Green Ice by Gerald A Browne

having their breasts pierced.”
    It looked painful to Wiley.
    “That’s the intention,” Mrs. Gimble said. “Seems everything’s getting more and more flavored with S and M.”
    His Coco-loco came. Gin, vodka and rum over shaved ice, served in a fresh coconut with a pair of straws sticking up like an antenna. Wiley took a long sip, managed to conceal a grimace.
    “Have you ever done any acting?” Mrs. Gimble wanted to know.
    “Why do you ask?”
    “You have a most attractive squint, as though you were searching for something in the distance or scrutinizing everything, everyone around you. Most film stars have it, that same squinty intensity.”
    He was about to explain that this morning he’d accidentally broken both his pairs of sunglasses, but at that moment someone opened his eyes.
    The man with the Herculean head, the one who had been with Lillian last night, was making his way through the sunbathers, stopping to speak and shake or kiss hands. There was an outgoing, robust quality about him. He seemed to know almost everyone. He had on only a pair of white sharkskin shorts, revealing how extremely hirsute he was, even across his shoulders and back. He came to Mrs. Gimble and Wiley.
    “I assume you’ve met our host?” Mrs. Gimble said.
    “Briefly,” Wiley said. He shook hands with Meno Argenti.
    “I don’t recall,” Argenti said. “Usually I’m excellent at remembering people, make a point of it.”
    “I’m Joseph Wiley.” Said as though it should mean something.
    “Oh, yes,” Argenti said, faking it. “I beg your pardon. Enjoy yourselves.” He went on a short way to greet a swarthy-complexioned bald man, who was with a pair of shapely young girls. Argenti called the man General. He flattered the girls, and they reacted as though they’d received gifts. They opened a leather case and began setting up a game of some sort. Argenti joined them. The moment he sat, a drink was at hand. The waiter had been following him around with it, just in case.
    So that was Lillian’s benefactor, Wiley thought. The big man, top man. Well, good for her.
    Mrs. Gimble was on the subject of young women, girls, admitting what they offered but emphasizing how importunate they were, unappreciative and eventually, when one got right down to it, disappointing.
    Wiley grunted agreeably, while actually paying attention to Argenti, guessing his age was at least fifty. Argenti and the General were talking about going fishing for marlin. Argenti was patronizing the General to some extent. He offered the use of his yacht. The General accepted. The two girls were overjoyed. The General pinched one of the girls on the inside of her thigh as high up as possible. The other one reached across for a cigarette and intentionally elbowed the General’s groin. He too had an accent, but not Italian. Spanish was Wiley’s guess, confirmed when he heard the man’s last name: Botero. Wiley also heard mention of Lillian. He got only a fragment of it, something to do with that evening.
    “My husband suffers from angina,” Mrs. Gimble was saying. “Whenever things get too active, he gets pains in his chest.”
    “Looks healthy enough to me.”
    “He is really. I allow him the excuse.” She did a know-what-I-mean glance. “He’s playing cards or whatever with someone tonight, and I’m seeing a friend from Dallas. Perhaps you know her. Hendy?”
    “Who?”
    “Sarah Jean Hendricks. Why not have dinner with us?” As though it had just occurred to her.
    “Don’t mind if I do.”
    “I won’t,” she promised wryly.
    At that moment Wiley caught sight of Lillian, on the opposite side of the pool. He watched her cross over via the suspended rope bridge. She had on a pale blue full-length overdress of crepe de chine, unbuttoned three down from the neck and seven up to the crotch. A matching visored scarf bound round and tied at the nape of her neck; a woven net bag slung over her shoulder. She said hellos and distributed some smiles