Dark Maze

gold shield.
    “I guess you don’t want a room?” he said.
    “Tonight, no. I just want some information.”
    “Like I told all the other cops crawling around here, the Seashore Hotel doesn’t give out personal information on our guests. It’s a violation of privacy and nobody’s got any search warrants out or anything like that. I know my rights.“
    “I can tell that you do,” I said. My wallet was still out. I opened it so that the clerk could see the money inside. “But I’m special.”
    The clerk looked past me, over to the pross. Then he whispered, “How much you want to know?”
    “That depends.”
    “On what I could tell you about this Picasso guy everybody’s looking for?“
    “That and whatever else it might occur to me to ask. Start talking and we’ll see if we’ve got business to conduct.”
    I took out a twenty-dollar bill and crackled it. Then I heard the pross get up from the chair and head over my way.
    “Well, let’s see now, Picasso burnt up his room the day we had to have the marshall come put him out.”
    “That I already know, son. No sale. Tell me something original.”
    “The guy was a real loner type.”
    “You’re not even trying.”
    The clerk thought, which brought pain to his broad face. Then he brightened and said, “Once he had a visitor—I was on duty! This was a very big deal because it was the only visitor the guy ever had in all the time he’d been here.“
    “First, how long did he live here?”
    “Say, man, you ever going to let loose of that money?”
    I crackled the bill and turned around. The pross smiled at me, and I counted three gold caps on her teeth. I asked her, “You ever visit Picasso, darlin’?”
    “Hey!” The clerk complained so loudly there was an echo in the lobby. “I’m going to tell you!”
    I said to the pross, “Ignore Fats back there in the cage, darlin’. Here’s for your conversation.” I handed her the twenty. She stuffed it in her bra.
    “Hey, the name’s Jerry!” the fleshy clerk complained.
    I looked back and told him, “Okay, Jerry, now keep quiet so I can hear the lady. You just be thinking all about that visitor, and watch how easy it could be for you to make some money.”
    The pross asked me, “What’re you, with the cops?”
    I introduced myself, then asked, “What’s your name, darlin’?”
    “Chastity.”
    “That’s a pretty name,” I told her. She flashed gold teeth. “Did you ever visit Picasso?“
    “Well, I been up to his room, oh, maybe six, seven times. No big deal. Mostly he’d pay five bucks for me to kneel down and pray with him.”
    I commiserated with her. “A lot of these johns nowadays, they’re only looking for Mary Magdalene.”
    “Yeah, tell me about it.”
    “Did Picasso ever do anything else?”
    “Naw, but once or twice he paid double when he wanted me to see him play with Madam Thumb and her four lovely daughters, you know?”
    “You earn every penny you make, don’t you, Chastity?” I gave her another twenty. I heard Jerry sighing behind me.
    “Did you ever see Picasso with anybody, up in his room, I mean?”
    “No,” she said. “I only would see him going through the lobby here, then up in his room when he’d ask. I never saw him even out in the street or the boardwalk.”
    “Can you tell me anything else about him?”
    Chastity shrugged and said, “People said he was hot-tempered, but I never saw that. I know he was a painter over at Astroland. That’s it, I guess, unless you want a date tonight.”
    “No, but thanks, Chastity. I’m sort of going steady. She’s a real nice lady.”
    “That’s good,” Chastity said. She went back to her chair.
    “Hey, you!” Jerry bellowed.
    “You just cost yourself a ten-dollar penalty,” I said, turning to him. “Now, quietly, tell me how long he lived here.”
    “Five years, thereabouts.”
    “Where’d he live before?”
    “Nobody knows, honest.”
    “When did he have this one visitor of his?”
    “Just before we had to call the marshall to come put him out.”
    “What was the visitor’s name?“
    “Hey, man—the names you get around here! I mean, give me a break—Picasso and Chastity? We don’t even bother asking anymore. Somebody gives us a funny name for their convenience, we use it and that’s it.”
    “Let’s keep it short and to the point, Jerry.”
    “Okay, but how about—you know?” Jerry stuck a soft hand out from the cage.
    I gave him a ten. “Let’s try for the twenty this time