“You get after him tomorrow,” Hogan snarled. “Chase him! I know lawyers. If you don’t keep after them, they sit on their tails and do nothing.”
Meg nodded.
“I’ll get after him. What are we going to do about Anson?”
Hogan scowled at her.
“Nothing… you give him the brush-off. What can he do? As soon as we get the money you give it to me to handle. You give him the air. You understand?”
Meg stared at him.
“I’ll give you the money Jerry, but I’ll also give you Anson to handle. He still has Phil’s gun.”
Hogan half sat up; his eyes alert. “What are you talking about?”
“I have already warned you about Anson,” Meg said. “There’s something about him that scares me. He’s coldblooded.
It’s fine for you to tell me to give him the brush off. What about me? He could do anything… he could kill me!”
“Yeah? He can’t do a damn thing!” Hogan snarled. “Can’t you see, you dope, that unless he wants to stick himself into the gas chamber, he can’t do a thing? We have him over a barrel. You get the money, tell him to go to hell, and give me the money… it’s as simple as that.”
“I wish it was,” Meg said, clenching her fists. “You don’t know him the way I do. He’s ruthless. His mind is set on getting money.”
Hogan swung his legs off the settee and sat up. His thick fingers closed around the buckle of his belt. With a quick movement he released the buckle and whipped the thin leather belt from around his waist.
“Okay, baby,” he said, getting to his feet, “it’s time you had a hiding. You’re getting too big for your pants. A beating…”
He paused as the front door bell rang. They looked at each other.
“Who’s that?” Hogan said, the belt swinging idly, his eyes uneasy.
“Go and find out,” Meg said. “But maybe you would like to beat me first!”
The front door bell rang, loudly and persistently.
Anson got out of his car, opened the double gates and drove the car onto the tarmac drive.
The headlights of the car lit up the garden. Before be turned off the car’s headlights he saw the garden had already lost its magic neatness without Barlowe’s care and discipline.
The time was half past eleven. There was a light on in the sitting-room. He paused for a moment, his hand going into his top coat pocket. His fingers touched the cold butt of Barlowe’s gun, then he walked to the front door and rang the bell.
There was no answer to his ring. He waited, aware of a cold mounting rage inside him, then he put his finger on the bell and held it there.
After a further wait, the front door was suddenly jerked open. The moonlight fell directly on Meg.
Anson remembered the first time he had seen her; in exactly the same position in which she was now standing, but now, of course, it was different. The bruise on her jaw and her slightly swollen eye marred the sensual quality she had.
At the sight of Anson, she drew in a quick, alarmed breath.
“What do you want?” she demanded. “I don’t want you here… go away!”
“Hello, Meg,” Anson said with a deceptively mild smile. “We have things to talk about”
“You’re not coming in!” Meg set herself to slam the door. “I have nothing to say to you!”
Anson made a quick move forward. He put his hand on her shoulder and gave her a hard shove that sent her staggering back. He entered the hall, shut the front door and then walked past her into the sitting-room.
A log fire burned cheerfully in the grate. Anson was quick to notice two half empty glasses of whisky standing on the occasional table. So she had company, he thought, and his hand slid into his pocket and touched the butt of Barlowe’s gun.
As Meg followed him into the room, leaving the door open, a sudden gust of wind blew a shower of rain against the windows.
Anson moved to the fire. He looked around the room. The burning logs, the settee and the two glasses of whisky sent his mind back to the exciting moment of their first meeting. It seemed a long time ago.
“What do you want?” Meg demanded.
Anson looked searchingly at her. His eyes moved over her body. He thought: you meet a woman and she starts a chemical reaction in you. You think there is no one like her in the world, then something happens, and it is finished. She means less to me now than the used plate after a good meal, and how little can that be?
“So you had to lie to me,” he said. “If you had told me you had been a tart and you had been a thief and you had been in jail, I wouldn’t have gone ahead with this thing, but you had to live in a dream world and lie. You hadn’t the guts to tell the truth. I’m sorry for you. To me now, you are just something I find on my shoe and scrape off.”
Meg hunched her shoulders. Her face was hard and her eyes bleak and indifferent Anson knew he had no power to hurt her. Her past life had armoured her against contempt.
“Do you imagine I care what you say about me?” she said. “Get out!”
“Not just yet… I have news for you, Meg. In spite of your record, in spite of your lies, they are going to pay the claim.
You’ll get the money tomorrow.”
Meg stiffened, staring at him. Blood rushed to her face, then receded, leaving her pale with excitement.
“You mean that?” she demanded huskily. “You really mean they are going to pay?”
Anson waved to the telephone.
“Call Jameson. They’ve even told him. I talked to him before I came out here. He said he would be coming out himself tomorrow as soon as he got the cheque.”
Meg drew in a long, slow breath. Watching her Anson’s face showed amused cynicism.
“We made a bargain… remember?” he said, “I was to insure your husband and murder him and you were to share the insurance money and yourself with me. We were going away together and we were going to have a whale of a time spending fifty thousand dollars.” His smile became crooked. “But now I’ve changed my mind. I have known too many whores to trust any of them and that now includes you. So I’ll settle for half the money. Tomorrow, you will get a cheque for fifty thousand dollars. I want a cheque right now from you for twenty-five thousand dollars, and we part and I hope I never see you again.”
Meg was aware that Hogan was just outside the room, listening to what was being said. His presence gave her the courage to say, “You get nothing! You can’t force me to give you anything… get out!”
“Don’t be stupid, Meg,” Anson said, his eyes bleak. “I can force you to give me my share… make no mistake about that.
You will do what I tell you or…”
A slight movement at the door made him jerk round. His heart skipped a beat at the sight of Sailor Hogan who grinned sneeringly at him.
“Hello palsy… you threaten me, not her. I’m more your size.”
As he moved into the room, Meg backed away.
Completely taken by surprise, Anson looked blankly from Hogan to Meg and then to Hogan again. Then his quick mind realized why Hogan was here. He saw suddenly the whole fabric of the plot he had blindly walked into.
“So… that’s how it is. You and she. So you are the boy friend the police think murdered Barlowe,” he said softly. “You are the pimp from Los Angeles who they talk about.”
Hogan’s sneering grin widened.
“Don’t get sore about it, palsy,” he said, leaning his broad, fighter’s shoulders against the wall. “We’re all suckers at one time in our lives. The cops thought I had knocked him off, but I convinced them I didn’t. I had an alibi. For your sake, I hope you have one too for they are certainly sniffing around.”