“To you who already appreciate the incomparable luxury of Smoothskin Handwear — to you who plan to compliment your sense of well-being when next you need fine gloves — the Kobler Glove Corporation offers truly the chance of a lifetime — the opportunity to win twenty-five thousand dollars in cash: Twenty... Five... Thousand... Dollars!”
Generally, when people come up with those impressive figures, I listen. Often as not here in the Plaza Royale they actually have that kind of corn and aren’t just blowing Broadway bubbles. But I couldn’t keep my mind on what the spieler was selling; I’d just remembered what it was I’d touched. The door. The door or the jamb leading from the living-room into Miss Marino’s bedroom and bath.
I went to it while violins began to moan about those Pa-a-ale Hands I Loved Beside the Shalimar.
The hand that had touched the inside of that door hadn’t been so pale.
No doubt about its being a hand; marks of the fingers were still there, sticky-thick crimson blotches on the inside of the French-gray door. Four fingers of a right hand, the marks weren’t large enough for me to be sure whether they’d been made by a man or woman.
There were only those four prints, about a foot above the lock. And on the edge of the door, where it fits the jamb, the thumb had left another smear. That had been before the door had been closed; there was a corresponding streak on the metal jamb. The mark I’d gotten on my hand had come from that edge of the door, where I’d pushed it open a little.
When I turned around Lanerd was watching the screen, but standing so he could have seen me peer around the door, at the jamb.
“This is what I want you to see, Vine.” He beckoned, as some ill-mannered guests do to a bellman.
I didn’t move. I could see all I wanted from where I stood.
On the tube, another cutie was playing a piano, the camera shooting down on the keyboard from above so only her hands and forearms showed. Not even the shoulders, this time.