Goldengirl

‘I thought you might be assisting the search for Goldine.’

‘You thought what?’ She broke into a ripple of laughter. ‘Hey, that’s priceless! Casing the clip joints to see if her ladyship is sold into white slavery! Honey, I’m here because I walked out. Quit. I’m finished with Serafin.’

‘What happened exactly?’

‘Got a spare smoke?’

He opened a pack for her.

‘It was obvious he was going to boot me out in a couple of weeks,’ she went on. ‘There’s no job for me once the Olympics are over. Klugman, Lee, everyone on the payroll has to look for a new job.’

‘I see what you mean, but what makes you give up now? This way you miss a trip to Moscow.’

Melody grinned. ‘I’m not so dumb as that. It was my job to fix the travel arrangements. You don’t think I’d walk out and leave my ticket behind?’

‘He won’t like that.’

‘He’s in no position to argue,’ said Melody. ‘I know enough to blow the project sky-high. The price of an airline ticket and a Russian hotel bill is peanuts to what I could collect in overtime pay. I’m thinking about that. No use trying to negotiate anything yet.’

‘You mean he’s too distracted over Goldine’s disappearance?’

She studied him amusedly with her green eyes and said nothing. ‘You, er, mentioned on the phone that you had news of Goldine,’ he prompted her.

‘That’s right, lover boy. I can tell you where she is right now.’

‘You know that?’

She was savoring this, pouting with her lower lip and fingering her hair as Dryden assimilated what she was saying. Two statements of fact had emerged: she had walked out on Serafin, and she knew where Goldine was. The facts didn’t trouble him so much as the implications.

‘Sure I know,’ she said.

‘Did you ask me here to let me into the secret?’

‘Depends.’

‘On what?’

‘What I get in return,’ said Melody.

‘Like Campari, for instance?’

She laughed, shaking her head. ‘Fancy your chances, lover boy? Later, maybe, but I was thinking of a different kind of arrangement, as a matter of fact. Something less romantic, more...’ She held up her right hand, passing the thumb lightly across the fingertips.

‘Let’s have it straight,’ said Dryden. ‘Who do you represent?’

She frowned. ‘I miss your drift, sweetheart.’

He didn’t disguise his irritation. ‘Less than two hours ago I got off a plane and bought a paper. It carried the news that Goldine has disappeared and is probably kidnaped. I get to my hotel and there’s a message from you. Urgent. So I meet you, and what do you tell me? You walked out on Serafin, and you know where Goldine is. Am I supposed to believe you have no part in her disappearance, you have nothing to do with the people who abducted her? You’re in this up to here, Melody.’

She clasped her hands over her knee and rocked back on the stool laughing. ‘Jack Dryden, you fracture me! You really believe I arranged for some hoods to kidnap Goldengirl and I’m here to fix the ransom? Melody ripping off the consortium, huh? Oh boy, that’s really wild! I just wish I had the nerve to do it.’ Her face became more serious. ‘Listen, I’m here strictly on my own account. I’m out of a job, as I told you. I figured you might use some extra help in the agency after Moscow, someone with experience as a confidential secretary and inside knowledge of the Goldengirl project. I’d like to stay with the assignment, if you think I could be useful. Jesus, I’m no kidnaper! Just one of America’s unemployed angling for a job.’

‘But do you know what’s happened to Goldine?’ Dryden said, without indicating whether he believed her.

She nodded, studying his reaction. ‘You can’t blame a girl who has information for wanting a return on it.’

‘I suppose not.’ The prospect of Melody on the agency staff didn’t enrapture him, but it might be tolerated. There could even be an advantage in having someone in the New York office with knowledge of the project. She wasn’t the type to stay long. It was a small price for the information she had. ‘How’s your typing?’

She leaned forward and kissed him lightly on the cheek. ‘I shall adore working for you.’

‘So what happened to Goldine?’ he asked.

‘She never left Cleveland. You’ll find her in Caradock Lodge. That’s a private sanitarium on Euclid Avenue, the road out to Cleveland Heights, east of the city center.’

‘Someone has locked her up in a sanitarium?’

‘That’s putting it a little strongly,’ said Melody. ‘I’d say she was under observation.’

‘Say what you like, we must get her out of there,’ said Dryden. ‘Do you know who is responsible for this?’

‘Sure I do.’ She took a sip at her drink. ‘Not the Mob, honey. Bill Serafin arranged it himself. Okay, you don’t believe that, because you read in the papers he informed the police she was missing, right? But listen to this. You remember how she complained she didn’t feel so good at the Trials — her legs were going heavy on her, or something?’

‘It was a virus infection,1’ said Dryden. ‘She had a dry throat as well. You mean it didn’t clear up?’