The Negro came for me, moving light on his feet like a big cat. “We don't want no trouble, white man. Just get out.”
“First I get an answer to my question,” I said.
The Negro kept coming. “You slob,” the woman said to me; “throwing women around.”
“Come on, white man,” the Negro said.
I let him get close to me. “All right,” I said. “I'll go.”
“Throw him on his ear, Jim,” the woman said.
He reached for my collar and I gave him a knee in the groin. He grunted. I let go a right to the face, putting my shoulder back of it. He started to shuffle away and I followed and gave him the old one-two and he went down. He lay on his back on the hall rug.
“Damn you!” said a woman behind me. “Leave Jim alone.” I turned just in time to get hit on the head with a lamp made of a Chinese vase. The porcelain, or whatever it was, shattered over me. The blonde who'd swung it stood there, waiting for me to fall.
“What the hell?” I asked her. “What's the Negro to you?”
She came at me, clawing. I caught one arm, jerked it hard and let it go. She spun into the parlour and crashed against the far wall. From the stairs the other blonde screamed. I looked at the Negro. He was trying to get to his feet, an ugly-looking straight-edged razor in one hand. I waited until he got up; then I jerked the rug. He fell on his side. I kicked the razor out of his hand. Then I kicked him in the face. The blonde on the stairs screamed again. I picked the Negro up by his belt and threw him out one of the hall windows. He took the shade and the lower pane of glass with him. I ran up the hall and shoved the fat woman away from the telephone. I jerked it off the wire and threw it into a big mirror. “Now, damn you,” I said to the woman; “where's Carmel?”
She was so scared she could hardly talk. “She went out... last night.”
“Where?”
“I don't know.”
“Who'd she go with?”
She shook her head stubbornly.
“The hell you don't know,” I said. “You don't let your girls go out that way.”
I grabbed her arms and shook her. Her false teeth fell out and rolled across the carpet. I stopped shaking.
“Chief Piper,” she said.
I gave her one more shake. There were a lot of heads at the top of the stairs, but when I looked up they disappeared. I started into the parlour, but a thin man in shirtsleeves was in the way. I hit him and he went down. In the parlour the blonde who'd slugged me with the lamp began to scream. She thought I was coming for her. I went to the big radio in the corner. I picked it up, tearing out the plug, and tossed it across the room. It shattered against the wall. I kicked over a table with two lamps on it. I tore some of the fabric off a davenport. I threw a chair at a big oil painting over the fireplace. I took a metal stand lamp and bent it up like pretzel. I pulled up the Oriental rug and ripped it down the middle. The fat woman and the blonde watched me with eyes like oysters. I came out into the hall.
“After this be more civil,” I told the fat woman.
I went out the door. The Negro was lying in some bushes under the window. I didn't worry about him. A Negro takes a lot of killing. I went back to the hotel, walking on the shady side of the street. I don't know why I did that; habit, I guess; I had already sweat up my clothes.
At the hotel the clerk gave me a number to call. Prospect 2332. I went up to my room and took off my clothes and got in the shower. I had a good bump on my head where the lamp had hit me. After a while I dried myself and called the number. The Princess answered, her voice as smooth as cream. “Hello, honey.”
“Hello,” I said.
“How are you feeling?”
“All right.”
“You're coming out tonight, aren't you?”
“I don't know.”
“Oh, but I'm expecting you. Don't eat; we'll have dinner together.”
I didn't say anything.
“How does it sound, honey?”
“It sounds wonderful.”
“About seven.”
“All right.”
“Goodbye, honey.”
“Goodbye.”
She hung up and I jiggled the hook on the telephone. When the clerk answered, I ordered a bottle of brandy and a dozen raw eggs.
CHAPTER TWELVE
McGEE'S old touring car had once been green. It had also been painted black, but this had worn thin and you
