“Just look on the sidewalk and follow the trail’a blood.”
“It’s that bad?”
“That girl’s eyes made contact with every dangerous man in the room. She flirted with one of ’em so much that he told Willis that he wanted to borrow her for the night.”
“Did they fight?” I asked.
“No. I told that big nigga to sit’own ’fore I shot him. They know around here that I don’t play. I told Willis to take his woman outta here and damn if she didn’t give that big man a come-on look while they were goin’ out the door.”
“You think she might’a told him where they were stayin’?”
“I wouldn’t put it past her.”
“What was this guy’s name?”
“Let’s see, um, Art. Yeah, Art, Big Art. Big Art Farman. Yeah, that’s him. He lives down Watts somewhere. Construction worker.”
I found an address in the phone booth of the Grotto. Listening to jazz and worrying about how big Big Art was made Bonnie fade to a small ache in my heart.
* * *
THE MAN WHO CAME to the apartment door was not big at all. As a matter of fact he was rather tiny.
“Art?” I asked.
“No,” he said.
“Does Art Farman live here?”
“Do you know what time it is, man?”
I pulled a wad of cash from my pocket.
“It’s never too late for a hundred bucks,” I said.
The small man had big eyes.
“Wha, what, what do you want?”
“I come to buy somethin’ off’a Art. He know what it is.” I could be vague as long as the money was real.
“I could give it to him when he comes in,” the little man offered.
“You tell him that Lenny Charles got somethin’ for him if he come in in the next two hours.”
“Why just two hours? What if he don’t come in before then?”
“If he don’t then somebody else gonna have to sell me what I need.”
“What’s that?” the little man asked. His coloring was uneven, running from a dark tan to light brown. He had freckles that looked like a rash and had hardly any eyebrow hair at all.
“I need to find a white girl called Sinestra.”
“What for?” The greedy eyes turned suspicious.
“Her daddy asked his maid, my cousin, to ask me to ask her to come back home. He’s willin’ to pay Art a century if he can help me out.”
“What’s your name again?”
“Len,” I lied. “Yours?”
“Norbert.” He was staring at my wad. “What you pay me to find Art?”
“Where is he?”
“No. Uh-uh. I get paid first.”
“How much you want?”
“Fifty?” he squeaked.
“Shit,” I said.
I turned away.
“Hold up. Hold up. What you wanna pay?”
“Thirty.”
“Thirty? That’s all? Thirty for me and a hundred for Art?”
“Art can give me the girl, can you?”
“I can give you Art. And she’s with him. That’s for sure.”
I considered taking out my gun but then thought better of it. Sometimes the threat of death makes small men into heros.
“Forty,” I said.
“You got to bring it higher than that, man. Forty ain’t worth my time.”
