“I’m a messenger,” she said.
“Messengers like this,” I said, “should happen to me the rest of my life. Your name really Sophia Sierra?”
“Sophie Sierra,” she said. “I’m Cuban.”
“But you speak English perfectly.”
“Oh, I was born here. I mean I’m of Cuban extraction.”
“Like a drink?” I said, touching her elbow, moving her back to the living room.
“No, thank you,” she said, and in the living room she stood stock-still, long-fingered hands on her hips, eyes moving over me. “I’ve heard about you,” she said. “Heard you’re kind of a ladies man.”
“So?”
“Nothing. Except that, kind of, I can understand it.” She moved near to me. Her face was inches away from mine. I could smell the musk-faint perfume of her. Her face was inches away from mine, but parts of her were touching me. She was built like that. “More than understand it,” she said. “I’ve kind of got a yen. I’m crazy like that. I go for people before I know what it’s all about.”
“I’m kind of crazy like that myself,” I said and I reached for her, but she moved away.
“I’m here with a message,” she said, “from someone who’s heard about you.”
“Like who?” I said.
“G. Phillips,” she said.
“G. Phillips?” I said. “I never heard of a G. Phillips in my life.”
She went to her handbag and took out a yellow sheet of paper. She brought it to me. It was a telegram. It was addressed to S. SIERRA, 11 EAST 45th STREET. It said: PLEASE CONTACT PETER CHAMBERS AT ONCE. TELL HIM TO GET IN TOUCH WITH ME. TELL HIM WHERE. I MUST SEE HIM IMMEDIATELY. HE IS A FRIEND. G. PHILLIPS.
“Maybe I am a friend of G. Phillips,” I said, “but you wouldn’t know it from me. I never heard of a G. Phillips.”
“Ever hear of a Gordon Phelps?”
“Gordon Phelps I heard of.”
“G. Phillips is Gordon Phelps.”
“Gordon Phelps!” I brushed past her and lifted one of the tabloids and turned to page three and pointed. “This Gordon Phelps?” I said.
“That’s the one,” she said.
The prize item on page three of my tabloid had to do with the murder of Vivian Frayne. Vivian Frayne had been a hostess in a dance hall called the Nirvana Ballroom. There was a photo of Vivian Frayne, a theatrical photo of a lush blonde loosely swathed in diaphanous veils. Vivian Frayne had been found the night before, in her two-room apartment on East Sixty-fourth Street, relaxedly attired in lounging pajamas, but quite dead nonetheless. Five bullets had penetrated the lounging pajamas making indiscriminate, deadly indentations within the body of Vivian Frayne. A gun had been found on the premises, but the newspaper report made no mention of the significance or insignificance of this find — other than reporting that “a gun had been found on the premises.” It did report, however, in its last paragraph, that the police were seeking “one Gordon Phelps, millionaire playboy” in connection with their investigation.
“Gordon Phelps,” I said, laying away the paper, “is G. Phillips?”
“Uh huh,” said Sophia Sierra.
“And he sent you to contact me?”
“Just like it says in the telegram,” said Sophia Sierra, staring at me.
“I don’t get it,” I said. “Couldn’t he contact me himself?”
“Cops are looking for him. You just read it in the paper, didn’t you?”
“Sure I read it. But he could have called me on the phone, couldn’t he? He knows where.”
“He’s got no phone.”
“Listen, Gordon Phelps owns a thirty-room mansion on Fifth Avenue, and I’d bet that joint has more telephones than rooms.”
“He’s not in his thirty-room mansion, sweetie. Otherwise the cops wouldn’t be looking for him — they’d have him.”
“You’ve got a point there,” I said. “So where the hell is he?”
“In a little hideaway he’s got — that only a few of his friends know about.”
“Okay, so where’s this hideaway?”
“Down in the Village. 11 Charles Street. Apartment 2 A. He’s listed as G. Phillips. That’s where you’re supposed to go.”
“Okay,” I said, “I’m going. But couldn’t he have called me from there?”
“No. Because it’s a hideaway. A complete hideaway. Not even a phone.”
“Check,” I said. “Now what about... you and me?”
She went for her coat, slung it over one shoulder, turned and smiled. “What about you and me?” she said.
“Are we going to see each other?”
“You’ve got a date. For tonight. I work at the Nirvana Ballroom—”
“Like Vivian Frayne...?” I pointed toward the crumpled tabloid.
“Just like Vivian Frayne,” she said. “Nirvana Ballroom. Once you’re a regular, it’s kind of like piece-work. You show up whenever you feel like it. You throw on an evening gown and you’re working — at fifty percent of what the suckers contribute. I’m a regular. I wasn’t going to work tonight — and I won’t — unless you’re coming. Are you coming?”
“For you,” I said, “I’m coming.”
“Swell. I’m looking forward. I’ll be at my best. I’ll wear my red gown. In the Nirvana Ballroom, that’s all you wear, practically — your gown. You’ll die when you see me in my red gown, I promise you.”
“I’ll be there,” I said. “Maybe late, but I’ll be there.”
“I’ll be waiting.” She waved, went to the door and opened it.
“About Vivian Frayne,” I called. “Did you know her? Vivian Frayne?”
“I knew her,” she said and she closed the door behind her.
And all that was left was the faint musk of her perfume.
I undressed, showered, and re-dressed for Gordon Phelps. Gordon Phelps was not a friend. He was a guy I’d run into in the top-type night clubs, a guy with more loot than he could possibly spend, and a guy for whom I’d done a few favors, for a fee. He was a sixty-year-old runabout who still had plenty of vitamins jiggling inside of him. He had an austerely attractive society-type wife who, it appeared, kept a slack rein on him, and he had, also, a fabulous town house on Fifth Avenue, a fabulous beach house on Fire Island, and a fabulous country house in Georgia. Now he had a hideaway. And sinec Gordon Phelps was ordinately generous in the matter of fees (he could afford it) I was quite as anxious to see Gordon Phelps as Gordon Phelps was to see me.
2
“Glad to see you,” Gordon Phelps said, when he opened the door of his apartment to me. “And it’s about time.”
“I made it as soon as I could, Mr. Phelps.”
“What held you up? The sultry Sophia Sierra?”
“No, but she could have, if she’d had a mind to.”
“Terrific piece, that one, eh? But look out there, sonny. She’s just opposite of what she looks like. That little gal is all mind and no heart, and it’s a mind concerned with one thing — gold, pure and simple. Gold, gelt, loot, dinero. But come on in now, young fella. We’ve got a hell of a lot of talking to do.”
He led me through a small round foyer into an enormous exquisitely furnished living room, its floor moss-soft with thick rose-colored carpeting. Above the fireplace hung an oil of a rose-colored nude.
“Just beautiful,” I said.
“Would you like to see more?” he said. He had a cultured, somewhat high-pitched voice, like a coloratura soprano who drank too much. “Everything’s sound-proofed, by the way. And that fireplace really burns wood.”
“Love to see more,” I said.
He motioned me to a bedroom which was bleak compared to the warm comforts of the living room.
He showed me a bathroom with gold plumbing, and a kitchen with all the equipment including a deep-freeze, and then, back in the living room, over drinks, he said, “I could live here for months without going out once. There’s enough food and drink — for months.”