Manhunt. Volume 5, Number 5, May 1957

“Forget that,” she said, and she flung the tickets to the table. “Let’s do it like Mr. Feninton said. Let’s make this evening on him.”

That gave me my little moment of triumph. I stood up, thinking of Gordon Phelps. This was the girl who, according to him, had a steel-trap mind cast in the mold of a cash register. Maybe. Maybe, according to him. But maybe not according to me. Maybe Peter Chambers, for some cockeyed reason of his own, had gone overboard for Sophia Sierra. Bing. Like that. Out of left field. Why not?

I stood up and took her arm and led her to the blue-streaked dimness of the dance-floor. We danced. She was warm and soft and clinging, and her body yielded to mine, and we ground together, lightly, in a primitive caressing embrace, swaying to the music. Prickles of sweat were hot on my spine. I did not gasp because I was ashamed to gasp. I held her and I attributed the dizziness to Feninton’s whiskey. And now her cheek was against mine again and her giggle was alive at my ear. “Perpendicular prostitution,” she said. “It’s part of the racket, taxi-dance racket.”

“Let’s sit,” I said.

“You angry with me?” she said. “Because of what I said?”

“I’m nuts about you,” I said.

“That’s the way I want it,” she said.

We danced for a few moments, most conservatively, and then we broke it up and went back to the table and sipped at Feninton’s highballs and I said, “I saw G. Phillips.”

“I figured,” she said.

“You know what he wants?”

“I imagine he wants to get out from under — on the Vivian Frayne thing.”

“Why should he want to get out from under?”

“The cops are looking for him. And it’s my hunch he killed her.”

“Why should he? Why should G. Phillips kill V. Frayne?”

“Because it’s my hunch she was sticking a finger in his ear. For a little blackmail.”

I leaned back and I looked at her. She was a smart girl. A very smart girl. Too smart, perhaps.

“That’s a cute bunch of hunch you’ve got,” I said. “Want to tell me about it?”

“G. Phillips,” she said, “is Gordon Phelps. Gordon Phelps is a millionaire. He’s got a wife who wouldn’t kind of like it if she knew all about him—”

“How do you know?”

“I get around, lover. Anyway, that sets the guy up like a pin in a bowling alley. Leave it to V. Frayne to roll the ball.”

“What about S. Sierra?”

“Now what the hell does that mean, lover?”

“Means,” I said, “that if he was a set-up for V. Frayne, he was just as much a set-up for S. Sierra. Both of you knew he was Phelps — he talked out of turn one night while both of you were present. Nobody else around here knew he was Phelps — unless either of you talked.”

“We didn’t.”

“So he was a set-up for either one of you. Logical?”

“No. Because there are people who are capable of blackmail, and there are people who are not.”

“You’re not?” I suggested.

“Damn right I’m not. Oh, I’m no angel, don’t think I’m trying to give you that idea. But there are people and people, and people are... how do you say it?... complex, crazy, mixed-up. There are people who can kill, but love their mothers and their children. There are people who can steal, but cannot kill. There are—”

“Okay,” I said. “There are people and people. What kind of people are you?”

“I’m a people that thinks that blackmail is dirty, filthy, rotten. I couldn’t do blackmail if my life depended on it.”

“Could Vivian Frayne?”

“Sure-pop. Vivian was different. But she was people too. She thought blackmail was smart, worked it pretty good in her lifetime. On the other hand, there was another side to Vivian Frayne. She could be good, kind, sweet — she was like a mother to most of the kids working in this joint. Now Vivian—”

“You didn’t particularly like her, did you?”

“That G. Phillips briefed you pretty good, didn’t he?”

“Pretty good,” I said.

“I hated the son of a bitch,” she said.

“Enough to kill her?”

“I’ve got a temper.”

“Temper enough to kill?”

“Only when it’s at tip-top point. But I cool off after awhile.”

“Did you cool off toward Vivian?” I said. “After she took a sucker away from you right under your nose?”

She stood up. Her dark eyes peered down at me, filmed with fear, or hatred. “I cooled off,” she said. “You’re a nosey son of a bitch, aren’t you?”

“I’m paid for being nosey.”

“Like how much?” she said.

“Like five thousand dollars,” I said.

Her posture eased. She smiled. “At least it’s a respectable buck,” she said. “For being nosey.”

“Who’s Steve Pedi?” I said. I stood up beside her.

“He owns the joint.”

“I’d like to go talk to him.”

“You’re liable to get bounced on your ear, lover, by an ape named Amos Knafke. Guardian of the portals.”

“I’ll take my chances with Knafke.”

“I’d like to watch, hero.”

“Be my guest,” I said. “In fact, be my guide.”

She led me to the carpeted stairway. I followed her up it and along a carpeted hallway to a door at the end, in front of which stood a massive man like a languorous behemoth. Knafke, no other.

“Steve Pedi,” I said.

“So who wants to see Mr. Pedi,” he said in a voice that sounded like gravel being sifted in a deep drum.

“Peter Chambers.”

“Who’s Peter Chambers?”

“Me.”

“Who’re you?”