“It’s likely.”
“Except,” Gilbert added, “when it’s something big, you know, something they would like to’ve done.”
I said again it was likely.
Mimi said: “Don’t be polite to Gil if he starts talking nonsense, Nick. His head’s so cluttered up with reading. Get us another cocktail, darling.”
He went over to get the shaker. Nora and Jorgensen were in a corner sorting phonograph records.
I said: “I had a wire from Wynant today.”
Mimi looked warily around the room, then leaned forward, and her voice was almost a whisper: “What did he say?”
“Wanted me to find out who killed her. It was sent from Philadelphia this afternoon.”
She was breathing heavily. “Are you going to do it?”
I shrugged. “I turned it over to the police.”
Gilbert came back with the shaker. Jorgensen and Nora had put Bach’s Little Fugue on the phonograph. Mimi quickly drank her cocktail and had Gilbert pour her another.
He sat down and said: “I want to ask you: can you tell dope-addicts by looking at them?” He was trembling.
“Very seldom. Why?”
“I was wondering. Even if they’re confirmed addicts?”
“The further along they are, the better the chances of noticing that something’s wrong, but you can’t often be Sure it’s dope.”
“Another thing,” he said, “Grass says when you’re stabbed you only feel a sort of push at the time and it’s not until afterwards that it begins to hurt. Is that so?”
“Yes, if you’re stabbed reasonably hard with a reasonably sharp knife. A bullet’s the same way: you only feel the blow–and with a small-calibresteel-jacketed bullet not much of that–at first. The rest comes when the air gets to it.”
Mimi drank her third cocktail and said: “I think you’re both being indecently gruesome, especially after what happened to Nick today. Do try to find Dorry, Gil. You must know some of her friends. Phone them. I suppose she’ll be along presently, but I worry about her.”
“She’s over at our place,” I said.
“At your place?” Her surprise may have been genuine.
“She came over this afternoon and asked if she could stay with us awhile.”
She smiled tolerantly and shook her head. “These youngsters!” She stopped smiling. “Awhile?”
I nodded.
Gilbert, apparently waiting to ask me another question, showed no interest in this conversation between his mother and me.
Mimi smiled again and said: “I’m sorry she’s bothering you and your wife, but it’s a relief to know she’s there instead of off the Lord only knows where. She’ll have finished her pouting by the time you get back. Send her along home, will you?” She poured me a cocktail. “You’ve been awfully nice to her.”
I did not say anything.
Gilbert began: “Mr. Charles, do criminals–I mean professional criminals–usually–”
“Don’t interrupt, Gil,” Mimi said. “You will send her along home, won’t you?” She was pleasant, but she was Dorothy’s Queen of France.
“She can stay if she wants. Nora likes her.”
She shook a crooked finger at me. “But I won’t have you spoiling her like that. I suppose she told you all sorts of nonsense about me.”
“She did say something about a beating.”
“There you are,” Mimi said complacently, as if that proved her point. “No, you’ll have to send her home, Nick.”
I finished my cocktail.
“Well?” she asked.
“She can stay with us if she wants, Mimi. We like having her.”
“That’s ridiculous. Her place is at home. I want her here.” Her voice was a little sharp. “She’s only a baby. You shouldn’t encourage her foolish notions.”
“I’m not doing anything. If she wants to stay, she stays.”
Anger was a very pretty thing in Mimi’s blue eyes. “She’s my child and she’s a minor. You’ve been very kind to her, but this isn’t being kind to her or to me, and I won’t have it. If you won’t send her home, I’ll take steps to bring her home. I’d rather not be disagreeable about it, but”–she leaned forward and deliberately spaced her words–“she’s coming home.”
I said: “You don’t want to pick a fight with me, Mimi.”
She looked at me as if she were going to say “I love you,” and asked: “Is that a threat?”