Lipton seemed to know one of the dancers, a woman of about thirty-five, with bleached blond hair and siliconed breasts tipped with star-shaped pasties, ample buttocks, rather resembling in build one of the sturdy Clydesdale horses in the Rheingold commercials. When she finished her number, she kneeled down beside him on the bar top, chatted with him briefly, and then went to join him at a table in the rear of the place. Lipton ordered a drink for the girl, and they talked together for perhaps a half hour, at the end of which time she clambered onto the bar top again to hurl some more beef at her audience, all of whom watched her every move in pop-eyed fascination, as though privileged to be witnessing Markova at a command performance of Swan Lake. Lipton settled his bill and left the bar. Without much regret, Hawes followed him back to the garden apartment, where he put his car into one of a row of single garages on the ground level of the building, and then went upstairs. Figuring he was home for the night, Hawes drove back to the Gee-Gee-Go-Go, ordered a scotch and soda, and waited for an opportunity to engage the beefy blonde in conversation.

  He caught her after she finished her number, a tiresome repetition of the last three, or five, or fifty numbers she had performed on the bar top. She was heading either for the ladies’ room or a dressing room behind the bar when he stepped into her path, smiled politely, and said, “I like the way you dance. May I buy you a drink?”

  The girl said, “Sure,” without hesitation, confirming his surmise that part of the job was getting the customers to buy watered-down booze or ginger ale masquerading as champagne. She led him to the same table Lipton had shared with her, where a waiter appeared with something like lightning speed, pencil poised. The girl ordered a double bourbon and soda; apparently the champagne dodge was a mite too sophisticated for the Calm’s Point sticks. Hawes ordered a scotch and soda and then smiled at the girl and said, “I really do like the way you dance. Have you been working here long?”

  “Are you a cop?” the girl asked.

  “No,” Hawes said, startled.

  “Then what are you? A crook?”

  “No.”

  “Then why are you carrying a gun?” the girl said.

  Hawes cleared his throat. “Who says I am?”

  “I say you are. On your right hip. I saw the bulge when we were talking in the hallway there, and I brushed against it when we were coming over to the table. It’s a gun, all right.”

  “It’s a gun, yes.”

  “So, are you a cop?”

  “No. Close to it, though,” Hawes said.

  “Yeah? What does that mean? Private eye?”

  “I’m a night watchman. Factory over on Klein and Sixth.”

  “If you’re a night watchman, what are you doing here? This is the nighttime.”

  “I don’t start till midnight.”

  “You always drink like this before you go to work?”

  “Not always.”

  “Where’d you go when you left here before?” the girl asked.

  “You noticed me, huh?” Hawes answered, and grinned, figuring he’d get the conversation onto a socio-sexual level and move it away from more dangerous ground.

  “I noticed,” the girl said, and shrugged. “You’re a big guy. Also you’ve got red hair, which is unusual. Do they call you ‘Red’?”

  “They call me Hamp.”

  “Hamp? What kind of name is that?”

  “Short for Hampton.”

  “Is that your first name or your last?”

  “My last. It’s Oliver Hampton.”

  “I can see why you settled for Hamp.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “It’s on the card outside. Didn’t you see it?”

  “I guess I missed it.”

  “Rhonda Spear.”

  “Is that your real name?”

  “It’s my show business name.”

  “What’s your real name?”

  “Why do you want to know? So you can call me up in the middle of the night and breathe on the phone?”

  “I might call you, but I wouldn’t breathe.”

  “If a person doesn’t breathe, he drops dead,” Rhonda said. She smiled, consumed her drink in a single swallow, and said, “I’d like another double bourbon, please.”

  “Sure,” Hawes said, and signaled for the waiter to bring another round. “How many of those do you drink in a night?”

  “Ten or twelve,” she said. “It’s only Coca-Cola,” she said. “You’re a cop, you know damn well it’s Coca-Cola.”

  “I’m not a cop, and I didn’t know it was Coca-Cola,” Hawes said.

  “I know cops,” Rhonda said. “And you know Coca-Cola.” She hesitated, looked him straight in the eye, and said, “What do you want from me, officer?”

  “Little conversation, that’s all,” Hawes said.

  “About what?”

  “About why you would tell a cop, if that’s what you think I am, that he’s paying for bourbon and getting Coca-Cola.”

  Rhonda shrugged. “Why not? If this joint was gonna be busted, they’d have done it ages ago. Everybody in this precinct, from the lieutenant on down, is on the take. We even dance without the pasties every now and then. Nobody ever bothers us. Is that why you’re here, officer,” she asked sweetly, “to get your share of the pie?”

  “I’m not a cop,” Hawes said, “and I wouldn’t care if you danced bare-assed while drinking a whole crate of Coca-Cola.”

  Rhonda laughed, suddenly and girlishly. Her mirth transformed her face, revealing a fleeting glimpse of what she must have looked like when she was a lot younger, and a lot softer. The laughter trailed, the image died. “Thanks, honey,” she said to the waiter, and lifted her glass and said to Hawes, “Maybe you’re not a cop, after all. Who gives a damn?”

  “Cheers,” Hawes said.

  “Cheers,” she answered, and they both drank. “So if you’re not a cop, what do you want from me?”

  “You’re a pretty woman,” Hawes said.

  “Um-huh.”

  “I’m sure you know that,” he said, and lowered his eyes in a swift covetous sweep of the swelling star-tipped breasts.

  “Um-huh.”

  “Saw you talking to a guy earlier. I’m sure he…”

  “You did, huh?”

  “Sure.”

  “You’ve been watching me, huh?”

  “Sure. And I’ll bet he didn’t want to talk about the price of Coca-Cola, either.”

  “How do you know what he wanted to talk about?”

  “I don’t. I’m just saying that a pretty woman like you…”

  “Um-huh.”

  “Must get a lot of attention from men. So you shouldn’t be so surprised by my attention. That’s all,” he said, and shrugged.

  “You’re kind of cute,” Rhonda said. “It’s a shame.”

  “What is?”

  “That you’re a cop.”

  “Look, how many times…”

  “You’re a cop,” she said flatly. “I don’t know what you’re after, but something tells me to say good night. Whatever you are, you’re trouble.”

  “I’m a night watchman,” Hawes said.

  “Yeah,” Rhonda replied. “And I’m Lillian Gish.” She swallowed the remainder of her drink, said, “You’ll settle with the waiter, huh?” and swiveled away from the table, ample buttocks threatening the purple satin shorts she wore.

  Hawes paid for the drinks, and left.

  On Saturday morning, while Carella was waiting for a lab report on the sneaker he had found in Elliot’s trash, he made a routine check of the three hospitals in the area, trying to discover if and when a man named Sanford Elliot had been treated for a sprained ankle. The idea of calling all the private physicians in the area was out of the question, of course; if Carella had not hit pay dirt with one of the hospitals, he would have given up this line of investigation at once. But sometimes you get lucky. On Saturday, April 24, Carella got lucky on the second call he made.

  The intern on duty in the Emergency Room of Buenavista Hospital was a Japanese named Dr. Yukio Watanabe. He told Carella that business was slow at the moment and that he was free to check through the log; had Carella called an hour ago, he’d have been told to buzz off fast because the place had been thronged with victims of a three-car highway accident.

  “You never saw so much blood in your life,” Watanabe said, almost gleefully, Carella thought. “Anyway, what period are you interested in? I’ve got the book right here in front of me.”

  “This would have been sometime between the eighth and fifteenth,” Carella said.

  “Of this month?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, let’s take a look. What’d you say his name was?”

  “Sanford Elliot.”

  There was a long silence on the line. Carella waited.

  “I’m checking,” Watanabe said. “Sprained ankle, huh?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Nothing so far.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Through the eleventh,” Watanabe said, and fell silent again.

  Carella waited.

  “Nothing,” Watanabe said at last. “You sure it was between those dates?”

  “Could you check a bit further for me?”

  “How far?”

  “Through the next week, if you’ve got time.”

  “We’ve always got time here until somebody comes in with a broken head,” Watanabe said. “Okay, here we go. Sanford Elliot, right?”

  “Right.”

  Watanabe was silent. Carella could hear him turning pages.

  “Sanford Elliot,” Watanabe said. “Here it is.”

  “When did he come in?”

  “Monday morning, April nineteenth.”

  “What time?”

  “Ten past seven. Treated by Dr. Goldstein.” Watanabe paused. “I thought you said it was a sprained ankle.”

  “Wasn’t it?”

  “Not according to this. He was treated for third-degree burns. Foot, ankle, and calf of the left leg.”

  “I see,” Carella said.

  “Does that help you?”

  “It confuses me. But thanks, anyway.”

  “No problem,” Watanabe said, and hung up.

  Carella stared at the telephone. It was always good to stare at the telephone when you didn’t have any ideas. There was something terribly reassuring about the knowledge that the telephone itself was worthless until a bell started ringing. Carella waited for a bell to start ringing. Instead, Miscolo came in with the morning mail.

  The lady was lovely, to be sure, but nobody knew who she was. There was no question about what she was. She was a silent film star. There is a look about silent film stars that immediately identifies their profession and their era, even to people who have never watched any of their films. None of the detectives looking at the lady’s picture were old enough to have seen her films, but they knew immediately what she was, and so they began riffling through their memories, calling up ancient names and trying to associate them with printed photographs they’d seen accompanying articles probably titled “Whatever Happened To?”

  “Gloria Swanson?” Hawes asked.

  “No, I know what Gloria Swanson looks like,” Meyer said. “This is definitely not Gloria Swanson.”

  “Dolores Del Rio?” Hawes said.

  “No, Dolores Del Rio was very sexy,” Carella said. “Still is, as a matter of fact. I saw a recent picture of her only last month.”

  “What’s the matter with this girl?” Meyer said. “I happen to think this girl is very sexy.”

  “Norma Talmadge, do you think?” Hawes said.

  “Who’s Norma Talmadge?” Kling asked.

  “Get this bottle baby out of here, will you?” Meyer said.

  “I mean it, who’s Norma Talmadge?”

  “How about Marion Davies?”

  “I don’t think so,” Carella said.

  “Who’s Marion Davies?” Kling asked, and Meyer shook his head.

  “Janet Gaynor?” Hawes said.

  “No.”

  “Pola Negri?”

  “I know who Pola Negri is,” Kling said. “The Vamp.”

  “Theda Bara was The Vamp,” Meyer said.

  “Oh,” Kling said.

  “Dolores Costello?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Mae Murray?”

  “No.”

  The telephone rang. Hawes picked up the receiver. “87th Squad,” he said, “Detective Hawes.” He listened silently for a moment, and then said, “Hold on, will you? I think you want Carella.” He handed the receiver to him, and said, “It’s the lab. They’ve got a report on your tennis sneaker.”

  Through the plate-glass window of Sandy Elliot’s shop, Carella could see him inside with two bikies. He recognized one of them as Yank, the cigar-smoking heavyweight he had spoken to on Tuesday. Yank was wandering around the shop, examining the pieces of sculpture, paying scant attention to Elliot and the second bikie, who was wagging his finger in Elliot’s face like a district attorney in a grade-C flick. Elliot leaned on his crutches and listened solemnly to what was being said, occasionally nodding. At last the second bikie turned away from the counter, tapped Yank on the arm, and started out of the shop. Carella moved swiftly into the adjacent doorway. As the pair passed by, he caught a quick glimpse of Yank’s companion—short, brawny, with a pock-marked face and a sailor’s rolling gait, the name “Ox” lettered on the front of his jacket. As they went off, Carella heard Yank burst into laughter.

  He waited several moments, came out of the doorway, and went into Elliot’s shop.

  “See you had a couple of art lovers in here,” he said. “Did they buy anything?”

  “No.”

  “What did they want?”

  “What do you want?” Elliot said.

  “Some answers,” Carella said.

  “I’ve given you all the answers I’ve got.”

  “I haven’t given you all the questions yet.”

  “Maybe you’d better advise me of my rights first.”

  “This is a field investigation, and you haven’t been taken into custody or otherwise detained, so please don’t give me any bullshit about rights. Nobody’s violating your rights. I’ve got a few simple questions, and I want a few simple answers. How about it, Elliot? I’m investigating a homicide here.”

  “I don’t know anything about any homicide.”

  “Your sneaker was found at the scene of the crime.”

  “Who says so?”

  “I say so. And the police lab says so. How did it get there, Elliot?”

  “I have no idea. I threw that pair of sneakers out two weeks ago. Somebody must’ve picked one of them out of the trash.”

  “When I picked it out of the trash yesterday, you said you’d never seen it before. You can’t have it both ways, Elliot. Anyway, you couldn’t have thrown them out two weeks ago, because I saw you wearing one of them only two days ago. What do you say? You going to play ball, or do you want to take a trip to the station house?”

  “For what? You going to charge me with murder?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I don’t think you will,” Elliot said. “I’m not a lawyer, but I know you can’t build a case on a sneaker you found in a goddamn abandoned tenement.”

  “How do you know where we found that sneaker?”

  “I read about the murder in the papers.”

  “How do you know which murder I’m investigating?”

  “You showed me a picture, didn’t you? It doesn’t take a mastermind to tie the newspaper story to…”

  “Get your hat, Elliot. I’m taking you to the station house.”

  “You can’t arrest me,” Elliot said. “Who the hell do you think you’re kidding? You’ve got nothing to base a charge on.”

  “Haven’t I?” Carella said. “Try this for size. It’s from the Code of Criminal Procedure. A peace officer may, without a warrant, arrest a person when he has reasonable cause for believing that a felony has been committed, and that the person arrested has committed it…”

  “On the basis of a sneaker?” Elliot said.

  “Though it should afterwards appear,” Carella continued, “that no felony has been committed, or, if committed, that the person arrested did not commit it. All right, Elliot, I know a felony was committed on the night of April eighteenth, and I know an article of clothing belonging to you was found at the scene of the crime, and that’s reasonable cause for believing you were there either before or after it happened. Either way, I think I’ve got justifiable cause for arrest. Would you like to tell me how you sprained your ankle? Or is it a torn Achilles’ tendon?”

  “It’s a sprained ankle.”

  “Want to tell me about it? Or shall we save it for the squadroom?”

  “I would not like to tell you anything. And if you take me to the squadroom, you’ll be forced to advise me of my rights. Once you do that, I’ll refuse to answer any questions, and…”