Murder on the Rocks. Talmage Powell

shrugged. “Your secretary said you’d be here.”

      I pushed back the chair and stood up. “Uh-uh. Yesterday afternoon my secretary left for Old Point Comfort. I don’t eat here habitually so my coming to Hogan’s wasn’t predictable by anyone who knows me. That leaves it at you following me here. From my office. I suppose there’s a reason, your own reason, but it interests me less than the secret of pistachio fudge. Three blocks from here I’ve got a boat that’s begging to be put under sail. The week-end’s one-fourth shot already, and what’s left of it is going to be nice and peaceful and un-devious. So adios, as they say in your country. Some other time, perhaps.”

      I turned away, but her hand was on my wrist. “All right,” she said, “I followed you here. Because first I wanted to see what you looked like.”

      “Over pie and coffee?” I suggested. “Like Dagwood?”

      “Oh, please don’t be sarcastic. I’ve had about all I can take. Jean told me about you, said you could help me. That’s why I’m here. I need help, Mr. Bentley, I need it badly. My father—I—well, there’s some trouble and we—”

      I looked down at her. “You’re just a trifle confused. You or Jean or both of you. I’m a tax consultant. I’m admitted to Tax Court practice but I’m not a lawyer. I’m not a cop or a private detective. The way it sounds that’s what you want. Well, Artie Von Amond’s reliable. He’s got an office on New York Avenue, he’s in the book. So-”

      Her eyes stopped me. Cold. She lifted her purse, fumbled inside, and pulled out two crumpled bills. She pushed them toward me and I saw that each bill was worth five hundred dollars. She said, “Here’s a thousand dollars, Mr. Bentley. There’s more where it came from. Will you—?”

      “Your husband’s a lawyer,” I interrupted. “Paul Sewall. Mouthpiece for Vance Bodine, the District’s gambling king. Why shouldn’t Sewall get someone for you?”

      Her face had frozen. Her lips moved stiffly. “We’ve separated,” she said. “Nearly a year ago. For reasons that don’t concern you or anyone. Jean was at the affair last night. I’d had enough to drink that I had to talk to someone, so I told Jean in general terms what I wanted done. She suggested you. Said you were completely trustworthy, and told me something about you. Enough to convince me I should see you, talk to you.”

      “What did she tell you?”

      “The Korea business, for one thing. The black market rings you broke up over there. Then a little about when you were with the Treasury, the way you got evidence for big tax cases. She described you to me: on the handsome side, highly intelligent, and with the social polish and discretion to handle an Embassy matter without attracting attention.”

      “Quite a build-up.” I looked at the money lying on the table in front of me.

      “Yes. I couldn’t help wondering how she let you get away.”

      “It’s a long story,” I said. “And it happened quite a while ago. Ashes to ashes.”

      She glanced at the money, then at my face. “Don’t feel offended because I’m offering you money, but I—”

      “Money couldn’t possibly offend me.”

      “Then help me,” she said bluntly. “I know you’ve your own business to think about, but this shouldn’t take you very long.”

      “For instance?”

      “A week—perhaps less.”

      I took out my pipe, opened my tobacco pouch, and tamped mellow Latakia into the bowl. I lighted the pipe, blew a smoke ring toward the windows, and said, “Let’s say I’m interested. Let’s even assume I’ll go all the way. But if you don’t want publicity, I couldn’t protect you if I slipped up or if something blew beyond my control because I’m not a private investigator and so there’s no such thing as privileged communications between us. I can’t offer you the same degree of security or privacy that a lawyer or a PI could. Do you understand that?”

      She nodded. The waiter brought a frosted copper flagon to the table but I waved him away. I said, “You’ve sipped enough sauce for now and I want to be sure you’ve got a sober understanding of things. Just to remind you, the State Department runs a Special Detail to handle things quietly for foreign diplomats.”

      “I know. But that applies only to my father—he’s the diplomat. I’m an American citizen. I was born in San Francisco when my father was a consul there, the—problem isn’t anything he’d want the Department to handle or even know about. That’s why I’m talking to you instead of my father. He was afraid to ask you to come to the Embassy, afraid to call you by telephone because of the talk it might cause among the staff. And if it should happen to become known that you’re working for him, well, you aren’t a private detective, and he can always say he was consulting you about investments or something like that.”

      My wristwatch showed three-fifteen. On my ketch the deck planking would be hot as a blowtorch but the beer cans in the galley icebox would have a delicate coat of frost. I studied the money, the two five-hundred-dollar bills a foot from my hand and thought of the new nylon sails and the new auxiliary engine those bills would buy. I blew a smoke ring upward, trying to circle the snout of a black marlin on the wall, still thinking about the money, balancing it against the lost week-end and the week ahead, and then I said, “I’ll listen, Mrs. Sewall. But only if there’s no obligation to buy.”

      She bit her lip and it seemed an oddly childish mannerism for the sophisticated daughter of a foreign ambassador.

      “Very well,” she said. “Now can we go somewhere and talk?”

      I motioned over the waiter, paid for her drinks, and pulled back her chair. As she stood up, smoothing the iridescent silk across her thighs, she said, “Your boat’s near by?”

      “You wouldn’t like it. It smells of pitch and paint and there’s oil and salt water in the bilges. Your dress looks like about two hundred dollars worth of Gar-finckel finery and it wouldn’t ever be the same.”

      “Your office?”

      “The air-conditioner’s on the fritz.”

      “Well, the one in my apartment’s working. I’ll drive my car down and you follow.”

      I shook my head. “You might pass the balloon test, then again, you might flunk it. How far are we going?”

      “Georgetown. Philips Place, west of Wisconsin.”

      “Where’s your car?”

      “On the pier. In the parking area.” She took a small leather key-holder from her purse and handed it to me. “If you think I’m not sober enough to drive you’re quite absurd.”

      “I’m just generally foolish. But thanks for giving in without a-struggle.”

      Her hand picked up the two bank notes and tucked them into my pocket. They felt heavier than sheets of platinum. She slipped her arm through mine and we walked past the empty tables. As I opened the door the cashier turned up the volume of a hidden radio. The game at Griffith Stadium. The Senators versus the Visitors. With luck they might win a few this summer, I thought, meaning the Senators. With a lot of luck. The closing door cut off the cashier’s chuckle. An out-of-towner, I thought. A Philadelphian. In Washington when the home team plays the natives seldom smile.

      chapter 2

      HER CAR was a red Lancia sportster. Right-hand drive with about six gear positions to occupy your left hand, and door armhole cut low enough to drag your elbow on the road. I had a hell of a time with the gearshift and finally she took over that part of it while I handled the brakes, the clutch, and the wheel. On the hard-top parkway heat waves rose like thin blue smoke. Ten degrees hotter and it would burst into flame.

      People were sunbathing on the grass beside the parkway, flanked out limply