Джеймс Чейз - You Never Know With Women

Summers cleared his throat menacingly. He was big and fleshy and tough. On the middle finger of his right hand he wore a flat cameo ring. It came in handy when he punched a suspect in the teeth. A ring like that could do plenty of damage and he could always plead the excitement of the moment made him forget to take it off.

“Why did you go up there?” Redfern asked curtly.

“I was on my way to see my friend Casy — you know Casy?”

“I know him. Casy doesn’t live anywhere near Ocean Rise.”

“That’s right. I was waiting for a bus and a guy came along and gave me a lift. I told him how to get to Santa Medina but he was too smart to listen. He said he knew his way around and promptly took the wrong turning. I was in no hurry so I let him sort himself out of the mess. We landed up outside Brett’s place and a guard got sarcastic. Then I told this guy where he’d gone wrong and he went right. That’s all there’s to it.”

“Listen you cheap—” Summers began, but Redfern waved impatiently at him.

“I’ll handle this,” he said and stared at me woodenly. “Who was this fellow who gave you a ride?”

“No idea. He looked like a drummer to me, but I may be wrong. I didn’t ask his name. He dropped me off at Santa Medina and I lost sight of him.”

Redfern wandered around the room.

“Where were you last night?” he demanded and jerked round to look at me.

“With Casy.”

“You’ll have to do better than that, Jackson. I think you were up at Brett’s place last night.”

“Well, there’s no harm in you thinking so, so long as you don’t believe it,” I said, slipped the bottle of Scotch in my pocket and glanced around to make sure I hadn’t forgotten anything. “I was playing poker with Casy. You ask him. There was a pal of yours there too. Chief of Police O’Readen. I took fifty dollars off him.”

Redfern stood very still while he looked at me, then he glanced down at his nicely manicured nails.

“O’Readen?” he repeated.

“That’s the fella. Good cop too by the look of him. Nice cheerful guy; always smiling.”

Summer flexed his muscles. I could see he was having to make an awful effort not to sock me with his ring.

“And O’Readen was playing poker with you last night? How long did the game last?”

“From seven-thirty till two,” I said cheerfully.

Again there was a long pause, then Redfern shrugged. He looked suddenly tired and a little sad.

“Okay, Jackson, that let’s you out.” He stuck his hands into his trouser pockets. Only his eyes showed how mean he was feeling. “Where are you going now?”

“Got myself a frail and I’m using Casy’s penthouse for an unofficial honeymoon. Look in some time, pally. Casy would like to have you over.”

“Let’s go,” Redfern said to Summers and moved to the door.

“Can’t I give this heel a tap, Chief?” Summers pleaded.

“I said let’s go,” Redfern snapped and went out.

Summers paused at the door. He looked like a tiger that’s had its dinner snatched away.

“One of these days I’ll have you where I want you, you smart punk: then watch out.”

“Don’t put off till tomorrow what you can do today,” I said, grinning at him. “Start something now, and see where it gets you.”

“Come on!” Redfern called from the bottom of the stairs. Summers gave me a bleak look and went out, his face slack with rage. The door slammed violently behind him.

I gave them a few minutes to get out of my way, went down to the basement and paid up my rent, told Mrs. B. I was pulling out and scuttled from the house before she could kiss me or maybe slug me with a bottle.

I piled my bags in the back of the Cad, climbed in and drove over to my office. The number of girls who smiled at me as I drove along was an education. I could have had a car-load if I hadn’t been busy. I told myself I’d borrow this car when I had some time on my hands and drive along Ocean Boulevard and see what I caught. I wouldn’t need a net.

A crowd of kids came from the vacant lot and swarmed around the car as I pulled up outside the office. I picked the biggest and toughest-looking of them and held up three nickels.

“Listen, killer,” I said, “keep these kids off this car and you’re on my payroll.”

The kid said he would, and I left him glaring ferociously at the other kids, his clenched fists threatening them. He looked so tough I didn’t know if I’d have the nerve to ask him for the car back.

The telephone bell was ringing as I unlocked the office door. I kicked the door shut, reached for the receiver as the bell stopped.

I didn’t worry. No one had called me up in weeks. It was probably a wrong number.

I cleared out my desk drawers, stuck my.38 police special in my hip pocket, dropped the Scotch bottle from the desk cupboard into the trash basket, closed all the drawers a little regretfully. It wasn’t much of a room, but I liked having an office of my own. Casy’s penthouse was all right, but it didn’t belong to me and that makes a big difference.

As I turned to the door, the telephone bell started up again. I was going to leave it, then changed my mind.

A girl’s voice asked, “Is that Mr. Floyd Jackson?”

I had to think for a moment before I told her it was. No one had called me ‘Mister’ on the telephone for months.

“Will you hold on, please?”

She had a nice voice; quiet, musical and a lilt in it.

“Mr. Lindsay Brett is calling,” she added.

I clutched the telephone.

“Mr. — who?”

“Mr. Lindsay Brett.” There was a click on the line, then she said: “You’re through, Mr. Brett. Mr. Jackson is on the line.”

A crisp tense voice, demanded, “Jackson?”

That was more like it. That’s the way it’d been for the past months. “ Jackson ?” Some copper looking for trouble. Redfern snarling at me. Now Brett.

“Yeah,” I said.

“I want to talk to you, Jackson. Come over to my place on Ocean Rise right away. I’ll expect you in an hour.”

I stared at the big ad. on the wall. It showed a girl with a lot of cleavage in a swim suit that looked like it was put on with a spray gun. She had a cute smile and I winked at her. She didn’t wink back.

“I shouldn’t, Mr. Brett,” I said.

“What? What was that?” The bark in his voice would have scared his secretary or the guys who worked for him. But I wasn’t his secretary nor did I work for him, so it didn’t scare me.

“You shouldn’t expect me,” I said, as polite as a receptionist booking a room, “because I won’t be there.”

There was a pause. Icicles seemed to drip from the mouthpiece, but maybe I was just imagining it.

“I want to talk to you.” There was a shade less bounce in his voice now. Not much, but enough for me to notice.

“If it’s that important maybe you’d better come down here,” I said. “I’m leaving San Luis Beach in about an hour. I’m leaving for good.”

“Don’t leave until I get down,” he said; much, much softer now: almost human.

“I’ll be gone in an hour,” I said and hung up.

I walked down the six flights of stairs to the street level, paid off Little Sir Echo who was guarding the Cad, took it around to a nearby garage and crawled up the six flights again. I was fighting for my breath after the climb when I heard a rush of feet along the passage.

To get from Ocean Rise to this dump in twenty-five minutes was fast going. I expected Brett to come into the office with congestion of the lungs and a heart murmur; but he didn’t. He looked the kind of guy who spends a lot of time being athletic, and six flights of stairs was just a warm-up to him. He could have run to the Matterhorn and still have had enough breath to whistle Dixie.