I had a hunch that something was cooking.
2
I drove down Ocean Drive. The traffic was heavy, and I moved slowly, the damp, salt smell of the sea in my nose, the pounding of the surf in my ears.
It was the kind of night you read about in books. The stars looked like diamond dust on blue velvet.
Two blocks further up I came upon a lighted drive that led to a big building with one of those fancy fronts made of marble or glass or porcelain or something—a kind of powder blue with “Casino” in sizable letters on a ledge at the top of the first floor. The whole building was lit by indirect lighting, and the over-all effect was pretty nice.
The Negro doorman’s brass buttons gleamed in the light. He pulled open the door of the Buick, and another Negro stepped forward to drive the car to the garage.
I walked in under the blue canopy and found myself in a corridor fined on both sides with discreet private dining-rooms with numbers on the doors. At the other end of the corridor was an arch and beside it was the booth occupied by a blonde hat-check girl.
“Check, Mister?” she asked nasally.
I wolfed her over. She was wearing a tight little bodice in sky blue satin, open all the way down the front and laced together loosely by black silk cords. Apparently she had nothing on under the bodice. It was one of those outfits that keeps everyone warm except the wearer.
I gave her my hat and a friendly leer.
“That’s a nice view you have there,” I said courteously.
“The night some guy doesn’t make that crack I’ll drop down dead,” she returned, sighing. “It’s part of my job to have a nice view.”
I paused to light a cigarette. “A view to what?” I asked.
“No dice. That gag’s transparent with age.”
“Sorry,” I said. “I don’t often come to a joint like this. I’m a home lover, and one gets kind of old-fashioned in fife’s little backstreams.”
She looked me over and decided I was harmless. “That’s all right by me,” she said, smiling. “I like variety. The trouble here is that all men seem cast in the same mould.”
“But surely some are more mouldy than others?” I said.
She giggled. Three men came up to check their hats, so I drifted on through the arch into as sweet a night club layout as you would wish to see, done in pastel shades with indirect lighting and with a beautiful crescent- shaped bar on one side. It was a terrific room with a place for an orchestra and small dance floor made of some composition that looked like black glass. Out of the floor, out of blue and chromium boxes, grew banana trees with broad green leaves and clusters of green bananas. Vines clung to the trunks of the trees, bearing fragile blossoms; pink, orange, bronze and henna. Half the room had no roof and overhead were stars.
A fat bird came up to me and gave me the teeth, which was supposed to mean he was glad to see me. He wore patent-leather shoes, dark trousers, a Dubonnet-red cummerbund and a white drill coat tailored like a mess jacket.
“Give me Speratza,” I said.
He gave me the rest of the teeth, including a couple of gold inlays.
“I am the manager, please,” he said. “Is there something I can do?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Drum up Speratza. Tell him Chester Cain has blown in.”
If I’d said I was King George VIth I couldn’t have got a faster double-take.
“A thousand apologies for not recognizing you, Mr. Cain,” he said, bowing in half. “Senor Speratza will be enchanted. I will have him informed you have arrived.” He swung round and signalled frantically to a dressed-up dummy who was posed by the bar. The dummy shot away like he had a rocket in his pants. It was a pre-arranged, regal routine, and it impressed me as it was meant to impress me.
“Nice place you have here,” I said for something to say. I was only giving him half my attention. The other half was reeling under the impact of the women in the joint. They were something to see. Even a horse would look over his shoulder at them. A dark woman in a red dress drifted past as I was about to compliment him further. She stopped me in mid-stride. She had the most provocative walk I had ever seen. Her hips were sheathed in this red silk, pulled so taut that light rippled over the fabric as she moved. They flowed under the dress like heavy and seductive liquid, like molten metal.
“We hope you’ll like it here, Mr. Cain,” he was saying, as if he’d rushed around and built the place as soon as he’d heard I was coming. “May I introduce myself? Guillermo at your service. Would you care for a drink?”
I tore my eyes away from the woman’s hips and said I was glad to know him and a drink would be swell.
We went over to the bar and put our feet on the elegant brass rail. The bar was glistening and spotless but the barman hustled up and wiped it mechanically, his eyes on Guillermo.
’What’ll it be?” said Guillermo.
“A little bourbon, I guess,” I said.
The barman gave me three inches of the finest bourbon I’d ever encountered. I said as much.
At this moment a tall man with a terrific torso appeared at my side.
“Senor Speratza,” Guillermo said, and faded out of the picture.
I turned and looked the newcomer over. He had everything in the way of good looks a man could want. He was as big as a house, his eyes were black and the whites of them like porcelain. His hair was rather long and curled a little over his temples. His skin was cream-rose. He was really handsome in a Latin way.
“Mr. Cain?” he said, offering his hand.
“Sure,” I said, and shook hands.
He had a grip like a bear’s, but then so have I. We cracked each other’s bones and pretended we weren’t hurting each other.
He said how pleased he was to meet me, and how he hoped I’d enjoy my stay at Paradise Palms.
I admired his place and told him they had nothing like it in New York. That seemed to please him.
By that time I’d finished my bourbon, and he called the barman.
“Two,” he said. “Take a good look at Mr. Cain because I want you to remember him. Whatever he wants is on the house, including his whole party.”
The barman nodded and gave me a quick up-and-down, and I could tell there wasn’t a chance he would ever mistake me for anybody else.
“All right?” Speratza asked, beaming at me.
“Swell,” I said.
“I don’t know what your plans are, Mr. Cain,” he went on, after we had dipped into the bourbon, “but if you want a little relaxation and a mild gamble, you could do worse than spend
some of your time here.”
“That’s just what I do want,” I said. “I’m figuring on a quiet time, and a little company when I feel that way.” I fiddled with my glass and then went on, “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but frankly, I’m a little puzzled by all this attention.”
He laughed. “You’re modest, Mr. Cain,” he said, shrugging. “Why even in this little place, far from anywhere, we’ve heard of you. We’re glad to offer hospitality to such a successful gambler.”
“I appreciate it,” I said, and shot him a hard look. “But I’d like to get this on record for all that. I’m on vacation: that means I’m not working. I wouldn’t b
He laughed silently and easily as if I’d cracked the funniest gag in the world.
