Knife at My Back

by Lawrence Lariar

  “I don’t mean the plot. I mean the girl. The girl in that Cuban film.”

  “I don’t quite understand.”

  “Her face. Do you remember it?”

  “Unfortunately, no. When a stag reel is shown, who looks at the faces, Conacher? I have a big library of films. You didn’t expect me to remember the face of each girl?”

  He went into a rambling dissertation on the stag reel business, running over his reasons for collecting the junk, trying to justify the hobby no man can really rationalize. Lasker had the keen and probing perception of a man twenty years younger. He spoke slowly but fluently, explaining his collection as only a sop for his business contacts and customers. He worked hard to convince me that whatever he showed in the privacy of his exhibition chamber had nothing at all to do with his home life with Grace Lasker. He artfully brought in his most recent business deals and showed me that most of them were handled successfully after the unwilling customers were treated to a few hours of entertainment in his small viewing room. He had an old man’s tongue, given to long and windy circumlocution. So that I had to bring him back to the present after a while.

  “How about your wife?” I asked. “Did she ever see these films?”

  Lasker reacted to my question with a change of pace. A dull spot of color blossomed on his ancient cheeks and he gripped his chair arm until the knuckles whitened. “But of course not. What kind of a question is that, Conacher? Do you think I’m crazy?”

  “Skip it. I didn’t mean that you showed them to her. Could she have seen them by herself?”

  “It’s possible. When I went to the office, I suppose she could, if she wanted to.”

  “She knew about your film library?”

  “It was no secret, Conacher. I already explained to you why I collected and showed them. Grace understood, of course. After all, she came out of show business herself, didn’t she? Grace was sophisticated and wise.”

  “Did she ever meet Repp?”

  “I never did business with him at home.”

  “But she might have known his name? You might have mentioned it to her?”

  “Why not?” Lasker nodded. “My wife was a wonderful woman, Conacher, not like most of them. She was interested in my business. She always knew what was going on with me. Therefore, I must admit she could have known about Repp. Grace and I always had long talks, every day, a habit she had that made me happy. After we ate at night, sitting together, we would talk. What a wonderful brain she had! Everything was interesting to her. Can you imagine, a woman letting herself become interested in a business like mine, even? She had facts at her fingertips, a smart, smart woman.”

  “But she wasn’t active in your business?”

  “Oh, no,” said Lasker softly. “Not that. Grace was much too clever to try anything like that. Instead, she only advised me.”

  “How about her private life?” I asked. “Did she do anything on her own? Anything in the business line?”

  “Stocks, a little, yes. She played the market.”

  “She had her own money?”

  “But of course,” Lasker said, surprised at my ignorance. “Grace had all the money she wanted. She was quite successful in the stock market.”

  “How much money would you say she owned?”

  “I never checked, Conacher. But plenty. She banked at the Tenth National.”

  He seemed sorry to see me go, coaxing me with the bottle, trying to snare me into more small talk. His loneliness returned to mask his face with gloom and quiet sadness when he left me at the door. I shook his hand and walked off, conscious of his figure behind me, still standing there, his almost colorless eyes lost in the gray and solitary world of the bereaved.

  I crossed the garden and strolled into the shadows of the main building. I checked Paul Forstenburg’s office. Paul was gone, but Jorgenson sat in his usual spot, his beefy frame sweating freely, his big brogans on the desktop. Jorgenson was barking something at the cop who had plucked me off the road to Taylorville. The cop just stood there, taking it and shaking his head on a well-oiled hinge.

  I abandoned the tableau and backtracked along the side of the alley and toward the staff building. Lili was still awake, her window the only yellow oblong of light in the building. I entered by the rear door to the hail and opened Jorgenson’s door.

  A man reveals the hidden facets of his personality by the way he maintains his lodgings. Jorgenson’s nest gave me the screaming meemies. He was a disorganized type of lodger, his room a riot of unrest and upset, despite the fact that the hotel maid had cleaned it earlier. Jorgenson swilled liquor. Three dead soldiers sat on his bureau, and around and about the room, his ashtrays told me that he liked company. Of all types. Several of the butts were stained with a dark and flashy crimson. I pocketed a few of them for future reference.

  The room was small enough to examine thoroughly in a few minutes. Jorgenson had obviously used the bed. The throw was pulled back and the blanket top showed signs of physical exertion, the pillows rumpled, the base of the blanket marked with dirt where somebody’s filthy shoes had ruined it. The cloying, teasing smell of a violent perfume hung over the bed, a type of musk used by the deeply sexual babes who must telegraph their desires by way of their personal aromas. I turned the mattress and tested it for extra lumps. Jorgenson had hidden no bundle of loot here, nor had he cached it anywhere else in the room. I laughed softly at my zany impulse to check the hick cop, the stubborn anxiety that moved me out into the secret alleys of the night.

  Night? It would be morning in a few hours. Around me, the room rang with silence, the sticky quiet that comes when the night is almost dead and the dawn threatens to break over the hills. A watch ticked loudly from Jorgenson’s bureau. Out on a distant tree, a bird hooted and the echoes ran down the valley and lost themselves in the inscrutable distances. Somewhere close to me, through the depth of a wall, a man snored. A bedspring squealed. A mouse played games in the floorboards. It was, a time for slumber. A time for rest.

  So I rubbed my eyes and slipped out of Jorgenson’s room and continued my wanderings. Out here, the narrow hall was a box of sibilant whisperings. A small breeze had come up and it stirred against the outer walls, brushing and flicking against hidden windows. A weak and glimmering light glowed up ahead, where the hall turned sharply to the right. The rest of the hall was bathed in gloom, the vague shadows converting the corridor into a mystic gray path, down which I must move to the front door.

  I moved. But somebody moved ahead of me.

  It was Lili.

  She came through the doorway on her toes, her direction planned and purposeful. She didn’t turn her head my way. My mind struggled to bring the layout of the building into focus, to guess at her destination. But everything was lost to me in the moment of following her. I allowed her to pass the end of the corridor and turn left. Then I ran up and edged close to the wall at the turn, watching her as she started for a door on the right side of the wall.

  Lili knocked and waited. She was moving with a controlled and calculated purpose. Impatience showed itself in the way she tapped her slipper and waited for the answer to her knock. She was wearing a light and silky ensemble, yellow pajamas tied with a bright red sash. Her face still sported her ritual make-up, fresh and sparkling even in the dimly lit hall. From where I stood, the rise and fall of her breasts punctuated her mood, the fullness of her torso straining against the confining silk, her head forward in an attitude of expectant hostility. The corners of her passionate mouth were drawn down in a sulking pout, as mean and nasty as a dirty word. Lili was scowling and frowning mightily as she rapped again. Louder this time, but still under control.

  “Scummy little crumb!” she whispered at the door panel.

  And then it opened and Lili moved into smooth action. It was all underplayed and deliberate. She wanted no show of violence, no activity that might breed noise. She pushed forw
ard against the door as soon as it opened. She wedged herself against it and began to mutter a few quiet obscenities.

  “Open up, you little punk,” she hissed.

  “Take it easy,” a voice said. It was the voice of Manny Erlich and it came in a softer whisper than Lili’s, a guttural growl that might have been calculated to hold her where she stood.

  But Lili would not be held.

  “Let me in,” Lili hissed again.

  “What in hell for?”

  “A visit, you stinker.”

  “At this hour? Are you drunk again?”

  “I’ve been sitting up, Manny. I want in.”

  “Why? You’ll have to break it down for me,” Manny insisted.

  “You want me to give a small yell?” Lili hoarsed. “I know she’s in there, see? And I’m coming in after her.”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Now,” said Lili and pressed against the door. She breathed hard and he fought her there. From behind Manny Erlich, I caught the sound of another feminine Voice, a dull gasp that told me nothing.

  Then the battle swung Lili’s way. Manny must have been having trouble with his bandaged hands. I heard him spew a quick flood of choice epithets, and then the door sank under Lili’s weight and she was edging her powerful frame inside. Even under normal circumstances Manny would have been no much for the ex-athlete. She heaved again and he fell back through the door and Lili strode inside, the conquering Amazon.

  I edged across the hall for a better point of observation. In the shadow of the stairway opposite the door, I saw Lili jerk into action in there. The door was wide open and framed the tableau for me. Lili marched past Manny and approached her target for tonight.

  And the target was Darlene.

  “I figured I’d find you here, you little bitch,” Lili whispered.

  Darlene was caught with her proverbial britches down. She had a light robe around her, hugging it desperately. It was a masculine wrapper, part of Manny’s impeccable wardrobe. But on Darlene, it looked silly. Lili stepped in close and ripped the robe out of Darlene’s hands, a sudden tactic that caught the rhumba queen off balance and left her standing there, as nude as one of Hugo Repp’s pornographies She was a vision of sunburned loveliness standing that way. But the vision was out of place, like a strip tease queen at a sewing circle. Her mouth curled nastily and she exploded in an evil word, aided and abetted by a quick lunge at Lili that almost floored her.

  But not quite. Lili sidestepped her and grabbed for the flowing hair as she swept past.

  “Whore!” she spat, still holding her voice under complete control. “So you thought you’d play with Manny, eh?”

  “Easy,” Manny whispered, wedging himself between them. “If you wake people, there’ll be hell to pay, Lili!”

  But Lili had no intention of waking anybody. The scene began to blossom with an idiotic continuity. Quietly, in the most controlled infighting I ever saw, Lili went to work on her naked rival. And just as quietly, Darlene prepared to parry her blows and bring her to earth. It was a situation ripe for a madhouse. Manny could do nothing but struggle to quiet them with whispered entreaties. His hands were useless under the gauze and bandages. He fought to put himself between them, but Lili was dedicated to her task and she had the cunning and the muscle for the job.

  Darlene squirmed for a good grip, her hands clawing at Lili’s hair and finding their target, jerking her head back and then adjusting herself for a sneak punch. But Lili knew all the rules of maul and tackle. Lili encircled Darlene’s waist with her powerful arms and heaved her skillfully to the floor and sat on her and lashed out at her face with her openhands. It was a frantic scene, an opera conceived by an idiot, soundless and wordless and built for mayhem without dialogue. Lili slapped hard at her adversary’s jaw and her open hand connected and the noise of her brutality added the only note of excitement to the otherwise silent struggle. Manny moved in then and managed to clip his arms around his erstwhile flame. He pulled hard and Lili fell back and Darlene recovered herself in time to spill over them and claw valiantly at her rival. She must have connected, finally, because I heard Lili let fly with a small shrill squeak of surprise.

  And then Darlene opened her mouth to scream.

  And I stepped inside and broke it up.

  The struggle ended abruptly as I moved in. They were all equally shocked to find me there, but Manny recovered first.

  “Jesus, but I’m glad to see you, Steve,” he said, hiding his embarrassment in a painful grimace at his hands. He had hurt himself and hopped around flapping his arms like a wounded duck. “A little more time and these dames would have had everybody in the hotel here at ringside.”

  “A little more time, and Lili would have had to find a new face,” said Darlene, breathing lustily in the pause. She stood at the bed, still glaring at her wrestling mate. “She’s drunk as a bar rag.”

  “Bitch!” spat Lili. “I’m not finished with you yet.”

  “For tonight, you are,” I said. “Get dressed, Darlene. I’ll take you back to your room.”

  “And I’m not taking orders from you, either,” Darlene snapped. The exertion of her womanly warfare had left her breathless and out of control. Her eyes seemed strangely damp and dewy in the quick moment of her passion. Something burned behind her mask of beauty, an animal passion I hadn’t thought she could muster.

  “Better take them from me,” I said. “Or you’ll be taking them from Jorgenson.”

  “I’ve had enough of Jorgenson tonight.”

  “So I’ve heard. Put your drawers on and let’s get out of here.”

  “Better do as he says,” Manny suggested. He approached Lili, who now stood at the window, rubbing her arms savagely and making faces at the great outdoors. He touched her tentatively, but she shrugged away his hand with a violence that made him start. “You, too, Lili. Time to hit the hay.”

  “Not yet, lover boy. You and I have to talk.”

  “Tomorrow, Lili.”

  “Tonight,” she muttered, wheeling to show him the depth of her angry purpose. “Tonight, or never, understand?”

  “Tonight then.” Manny shrugged.

  I left them that way. Darlene was dressed and already shaking herself past me, striding down the hall, her high heels clacking out a noisy rhythm. I closed the door on Lili and Manny and beat it after Darlene. I caught her as she ran down the last step to the lawn, and grabbed her arm and held her alongside me.

  “Where do you think you’re going, sweetheart?” I asked.

  “To bed, of course.”

  “Not yet.”

  “What did you have in mind, little man?”

  “Talk,” I said, and jerked her off the path with a ferocity that made her gasp. “Just you and I, under the green trees, baby.”

  She didn’t fight me too hard.

  CHAPTER 15

  No detective on earth can plumb the hidden corners of a clever doll’s cranium. She will swear on an assortment of Bibles, she will mouth the pat phrases and show you the depths of her limpid eyes, she will let you feel her honesty by way of her simple and girlish smile. And all along, you will listen to the little man behind your ears and know that she is lying. Like the way Darlene was lying to me now, on the hard bench near the garden.

  “All right, it may sound crazy to you, Steve,” she said, with quiet shivers, rubbing her arms against the early morning chill. “It may sound positively nuts, but I’m telling you the honest truth. I’m in love with Manny Erlich.”

  “What has he got?” I asked.

  “Don’t be corny,” Darlene said. “Manny is charming. And we have so much in common, really. You take show business, for instance. Manny is simply wild about dancing, all kinds of dancing. And he thinks I’ve got talent. Can you blame me for falling in love with the man?”

  “What’s the deal? He promise to promote you
?”

  “And if he did?”

  “I’m only asking. Did he?”

  “Well, yes,” she said, with the proper pause for emphasizing her unwillingness to let me have this crumb of ambitious scheming. “Manny wants to put me in his show.”

  “Which show?”

  “He’s planning a big one, next spring. Broadway. He’s got plenty of backing, you know. Lots of people think he’ll murder them on Broadway. Manny has a terrific amount of talent, Steve. He’s always planning for the future. He’s dreamed up a swell musical—and I’m helping him with some of it.”

  “The bedroom scenes?”

  “Kill it,” Darlene said angrily. “I told you I was in love with the man.”

  “You think you can cut in on Lili?”

  “Lili doesn’t know when she’s through. But Manny’ll tell her off.”

  “Manny’s quite a boy.”

  “Are you finished now?” She shivered. “I’m going to hate myself for this in the morning, Steve.”

  “Repp,” I said. “I want to talk to you about Repp. How long was he a rhumba customer?”

  “He wasn’t.”

  “What were you teaching him in his bedroom?”

  “Nothing. He met me in the bar. He said he was interested in some lessons, and would I come up to his room to talk. Don’t look at me that way, Steve. It’s happened before and it’ll happen again. The middle-aged ones are always anxious for a session in the bedroom. They like to make passes while discussing the rhumba. Repp looked as if he might be loaded. So I went to his room for a crack at him.”

  “And how were you doing when I walked in?”

  “You spoiled my sale, you little louse.”

  “Anybody know you were up there?”

  “Maybe some of the people at the bar might have heard me make the date.”

  “Who? Try to remember.”

  “Quite a few characters were standing around when Repp made his play for me.” Darlene fingered her lush lip and slipped into a reminiscent mood. “Don Trask, Buddy Binns, and a couple of others.”