Rogah joined them and he walked as they did. “Mr. Smith, may I present Miss Smith? And Miss Brown? Mr. Smith and Mr. Brown.” He floated back into the gloom, drifting like something that had become untied under the sea.
Miss Brown’s pupils were so vast that they shrunk the iris to a thin frame of blue. Her honey hair was intricately coiffed. The dress was an off-orange that should have been the wrong color for her but wasn’t. She moved close to the bar between Shay and me, and the other one was on the other side of Shay, his big shoulders turned so that all I could see of her was the crown of her head, the mist-brown hair, ringleted.
“It’s so difficult to meet interesting people,” Miss Brown said. The diction was flat, clipped, precise.
“It seemed easy this time. Boston?”
“Dedham. And please call me Lee.”
“I’m Robby. And your drink is either Scotch or brandy.”
“How perspicacious, Robby. I like men who guess. Earlier in this dull evening it was Scotch, but now it’s five star.”
I ordered. She tilted her head on one side, and I saw that some of the precision of her speech and the carefulness of her movements was due to a case of being taken drunk. Her shoulder, where she leaned lightly against me, was warm.
She said, “Do you work for Mr. Smith?”
“Don’t tell me it’s beginning to show, Lee.”
“Don’t be hurt, Robby. I just felt that relationship in the atmosphere. And I prefer people without that... certain ruthlessness that employers have. You’re a small boy trying to be as tough as the big boys, aren’t you? There — I can see I’ve hurt your feelings.”
“You’re odd, aren’t you?”
“That,” she said briskly, “is a gambit I grow weary of. Dear Lee, you’re so intelligent, so charming, so lovely, so obviously well educated. Then the next step is to ask me why I’m doing this. I’ll tell you in advance, Robby, before you work your way up to the question. It’s because the world is a very, very dull place.”
“Since he left?”
The tiny brandy glass lifted slowly, was emptied, and moved just as slowly back down onto the bar. “Darling,” she said, “if you get nasty and make me cry, I’ll spoil your evening, but good.”
A new customer moved in at the bar beyond Shay. He looked around almost shyly, like a small boy who has just finished writing a dirty word on a fence. He took off his glasses and wiped them on a crisp white handkerchief. I ordered another round. When I looked at him again there was a girl with him. He had adopted an uncle’s attitude. I heard his jovial laughter. The girl was young and she was neatly and plainly dressed. The man had a comfortable round tummy and a pin-striped business suit, a lodge pin in his lapel.
Shay pulled his girl around so that we stood in a group of four. He said, glancing at his watch, “Robby, the party ought to be in full swing by now, and now that we’ve got dates, let’s go.”
His girl pouted. “Don’t want to go to any dull parties, Shay.”
“Let’s not,” Lee said.
“Come on, we’ll have fun,” Shay said.
“Let’s stay here,” Lee said firmly. “Then later on we’ll go over to my apartment and have a more select party. No strangers. Just the four of us.”
“No, I insist we go,” Shay said.
I caught the look that Lee gave the other girl. The other girl said, “You two looked like fun, but I guess we were wrong. Have a good time at your party, boys.”
There must have been another signal I missed. Rogah appeared, as if he had sprouted up out of the floorboards. “All you sweet people shouldn’t quarrel,” he murmured.
Shay smiled. “I have a strange aversion to going to any place a girl suggests. It so often turns out to be remarkably expensive.”
“What are you implying?” Rogah said. He smiled.
“Nothing at all. My friend and I are in a strange town. Our guard is up. Is there a law against that?”
Rogah sighed. “I make my share of mistakes. Considering the hour, I think that the girls can go with you to the party you mentioned, but I do think you should pay me the profit I would have made from your drinks and theirs.”
“Anything to make both ends meet, eh?” Shay said, smiling with his lips.
“A hundred should cover it.”
“That’s a fair bit of drinking.”
“The glasses have false bottoms, Mr. Smith.”
Shay looked at the girls. He shook his head. “Thanks just the same, Rogah. The refreshment is overvalued.”
“Why, you cheap—”
“Lee!” Rogah said. It was almost a whisper, but it whistled and snapped like a whip end. She stopped and she was pale around the mouth. Rogah made a small gesture with his hand and they walked off, balancing false dignity like schoolgirls carrying books on their heads for the sake of posture.
“Don’t hurry back, gentlemen,” Rogah said. He smiled. His teeth were small and quite pointed.
Outside, in the alley, Shay said, “Now we check another piece of the puzzle.”
“If you’re collecting pieces of a puzzle, friend, you’re one up on me.”
The cabstand was right around the corner. The flag was up and the driver lounged behind the wheel, the radio turned low.
“We want a cab,” Shay said, reaching for the door handle.
“Sorry, Mac. Waiting for a customer.”
“Your flag’s up.”
“So my flag’s up. Don’t give me an argument, chubby. Go on down the street. There’s other cabs.”
Shay, to my surprise, walked meekly off. Our sedan was around the corner.
He slid behind the wheel and made no move to start the motor. “The shell in the middle has the pea under it, mister,” he said.
“You lose,” I said.
“It smelleth to highest heaven, Robby. It stinketh, in fact. Wait here. I want to stir James P. Garver out of his downy nest.” He slid out and went off into the darkness. I lit a cigarette. When it was half gone, he was back.
“The address,” he said, “is the Henderson Hotel. Neat, clean, efficient. Horse your bag out of the back and check in there. Let the desk clerk know you’re on vacation and you want to say whoopee in loud, harsh tones. Give your right name and a fake address.”
It was twelve thirty when I registered. The Henderson had an aseptic look. The lobby was the severe inside of a concrete shoebox. I was too tired to give my lines much life when I leaned over the desk and asked the clerk if this was “a pretty good town.”
He slid his fingers inside his shirt and scratched himself. “Depends.”
“I’m not afraid to spend money.”
“That case, you might have yourself a time. Take a look at your room and then come on down to the bar. I’ll page you later, Mr. Moran. When I get things set up.”
I tipped the bellhop two dollars, to stay in character. After he left I yanked one black hair from my head and wound it around the catch on my suitcase. Then I went downstairs. They gave me time for one drink before the call came. The horse-faced clerk moved in so close he was nearly nibbling on my ear.
“You just go along where the cabbie out the side entrance takes you. Good man. You can trust him.” I slipped the clerk a five and went on out.
Three steps from the cab I began to make two and one add up to four. It was the same cab which had been at the end of the alley.
“Hear you want some fun, mister,” the cabbie said jovially. I held my breath. He glanced at me but I could see that he didn’t recognize me.
“I could do with some.”
“There’s a place outside of town runs wide open. You ought to like it.”
“It’s your town. Let’s go.”
The music thump shook the silent fields for a hundred yards around. Cars nuzzled up against the clapboard walls like fierce, patient dogs awaiting their masters.