I said, “You broke down on cross-examination, and couldn’t tell a consistent story.”
She laughed as though the whole thing was very amusing. “I was just sounding you out, Donald, riding along with the gag.”
She moved over to the davenport and sat down beside me, put one hand on my shoulder, said softly, “Donald, why don’t you grow up?”
“I’ve grown up.”
“You can’t buck money and influence — not in this town.”
“Who has the money?” I asked angrily.
“Right at the moment,” she said, “John Carver Billings the Second has money.”
“All right. Who has the influence?”
“I’ll answer that question. John Carver Billings.”
“You left off the Second,” I told her sarcastically.
“No, I didn’t.”
“You mean that?”
She nodded. “I mean John Carver Billings, the old man. He’s calling the turns.”
I thought that over.
She said, “You stuck your neck out. You did things you shouldn’t have done. You said things you shouldn’t have said. Why didn’t you ride along, Donald?”
“Because I’m not built that way.”
“You’ve lost five hundred dollars, you’ve got yourself in bad with the police, there’s an order out to pick you up, and you’re in a sweet mess. Now, if you wanted to grow up and be your age you could have that all straightened out. The police would withdraw their pickup order, the fivehundred- dollar check would be reinstated, and everything would be hunky-dory.”
“So you’ve gone back to the alibi story.”
“I never abandoned the alibi story.”
“You did to me.”
“That’s what you say.”
“You know you did.”
She said almost dreamily, “John Carver Billings the Second, Sylvia Tucker, and I all tell the same story. You come along and claim that I changed my story to you. I deny it. John Carver Billings the Second says you tried to blackmail him. Police say you were snooping around trying to get something which you could use to blackmail a client. That’s not being smart, Donald.”
“So you’ve decided to sell me out?”
“No. I’ve decided to buy me in.”
“You can’t get away with it, Millie. Don’t try it,” I pleaded.
“You run your business. I’ll run mine.”
“Millie, you can’t do it. You can’t get away with it.
Within two minutes of the time I started to cross-examine you, you had yourself all mixed up.”
“Try cross-examining me now.”
“What good would it do if I trapped you again? You’d simply be that much wiser and you’d lie out of it.”
“I’m wise now, Donald. Why don’t you get wise?”
I said, “You’re dealing with a bunch of amateurs. They think they can fix things up. You’re a nice girl, Millie. I hate to see you get mixed up in this thing. You could get in pretty bad over this.”
“You’re the one who’s in bad now.”
I started for the door and said angrily, “Stick around and see who’s in bad.”
She came running to me. “Don’t leave like that, Donald.”
I pushed her to one side.
Her arms were around me. “Look, Donald, you’re a swell guy. I hate to see you get in bad. You’re bucking power and influence and money. They’ll crush you flat and throw you to one side. You’ll be discredited, convicted of extortion, you’ll lose your license. Donald, please. I can fix it all up for you. I told them they’d have to square things for you or I wouldn’t go along. They promised.”
I said, “Millie, let’s look at it from the standpoint of cold-blooded logic. It cost John Carver Billings the Second almost a thousand dollars to manufacture that alibi, and that isn’t taking into consideration what they paid you. I have an idea Sylvia was softhearted and they didn’t pay her much. They paid you two hundred and fifty dollars the first time. When they came back this second time they really decorated the mahogany.
“You started buying clothes and suitcases. You’re going to make an affidavit and then you’re going traveling, perhaps a trip to Europe.”
“All right,” she said hotly, “they sent for me. They paid me money, big money, and they gave me the protection of influence, big influence. I’m not going to Europe. I’m going to South America. Do you know what that means?”
“Sure I know what it means,” I said. “You’re making an affidavit and then you’re getting on a boat, where, for a time at least, you’ll be out of the jurisdiction of the court.
They can only question you by interrogations forwarded through the American Consulate. You’ll—”
“It isn’t that,” she said. “You’re looking at it from the other person’s viewpoint. I am looking at it from my viewpoint.
“Do you know what it means when a girl comes to the city and gets on her own? She doesn’t have any difficulty meeting a lot of boys — playboys. That’s all they want to do, play.
“At the start you think you’d like a little playing yourself. You’re on the loose. For the first time in your life you’re grown up, with all that it means. You’re an individual, completely free and unhampered. You have an apartment, you are your own boss, you’re making your own living. You don’t have to ask anybody for anything. Or, that’s what you think. You feel there’s lots of time to settle down whenever you get ready. You have a job and you’re getting a regular paycheck. You can buy clothes and you can do what you want when you want.
“It’s a fine sensation for a while and then the sugar coating wears off and you begin to taste the bitter that’s underneath.
“You’re not independent. You’re a cog in the economic and social machine. You can get just so high and no higher. If you want to play you can get acquainted with a lot of playboys. If you want anything else you’re stymied.
“After a while you begin to think about security. You begin to think about a home, about children, about — about being respectable. You want to have some one man whom you can love and respect, to whom you can devote your life. You want to have kids and watch them grow up.
You want to have a husband and a home.
“You don’t meet anybody who wants to be a husband or to make a home. You’re tagged as a playgirl. You’ve been having fun and there’s a tag on you. The homely little bookkeeper marries the bashful guy in the filing-department. You don’t get proposals. You get propositions. The headwaiters all know you and make a fuss over you — You’re tagged.
“The married men at the office all make passes at you in their spare time. The boss slaps your fanny, tells you an off-color joke or two, and thinks he’s being devilish. You meet a lot of guys who look all right on the surface and who swear they’re bachelors on the loose. After the fifth drink they pull a wallet out of their pocket and show you pictures of the wife and kids.”
“I’m going on a boat, Donald. No one’s going to know anything about me or about my background. I’ll have good clothes. I’ll be chic and interesting. I’ll sit in a deck chair and have all day to look over the passengers. I’ll spot the ones who are eligible.”
“And throw your hooks into the first one you can get?” I asked.
“I’m not that anxious,” she said, “and I’m not that low, but if I find someone who interests me and find that I’m interesting him, I’ll have an opportunity to talk with him, to find out what kind of a chap he is, what he wants out of life. I’ll really get acquainted.