“I’ve been there, baby, it’s nothing new anymore.”
“But I’m curious, Mr. Fallon...”
“Cat.”
“All right. Cat. You said we had met before.” She blew a cloud of silver smoke toward me. “Where?”
“Uh-uh. I like my advantage. Maybe some other time I’ll tell you. Right now get on with your pitch. What’s it this time?”
She waved one hand toward the closed door. “You had an important visitor. What’s he doing here?”
I shrugged and slid off the desk. “The same thing you’re doing.”
Her eyebrows went up with mock curiosity.
“Come on, quit the games. I wasn’t born yesterday, kid. He’s a state rep engaged in political work dealing with the Cuban situation. You’re a nosy legman for a political reporter. You both want the same thing.”
“And what would that be, Cat?”
“Whatever you think Tucker Stacy was doing for the anti-Castro bunch.”
“It would make a good story. It is my job, you know.”
“Happy landings.”
“Will you help me?”
“What for?”
“I could guarantee you certain rewards.” She grinned impishly.
“Sex isn’t a reward with me, baby. It’s a functional necessity. Like lunch. Got any better offers?”
Lois snubbed out her cigarette in an ashtray, glanced at me and picked up her handbag. She smiled, cocked her head and said, “Give me time. I’ll think of something.”
I waited until she was almost out. “Lois...”
She looked back at me. “Yes?”
“What are you after?”
“Have you gone through your deceased friend’s things yet?”
“Casually.”
“Did he traffic in bananas?”
“Beats me.”
She smiled again. “If you find out, I’m at the Jackson Hotel.”
“Swell. I’ll bring a bottle.”
“Why waste time drinking?”
“Yeah,” I said as she closed the door.
Bananas! Now it was bananas. What was it Tuck’s letter said?... “Don’t choke on a banana.”
I got Charlie Traub, two of his assistants and three girls from the office. We spent the rest of the day going through every piece of paper in the files. There wasn’t a thing mentioning bananas anywhere. I said the hell with it, went back to my motel unit to clean up for supper. The second I stepped inside the darkened room I knew I’d been had. The first solid thwack caught me rolling away but brought me to my knees. The second one did the job and was almost a relief. The sudden swell of unconsciousness blotted out the terribly explosive pain that seemed to be bottled up inside my skull, dulling it little by little until it was only a memory.
There were three of them there: two small dark men in grey business suits and a taller, sardonic type who sat comfortably in a chair, watching me with mild amusement.
I lay on the floor at his feet, my legs drawn up behind me and taped to my wrists behind my back. A piece of the same adhesive had been plastered across my mouth so that the low moan of pain I let out seemed to come through my nose. Each eye was a separate ball of torture, the ache in my head seeming to be concentrated at the pupils. Every pulse beat was an individual torture.
Either the pain moderated or my tolerance to it increased, because I could see and hear again. There was wind, but it came from outside the building, gusts rattling the palm leaves and whistling as they twisted past the corners of the motel.
“Feeling better, Mr. Fallon?” His eyes danced again and the pencil-line mustache twisted as he smiled.
All I could do was glare at him.
“Don’t try to talk. Until you fully understand your predicament, I merely want you to listen and understand. Then you may speak. Let me remind you — one attempt to draw attention here and you will regret it.” He turned his head to the man beside him. “Juan...”
With a practiced move, the little guy flipped open a knife.
“It can be painful, Mr. Fallon.”
He didn’t have to point it out. I’d seen it all done before. I let my eyes wander past his face and take in the room. They had destroyed it pretty well. The one in the chair smiled again. He reached inside his coat and found an envelope. When he pulled out the letter, I saw it was the note Tucker had left for me.
“I’m going to remove the tape from your mouth, Mr. Fallon. I want you to explain something, and if it is satisfactory we will simply leave you here. Frankly, dead men can cause trouble. However, you can make me kill you, if you wish. Your life is a very impersonal matter. Do you understand?”
I nodded. I had done business with these types before.
“Take off the tape.”
The man with the knife bent over, felt for the edge of the adhesive like he was going to peel an apple, caught it and ripped it loose with a jerk. I felt the skin of my lips tear and I almost made a fatal mistake of trying to catch his nose with the top of my head. He grinned, realizing my intention, and squatted there with the knife, ready to slip it into my belly.
“You have control now?”
“I know the rules,” I said.
“Good.” He fingered the paper, holding it up so I could see it. “A carefully guarded note from your late friend, no?”
“No.”
“Then why hide it where you did?”
“It wasn’t hard to find. I just considered it personal, that’s all.”
“Perhaps. But I think you couldn’t quite figure it out and kept it as a memorandum.”
“Why?”
“Ah yes, why. We know that Tucker Stacy had little or no previous contact with you, so I agree that you have no knowledge or interest in his... let’s say, ventures. However, as his inheritor, you do have now, and it is likely that you think to capitalize on everything he was involved in. Therefore you do not wish to let anything slip through your fingers. Reasonable?”
“Yeah, but not true,” I grunted. “What the hell is this all about?”
“Who are Verdo and Cristy, Mr. Fallon?”
“I wish I knew.”
“Ah, but you do.”
“Sorry, buddy, but that’s one thing you can’t get from me. Whoever they are belongs to twenty years ago.”
“Tucker Stacy seemed to think you would know them.”
“He was wrong.” It was the way I said it that made him frown.
“Yes, that could be, but there are ways of probing a man’s mind to make him remember.”
“So hypnotize me.”
Very languidly, he screwed a cigarette into a holder. “You are in no position to be facetious, my friend.”
“So go screw yourself then.”
The little guy with the knife pricked the skin of my neck. He was enjoying his work.
I said, “What’s this all about?”
“It is better that you don’t know. None of it is your affair.”
“Then you’re at a dead end, buddy.”
The tall one nodded and pulled at his cigarette, “If we could be sure of that, your chances of survival would be much improved.”
There was a sudden shriek of metal and something smashed against the window frame. Like a cat, the little guy was at the light, snapped it off, then opened the door a crack to peer out. He turned, closed the door and flipped the light back on. “It is the window shutter, Señor Marcel. The wind...”
His voice cut off at the look the tall guy gave him. I faked a groan and laid my head back to cover the moment. A name. At least I had a name now. Señor Marcel.
When I opened my eyes he was watching me. Then, after a few seconds, he seemed to make his decision. I was a nothing. I couldn’t have caught his name. “This note, Mr. Fallon... it mentions choking on a banana. Could you explain that?”