Ed McBain - Poison

He looked at the wall clock.

What the hell was taking Willis so long to get that list?

"That's all of them," Marilyn said, and tossed down the pencil. "I have writer's cramp."

Willis glanced cursorily at the list.

"What would you say? Sixty, more or less."

"It felt like a hundred and sixty."

He went to her, kissed the top of her head.

"Thank you," he said.

" De nada ," she said.

"I want to get back to the squadroom. I'll call you later, we can figure out what we want to do tonight, okay? We'll have company. They're putting you back on protective."

"Oh, great," she said, and rolled her eyes.

He was starting for the door when she said, "Hal?"

"Yes?"

"Do you really think this could be someone with a grudge?"

"It could be." He looked at her and then said, "Why?"

"No reason," she said, and shrugged.

He came back to where she was sitting.

"Can you think of such a person?" he asked.

"Not really. I mean, it could be anyone, right? The spot on the blouse, right?"

"Or something more important than a spot."

He kept watching her.

Her eyes met his.

"Hal," she said, "suppose… suppose a long time ago, I did something that… that maybe somebody now is… trying to revenge."

"What'd you do?" he asked at once.

"I'm only saying suppose."

"All right, suppose you did something. Like what?"

"Like something if… if somebody found out about it, maybe they'd want to… you know… get me for it. Or maybe get my friends for it. Maybe as a sort of warning, you know? That they were coming for me, you know?"

"Who, Marilyn? Who'd be coming for you?"

"I used to know a lot of bad people, Hal."

"Pimps, are you talking about? You think Seward may be coming after you? For running out on him in Houston?"

"No, he let me go with his blessings. I told you that."

"Then who? Your Los Angeles beach bum? That was ancient…"

"No, not him. But… maybe someone from Buenos Aires."

"Hidalgo? The guy who bought you out of that Mexican prison?"

"No, not him, either. But maybe… if somebody in Buenos Aires thought I'd done something…"

"What'd you do, Marilyn?"

"Nothing. I'm only saying maybe somebody down there got the idea I'd done something…"

"Who? And how'd he get this idea?"

"People get ideas."

"What people?"

"You know, people. You meet a lot of people in the life. Hidalgo had a lot of friends."

"Hidalgo let you go. He gave you your passport and let you go. Why would any of his friends…?"

"Well, people get ideas, you know."

"What kind of ideas?"

"You know how Spanish men are."

"No, I don't know how they are. Tell me how they are."

"All that macho bullshit. You know. Blood brothers. Revenge. You know."

"Revenge for what?"

"For something they think a person might have done."

"Marilyn, what the hell did you do ?"

She was silent for a long time.

Then she said, "I'll lose you."

"No, you won't. Tell me."

"I'll lose you, I know it."

"Damn it, if somebody's after you…"

"Hidalgo didn't give me my passport," Marilyn said. "I took it."

"You…"

"I stole it."

"Is that all you did?" Willis said, relieved. "Honey, honey…"

"That's not all I did."

He sat down beside her.

"All right," he said, "let me hear it."

Hidalgo was a man of means, an ambitious pimp with a large clientele serviced by a modest stable. Born in Caracas, he lived in Buenos Aires by choice, and was as paranoid as only someone with a great deal to lose can be. Even recognizing the hold he had over Marilyn, he rarely let her out of his sight, fearful she would either run away or go to the American Embassy. She could have done either, had she realized her true circumstances. The American woman named Mary Ann Hollis was already lost to the Mexican and American authorities; monies had changed hands, records had been destroyed, she had in effect been sold to Hidalgo.

But she believed that if she disobeyed him, her parole (or whatever it was) would be revoked, and she would be sent back to La Fortaleza. Hidalgo nurtured this misunderstanding from the very beginning, telling her immediately that he was in possession of her passport, which was the truth, and that if she went to the American Embassy to apply for a new one on the grounds that it had been lost or stolen, they would discover at once that she was a convicted felon on parole and in the custody of one Alberto Hidalgo, who was not without influence in Argentina.

"Influence, certainly," she said. "You're a pimp."

"Yes," he said, "that may be true, but the Mexican authorities have nonetheless seen fit to place you in my custody for the remainder of your prison term. As you well know, you will be free to go wherever you wish or do whatever you choose once you have served your full sentence. But, Mariucha, my dear"—all this in his soft, persuasive voice—"you had only served four months of it when you were released in my custody, and you must still serve another five years and eight months until the authorities will consider your debt paid. At which time, of course, they will inform your State Department. But for now, Mariucha, you are not a free woman. You must remember that."

There were six other whores in Hidalgo's stable, all of them very high-priced horseflesh, racehorses as they were known in the trade, bringing prices of upward of a hundred an hour. Most of them had been ransomed from prisons, as Marilyn had been, or else openly abducted into white slavery, as a buxom blonde from Munich claimed she'd been. Each of the girls—Hidalgo called them "las muchachitas ," the little girls—felt he had absolute control over their lives and their destinies. If one or another of them ever complained about an indignity to which she'd been submitted, or a future indignity she was being asked to endure, always there was the threat, the reminder that she was not a free agent.

"I won't go," Marilyn told him.

"Yes, you will," Hidalgo said.

"No. You don't own me."

"For certain, I do not own you. The Mexican prison system owns you. I am only your legally appointed custodian. But, Mariucha, I must tell you that if you become too troublesome, it would be simpler for me to wash my hands of you completely."

"You wouldn't do that," she said. "You paid them good money. You wouldn't send me back."

"I would merely consider it a bad business investment," Hidalgo said, and shrugged. "I would tell the authorities that you are incorrigible."

"You're a pimp. They wouldn't believe you."

"They would believe you, of course," Hidalgo said. "A woman convicted of trafficking in narcotics."

"I wasn't trafficking!"

"A cheap whore," Hidalgo said.

"I'm not a cheap whore," Marilyn said, and began weeping.

He took her in his arms. "There, there, little girl," he said, "why must we argue this way? Do you think it pleases me to have to threaten you?"

"Yes," she said, sobbing.

"No, no, little girl. Please now, no more tears, eh? Go to meet this gentleman, do whatever it is he desires of you. He will be good to you, Mariucha, I promise."

"No," she said. "I'll run away. You'll never find me. I'll go all the way to Santa Cruz, I'll…"

"But you do not have a passport," he said gently.

"I don't need a passport to travel inside Argentina. I speak Spanish, everyone will think…"

"Oh, yes, with your blonde hair, they will certainly believe you're a native."

"I'll dye my hair black."

"And your eyes? Will you dye them black as well? Mariucha, Mariucha, the police will know in an instant that you are American. They will ask for your passport."