He saw the girl lying half in and half out of the open door of 914.
She lay on her side, in a sheen of steel-gray lounging pajamas, her cheek pressed into the nap of the hall carpet, her head a mass of thick corn-blond hair, waved with glassy precision. Not a hair looked out of place. She was young, very pretty, and she didn’t look dead.
Carmady slid down beside her, touched her cheek. It was warm. He lifted the hair softly away from her head and saw the bruise.
«Sapped.» His lips pressed back against his teeth.
He picked her up in his arms, carried her through a short hallway to the living room of a suite, put her down on a big velour davenport in front of some gas logs.
She lay motionless, her eyes shut, her face bluish behind the make-up. He shut the outer door and looked through the apartment, then went back to the hallway and picked up something that gleamed white against the baseboard. It was a bone-handled .22 automatic, seven-shot. He sniffed it, dropped it into his pocket and went back to the girl.
He took a big hammered-silver flask out of his inside breast pocket and unscrewed the top, opened her mouth with his fingers and poured whiskey against her small white teeth. She gagged and her head jerked out of his hand. Her eyes opened. They were deep blue, with a tint of purple. Light came into them and the light was brittle.
He lit a cigarette and stood looking down at her. She moved a little more. After a while she whispered: «I like your whiskey. Could I have a little more?»
He got a glass from the bathroom, poured whiskey into it. She sat up very slowly, touched her head, groaned. Then she took the glass out of his hand and put the liquor down with a practised flip of the wrist.
«I still like it,» she said. «Who are you?»
She had a deep soft voice. He liked the sound of it. He said: «Ted Carmady. I live down the hall in 937.»
«I got a dizzy spell, I guess.»
«Uh-huh. You got sapped, angel.» His bright eyes looked at her probingly. There was a smile tucked to the corners of his lips.
Her eyes got wider. A glaze came over them, the glaze of a protective enamel.
He said: «I saw the guy. He was snowed to the hairline. And here’s your gun.»
He took it out of his pocket, held it on the flat of his hand.
«I suppose that makes me think up a bedtime story,» the girl said slowly.
«Not for me. If you’re in a jam, I might help you. It all depends.»
«Depends on what?» Her voice was colder, sharper.
«On what the racket is,» he said softly. He broke the magazine from the small gun, glanced at the top cartridge. «Coppernickel, eh? You know your ammunition, angel.»
«Do you have to call me angel?»
«I don’t know your name.»
He grinned at her, then walked over to a desk in front of the windows, put the gun down on it. There was a leather photo frame on the desk, with two photos side by side. He looked at them casually at first, then his gaze tightened. A handsome dark woman and a thin blondish cold-eyed man whose high stiff collar, large knotted tie and narrow lapels dated the photo back many years. He stared at the man.
The girl was talking behind him. «I’m Jean Adrian. I do a number at Cyrano’s, in the floor show.»
Carmady still stared at the photo. «I know Benny Cyrano pretty well,» he said absently. «These your parents?»
He turned and looked at her. She lifted her head slowly. Something that might have been fear showed in her deep blue eyes.
«Yes. They’ve been dead for years,» she said dully. «Next question?»
He went quickly back to the davenport and stood in front of her. «Okey,» he said thinly. «I’m nosey. So what? This is my town. My dad used to run it. Old Marcus Carmady, the People’s Friend; this is my hotel. I own a piece of it. That snowed-up hoodlum looked like a life-taker to me. Why wouldn’t I want to help out?»
The blond girl stared at him lazily. «I still like your whiskey,» she said. «Could I —»
«Take it from the neck, angel. You get it down faster,» he grunted.
She stood up suddenly and her face got a little white. «You talk to me as if I was a crook,» she snapped. «Here it is, if you have to know. A boy friend of mine has been getting threats. He’s a fighter, and they want him to drop a fight. Now they’re trying to get at him through me. Does that satisfy you a little?»
Carmady picked his hat off a chair, took the cigarette end out of his mouth and rubbed it out in a tray. He nodded quietly, said in a changed voice: «I beg your pardon.» He started towards the door.
The giggle came when he was halfway there. The girl said behind him softly: «You have a nasty temper. And you’ve forgotten your flask.»
He went back and picked the flask up. Then he bent suddenly, put a hand under the girl’s chin and kissed her on the lips.
«To hell with you, angel. I like you,» he said softly.
He went back to the hallway and out. The girl touched her lips with one finger, rubbed it slowly back and forth. There was a shy smile on her face.
TWO
Tony Acosta, the bell captain, was slim and dark and slight as a girl, with small delicate hands and velvety eyes and a hard little mouth. He stood in the doorway and said: «Seventh row was the best I could get, Mister Carmady. This Deacon Werra ain’t bad and Duke Targo’s the next light heavy champ.»
Carmady said: «Come in and have a drink, Tony.» He went over to the window, stood looking out at the rain. «If they buy it for him,» he added over his shoulder.
«Well — just a short one, Mister Carmady.»
The dark boy mixed a highball carefully at a tray on an imitation Sheraton desk. He held the bottle against the light and gauged his drink carefully, tinkled ice gently with a long spoon, sipped, smiled, showing small white teeth.
«Targo’s a lu, Mister Carmady. He’s fast, clever, got a sock in both mitts, plenty guts, don’t ever take a step back.»
«He has to hold up the bums they feed him,» Carmady drawled.
«Well, they ain’t fed him no lion meat yet,» Tony said.
The rain beat against the glass. The thick drops flattened out and washed down the pane in tiny waves.
Carmady said: «He’s a bum. A bum with color and looks, but still a bum.»
Tony sighed deeply. «I wisht I was goin’. It’s my night off, too.»
Carmady turned slowly and went over to the desk, mixed a drink. Two dusky spots showed in his cheeks and his voice was tired, drawling.
«So that’s it. What’s stopping you?»
«I got a headache,»
«You’re broke again,» Carmady almost snarled.
The dark boy looked sidewise under his long lashes, said nothing.
Carmady clenched his left hand, unclenched it slowly. His eyes were sullen.
«Just ask Carmady,» he sighed. «Good old Carmady. He leaks dough. He’s soft. Just ask Carmady. Okey, Tony, take the ducat back and get a pair together.»
He reached into his pocket, held a bill out. The dark boy looked hurt.
«Jeeze, Mister Carmady, I wouldn’t have you think —»
«Skip it! What’s a fight ticket between pals? Get a couple and take your girl. To hell with this Targo.»
Tony Acosta took the bill. He watched the older man carefully for a moment. Then his voice was very softly, saying: «I’d rather go with you, Mister Carmady. Targo knocks them over, and not only in the ring. He’s got a peachy blonde right on this floor, Miss Adrian, in 914.»
Carmady stiffened. He put his glass down slowly, turned it on the top of the desk. His voice got a little hoarse.
«He’s still a bum, Tony. Okey, I’ll meet you for dinner, in front of your hotel at seven.»
«Jeeze, that’s swell, Mister Carmady.»