The Body Lovers Read Free Page B

he’s seen other suicides go out in their scanties. Seems to be a common practice.”
    “Yeah, I know. She could have had a coat on before she hit the river. Nobody would have noticed her then. If she dropped it any one of that crowd along the docks would have picked it up and hocked it for a drink without thinking about it.”
    “What’ll I tell Pat?”
    “I’ll play along for a week. Meanwhile, I’ll still try to get an angle on those gowns.” He looked across his glass at me. “Now what about you, Mike? You’ve always made interesting copy. Where do you stand?”
    “Out of it. I’m a working stiff.”
    “You’re not even curious?”
    “Sure,” I grinned, “but I’ll read about it in The News.”
    After lunch I walked to Broadway with Mitch, turned north and headed back to the office. The morning damp had turned into a drizzle that slicked the streets and turned the sidewalks into a booby trap of umbrella ribs. The papers on the newsstands were still carrying front-page stories of the death of the redhead and the afternoon edition of one had a nice picture of me alongside the body shot of the corpse and one of the kid. I bought three different papers, stuffed them in my raincoat pocket and turned in at the Hackard Building.
    Velda had left a note saying she was going to do some shopping and would be back later. Meanwhile, I was to call the Krauss-Tillman office. I dialed Walt Hanley at K-T, got his instructions on another job, hung up and added a postscript to Velda’s note saying that I’d be out of the city for a few days and to cancel our supper date.
    She was going to be sore about that last part. It was her birthday. But I was lucky. I had forgotten to buy her a present anyway.
     
    The few days were a week long and I stopped by the office at a quarter to five. Velda sat there typing and didn’t even look up until she had finished the page. “Happy birthday,” I said.
    “Thanks,” she said sarcastically.
    I grinned and tossed down the package I had picked up ten minutes ago. Then she couldn’t hold the mad any longer and ripped the paper off it. The pearls glinted a milky white in the light and she let out a little squeal of pleasure. All she could say was, “They real?”
    “They’d better be.”
    “Come here, you.”
    I leaned over and sipped at the rich softness of her mouth and felt that same surge of warmth that came over me whenever she did those woman-things to me.
    I pushed her away and took a deep breath. “Better quit while you’re ahead.”
    “But I thought you were winning.”
    “You were drowning me, kitten.”
    “Just wait till later.”
    “Stop talking like that, will you?” I said. “I’ve been stuck in the bushes a week until I’m ready to pop.”
    “So I’ll pop you.”
    I rumpled her hair and perched on the edge of the desk. She had my mail stacked up in three piles, circulars, business and personal, and I riffled through them. “Anything important?”
    “Haven’t you been reading the papers?”
    “Kid, where I’ve been there wasn’t anything but hills and rocks and trees.”
    “They identified the redhead that was killed.”
    “Who was she?”
    “Maxine Delaney. She was a stripper on the West Coast for a while, was picked up twice in a suspected call-girl operation, but released for lack of evidence or complaints by parties involved. She was last heard of in Chicago where she was registered with a model agency and did a few nudies for a photographer there.”
    “I meet the nicest people, don’t I? Any mail?”
    “Nothing special. You got a package there from a pen pal, though.”
    In the personal pile was a flat, six-inch square package with a box number address and a postmark from that famous city on the Hudson that harbors New York’s more notorious ex-citizens. I tore it open and took the lid off the box inside.
    A stenciled letter informed me that the enclosed was made by a prison inmate and any voluntary contribution I cared to make would go