extremely early.”
“Now, do I look like your five o’clock?” I said, grinning back.
“I don’t know,” she said coquettishly, working her eyes overtime. “He’s new. I never know; maybe you’re a movie actor in disguise.” The whole time she was showing me all of her assets.
“Do the seagulls ever bother you?” I asked.
Naked One giggled.
“My name’s Zeke Bannon,” I said, offering her my hand.
“Zeke?” the other one said. “What kinda name is Zeke?”
“Where are your manners, Emerald?” Naked One said. Then added, “Emerald’s new. She hasn’t finished the course yet.”
“Is this a school?”
Naked One lowered her chin a notch and looked up at me.
“Miss Delilah’s finishing school,” she said. She leaned back on her elbows and said, “If you’re not my five o’clock, I’ve got at least two hours free. Maybe I could give you a lesson or two.”
“I’ll just bet you could.”
A voice from high over my shoulder said sternly, “Jade, you two put something on. This isn’t a cattle show.”
Both girls scrambled for cover. I turned around and looked up. The woman on the second-floor balcony had to be Delilah O’Dell. She was dressed in a long yellow silk robe with a pale pink striped sash, and yellow slippers with large fluffy balls on the top. And a hat. A pink feathery thing, with one feather arching down behind her ear and over her shoulder. She had flaming red hair and a rather full face with suspicious eyes. She could have been anything from thirty-five to fifty. She had a monumental figure, not voluptuous, just right, with a waist a wasp would weep for. Not beautiful, she didn’t need to be; she was a package and knew it.
“Just make yourself at home, why don’t you,” she snapped.
“I rang the bell several times.”
“Maybe I was out.”
“You weren’t.”
“Maybe I wanted you to think I was. Most people would have come back later.”
“You’re Delilah O’Dell,” I said.
“Really? Do I owe you anything for that information?”
I took out my badge and held it up so it winked in the sunlight.
“I’m a cop.”
It neither surprised nor flustered her; nothing short of an earthquake would.
“I don’t give a damn if you’re King George,” she said. “This is a private club and I don’t remember inviting you in.”
“I took a chance I’d catch you home.”
“Did you now? Let me try and guess. You’re Bannon.”
“Word travels fast in San Pietro.”
“Out of all mouths and into my ears. What are you doing up here?”
“I made a wrong turn.”
“You sure did. Come around to the door.” She vanished into the house.
I walked back to the front door, and a middle-aged colored man with graying hair and a build like King Kong opened it. He took my hat and nodded toward the stairs. I followed his instructions. I don’t know what he did with my hat.
There was a living room to the right of the door as I entered, a large sitting room to the left, a door at the far end of the sitting room, and another door under the stairs, which circled up to a small mezzanine. It was fashionably furnished and in good taste. I went up to the top of the stairs. A hallway led off to my left and a door was to the right. I turned around and surveyed the downstairs sitting room. A moment later Delilah O’Dell came out of the door.
“Enjoying more of the view?” she asked.
“So that’s where the Grand View shoot-out occurred,” I said, nodding to the large room. “And you and Culhane were the only two who walked away from it.”
“It wasn’t the Battle of Gettysburg,” she answered tartly. “Keep it in perspective. Come in here.”
“Your man took my hat,” I said.
“You’ll get your damn hat back. Occasionally we have a guest who forgets his manners and wears his hat inside. This way we don’t embarrass anyone.”
“I should think at five hundred smackers a pop you wouldn’t care.”
“This is a classy place, Bannon, it isn’t Steubenville, Ohio,” she said, assuming I knew that Steubenville was reputed to be the whorehouse capital of the world.
Her living room was done in yellow and pale green. Chaise, sofa, three chairs you could sink in and disappear, white coffee tables. The lamps were Tiffany and overhead was a magnificent crystal chandelier that filled in the shadows in the room. A well-stocked wet bar in one corner. Billie Holiday was singing “I Get Along Without You Very Well” on the console.
I looked at the feather draped across her shoulder.
“Do you wear that hat to bed?” I asked.
“I don’t wear anything to bed,” she said. “How about you?”
“Silk pajama bottoms.”
“You aren’t the type.”
“I live alone. I don’t have company that often so I dress for comfort.”
“You must not be trying very hard,” she said, walking to the bar.
“To do what?”
“Have company. John Jameson alright?”
“Beautiful. One cube of ice, please.”
She chuckled as she fixed the drinks.
“What’s funny?” I asked.
“Two of a kind,” she said half-aloud, shaking her head. She opened an ebony humidor, took out two thin cigars, and squeezed them between thumb and forefinger. Satisfied they were fresh, she snipped the ends off with a small scissor. She lit one, twirling it in the flame like an expert, and brought the drink and cigar over to me.
“Cuban,” she said, nodding to the cigar. “I have a friend that brings them to me once a month. Why don’t you give your legs a rest.”
I sank into one of the big chairs. It was like sitting on a cloud.
“This is a great cigar,” I said. “Of course, most of the cigars I’ve smoked cost a nickel and had ‘It’s a boy’ printed on the wrapper.”
She lit her own cigar.
“You do that with real finesse,” I said. “Did your tricks come with the house?”
“I learned my tricks-as you call them-from a very experienced lady in Paris. I was her apt pupil for three years, starting when I was eighteen.”
She looked me over with an experienced eye. “You shouldn’t have any trouble finding company. Great eyes, nice nose, good strong jawline. Nice straight teeth. Trim. You could use a few hours in the sun. And not too tall. That’s good. Anything over six feet I find intimidating.”
“Who’re you kidding? Nothing intimidates you.”
“How would you know?”
“It’s a measured guess. Is this how you size up your young ladies?”
“I’m not too concerned about height where the ladies are concerned,” she said, sitting down on the chaise. “Some men like amazons, some like midgets.”
“No kidding. I’ve never met a lady midget.”
“Would you like to?”
“I can’t afford it. A drink in this place would bankrupt me.”
“Maybe a free sample, then. But I get to watch.”
