From a number of less important details, he learned from the report that Ira Marsh was a wild one. She had a J.D. rating with the local police, but had been smart enough never to have come up before a judge. She was known as an expert shoplifter and store detectives never let her out of their sight when they saw her come in. She was associated with the Moccasin gang, a leading mob of teenage terrorists who were continually clashing with the police and rival gangs in the district. The leader of the Moccasins was Jess Farr, an eighteen-year old thug who had hacked, coshed and cut his way to his present indisputable position. Six months ago, the report stated, Farr had been going round regularly with a girl named Leya Felcher. She was the same age as Farr, a tough, handsome virago who had imagined her position as Farr’s mistress was unassailable. Ira had decided she wanted Farr and she wanted Leya’s position. In a crowded cellar under a warehouse, watched by the male members of the gang with Farr as the prize, the two girls, stripped to the waist, fought nail-tooth-and-fist in the longest and bloodiest battle the Moccasins had ever seen.
Ira had known that she would have to fight for Farr and she had taken the precaution of training for the battle. For three weeks, she had lived like a Spartan and had paid regular visits to Mulligan’s Gym run by an old pugilist who, let into the secret, had trained her as he used to train himself with the gleeful certainty that she couldn’t fail to win.
As Farr’s girl, Ira had become more and more involved with the gang’s activities. She was always on the spot to cheer them into battle. Often she was used as bait to break the uneasy peace that from time to time was arranged between the gangs.
The report concluded with these words:
‘This young girl is shrewd, intelligent, vicious, selfish and amoral. It is the opinion of our investigator that there is nothing she would shrink from to gain her own ends. On the small credit side, she has courage, determination and an aptitude for figures. Whenever she is without funds, which appears to be seldom, she does part-time work for Joe Slesser, a bookmaker, who speaks highly of her. From him she has learned to handle a variety of adding machines and computers.’
On paper, Ira Marsh seemed the ideal candidate for the difficult job Edris had for her. As he sat in the Mini, examining her attractive little face, he became even more confident that she would do.
‘I’ve been making inquiries about you, baby,’ he said. ‘I like what I’ve learned. Do you want to make some money?’
All the time Edris had been driving and now as he talked, Ira had been studying him as narrowly as he studied her. Her instincts told her this little freak was to be taken seriously.
‘It depends on two things: how much and what I have to do for it,’ she said.
Edris patted the steering wheel with his stumpy hands and smiled.
‘Are you a gambler, baby?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘How much money do you want?’
‘As much as I can get.’
‘I don’t mean that. Do you ever dream about money? I do.’ Edris crossed one short leg over the other. ‘I’m always dreaming about having money. Don’t you?’
‘I guess so.’
‘How much money do you dream about having?’
‘Much more than you could give me.’
‘But how much?’
‘A million dollars.’
‘Why stop there?’ Edris said and giggled. ‘Why not ten million — twenty million?’
She glanced at her cheap wristwatch.
‘Let’s stop playing games. I have to be home in another ten minutes. I have a date tonight.’
‘Suppose I showed you how to make fifty thousand dollars,’ Edris said softly, ‘would you be ready to take a risk?’
She looked at him and she could tell by the expression in his eyes he was serious and she felt a sudden quickening of her blood.
‘What have I to risk? I don’t own anything.’
‘Yes, you do. You have the same possession I have and which I am going to risk. It depends on the value you set on it. Fifty thousand dollars is a nice sum of money. The risk isn’t very great, but it does exist. You will be risking your freedom, baby, as I’ll be risking mine.’
‘What makes you think my freedom is worth fifty thousand dollars? My freedom?’ She laughed. ‘There is nothing I wouldn’t do to have that kind of money.’
He studied the bitter, hard smile that remained after the laughter, and he nodded, satisfied.
‘You’ll have to earn it, baby, make no mistake about it. I have a very special job for you, but you’ll have to earn it.’
‘How?’
‘Before I tell you that, let me tell you the background of this thing.’
It was then she learned about her sister and her marriage, and how her sister had run away with the baby and had finally become a streetwalker.
‘Your sister is a heroin addict,’ Edris said. ‘There’s nothing anyone can do for her. I give her four months. not more. She’s dying on her feet.’
Ira sat forward, her face in her hands, her elbows on her knees, her blue eyes cloudy with concentration, so absorbed that she forgot her date with Jess, forgot the Sunday night jive session, forgot everything except the piping, whispering voice that dripped its poison into her ears.
Finally, Edris got around to explaining what he wanted her to do. It sounded like a plot from some movie, and at first, she decided without telling him, that he was crazy: a freak with a hole in his head, but as he talked on and on, she began to see that such a plan might work and if it did, the money was there.
‘He’s never seen his daughter,’ Edris concluded. ‘He’s heard nothing of her for sixteen years. There is a family resemblance. I can see it. You look uncommonly like Muriel. He’ll see it too. From that angle, there is nothing to worry about. He’ll accept you as his daughter without question. You can see that, can’t you?’
Yes, she could see it. She knew from what her mother had said that she did look like Muriel when Muriel was her age.
‘But what about the daughter? The one I am to impersonate?’ she asked. ‘What about her? Suppose she hears about me?’
‘She won’t,’ Edris said and rubbed his hands together. ‘She’s dead. She died last week. That’s why I’m here. If she was alive, we couldn’t do it. It was only when Muriel told me she was dead that I dreamed up this idea.’ He looked searchingly at her face to see if she accepted these lies. ‘Even now we can’t do anything until Muriel dies. But that won’t be long... three or four months.’
Ira moved uneasily.
‘How did the daughter die?’
‘She was swimming, got cramped and drowned,’ Edris lied glibly.
‘Can’t something be done about Muriel?’
‘No. She’s as good as dead now.’
Ira sat silent, staring through the windshield of the car.
‘Well?’ Edris asked impatiently. ‘Will you do it? There’s little risk.’
‘I’ll think about it. It wants a lot of thinking about. Be here this time next Sunday and I’ll tell you one way or the other.’
‘I can’t come up from Paradise City again, baby,’ Edris said. ‘This is part of my yearly vacation. I have to earn a living.’ He took a card from his wallet. ‘Here’s my address. Send me a telegram when you have thought it over. Keep it short: yes or no. There’s no great hurry. We can’t do anything until Muriel dies. Plenty of time to get things right, baby, and they certainly have to be right.’
She thought of this first meeting with Edris as she walked through the reception lobby of the airport and made her way to the bus terminal. She had seen him twice since then. He had put a lot of polish on his plan during the four months’ wait. She couldn’t see now how it could go wrong. She had taken leave of her father, telling him she had a job outside New York and wouldn’t be coming back.