She jerked away from me and grabbed the gun out of her suitcase. “What we’ve been talking is money,” she told him.
“Always a mistake,” Mitchell said. His color was high and his eyes too bright. “Especially in that position. You won’t need the gun, honey.”
He poked at me with a straight right, very fast and well sprung. I stepped inside it, fast, cool and clever. But the right wasn’t his meal ticket. He was a lefty too. I ought to have noticed that at the Union Station in L.A. Trained observer, never miss a detail. I missed him with a right hook and he didn’t miss with his left.
It snapped my head back. I went off balance just long enough for him to lunge sideways and lift the gun out of the girl’s hand. It seemed to dance through the air and nestle in his left hand.
“Just relax,” he said. “I know it sounds corny, but I could drill you and get away with it. I really could.”
“Okay,” I said thickly. “For fifty bucks a day I don’t get shot. That costs seventy-five.”
“Please turn around. It would amuse me to look at your wallet.”
I lunged for him, gun and all. Only panic could have made him shoot and he was on his home field and nothing to panic about. But it may be that the girl wasn’t so sure. Dimly at the extreme edge of vision I saw her reach for the whiskey bottle on the table.
I caught Mitchell on the side of the neck. His mouth yapped. He hit me somewhere, but it wasn’t important. Mine was the better punch, but it didn’t win the wristwatch, because at that moment an army mule kicked me square on the back of my brain. I went zooming out over a dark sea and exploded in a sheet of flame.
6
The first sensation was that if anybody spoke harshly to me I should burst out crying. The second, that the room was too small for my head. The front of the head was a long way from the back, the sides were an enormous distance apart, in spite of which a dull throbbing beat from temple to temple. Distance means nothing nowadays.
The third sensation was that somewhere not far off an insistent whining noise went on. The fourth and last was that ice water was running down my back. The cover of a day bed proved that I had been lying on my face, if I still had one. I rolled over gently and sat up and a rattling noise ended in a thump. What rattled and thumped was a knotted towel full of melting ice cubes. Somebody who loved me very much had put them on the back of my head. Somebody who loved me less had bashed in the back of my skull. It could have been the same person. People have moods.
I got up on my feet and lunged for my hip. The wallet was there in the left pocket, but the flap was unbuttoned. I went through it. Nothing was gone. It had yielded its information, but that was no secret any more. My suitcase stood open on the stand at the foot of the day bed. So I was home in my own quarters.
I reached a mirror and looked at the face. It seemed familiar.
I went to the door and opened it. The whining noise was louder. Right in front of me was a fattish man leaning against the railing. He was a middle-sized fat man and the fat didn’t look flabby. He wore glasses and large ears under a dull gray felt hat. The collar of his topcoat was turned up. His hands were in the pockets of his coat. The hair that showed at the sides of his head was battleship gray. He looked durable. Most fat men do. The light from the open door behind me bounced back from his glasses. He had a small pipe in his mouth, the kind they call a toy bulldog. I was still foggy but something about him bothered me. “Nice evening,” he said. “You want something?”
“Looking for a man. You’re not him.”
“I’m alone in here.”
“Right,” he said. “Thanks.” He turned his back on me and leaned his stomach against the railing of the porch.
I went along the porch to the whining noise. The door of 12C was wide open and the lights were on and the noise was a vacuum cleaner being operated by a woman in a green uniform.
I went in and looked the place over. The woman switched off the vacuum and stared at me. “Something you wanted?”
“Where’s Miss Mayfleld?”
She shook her head.
“The lady who had this apartment,” I said.
“Oh, that one. She checked out. Half an hour ago.” She switched the vacuum on again. “Better ask at the office,” she yelled through the noise. “This apartment is on change.”
I reached back and shut the door. I followed the black snake of the vacuum cord over to the wall and yanked the plug out. The woman in the green uniform stared at me angrily. I went over and handed her a dollar bill. She looked less angry.
“Just want to phone,” I said.
“Ain’t you got a phone in your room?”
“Stop thinking,” I said. “A dollar’s worth.”
I went to the phone and lifted it. A girl’s voice said:
“Office. Your order, please.”
“This is Marlowe. I’m very unhappy.”
“What? . . . Oh yes, Mr. Marlowe. What can we do for you?”
“She’s gone. I never even got to talk to her.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Marlowe,” she sounded as if she meant it. “Yes, she left. We couldn’t very well—”
