"Not with money," he smiled. "You ought to look in tonight.
One of your friends is outside betting the wheels.
I hear she's doing pretty well.
Vivian Regan."
I sipped my drink and took one of his monogrammed cigarettes.
"I kind of liked the way you handled that yesterday," he said. "You made me sore at the time but I could see afterwards how right you were.
You and I ought to get along.
How much do I owe you?"
"For doing what?"
"Still careful, eh?
I have my pipe line into headquarters, or I wouldn't be here.
I get them the way they happen, not the way you read them in the papers." He showed me his large white teeth.
"How much have you got?" I asked.
"You're not talking money?"
"Information was the way I understood it."
"Information about what?"
"You have a short memory.
Regan."
"Oh, that." He waved his glistening nails in the quiet light from one of those bronze lamps that shoot a beam at the ceiling. "I hear you got the information already.
I felt I owed you a fee.
I'm used to paying for nice treatment."
"I didn't drive down here to make a touch.
I get paid for what I do.
Not much by your standards, but I make out.
One customer at a time is a good rule.
You didn't bump Regan off, did you?"
"No.
Did you think I did?"
"I wouldn't put it past you."
He laughed.
"You're kidding."
I laughed.
"Sure, I'm kidding.
I never saw Regan, but I saw his photo.
You haven't got the men for the work.
And while we're on that subject don't send me any more gun punks with orders.
I might get hysterical and blow one down."
He looked through his glass at the fire, set it down on the end of the desk and wiped his lips with a sheer lawn handkerchief.
"You talk a good game," he said.
"But I dare say you can break a hundred and ten.
You're not really interested in Regan, are you?"
"No, not professionally.
I haven't been asked to be.
But I know somebody who would like to know where he is."
"She doesn't give a damn," he said.
"I mean her father."
He wiped his lips again and looked at the handkerchief almost as if he expected to find blood on it.
He drew his thick gray eyebrows close together and fingered the side of his weatherbeaten nose.
"Geiger was trying to blackmail the General," I said. "The General wouldn't say so, but I figure he was at least half scared Regan might be behind it."
Eddie Mars laughed.