West 47th by Gerald A. Browne

Author:Gerald A. Browne
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781453267950
Publisher: Open Road Media

Chapter 20

At twenty after eleven that night Mitch was waiting outside the Sherry. He’d been there for over a half hour, talking bygone baseball and recent violence with the doorman.

Hurley’s police Plymouth pulled to the curb.

“I was about to give up on you,” Mitch told Hurley.

“I said around eleven. Twenty after is around.”

Wait had again chafed Mitch. “Where we going?”

“Hopefully to get you your six hundred large. Does Maddie know you’re with me?”

“Sure.”

“You tell her everything?”

“No, you do.”

They took 59th over to Third and went uptown. To a high-rise apartment house on 70th. Thirty-six stories trying for the impression of upscale. Its oversize lobby contained a lot of overstuffed furniture, mirrors and several hanging light fixtures comprised of clear plastic unsuccessfully imitating crystal.

Both of the lobby attendants on duty knew Hurley by name. They also assumed to know what he was there for. The elevator was self-service. Hurley punched in the button numbered 22. The coalesced smell of diverse food preferences was pronounced. Even more so in the corridor of the twenty-second floor. Various sounds leaked through the many closed doors.

All the way down the corridor and around another to the last possible apartment. Hurley pressed the square chime button in the face of the door. They were looked out at through a peephole.

The woman who admitted them acted a bit too glad to see Hurley, gave him a quick hug. She was a one-name person that Hurley introduced as Gloria. Chunky and plain-faced. The cotton print dress she had on concealed her shape. Her shoes were black flats.

There was a narrow table in the entryway. Business cards on it. Mitch picked up one of the cards on the way in. It had the word INTERIORS and a phone number.

No doubt about the place. A typical, twenty-five-hundred-a-month unfurnished. Three bedrooms, living room, dining alcove, narrow New York kitchen. Effortlessly decorated in black and beige and chrome. Two eight-foot sofas were separated by a low glass table. An artificial ficus with lima bean—shaped pebbles around the base of its trunk. Framed $19.98 prints of tropical scenes: a black native’s head eternally burdened by a stalk of bananas.

Mitch was on the sofa that was vacant. The sofa opposite was occupied by two working girls. One was blonder but the hair of both was a mass of split ends and done to death by repetitive chemical warfare.

The two were neither pretty nor ugly. One way or the other would depend on the light, the angle and the degree of arousal that had been attained. They were overdressed, as though there was to be a party. Their long fingernails were rectangular-shaped and enameled white.

Interiors, Mitch thought. Evidently this was one of the places Hurley came to get serviced or called for a delivery. At the moment he was off somewhere having a few private words with Gloria.

The girls did smiles at Mitch. It was Monday night slow. Any action would be a godsend.

“What’s your name?” the less blonde asked.

Mitch told her his first.

“What do you do Mitch?”

“I have a business on 47th Street.

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