They didn’t argue or waste any time. Both of them got up, the blond brushing past me with a narrow-eyed look, and headed straight across to the bar.
Quilmes said coldly, “You may sit down.”
I sat and we looked at each other some more. I put an end to that by producing the photostat of my license and laying the case open flat on the table between us. He leaned forward to study it, leaned back again, and picked up his drink. Still no expression on his aristocratic face.
“Yes?” he said.
“Janice. The woman you had the appointment with Saturday night.”
“How do you know I had such an appointment?”
“How I know isn’t important. Are you going to deny it?”
Silence. He sipped his drink, set the glass down again, carefully. “In my country,” he said at length, “we have laws
that carry severe penalities for attempted extortion. You
have the same laws, do you not?”
“We do,” I said. “And I support them, just as I support ethics in my profession. I’m not here for financial gain or to cause you any undue embarrassment.” “Then why are you here?” “For the answers to a few questions.” “And if I choose not to answer your questions?” “That’s your prerogative. But it would be in your best interest if you’re candid with me. The woman, Janice, has disappeared under … let’s say unusual circumstances that may involve foul play. If you refuse to talk to me, and her disappearance becomes a police matter, I’d have to tell them about your Saturday-night appointment. And that you were uncooperative when I asked you about it.”
He said nothing for maybe thirty seconds. His pupils, in the dim light, were as black as obsidian. Then, “I have a wife and two children in Buenos Aires. I love my family very much. I also have a successful business and many associates, some of whom are quite religious. Do you understand?”
“I understand. If you have nothing to hide and you don’t try to stonewall me, there’s no reason your name has to be mentioned to anyone. Stonewall means—”
“I know what it means,” he said. “Do you think I had something to do with this woman’s disappearance?”
“I have no reason to. Information is all I’m after. Provide it, and we’ll consider this conversation a private business meeting strictly between the two of us.”
I had him and he knew it. “Very well,” he said stiffly. “I will answer your questions.”
“Good. You did have a date with Janice Saturday night?”
“Yes.”
“Here in your suite.”
“Yes.”
“Had you ever seen her before that night?”
“No.”
“How was the date arranged?”
“Through a personal acquaintance.”
“His name?”
“I cannot tell you that.”
“It wouldn’t be Carl Lassiter, would it?”
The slightest hesitation before he said, “I know no one by that name.”
“Someone else connected to QCL, Incorporated?”
“Nor any such business.”
“How long did Janice stay with you?”
“Not long. One hour, perhaps.”
“For which you paid her how much?”
“No money changed hands,” Quilmes said.
“No? Who did you pay? The acquaintance who made the arrangement?”
“If you must know, yes.”
“Is that always the way it’s done?”
“You may think I make a habit of this sort of thing, but I do not. Only once in a great while. A man has needs, and when they become too great to ignore … well, we are only human. Surely you understand.”
I understood that he was another one like Mitchell Krochek—a self-justifer who relied on the old “a man has needs” wink-wink line when he got caught philandering. Krochek, at least, had some foundation for his affair with Deanne Goldman; Quilmes had none other than pure lust.
I said, “I’m sorry to have to ask this, but it’s necessary. What sort of sexual activity was involved?”
Brittle silence. The black pupils had sparklights in them now, like fire opals. He said finally, “I am a man of simple and conventional tastes.”
“No sadomasochistic games, then.”
“Of course not. I find that sort of thing repugnant.”
“Rough sex?”
“That, too.”
“So Janice was perfectly healthy when she left you.”
“Perfectly. Why do you ask these questions?”
“She was beaten up sometime late Saturday or Sunday. I’m trying to find out who did it and why.”
“I see,” Quilmes said. He didn’t sound sympathetic. “A dangerous profession, prostitution.”