The McBain Brief Read Online Free PDF Page A

leaden. He followed the cop to the door, and then walked with him to the elevator. They were both silent as the doors closed.
    â€œYou picked an important one for your first one,” the cop said.
    â€œHe shouldn’t have died on me,” Stevie answered.
    â€œYou shouldn’t have stabbed him,” the cop said.
    He tried to remember what Skinner had said to him before the line-up, but the noise of the elevator was loud in his ears, and he couldn’t think clearly. He could only remember the word “neighbors” as the elevator dropped to the basement to join them.

Skin Flick
    W e’d still be shooting that damn movie if it hadn’t been for Harry. And I want to tell you it was me who at the very beginning said Harry would be no good for the project, and don’t forget it. That’s because Harry is a dope. I am not talking about his acting ability. He probably was as talented in his own way as the rest of us put together. I am only talking about his capacity to understand a very good deal that could have made everybody extremely happy, if only some dope wouldn’t fall in love with a dizzy broad the way Harry did. I will never forgive Harry. I don’t know where he is right now, but someday I’m going to meet him someplace, I’m going to spot him coming down the street with his skinny face and his eyeglasses, and he’ll probably have that dumb blonde on his arm, and I’m going to walk up to him and say, “Hello, stupid, you happy now? You happy you blew the whole thing?”
    I don’t want to hear anything about morality; there’s no such thing as morality when you are making a pornographic movie. In fact, the only thing obscene was that Harry went off the deep end for that girl, and ruined my idea. Yes, it was my idea from the beginning, though I’ve been hearing around town that Ben saysit was his idea. I don’t like to hear that kind of talk. It breaks my heart to hear that kind of talk. I give credit where credit is due, and Ben was the one who thought of the empty loft, but that was after I got the idea of doing the movie. Anyway, it was that dumb bastard Harry who blew it all, so what difference does it make whose idea it was in the first place, even if it was Ben’s? Which it wasn’t.
    And I admit that Solly was the one who found the girl, I’ll even admit he did the preliminary talking, he’s a very smooth talker, Solly, and a good dresser besides; I’ll tell that to anyone who’ll listen, you’ll never hear me bad-mouthing a friend. But it was me who convinced the girl we could make her a star. Even Solly will admit it was me who finally sewed up the deal that day in the R&M Cafeteria when she was sitting there at the table nibbling on a jelly doughnut and driving us all crazy just from the way she licked powdered sugar from her lips. She was no beauty, but she had something, all right; she had star quality. Solly recognized her star quality while she was giving him a massage in that place on Eighth Avenue. Solly’s got a good eye, no one can take that away from him.
    It was raining the day she came in the R&M, and she was wearing this soaking wet black raincoat, and she apologized for being late, but she’d just come from dance class. She took off the coat, and what she was wearing underneath was this black leotard with a short leather skirt wrapped around it, and black boots, and right away I got an idea for a scene in the picture, but I didn’t tell her about it just then because what we were there to do was sell her on becoming a porn queen. I did most of the talking; I’m the one who sold her. Ben was the one who explained the project to her, but I’m the one who finally nailed down the deal. In fact, it wasn’teven Ben who told her what we planned to do. It was Solly. Yes, that’s absolutely correct, what’s right is right.
    They had got to talking in the massage parlor,