“Yes, that's what I mean. I'm sorry, but I can't go ahead with it now.”
“But, Joan, I have been relying on you,” he said, his voice husky. “We had it all worked out. I can't believe you're going to let me down. Why have you changed your mind?”
“My father trusts my judgment,” she said, looking across at the distant fairway where four men were coming down the hill towards the eighteenth green. “He never questions anything I do or want to do. He would back me if I asked him to put up capital for a business. He'd take my word that it was a sound investment. That puts me in a difficult position. I couldn't tell him the idea is a sound one.”
Harry felt the blood rise into his face.
“I don't understand,” he said sharply. “You know this is a sound idea, Joan. Why can't you tell him so?”
“The idea is sound enough,” she said quietly, and suddenly she looked straight at him, “but I am not sure now it would be sound if you handled it.”
Harry felt himself turn white.
“Are you telling me that you don't love me?”
She shook her head.
“I'm not saying that: love has nothing to do with it, Harry. I've been told often enough by my father that business and sentiment don't mix. He's right: they don't.”
Harry ran his fingers through his hair. Without Graynor's backing, he would get nowhere, he told himself. He would have to be content to buy one aircraft which would give him plenty of headaches and only a bare living.
“But why have you changed your mind? What have you got against me?” he asked.
“It has suddenly dawned on me that I don't know anything about you,” she returned. “I know I have behaved very badly, and I should never have let you make love to me. You swept me off my feet. I thought you were a wonderful person, but now I'm not sure that you are. Yesterday, I discovered two things about you: you are afraid of the police and you are a liar. I couldn't go into a partnership with a man I can't trust.”
With a hand that shook, Harry picked up his drink and gulped down half the whisky.
“Well, that's pretty good,” he said, his voice off-key. “So I'm a liar and you can't trust me. I didn't expect this from you.”
“What have you done to Glorie Dane?” she asked quietly, her eyes looking into his.
Harry felt sweat break out on his face.
“Done to her? What do you mean?”
“What I say. What have you done to her?”
“I've done nothing to her,” Harry said, sitting forward, his fists clenched. “I told you: I put her on a train for Mexico City. She's gone to her brother's place.”
“Will you give me her brother's address so I can find out if she has arrived there?”
“If I had it, I'd give it to you,” Harry said, talking out of his handkerchief and wiping his face. “But I haven't got it. I don't know where her brother lives, and I don't give a damn either.”
“You saw her on the train?”
“Yes. Now look, Joan . . .”
“What time did the train leave?”
Harry immediately saw the trap. This was something she could check. He cursed himself for giving her such an obvious opening.
He should have checked the trains when he had first told her Glorie had left for Mexico City.
“Some time in the morning,” he said, reaching for his glass again to cover his confusion. “For the love of mike, Joan . . .”
“Are you quite sure it was in the morning?” she asked quietly.
He put down his glass with the drink untouched and faced her.
He knew he couldn't hedge anymore. She had cornered him, and whatever he said, she could prove he was lying. He realized he must shift ground and tell her half the truth in the hope he could convince her.
“All right: she didn't go to Mexico City. Now are you satisfied?” he said angrily.
She continued to stare at him, her eyes cold and hurt.
“So you admit lying to me?”
“Yes, I lied,” Harry said, “and I'm sorry. I'll tell you what happened if you must know. Glorie did turn sour as I told you she had. She wanted thirty thousand dollars to let me go. She said she would go to your father and tell him she was my mistress if I didn't give her the money. If I did give it to her I would have no capital to go into partnership with you. I was in a spot. I decided I'd have to give you up and go with her. She wanted to go to New Orleans. She thought she and I could run this air-taxi business there better than here. We got as far as Collier City, then I suddenly couldn't take it. I felt if I gave in to her, I wasn't only ruining my life and yours, but hers as well. I told her so. I told her if she continued to blackmail me, I'd blackmail her. I said I'd give her away to the police: I should have told her that before, but I didn't want to do it. That settled it. She climbed down. I made her take two thousand and promise to leave me alone. I put her on a bus to New Orleans and I came back here. That's what happened and that's the truth.”
Joan continued to stare at him.
“Why didn't you tell me this before instead of making out she had gone to Mexico City?” she asked in a quiet, cold voice.
“I didn't want to worry you, I thought if I told you she was going to her brother instead of going off into the blue to New Orleans you'd be more easy in your mind about her,” Harry said, trying not to show how desperately he was lying.
“So she is in New Orleans now?”
“I guess so. I don't know. I put her on a bus to New Orleans. What's happened to her now I don't know and I don't care.” He finished his drink and set down the glass. “Can't we get her out of our lives, Joan? I'm through with her, and she is through with me. I love you. I want to marry you, and I want to go ahead with my plans. Can't we do that?”
“No, we can't,” she said. “You see, Harry, I just don't know if I can believe you or not. I'm certainly not going into a business partnership with you. I couldn't risk my father's money in anything you were handling. I can't marry you either until I know for certain you are speaking the truth.”
“Of course I'm speaking the truth,” Harry said angrily. “I give you my word . . .”
“Then why are you looking the way you're looking? What are you frightened about? You have something on your conscience,” she said. “Anyone can see that. It's as if you have done something dreadful.” She paused, her hands turning into fists. “You know what I’m beginning to suspect, don't you?”
He stared at her, his face glistening with sweat.
“It's not true, Joan. I swear it isn't.”
“Then you know what I mean?”
“No, I don't, but I've done nothing wrong. You've got to believe me.”
“I’m frightened for you, Harry.”
“You don't have to be. I tell you I've done nothing wrong. You've got to believe me, Joan!”
“All right, I will believe you on one condition,” she said. “I can't accept your word now. You have told me too many lies for me to do that, but I’m willing to be convinced. If you will go with me to New Orleans so I can talk to Glorie myself and hear her version of this business, I’ll be convinced, but not before. Will you come to New Orleans with me?”
He hesitated, and the hesitation was fatal. She had been watching him closely. She saw his eyes shift away from hers, his face slacken while his brain raced to find a way out.
She got to her feet.
“All right, Harry,” she said unsteadily. “Let's leave it at that. I don't think we should meet again, anyway not until you have brought Glorie back to Miami. If you can do that, then we might have another talk.”
He knew this was the end between them. He could tell that by her expression, and he cursed Glorie and cursed himself for spoiling the only love in his lie. Defeated, he got slowly to his feet and followed her across the terrace, around the clubhouse to the car park.