“I really wouldn’t have let them arrest you.”
“I’ll take your word for that.”
Frank had some of his drink. Then he set it down calmly on the filing cabinet and scratched his beard-stubbled chin. “I really do give a damn about you; have I ever told you that?”
“Yeah, you’ve told me that, Frank.”
“But I was in a bind.”
“I’ll grant you that, Frank. You were in a big bind. A big one.”
“So I didn’t have a lot of choice.”
Tobin shook his head, hating Frank and pitying him at the same time. “Richard was killed because you were afraid that if the company that was going to buy you out found that Richard was taking payola, the deal would be off, right?”
Quietly, Frank said, “Right.” Then he flung his arm dramatically around the room. “You know what my oldest son says when he thinks something’s neat?”
“What does he say, Frank?”
“He says ‘bitchin’. As in ‘That’s a ‘bitchin’ car’ or ‘That’s a ‘bitchin’ movie.’ Well, you know what, Tobin?”
“What?”
“Tonight we had one ‘bitchin’ good party here. You know that?”
“I’m happy for you, Frank.”
Frank eyed him as soberly as he could. “I really do give a damn about you, Tobin. I really do.”
“Ebsen had to be killed, too.”
“Ebsen.” This time when Frank waved his hand it was with a sense of dismissal. “He was really slime. He was trying to blackmail Dunphy for stealing his script — which Dunphy did, in fact — but then he followed him around with one of those goddamn shotgun microphones and that’s how he found out Dunphy was taking bribes.”
“Two people, Frank. Killed. Jesus.” He was exhausted. Frank sort of hugged the filing cabinet. Sort of put his face down on it.
“I’m sorry, Tobin.”
“For what?”
Frank’s head rose and he looked at Tobin. “For what? What the hell are you talking about? I’m sorry I killed Richard and even that slimy bastard Ebsen.” This was the most animated he’d been since Tobin had entered the office. “I killed them and I’m going to have to pay for it.”
Gently, Tobin said, “You didn’t kill them, Frank.”
“What the hell are you talking about? Of course I did.”
“Frank, I know you very well — remember?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you don’t have what it takes to kill somebody.”
“Oh, sure, I see what you’re saying. Old wishy-washy Frank Emory. He doesn’t have the balls to kill anybody. That’s what you mean, isn’t it, Tobin? That’s what you mean, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Frank, that’s what I mean.”
“Well, you’re wrong. I not only killed one person, I killed two. Two fucking people, Tobin, do you understand that?”
“Where is she, Frank?”
“Who?”
“Dorothy.”
“What the hell’s Dorothy got to do with this?”
“You don’t have the balls, Frank, but Dorothy does.”
From behind him a female voice said, “I’m going to take that as a compliment, Tobin.”
Dorothy had come out from one of the darkened offices. She looked remarkably fresh, even lovely.
“You like a drink, Tobin?” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I would.”
“Scotch all right?”
“Scotch is fine.”
She went over to the bar and poured the three of them healthy doses of Scotch, then brought them over. She’d put on perfume recently and as she brushed close to him the smell of it was erotic.
She stood next to Frank and said, “The funny thing was, I didn’t have to kill either of them.”
“Why not?” Tobin said.
“You remember seeing me the night Richard was killed?”
“Downstairs, when I was telling Frank he should go have an IRA cocktail?”
“Exactly.”
“What about it?”
“Well, do you remember one of the grips came up and said Frank had a phone call?”
“Yes.”
“Well, the phone call was from Frank’s lawyer. The papers had just been signed.”
“God,” Tobin said. “So no matter what came out in the press about Richard taking bribes—”
She laughed. He could hear the shock and panic and terror in the sound. “Yes. But I went into his dressing room without knowing that the deal had been signed and killed him. For absolutely no good reason at all. Frank and I were already off the hook as far as the company goes.”
She finished her Scotch in a gulp. “I think I need a little more.”
Tobin followed her to the bar. Everything there looked sad and depressing. Mashed-up paper cups and cigarette butts everywhere, and various kinds of dips smeared all over the once-white tablecloth.
“But Ebsen you had to kill,” Tobin said.
“You want some more?”
She held up the bottle.
Tobin shook his head.
She filled half her glass.
“But you had to kill Ebsen, right?” he repeated.
“As it turned out, yes. He knew everything. He’d just keep on blackmailing us, only now murder would be in the bargain.” She sighed. “He knew that one of us had killed Dunphy. We were the only ones who had reason to.”
She took another jolt of her drink and then her eyes roamed to Frank and she said, “The past four months have been terrible. I just wanted things to be as they used to be.” She smiled. “I was even trying to be nicer to Frank.”
Tobin said, “I never could decide.”
“Decide what?”
“If I liked you or not.”
She looked at him without coyness and asked, “You’ve come to a decision?”
“I admire your courage. Even if you did it, Dorothy.”
“I didn’t have any choice. Anyway, admiring my courage isn’t the same as liking me.”
Tobin laughed without quite knowing why. “No, I guess it isn’t.”
Then he saw that she was looking past him and she said, “For God’s sake, Frank.”
Tobin turned.
Frank stood there looking more drunk and disheveled than ever. Except now he had a chrome-plated .45 in his hand.
“Frank, just what do you plan to do with that?” Dorothy asked.
“Kill Tobin if I need to.”
“That’s brilliant. That would really help us out. Anyway, he’s the best friend you’ve ever had.”
“I don’t mean I’d kill you out of any kind of malice or anything, Tobin.”
Tobin said, “No, I often kill people I like.”
“Well, goddammit!” Frank shouted. “I’ve do something, don’t I?”
And suddenly tears filled his eyes and his voice became tight with grief. “She killed two people — for me! Because I didn’t have the courage to do what I needed to do!” He slammed the fist without the gun hard into the edge of the filing cabinet.
And then he screamed.
From the force and angle with which he’d struck the cabinet, Tobin assumed that he’d broken a knuckle or two, if not the wrist.
Dorothy went to him. She held out her hand and said, “Now quit being stupid, Frank, and give me the gun.”
When he complied, she took it and handed it to Tobin. “Now go over there and sit in that chair, Frank, and let’s have a look at that hand. You’re such a child, Frank. You really are.”
As she guided her husband to the chair, she looked back at Tobin and said, “Call the police, all right?”
“You sure?”
She thought a moment and then she said, “Yes, Tobin, I’m sure.”
Tobin said, “You know what?”
“What?”
He smiled. “I do like you, after all.”