Jimmy and Fay (11 page)

She nodded. “Yes, I've heard about them.”

“I don't know that they'll try anything, but they followed Miss Wray to our place and then they got in, so they know who you are. I told Fat Joe not to let 'em in again, but it looks to me like they're so damn stupid you can't tell what they're going to do. Makes them dangerous. So maybe I'm nuts to give you Marie Therese's piece, but maybe I'm not.”

Connie forgot she was mad at me and put her arm through mine as we walked down Broadway and then turned toward the Chelsea. There was no sign of the Olds or the idiots.

“What are you going to do now?” she asked.

I explained that when I'd told her earlier that I was going to Polly's, I was trying to find Charlie Luciano to see if his guys had anything to do with the book and the shakedown. Nobody he knew had anything to do with it, but he knew the girl in the book. She used to work for Polly. Hearing that, Connie perked right up and asked why I hadn't told her.

“Things are happening too fast. Seemed more important to pay attention to Saxon Dunbar and the guys who are asking for the money the last time we talked.” Then I explained to her that I met Pearl, now known as Polly, back when I was a kid. I didn't go into all the whys and wherefores.

“Tonight,” I said, “this girl named Cynthia was filling in for Polly and she told me about Nola, the girl in the pictures. She flew the coop about a year ago, but there's this other girl, Daphne, who used to work for Polly, too, and she was a friend of Nola's.”

Connie said, “That's too many names to keep straight if you don't know them.”

“Not much easier if you do. Think of 'em as Polly the madam, Cynthia her assistant, Daphne the mistress, and Nola with the tits.”

“You're such a silver-tongued devil.”

“Anyway, tonight I learn that Daphne is out of the life. She found a sugar daddy who set her up in a place, and she might know more about Nola, so I'm going to talk to her. After that, if the lawyers decide to pay up, I guess I'll be delivering six grand for them tomorrow evening.”

The lobby of the Chelsea was empty, like it usually was when we came in from work. Tommy, the night man, was snoring behind the desk. The elevator operator was asleep on his little folding seat. I gave him a tap on the shoulder, like I did most mornings. He rubbed his eyes and said, “Hello, Connie. How you doing?”

“Good, Nelson. You? How's Phyllis?”

They yakked away all the way up to the fifth floor. Phyllis was either his wife, daughter, or girlfriend. I couldn't tell, but it was somebody they'd talked about before, talked about a lot from the sound of it.

I waited by the door to her room as Connie went through her bag for her key. Some nights I was invited in. I suspected this wasn't going to be one of them. But after she'd opened the door and checked to see that there was nobody in the room and nobody else in the hall, she threw her arms around my neck and gave me a long hard kiss that would melt stainless steel.

She rubbed her thighs against mine, and after she felt the reaction she was looking for, she leaned back and smiled.

I said, “Does this mean you're not mad at me anymore?”

She pulled herself closer so she could whisper, “Hell, no, I just want you to know what you're missing,” and she kissed me again.

“Goddammit, what is going on. I don't—”

She cut me off with another purring smile, and she touched my lips with a gloved finger. “Don't worry, you'll figure it out,” she said.

She could be the most exasperating woman when she wanted to be.

Chapter Ten

On Friday I was up before noon.

Based on what Cynthia said, I figured I had a fair chance of seeing Daphne, so I strapped on my brace and took out one of the better suits. It was a new single-breasted from Brooks Brothers, dark gray, almost black, finished off with a crisp white pin-striped shirt and a burgundy grenadine tie. When you're my size, you don't dress sharp, you look like a damn kid. It was cloudy and looked to be cold but warmer than yesterday, so I went with the lighter-weight camel-hair topcoat, the one with large inside pockets. I packed up Miss Wray's cash, the Banker's Special, my notepad and pen, found my stick and hat, and set off.

I picked up a few of the morning papers and decided to skip the hash house on the corner where I usually got breakfast. Instead, I went back to the speak. Some of Vittorio's guys would be in the Cruzon kitchen early. They fixed really good strong coffee, and they didn't mind whipping up something for me from time to time. Turned out to be a nice-size omelet and fried potatoes and spinach on the side. Hit the spot.

While I was eating, I read Freddie Hall's review of
King Kong
in the
Times
. Miss Wray had been wrong when she said he'd hate it. Hell, I was sitting right next to him in the theater. I knew he liked it as much as I did. I thought he gave away too much of the story, but it's hard not to do that when you're enthusiastic.

After I finished, I took the tray back upstairs, got more coffee, and settled behind my desk. I put off making any decisions about what I was going to do until I got through the rest of the papers. The truth is I didn't know what I wanted to ask Daphne or what she could tell me, but I promised Miss Wray that I'd see this through, so I picked up the phone and dialed the number Cynthia gave me.

Daphne picked up before the first ring had ended, like she'd had her hand hovering over the phone. She said, “Okay, I'm ready.”

I recognized her voice, but she surprised me by picking up so quick and I didn't answer right away.

She said, “Harold, what's wrong? I'm ready to write it down this time. Go ahead.”

“Daphne? This is Jimmy Quinn.”

“Jimmy? What are you . . . How did you . . . Oh, fuck, not now. Look, I can't talk,” and she hung up.

I had no idea what any of that meant. She sounded surprised and pissed off, but at least I knew she was there. So I decided on the approach I'd been considering and went down to the cellar for an expensive bottle of Chablis.

Connie was sitting behind the desk when I got back. The safe was open, and she was counting last night's take. She cut her eyes at the wine and gave me a curious look but didn't stop her work. I didn't interrupt.

When she finished, I held up the wine and said, “How much do we get for this? Twelve fifty, isn't it?”

She said yes and I peeled thirteen bucks off Miss Wray's money and told her to add it to last night's total.

Connie's eyebrows arched. “What's up?”

I put on my topcoat and slipped the wine into the inside pocket. “I'm going to tell Daphne, whose last name I don't know, that Miss Wray, star of stage and the silver screen, would like to know anything she can tell me about one Nola Revere, late of Polly Adler's establishment. The wine is for Daphne. If she's got anything to say that's useful, we'll settle on a price. I got a hundred from Miss Wray last night.”

“What do you mean you ‘got a hundred'?”

“When I told her I knew who the girl in the pictures was, I said I'd probably have to spend some money to learn more. She told Hazel to call down to the concierge for a hundred bucks. Ten minutes later, it was there.”

“Are you making that up?”

“I swear to you that I'm not. They live in a different world than we do.”

Connie whistled low. “Ain't it the truth.”

I was almost out the door when she stopped me, saying, “You know, it might be a good idea not to mention Miss Wray right up front. Isn't she more interested in keeping her name out of this business than anything else? You might need to drop her name to impress this Daphne, but don't use it unless you have to.”

It was my turn to give her a look, and she could tell that I was impressed.
Damn
, I thought and not for the first time,
she's smart, stacked, and pretty, that's a dangerous combination
.

Out on the street, I took time to check for the Olds and the idiots. Nothing. I got a cab down to Christopher Street and walked a block to Gay, a crooked little street, not much wider than an alley. You find them tucked away down there in the Village. Daphne's address was a narrow place with a fire escape over the bright red door and a tree growing up against the front. A paper tag on the doorframe read
d. prewitt

I twisted the bell in the middle of the door. A few seconds later I heard footsteps and then a voice behind the door. “Harold?”

“No. Jimmy Quinn. Again.”

She said something I couldn't make out.

I said, “Daphne, if you'll just let me in and talk to me for a few minutes, it could mean a nice piece of change for you. That's all I want, a little talk, and I'm ready to pay for it. I've got a five-spot in my hand.”

The bolt snapped back.

I guess I should explain that when Daphne was working at Pearl's place, I mean Polly's place, she was out of my league. Charlie Luciano liked her a lot for a few months, and during that time, Charlie “the Bug” Workman was working as Charlie Lucky's driver. He was sent to pick Daphne up every day or so, and as I understood it, he decided to cut himself in on her action, too. The Bug was a dangerous man. You didn't say no to him and Daphne knew that.

She was one of the best-looking girls who ever worked for Polly. The first thing you noticed about her was her shining blond hair, a lot of it even though most of the girls wore their hair bobbed. She also had a big inviting smile and a fizzy laugh to go with it. The rest of her wasn't bad, either.

Daphne wasn't smiling that afternoon when she opened the door. Her worried look made me think that maybe the sweet deal she had with her sugar daddy wasn't working out so well. She looked at the fiver in my hand, cut her eyes up and down the street, and pulled me inside fast. The place was low ceilinged and small, not much wider than the front door and the double window beside it. The furniture was covered in chintz and plaid. In the front room, she had a fireplace, a nice radio and record player, and a telephone on a round wooden table. I could see the kitchen in back and stairs to the bedroom upstairs.

She was wearing a nice prim-looking suit and blouse, even more businesslike than the outfit she had on when I saw her in the Grand Central Building. Her shoes were businesslike too, and she had her hair pulled back. A pair of thick-rimmed specs and a copy of the Friday
Gotham Comet
were on the coffee table in front of the love seat. If I saw her on the street in those clothes and glasses, I probably wouldn't recognize her.

Her worried expression hadn't changed. “What the hell is this?” she asked.

I gave her the five, took the wine out of my coat pocket, and said, “Here, this is for you, just to prove that this is a friendly visit. I'm on the up-and-up.”

She looked at the label and was impressed. Since it was me giving it to her, she knew it wasn't some kind of camel piss in a phony bottle. “Okay,” she said, “I'm listening.”

A calico cat ambled down the stairs, clawed its way to the top of the loveseat, and stared at me. It was not impressed. I took off my topcoat and sat in a chintz armchair. “What can you tell me about Nola Revere?”

Her mouth sagged open in surprise, and she dropped onto the loveseat. The cat jumped down beside her. “Nola? What kind of trouble has she gotten herself into?”

“Nothing. Maybe. She posed for some dirty pictures, and some people are interested in them. They asked me to help. I understand you and her were friendly at Pearl's, I mean Polly's.”

“Dirty pictures, yeah, that's how she got into the business. She was just a dumb kid then. Guys could sweet-talk her into anything. I tried to help her wise up, but with some girls, there's nothing you can do.”

Daphne repeated what Cynthia said the night before. Nola was a Polack. Her real name was Nadzeija but nobody could pronounce it, so she started calling herself Nola. Hadn't been in the country very long, and when Daphne met her, she spoke hardly any English. But she didn't need to talk at the Times Square dancehall where she first worked. And she hated it. The pay wasn't good, and she was on her feet all night. She picked up extra money finishing guys off by hand in the back room. A lot of them wanted more than that. Another girl from Poland told her they could do better as strippers, so they bought some costumes and got on at Minsky's, but before long, it was the same story. The early show was the standard coochie dance on the main stage, but to make real money, they had to work the late show downstairs in the basement where things went further. A lot further.

A guy she met there talked her and the other girl into posing for a set of pictures fooling around with each other. Nola told Daphne that he paid them twenty bucks up front and promised them another twenty after he saw how the pictures turned out. He wasn't sure they'd be any good because the girls laughed and giggled too much, but he still wanted Nola to come back by herself. But that was the last they ever saw of him.

I asked if Daphne knew who the guy was, and she said no, Nola didn't tell her and that kind of thing happened all the time. It didn't sound like those pictures had anything to do with the book, anyway.

After that, Nola took her ten dollars and bought a nice dress and went to see Polly. Polly could tell right away that Nola would be popular, but her girls were the best. There was more to working at her place than a girl washing a guy's works, unzipping a shift, and spreading her legs. Polly's best girls, like Daphne, could accompany gents to upper-crust functions and look and sound like they belonged there. So Polly asked Daphne to give the new kid a little polish, not that all the guys cared. You see, Daphne could tell that Nola wasn't that sharp. It showed on her face, and that helpless little girl routine, real or faked, really hit the spot with a lot of customers. Nola never got to be as confident and collected as Daphne and Cynthia—damn few of Polly's girls were—but she did fine for herself.