But handling Ruth came first. He found himself planning what he'd say to her, as he'd plan a sales talk. He'd have to eat a little crow, and make some promises. Not to quit gambling; she'd never believe him if he promised that, and disbelief would antagonize her. But he would promise—and sincerely, because he never wanted to get into a jam like this again—never again to gamble on credit and go in over his head. He could promise too to pay back the loan against the policy at, say, twenty-five a week, so the full ten thousand would be coming when the endowment was due. And even make the payments for a few weeks until things were on even keel again. He could tell her—
"Beg your pardon, Mr. Fleck. Like to talk to you."
He'd been aware, while thinking, of someone coming up alongside him at the bar and ordering and getting a drink, and now he turned to see who it was. He didn't know the guy. Medium height, stocky and husky-looking, reddish face, and eyes like pale blue marbles.
"You don't know me," the man said. "My name's Mack Irby."
Ray Fleck nodded, not too cordially. "Glad to know you, Mr. Kirby," he said. "Got to leave in a minute but—what's it about?"
"Irby, not Kirby. Mack Irby—does sound like Kirby when you say both names together. Look, it's kind of private. End booth back there's empty, and so's the one next it. Let's go back to the end booth."
Ray frowned. "I said I got just a minute. You can tell me what it's about right here." The guy might be a damn insurance salesman, for all he knew. Or more likely a bill collector.
Irby said, "Let's say I want to talk about a friend of yours, Mr. Fleck. His name's something like yours. It's Ray Fletcher."
Ray Fleck winced. He knew that the wince was visible, even obvious, but he couldn't help it; the shock had been too great. Here was trouble, new trouble, just when he'd thought he had figured a safe answer to the problem of his debt to the bookie. Now this. He had no doubt what it concerned. At various times in his life and for various reasons he'd used a name other than his own, but not always the same one; to no one but Dolly Mason had he ever given his name as Fletcher.
But how had he been found so quickly? The only thing he could think of was that Dolly must have known all along, or for a long time, what his real identity was. There'd been times—not tonight—when she'd been briefly alone with his clothes while he'd gone into the bathroom; on any of those occasions she could have taken a quick look at identification in his wallet or papers in his pocket. Just what a girl like Dolly would do. Why hadn't he thought of....