“I’ll ask you a question,” Stenn said. “How many people that get better than a half-million worth of pie out of the sky go around thinking they’re God? Add a busted home on top of that. Add a lot of play-acting. Add gullibility. I’ll play out the hand and what can I lose but a couple days’ pay?”
Morganson sighed. “Okay. What do I do?”
“You got to get that Palma out of my hair. I want the girl alone in that warehouse this afternoon. I got to get there first and get in and get his stuff out of sight. This has got to look real good.”
“How do I do that?”
“You’re a big boy now. How the hell do I know how you do it?”
Morganson snapped his fingers. “I’m the eager reporter. I went and got hold of that will. I found a clause in it where she can’t marry until she’s twenty-five. I’ve got a friend who’ll play along. A kid lawyer. Maybe I can take Palma to his office. How long do you need?”
“She comes in to rehearse at two. It’s eleven now. You get Palma when he goes after food. Say about one. I’ll hang around until you get him away from there. I can get in all right. I’ll be there when the girl arrives.”
Stenn sat with one haunch on the corner of the table, the big shoe swinging slowly, his hat shoved off his forehead, the pale eyes hooded. The cigarette in the corner of his mouth sent a tendril of smoke upward along the heavy cheek, curling around the hat brim. He had tossed Palma’s personal things in a suitcase and shoved it under the cot. The grey sheet hung down far enough to conceal it.
Through the dusty glass and wire grill he saw Della Clove come down the alley with cat-tread, sunglint on the heavy black hair, the red slash of lips.
She pushed the door open and the smile faded. “What do you want? Where’s Raoul?”
“You won’t see him any more, honey. He outsmarted us. He jumped just before we grabbed him.”
She put her hands on her hips, spread-legged in fishwife pose, the pointed chin thrust toward him. “Just what the hell is this all about?”
He kicked the cane-bottomed chair toward her. “Sit down. That will keep you from falling down.”
Fear flickered for a moment in her eyes. She sat down. He regarded her somberly. He said, “Kid, you can get tied up with some real rough people when you don’t watch yourself.”
“I don’t need a guardian.”
“I could give you an argument on that. Look. See this? A picture of Palma. We got it as he was coming out of the alley. See this? A picture of the dead blonde, retouched a little. We sent those two pictures by airmail to Mexico City. We got an answer.”
“I don’t have to read it. Raoul told me about the trouble he had in Mexico.”
“Maybe you ought to read it. Maybe there’s something in it you don’t know.”
They had fixed up the wire in accord with Stenn’s detailed request. It was a nice job. Official looking.
Señor Stenn: Photographs are of Fernando Barredo y Fourzan and female accomplice who practised extortion here. Method of operation, girl would locate wealthy woman, Barredo would contact, marry and later desert after acquiring wife’s money. Pair fled country in anticipation of arrest. Request deportation proceedings against Fourzan. Girl believed U.S. citizen but known to be Barredo’s wife.
The yellow sheet slipped out of the girl’s fingers, swooped toward Stenn’s heavy shoe, fluttered to the floor. He grunted as he bent over and picked it up.
Though the girl’s voice was barely audible, it had the quality of a scream. “No,” she said. “No! It’s all a lie!”
“Sure,” Stenn said. “Talk yourself into believing that, the same way you talked yourself into the cock-and-bull story Palma gave you.”
She looked through Stenn and beyond him. “But I... she came here and said horrible things. She was on her way out to talk to my mother. He told me how for years she had made his life...”
She turned suddenly as Palma came through the doorway. He looked sharply at Della and then at Stenn. He was breathing hard. “I thought so!” he said. “Your friends were a little clumsy. They contradicted each other. They were too anxious to have me stay with them.” He put his hand on Della’s shoulder. “Are you all right, my darling?”
Stenn saw her shudder and then smile up into his face. “Of course.”
“This police person is a fool, you know.” Palma spoke intently, looking into her eyes. “A complete fool.”
“Of course,” she whispered, still smiling.
Stenn put the pictures and the wire in his pocket. He looked at the girl with sadness. She continued to look into Palma’s eyes.
Stenn saw that Palma sensed that the girl had slipped, that some information had been given. There was deep tension in Palma. He looked quickly at Stenn, apparently reassured by placidity. The cord of his throat relaxed.
He patted Della’s shoulder lightly. “Come on, darling. Time for rehearsal. You’d better change.”
Della meekly left the room.
Palma said, “Possibly I underestimated you, my friend. It won’t happen again.”
“It could have worked.”
“What could have worked? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about using a half-wild impressionable kid like that to do your own dirty work, Palma. You didn’t have the guts to handle the blonde yourself It was easier to play on the girl, wasn’t it?”
Palma peered at him. “My dear man, have you been attending the cinema too often? Or is it those comic books you read?”
“Sooner or later,” Stenn said. “Your time will come.”
“I’m afraid not,” Palma said. “Now you may watch us rehearse, if you care to. Where did you put my things? Oh, under the bed. Of course.”
Stenn sat on the table. Palma took off his jacket shirt and undershirt. His shoulders and chest were well muscled. He pulled on a sweat shirt, smiled mockingly at Stenn and said, as he walked toward the inner doorway, “Art cannot wait, you know. The show must go on.”
Stenn said a short incisive word. Palma grinned over his shoulder.
Stenn went to the doorway. The girl, in rehearsal clothes, stood on the stage. She had changed, apparently, behind the makeshift curtain that served as a backdrop.
Seventeen years of police work had sensitized small alarm circuits in the back of Stenn’s mind. He did not understand how they operated, but he knew that usually it was the result of something seen with the eye but not recorded by the brain. His eyes flicked across the room, across the litter and the dust. A half bottle of milk, caked and curdled, stood by the door. He stood up and felt the tension in his shoulders. Morganson pushed the outer door open and came in. He was flushed.
“I didn’t do so good, Paul.”
“Neither did I. Anyway, it was a try.”
Morganson looked around with distaste. “The happy little pigpen.”
Stenn followed his glance, saw the chipped plate half under the cot. The alarm circuits quickened. He stared at the plate. A tarnished knife lay across it.
Alarm can come from something that is visible, or something that was once visible and suddenly, for no reason, has disappeared.
He grunted, low in his throat. He turned and strode toward the inner doorway, Morganson at his heels. They went through into the big room where the folding chairs sat in orderly ranks staring mindlessly at the stage.
Palma said, “Now, you remember this one, darling. I am upstage, here. Half turned. I am looked across at Berta. She represents hidden desire. She will be over there, facing me. You are jealous. Now circle me slowly and keep the count in your mind. Crouch low and keep looking up at my face. Your hands must express tension and anger.”