when I drank, I really did get “tight”—wound up, archly funny, and, according to Paul, sexy in a sort of dangerous way, as if I might have a switchblade concealed in my bra. When the next September 12 came along—two years—I did the same.
It was 1941. I was an adult, a junior at USC, and no longer a virgin. A boy I knew had died in battle. If there were times when I ached to share a story with Barbara or hear her laugh—if, alone in our bedroom, I opened the lid of my treasure box and held her note, or found a scarf she’d left behind and pressed it to my nose to catch a whiff of her—the next morning I was brisk and cool again: Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story, Rosalind Russell in His Girl Friday, Bette Davis in anything.
I felt as if I were in a movie, delivering lines that surprised me with their sophisticated bite, the first time I spoke to Philip Marlowe. I guess he brought that out in me.
It happened that October at Leo’s bookstore. I was working alone that afternoon. An ominous sky and thunder growling in the foothills had discouraged paying customers, leaving just a handful of regulars, people who would read entire books as they stood in the aisle—and whom I trusted not to steal anything. It was enough to glance at them occasionally from the office, where I was studying for a pre-law class.
I looked up, alerted by the bell over the door, when Philip came in. I kept looking because he didn’t belong. Not because he was handsome in the rough-hewn style of movie thugs; we got customers who looked like that. But those men entered the store like every other book lover—even as their feet carried them forward, their eyes kept darting toward the shelves on either side, and after a few steps, they paused, enticed by a title or the look of a binding. This man headed straight toward me, and though he was polite as he elbowed his way down the narrow aisle, I sensed a contained violence in him that put me on alert and intrigued me.
He opened his wallet and flashed a star at me. Apart from chatting with the beat cops who stopped by the store, my only experiences with the police had involved helping Mollie hide from them and having them call Papa to look at girls in the morgue. I said nothing, collecting my thoughts. And I took off my glasses, distancing myself; though a moment later I realized it was the gesture I’d adopted as a teenager around boys. Well, the cop was good-looking; more than that, his eyes hinted at intelligence and humor.
He asked if I’d do him a favor.
“What kind of favor?” Whoever this cop was chasing, I figured I might be on their side.
But he wanted to know about Arthur Gwynn Geiger. And he asked as if he wanted something bad to happen to Geiger, which made me inclined to help him in any way I could. I hated Geiger for ruining Barbara, even though blaming him wasn’t rational. He had only sold the photos; I should have turned my wrath toward Alan Yardley for taking and peddling them, or the capitalist system for turning girls into commodities, or why not Barbara herself for being such a little fool? But no matter; it was Geiger who repelled me.
Still, I didn’t know what the cop wanted with Geiger. And was this man really a cop? Anyone could make up a badge with a star, and something about the man felt slightly off. Stalling as I debated whether to trust him, I parried his questions. And flirted a little. He parried back. I had never met a cop with such an agile mind. I’d been right about the intelligence in his eyes.
He asked for an 1860 edition of Ben-Hur with a specific erratum. I looked it up and saw that Ben-Hur hadn’t been published until 1880.
“There isn’t one,” I said.
“Right. The girl in Geiger’s store didn’t know that.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.” I had seen the girl who worked for Geiger, a slithery sexpot; I questioned whether she even knew how to read.
Then the man told me he was a private detective, and the things that had seemed wrong about him fell into place. I gave him my impression of Geiger, not saying a word about Barbara, of course. And not mentioning Geiger’s business in smut—clearly he already knew