“You said something about her and a murder?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Know what?”
“Jackie was murdered three days ago.”
Munson’s mouth fell open. His eyelashes fluttered. If he was acting he was the best I had ever met.
“Who, who is this man? The one you’re working for?”
“I can’t tell you that, Mr. Munson,” I said. “He’s married and, well, you know—important. He doesn’t want it to get out that he was involved.”
Munson watched my eyes with a steady gaze. I wasn’t worried though. A good liar learns to use his eyes in the tales he spins. And I was a good liar, a very good one.
“Who are you, Mr. Rawlins?” Munson asked.
“I’m unofficial,” I said. “I look into things when people want to be sure that there’s no notes or forms to be filed or remembered. Right now I’m the man looking for Jackie Jay’s killer.”
Munson winced.
“I thought you said that this Muta guy did it?”
“That’s what I thought,” I said. “But then I found this list.”
I handed him the list I took from Jackie’s apartment.
He read it over, then over again.
He held it away from me and asked, “Isn’t this police evidence?”
“I got the mother’s permission to search Jackie’s house. There was no police notice telling me not to look around.”
“Well,” he said with sudden authority in his voice, “I think I’ll hold onto this for the cops if they need it.”
I have fast hands. I snatched the list out of Munson’s grasp before he could move. He tried to muscle and I slapped him. I didn’t think I’d hit him hard but he tipped over and fell on his side. He was up quickly though. There were tears in his eyes.
“Who the hell do you think you are hitting me?” he said.
“You try an’ take this paper from me again and I’ll kick your ass up and down the block.”
He reached for the phone on his desk.
“I’m calling the police.”
He picked up the receiver.
I watched him.
He watched me.
“Are you going to give me that list?” The threat was thick and ridiculous on his tongue.
“Why’d you give her the money, Matt?”
The tears were still streaming from his eyes. I doubted if any man ever hated me more than he did at that moment.
“When we met she told me that one day she would ask me for five hundred dollars. She said that I didn’t have to give it to her, that I should only do it if I wanted to.”
“And did you?”
“What’s it to you?” Munson said. He was regaining his feeling of superiority so I reminded him:
“It ain’t nuthin’ to me, man. But the cops’ll be more interested in you bein’ on this list than me havin’ it.”
The accountant’s lashes fluttered again. He was so upset that I wouldn’t have been surprised if he had started foaming at the mouth.
“Yes,” he said.
“You gave it to her?”
“Seven-hundred-and-forty-eight dollars,” Munson said, nodding. “And she gave me a letter stating that she owed me the money and that she’d pay off the loan at the rate of five dollars a month.”
“Long-term loan. Did she ever make a payment?”
“Yes. Two of them.”
I should have felt good. I got what I wanted and I was able to show a superior-feeling white man that he couldn’t bully me with his arm or his will. But seeing him so defeated only reminded me of all the defeats me and mine had experienced. I actually felt sorry for him.
“Is Rita’s last name Wilford?’ I asked.
“No. It’s Longtree,” he said. “Why?”
“I thought she was a Wilford from down Dallas. Guess I was wrong.”
LONG AND LEAN BOB HENRY was sitting at a desk behind a glass wall when I drove up to his Atlas gas
