Death is the Last Lover (Prologue Books) Page 5

  “Let’s go sit,” I said.

  “At least this is legit,” she said. “Nobody’s making it with anybody, the whole bit is strictly impersonal — ”

  “Let’s sit,” I said. “You angry with me?”

  “I’m nuts about you.”

  “That’s the way I want it.”

  “Let’s go sit.”

  “Whatever you say. You’re the boss, lover.”

  “Let’s sit,” I said.

  “Sure,” she said, and she moved from me, and we danced for a few moments, as conservative as the minuet, and then we broke it up and hustled back to the table and sipped Feninton’s highballs in silence, and then I said, “I saw G. Phillips.”

  “About time you opened up,” she said. “I’ve been waiting.”

  “Why didn’t you ask?”

  “It’s none of my business, though I’ve been dying.”

  “Of what?”

  “Curiosity.”

  “You know what he wants?” I said.

  “My guess — he wants to get out from under.”

  “You think he’s mixed up in it?”

  “My guess — yes. I wouldn’t say this to the cops. I’m saying it to you.”

  “You think he killed her?”

  “That’s my hunch.”

  “Why?” I said. “Why should G. Phillips kill V. Frayne?”

  “It’s my hunch she was pushing him.”

  “How?”

  “Sticking a finger in his ear. For a little blackmail.” I leaned back and I looked at her. She was a smart girl. A very smart girl. Too smart, perhaps. “What kind of blackmail?” I said.

  “I’m not quite sure. But when a guy’s operating under a name that’s not his own — he’s open for it.”

  “Frayne knew that G. Phillips was Gordon Phelps?”

  “Sure she knew. That’s why she hooked him from me.”

  “Who told her?”

  “Search me. But that guy was set up like a pin in a bowling alley. Leave it to V. Frayne to roll the ball.”

  “What about S. Sierra?”

  “Now what the hell does that mean, lover?” She moved her glass aside, put her elbows on the table, clasped her hands, leaned her chin on her knuckles and stared at me.

  “Means,” I said, “that if he was a set-up for V. Frayne, he was just as much a set-up for S. Sierra. Logical?”

  “No.”

  “Why not, pray?”

  “Because, pray, there are people and people.”

  “Aren’t there, for sure,” I said.

  “There are people who are capable of blackmail, and there are people who are not.”

  “And Sophia Sierra is not?” I suggested.

  “You bet your ass she’s not.” Her Cuban temper loaded her eyes with fire. Her hand came across to my arm and I could feel the fingernails through my sleeve. Just for a fleeting irrelevant moment I thought about being in bed with her. “Oh, I’m no angel,” she said, “don’t think I’m trying to give you that idea. But there are people and people, and people are … complex, crazy, mixed-up. There are people who can kill but cannot steal. There are people who can steal but cannot kill. There are soft-hearted murderers and hard-hearted evangelists. There are people who can stick up a bank but they can’t blackmail a sucker. There are extortionists that go to church every Sunday and really believe in God. There are thieves who give most of their loot to charity, and there are charity workers who are truly thieves. There are blackmailers who think that pickpockets are criminals, and there are pickpockets who think that blackmailers stink to high heaven. People have all kinds of quirks about what’s right and wrong — ”

  “Okay,” I said. “There are people and people. What kind of people are you?”

  “I’m a people that thinks that blackmail is dirty and filthy and rotten. Now don’t get me wrong. I can work a bunco game, I can take a sucker for a ride like he’s on a toboggan, but I think that out-and-out blackmail is dirty and filthy and rotten — I could never go through with it. I couldn’t do blackmail if my life depended on it.”

  “Could Vivian Frayne?”

  “Sure-pop. Vivian was different people. She thought blackmail was smart, worked it pretty good in her lifetime.”

  “No kind word for the dead?” I said.

  “Oh, there was another side to Vivian Frayne, I’ll admit that. She could be good, kind, sweet — she was like a mother to most of the kids working in this joint, really like a mother, lent them money, worried over their problems, even gave them advice on their morals. That’s what I mean about people, lover, nobody yet has made a straight pattern for people. Now Vivian — ”

  “You didn’t particularly like her, did you?”

  “That G. Phillips briefed you pretty good, didn’t he?”

  “All the way,” I said.

  “Well, I hated that bitch.”

  “Enough to kill her?”

  “I admit I’ve got a temper.”

  “Temper enough to kill?”

  “Only when it’s at tip-top point.”

  “At what point was it with Vivian?”

  “It had cooled down to a simmer.” She smiled but her eyes remained serious. “You’re a nosey son of a bitch, aren’t you?”

  “I’m being paid to be nosey.”

  “Like how much?” she said. “Like five thousand dollars,” I said.

  Her posture eased. The smile grew broader. The eyes squinted. “At least that’s a respectable buck,” she said, “for being nosey.” Now she threw me a mellow bordello glance. “Guys like you make lots of money, don’t they?”

  “Enough,” I said, “for a fringe-type character. But fringe-type characters like Steve Pedi, I imagine, make more.”

  “Ah-ha,” she said. “Now we’re up to Steve Pedi.”

  “He threw you Phelps, didn’t he?”

  “Let’s say he recommended him.”

  “But as Gordon Phelps, not as an anonymous G. Phillips.”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “But Vivian had her hooks in right after you?”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Upon Pedi’s recommendation too?”

  “That’s a hundred percent wrong.”

  “All right,” I said, “let’s just stay on that for a moment, please. Pedi steered you to Phelps — as Phelps. Then Vivian moved in — because, according to Phelps himself, she knew who he was. Both you and Phelps seem certain that it wasn’t Pedi who gave her the tip-off. Now, why, please, so certain?”

  “Because Pedi wouldn’t be doing favors for Vivian. That’s simple enough, isn’t it?”

  “Why not?”

  “Look,” she said. “Vivian was an old-timer here. She was a very beautiful girl, she knew her way around, the customers loved her. But if she would have quit the joint, Steve wouldn’t have been too unhappy.”

  “So why didn’t he fire her?”

  “I just don’t think he had the nerve. She knew a lot of the ins-and-outs, she’d been here a hell of a long time. A girl like that can gossip. Why should Steve Pedi make an enemy?”

  “Why didn’t he like her?”

  “In a way, she was a pest. She stuck her nose into everything. If you can think of a shop-foreman in a dance hall — Vivian was the shop-foreman. Any girl had a beef, she’d go to Vivian, and Vivian would take it to the boss. A boss likes that like he likes a toothache. Even when there were no special beefs, Vivian took over with complaints to the boss. She was always on his neck. Maybe she thought she had that right, by seniority. In every business, you get one like that. A pain in the ass to the boss, but the boss just hasn’t the nerve to fire them.”

  “I’d like to meet this boss.”

  “How do you know he’d like to meet you?”

  “He’ll meet me,” I said. “What kind of a guy is he?”

  “A guy.”

  “Nice?”

  “Nice like hell.”

  Mildly I said, “Now that doesn’t sound real nice.”


  “Who gave you the idea that Steve Pedi was a nice guy?”

  “Nobody. I was just asking. Look, I’d like to go talk to him. Take me, huh?”

  “You’re liable to get bounced on your ear, lover.”

  “By whom?”

  “By an ape named Amos Knafke. Guardian of the portals.”

  “I’ll take my chances with Knafke.”

  “Think you’re big enough?”

  “If not, I’ll cut him down to size.”

  “At the risk of sounding sadistic,” she said, “this is a show I think I’m going to enjoy watching. I’ll play wet-nurse.”

  “To whom?”

  “To you.”

  “Be my guest,” I said. “In fact, be my guide.”

  TEN

  She led me to the carpeted stairway, the stragglers on the other side of the barrier eye-popping her like vultures glimpsing bait. She stalked through them, imperious, oblivious, and I followed. Heads turned, eyes glistened, tongues licked at dry lips. Even here, at the Nirvana, where the commodity was enticement for perpendicular performance, Sophia Sierra stood out amongst her shapely sisters, moving tall and disdainful, as heads turned and eyes glistened and tongues licked at dry lips. I followed her up the carpeted stairway, and along a carpeted hallway. At the door at the end stood a massive man like a languorous behemoth.

  “That’s Knafke,” she whispered.

  “I’m thrilled,” I said.

  “Yeah?” he grunted as we approached.

  “Steve Pedi,” I said.

  “So?” he said.

  He was an enormous man but he had the muscle-bound movements of most big men. A ponderous belly stood out like an idealist among politicians. He could be had, if you were quick, and that would be the point of attack, the belly: it was wide-open and vulnerable.

  “So who wants to see Mr. Pedi?” he said in a voice that sounded like gravel being sifted in a deep drum. “And furthermore he’s busy.”

  “Busy with whom?” I said.

  “Busy with himself.”

  “Please tell him,” I said.

  “What?”

  “That I’d like to see him.”

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “Peter Chambers. Please tell him.”

  Eyes drowned in the fat of a face veered to Sophia.

  “Who’s your boyfriend, Sophie?” he said.

  “He wants to see Mr. Pedi,” she said.

  “About what?” he said.

  “He wants to talk to him,” she said.

  The eyes came back to me. “If it’s a complaint, buster, we got a complaint department. Mr. Pedi don’t like no bother with the chumps.”

  “Amos,” I said, “kindly go in and tell Mr. Pedi a chump would like to talk to him. And kindly, Amos, shake up that fat ass of yours.”

  “That’s not nice language in front of a lady,” he said gleefully. “And how do you know I’m Amos?”

  “A birdie whispered to me. A pigeon.”

  “Oh, a wise weenie,” he said with pleasure. “How come I always get them?” A large paw reached for my neck and his smile was almost slobbering in anticipation.

  I hated myself for doing it.

  He got two quick fists to the belly and they went in deep. He grunted but he bent, resistantly, like strong flame in wind. A knee to the groin bent him further and then a judo-shot to the nape of the neck flattened him to the floor, comatose and breathing stentoriously. I was ashamed as I stepped over him and opened Pedi’s door.

  “After you,” I said.

  Her eyes were wild. “Wow, you’re crazy, you’re a crazy man.”

  I hated her too, but I hated myself more.

  She went through the open door and I followed her and closed it behind me. A handsome, white-faced man stood up behind a desk.

  “Yes?” he said. “What is it? Hello, Sophia.”

  “Hello,” she said and fell into a soft chair as though she were exhausted.

  “Yes, what is it, please?” he said.

  I looked about. It was a large room, its walls cluttered with autographed copies of photographs of celebrities. The furniture was tasteful, expensive and comfortable.

  “He wants to talk to you,” Sophia said.

  “Where’s Knafke?” he said and he frowned.

  He was tall and lean. His clothes were tailor-made, narrow-lapeled and high-gorged. He was slim and elegant, with hollow cheeks, a patrician nose, and black, intelligent eyes, slanted and foreign-looking in the white face.

  “Knafke is outside,” Sophia said.

  “Outside!” he said.

  “This is Peter Chambers,” Sophia said. “Mr. Chambers — Mr. Steve Pedi.”

  “How do you do?” I said.

  “Knafke?” he said, blinking uncomprehendingly. “Outside?”

  “I laid him out,” I said.

  He squinted at me. A hand went up to his hair, black hair, perfectly in place, tight against the sides, with a widow’s peak in front. “You did what? You laid out who?” he said.

  “Knafke,” I said, “if that’s the name of the gorilla who’s supposed to play Horatius to your bridge.” I do not like to admit it, but I was still impressing Sophia.

  Pedi’s mouth pulled thin against his teeth. He threw a glance at Sophia, another at me, came out from behind the desk, went to the door, opened it, cast a glance beyond, closed the door. He smiled with fine white teeth, every one of which was capped. He spoke to Sophia. “Who did you say this man was?”

  “I didn’t say who. All I said was his name.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Peter Chambers.”

  He came to me. He extended his hand and I took it. For a slender man he had a lot of strength in his hand. “I’m glad to know you,” he said. The capped teeth flashed brilliantly in a wider smile. “You wouldn’t want Knafke’s job, would you? Because if you would, you’re hired. Right now.”

  “I’m not available,” I said.

  “Too bad,” he said. “All right. What is it, please?” The door opened. Knafke lumbered in.

  “Where is he?” Knafke said. “Where is that mother-grabbing son of a bitch.”

  “I’m here,” I said, softly.

  “Get out of here, Amos,” Pedi said. “Out, please.” And as Knafke stood indecisively, Pedi repeated, “Out, out. Go watch the door.”

  Knafke looked at me, looked at Sophia, looked at his boss. Then his mouth twisted into a rueful fang-toothed smile. “Check,” he said to me, “only I wish you should try this some other time, buster. I would like you should try this again.”

  “Any time,” I said.

  “I wish,” Knafke said.

  “Out, out,” Pedi said. “Go watch the door.”

  “I only wish,” Knafke murmured, as he left, quietly closing the door.

  “All right, Mr. Chambers,” Pedi said. “What’s the beef?”

  “It’s personal, I think,” I said.

  “You mean you don’t want Sophia?” Pedi said.

  “It’s up to you,” I said. “It’s personal as far as you’re concerned, not me.”

  “Personal, like what?” he said.

  “Personal like Vivian Frayne,” I said.

  “You heard the man, Soph,” he said. “Will you wait for him downstairs, please.” His smile had very little mirth as he added: “Where’d you find him?”

  “I came to bring him a message,” she said.

  “Message,” he said in bewilderment.

  “She brought me a message,” I said.

  “Razzle-dazzle talk,” he said irritably. “Ring-around-the-rosy. Okay, that’s the way you want it, that’s the way you got it, it’s none of my business. Go wait for your friend downstairs, Soph. Please.”

  She rose, smiled at him, smiled at me, said, “See you,” and moved to the door.

  “Man, that’s a dress,” Steve Pedi said.

  “Thank you,” she said over her shoulder and went out.

  He lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, flicked
the match to an ashtray. He lounged against the edge of the desk, one knee moving impatiently.

  “All right,” he said, “let’s have it. What’s this all about?” He had a smooth, controlled voice — which suited him. That was the sum of him, smooth, controlled — fighting for the smoothness and control — the ulcer type.

  “Vivian Frayne,” I said.

  “You a cop?”

  “No.”

  “The cops have been here.”

  “Of course,” I said. “The gal worked here.”

  “What’s your interest, pal?”

  “I’m checking. I’m being paid to check.”

  “By whom?”

  “It’s not allowed that you talk when you’re being paid to check. Wouldn’t be fair potsy.”

  His voice suddenly had a bite like mustard. “All right, what do you want, Mac?”

  “I want to know if you threatened Vivian Frayne.”

  He turned his back on me. He scratched out the cigarette in an ashtray. When he turned back, a meditative frown sat on his face. “Mac,” he said seriously, “I got a few more around here like Amos. If I push a few buttons, I could have you chopped up like hamburger and thrown out on the seat of your ass.”

  “Why should you push buttons, Mac?”

  “You know my name.”

  “And you know mine, Mac. So why should you want to push buttons?”

  “Because you’re poking around, and I don’t like pokers. Now you want to play ball, okay, we play ball. If not, I’m starting to push buttons — Mac.”

  “What kind of ball, Stevie?”

  “You want to level, Petie?”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “Want to tell me who told you I threatened Vivian?”