"I"m fine."
"You know why I think she picked me to have that little conversation with? I think it"s because I don"t have a pimp." She settled herself in her seat, uncrossed and recrossed her legs. I remembered other times in this apartment, one of us on the couch, the other on the Eames chair, the same sort of un.o.btrusive music softening the room"s hard edges.
I said, "You never had one, did you?"
"No."
"Do most girls?"
"The ones she knew did. I think you pretty much have to on the street. Somebody"s got to defend your right to a particular corner and bail you out when you get arrested. When you work out of an apartment like this, well, that"s different. But even so, most of the hookers I know have boyfriends."
"Is that the same thing as a pimp?"
"Oh, no. A boyfriend isn"t running a batch of girls. He just happens to be your boyfriend. And you don"t turn your money over to him. But you buy him a lot of things, just because you want to, and you help out with cash when he hits a rough spot in life, or if there"s some business opportunity he wants to take advantage of, or because he needs a little loan and, gee, it"s not like you were giving him the money. That"s what a boyfriend is."
"Sort of a one-woman pimp."
"Sort of, except every girl swears her boyfriend"s different, her relationship"s different, and what never changes is who earns the money and who spends it."
"And you never had a pimp, did you? Or a boyfriend?"
"Never. I had my palm read once and the woman who did it was impressed. "You have a double head line, dear," she told me. "Your head rules your heart." " She came over, showed me her hand. "It"s this line right here. See?"
"Looks good to me."
"d.a.m.n straight." She went back for her gla.s.s of soda, then came and sat on the couch beside me. She said, "When I learned what happened to Kim, the first thing I did was call you. But you weren"t in."
"I never got the message."
"I didn"t leave one. I hung up and called a travel agent I know. A couple hours later I was on a plane for Barbados."
"Were you afraid you were on somebody"s list?"
"Hardly that. I just figured Chance killed her. I didn"t think he"d start knocking off all her friends and relations. No, I just knew it was time for a break. A week at a beachfront hotel. A little sun in the afternoon, a little roulette at night, and enough steel-drum music and limbo dancing to hold me for a long time."
"Sounds good."
"Second night out I met a fellow at the poolside c.o.c.ktail party. He was staying at the next hotel over. Very nice fellow, tax lawyer, got divorced a year and a half ago and then went through a tough little affair with someone too young for him, and he"s over that now, and who does he meet but me."
"And?"
"And we had a nice little romance for the rest of the week. Long walks on the beach. Snorkeling, tennis. Romantic dinners. Drinks on my terrace. I had a terrace looking out at the sea."
"Here you"ve got one looking at the East River."
"It"s not the same. We had a great time, Matt. Good s.e.x, too. I thought I"d have my work cut out for me, you know, acting shy. But I didn"t have to act. I was shy, and then I got over my shyness."
"You didn"t tell him - "
"Are you kidding? Of course not. I told him I work for art galleries. I restore paintings. I"m a freelance art restoration expert. He thought that was really fascinating and he had a lot of questions. It would have been easier if I"d had the sense to pick something a little more humdrum, but, see, I wanted to be fascinating."
"Sure."
She had her hands in her lap and she was looking at them. Her face was unlined but her years were beginning to show themselves on the back of her hands. I wondered how old she was. Thirty-six? Thirty-eight?
"Matt, he wanted to see me in the city. We weren"t telling each other it was love, nothing like that, but there was this sense that we might have something that might go somewhere, and he wanted to follow it up and see where it led. He lives in Merrick. You know where that is?"
"Sure, out on the Island. It"s not that far from where I used to live."
"Is it nice out there?"
"Parts of it are very nice."
"I gave him a phony number. He knows my name but the phone here is unlisted. I haven"t heard from him and I don"t expect to. I wanted a week in the sun and a nice little romance, and that"s what I had, but once in a while I think I could call him and make up something about the wrong number. I could lie my way out of that one."
"Probably."
"But for what? I could even lie my way into being his wife or girlfriend or something. And I could give up this apartment and drop my john book in the incinerator. But for what?" She looked at me. "I"ve got a good life. I save my money. I always saved my money."
"And invested it," I remembered. "Real estate, isn"t it? Apartment houses in Queens?"
"Not just Queens. I could retire now if I had to and I"d get by all right. But why would I want to retire and what do I need with a boyfriend?"
"Why did Kim Dakkinen want to retire?"
"Is that what she wanted?"
"I don"t know. Why did she want to leave Chance?"
She thought it over, shook her head. "I never asked."
"Neither did I."
"I"ve never been able to understand why a girl would have a pimp in the first place, so I don"t need an explanation when somebody tells me she wants to get rid of one."
"Was she in love with anybody?"
"Kim? Could be. She didn"t mention it if she was."
"Was she planning to leave the city?"
"I didn"t get that impression. But she wouldn"t tell me if she was, would she?"
"h.e.l.l," I said. I put my empty cup on the end table. "She was involved someway with someone. I just wish I knew who."
"Why?"
"Because that"s the only way I"m going to find out who killed her."