Answered Prayers

"And now guess what she's done!" Butch hissed as I walked in. "She's pregnant."

Maggie pleaded: "Please, Butch. I don't see why you're making such a hullabaloo. I only found out yesterday. It won't interfere."

"That's what you said when you sneaked off and married this bum. Maggie, you know I love you. But how could you have let such a thing happen?"

"Please, honey. I promise. It won't happen again."

Not mollified, but somewhat, Butch rustled papers on his desk and turned to Sal.

"Sal, I hope you're not forgetting you have a five o'clock appointment at the St. George hotel. Room 907. His name is Watson."

"The St. George! Jeez," grumbled Sal, whose nickname is Ten Pe

"It's a fifty-dollar date."

"I hope it's nothing fancy. I'm not up to anything fancy."

"Nothing fancy. Just a simple Golden Shower. The gentleman's thirsty."

"Well," said Sal, stepping over to a water cooler in the corner and grabbing himself a Dixie cup, "I guess I'd better tank up."

"Andy!"

"Yessir."

"Put that miserable harmonica in your pocket and leave it there."

"Yessir."

"Is that all you delinquents do in jail? Get yourselves tattooed and learn to play the harmonica."

"I ain't got any tattoo—"

"Don't talk back to me!"

"Yessir," said Andy humbly.

Butch swerved his attention my way; in his expression there was an extra-added smugness hinting that he might be privy to some ominous information concerning me. He pressed a buzzer on his desk, and said: "I believe Miss Self is ready to see you now."

Miss Self seemed oblivious to my entrance; she was stationed at a window, her back to me, pondering the downpour. Thin grey braids were looped around her narrow skull; as always, her stoutish figure bulged inside a blue serge suit. She was smoking a cigarillo. Her head swiveled. "Ah, so," she said with the leftover remnants of a German accent, "you are very wet. That is not good. Have you no raincoat?"

"I was hoping Santa Claus would bring me one for Christmas."

"That is not good," she repeated, advancing toward her desk. "You have been making good money. For sure you can afford a raincoat. Here," she said, producing from a drawer two glasses and a bottle of her preferred tranquilizer, tequila. While she poured, I wondered anew at the severity of the setting, starker than a penitent's cell, utterly unadorned except for the desk, some straight-back chairs, a Coca-Cola calendar, and a wall of filing cabinets (how I would have liked to have got a look inside those!). The only frivolous object in view was the gold Cartier watch flashing on Miss Self's wrist; it was so out of character. I puzzled as to how she had acquired it—was it perhaps a gift from one of her rich and grateful clients?

«Kicks», she said, emptying her glass with a shudder.

"Kicks."

«Alors,» she said, sucking her cigarillo, "you may recall our first interview. When you applied here as a potential employee of The Service. Recommended by Mr. Woodrow Hamilton—who, I regret to say, is no longer with us."

"0h?"

"For a serious infraction of Our Rules. Which is precisely what I want to discuss with you." She narrowed her pale Teutonic eyes; I felt the queasiness of a captured soldier about to be interrogated by the Commandant of the Camp. "I acquainted you with those rules in complete detail; but to refresh your memory, I will remind you of the more important ones. Firstly, any attempt by a member of our staff to blackmail or embarrass a client will result in severe retribution."

A vision of a strangled corpse floating in the Harlem River insinuated itself.

"Secondly, under no circumstances will an employee ever deal directly with a client; all contacts, and all discussion of fees, must be made through our auspices. Thirdly, and most especially, an employee must never associate socially with a client: that sort of thing is not good business and can result in very disagreeable situations."

She doused her cigarillo in the tequila, and downed a generous slug straight from the bottle. "On September eleventh you had an appointment with a Mr. Appleton. You spent an hour with him in his room at the Yale Club. Did anything unusual happen?"

"Not really. It was just a one-way oral deal; he didn't want any reciprocation." I paused, but her unsatisfied demeanor indicated that she expected to hear more. "He was in his early sixties, but in good condition, hearty. A likable guy. Friendly. He talked a lot; he told me he was retired and lived on a farm with his second wife. He said he raised cattle—"

Miss Self impatiently interrupted: "And he gave you a hundred dollars."

"Yes."

"Did he give you anything else?"

I decided not to lie. "He gave me his calling card. He said that if I ever felt like breathing country air, I was welcome to visit him."

"What became of this card?"

"I threw it away. Lost it. I don't know."

She lit another cigarillo, and smoked it until a long ash tumbled off it. She picked up an envelope lying on her desk, extracted a letter from it, and spread it out before her. "I've worked more than twenty years in this business, but this morning I received a letter unique in my experience."

As I may have mentioned before, one of my gifts is an ability to read upside down: those of us who subsist on our wits develop offbeat talents. So, while Miss Self examined the mysterious communication, I read it. It said: Dear Miss Self, I was well pleased with the amiable fellow you arranged to meet me at the Yale Club this past September 11th. So much so that I would like to get to know him better in a more gemütlich atmosphere. I wondered if it could be arranged, through your auspices, to have him spend the Thanksgiving holidays here at my farm in Pe