A. Fair - Spill the Jackpot

“You don’t know that girl’s name?”

“No.”

“How does she play the game? Is she on the make?”

“You mean with men?”

“Yes.”

He thought for a while, scratched the fringe of dark, woolly hair around his ears, and said, “Now you got me, buddy. Y’understand Las Vegas is different from other places. Girls come here to get a divorce. They have to wait to establish a residence. It ain’t a long time, when you just think of it as so much time out of a year, but when you stay here, it gets pretty long. The girls get lonesome, and if a good-looking guy gives ’em the eye, they figure what the hell. They ain’t got nothing else to do, and they fall. Back in their home town, they’d give him the icy stare, but out here, they want something to break the monotony and they’re just getting a divorce so they figure it’s sorta in between drinks, and a little cheating don’t count. You get me?”

“I get you.”

“So when you ask me, is a woman on the make, I can’t tell much unless she’s pretty heavy on the make, because out here they’re all more or less on the make. You get me?”

“Can you remember anybody who’s been in with her?”

“No, I can’t. But wait a minute. I do, too. I remember one girl that was in with her yesterday, a knockout.”

“Can you describe her?”

“She had red hair. I don’t remember what color her eyes were, but she was all strawberries an’ cream, and when she moved, she moved as easy as jelly on a plate.”

“Fat?” I asked.

“No. That’s it. She wasn’t fat. She was thin like, but she wasn’t stiff. Lots of women go on a diet and starve themselves until their joints get frozen stiff, and they move like wooden jumping jacks. This girl just walked like she w; all double-jointed. I noticed her particularly.”

“Anything else about her?”

“No.”

“How old?”

“In the twenties maybe.”

“How many times has she been here?”

“She was here a couple of times with this girl. Say, wait a minute. I remember something about her, too. She was a bunny-nose.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know the way a bunny moves his nose? Well, she had thin nostrils, and when she’d get a little excited, they’d twitch. I remember now, I noticed that. She was a good-looking jane. Boy, I could have gone for her in a big way.”

I gave him my hand. “Thanks, Louie,” I said.

“Not at all. And no hard feelings over the sock I gave you?”

I shook my head.

“Honest,” he said, “you was a pushover. Now mind, I ain’t throwing no slams at you, buddy. I’m just telling you. You didn’t have any neck hold at all. When you’re fight-mg, you want to keep your neck muscles so that when a punch gets by your guard and you have to take it on the button, you can roll it off. You get me?”

“No,” I said, “and I haven’t time to go into it right now. But I’m coming back some day and let you show me.”

His face lit up. “Do you mean that, buddy? Gee, that’d be swell. I need to get in practice a little, and I’d like to show you. First we start out with the old one-two—” And be got the fighter’s crouch again, and his feet started shuffling over the cement.

“Okay,” I said hastily, “I’ll be back,” and headed for the door. My watch gave the time as five minutes before six.

I climbed the stairs to Helen Framley’s apartment once more. My face was sore now. The tips of my fingers showed there was a bump on the right side of my jaw, and another just below my left cheekbone. I didn’t think they’d show badly, but they hurt.

I rang the bell and waited.

There was no answer.

I rang again.

Abruptly the door of the adjoining apartment opened. The woman who had talked with me before, said, “Oh, it’s you. I think she’s in now. I thought you were ringing this apartment. What’s the matter? Won’t she answer?”

I said, “Give her time. She may not have heard the bell.”

“Humph! I can hear it in my apartment as plain as my own bell. I certainly thought you were ringing my bell. Perhaps—”

The man’s voice called impatiently from the back of the apartment, “Maw, get away from that door and quit prying into other people’s business.”

“I don’t pry into other people’s business.”

“No, not much.”

“I thought he rang my bell, and—”

“Get away from that door.”

The door slammed.

I rang Helen Framley’s bell again.

Her door opened a cautious inch. I could see the brass chain which kept it from opening wider, could see cool, slate-colored eyes looking at me, and then heard her exclamation of surprise. It was the slot-machine girl. “How did you find me?”

“May I come in?”

“No— Certainly not— What do you want?”

“It doesn’t have anything to do with what happened at the Cactus Patch — and it’s important.”

She hesitated a moment as though turning something over in her mind, then slid the guard chain back out of its catch.

She studied me curiously as I walked on in.

“Don’t pay any attention to the face,” I said. “It’ll come back into shape after a while.”

“Did he hit you hard?”

“I guess it was hard. I felt like a flock of tenpins when a bowler makes a strike. I’ve often heard them explode all over the alley, and now I know just how they must feel.”

She laughed, said, “Come on in here and sit down.”

I followed her into a little living-room. She indicated a chair. I sat down.

“Weren’t you sitting here?” I asked.

“No. I was sitting over here.”

The chair was warm.

“Mind if I smoke?”

“I should say not. I was smoking when you came in.”

She picked up a cigarette from an ash tray which was by her chair.

I said, “I’m going to put the cards on the table.”

“I like people who do that.”

“I’m a private detective.”

Her face became cold and white, frozen into a stiffly starched look of courteous attention.

“What’s wrong with that?” I asked.

“N-n-nothing.”

“Don’t you like private detectives?”

“It depends on — on what they’re after.”

“I’m after information about a friend.”

“I–I’m afraid I can’t help you. I—”

I heard a hinge squeak. She flashed a quick glance past me, then shifted her eyes and kept silent, waiting for something.

I said, without turning my head, “You might just as well come on over and join the party, Sid.”

I heard quick motion behind me, sensed someone standing close to the back of my chair. “Get all your cards on the table, brother,” a man’s voice said.

“All of them that concern you are on the table.”

I turned around and looked at him then. It was the man in the plaid sport coat who had been playing the quarter machine, and I noticed now he had just the trace of a cauliflower on his right ear. He was uneasy — and dangerous.

“Sit down,” I told him, “and join the party. I’m not holding anything back.”

He said, “You happened to stumble into the Cactus Patch at a queer time tonight. Maybe it was just luck — and then—”

I said, “Don’t talk so loud. The woman in the next, apartment is curious.”

“I’ll say she is,” Miss Framley said.

The man in the plaid coat sat down. He said, “ We’re not going to say anything for about five minutes. During those five minutes, you’re going to do a lot of talking.”

“There’ll be just about four minutes of silence then,” I said. “My name’s Donald Lam. I’m working for the B. Cool Detective Agency. I’m trying to locate Corla Burke. I have reason to believe Miss Framley knows where she is.”