Klaus nodded sympathetically and his fingers moved on her knee.
“He bought me clothes, those jewels, in Paris. They were not his mother’s and he gave them to me.”
The lawyer nodded again and his fingers moved again on her knee.
“He brought me over here then and” — she put the burning end of her cigarette on the back of his hand — “I stayed at his—”
Klaus had snatched his hand from her knee to his mouth, was sucking the back of his hand. “What’s the matter with you?” he demanded indignantly, the words muffled by the hand to his mouth. He lowered the hand and looked at the burn. “If there’s something you don’t like, you can say so, can’t you?”
She did not smile. “I no speak Inglis good,” she said, burlesquing a heavy accent. “I stayed at his house for two weeks — not quite two weeks — until—”
“If it wasn’t for Brazil, you could take your troubles to another lawyer!” He pouted over his burned hand.
“Until last night,” she continued, “when I could stand him no longer. We quarreled and I left. I left just as I was, in evening clothes, with...”
She was finishing her story when the telephone bell rang. The attorney went to the desk and spoke into the telephone: “Hello?... Yes... Just a couple of minutes more... That’s right. Thanks.” He turned. “They’re getting impatient.”
She rose from her chair, saying: “I have finished. Then the police came and he escaped through the window and they arrested me about those rings.”
“Did you do any talking after they arrested you?”
She shook her head. “They would not let me. Nobody would listen to me. Nobody cared.”
A young man in blue clothes that needed pressing came up to Luise Fischer and Klaus as they left the courthouse. He took off his hat and tucked it under an arm. “Mith Fither, I’m from the Mile Valley Potht. Can you—”
Klaus, smiling, said: “There’s nothing now. Look me up at the hotel in the morning and I’ll give you a statement.” He handed the reporter a card. He cleared his throat. “We’re hunting food now. Maybe you’ll tell us where to find it — and join us.”
The young man’s face flushed. He looked at the card in his hand and then up at the lawyer. “Thank you, Mithter Klauth, I’ll be glad to. The Tavern’th jutht around the corner. It’th the only plathe that’th any good that’th open now.”
He turned to indicate the south. “My name’th George Dunne.”
Klaus shook his hand and said, “Glad to know you,” Luise Fischer nodded and smiled, and they went down the street.
“How’s Conroy?” Klaus asked.
“He hathn’t come to yet,” the young man replied. “They don’t know yet how bad it ith.”
“Where is he?”
“Thtill at Robthon’th. They’re afraid to move him.”
They turned the corner. Klaus asked: “Any news of Brazil?”
The reporter craned his neck to look past Luise Fischer at the lawyer. “I thought you’d know.”
“Know what?”
“What... whatever there wath to know. Thith ith it.”
He led them into a white-tiled restaurant. By the time they were seated at a table, the dozen or more people at counter and tables were staring at Luise Fischer and there was a good deal of whispering among them.
Luise Fischer, sitting in the chair Dunne had pulled out for her, taking one of the menus from the rack on the table, seemed neither disturbed by nor conscious of anyone’s interest in her. She said: “I am very hungry.”
A plump, bald-headed man with a pointed white beard, sitting three tables away, caught Dunne’s eye as the young man went around to his chair, and beckoned with a jerk of his head.
Dunne said, “Pardon me — it’th my both,” and went over to the bearded man’s table.
Klaus said: “He’s a nice boy.”
Luise Fischer said: “We must telephone the Links. They have surely heard from Brazil.”
Klaus pulled the ends of his mouth down, shook his head. “You can’t trust these county-seat telephone exchanges. “
“But—”
“Have to wait till tomorrow. It’s late anyhow.” He looked at his watch and yawned. “Play this kid. Maybe he knows something.”
Dunne came back to them. His face was flushed and he seemed embarrassed.
“Anything new?” Klaus asked.
The young man shook his head violently. “Oh, no!” he said with emphasis.
A waiter came to their table. Luise Fischer ordered soup, a steak, potatoes, asparagus, a salad, cheese, and coffee. Klaus ordered scrambled eggs and coffee, Dunne pie and milk.
When the waiter stepped back from the table, Dunne’s eyes opened wide. He stared past Klaus. Luise Fischer turned her head to follow the reporter’s gaze. Kane Robson was coming into the restaurant. Two men were with him. One of them — a fat, pale, youngish man — smiled and raised his hat.
Luise Fischer addressed Klaus in a low voice: “It’s Robson.”
The lawyer did not turn his head. He said, “That’s all right,” and held his cigarette case out to her.
She took a cigarette without removing her gaze from Robson. When he saw her, he raised his hat and bowed. Then he said something to his companions and, leaving them, came toward her. His face was pale; his dark eyes glittered.
She was smoking by the time he reached her table. He said, “Hello, darling,” and sat in the empty chair facing her across the table. He turned his head to the reporter for an instant to say a careless “Hello, Dunne.”
Luise Fischer said: “This is Mr. Klaus. Mr. Robson.”
Robson did not look at the lawyer. He addressed the woman: “Get your bail fixed up all right?”
“As you see.”
He smiled mockingly. “I meant to leave word that I’d put it up if you couldn’t get it anywhere else, but I forgot.”
There was a moment of silence. Then she said: “I shall send for my clothes in the morning. Will you have Ito pack them?”
“Your clothes?” He laughed. “You didn’t have a stitch besides what you had on when I picked you up. Let your new man buy you new clothes.”
Young Dunne blushed and looked at the tablecloth in embarrassment. Klaus’s face was, except for the brightness of his eyes, expressionless.
Luise Fischer said softly: “Your friends will miss you if you stay away too long.”
“Let them. I want to talk to you, Luise.” He addressed Dunne impatiently: “Why don’t you two go play in a corner somewhere?”
The reporter jumped from his chair, stammering: “Th-thertainly, Mr. Robthon.”
Klaus looked questioningly at Luise Fischer. Her nod was barely perceptible. He rose and left the table with Dunne.
Robson said: “Come back with me and I’ll call off all this foolishness about the rings.”
She looked curiously at him. “You want me back, knowing I despise you?”
He nodded, grinning. “I can get fun out of even that.”
She narrowed her eyes, studying his face. Then she asked: “How is Dick?”
His face and voice were gay with malice. “He’s dying fast enough.”
She seemed surprised. “You hate him?”
“I don’t hate him — I don’t love him. You and he were too fond of each other. I won’t have any male and female parasites mixing like that.”
She smiled contemptuously. “So. Then suppose I go back with you. What?”
“I explain to these people that it was all a mistake about the rings, that you really thought I had given them to you. That’s all.” He was watching her closely. “There’s no bargaining about your boyfriend, Brazil. He takes what he gets. “