himself he would, though he had hoped for a more sensible and businesslike attitude from any American organization, whichever side of the law it happened to be on. They said they just might be able to see their way clear to letting him have a quarter of the loot, so he shut the door, sat back, and smiled. Then the bargaining got under way in earnest.
Because he found them so impressive that he was no longer sure he would be able to get away with the whole boodle, he bargained tenaciously and well, and when he emerged from the car he had the fat end of a sixty-forty split. He also had the uneasy conviction that the Outfit really intended to try for 100 per cent. Ah, well. Though the members of the Outfit were impressive in their grim stolidity, Menlo was the product of fifteen years of Communist bureaucratic intrigue, and he thought he might be able to handle himself adequately in this situation.
His assistants came to see him the following day, and slowly the operation took shape. He revealed Kapor’s name, no longer having any choice, and it turned out the Outfit had an indirect connection with a maid in Kapor’s home named Clara Stoper. The connection was made more direct, and when Clara was offered a 10 per cent cut she would never receive she became a willing and eager member of the group. Events progressed without a ripple until the unexpected and somewhat frightening appearance of Handy McKay, who began playing up to Clara in a manner that was definitely suspicious.
Could someone else be after the money? Could there have been a leak among the higher echelon of the Outfit? There was too much uncertainty here and that was dangerous. Menlo gave the order that Handy be taken and questioned, and from that point events barrelled onward like a plane in a tailspin. Menlo had shifted this way and that, always retaining his balance by the narrowest margin, and when the dust settled, there had been a total realignment. The Outfit was no longer a part of the scheme. Spannick was dead, and Menlo’s bridges were burned; he could no longer change his plans and go home now, even if he wanted to. So Menlo found himself in an uneasy alliance with the two newcomers, Parker and McKay.
Menlo had much to be thankful to Parker and McKay for. They had, initially, saved his life. They had additionally simplified the actual mechanics of the robbery, far more so than the Outfit’s plan. And also they had, indirectly, reintroduced the fat man to sex.
Bett Harrow. So long, so lean, so firm! So active and eager a participant! This was what he had been looking forward to while gaping at the airline stewardess, this was what he had been thinking of whenever the hundred thousand dollars recrossed his mind. Bett Harrow.
He had waited that night till he was sure that Parker and McKay were asleep, and then he had risen from his bed on the floor. He carried his shoes and his jacket and necktie out to the hall, and there donned them, smoothing his somewhat oily black hair into place with his fingers and running thumb and forefinger down his trouser crease.
He knocked softly at the door of room 512 and after a few seconds he heard a bed creak and then her soft call: “It’s unlocked.”
He went in. The table lamp beside the bed offered the only light, amber and intimate. She was lying supine on the bed, the covers outlining her incredibly long body, her face framed by the blonde hair on her pillow. She looked up at him with surprise. “Oh, it’s you.”
“You expected our friend again?” The prospect of Parker coming down the hallway now did not please him.
“That son of a bitch!” She seemed very angry with Parker. “Get me a cigarette, will you? Over on the dresser there.”
“Most certainly. I will, if I may, join you.”
“Be my guest.”
The tendency to goggle and giggle, as it had on the jetliner, was growing stronger and stronger. He fought it away, retaining an urbane and practised exterior as he carried her cigarettes over to the bed and leaned over to offer her a light. Her eyes were hazel, and deep, and knowing, and they gazed up unblinking into his own. He held her gaze, and smiled pleasantly.
“Thanks,” she said, and blew smoke, but not towards his face. She patted the bed next to her mounding hip. “Sit down.”
“You are most kind.” His weight sagged the mattress, and she slid just slightly towards him.
“What are you to Parker?” she asked suddenly.
“Ah,” he said. “How coincidental. Much the same question I had in my mind to ask you, though of course since you are a lady I would have phrased it somewhat differently.”
“Parker’s a pain in the ass,” she said. “Sorry if I shocked you.”
She had. Women at home did not speak in such a manner. He smiled to cover the instant of shock. “Precision in all things, my dear. And that phrase has admirable precision. My name, which our mutual friend neglected to tell you, is Auguste Menlo.”
“You told me yourself, remember?”
“Ah, yes, so I did.”
“What are you so nervous about?”
“I am most sorry. I hadn’t realized I was.”
“Parker won’t be back, if that’s it,” she replied.
That was, of course, part of it.
He said, “As to Parker, my own connection with him is most transitory, and for convenience only.”
“I could say the same thing,” she said bitterly. “I’d like to push the bastard off a cliff.”
“Dear lady, how rapidly we have come to a meeting of minds.”
She didn’t get it at first. She frowned slightly at him as she sorted out the words, and then all at once she responded to his smile with a dazzling smile of her own. “I’m Bett Harrow,” she said.
“I am charmed.” And he meant it. He leaned forward to stub his cigarette in an ashtray. “Parker has told me of
