5 Detective Novels Magazine Cover — page 66: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

66 five miles’ out, he swung off, cutting across to Long Beach Boulevard. After another mile, he turned again. The nightclub had a big red neon sign, with neon-lighted palms at either end of it. He pulled his car into the parking place and sprinted through the rain toward the club entrance. The door let him directly into the bar. The long, narrow room was well filled. He stopped and ordered a double martini, extra dry. The bartender was a short, fat man with eyes that popped some- what like a frog’s. There wasn’t a hair on his head, even where his eyebrows should have been. It gave him a startled expression. Prentiss had an impulse to take a soft pencil and draw the man a couple of eyebrows. He didn’t. He downed his martini, went along a passage, and came into a big supper room. It had a lot of potted palms masking the tables. The whole place was badly lighted and packed full with people. There were two orchestras, five Hawaiian strings. and a swing band. Prentiss won- dered, as he sat down, what Hawaiians were supposed to have to do with Borneo. The waiter was Eurasian. The whole place seemed to be Eurasian. Prentiss gave his order, asked for another mar- tini. and lit a cigarette. Then he looked around. At the moment, the Hawaiians were playing, and the scrape of steel on the strings of the guitars shrilled high above the chatter of voices and clink of glasses. Prentiss yawned. The whole thing had a svnthetic air, but the crowd seemed to be eating it up. His steak came and it was a good one. He ate slowly, had a liqueur with his coffee, and settled back, lighting a cigar. There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the joint. He couldn’t see the customers. clearly through the gloom and smoke, but there were a lot of them. The Hawaiians stopped playing after a dusky, well-rounded girl had given a bad version of Aloha with an encore of Blue Hawai. The swing band broke into a noisy jam session, and a small girl came out of the door behind the band platform. Prentiss stiffened. It was the girl who had been carrying the package, the one FIVE DETECTIVE NOVELS MAGAZINE who had come to his office. He leaned forward, listened as she sang Scatter- brain. She could sing. It was a shame to waste a voice like hers in a dive like the Borneo. He signaled a waiter, found a piece of paper and scribbled a note: When you finish, come over to my table. I want to talk about heads—yours and mine. He saw the man take the folded note, make a circuit of the room, and slip the paper into the girl’s hand as she left the platform. HE stopped beside one of the shrouded lights. He saw her unfold the note, read it. When she glanced up sharply, he raised one hand. For a moment he thought she wasn’t coming. Then she walked toward him slowly, unwillingly, as if she were afraid. He rose and held a chair for her. She slid into it sideways, her eyes never leaving his face. “You shouldn’t have come here.” Her voice was so low it hardly carried to his straining ears. “Why?” he said, and the word was almost lost in the blare and clatter of the band. 7 She was leaning toward him, arms on the table. “Because they’ll probably kill you.” He looked at her, his brows pulling down into a straight line as he frowned. “That’s a funny thing to say. This afternoon you were in my office, waving a gun around.” “What did you do with the real head ?” she demanded suddenly. He pretended surprise. “Real head? What are you talking about ?” “Don’t stall, Mr. Prentiss. That head I got from your office was made of plas- ter. As long as you have the real head, you’re in constant danger.” “Why?” he asked interestedly. She didn’t answer directly. “T can’t explain. And the less you know, the better off you’ll be.” “T like mysteries,” he said. She nodded. “I know you do. mysteries don’t like you, Mr. Prentiss. Why don’t you give that head back to But . AMTCLOOO S eo nn