“You bet. When I came to, he had cuffs on me, and a blindfold, and he was sitting with me in the back of a car. I could smell his aftershave. The girl was driving. She had great perfume, and anyway, every so often they said something. He was working for her, or at least working for the people she worked for. Okay, that’s how they suckered me. What’s your story?”
“It is really not much different from your own. Today I defrauded a certain one, the namesake of one who possesses much authority, below. This I did knowing his name, yet thinking nothing of it. He sent—”
The door flew open; and Barnes, still naked except for a bandage over his eyes, staggered blindly through it. The man who had pushed him from behind tossed a bundle of clothing after him. He tripped over one of the tin chairs and fell.
“What the hell,” Stubb said. “How’d you get so screwed up?”
“Is that you, Stubb?”
“Sure it’s me. Hold still a minute.” Stubb’s short, dirty fingernails scrabbled at the adhesive tape, ripping it away with much of Barnes’s eyebrows.
Barnes yelped.
“Best way to do it. Get it over with fast. Now wait till I get my pocket knife out and I’ll cut you loose.”
The witch said, “They permitted you to keep such a thing?”
“Sure. What could I do with it? It wouldn’t cut those cuffs, and anyway I couldn’t get at it.”
“And they permitted me to reclaim my handbag. But poor Ozzie has been stripped to the skin.”
“They threw his stuff in with him,” Stubb pointed out.
“I guess I did it myself,” Barnes said. “I mean, mostly I took off my own clothes.” He was rubbing his wrists.
The witch observed, “You have a tale to tell.”
“All right, but I want to get something on my tail first. Jesus, can’t you at least shut your eyes?”
“As you wish. See, I hold my bag before them.”
Barnes picked up a pair of check pants and swore.
“They rip you off?”
“I’ll say they did. These are mine.”
“Hey, you’re right. Your old suit. Didn’t you lose it in that hospital?”
Barnes nodded. “A sailor named Reeder took it.”
“And you went out while the blackout was still on and rolled some other guy for his.”
“No, I didn’t. I got it from a store. Hey, look—Fruit of the Loom! They even found my old underwear.”
“Nifty. I hope they washed it. Put it on.” Stubb stroked his chin. “You know, Ozzie, they’re not as smart as they think they are, or they would only have bandaged one eye.”
Barnes was feeling the pockets of his suit. “Yeah, I lost my glass one, and it’s not here, either. You could tell, huh? When I read the label?”
“I could tell whether you looked at the label or not. Now put the damn clothes on—Madame S.’s getting tired of holding up her bag. They must have gotten their hands on this Reeder. That or he was working for them all along. You haven’t seen him since we skipped the hospital?”
“Hell, yes, I saw him. I tagged him a good one in the lobby of the Consort for taking my stuff.”
“No problem, then. They knew we were in the Consort. A house dick spotted me eating breakfast there this morning. He told Cliff Rebic, and Cliff would have told them. They might have known it even earlier—”
“But they did!” The witch interrupted, speaking from behind her purse. “That girl—she worked for Illingworth. He brought me here.”
“You mean Sandy?” Stubb asked.
“Yes. That Alexandra Duck.” The witch hesitated. “Perhaps she did not know. I would have sensed it, I think, and I did not.”
“Illingworth’s the guy that publishes those magazines?”
“He says so, yes.”
Stubb said, “I doubt if he was working for them himself before this morning. She said they called him then. But they knew to call him—hell!”
“You have thought of something?”
“Just Mrs. Baker. They put a tail on her. Maybe even one of Cliff’s guys. The two girls went to grill her, and he watched to see where she’d go. Or they staked her out themselves. She went to the Consort to talk to us. You can put down your bag now—Ozzie’s got his pants on.”
The witch lowered it. “And now you, Ozzie. Why were you brought in naked?”
“I don’t think I’m going to tell you that.”
“Oh, really?” The witch’s face twisted in the suggestion of a smile. “Mr. Stubb has told his story.”
“I didn’t hear it.”
