James Chase: The Whiff of Money

“Where do I find him?”

“He has a studio on Rue Garibaldi. His front cover is high-class studio portraits for movie stars and society people... you know the drag, but his folding money comes from blue films.”

“Do you know him?”

Benny’s fat face wrinkled in disgust.

“I wouldn’t be seen with him in the same toilet. I loathe the beast.”

“And the man in the film?”

“That’s a problem with that hood. Rosnold has a permanent stallion for these movies: Jack Dodge... he’s an American. I’ve never met him, but I hear he always wears a hood on these films because he doesn’t want to be recognised. He works at Sammy’s Bar where simply hordes of ghastly American tourists go.” Benny shifted his enormous buttocks on the stool. “The girl interests me. She’s an amateur of course, but she has great technique. She could be making herself nice money... and I mean nice.”

“I’m not interested in her,” Girland said. “There are three other films, Benny. I’ve got to find them. It looks as if I’ll have to call on Rosnold and twist his arm a little.”

Benny’s small eyes widened.

“Be careful, darling. He’s a toughie.”

Girland slid off the table.

“So am I.” He grinned at Benny. “Well, thanks. I’ll go talk to Rosnold.”

Benny rewound the film and gave it to Girland.

“Anything else I can do, give me a call.”

They walked together to the door and Benny slid back the bolt.

As they moved out into the corridor, Vi Martin came from behind the screen. She ran silently across the studio to the dressing room and began hurriedly to dress.

With sweat running down his face, Drina kept looking at his watch. Kovski had promised to rush a man down to where he was waiting, but up to now the man hadn’t arrived.

What was he to do if the man didn’t arrive and Girland appeared and drove off in his car? He would be held responsible for losing Girland! He knew Kovski was already displeased with his work. He could get into serious trouble.

He took off his shabby hat and wiped the sweat off his balding head. He moved from one foot to the other. His heart hammered and his mouth was dry.

Then he saw Girland come out of the building.

Drina was unprepared. He shouldn’t have been standing in the entrance to the courtyard. He should have concealed himself in one of the many doorways leading into the big apartment block. It was too late now. He lost his head and turned quickly, walking into the street. Had he not moved so quickly, Girland wouldn’t have noticed him, but that panicky movement alerted Girland. He saw the short, fat man wearing a greasy fur hat dart into the street and Girland’s eyes narrowed.

He had decided, as he had descended the stairs from Benny’s studio, that as Rosnold’s studio was close by, he would walk rather than chance finding parking space. So he sauntered out of the courtyard and almost cannoned into Drina who wasn’t sure whether to dart to the right or left.

The two men looked at each other.

Girland too had a photographic memory. He placed Drina immediately: a washed-up, hack Soviet agent of the Security police. “Pardon,” Girland said, moved around Drina and set off with his long strides towards Boulevard Pasteur.

Hardly believing his luck, Drina went after him. He had to half-run to keep up with Girland’s swinging strides and sweat ran down his face as he bounced along, dodging people on the sidewalk, but keeping Girland in sight.

Girland was thinking: is this a coincidence? I don’t think so. Have the Russians got onto Sherman?

He reached Boulevard Pasteur and stopped at a busy bistro. It was lunchtime and he decided to have lunch. He entered the Bistro and took a vacant table at the far end of the big room.

Drina saw him enter the bistro and hesitated. He too was hungry. He again hesitated, then sat at one of the outside tables where he could watch the exit.

From his table, Girland could see the outside terrace and he watched Drina take a seat at a table.

When the waiter came, Girland ordered a steak and a lager. Drina, outside, ordered a ham roll and a vodka.

Drina had placed himself in a bad position. He could watch the exit from the bistro, but he couldn’t see Girland. Aware of this, Girland got to his feet and went to a telephone kiosk. He called Dorey.

When the connection was made, Girland said, “I think our Soviet friends have become interested in our movie. I have Drina on my tail.”

Dorey knew Drina as he knew every Soviet agent operating in Paris.

“You have the film on you?”

“Of course.”

“Where are you?”

Girland told him.

“I’ll send two men down to cover you. Stay where you are.”

“Hitch up your suspenders!” Girland said impatiently. “I can handle this. Wake up! You can’t send two of your jerks down here to cover me unless you make this official.”

Dorey swallowed this, knowing Girland was right.

“But if they jump you and get that film...!”

“They won’t get it. Stop laying an egg! I’ll lose this fat slob and I’ll call you later. I just thought I’d increase your blood pressure,” and Girland hung up.

When he returned to his table, his steak was placed before him. It looked very good. He made a leisurely lunch, paid the bill, then wandered out onto the busy boulevard.

Drina gave him a few metres start, then went after him. Girland wandered along, taking his time. Satisfied now that Girland hadn’t spotted him, Drina loafed along in the rear.

Girland was an expert at losing a tail. When he came upon a crowd of people staring at a TV programme showing in a radio shop window, he stepped around them swiftly and into a doorway. The movement was so quick Drina didn’t see it. Suddenly Girland had vanished. Drina paused, people pushing by him. In a panic, Drina rushed past the doorway in which Girland was standing to the crossroads. He looked frantically to right and left.

Watching the panic-stricken face of the fat agent, Girland grinned.

On the top floors of most of the older apartment blocks in Paris there are a number of small rooms known as Сhambres de bonne where servants who worked for the owners of the apartments below used to live. But now servants were almost impossible to find, the owners rented these miserable little rooms to students or to those unable to afford higher rents.

Vi Martin lived in one of these rooms on the eighth floor of an old-fashioned block in Rue Singer. The room was equipped with a toilet basin, a portable electric grill, a bed, one small battered armchair and a plastic wardrobe. There was a table under the attic window on which stood a small transistor radio that never ceased to churn out swing music from the moment Vi woke to the moment she went to sleep. She just could not imagine anyone not living in the perpetual din of swing music.

There were eight other little rooms on her floor. Four of them were occupied by elderly women who went out early every day on cleaning jobs. There were two Spanish couples who worked as servants in the apartments below and two elderly widowers who worked at the post office, a few doors down the street.

These people had the habit of leaving their doors open so they could converse with their neighbours without leaving their rooms.

These conversations were carried on at the top of their voices so the din, plus Vi’s transistor, was a nightmare bedlam of noise.

Vi shared her room with Paul Labrey. They had met at a Left Bank party and Vi had immediately fallen for Labrey. She thought he was terribly with it with his green tinted glasses and his long hair. He told her as they were dancing that he was sharing a room with a Senegalese who was planning to get married and he would have to move out. Did she know of a cheap room he could rent? Under the influence of six large gins and feeling sexually aroused by the way he was holding her, Vi suggested he should move into her pad and share the rent.