Lawrence Block - In the Midst of Death

"I didn't know her terribly well," I said. "But I knew her, yes."

"Yes. Hmmm. I don't believe I asked you your profession, Scudder."

"I'm a private detective."

"Oh, very interesting. Very interesting. Is that coffee all right, incidentally?"

"It's the best I've ever tasted."

He allowed himself a smile. "My wife's the coffee fanatic. I was never that much of an enthusiast, and with the ulcer I tend to stick to milk. I could find out the brand for you if you're interested."

"I live in a hotel, Mr. Hardesty. When I want coffee I go around the corner for it. But thank you."

"Well, you can always drop in here for a decent cup of the stuff, can't you?" He gave me a nice rich smile. Knox Hardesty didn't live on his salary as United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. That wouldn't cover his rent. But that didn't mean he walked around with his hand out. Grandfather Hardesty had owned Hardesty Iron and Steel before U. S. Steel bought him up, and Grandfather Knox had followed a long line of New England Knoxes in shipping. Knox Hardesty could spend money with both hands and still never have to worry where his next glass of milk was coming from.

He said, "A private detective, and you were acquainted with Portia. You could be very useful to me, Mr. Scudder."

"I was hoping things might work the other way around."

"I beg your pardon?" His face changed and his back stiffened and he looked as though he had just smelled something extremely unpleasant. I guess my line had sounded like the overture of a blackmail pitch.

"I already have a client," I said. "I came to you to find something out, not to give information away. Or even to sell it, as far as that goes. And I'm not a blackmailer, sir. I wouldn't want to give that impression."

"You have a client?"

I nodded. I was just as glad I'd given the impression I did, although it had been unintentional on my part. His reaction had been unequivocal enough. If I was a blackmailer he wanted no part of me. And that generally means the person in question doesn't have reason to fear being blackmailed. Whatever his relationship with Portia, it wasn't something he would have trouble living down.

"I'm representing Jerome Broadfield."

"The man who killed her."

"The police think so, Mr. Hardesty. Then again, you'd expect them to think so, wouldn't you?"

"Good point. I'd been given to understand he was virtually caught in the act. That's not the case?" I shook my head."Interesting. And you'd like to find out—"

"I'd like to find out who killed Miss Carr and framed my client."

He nodded. "But I don't see how I can help you toward that end, Mr. Scudder."

I'd been promoted — from Scudder to Mr. Scudder. I said, "How did you happen to know Portia Carr?"

"One has to know a wide variety of people in my line of work. The most fruitful contacts are not necessarily those persons with whom one would prefer to associate. I'm sure that has been your own experience as well, hasn't it? One sort of investigative work is rather like another, I suspect." He smiled graciously; I was supposed to be complimented that he saw his work as being similar to mine.

"I heard of Miss Carr before I met her," he went on. "The better sort of prostitutes can be very useful to our office. I was informed that Miss Carr was quite expensive and that her client list was primarily interested in, oh, less orthodox forms of sex."

"I understand she specialized in masochists."

"Quite." He made a face; he'd have preferred it if I'd been less specific. "English, you know. That's the English vice, so-called, and an American masochist would find an English mistress especially desirable. Or so Miss Carr informed me. Did you know that native-born prostitutes oftimes affect English or German accents for the benefit of their masochistic clients? Miss Carr assured me it's common practice. German accents for the Jewish clients in particular, which I find fascinating."

I freshened my cup of coffee.

"The fact that Miss Carr's accent was quite authentic increased my interest in her. She was vulnerable, you see."

"Because she could be deported."

He nodded. "We have a good enough working relationship with the fellows in Immigration and Naturalization. Not that it's often necessary to follow through on one's threats. The prostitute's traditional tight-lipped loyalty to her clientele is as much a romantic conceit as her heart of gold. The merest threat of deportation is enough to bring immediate offers of full cooperation."

"And that was the case with Portia Carr?"

"Absolutely. In fact she became quite eager. I think she relished the Mata Hari role, garnering information in bed and passing it on to me. Not that she managed to supply me with too terribly much, but she was shaping up as a promising source for my investigations."

"Any investigation in particular?"

There was just a little hesitation. "Nothing specific," he said. "I could just see that she would be useful."

I drank some more coffee. If nothing else, Hardesty was enabling me to find out just how much my own client knew. Since Broadfield had chosen to play coy with me, I had to get this information in an indirect fashion. But Hardesty didn't know that Broadfield hadn't been completely straight with me, so he couldn't deny anything that I might have presumably learned from him.

"So she cooperated enthusiastically," I said.

"Oh, very much so."He smiled in reminiscence. "She was quite charming, you know. And she had the notion of writing a book about her life as a prostitute and her work for me. I think that Dutch girl was an inspiration to her. Of course the Dutch girl can't set foot in the country because of the role she played, but I don't really think Portia Carr would have ever gotten round to writing that book, do you?"

"I don't know. She won't now."

"No, of course not."

"Jerry Broadfield might, though. Was he terribly disappointed when you told him you weren't interested in police corruption?"

"I'm not sure I put it quite that way." He frowned abruptly. "Is that why he came to me?For heaven's sake. He wanted to write a book?" He shook his head in disbelief. "I'll never understand people," he said. "I knew that self-righteousness was a pose, and that made me resolve not to have anything to do with him, that more than the sort of information he had to offer. I simply couldn't trust him and felt he'd do my investigations more harm than good. So then he popped over to see that Special Prosecutor chap."

That Special Prosecutor chap . It wasn't hard to tell what Knox Hardesty thought of Abner L. Prejanian.

I said, "Did it bother you that he went to Prejanian?"

"Why on earth should it bother me?"

I shrugged. "Prejanian started to get a lot of ink. The papers gave him a nice play."

"More power to him if publicity is what he wants. It seems rather to have backfired on him now, though. Wouldn't you say?"

"And that must please you."

"It confirms my judgment, but aside from that why should it please me?"

"Well, you and Prejanian are rivals, aren't you?"

"Oh, I'd hardly put it that way."

"No? I thought you were. I figured that's why you got her to accuse Broadfield of extortion."

"What!"

"Why else would you do it?" I made my tone deliberately offhand, not accusing him but taking it for granted that it was something we both knew and acknowledged. "Once she was pressing charges against him he was defused and Prejanian didn't even hear his name mentioned. And it made Prejanianlook gullible for having used Broadfield in the first place."

His grandfather or great-grandfather might have lost control. But Hardesty had enough generations of good breeding behind him so that he was able to keep almost all of his cool. He straightened in his chair, but that was about the extent of it. "You've been misinformed," he told me.