ice.
Fred Gurney tasted his rye, wriggled his long thin nose, twisted the bloodless gash that was his mouth into a sour grimace, and took a quick sip of root beer.
Gurney had been a handsome man once. That was years ago, long before Shayne had known him except through having studied his police record and pictures. Now, at the age of forty, he was no longer handsome. His face had a wax-like pallor and the flesh was thinned away from nose and chin, leaving them starkly pointed and too close together. His eyes were sunken between graying brows and they glittered oddly in the light that filtered downward through the pall of smoke. His hair was thin and grayish. There was something repellent about him, particularly now as he sat across the table from the full-blooded and lush vitality of Mrs. Dawson.
Shayne watched the two of them from the corner of his eye and wondered about a lot of things.
The bartender set a big round glass bowl in front of Shayne and emptied two ponies of Hennessy into it. He filled a glass with ice water and turned away. The jukebox ended one record and began another. The couple on the dance floor was still hugged tightly together, feet scarcely moving, eyes nearly closed. There was nothing of ecstasy or even enjoyment on their faces. Shayne thought, with a wide grin, that they might have been a couple of somnambulists who, having met, were unable to pass each other and decided to lock arms and go round and round together.
Turning back toward the bar, Shayne lifted the big snifter in both hands and pretended to inhale the fumes filling the bowl. Actually, he considered this a very silly way to drink cognac, but tonight the big bowl hid his face from view while he sipped and sniffed in the approved manner.
Still listening to Gurney, Mrs. Dawson took her dripping forefinger from the goblet and stuck it in her mouth to lick off the wetness. She picked up the goblet in both hands, bracing her elbows on the table, and drank the entire glassful of gin and beer without removing it from her lips. Her Adam’s apple moved almost imperceptibly beneath the well-fleshed contour of her chin as she drank. She set the empty glass down, emptied the second portion of her drink, and again mixed it with her forefinger.
Thus far, Shayne had not seen her speak a word to her companion, though Fred Gurney paused now and again with a questioning scowl, as though he expected an answer and was becoming extremely irritated.
Now she leaned forward and said something to him. He shook his head angrily in disagreement, then shrugged and got up and walked to a telephone booth at the rear of the room.
Shayne sloshed the cognac around in his bowl, slid from the stool and walked over to sit down in the chair Gurney had vacated.
The big blonde had lifted her glass with both hands embracing it. She looked at Shayne over the rim of the goblet; her brows lifted slightly.
Shayne said, “Only thing lacking in that mixture is a couple of ounces of laudanum.”
She lowered the full glass far enough to say, “They don’t keep it in stock here.”
“That makes it tough.” He intended his remark to be sarcastic, but she only nodded agreement and said, “It takes a lot more to do the job drinking it straight like this.” She put the goblet to her mouth and emptied it in even, unhurried swallows.
“But you’re getting it done,” Shayne suggested amiably.
“I didn’t hear anybody ask your opinion,” she said in a husky drawl. “But if it’s anything to you, nosy, you don’t taste this stuff but once when you pour it down like that.”
Shayne grinned and said, “I had a big blonde for a nurse when I was a baby, and I’ve had a yen for them ever since.”
Mrs. Dawson sucked in her breath and her lower lip. Her blue eyes glowed with an unnatural brightness as she began a slow appraisal of Shayne, beginning with the brim of his hat and continuing over his wide shoulders downward until the table blocked her view. She nodded and said, “Come around some time, big boy, and bring your laudanum.”
“What’s the matter with tonight?”
She shook her head slowly from side to side, her eyes momentarily dull and troubled, looking past him to the rear of the room. He turned and saw Fred Gurney coming out of the telephone booth.
“We can ditch him,” he told her.
She said, “I’ve got more important things on my mind tonight.”
“You can forget Mr. Dawson, too,” Shayne told her.
She stiffened at his words. Again he saw the hot blue flame in her eyes that he’d seen earlier. Gurney was approaching the table. Shayne didn’t care much now whether Gurney recognized him or not. He was beginning to be bored with the whole setup. He wished he’d taken that plane to New Orleans and Lucy Hamilton.
The blonde said, “Dawson?” in a low voice that was almost a whisper, then looked up to ask Gurney, who now stood scowling behind Shayne’s chair, “Any luck?”
He didn’t reply, and Shayne imagined he must have shaken his head, for Mrs. Dawson said sharply, “Go on back and keep trying.”
Gurney stepped around to face Shayne, the scowl still on his face. “That’s my chair,” he snapped.
“Scram,” said the blonde. “He’s buying me a drink.”
Shayne looked up at Gurney and saw no flicker of recognition in his sunken eyes. The man’s lips curled back from his yellowed teeth. He hesitated for a moment, then turned and went slowly back to the telephone booth.
Shayne said, “He minds well.”
She leaned toward him and asked earnestly, “Did you say Dawson sent you?”
“What makes you think he’d do that?” countered Shayne.
The lazy waiter with the greasy hair came up and stood beside the table. Shayne still had a little brandy in his snifter. He said, “I’m buying the lady a drink.”
When the waiter went away, she asked, “What do you know about Dawson? Where is the little bastard?”
Shayne said, “Let’s dance. You’ll quit worrying about him that way.”
“You go to hell,” she said thickly.
Shayne pushed his chair back and stood up with a mocking grin. “Come on, if you can still stand up.”
She put one hand on the table and rose slowly, stood for a moment to get her balance. Shayne put his long arm around her, and they moved together onto the little dance square.
There was a clean, animal smell about her, like the odor of a young calf after it has been bathed by its mother’s tongue. Her body was supple and yielding and she danced as she had walked, with a deliberate carefulness and measured rhythm. Her full red mouth, smeared at the corners, was just below his chin.
“You can give it to me straight,” she told him in a low voice that was slightly guttural.
“Hell,” said Shayne, “I thought you’d be corseted up to the hilt.” His tone was one of surprise and admiration. His knobby fingers tightened on the hard flesh at her waistline.
“I don’t wear any of that tight stuff women bind themselves up in. What about Dawson?”
“Why worry about a shrimp like him when you’re dancing with a man?”
The record ended abruptly. They were close to their table. She pushed him away from her and sat down. The waiter was standing by with a tray containing a double shot of gin, a bottle of beer, and a goblet of ice cubes. Shayne sat down and said, “Why don’t you put the lady’s drink on the table?”
“Was goin’ to,” he stammered in broken English, “w’en you pay for one you have.” Shayne looked at him in astonishment, and the man said quickly, “Don’ get sore me, mister. Thees house order. We not allow serva two drink till first one pay for.”
Shayne repressed his first impulse toward anger as he realized the punk was merely stating a house rule. He took out his wallet. “Give it to her and bring me another cognac. You can take it all out of this.” He extracted one of the bills Dawson had given him and laid it on the table. “A double shot of Hennessy in a plain glass and ice water on the side.” He drained the snifter bowl and shoved it toward the waiter.
The man picked up the bill and started away. He turned back, his forehead creased and his black eyes narrowed on the rumpled bill. “This a hunner-dolla bill,” he said excitedly, pointing to the figure in the corner of the bank note. “You mean givva me thees?”
Shayne said, “It’s the smallest I have.”
The waiter looked from the bill to Shayne, his eyes filled with doubt. “You sure you gotta no leetle money?”
