“I guess you forgot to invite me. But I’ll manage.” He trimmed fat from the joints, while the frying pan hissed gently with liquescent butter. “Did the mailman deliver?”
“It didn’t come today.”
And once again it was like a Geiger counter clicking to the intrusion of invisible radioactivity, the way his intuition tingled deep down at her reply.
He said, pleasantly, “I hope you really do know as much about me as you indicated once.”
“How do you mean?”
“I shouldn’t want you to be worrying about whether I’m going to double-cross you again. I made a deal with you, and when I make deals they stay made. It’s only when someone else starts dealing from the bottom that all bets are off.”
“Obviously,” she said, with cool indifference.
She let him take a key to the apartment when he left, and that alone told him to save himself the trouble of returning for a search while she was out. If there was anything she didn’t want him to find, it would certainly not be there.
He had taken routine precautions against being followed when he went to the Bienville, but as he turned into the lobby of the Hotel Monteleone the chunky figure of Lieutenant Wendel rose from an armchair to greet him.
“Had a nice afternoon, Saint?”