‘There’s no need to talk like that!’ he snapped. ‘I didn’t mean anything of the kind. You can persuade him your expenses…’
‘But don’t you understand he hasn’t any money?’ she said impatiently. ‘It was you who told me he owes thousands.’
‘A man like Kile can always raise money. People trust him. That’s why I picked on him. Hasn’t he made a hit with the Rajah? A man with his looks and reputation can always get money.’
She gave him four ten-dollar bills.
‘You must try and manage with that,’ she said. ‘I can’t ask him for any more just yet. I don’t know how I’m going to manage myself: I’m cleaned out.’
He touched the gold chain bracelet around her wrist.
‘I could hock that for you,’ he said, obviously pleased with the idea. ‘You must have a lot of junk you could raise money on. I could handle it for you. I know all the best places.’ There was a boast in his voice. He was proud of his knowledge of pawnshops. ‘We can get the stuff back when we’ve hit the jack-pot.’
‘I’ll think about it.’ The note of misery in her voice made him look sharply at her. ‘Have you forgotten this belonged to mother?’ Her fingers touched the bracelet lovingly.
‘Well, she wouldn’t mind,’ Gillis said, scowling. ‘She hocked it herself, if I remember rightly, when the old man wouldn’t give me a new suit.’
‘Good night, Adam.’
‘I wish you wouldn’t look so damned miserable at times,’ he said crossly as he got out of the car. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow night. You might look through your things. That fur coat he gave you… you don’t need it until the winter…’
‘Good night, Adam,’ she repeated.
They stood facing each other for a moment. She was glad he couldn’t meet her eyes. She leaned forward and kissed his cheek.
‘Try and come early,’ she pleaded. ‘I want to talk to you, darling.’
‘About nine,’ he said, his voice flat and disinterested. Already he was thinking of more important things. He had forty dollars in his pocket. The night was still young. He might do worse than take Lois back to his room. He might persuade her to do that comic dance of hers again. She had wanted fifty dollars the last time: ridiculous! She might do it for twenty if he could convince her that was all she would get. Yes, he’d go along and pick her up. He felt in the mood for Lois’s kind of fun.
He watched Eve as she moved back to the club. She was an odd girl. Sometimes he wondered about her. She didn’t treat him as if he was her brother. There were times when she acted as if she were in love with him. He touched his pencil-lined moustache, frowning. Odd!
After he had left the parking lot, Dallas came out of the shadows and stood looking after him.
IX
Harmon Purvis had a small villa on East Boulevard: a modest, three-bedroom affair with a small garden crammed with roses and a
A light showed in one of the downstairs rooms, and through the open window came the brittle notes of Chopin’s
Dallas got out of his car, pushed open the gate and walked up the path. The night was hot and still, and the perfume from the roses was a little overpowering.
He dug his thumb into the bell-push, leaned forward to sniff at the purple flower of the clematis – as big as a breakfast plate.
Purvis came to the door and opened it. He was in his shirt sleeves and had changed his shoes for slippers.
‘You’re late,’ he said, giving Dallas a sharp look. ‘I was thinking of going to bed.’
‘You’re lucky to have a bed,’ Dal as said, fol owing him into the comfortable front room. It was lined with books and restfully lit by table lamps. Purvis was a bachelor, but he knew how to make himself comfortable. He had a Filipino boy to run the house and cook, and in his spare time he looked after the tiny garden himself. ‘I don’t get any time for my bed,’ Dal as went on, lowering himself gratefully into a comfortable easy chair.
Purvis wasn’t paying at ention. He was listening to the concluding passages of the
‘You should listen to this,’ he said, leaning against the radiogram and beating time with his finger.
‘It’s the most difficult of any of Chopin’s
‘Never mind Paderewski – he’s dead,’ Dal as said, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. ‘Turn it off for the love of Mike. I’m here on business.’
Reluctantly Purvis turned off the disc and sat down opposite Dallas.
‘Do you good to listen to some of the classics,’ he said, placing his finger-tips together and staring at Dallas from over them. ‘You’re losing your sense of culture.’
‘Never had one. Don’t offer me a whisky: I’d accept it.’
‘I haven’t any in the house,’ Purvis said happily. ‘I don’t touch the stuff: wastes money, dul s your perception and rots your liver.’
Dallas sighed.
