“Hello, bastard,” Miss Harris Brown went on.
I was aware Ricca was watching me with interest. Della’s face had gone pale, but she
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didn’t make a move. They were my cards, and I had to play them.
“What do you want?” I said.
Della and Ricca weren’t the only two looking at me now. Everyone on the terrace was
looking.
She pushed her breasts out at me, and her red-painted lips curved into a smile that was as
vicious as her eyes.
“I want to know who the whore is you’re going around with,” she said. “The pretty little
trollop with red hair. The one you take to your rooms on Franklin Boulevard. The one you
slop over at Raul’s. Who is she?”
I went hot, then cold. My brain closed up. I opened my mouth, but nothing came out of it.
Ricca said, “She’s his sister by his mother’s side. Now go away, you drunken little fool.
Your eyes are watery, your nose is red, and you’ve got a stinking, rotten breath.”
Someone in the audience laughed.
Miss Harris Brown collapsed like a pricked balloon.
I watched her run across the terrace, down the steps and towards her cabin. Then I looked at
Ricca.
“It was easier for me to do it,” he said, “but if I spoke out of turn, I’m sorry.”
“Thanks,” I said. “She was drunk.”
Then I looked at Della.
“Where’s Raul’s Johnny?” she asked, smiling, but her eyes were like chips of ice. “Or
shouldn’t I ask?”
“You heard what I said: she was drunk.”
“We get them like that in Los Angeles,” Ricca said soothingly. “You don’t have to pay any
attention to them. They are kind of crazy in the head.”
Della got up.
“Jack and I are going over to Bay Street,” she said, without looking at me. “We’ll be seeing
you.”
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She walked down the steps towards her car.
Ricca patted my arm.
“Women are funny animals,” he said, “and she’s no exception.”
It might have been Reisner talking.
“Don’t let it bother you, Johnny.”
He went after her, and his smile was a mile wide.
VII
I sat at my desk, a cigarette smouldering between my fingers, my brain busy. The writing
was on the wall. I didn’t kid myself I could bluff Della. She was too smart. By tonight she
would have found out about Ginny, my apartment on Franklin Boulevard and Raul’s. Then
would come the show-down.
She wouldn’t have to give me away to Hame. She’d team up with Ricca and let him take
care of me. This was my out. I had to skip before it was too late.
I twisted around in my chair and looked at the safe. Behind that heavy steel door was a
bundle of money belonging to me. If I could get to it, I hadn’t a worry in the world. But I
hadn’t a hope of opening that door without the combination.
For nearly four weeks I had sat around hoping the combination would drop in my lap. I
now had three hours, possibly four, to get it if I was ever going to get it.
