shut I held the customer’s chair for her and she gave the office the usual once-over. I got around to my side of the desk.
“You’re establishment isn’t exactly palatial,” she said. “Don’t you even have a secretary?”
“It’s a sordid life, but I’m used to it.”
“But I shouldn’t think very lucrative,” she said.
“Oh I don’t know. Depends. Want to see a portrait of Madison?”
“A what?”
“A five-thousand-dollar bill. Retainer. I’ve got it in the safe.” I got up and started over there. I spun the knob and opened it and unlocked a drawer inside, opened an envelope, and dropped it in front of her. She stared at it in something like amazement.
“Don’t let the office fool you,” I said. “I worked for an old boy one time that would cash in at about twenty millions. Even your old man would say hello to him. His office was no better than mine, except he was a bit deaf and had that soundproofing stuff on the ceiling. On the floor brown linoleum, no carpet.”
She picked the portrait of Madison up and pulled it between her fingers and turned it over. She put it down again.
“You got this from Terry, didn’t you?”
“Gosh, you know everything, don’t you Mrs. Loring?”
She pushed the bill away from her, frowning. “He had one. He carried it on him ever since he and Sylvia were married the second time. He called it his mad money. It was not found on his body.”
“There could be other reasons for that.”
“I know. But how many people carry a five-thousand-dollar bill around with them? How many who could afford to give you that much money would give it to you in this form?”
It wasn’t worth answering. I just nodded. She went on brusquely.
“And what were you supposed to do for it, Mr. Marlowe?’ Or would you tell me? On that last ride down to Tijuana he had plenty of time to talk. You made it very clear the other evening that you didn’t believe his confession. Did he give you a list of his wife’s lovers so that you might find a murderer among them?”
I didn’t answer that either, but for different reasons.
“And would the name of Roger Wade appear on that list by any chance?” she asked harshly. “If Terry didn’t kill his wife, the murderer would have to be some violent and irresponsible man, a lunatic or a savage drunk. Only that sort of man could, to use your own repulsive phrase, beat her face into a bloody sponge. Is that why you are making yourself so very useful to the Wades—a regular mother’s helper who comes on call to nurse him when he is drunk, to find him when he is lost, to bring him home when he is helpless?”
“Let me set you right on a couple of points, Mrs. Loring, Terry may or may not have given me that beautiful piece of engraving. But he gave me no list and mentioned no names. There was nothing he asked me to do except what you seem to feel sure I did do, drive him to Tijuana. My getting involved with the Wades was the work of a New York publisher who is desperate to have Roger Wade finish his book, which involves keeping him fairly sober, which in turn involves finding out if there is any special trouble that makes him get drunk. If there is and it an be found out, then the next step would be an effort to remove it. I say effort, because the chances are you couldn’t do it. But you could try.”
“I could tell you in one simple sentence why he gets drunk,” she said contemptuously. “That anemic blond show piece he’s married to.”
“Oh I don’t know,” I said. “I wouldn’t call her anemic.”
“Really? How interesting.” Her eyes glittered.
I picked up my portrait of Madison. “Don’t chew too long on that one, Mrs. Loring. I am not sleeping with the lady. Sorry to disappoint you.”
I went over to the safe and put my money away in the locked compartment. I shut the safe and spun the dial.
“On second thought,” she said to my back, “I doubt very much that anyone is sleeping with her.”
I went back and sat on the corner of the desk. “You’re getting bitchy, Mrs. Loring. Why? Are you carrying a torch for our alcoholic friend?”
“I hate remarks like that,” she said bitingly. “I hate them. I suppose that idiotic scene my husband made makes you think you have the right to insult me. No, I am not carrying a torch for Roger Wade. I never did—even when he was a sober man who behaved himself. Still less now that he is what he is.”
I flopped into my chair, reached for a matchbox, and stared at her. She looked at her watch.
“You people with a lot of money are really something,” I said. “You think anything you choose to say, however nasty, is perfectly all right. You can make sneering remarks about Wade and his wife to a man you hardly know, but if I hand you back a little change, that’s an insult. Okay, let’s play it low down. Any drunk will eventually turn up with a loose woman. Wade is a drunk, but you’re not a loose woman. That’s just a casual suggestion your high-bred husband drops to brighten up a, cocktail party. He doesn’t mean it, he’s just saying it for laughs. So we rule you out, and look for a loose woman elsewhere. How far do we have to look, Mrs. Loring—to find one that would involve you enough to bring you down here trading sneers with me? It has to be somebody rather special, doesn’t it—otherwise why should you care?”
She sat perfectly silent, just looking. A long half-minute went by. The corners of her mouth were white and her hands were rigid on her gabardine bag that matched her suit.
“You haven’t exactly wasted your time, have you?” she said at last. “How convenient that this publisher should have thought of employing you! So Terry named no names to you! Not a name. But it really didn’t matter, did it, Mr. Marlowe? Your instinct was unerring. May I ask what you propose to do next?”
“Nothing.”
