‘What’s the idea of sandwiches?’ Kerman asked in disgust. ‘Can’t we afford to go to a restaurant?’
The bellhop put the beer and sandwiches on the bamboo table and stood around, waiting to see if there was anything in it for him. I gave him half a buck and told him to scram.
‘If you guys are looking for a little recreation,’ he said hopefully, ‘I have that blonde lined up, waiting.’
Kerman opened the door.
‘Beat it!’ he said.
When the bellhop had gone I opened a couple of bottles of beer and started pouring.
‘I thought we’d better talk up here where we wouldn’t be overheard,’ I explained.
‘Well, all right,’ Kerman said, and sat in the armchair. ‘You were long enough in that dump. I was getting ready to organize a rescue.’
I gave him a beer and went over to sit on the bed.
‘I’ve picked up a lot of stuff,’ I said, and told him what I had learned. I told him everything except about the girl contortionist. I thought if I told him about her he wouldn’t be able to keep his mind on business.
He listened without saying anything, but he didn’t touch his beer, and that’s a sure sign I had his attention. When I was through, he let out a long, low whistle.
‘For crying out loud!’ he exclaimed. ‘What does it all mean?’
‘All these facts are pieces in the jigsaw puzzle,’ I said. ‘They need fitting together. I had no idea Gail Bolus was hooked up in this business. All right, you don’t have to grin.’
‘Think she’s working hand-in-glove with Thayler?’
‘She might be. I don’t know. It may be a coincidence she turned up in Orchid City. She may have cut Thayler right out of her life. I don’t know, but I’m going to find out. The big discovery is that Anita was married when she married Cerf. If she married Cerf secretly — that is if Thayler had no idea what she was up to, and then found out — we shan’t have to look far for the blackmailer. And another thing that’s interesting. Thayler is an expert with a .45. He may be the boy who has done the killings.’
Kerman grunted and drank some beer.
‘Do you think Thayler knocked off Benny?’
‘Thayler or Louis or both.’
‘And how about Mills? Is he out of it?’
‘I don’t know. I think there’s something going on between Natalie Cerf and him, but whether it has anything to do with this setup or not I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know much, do you?’ Kerman said. ‘You’ll have to do a lot better than this if you’re going to make a name for yourself.’
‘I know enough to tackle Louis now,’ I said. ‘And that’s what we’re going to do.’
I opened my suitcase and took out a writing-pad. I wrote in big block letters the words:
THIS BUSINESS IS CLOSED FOR THE DAY.
Kerman said blankly, ‘You mean we don’t do any more work?’
‘Not us, you dope. We’re going across the way and we’re seeing Louis. We’ll stick this on the shop door as we go in.’
Kerman hurriedly finished his beer.
‘This is the moment I’ve been waiting for,’ he said, and reached for his hat.
V
As I pushed open the shop door a concealed bell went ping! Harsh electric lights lit up the outer room of the shop: a room smothered in glossy prints more or less on the same pattern as those decorating the outside of the Brass Rail. A short counter divided the outer from the inner room. The inner room, from what I could see of it between the gap in the two shabby curtains that had only been half-drawn, consisted of a number of chairs, a couple of partitions with curtains hanging before them and two big mirrors. Beyond the inner room was a narrow passage that led, I assumed, to the studio.
We had decided that if anyone happened to be in the shop they would have to be taken care of, and Kerman had brought along his gun. He was a little self-conscious of it as he had never shot with it nor did he have any cartridges for it. I said it didn’t matter so long as Louis didn’t produce a gun of his own. Kerman’s gun looked all right: it looked vicious No one, unless they were out of their minds, would argue with it.
Kerman said bitterly that we would look a couple of suckers if Thayler turned up and started some trick shooting.
I guess he was right, but I didn’t tell him so.
As soon as we were in the shop, Kerman stuck the notice on the door, and as he shot the two bolts a girl in a slinky black dress and with a figure like an hour-glass came down the passage, through the changing-room into the outer room. She was hard and blonde and brassy, and switched on a mechanical smile when she saw us, although her eyes looked bored.
‘Was there something?’ she asked, resting her hands on the counter. She had bright scarlet nails, and her fingers were grubby. When you looked closer the rest of her was grubby too.
‘Why, sure,’ I said, tipping my hat. ‘We thought it would be nice to be photographed. Can you fix it?’
Kerman said, ‘I’ll let you have a copy of mine to keep you warm nights if it’s a good likeness.’
The blonde’s bored eye blinked and she looked questioningly from Kerman to me.
‘I’m afraid Mr. Louis is engaged right now. I can make an appointment,’ she said, and languidly patted her back curls.
‘We’re in a hurry,’ I said, looked at Kerman and nodded.
Kerman produced his gun with a flourish and pointed it at the blonde.
‘Don’t squawk, sister,’ he said in a voice that sounded like someone ripping calico. ‘This is a stick-up!’
The blonde recoiled, her eyes popping and her mouth opened to scream. I poked her hard with my index finger in her midriff and the breath came out of her with a hiss like a punctured tyre. She doubled up over the counter.
It took us about a minute and a half to tie her hands and feet and gag her with the cords and gag we had brought with us. Then we put her under the counter, found a pillow for her head and told her to take it easy. Her eyes weren’t bored any more: they were black explosions of fury.
‘Come on,’ I said to Kerman. ‘You’re doing fine.’
‘What really excites me,’ he said, as he moved after me, ‘is the thought a copper might crash in here and mistake me for a gunman. I guess a little thing like that hadn’t crossed your mind?’
I motioned him to silence, crept down the passage to a door at the far end, opened it and looked in.
The studio was fair sized and workmanlike. The usual portrait camera stood on its wooden tripod facing a backcloth of grey-painted canvas. Two big arc lamps on wheels stood on either side of the camera. There was a table with a raised drawing-board against the wall and a man in a white smock and a blue beret sat at the table, working on a collection of glossy prints. He was tall, weedy, effeminate, and had a black chin beard. His complexion was the colour of old parchment, and his lips were thick and red against the black-ness of his beard and moustache: not a pleasant specimen.
When he saw us he dropped the paint brush he was working with and his hand shot into a drawer of the table.
‘Hold it!’ Kerman snarled, threatening him with his gun.
The hand hovered above the drawer. The bearded face turned a greenish tinge. I went over and took a small automatic from the drawer and shoved it into my hip pocket.
‘Hello,’ I said, and brought my fist down as hard as I could into the hollow between his neck and right shoulder. The blow drove him off his chair on to the floor. I bent over him, gathered him up and stood him on his feet, then I hauled off and hit him on the bridge of his nose. He went shooting across the studio, collided with the camera and landed up on the floor with the camera on top of him.