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imagine!—to have dinner with a multimillionaire. So then I just couldn’t resist it, but couldn’t! I said, ‘Miss Gonda, do you really think you’re so much better than everybody else?’ And what do you suppose she answered? ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I do. I wish I didn’t have to.’ But actually!”
    â€œDid she say anything else?”
    â€œNo. I’m the kind of person that simply does not understandconceit. So I did not care to continue the conversation. And I do not care to continue it now. I’m sorry, Mr. Pickens. But the subject bores me.”
    â€œDo you know where Miss Gonda is at present?”
    â€œI haven’t the faintest idea.”
    â€œBut if anything’s happened to her . . .”
    â€œI’ll ask them to put Sally Sweeney in the part. I’ve always wanted to write for Sally. She’s such a sweet kid. And now you’ll have to excuse me, Mr. Pickens. I’m very busy.”
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    Bill McNitt sat in a filthy office that smelt like a poolroom: its walls were plastered with posters of the Gonda pictures he had directed. Bill McNitt took pride in being a genius and a he-man besides: if people wished to see him, they could well afford to sit among cigarette butts, next to a spittoon. He leaned back in his swivel chair, his feet on a desk, and smoked. His shirtsleeves were rolled high above his elbow, and he had big, hairy arms. He waved one huge hand with a golden snake ring on a stubby finger when Morrison Pickens entered.
    â€œSpill it,” said Bill McNitt.
    â€œI,” said Morrison Pickens, “have nothing to spill.”
    â€œNeither,” said Bill McNitt, “have I. Now beat it.”
    â€œYou don’t seem to be busy,” said Morrison Pickens, sitting down comfortably on a canvas stool.
    â€œI’m not. And don’t ask me why. Because it’s the same reason that keeps you so busy.”
    â€œI presume you’re referring to Miss Kay Gonda.”
    â€œYou don’t have to do any presuming. You know damn well. Only that won’t do you any good around here, ’cause you can’t pump anything out of me. I never wanted to direct her anyway. I’d much rather direct Joan Tudor. I’d much rather . . .”
    â€œWhat’s the matter, Bill? Had trouble with Gonda?”
    â€œListen. I’ll tell you all I know. Then beat it, will you? Last week it was, I drove down to her beach house and there she was, out at sea, tearing through the rocks in a motorboat till I thought I’d have heart failure watching it. So she climbs up to the road, finally, wet all over. So I say to her: ‘You’ll get killed someday,’ and she looks straight at me and she says: ‘That won’t make any difference to me,’ she says, ‘nor to anyone else anywhere.’”
    â€œShe said that?”
    â€œShe did. ‘Listen,’ I said, ‘I don’t give a hoot if you break your neck, but you’ll get pneumonia in the middle of my next picture!’ She looks at me in that queer way of hers and she says: ‘Maybe there won’t be any next picture.’ And she walks straight back to the house and the flunky wouldn’t let me in!”
    â€œShe really said that? Last week?”
    â€œShe did. Well, I should worry. That’s all. Now beat it.”
    â€œListen, I want to ask you—”
    â€œDon’t ask me where she is! Because I don’t know it! See? And what’s more, none of the big shots know it, either, only they won’t say so! Why do you suppose I’m sitting here like fly food, drawing three grand a week? Do you think they wouldn’t get the fire department to drag her back if they knew where to send for her?”
    â€œYou can make a guess.”
    â€œI don’t make guesses. I don’t know a thing about the woman. I don’t want to know a thing