I checked my hat—I hadn’t worn the Burberry—and we passed by a bar with a Rat Pack feel and were quickly seated in a dining room where log-siding hugged booths that corralled thirty or so tables with chairs. The upper walls were smooth and decorated with muskets, Winchesters, and Indian artifacts.
Dorena had a Pink Lady, and mine was Four Roses and ginger. We sipped while we waited for our steaks to come. We chatted.
“Do you expect me,” she said with a twinkle, “to believe you picked this place by chance?”
“Whatever do you mean,” I said flatly. I don’t twinkle.
She leaned forward, as if to keep this revelation from the several vacant tables beside our booth; the dining room was only lightly populated. “This Abe character is who my brother Dex is into, for a small fortune.”
“Do tell.”
“No, you tell. You can’t suspect Abe What’s-It of killing Jamison… or my father, for heaven’s sake.”
“That’s right. I don’t.”
She eyed me with friendly suspicion. “You’re here for my brother. What, to make his case for being good for the money?”
That was close enough. “Exactly,” I said.
She sat back. “Well, that’s fine by me. I think it’s terrible the way some people prey on the weaknesses of others.”
“If they didn’t,” I said with a shrug, “what would you have to write plays about?”
She gave me a chin-crinkling grin. “You’re making fun of me, aren’t you?”
“Not at all. Anyway, not very.”
She leaned forward conspiratorially again. “Do you need extra money?”
“Who doesn’t?”
“I mean… for doing this for Dex.”
“No. He asked for a favor and I’m giving it to him. You’ve already been plenty generous.”
When she had finished her queen filet and I’d put away my New York Strip, I ordered us another round of drinks. As we sipped those, I asked, “Will I be making anybody jealous tonight?”
“What do you mean?”
“Surely a lovely girl like you has a man in her life. Or men.”
Dorena shook her head; the beret kept up with her. She looked like Bonnie Parker if a Hollywood star played her.
“Nobody,” she said.
“Well, I count myself lucky I caught you between suitors.” I kept that light, but she really was a beautiful thing. Also a client. And there was Velda to consider. Did I mention she was a beautiful thing?
“I’ve had men in my life,” she admitted. “But it never lasts.”
“Why is that? Have they been out of their minds?”
She sipped her Pink Lady. “Maybe I’m hard to get along with.”
“I can’t see that. Are you afraid they’re only after your money?”
“Good grief,” she said, smiling, “I won’t get my money for a lot of years.”
But it was a lot of money.
“Anyway,” she said, shrugging, “most of the guys I’ve dated were of the same… financial class.”
That made sense. Minnows ran with minnows, sharks with sharks.
“Well,” I said, “you being available is a mystery this detective can’t solve.”
She said nothing. She had that blankness a beautiful woman can get when she’s thinking.
I said, “I’m prying. I’m sorry. It’s my detective’s nature.”
A smile blossomed—a tiny one, as usual coral-tinged, but it did blossom. “Mike, with the last guy… I broke it off. I always break it off.” A tiny shrug. “And I think the word has gotten around. I can’t say the phone has been ringing off the hook.”
“Do they get too fresh, these men you break it off with?”
She laughed. Damn near giggled. “No! I’m no virgin.”
“Duly noted. Then why?”
Her sigh was deep and troubled. No giggling now. “Getting serious with anyone is out of the question. Getting married… it’s just not for me.”
I reached across and patted her hand. “Honey, you’d make some lucky slob a great wife. And some lucky kids a wonderful mother. Look at how you handle Chickie.”
And she started to cry.
I came around on her side of the booth, slid in, and slipped an arm around her. She was dabbing her eyes with a clean corner of her napkin.
She swallowed. “Sorry… sorry.”
“I’m sorry, doll. I caused this. What did I say?”
“It’s just… Chickie… the way he is… the kind of child I might have…”
And I knew what it was that so terrified her: her brother’s condition might be genetic, and she might carry that into a marriage, and motherhood. Pat had told me, and now so had she.
“Have you talked to the medics about it?”
She shook her head.
I shook mine. “Then these are just fears, not facts. I understand why you feel them, but you need to check this out and—”
“What Chickie has,” she said, “isn’t something the doctors know about.”
“Well, sure it is, honey.”
But she shook her head again, firmly, and I could tell there was no talking to her about it. I squeezed her shoulder, kissed her cheek, and got back across from her in the booth.
Then she excused herself and went off to fix her make-up. Light as she preferred it, that shouldn’t take long. It didn’t. She looked fresh and young again, getting in the booth across from me. I hated that she was suffering from what had to be a misconception about her situation.
“Now, it was not my intention,” I said, “to spoil your evening. What say we go have a little fun? What’s your pleasure? Roulette? Blackjack?”
“Oh, no,” she said, eyes wide. “I’m too intimidated to really gamble. I’m afraid slots are my speed.”
“Nothing wrong with that.”
The casino took up a wing, and to get in, you had to be a member of the Log Cabin Club. It cost five whole bucks. Dorena was already a member. Inside, the cabin motif continued, bottom third of the walls log-siding, upper two-thirds smooth and all cowboys and Indians. Slots were lined up against every wall like St. Valentine’s Day victims, and three roulette tables were going, business in here much better than in the dining room.
There were half a dozen blackjack stations, and toward the back some poker tables. Cute waitresses in short, fringed cowgirl skirts and Dale Evans hats were threading through, giving gamblers free drinks. I also noted half a dozen burly types in tuxedos who did not look like social directors.
I gave Dorena a twenty to get some quarters for the slots, and she protested, but I told her she could pay me back when she turned forty. She was just heading for the window to get herself some quarters when I spotted Dex, and I stopped her with a gentle hand on her arm.
“Who’s that with your brother?”
I was referring to a brick-shithouse brunette with short, curly hair, wearing a paisley red-green-black sheath that hugged her the way most men would like to. Her face was heart-shaped, her nose pug, her lips lush and very red-lipsticked.
“That’s Dex’s latest,” she said offhandedly. “Brenda Something.”
That’s how Wake had put it. Maybe her last name was Something.
I asked, “What do you know about her?”
“She works in a beauty shop. She’d like to be rich someday. What else do you need to know?”
“Doesn’t she already have a husband?”
“Not a rich one. Anyway, they’re separated, Dex says. But that doesn’t stop the husband from getting jealous.”
“Thanks,” I said, and shooed her toward the nearest wall of slots.
I went over to where Dex could see me and nodded and smiled at him, and he nodded back. He was concentrating. Brenda Something, at his side, gave me one of those looks. You know the kind. The I-could-have-her-if-I-wanted variety. Why aren’t all girls so friendly?
Here’s the thing about Dex playing blackjack: he stunk.
He split tens, hit on hard fifteen when the deal
er had a six up, and stood on an ace three. When he lost, he would double the size of his next bet, apparently thinking he’d only need to win once to get even. Sucker play.
No wonder he was in so deep to the house.
I was keeping an eye on the bouncer types. Two of them were talking, half a room away, nodding toward me. One nodded again and went off somewhere. I figured I’d been made. So much for no such thing as bad publicity.
Fifteen minutes disappeared, and so did fifteen-hundred of Dex’s dollars. He was hunkered over with the miserable look of a guy who had been working an assembly line for way too long. Then Brenda whispered in his ear and she drifted off.
I followed her to the ladies’ room and, not being a pervert, waited till she came back out before approaching her.
“How about a real drink?” I asked her.
“Pardon?” She gave me that toss of the head that tells a man that he’s gone too far and hasn’t gone far enough.
I gave her an openly lecherous grin. “You’re better than these watered-down free drinks. You can only watch your boy friend lose for so long before it gets depressing.”
She laughed a little and said, “I’ll say,” and took the elbow I offered.
We sat at the bar. I had another Four Roses and ginger and she ordered a Daiquiri.
“You’re Brenda,” I said, when we’d both finished our first drinks.
She was sitting sideways, facing me, her legs crossed. They were nice legs, dress hiked a little. She had red kitten heels on. Subtle she was not, but I liked her.
“How do you know my name?” she wondered.
“I asked somebody. Do you have a last name?”
“Sure. Everybody does.”
“What is it?”
“Sundein.”
Close to “Something,” at that.
She asked, “Do you have a first name?”
“Mike. I have a last name, too.”
She shrugged. “I don’t really care. What do you think about a guy who takes a girl out and ignores her?”
I was doing that at the moment with Dorena. “He’s a louse.”
“Why do I stick with a guy like that?”
“Well, isn’t he a Dunbar? Don’t they have dough?”
She sighed. “They do. Not right now, maybe. But eventually.”
“Didn’t you used to have a ring on the fourth finger of your left hand?” I could see the white ghost of it. “A diamond maybe?”
She leered at me. “Why, did you find it?”
I leered at her. “Why, did you lose it?”
She laughed heartily at that; snorted a little. Possibly not her first Daiquiri of the night.
“Did you used to have a husband?” I asked. “Or do you still have one?”
“In between.”
“What does that mean?”
“We’re separated. Not his idea, but… we’re separated.”
“That’s too bad.”
“No it isn’t.”
“Too bad for him, I mean. Losing out on a dish like you.”
“You’re a little fresh,” she said, but she liked it.
I made my Four Roses and ginger last, but after her third Daiquiri, she proposed that we go outside and get a little fresh air. She had the keys to Dex’s Lincoln and suggested we sit in back for a while and talk. That seemed like a fine idea to me.
Her kisses were hot and sticky and sloppy as hell, but not a bad time at all, and when I asked her, “Why did you break up with him?” (meaning her husband), she kissed me again, and her tongue went looking for my tonsils. Then she backed away a full three inches from my face and said, “He’s unreasonably jealous.”
That’s as far as it went—some necking, some very heavy petting, but my fly and her dress stayed zipped. It was our first date, after all. I leaned against the Lincoln and lit up a Lucky. She was standing where the moonlight let her fix her make-up; she’d brought her purse along for the fun.
The guy came out of nowhere. He was tall enough to be the original Honest Abe, and had the same kind of sinewy look as that legendary wrestling president. Narrow-faced, handsome in a Senior Boy Most Likely To Succeed sort of way, he was in a sportshirt and slacks and a rage.
He yanked her by the arm and almost hurled her to the gravel. “Is this him?” he snarled, pointing his finger at me. “Is this your rich boy friend?”
Her eyes were white all around. “Roger, stay away from me. I’ll get a court order!”
He shoved her and she went down on her ass.
That was enough. I tossed the cig and grabbed him by the arm and swung him around, right into my right fist. Now he was on his ass. Brenda, sitting, leaning on her hands, started laughing.
I’d hit him hard, but he didn’t care. He came up all at once, fists ready, charging like a bull. I kicked him in the stomach and he went down, retching. I was just about to kick his teeth in when I felt Brenda at my side, tugging on my arm, saying, “That’s enough, Mike. That’s enough.”
And it was. She was beating the poor bastard up bad enough for the both of us. I walked her back inside, and she ducked into the bathroom again, then emerged to return to watching Dex lose.
I went into the men’s john and splashed some water on my face; otherwise, I was none the worse for wear. Hadn’t been much of a scuffle.
Dorena was winning. The tray below her slot machine was swimming with quarters. She smiled at me. “What have you been up to?”
“The usual. Picking up women and making out with them.”
“Oh, you. Are you ready to go?”
“No, keep playing. I need to try to see somebody.”
I had already spotted the door with the sign that said OFFICE—PRIVATE. A burly bastard with shoulders so broad you had to look at them one at a time was standing by that door like a eunuch guarding the entrance to a harem. I didn’t know they made tuxes that big.
I approached him with a smile, hoping he was muscle-bound enough to make handling him as easy as Brenda Something’s spouse. Or Brenda for that matter.
“Mike Hammer,” I said, figuring word was around that I was on the premises, “to see Mr. Hazard.”
The guy had the sloping brow that goes with the job, and little flecks of white scar here and there. He had a blond crew cut, and you could smell the Butch Wax.
“You expected?” he asked, spitting the words like tobacco.
“No,” I said, “but ask Abe if he’ll see me.”
He thought about that, as still as a statue and just as intelligent. Then he said, “You’re that Mike Hammer?”
“How many are there?”
“Would you stand for a frisk?”
“No. But I’m unarmed.” And I was.
“Then why wooden cha stand for a frisk?”
“Because I don’t like men’s hands on me.”
He thought about that. That seemed reasonable.
“You stay here,” he advised me pointlessly, and went in.
The eunuch wasn’t gone long. He opened the door for me and gestured graciously. I went in alone.
Abe Hazard got up from behind a big old oaken desk as scarred as his bodyguard’s face. Abe was short and fat but rather handsome, Robert Taylor’s head on Stubby Kaye’s body. He wore a beard like that of his namesake, a fun touch for the rubes.
He offered a plump hand for me to shake. What the hell. I shook it.
“It’s been years, Mike,” he said.
I knew of him but didn’t remember ever meeting him. I said, “A long time.”
“Also, we have mutual friends.”
If he meant Carl Evello, who I tricked a stooge into killing, we did.
I said, “Small world.”
He nodded to the chair opposite the desk. I took it. The office was nothing fancy, the same log-siding below and smooth cream walls above. A couch against one wall showed the wear of a body using it, and a couple of file cabinets huddled in one corner, as if waiting for a raid; on the walls were framed pictures of Abe and celebrities who�
��d stopped by the Log Cabin: Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Joe DiMaggio.
My host folded his hands on his uncluttered desk as if about to say grace. “My staff told me we had a celebrity in the house.”
His “staff” were those Neanderthal types in tuxes.
I gestured to the wall of frames. “Did you want to take my picture?”
He laughed. “No, Mike, I just wanted to say hello. And, uh, my people noticed you were watching my pal Dex Dunbar playing blackjack.”
“I was. He’s lousy. No wonder you consider him a pal.”
His smile had a plastered-on look. “I saw in the News that you were the one who found that butler’s body.”
“I found half of it.”
He offered me a cigar in a brass humidor. I shook my head. He selected one and got it going.
“So,” my host said, “is that what brings you to the area? Dex and the other Dunbars?”
“Are we just making conversation, or is this business? I’m prepared to talk business, if you are.”
Cigar smoke seeped through his smile. “All right, Mike. I’ll bite. What is your business with me?”
“Dexter Dunbar is into you heavy. One hundred grand heavy—judging by the way I saw him playing tonight, probably more by now.”
Abe shrugged a bulky shoulder.
I continued: “I understand you’ve been leaning on him to pay up. Yet you know he doesn’t have the dough right now. So it’s a dodge to get him to sign over a healthy chunk of his inheritance.”
Abe’s hands were still folded. He was twiddling his goddamn thumbs. “That is business, Mike… just not yours.”
“Actually it is. Somebody took two shots at Dex a few days ago. He wants me to find out who might want him dead. I was thinking maybe nobody wanted him dead. Maybe somebody just wanted to spook him a little.”
“And you think I might have done that?”
“Not you personally. Maybe one of your bully boys out there, if any of their thick clumsy paws can still hold a rod.”
The plastered-on smile started to crack. “That’s a very old-fashioned word, Mike—rod. You’re like something out of another time.”
“So is my .45. But it gets the job done.”
He sighed. Shook his head a little. The handsome face on the circus fat-man body worked up a frown. “Threats. Tough talk. This is the sixties, Mike. That time is over. Don’t be a relic.”
The Will to Kill Page 9