“Took ’er down to Chinatown; showed ’er how to kick the gongaroun’.”
Mr. Winfield reached up into the pocket of the dressing-gown, fished out a cigarette, matches. He lighted the cigarette, leaned back in the water, sighed. His face was a long tan oblong of contentment. He flexed his jaw, then mechanically put up one hand and removed an upper plate, put the little semi-circle of shining teeth on the basin beside the tub, ran his tongue over thick, sharply etched lips, sighed again. The warm water was soft, caressing; he was very comfortable.
He heard the buzzer and he heard the blonde woman stagger along the corridor past the bathroom to the outer door of the apartment. He listened but could hear no word of anything said there; only the sound of the door opening and closing, and silence broken faintly by the phonograph’s “Hi-de-ho-oh, Minnie.”
Then the bathroom door swung slowly open and a man stood outlined against the darkness of the corridor. He was bareheaded and the electric light was reflected in a thin line across his hair, shone dully on the moist pallor of his skin. He wore a tightly belted raincoat and his hands were thrust deep into his pockets.
Winfield sat up straight in the tub, spoke tentatively “Hello!” He said “hello” with an incredulous rising inflection, blinked incredulously upward. The cigarette dangled loosely from one corner of his mouth.
The man leaned against the frame of the door and took a short thick automatic out of his coat pocket and held it steadily, waist high.
Winfield put his hands on the sides of the tub and started to get up.
The automatic barked twice.
Winfield half stood, with one hand and one leg braced against the side of the tub for perhaps five seconds. His eyes were wide, blank. Then he sank down slowly, his head fell back against the smooth blue porcelain, slid slowly under the water. The cigarette still hung in the corner of his clenched mouth and as his head went under the water it hissed briefly, was gone.
The man in the doorway turned, disappeared.