Skinflick by Joseph Hansen Page A

extra windows might be a mistake. Groaning, he rolled onto his back on the creaky chaise he’d dragged in from the courtyard—webbing slack on a frame of aluminum tubing, the stuffing lumpy in the gaudy flower-print plastic pallet. He clutched the blanket around his nakedness and sat up. Tap-tap-tap. He squinted at the French doors. Where Amanda had made the circle on the dusty pane yesterday, she was smiling in at him. He lifted to her a hand that felt as if it belonged to someone else. It was early to smile, but he worked at it.
    “You’ll have to clear out,” she called. “All sorts of physical types are coming with crowbars.”
    He pointed to the door, tottered into pants, and went barefoot to let her in. He raked fingers through his hair. His mouth tasted sour. He and Doug had drunk Dos Equis and munched tortilla chips until late—how late he didn’t know. The talk had been guarded, mannerly, but he hoped Doug wouldn’t keep coming back. What you used to have was only that. And what they used to have was flawed from the start. He’d lost Rod to cancer, Doug had lost Jean-Paul in a car smash. They’d tried to make the losses up to each other. Life didn’t work that way. Love didn’t work that way—if love worked any way. What did they coat those tortilla chips with? Rust-color dust. Garlic was what he tasted. He ran his tongue over his teeth and opened the door to Amanda. Her T-shirt read HIS TOO. She was in ninety-dollar jeans. She was ready for work.
    “Someone’s in your kitchen,” she said. “A lovely, haggard Mediterranean type with long black eyelashes. He offered me coffee in a sultry voice. I was cagey. It could be doped. I could end up in a brothel in Turin.”
    “Or a motel in Santa Monica,” Dave said, “which is worse. Go help him with the bacon and eggs. If he makes any false moves, holler, and I’ll come running. Soapy and stark naked but running.”
    “Promises,” she said, and went to the cookhouse.
    Dave hobbled and hopped to the fencing studio. Getting there barefoot was painful. A countertenor was having to do with Monteverdi when he switched on the radio. He rifled cartons for clothes and went into the bathroom. When he came out, showered and shaved, the music was piano and violin, something twentieth-century. Delgado and Amanda sat on the side of the bed and ate from plates on their knees. Mugs of coffee steamed at their feet. Delgado started to get up but Dave went to the cookhouse, got his own plate from the oven where it was keeping warm, poured himself a mug of coffee, and went back with them. He sat on the other side of the bed, drank some coffee to wash out the mint taste of the tooth powder, and swallowed some eggs.
    “The car is full of catalogues for you to look at,” Amanda said. “Sample books. Fabrics. Carpet. Furniture. I hope you haven’t got a big day’s work planned.”
    “I can work for him,” Delgado said. He looked over his shoulder at Dave. “Who should I talk to?”
    “Spence Odum. Maybe he knows where Charleen Sims is. Only you have to find him first. I’ve checked the directories. He doesn’t have a business address. He doesn’t even have a home address. He makes skinflicks.”
    “I’ll find him for you,” Delgado said. “What do you want with Charleen what’s-her-name?”
    “I think it’s possible she witnessed a murder.”
    Delgado was making Dave feel guilty about having checked the liquor bottles in the kitchen. He knew drunks. Delgado must have awakened feeling rotten. The remedy for that was to jolt down alcohol as soon as possible. To stop the shaking, the panic. The gin bottle was the only one Dave had opened himself. It didn’t seem any emptier than when he’d made his martini. The seals on the Jack Daniels and the Glenlivet were intact. He said, “You don’t have to do it.”
    “I’d like to,” Delgado said. “Maybe if I do it right, you’ll put in a word for me at Sequoia.”
    “You’ll do it right,” Dave said.