The Jack-O’-Lantern Nightclub was typical of dozens of other little nightclubs that clustered through the French Quarter. There was a floor show of sorts, half a dozen hostesses, and tables crowded into three rambling rooms which had been merged together by a process of knocking out doors and making full-length openings where windows had been. Out in front a dozen publicity pictures of the various performers in the floor show were exhibited in a large, glass-covered frame.
It was early, and the place hadn’t as yet begun to fill up. There were a few stragglers here and there. A sprinkling of soldiers, some sailors, four or five older couples, evidently tourists, determined to “see the sights” and starting early.
I found a table to myself, sat down, and ordered a Coke and rum. When it came, I stared down into the dark depths of the drink with a lugubrious expression of acute loneliness.
Within a few minutes a girl came over. “Hello, sour-puss.”
I managed a grin. “Hello, bright-eyes.”
“That’s better. You look as though you needed cheering up.”
“I do.”
She came over and stood with her elbows on the back of the chair opposite, waiting for my invitation. She didn’t expect me to get up, and seemed surprised when I did.
“How about a drink?” I asked.
She said, “I’d love one.” She looked around as I was seating her, hoping some of the others would notice.
A waiter popped up from nowhere.
“Whisky and plain water,” she ordered.
“What’s yours?” he asked me.
“I’ve got mine.”
He said, “You get two drinks for a dollar when one of the girls sits at the table with you. Or you get one drink for a dollar.”
I handed him a dollar and a quarter and said, “Give my drink to the girl. Keep the quarter for change, and don’t bother me for a while.”
He grinned, took the money, and brought the girl a medium-sized glass filled with a pale amber fluid.
She didn’t even bother to pretend, but tossed it down straight as though performing a chore, then pushed the empty glass out in front of her where it bore eloquent testimony to the fact that she was being neglected.
I reached for it before she could snatch the glass away, and smelled it.
She said, somewhat angrily, “Why is it that all you wise guys think you’re being so cute when you do that? Of course it’s cold tea. What did you expect?”
“Cold tea,” I said.
“Well, you’re not disappointed. If my stomach can stand it, you shouldn’t kick.”
“I’m not kicking.”
“Most of them do.”
“I don’t.”
I reached down in my pocket, pulled out a five-dollar bill, let her see the figure on it, then folded it so it was concealed in my hand, and slid the hand halfway across the table. “Marilyn in here tonight?” I asked.
“Yes. That’s Marilyn, the girl standing up by the piano. She’s the big-shot hostess, runs things, and spots us girls around at the different tables.”
“She sent you over here?”
“Yes.”
“What would happen if we started fighting?”
“We wouldn’t. It takes two to make a fight. As long as you were buying drinks, I wouldn’t fight. When you quit buying drinks, I wouldn’t be here to fight with.”
“Suppose we didn’t get along?”
“Then you wouldn’t be buying drinks, would you?”
“No.”
She grinned. “Well, then I wouldn’t be here.”
“Would Marilyn send you back?”
“No. If you stayed here, she’d try you with another girl. Then if you didn’t loosen up, she’d let you sit here and mope all by yourself unless the place got crowded. If it did, and they needed the table, they’d get rid of you. Is that what you wanted to know?”
Her hand slid across toward mine.
“Most of it,” I said. “What’s your name?”
Her hand hesitated. “Rosalind. What else do you want?”
“How could you get Marilyn to come over here and sit at this table?”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. She looked around the room and said, “I think I could arrange it.”
“How?”
“Tell her that you like her style, and kept looking at her instead of playing up to me, that I thought she could hustle a few commission checks on the side before the place filled up. She’d fall for that.”
“Think you could do that?”
“I’d try.”
Her fingers touched mine. The five-dollar bill traded hands.
“Anything else?” she asked.
“How about Marilyn?” I asked. “Is she a good scout?”
“She’s all right, but she’s been off her feed for the last four or five weeks. She fell awful hard and had a jolt. A girl’s a fool to fall for anybody in this racket.”
“How’s the best way to get along with her? What’s the line of approach?”
“With Marilyn?”
“Yes.”
The girl grinned. “That’s easy. Buy her drinks and slip her a dollar on the side when no one’s looking.”
“How about her love affair? That fellow didn’t make her by buying her drinks, did he?”
“No. A man who buys her drinks is a sucker to her — say, mind if I tell you something?”
“Go ahead.”
“I’m going to give you a tip. You look like a right sort. Don’t monkey with Marilyn.”
“I want something from her.”
“Don’t get it.”
“I mean information.”
“Oh.”
There was silence for a little while. I caught the waiter looking at me and motioned him over. I handed him another dollar and a quarter and said, “Another drink for the lady.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” she said after he left.
“Why not?”
“Because Marilyn might not fall for that line I’m going to hand her. That would only go where you’re not buying me very many drinks. If you kept on buying me drinks, she’d know darn well I wouldn’t give a hang who you looked at.”
“Mercenary, eh?” I asked, smiling.
She said, “You’re damn right I’m mercenary. What did you think this was, love at first sight?”
I laughed.
She said somewhat wistfully, “It may be at that. You’re a good kid. You can always tell them, the fellows that treat us like ladies... Marilyn’s turning around. Start staring at her. I’ll pretend I’m sore.”
I stared at Marilyn. She was rather tall, slender, with dark hair, somewhat deep-set black eyes, and a mouth made up so that the lips were a thick, crimson smear across the olive of her face.
I saw her start to turn away, then suddenly turn back, and realized that the girl at my table had given her some sort of a signal.
For a moment she looked full at me, and I caught the impact of her dark, feverish eyes; then she turned away, standing so that I could see the long curves of her body beneath the red gown which clung to her like wet silk.
Rosalind said, “She’s feeling pretty low today. She was a witness on that murder case.”
“You mean the lawyer that was killed?”
“Yes.”
“The deuce! What did she know about it?”
“She heard the shot — just as she was opening the door of her apartment house.”
“And the realization that she had heard the shot that caused the death of someone upset her?” I asked.
“Not Marilyn. She was upset because the officers woke her up to question her, and she lost some of her beauty sleep.”
“Does she drink?” I asked.
The girl looked at me suddenly, said, “You’re a detective, aren’t you?”
I raised my eyebrows in a gesture of surprise. “Me, a detective?”
“Yes, you are. You want to talk with her about that shooting, don’t you?”
I said, “I’ve been accused of lots of things in my life, but I think this is the first time anyone has taken a good look at me and said I looked like a detective.”
“You are, just the same. Okay, you’re a good sort. I’ll give you a tip. Marilyn Winton is as cold as an electric icebox, but she’s accurate. If she says that shot was fired at two-thirty, it was fired at two-thirty, and you don’t need to waste time worrying about it.”
“But you will get her over here so I can talk with her?”
“Uh huh. And that makes me feel better.”
“What does?”
“Your being a detective. I thought perhaps you really were falling for her.”
“Tell me about that love affair of hers. How did the man get her to fall for him?”
“Believe it or not, by sheer indifference. Once he got her going, he pretended he didn’t care whether she liked him or not. That bothered her. Men have always been the other way, threatening to kill themselves if she wouldn’t marry them, and all that sort of stuff.”
“You’ve talked with her?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“About what happened?”
“Yes.”
“Think she’s telling the truth?”
“Yes. She heard the shot and looked at her watch the minute she got to her apartment.”
“And she was cold sober?”
“She’s always cold and sober.”
I grinned at her and said, “I guess you’ve told me all I need to know, Rosalind. I won’t have to waste time with Marilyn.”
She said, “I’ve already given her the signal that you were falling for her and she’s expecting to come over. Notice the way she’s turning so you can see her curves? She’ll look back at you over her shoulder in a minute, and give you a half smile. She got that pose from an art calendar.”
I said, “It’s a shame she’s wasting it. Tell her I changed my mind, and decided she had halitosis or athlete’s foot, or something. Good night.”
“Will I be seeing you again?” she asked.
“That the standard line you hand all the customers?”
She looked at me frankly and said, “Sure. What the hell did you think? That I want to marry you? If you’re a detective, be your age.”
“Thanks,” I told her. “You may see me again at that. In the meantime, I’m off.”
“Where?”
“Leg work. Lots of leg work. Chores. Damn details. I hate them, but you have to do them.”
She said, “I guess that’s life. For you and me and the other guy.”
“That the way it is with you?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She made a little gesture and said, “Because I was a damn fool. I have to make a living. I’ve got a kid.”
I said, “On second thought, I guess the information was worth ten dollars to the agency. Here’s the other five.”
“No kidding, it’s on an expense account?”
“On an expense account — and my boss is a big-hearted egg.”
Her hand joined mine. “Gosh, aren’t you lucky — a boss like that!” The five-dollar bill slipped over into her palm. She walked with me as far as the door. “I like you,” she said. “I wish you really would come back.”
I nodded.
She said, “I tell all the customers that, but this time I happen to mean it.”
I patted her shoulder and went on out. She stood in the door, watching me down the street. I caught a taxi-cab at the corner and drove out to the airport.
It was just the old routine leg work of a complete check-up, but something you can’t overlook if you want to be a good detective.
The passenger lists showed that Emory G. Hale had been a passenger on the 10:30 plane for New York City, that he’d returned on the plane, arriving at 8:30 that morning. I even checked to make sure he’d actually traveled on the plane.
The records showed that he had.
I took a cab back to the hotel. I was past due for a lot of shut-eye.