At least I had not lost her yet. "I want to remind you that it is a matter of record in Oaxaca that Miss McLeen and Miss Bowie were staying with you. It is a matter of record that you identified the body. It is a matter of record that Miss Bowie was under suspicion of complicity in an attempt to smuggle narcotics into the United States."

"This has nothing to do with me. Nothing. I should not have... done the kindness of helping them find out who that poor child was, and giving them her possessions to send home to her family. I do not become involved in such matters."

"But the point is you did become involved. I agree with you, Mrs. Vitrier. Things should always be handled privately and with discretion. I find myself in an awkward position. I must return to Florida and report to the Bowie girl"s father. He wanted to know the circ.u.mstances of her death. If I go back to him with a lot of unanswered questions, he has the resources to pursue this matter through diplomatic channels. I have talked to your attorney in Oaxaca, Alfredo Gaona. He refused to give me any help in getting in touch with you. But from talking to him, I think I know how much you value your privacy."

"Do you now have a desire to threaten me in some way, Mister McGee?"

"No. But should Mr. Harlan Bowie pursue this further because I could not give him any answers, I would think that the Mexican government would make a complete and official investigation, as a matter of diplomatic courtesy. And I do not think that you could... stay behind your walls under such circ.u.mstances."

There was such a long pause I began to be afraid she had hung up very quietly. Then she said, "I have always enjoyed this country. But you see, it is not entirely necessary to me, is it? There is nothing to prevent my leaving tomorrow and never coming back here. What I have would be sold without difficulty."

"I think that would be a very odd thing for you to do."

"I cannot be impressed with what you might think of what I do or do not do."

"I merely meant that it seems like such an extreme reaction to a very simple thing. I just want to fill in the blanks. It would not take much of your time. And then I would leave you alone, and I could make my report to Mr. Bowie. It"s that simple."

"I think... you are a clever person, Mr. McGee."

"Not particularly."

"To learn the name I use here was a clever thing. Poor Alfredo was dreadfully upset to learn there had been no call from me. So it is to understand you found where I am by tricking that old man. But certainly he did not tell you this name I invented."

"Sometimes there is luck."

"Luck is something one makes for oneself, I think. Mr. McGee, I think I will give you that little time to ask your questions. You will present yourself at this suite at seven promptly?"

"Thank you very much."

"This is done only because I must believe you are a person of some discretion and privacy."

"I will be there at seven."

The wing of the hotel that was given over to the suites had wider and more luxurious corridors, was more deeply carpeted, more boldly decorated. The Fiesta Suites were on the fourth floor. I had gone in and talked to the reservation people about accommodations and had learned that suites were available from forty dollars a day to three hundred dollars a day. The wing was five stories high, and the several Fiesta Suites were duplex, with the living areas on the fourth floor, opening out onto s.p.a.cious, walled roof gardens, and with two bedrooms and two baths on the fifth floor, and an internal staircase. The reservation girl was friendly, not busy, willing to chat.

She said that the largest suite, the presidential suite, had four bedrooms, a servant"s room, a baronial dining room, and, on its larger roof garden, quite large shade trees and a large heated swimming pool. She said that several of the suites were permanently rented, some by businesses, some by individuals who had taken them when the hotel had opened and either lived there most of the year, or used them whenever they visited the city.

I pressed the bronze b.u.t.ton by the door. I noticed one of those little peepholes set into the door, a wide angle lens, and I repressed my usual impulse to put my thumb over it.

The door opened six inches, as far as the heavy bra.s.s safety chain would let it. Eva Vitrier looked out through the gap at me. Enelio"s description had been apt. Her face had all the striking thrusts and angles and slightly vulpine harshness of Nefert.i.ti.

Black hair piled high. A long muscular throat, graceful but not delicate. It was as broad as the slender face. The mouth was small and plump and fleshy. Her eyes were set oddly, one more sharply tilted than the other. She was wearing some sort of hostess gown, deep aqua, floor-length, with a wide scooped neck, a metallic golden rope belting it at the natural waistline. She had a look of extraordinary sensuous vitality kept under such exacting control, such practiced control, that she was an immediate challenge.

I could see beyond her into a hushed and handsome room, with a high ceiling and gla.s.s doors beyond, through which I could see a patio garden so verdant and substantial it was difficult to adjust to being on the fourth floor. Sizable trees, and muscular flagstones winding through heavy plantings.

"You are Mr. McGee? I do not care to ask you in, or feel the need to apologize. I am quite alone here. There is no reason why I should even give you this much time. But I was curious to... put a face and body with your voice, perhaps."

"I"m what you imagined?"

"Does it matter? I thought you would be a large man, but with more of the American look of softness and baldness and the quick clever eyes behind gla.s.ses, the look of the ones who find their way to the money so easily I would rather you looked like that, because as you look now you disconcert me. To be so muscular and fit and brown, and to have about you a look of laughing at me somewhere inside you, and to look so... indolent-perhaps it is a part of cleverness to create an illusion of being a faithful dog one can scratch behind the ears, and send bounding off to fetch some object or to kill some animal. Now if you will tell me the blanks I will give you the little words to fill them, and everything will be tidy and proper for your report."

So the day was fading quickly, the room darkening behind her, and I was sorry I could not be rea.s.suringly balding and soft with little shrewd economic eyes so she would be rea.s.sured.

"Okay. What day did Minda McLeen leave and go to Mexico City?"

"The twenty-eighth day of July. A Monday."

"What did they quarrel about?"

"I have no idea. She was a tiresome girl, nervous and restless and irritable. She asked me to lend her money so she could leave. I was glad to."

"How much?"

"I do not know exactly. Perhaps two thousand pesos."

"How did she travel?"

"I have no idea. Something was said about someone driving to Mexico City. I did not listen. I was not interested. I do not know if she even came here, nor do I care."

"Why did you invite them to stay with you, when it must have been obvious to you that Miss Bowie was on drugs?"

"I felt sorry for them. One makes certain impulsive gestures from time to time, and usually regrets them. I had room for them, or for a dozen of them, at my Oaxaca home. And servants and money. It was a human impulse. I thought I might help them."

"Did you try to do anything about the Bowie girl"s addiction?"

"Of course! I had a discreet doctor fly in and give her a complete physical examination. She was in very bad shape from the addiction, malnutrition, intestinal parasites, several small chronic infections. The McLeen girl needed medical attention too, but mostly rest and nourishing food. Soon she was able to help with the Bowie girl. I gave her much personal care. I have had some practical experience. My first husband was seriously ill for a year and a half before he died, and he would not permit anyone else to care for him. I gave her the prescribed injections to quell the withdrawal symptoms of heroin addiction."

"And you knew what you were taking on?"

"One becomes bored and feels a bit... unnecessary from time to time. Then it is an affirmative act to make oneself needed. I would not have gone on and on with it, certainly. I had planned to have someone take her back to Florida to her home when she was well enough."

"When did Miss Bowie leave your home?"

"She was becoming more alert and responsive. On Sat.u.r.day in the early afternoon, a young man came asking to see her. I told my gate man that he could see Bix. Then Bix came to me and asked me if she could go for a ride with the young man. She said he was a friend. I thought it would be constructive to give her a test of her will and her desire to be cured. So she left with him. When she did not return Sat.u.r.day night I was annoyed and disappointed, and quite alarmed. She had become a likable personality. But I had no reason to report it. One cannot keep a houseguest locked up. Then she did not return Sunday night either. My cook went to market Monday morning and came back and told, me of an unidentified girl killed on the mountain road. I had her identification and her belongings at the house. I do not care to be involved in such things. I summoned my attorney, Alfredo Gaona, and explained the situation, and sent him to make arrangements with the police so that it could be done as quickly and quietly as possible. The body was sickeningly damaged, of course, but I knew at once from the chain she wore on her ankle and the red shoe that it was Beatrice Bowie. The police came to my home and claimed her belongings. And I did not care to stay there in the house longer. It was very depressing. So I came here the same evening. I have maintained this suite since the hotel opened."

"She was over her addiction?"

"She had been addicted intentionally to several compounds, each less powerful. It is a common method of treatment. Perhaps she could have been cured entirely. I do not know. There seemed to be in her a great need to escape herself, to blot out her known world."

Neat blanks, neatly filled.

"What day did Mr. McLeen come to you, asking about his daughter?"

"Let me think. Was Bix there? No, because he wished to question her about where Minda might have gone. I believe that it was quite late on Sat.u.r.day afternoon."

"Then you must have told him to come back, because at that time you thought Bix would be back from her ride."

"Then I am mistaken, and it was late on Sunday afternoon, because I did not ask him to come back. He is a very tiresome and talkative man."

I was running out of blanks. So there was left only what I expected would be the doorslammer.

"Mrs. Vitrier, did Minda McLeen try to prevent your having an affair with Miss Bowie?"

She stared at me, so motionless I could believe she had stopped breathing. Then she gave a husky, earthy, single bark of derisive laughter.

"Do you wonder that I close the world out, Mr. McGee? There is always some kind of obscene poison, isn"t there? Can you look at me and believe that?"

"Well, it isn"t easy."

"I have buried four husbands, Mr. McGee. They were all elderly and extremely well off. I respond to older men. Perhaps that is a weakness. I do not know. I loved them. There was poison then, too. Each time. Snickerings about how I had seen to it that they would die in bed. The world is nasty and cruel. Fortunately they left me with all the money I shall ever need, and nasty gossip cannot touch me."

"Maybe the gossip started because you"ve brought so many big, healthy, pretty maids down there with you, one at a time of course."

"Oh? Yes, I see. That could do it, couldn"t it? But how grotesque! It is a kind of work I do for an inst.i.tution in Brussels, Mr. McGee. The rehabilitation and training of disadvantaged young girls. I give them a year of training, and when each one leaves my service, she is competent and disciplined and polite. I must confess that I select ones who are attractive to look at. I select paintings and lamps which are attractive to look at. And I try to see that they are st.u.r.dy enough to do a hard day"s work. Do you understand? One cannot protect oneself against idle malice. I am a mystery. They seek answers. They will not accept the idea that there is no mystery at all. But I believe you will. You are, I think, an understanding and complex man. You look like the sort of man who is paid to strike a ball with a stick, or to fly to another star. But you have an easiness, an awareness of pleasure, no? And a life style which contents you, I think. You disconcert me. And you intrigue me."

"Which makes us even, Mrs. Vitrier."

"More blanks?"

"If I think of any I"d like to come back and stand out here in the hall and have a nice little chat."

"Sorry. This is the only chance you will have."

"And... I"ve run out of blanks."

She smiled, and without another word she closed the door. I stared at it and wondered if she was looking out the little peephole at me. I walked back down the corridor. Nice going, McGee. Handled it real swell. And besides, you"ve got a life style which contents you. But not very much right now. You are pure h.e.l.lfire with an insurance secretary from Guadalajara, but to the pretty French lady you are as impressive as a bag boy at the A R.

Something about her was so vivid and so directed and so strong, it was difficult to think clearly in her presence.

So I adjourned the meeting to a metal table on the wide deck outside Azulejos. One was a quorum. All right. Meeting come to order. What was wrong? Standing out in the hall. She"s alone, she likes privacy, too many people could be on the make for some of that money from those four old dead boys. So she is alone, eh? Where are all the servants? All right, this is one of the great hotels of the world, and they can give you service until you drown in it, particularly if you maintain a suite like that permanently, and if you demand service, which I imagine she would. And it could be the maid"s night out.

When I came to the doorslammer, why didn"t she slam it instead of explain herself? What would she have to lose? Maybe she has so much pride in being 110 percent woman, she doesn"t want anybody to believe she likes girls.

So why hadn"t I tried to break up that act by bringing in Bruce Bundy? Because I knew she was lying anyway. And how did you know that, McGee, you subtle, clever, complex fellow? Nothing but pure instinct. Don"t knock it. Meyer says it is made up of things you saw without knowing you saw them.

So what did I see that I didn"t know I saw? Close the eyes. Focus on the room behind her. Whoal Scan back. Change focus. Something there. Corner of coffee table. Fancy box. Candy box. How do you know it"s candy? Because, dammit, there were those things on the floor there. What things? Well, candy litter. Wadded up pieces of that kind of red tinfoil and yellow and blue they wrap up good candy in. And some of those little pieces of brown paper.

So she has a sweet tooth.

And throws the debris on the floor under the coffee table?

Maybe she isn"t neat.

But wasn"t the rest of the room, what you could see of it, so neat as to be practically sterile?

She was sitting on the couch eating chocolates. Why not?

But I"d been aware of two scents coming from that woman. One was perfume, faint and astringent, and the other was gin. Gin and candy? Ech!

So the servant eats candy.

And throws the wrappers on the floor?

Well, it was a big hotel and they would take very good care of the monied guests, and they would make a practice of not handing out information for the h.e.l.l of it. But a big hotel has to have a big staff, and there are always new people who haven"t learned how to keep the mouth entirely closed. And guests have room service, maid service, laundry service, dry cleaning, television repair, dog-walking service. All in Spanish, no doubt.

If you skulk you attract attention and suspicion. If you have to sneak, be loud and brash and confident about it.

My approach drew a blank with the guest service director"s staff, and it drew a blank with the travel agency office, and I struck out with the switchboard girls, and then I started hitting the shops, all open at that time of the evening, on the lower level, showing my white teeth and finding out which clerk had the most English. I varied my pitch to fit the shop situation.

"You do speak English? Good. Golly, I sure hope you can help me out of an awful spot. I just had a drink up in Fiesta Suite D as a guest of Mrs. Rivereta, and she did me a real important favor. Now what I want to do, honey, is send up a couple of little gifts. But I must be losing my mind, because I"ve drawn a blank on any name except Mrs. Rivereta, and I thought maybe you might have sold stuff and sent it up there and know the names."

So you walk and talk, and it goes clunk, clunk clunk, and in a little silver shop it goes DING!

She was a brisk cute little thing and she had pale streaks dyed into her black, black hair, and she frowned and went thumbing through records, and asked questions of the other girl, and then finally pulled a card out.

"Yessss! I thought I remember something. But I don"t know if this is a guest living there or it is something she is taking outside the hotel to a fiesta, a birthday. These things Mrs. Rivereta signed for and they are put on her hotel bill. Very nice. Let me show you one thing." She scampered off and came back with a thing that at first glance looked like a silver cigarette case, but turned out to be a purse gadget, with s.p.a.ce for coins, notebook pencil, identification.

"Across here, inside, people like the name engraved. We can give two-day service. And here, see, on this copy is the name. Meenda McLeen. Also, many, many sets of our initials for luggage and personal things. M. M. In silver and gold, different esstyles. And also one bracelet with the initials. I can show you the kind of bracelet. Senor? Anything is wrong?"

"No. You"ve. been a big help to me. Yes, you"ve been a big help, and I certainly appreciate it more than you can know."

She was glad she had helped. Her smile was eager and pretty. I found the door without walking through the gla.s.s, and went down a corridor and came upon the coffee shop and sat at the counter and had coffee.

So it sorted out with a dismal and feral logic. Lose the first choice off a mountain road, so pick up the trail of the little brunette and cut the loss by settling for second choice. The door had stayed chained. Maybe second choice wasn"t exactly a willing guest? Want to indulge in a dramatic rescue attempt, McGee? Adolescent emotions. The thing to do is talk to Minda, because she was the one who was closest to Bix, and she would know the story and be able to guess how it must have ended.

I did some exterior surveying. I found a place where I could walk from the end of one of the buildings, parallel to it, far enough out to look up and see the night-lighted green of the fourth floor garden patios, and, above them, the narrow balconies outside the fifth floor windows of the bedrooms of the Fiesta Suites. So I got back up to the fourth floor and paced the long straight corridor, counting the strides to her door, took my count back outside and paced from the same basing-point and found that the bedrooms of Fiesta D had to open out onto the seventh and eighth balconies from the end.

Eighteen THE ROOF areas by the tennis courts and the heliport were too popular as a place to get kissed and a place to gawk at the great humming city. The chill of nighttime at seven and a half thousand feet didn"t seem to discourage either pastime.

And there was one of the hotel guard staff wandering around from time to time, on no schedule. I spent almost an hour and a half noodling around, knowing exactly the route I had to take, but unable to make my start because people get very edgy about watching other people go over the edge of a roof.

When the crowd was down to one couple and they moved toward the stairs, I moved to my drop zone, and as I did not know how long the privacy would last, I swung over, hung by my fingertips, kicked myself away from the wall, and dropped, landed on balance, and scuttled over and stood behind a bank of floodlights waiting for somebody to start yelling.

Of course somebody could have been looking out of the window of one of the rooms and might now be phoning the desk to complain about people sneaking around at midnight. So move along, aware of the residual stiffness in the leg where Wally had popped me that good one. Down the cornice, behind the spots and floods, over to the higher one. Jump and grab. Hear the shoulder gristle pop as I pull myself up. No lights on the roof at this level. Angle across. Look down, count the shallow balconies. Seven and eight. Pick any number from seven to eight. Because seven is lucky, I chose eight. High ceilings in their hotel. Looked like a thirty-foot drop into the fourth-floor roof garden.

Make it fifteen down to the floor of the little balcony. Cement railing maybe four and a half feet high, so call it ten and a half down to the railing. And it was about four inches wide and had a flat top. Drop to the balcony floor and it is not going to sound exactly like a stray birdfeather floating in. And hang by the fingertips and it is going to be a blind two foot drop to the railing.

Shoes off. Tie the laces. Hang around the neck. Check the pockets for any jingle-jangle of keys or change. Take a long long look around to see who might be watching the fun. Wave and see if they wave back. Momma, momma, look at the funny man on the roofl Get it over with. And, for G.o.d"s sake, McGee, in the future why don"t you try to believe what people tell you? Just pray for a nice landing, drawn draperies, and an unlocked door.

I let myself down, hung, rehea.r.s.ed it in my head and let go. I turned toward my left to land with feet at right angles to the balcony edge. Less chance of straddling it, which would sting like crazy. Landed, by design, leaning in, off balance. Landed on the railing, then dropped like that birdfeather to the balcony floor. Looked through a screened gap eight inches wide into a room with a brighter focus of light than I could have guessed from above. It did not illuminate the balcony because it was a recessed prism light in the bedroom ceiling. It shone straight down onto a tufted blue carpeted area. Beyond it I could see, in the dim glow, an open door and bathroom fixtures beyond. To my left I could see a low couch, a chair, a coffee table. To my right I could see the bottom corner, apparently, of a bed that was against the wall to the right, said corner perhaps six feet from the narrow opening created by opening the sliding door that far. and pulling the draperies open to the same distance.

It seemed a little bright for a night light. But maybe it would serve. More probably the room was empty. I stayed down below the railing height. Less chance of being noticed from a nearby building or from one of the other balconies.

Knelt and found the edge of the sliding screen and gave it a very gentle and cautious tug. It opened silently, a full inch. Another. Another. And somebody made a groaning sigh. Just as I was getting back into my skin, somebody said something, half mutter, half whisper, and I had to steady myself down again. Whoever you are there, talking in your sleep, why the h.e.l.l did you leave the light on? One small advantage, however. Enough light, maybe, to be able to distinguish one dark head and be able to see whether it was Eva Vitrier. If so, I could then make my well-known death-defying leap across empty s.p.a.ce to the other balcony.