you at the Fablon's house this noon?'
'Yes. I understand you were Virginia Fablon's employer at one time.'
'That's true.'
'What do you think about her marriage?'
I had succeeded in interesting him. 'Good Lord, did she marry the fellow?'
'So she told me. They were married on Saturday.'
'You've talked to her?'
'An hour or so ago. I couldn't figure out what was going on in her mind. Of course the circumstances weren't normal, either. But she seemed to be living out some kind of romantic dream.'
'Most women are,' he said dryly. 'Did you see him?'
'I talked to them together at his house.'
'I've never met him myself,' Sylvester said. 'I've seen him around here, of course, at a distance. What did you make of him?'
'He's a very intelligent man, highly educated, with a good deal of force He seems to have Virginia pretty well dominated.'
'It won't last,' Sylvester said. 'You don't know the young lady. She has a lot of personal force of her own.'
He added wryly: 'I've served in loco parentis to her since her father died, and it hasn't always been easy. Virginia likes to make up her own mind.'
'About men?'
'There haven't been any men in her life, not lately. That's one of the problems she's had. Ever since her father's death she's done nothing but work and study French. You'd think her life was nothing but a memorial to Roy. Then a few weeks ago, as you might expect, the whole thing broke down. She dropped her studies, when she was within easy shooting distance of her degree, and went hog-wild for this Martel.'
He sipped his drink. 'It's a disturbing picture.'
'Are you her doctor?'
'I was until quite recently. Frankly, we had a disagreement about the - the wisdom of her course. I thought it best to refer her to another doctor. Why do you ask?'
'I don't like the emotional risk she's taking. She's managed to convince herself that she's crazy about Martel, and she's perched way out on a limb. It could be brutal for her if the limb gets sawed off.'
'I tried to tell her that,' Sylvester said. 'You think he's a phony, eh?'
'He has to be at least partly phony. I've had one Washington reference checked, and it didn't pan out. There were other things I won't go into.'
The rat, the blood on his heel, the gun peering out of his hand at Harry Hendricks.
'What can I do about it? She's got the bit in her teeth, and she running with it.'
Sylvester paused, and finished his drink.
'You want another, doctor?' the bartender asked.
'No thanks, Marco. One thing I've learned in twenty years of practicing medicine,' he said to me: 'you have to let people make their own mistakes. Sooner or later they come around to reason. The men with emphysema will eventually give up smoking. The women with chronic alcoholism will go on the wagon. And the girls with bad cases of romanticism turn into realists. Like my dear wife here.'
A big woman in a kind of mantilla had come up behind us. Her chest gleamed like mother-of-pearl through black lace. She had bouffant yellow hair which made her as tall as I was when I stood up. Her mouth was discontented.
'What about me?' she said. 'I love to be talked about by men.'
'I was saying that you were a realist, Audrey. That women start out being romantic and end up realistic every time.'
'Men force us into it,' she said. 'Is this my daiquiri?'
'Yes, and this is Mr. Archer. He's a detective.'
'How fascinating,' she said. 'You must tell me the story of your life.'
'I started out as a romantic and ended up as a realist.'
She laughed and drank her drink, and they went in to dinner. Some other people followed them.
For a moment I was the only one at the bar. Marco asked me if I wanted another drink. He was staring at me intensely as if he had something on his mind. His mouth was sort of wreathed with unspoken language. I said that I would like another drink.
'On me,' he said as he rapped it down, and poured himself a Cola to take with me. 'I couldn't help hearing, you said you were a detective. And some of the things you said about Miss Fablon.'
'You know her?'
'Seem her around. She don't drink. I've been here for over twelve years, I knew her father. He drank, and he could carry it. Mr. Fablon was a man. He had machismo.'
Marco's red lips protruded, savoring the word.
'I heard he committed suicide,' I said without emphasis.
'Maybe. I never believed it.' He shook his bushy blackhead.
'You think he drowned accidentally?'
'I didn't say that.'
'The other alternative is murder.'
'I didn't say that, either.'
Without moving from his position behind the bar, he seemed to back away from me. Then he crossed himself. 'Murder is a big ugly word.'
'It's an uglier fact. Was Mr. Fablon murdered?'
'Some people thought so.'
'Who?'
'His wife, for instance. After he disappeared she was yelling bloody murder around the club here. Then suddenly she quit, and all you could hear from her was a loud silence.'
'Did she accuse anyone?'
'Not that I heard. She didn't name any names.'
'Why would she change her story?'
'Your guess is as good as mine, mister. Probably better.'
The subject seemed to make him nervous. He changed it: 'But it wasn't that I wanted to talk about. This other guy - calls himself Martel - the big-shot Frenchman?'
'What about him?'
'I got a funny feeling I've seen him before someplace.'
He spread his fingers. 'Anyway I'm sure he ain't no Frenchie.'
'What is he?'
'Same like me, maybe.' He made a stupid face, deliberately humbling himself in order to make what he said more insulting to Martel. 'Just another paisano. He never came in here only the once, and then he took one look at me and never came back.'
The orchestra had started up. Some people drifted in from the dining room and ordered brandy. Dodging a few dancing couples, I went back to Peter's table. The dessert plate in front of him was empty except for a few faint smears of chocolate. He looked smug and guilty.
'I thought you'd left,' he said.
'I was in the bar talking to some friends of the Fablons.'
'Dr Sylvester.'
'He was one of them,' I said.
'I had a word with him, too. He puts on that hard front of his, but he's worried about Ginny, I can tell.'
'We all are.'
'Do you think we better go back to Martel's house?' Peter made a move to get up.
'Not until we have something substantial to hit him with.'
'Like what?'
