at the size of some of the tips. But this isn't getting to what you want to know. Mr. Stuart, I guess your part of it ought to come first."