She put a small suit-case on the lounge and took off her hat and coat. “Anything break?”
Fenner shook his head. “If it wasn’t for that dead Chink, I’d write it off as easy money. Those guys wouldn’t have risked carting the stiff all the way up to my office unless they were mighty anxious to get me out of the way.”
Paula opened her case and took out a book. “I’ve had my dinner,” she said, sitting in the padded chair near the desk. “I’m all set. If you want to be excused, you can go.”
Fenner nodded. He got up and brushed himself down. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll be back in a little while. If she rings, tell her I want to see ,her bad. Get her address and still feed her syrup. I want to get close to that dame.”
“I was afraid of that,” Paula murmured, but Fenner went to the door without hearing her.
Just outside, two men, dressed in black suits, stood shoulder to shoulder. They looked like Mexicans, but they weren’t. Fenner thought they were Spaniards, but then he wasn’t sure. Each of them had his right, hand in the coat pocket of his tight-fitting suit. They were dressed alike: all in black, black fedoras, white shirts and dazzling ties. They looked like some turn that comes first on a vaudeville bill, only when you got a look at their eyes you began to think of snakes and things that hadn’t any legs.
Fenner said, “Want to see me?” He knew without being told that two guns were pointed at his belly. The bulge in the coat pockets couldn’t lie.
The shorter of the two said, “Yeah, we thought we’d drop in.”
Fenner moved back into the office, Paula slid open the desk drawer and put her hand on Fenner’s .38. The short guy said, “Hold it.” He talked through his teeth, and he made his message convincing.
Paula sat back and folded her hands in her lap.