“How would he manage that?”
“By studying you to find out what you want and then offering it to you in such a way you would feel grateful toward him. Money or excitement or advance knowledge or whatever happens to be your choice of private vices. If he had to have something, I think he would go after it his own way first.”
“And if that didn’t work?”
“He’d probably turn the problem over to one of the many people aching to do him a favor, no matter what it might be.”
“And you don’t like him.”
He pursed his lips. “… No. I think I like Tom. But I would be uneasy about getting into any kind of business association with him. I’m quite sure I’d make out very well, as have many others, but the inner circle seems to become… a group of faceless men. In any kind of speculation tight security is imperative. They seem to become very… submissive? No. That isn’t accurate. Retiring, discreet, and slightly patronizing toward the rest of the working world. I guess I am not a herd animal, Mr. McGee. Even if it would fatten my purse.”
“So if it wasn’t Pike or one of his admirers, how come I had a visitor, then?”
“My considered opinion is that it beats the hell out of me.”
“Well, if somebody was looking for something they think I have, and wants it badly enough to take a chance of getting caught going in or out of a motel room, the next place to look is in my pockets.”
“If it’s smaller than a bread box.”
“I think I’ll hang around and do a little trolling.”
“Keep in touch.”
“I will indeed.”
I drove back to the Lodge and ate one of the fake-Hawaiian special dinners, then went from the dining room into the cocktail lounge and stood at the bar. Business was very light. Some young couples were sploshing around outside in the big lighted pool. The bar was a half rectangle and I became aware of a girl alone at an end stool, by the wall, under a display of ancient fake Hawaiian weapons. She wore a weight of red-gold wig that dwindled her quite pretty and rather sharp-featured face. She wore a white dress, which seemed in better taste than the wig and the heavy eye makeup. She had a cluster of gold chain bracelets on one arm, smoked a cigarette in a long gold and white holder, and was drinking something wine-red out of a rocks glass, a measured sip at a time, as self-consciously slow and controlled as her drags at the cigarette.
I became aware of her because she wanted me to be aware of her. It was puzzling because I had appraised the motel as no hangout for hookers. Also, though she was apparently dressed and prepared for the part, her technique was spotty and inept. There are the ones who operate on the mark of their choice with the long, wide-eyed, arrogant-insolent-challenging stare, then properly leave it up to him to make the next move. There is the jolly-girl approach, the ones who say to the barkeep in a voice just loud enough to carry to the ears of the mark, “Geez, Charlie, like I always say, if the guy doesn’t show, the hell with him. I’m not going to cry my eyes out, right? Gimme another one of the same, huh.” Then there’s the fake prim, the sly sidelong half-shy inquisitive glance, and the quick turn of the head, like a timid doe. Or the problem approach, troubled frown, gesture to have the mark come over, and then the dreary little set piece: Excuse me, mister, this may sound like a crazy kind of thing, but a girl friend of mine, she asked me to be here and tell the guy she had a date with she can’t make it, and I was wondering if you’re George Wilson. Or: Would you mind, mister, doing me a crazy kind of favor? I got to wait here to get a phone call, and there’s some nut that was bugging me before and said he was coming back, and if you’d sit next to me, then he won’t give me any problems, okay?