Sassy reached a tentative paw toward his moving lips, and he took the paw in his hand. Immediately the tufted ears flattened; she half rolled on her side in an attempt to get at the holding hand with her other paw. He swept her off his chest down onto her back on the bed beside him and tickled the furry underbelly, and for an instant all four legs furiously resented this indignity before she stretched languidly and invited more.
Johnny laughed, played with her for another moment and then stuffed her under the sheet as he slid off the bed. He stood and watched her battle her way out, to emerge with fangs bared, ears cocked and tail thrashing. She glared about the bed for him, then in a kittenishly instantaneous change of mood collapsed flexibly upon herself as she energetically cleaned a hind leg.
Johnny picked up her saucers from the newspaper on the floor and rinsed them clean. He refilled them from the wax-papered cache and the milk carton in the refrigerator. The instant he stooped over the newspaper, saucers in hand, a white streak leaped from the bed and trotted over to him, white paws twinkling and tail aloft like a Saracen banner. He went into the bathroom and turned on the shower; he stood in a torrent of hot water and then of cold, and dashed out puffing and blowing. Halfway through his shave he remembered something and in his underwear went to the phone and gave the operator the number of Vic's apartment. “Lorraine? Johnny. Since you're home I don't know that I even need to ask, but how'd you make out with the boys?”
He caught her hesitation. “Where are you calling from, Johnny?”
“The hotel.”
“Do you think that's wise? Have you eaten yet?”
“Just on my way downstairs.”
“Why don't you come over and eat with me? It's too hot to fuss, but if a salad will tempt you-”
It was his turn to hesitate, but only for an instant. “Be there in thirty minutes.”
“Fine. I'll be expecting you.”
He stared down at the phone musingly as he replaced it. Just where did he stand with this woman? She was the wife of a good friend. By her own admission she wasn't a perfect wife. She had been tied up with Robert Sanders, professionally and-according to Mike Larsen-otherwise. She could have killed Robert Sanders. And whoever had killed Robert Sanders had more than likely killed Ellen Saxon. Johnny frowned down at his clenched hands; tonight he would clear out a little underbrush. The machete would probably draw a little blood, but so be it.
He finished shaving, whacked at his still damp hair a couple of times with the comb, dressed quickly, waved to the preoccupied Sassy and left the room. On the street the heat rose up and attacked him. He whistled for a cab; in the back seat the little breeze that they stirred up was a hot breeze. The city lay limp in the kiln.
Lorraine Barnes had the apartment door ajar when he came off the second floor landing; he knocked on the partly opened door.
“Come in,” she said from just inside.
He went in through the hall to the living room, where she was setting up collapsible little tables. “You look to see who you were inviting in?” he asked her, indicating the still open door in the hall.
“No.” She straightened, thoughtful. “I never even thought about it, since I knew you were coming-”
“I'd start thinking about it. There's no inoculation-”
“Sit down,” she interrupted firmly. “Food first, lectures later.” Johnny sat down, and she placed on the little table before him a platter piled high with potato salad, pineapple slices, hard-boiled eggs, lettuce, tomatoes, radishes, cucumbers, cold cuts and cheese. He blinked up at her. “Half of this is enough for the Mexican Army.”
“Eat.” A smaller tray with a tall glass, a pitcher of ice and a pitcher of tea was added to his table. “Speak up for what you don't see.”
For a short time the clink of cutlery and the tinkle of ice was the only sound in the room. When Johnny sank back with a repleted sigh Lorraine removed his tray. She had already removed her own. She lit two cigarettes and offered him one, and as he inhaled she sat down across from him again.
“I think I owe you an explanation, Johnny.” He had intended to give her no opportunity to speak first, but he realized that he had been outmaneuvered. The blue-gray eyes across the room were fixed upon him steadily. “Cards face up? All the way around?” He nodded, warily.
She crossed her legs deliberately and tugged her skirt down over her knees. “I hid a choice when I went down there this morning. I could tell them where I'd been last night, and in fact and inference explain Vic's presence in Ellen's room. I think they'd let him go if I did-soon, anyway. I didn't tell them, and I suppose you think I'm a first-class heel.”
He dragged hard on the cigarette. “It's your problem.” He couldn't keep the irritation from his voice.
“Granted. I'll handle it. Myself.” Twilight had stolen up to the apartment windows; he sat and watched the cigarette in the chair opposite glow more brightly as Lorraine Barnes continued. “There is a husband-and-wife relationship almost impossible to describe to an outsider. You're Vic's friend, so I'm trying. I'm also trying because I'd like your help.” The cigarette in her hand moved in a vague arc; the steady voice was expressionless. “Vic is not a passionate man. It has nothing to do with his age; he never has been. In our marriage there are really only two things I can give him: companionship, and his own self-respect. I've compromised the self-respect, but I don't intend for Vic to know it. Vic needs me, depends upon me; I'm his crutch against the world. And in turn I'm very grateful to him for being the sweet person that he is.” Above the smoldering cigarette her gaze was unwinking. “I wouldn't want you to think this an excuse or a rationalization, even. I'm simply trying to explain to you the position in which I find myself.”
He stirred uneasily in his chair. “So where does it leave you?”
“That depends on you. Do you think I killed Ellen, Johnny?”
He drew in his breath; this woman beat him to first one punch and then another. For the space of ten seconds he turned it over in his mind, and then he spoke deliberately. “I don't know. I doubt that a woman would have the strength; Ellen was no midget. On the other hand, you had opportunity as far as Sanders and Ellen both were concerned, so far as I know, and I have to think that whoever got Sanders got Ellen, too.” He was silent a moment. “I don't know about Sanders, but there's one way you can get yourself ninety-five per cent clean with me on Ellen. The police didn't put it out, but Ellen reached whoever killed her with her fingernails-reached them good. This morning when we went downtown you had on a high-necked dress. You've got another on now. I want a look. To the waist.”
She said nothing at all for a count of twenty, and when she did speak her voice was an octave lower. “If I didn't need you-” She said it between her teeth as she stood up.
“I'm in this thing, and I want out with as whole a skin as I can manage. Sit where you are.” She unfastened the three small mother-of-pearl buttons at the neck of her dress and in one long flowing motion stooped, caught up the hem of her skirt and pulled the dress off over her head. She had on a half-slip and a bra. In seconds she had the bra unhooked and off, and made one slow, complete pirouette. In the room's waning light her body glowed, and the only break from neck to waist in the ivory symphony were the dark-nippled, firmly jutting breasts.
She re-hooked the bra, face averted, picked up her dress and reversed it from its inside-out condition. She sounded a little breathless as she slipped it back over her head. “Satisfied?”
“Almost. I want to look at your scalp.”
“Then come and look at it,” she said wearily and sat down. In ninety seconds he had satisfied himself that there were no more scratches or abrasions hidden beneath her hair than there had been beneath her clothing.
He returned to his chair, and his voice was abrupt. “I don't know why you want me on your side. I don't know what you've got in mind, but let me tell you something I've got in mind. I wouldn't want to find out later that you had a partner and that he had the scratches.”