Sinful Woman

by James M. Cain

  “Is she with him?”

  “Must be. Tail light’s burning.”

  “She’s nuts.”

  “No law against driving with the lights on if she likes driving with the lights on, is there?”

  “No law gegen to be nuts.”

  Sylvia came into the casino and Dmitri looked at her in surprise, for he hadn’t known she was here. She said: “Dimmy, if you want to see that personal appearance contract you’ll find it back of Tony’s desk. I just signed it—in red ink.”

  Then she hurried outside, and he watched her uneasily as she stepped into the sunshine. Then, becoming aware of what she had said, he knit his brows in puzzlement, turned to Mr. La Bouche and Benny. But they, with that sixth sense that is a special characteristic of Hollywood, had quietly vanished. The boots were almost done now. Paying the Mexican he got up, walked around the end of the bar, approached the office. Throwing open the door for the majestic entrance that befitted his station in life, he strode into the room. He was well inside before he noticed there was nobody there, and stopped. Then he looked at the desk, which had nothing on it but a blotter, a paper cutter, and an ashtray. He looked out the window, to where Sylvia stood at the river’s edge, and took a step or two in that direction, as though he were going to call to her, find out what she had been talking about. Then he gave a low, quavering moan. Then he turned green, and sat down in one of the big leather chairs.

  Dreadful, hammering seconds went by before the door opened and Tony came in, faultless in his double-breasted black suit. Dmitri got up, forced a smile, lunged at what was intended for casualness. “Beg poddon, plizze. I’m looking for the proprietor.”

  “I own this place.”

  “You, Tony?”

  “Tony Rico is my name.”

  “Spiro mine. President Phoenix Pictures, big Hollywood company. Could I speak to you one minute?”

  “What about?”

  “I’m in a little trouble.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “Telling the truth I don’t know. I was not personally here. But nothing serious I give my word honor, epsolutely. Friend of mine, Baron Victor Adlerkreutz, fine fallow, fine family, one finest families in Europe—is hurt.”

  “In what way?”

  “I think—shot.”

  “And what do you want of me?”

  “Listen, Tony; listen, old fallow, listen to me, plizze. I want you to let me get the Baron out from here. I want we get him to a private hospital, get a doctor quick, fix it up what we say, so when the police come, and all those damn reporter, we don’t have any mess.”

  “Afraid I couldn’t do that.”

  “Tony, you don’t want no mess either!”

  “Your friend’s dead.”

  Tony motioned toward the desk and added: “Or so I think.” He glanced at the small mirror he had in his hand, polished it with his handkerchief, went behind the desk and knelt down.

  In a moment he stood up and came over to Dmitri, holding up the mirror. “You see anything on that?”

  “No.”

  “Neither do I.”

  He went to the phone, picked up the receiver, jiggled the bar. Dmitri seemed to come out of the trance that had half enveloped him and jumped for the instrument. Tony stepped aside and motioned him back to his seat. But, Dmitri kept grabbing, until the phone was knocked off the desk and Tony had to let go or have the cord torn out by the roots. He swore hotly at Dmitri, who paid no attention. “Tony! Not yet! Don’t call the police till I talk to you!”

  “Sorry, this is nothing I can talk about.”

  “Yes, Tony.”

  “Listen! I don’t know where the hell you come from, but in this state we got laws.”

  “Tony! Don’t you get it? I’m a producer! If this mess comes out, it ruins me, ruins my life, ruins my company, ruins my star!”

  “Once more: There’s nothing I can do for you!”

  “Then do it for Sylvia!”

  “You trying to tell me she shot him?”

  “Who do you think?”

  Tony stared incredulously at Dmitri, who seized the chance to pick up the phone, set it on the desk, and clap the receiver in place. At once it rang. He answered. “Hello. No, nobody called. Fell off the desk. Sorry, plizze.”

  He set the receiver in place, held it with both hands. Sylvia came in, her bravado gone. She sat down. Tony, after looking at her, was no longer incredulous. He went over to her. “We’ve been having an argument, Miss Shoreham. About something that’s happened. I’ve got no choice. I’ve got to report it.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “It’s none of my affair. But after what’s been going on, it don’t surprise me any. I want you to hear me say that, Miss Shoreham.”

  “Thanks, Tony.”

  “A jury may feel the same way.”

  “I’m not that far yet.”

  To Dmitri, a little wearily, Tony said: “You needn’t hold on to that phone. There’s twenty-two extensions in the place, and I can call from any of them.”

  Dmitri leaped for him, clamped arms around his neck as a drowning man might. “Tony, you don’t know what I say even. It’s not the jury. It’s Hays! So, jury say O. K., is swell, hey? Is like hell. Hays say, mess is mess and rub her out. Tony, I got one million pingo-pangoes tied up in this face! One million I swear, for Sugar Hill Sugar, first picture I make all my own money! If this mess comes out, I can’t release! It breaks me, breaks my company, breaks Sylvia—”

  “It’s tough, but I can’t—”

  “You want money? I’m rich, I—”

  “So am I!”

  “I buy your place, Tony! How much—”

  “It’s not for sale!”

  “Tony, give me ten minutes! Give me five minutes! I’ve got my production manager here! He can make it accident! He can make it—”

  “Mr. Spiro, maybe you’ve been in the picture business so long you don’t know how the rest of the world is. I’m a gambler. To you, maybe that’s a low tout, somebody to be bought. In this state, a gambler is as good as anybody else. He pays most of the taxes, he runs a straight game, he’s a leading citizen. And if you think you can—”

  “O. K., ruin me. I don’t care.”

  Tony started for the casino, first unwinding Dmitri from his neck and flinging him to the floor. But for a moment, in this straight-shouldered march to rectitude, he hesitated, broke step. It didn’t seem possible that Dmitri, prone by the desk, could see. Possibly he heard. At any rate, he rolled over, jumped up. “What is it, Tony? Only say!”

  “My little daughter.”

  “Yes, your little daughter!”

  Tony stood like a man of granite. Then, with even more emotion than Dmitri had shown, he went on: “My little girl Maxine, that’s got more talent than any actress that ever lived; that’s sent her picture to every scout for every agent in Hollywood, and that not never even got an answer to her letter; my little girl that’s crazy to get in pictures—could you make her a star?”

  “Tony! Ask something hard, something that will show how I feel for you! If she’s not cross-eyed, I make her Garbo! If she is cross-eyed—”

  “She’s not cross-eyed.”

  Having leveled one mountain, Dmitri turned to the Everest that sat motionless in the chair.

  But to his astonishment Sylvia looked up wearily and said: “Yes, Dimmy, it was an accident.”

  Chapter Six

  THE CLOCK IN THE hotel lobby crept to 1:05, to 1:10, to 1:20. The tall man in the cow-puncher’s hat, who marched up and down, was a stranger to the clientele, the smart women who would get their divorces in a quiet, discreet way, then take their departures noisily, with orchids; and they regarded him somewhat humorously as they made their way to the dining room. There was nothing humorous, however, about the way the clerk regarded him. Sheriffs, in his scheme of things, were problems to be got rid of at once, if not sooner, and at the first inquiry for Miss Shoreham, he had begun paging that lady all over town. After each ca
ll he would give a report, with conjectural matter on where it would be advisable to try next. It was during one of these speeches that Inspector Cy Britten, of the city police, strolled up, set his elbows on the desk, and stood listening. Then he smiled in a sad sort of way, and said: “Parker, have you got a date with that picture actress?”

  “That would be my business, I figure.”

  “Are you by any chance taking her to lunch?”

  “Are you by any chance bothered about it?”

  “No, Parker, not that I know of, though I freely admit that when she sashays up the street every morning I generally peep out the window of my office and keep on peeping. It’s only that your office said you were here, and so it’s my duty to inform you that there’s been a shooting out at the Galloping Domino, and that it’s out past the city limits in the county, and that as a matter of fact a couple of your men have already left for there, and that it’s plainly your duty to go.”

  “And that makes you happy?”

  “Well, somebody’s got to take this girl to lunch—”

  “And it might as well be you, hey?”

  “As a matter of the courtesy of the police department, I just thought I’d wait here, and inform her of the unfortunate circumstances that have led to the disappearance of her luncheon pardner, and then, as the least that any gentleman could do, to—”

  “You just thought it all wrong.”

  “I’m willing to bet—”

  “This is how it’s going to be: I left my car down to my office, not expecting to need it, and now, unfortunately and alas, I got no way to get out to the Domino without I commandeer the first car I can get. So as I see your car sitting out front, I hereby deputize you to do the job. This man can inform the young lady.”

  Driving out, the Sheriff learned more of the details. The call had come first to one of the hospitals, which had sent an ambulance, with interne and orderlies. When the doctor had found the victim was dead, he had called the city police, mistakenly supposing the Domino to be within their authority; they had rung the Sheriff’s office, relaying the facts and offering whatever help might be needed. The Chief Deputy, after asking the loan of police photographers, had dispatched his own motorcycle officers, called the Coroner and police magistrate who also served as marrying justice, and also an undertaker. In addition to their photographers, the city police had sent a brace of uniformed patrolmen, in a patrol car, to put themselves at the disposal of the Sheriff. So that when he and Mr. Britten turned in at the Domino, there was quite an array of official cars and motorcycles, to say nothing of an ambulance and an undertaker’s truck.

  At the door, a state policeman met them, and after saluting the Sheriff said: “We closed him down, pending and until. Such a mob jammed in here as soon as the radio give it out, on account of this picture actress, that—”

  “On account of who?”

  “Sylvia Shoreham. It’s her husband that got it, and from the way they’ve been piling in here you’d think—” He broke off, marched out to the gate, and held up his hand to a car full of boys that was turning in. “Just keep right on. Keep right on and don’t stop. This is not no cow-roping contest. I said beat it.”

  The boys drove off, and the officer led the way inside. To the Sheriff, Mr. Britten said: “Lucky, wasn’t it, that I didn’t stick around to take the young lady to lunch?”

  “Was, kind of.”

  “Things generally turn out right.”

  Inside, a white, tight-lipped Tony awaited them, and took them into the office where the police, Mr. Flynn and one other deputy, the Coroner, an undertaker, a doctor in white uniform, and two orderlies crowded back against the wall while two photographers took pictures. The late Baron Adlerkreutz was not lying as he had been a short time before, when he was an unseen presence behind the desk while Dmitri and Tony had their desperate argument. Now he lay in the middle of the floor, beside a few crimson drops on the linoleum carpet, the gun at his side, a tan silk handkerchief knotted in the trigger, and a white silk handkerchief knotted in the tan silk handkerchief, and fastened around his leg. Near him, and seeming to enclose him, were two ashtrays, two chairs, and the water cooler, on top of which was an electric fan. The Sheriff walked over, bent down, and peered. To Mr. Flynn, the Chief Deputy, who walked over close, he mumbled: “What’s the idea of the handkerchiefs?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out. They’d been having some kind of an argument about a picture scene.”

  “Who was having the argument?”

  “The picture men. He was a producer.”

  “They here?”

  “In the bar.”

  “Bring them in.”

  “If you’ll take a tip from me, you’ll talk to them where they are. Two of them are all right, but one of them, the one that seems to be boss, he didn’t do so good in presence of the body. He kind of cracked up. He—”

  “O. K.”

  Motioning Tony, Mr. Britten, the Coroner, the undertaker, the doctor, police and deputies to follow him, the Sheriff led the way into the bar, now deserted except for Mr. La Bouche, Benny, and Dmitri, who sat huddled at a table, and an officer who sat reading a paper. Mr. La Bouche jumped up and began arranging chairs, to be assisted at once by Benny; but Dmitri sat where he was, huddled in the posture of a man having a chill, and watching in some sort of oblique way, as though his nose were a side-vision mirror in which he could see what was going on. Tony made brief introductions, sat down, looked at his finger nails a moment, then said: “All right. Get going.”

  Dmitri drew a long, trembling breath. He said: “Sharf, Excellenz, I hope you don’t take it personal I feel so upset.”

  “Not at all, pardner. Now shoot.”

  “Yes, quite so. We came here last night, me, my production manager, Mr. La Bouche, and my special writer, Mr. Benny Zitt.”

  “These guys?”

  “Yes.”

  “Go on.”

  “We came to talk about a moving picture. You heard of me, yes? I’m Dmitri Spiro, president Phoenix Pictures, strictly class product, make only the best. We came to see our star, Miss Sylvia Shoreham, and talk about a picture. She was to get a divorce today, it meant a new start. Vicki was her husband, but all are good friends, fine friends—friendly friends.”

  “Get to the shooting.”

  “We talked about the picture, and there was one scene Miss Shoreham, she didn’t like. She is girl in prison, and had to shoot another girl, and didn’t like. She said, Dimmy, is impossible. She said, Dimmy, my public will not let me do this thing. Then she walked by the river to cool off.”

  “Was it hot?”

  “She was sore.”

  “What then?”

  “So then Benny, he had an idea. He said, Mr. Spiro, she shoots the other girl, but it’s accident! She finds the gun, she hides the gun, she puts the gun under the bed, but has no bad conscience gegen other girl. But the other girl sees the gun, gets the wrong idea. So they straggle! The straggle like in Destry Rides Again, only better. Then the gun goes off. It’s accident, but who’ll believe it? But, Vicki, the Baron Adlerkreutz, he said, ‘Yes, Dimmy, but out in the audience, how do we know it’s accident?’ Then Mr. La Bouche here, he said: ‘I show you, Vicki. It is so simple, you laugh. But wait a minute, I have to have a gun, or you won’t believe it.’ So we go to Tony, ask plizze may we borrow gun?”

  The Sheriff looked at Tony, who licked his lips and said: “I keep seven guns out here, on account of our heavy stock of cash, four rifles and three pistols, all registered to me and all under permits I got on file. I didn’t want to lend them any gun. I don’t want to lend anybody a gun ever. But they were friends of Miss Shoreham’s, and she’d been such a good customer and all, and they acted like it was important, so I took out the clip and handed over the automatic I keep in the desk.”

  “If you took out the clip—”

  “I must have forgot the shell in the barrel.”

  “Pretty careless you’re getting.”

&n
bsp; “Sheriff, if Mr. Spiro feels upset, I feel it double, because I ought never to have lent the gun in the first place. I thought I threw the ejector and snapped the trigger, that’s all I can say; but a wholesaler’s man was waiting for me out back and—”

  The Sheriff nodded at Dmitri, who went on: “And so, Bushy, he showed Vicki how we can do the scene, so Sylvia will love it. He say ‘Vicki, girls fight till dresses are torn to rags, and maybe Sylwia don’t look good in a scene where her dress is all torn off. So one piece of the dress, one piece of the other girl’s dress, catches in the gun—the trigger. We cut in, show the dress caught in the trigger, but the girls don’t see it. So, Sylvia almost has the gun. She twists the gun from the other girl’s hand, but oh!—oh!—oh!—oh! People see the piece of the torn dress pull tighter, tighter, tighter—and boom! The gun goes off, and there is the other girl dead on the floor. So we tie one henadkerchief to Vicki’s leg, one to the gun tryger, tie the henadkerchiefs together. Vicki takes the gun, I grab it, twist his hand. Bushy, he stands by the camera, which was an electric fan on the water cooler. Bushy, he say, ‘come around slow now, so it’s in close to the camera.’ So we come around slow, handkerchiefs tighten, Vicki say, ‘Ah yes, I see now, is very good, yes, yes—come up very slow’—and boom! There was Vicki on the floor, and I can’t believe it. I say ‘Vicki, Vicki, speak to me.’ I say—”

  “O. K.”

  The Sheriff, who had evidently found this recital a little difficult to keep up with, knit his brows and in a moment said to Mr. La Bouche: “I didn’t see any signs of a fight.”

  “What fight?”

  “Well—?”

  “Oh, they didn’t do the fight, if that’s what you mean. We allowed for that. A fight, it’s like jungle stuff, it’s a cutter’s job anyway. You shoot five hundred feet, or whatever you need, and he puts it together. All that mattered was the torn dress and the gun. So we laid it out how that would break. We figured the cell would be nine feet long, five feet wide, with two out for the bunk. So we marked the set with the ashtrays and chairs, set up the camera over the water cooler, and started her going. I mean, it was an electric fan. The henadkerchiefs were the torn dress.”