“What’s a matter, Peter?” the King asked, noticing his sudden gravity.
“Just thinking about Mac.”
“What about him?”
“We had to take him up to the hospital yesterday. He’s not so hot.”
“Malaria?”
“Mostly.”
“Huh?”
“Well, he’s got fever all right. But that’s not the main trouble. He goes through periods of terrible depression. Worry — about his wife and son.”
“All married guys’ve the same sweat.”
“Not quite like Mac,” Peter Marlowe said sadly. “You see, just before the Japs landed on Singapore, Mac put his wife and son on a ship in the last real convoy out. Then he and his unit took off for Java in a coastal junk. When he got to Java he heard the whole convoy had got shot out of the water or captured. No proof either way — only rumors. So he doesn’t know if they got through. Or if they’re dead. Or if they’re alive. And if they are — where they are. His son was just a baby — only four months old.”
“Well, now the kid’s three years and four months,” the King said confidently. “Rule Two: Don’t worry about nothing you can’t do nothing about.” He took a bottle of quinine out of his black box and counted out twenty tablets and gave them to Peter Marlowe. “Here. These’ll fix his malaria.”
“But what about you?”
“Got plenty. Think nothing of it.”
“I don’t understand why you’re so generous. You give us food and medicine. And what do we give you? Nothing. I don’t understand it.”
“You’re a friend.”
“Christ, I feel embarrassed accepting so much.”
“Hell with it. Here.” The King began spooning out the stew. Seven spoons for him and seven spoons for Peter Marlowe. There was about a quarter of the stew left in the mess can.
They ate the first three spoons quickly to allay the hunger, then finished the rest slowly, savoring its excellence.
“Want some more?” The King waited. How well do I know you, Peter? I know you could eat a ton more. But you won’t. Not if your life depended on it.
“No thanks. Full. To the brim.”
It’s good to know your friend, the King thought to himself. You’ve got to be careful. He took another spoonful. Not because he wanted it. He felt he had to or Peter Marlowe would be embarrassed. He ate it and put the rest aside.
“Fix me a smoke, will you?”
He tossed over the makings and turned away. He put the rest of the bully in the remains of the stew and mixed it up. Then he divided this into two mess kits and covered them and set them aside.
Peter Marlowe handed him the rolled cigarette.
“Make yourself one,” said the King.
“Thanks.”
“Jesus, Peter, don’t wait to be asked. Here, fill your box.”
He took the box out of Peter Marlowe’s hands and stuffed it full of the Three Kings tobacco.
“What’re you going to do about Three Kings? With Tex in hospital?” asked Peter Marlowe.
“Nothing.” The King exhaled. “That idea’s milked. The Aussies have found out the process and they’ve undercut us.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. How do you think they found out?”
The King smiled. “It was an in and out anyway.”
“I don’t understand.”
“In and out? You get in and out fast. A small investment for a quick profit. I was covered in the first two weeks.”
“But you said it would take you months to get back the money you put out.”
“That was a sales pitch. That was for outside consumption. A sales pitch is a gimmick. A way of making people believe something. People always want something for nothing. So you have to make ’em believe they’re stealing from you, that you’re the sucker, that they — the buyers — are a helluva lot smarter than you. For example. Three Kings. The sales force, the first buyers, believed they were in my debt, they believed that if they worked hard for the first month, they could be my partners and coast forever after — on my money. They thought I was a fool to give them such a break after the first month. But I knew that the process would leak and that the business wouldn’t last.”
“How did you know that?”
“Obvious. And I planned it that way. I leaked the process myself.”
“You what?”
“Sure. I traded the process for a little information.”
“Well, I can understand that. It was yours to do as you pleased. But what about all the people who were working, selling the tobacco?”
“What about them?”
“It seems that you sort of took advantage of them. You made them work for a month, more or less for nothing, and then pulled the rug from under them.”
“The hell I did. They made a few bucks out of it. They were playing me for a sucker and I just outsmarted them, that’s all. That’s business.” He lay back on the bed, amused at the näiveté of Peter Marlowe.
Peter Marlowe frowned, trying to understand. “When anyone starts talking about business, I’m afraid I’m right out of my depth,” he said. “I feel such an idiot.”
“Listen. Before you’re very much older, you’ll be horse-trading with the best of them.” The King laughed.
“I doubt that.”
“You doing anything tonight? Oh, about an hour after dusk?”
“No, why?”
“Would you interpret for me?”
“Gladly. Who, a Malay?”
“A Korean.”
“Oh!” Then Peter Marlowe added, covering at once, “Certainly.”
The King had marked Peter Marlowe’s aversion but didn’t mind. A man’s a right to his opinions, he’d always said. And so long as those opinions didn’t conflict with his own purposes, well, that was all right too.
Max entered the hut and crumpled on his bunk. “Couldn’t find the son of a bitch for a goddam hour. Then I tracked him down in the vegetable patch. Jesus, with all that piss they use for fertilizer, that son-of-a-bitching place stinks like a Harlem brothel on a summer’s day.”
“You’re just the sort of bastard who’d use a Harlem brothel.”
The King’s snarl and the raw grate of his voice startled Peter Marlowe.
Max’s smile and fatigue vanished just as suddenly. “Jesus, I didn’t mean anything. It’s just a saying.”
“Then why pick on Harlem? You wanna say it stinks like a brothel, great. They all stink the same. No difference because one’s black and another’s white.” The King was hard and mean and the flesh on his face was tight and masklike.
“Take it easy. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean nothin’.”
Max had forgotten that the King was touchy about talking crossways about Negroes. Jesus, when you live in New York, you got Harlem with you, whichever way you look at it. And there are brothels there, an’ a piece of colored tail’s goddam good once in a while. All the same, he thought bitterly, I’m goddamned if I know why he’s so goddam touchy about nigs.
“I didn’t mean nothin’,” Max said again, trying hard to keep his eyes off the food. He had smelled it all the way up to the hut. “I tracked him down and tol’ him what you said.”
“So?”
“He, er, gave me something for you,” Max said and looked at Peter Marlowe.
“Well, hand it over for Chrissake!”
Max waited patiently while the King looked at the watch closely, wound it up and held it close to his ear.