Sam McCain - 02 - Wake Up Little Susie by Ed Gorman

tan
    two-piece, his wife in a russet-colored suit that hid some of her boxy shape.
    “Anything new on the murder?” Dick asked.
    “Afraid not.”
    “I just wish I hadn’t gone home so early,”
    Mrs. Keys said. “If I hadn’t left at seven-thirty, maybe I could have scared him away. You know, with both Susan and me working in the showroom together.”
    He slid a commiserative arm around her.
    “I’m the one who should have been here. But there was so much last-minute stuff—I don’t think I was here twenty minutes the whole night.” He frowned. “Well, if you hear anything—”
    “I’ll call. Don’t worry.” I nodded
    good-bye to Mrs. Keys.
     
    You can never be sure how Judge Whitney is going to react to a piece of news. One time I told her I’d misplaced a vital piece of evidence in one of her cases, and she poured me a drink of brandy and said we all made mistakes from time to time and why didn’t I just sit down and relax. Another time I told her I was three minutes late for our meeting because my ragtop had had a flat tire, and she threw her brandy glass at me and said it was time I got rid of that “embarrassing juvenile car.” You may get the impression that she likes to start meetings on time.
    “How’s her mood?” I asked Pamela
    Forrest when I walked into the office that fine fall Monday morning. Pamela was wearing a blue shift with a matching blue ribbon in her baby-blond hair.
    “How was Custer’s mood after the Little Big Horn?”
    “That bad?”
    “She said you didn’t call her.”
    “I didn’t have anything to tell her.”
    “She said that shouldn’t be any excuse.”
    “Just wait till I tell her what David Squires wants. You’ll be hearing her scream.” Then: “Why are you smiling? Do you like seeing me in trouble with her?”
    “Oh. Sorry. I was thinking about something else.”
    And I got jealous because the only time Pamela ever looked that radiantly happy was when there was good news on the Stu Grant front.
    “Something happened with Stu, didn’t it?”
    “Not with Stu exactly.”
    “Huh?”
    “With his wife.”
    “Oh.”
    “Been called away, poor thing. Needs to spend two months with her ailing gran, poor thing.”
    “Here’s your chance,” I said, unable to keep the sadness from my voice.
    Her smile got even bigger. “That’s what I was thinking.”
    Her intercom buzzed angrily. “Is that who I think it is out there?”
    “Yes, Judge.”
    “Tell him to get in here right now!”
    “Yes, Judge.”
    I just kept thinking of how shocked she was going to be when I told her Squires wanted to hire me. I also just kept thinking about Pamela and Stu together for two months.
    The intercom clicked off.
    I turned and started for the Judge’s chambers.
    But before I could take a step, Pamela grabbed my hand. “I say prayers for you and Mary all the time. That you’ll—y know—get together. Would you do that for me? Say prayers that Stu and I get together?
    I’m so scared, McCain, I really am. This may be the only real chance I ever have at him.
    Two months.”
    “I’ll try.”
    I didn’t know which I felt more miserable about at that particular moment, Pamela or facing the Judge.
     
    She had her tall executive leather chair turned away from me. All I could see was the thick blue smoke from her Gauloise
    cigarette curling up toward the vaulted ceiling.
    With its mahogany wainscoting, small fireplace, leather furniture, and elegant framed Vermeer prints, the office was seminally intimidating. The Supreme Court couldn’t look a whole lot plusher than this.
    She didn’t say anything for a few moments.
    Making me anxious was her second favorite sport. The first was tennis.
    Finally: “Is the door closed?” Still facing away from me.
    “Yes.”
    “Are you sitting down?”
    “Yes.”
    “Are you afraid I’m going
    to explode and really tear into you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good.”
    Still facing away from me. More smoke from her Gauloise. More