the blonde, y'hear? She's a tricky hitch.'
'And here I thought I'd successfully changed the subject.'
Hazel smiled again before she went back to the bar. I took over her job of feeding potato chips to Kaiser. The big dog loved potato chips. I'd tested him with a potato chip versus a piece of steak. He ate the steak, all right, but
lie ate the potato chip first. He'd crunch the chip, then circle his muzzle with his tongue to get all the salt.
This town had already given me one surprise in the appearance of the redheaded Eddie from Manny Sebastian's Golden Peacock parking lot in Mobile. When I looked up from feeding Kaiser, I had another. Lucille Grimes was halfway across the floor, heading toward my booth.
Her hands were empty, and her bag dangled loosely from its shoulder strap. That much I made sure of in the first split second. Then she was standing beside the booth. 'Sit down, if you can,' I greeted her. 'What color welts are you wearing these days?'
She attempted to smile, but her eyes were murderous. She sat down, and I watched her until she laid her handbag aside. I had no intention of playing clay pigeon for this dolly. When she began speaking, it was plain she had herself under a tight rein. 'I stopped to ask you to come to dinner tomorrow night, Chet.'
Now here was a switch. 'Yeah? Where?'
'At my house.'
Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly. 'Your house? What's the occasion?'
She manufactured a smile. 'Why don't you come and see? Perhaps I can use someone as foresighted as you seem to be.'
'At the post office?'
She stood up. 'Call me in the morning and let me know.' She picked up her bag and walked toward the door. Her movements weren't as fluid as I remembered them. I was beginning to think Blaze really had worked her over. If so, it was the first time I'd been in agreement with him since I'd hit town.
Since Lucille was no Campfire Girl, the dinner invitation had to mean one of two things. Either Franklin was so crazy mad he was willing to try to drop a ton on me right in her house, or Franklin had given her such a hard way to go the blonde was looking for reinforcements to get her ass away from Franklin. I couldn't see much nourishment for me in either setup.
Of course if it was Franklin and the blonde who had short-circuited Bunny—
I'd have to give the dinner invitation more thought.
Out at Hazel's cabin I walked from the bathroom to the bedroom and looked down at her tastefully attired in one-thirty-second of a sheet. 'Come on and let's take a shower, big stuff,' I said.
She yawned, then stretched mightily. The effect was spectacular. 'You must have otter blood in you, man,' she complained drowsily. 'The last two nights I've been in and out of that shower with you until my corns are waterlogged. Why don't you just tumble on down here and relax your—'
I reached down and goosed her. She bounded from the bed to the middle of the room with a strangled yelp. Hazel was touchy. I aimed my thumb at her again, and she flew into the bathroom. I herded her into the glassed-in shower compartment and turned on the needle spray. We each took soap and in silence began to lather each other. The water hissed softly while the single off-center fluorescent light made sleek flesh dazzlingly brilliant, and my hands glided gently over slippery body contours. It was a moment out of a lifetime. We stayed in the shower a long time.
I stepped out at last and grabbed a towel. I handed one to Hazel, still in the shower. She buried her wet red head in the towel. I reached in behind her and flipped the shower regulator over to full cold.
'Oooooooohohohohl' It was a yell that would have backed off a catamount. Hazel boomed out of the shower enclosure like a fullback in an open field. She ran right over me I was laughing so hard when she turned and came after me, I couldn't defend myself. She got me down and banged my head enthusiastically on the tile. I couldn't get her off me until I got into her ribs and tickled. She squealed indignantly and rolled away.
Several more wet towels and a couple of cigarettes later we were stretched out on the bed, the firefly glow of cigarettes the room's only light. Beside me I could hear Hazel's deep, even breathing. She reached up over me to stub out her cigarette in the ashtray on the bedside table, then trailed her hand lightly along my body as she dropped back beside me with a sigh. 'You don't happen to think you're pretty far out reaching for sensations, Horseman?' she asked in her rich voice.
'You can tell your grandchildren you did it under water.'
She laughed, then sobered. 'That parlay breaks down with the first dog out of the box, Chet. Children come before grandchildren, unless they've repealed a law of nature.'
I didn't like what I thought I heard in her voice, so I changed the subject. 'I didn't get a chance to tell you before, but I'm invited out to dinner.'
Hazel came up on one elbow. 'The blonde?'
'In living color.'
I could see the outline of her features but not her expression as I took a final drag on my cigarette. 'Chet,' she began, then hesitated as though wondering whether to continue. 'I don't want to know your business, and I hope I'm not jealous of Lucille Grimes, but there's something I think you ought to know.' She stopped again, and it was a full minute before she continued. 'Blaze Franklin is asking questions about you all over town.'
Instinct is a wonderful thing. I didn't have a stitch on, but my hand was up instantly, reaching for the butt of the Smith & Wesson—in its shoulder holster in the next room with my clothes. 'Like what kind of questions is he asking?'
'Where you came from. What you're doing here. Where you lived before. How much talking you do about yourself.' Hazel's voice was quiet. 'I don't want you to think
'Don't think I don't appreciate it, baby.'
1 thought about Blaze Franklin. He wasn't asking those particular questions because of anything that had happened between Lucille and me. Things were getting warm. I had no damn business on the bed here playing with Hazel's ass when the wash was out on the line and a storm coming up. 'Any reaction from the questioned?' I asked.
'Even Jed was saying it was odd how little we really knew about you.' There was no emphasis in Hazel's remark. She was reporting a fact. Her hand settled on my arm. I'm going to say one more thing, and then I'm going to shut up. And that's if you think of anything I can do to help, let me know. I'm not even fussy what I'll be helping with.' She rolled over and sat up on the edge of the bed. 'I've got to open up the bar in the morning.'
It was a fact the life had gone out of the party. We dressed, locked up, and went out to the Ford. On the way back to town I thought about Hazel's last remark. It was just short of putting it in writing that she was on the team. More, she didn't care which name was on the uniform. I've run into few blanket endorsements in my life. The big woman was all gold and a yard wide.
I appreciated her help, as I'd told her, but I was damn well going to put a stop to the necessity for it. She could only get hurt. It was two-thirty when I turned into the Dixie Pig's crushed stone driveway. Our good-nights were an anticlimax.
I drove to the Lazy Susan. There was only one reason Franklin was asking those questions about me. He'd watched me tramp the sawgrass swamps and savanna intermingled with pineland, salt meadows, and mangrove thickets on the-cast side of town. Blaze Franklin had just about stamped the brand on himself. Franklin was the reason I'd come to Hudson.
It left unanswered questions. How had a mulehead like Franklin out-maneuvered Bunny, who could break Franklin up with his bare hands? And why was Franklin nosing around me at all, when by all rights he should have been keeping i low profile and hoping no one was looking in his direction?
I didn't know.
There was no question now about my accepting Lucille Grimes' dinner invitation.
That would be the first step in supplying a few answers.
The dinner was quite an affair.
We sat at opposite ends of a six-foot table, and we were served by a girl in a maid's uniform. Lucille sat at her end of the table with an expression like a medieval landowner's among his serfs. All I could think of was Lady
