The Thin Man Read Online Free Page A

been—”
    Dorothy came in from the bedroom. “I squared it.” She kissed her mother on the mouth and sat down beside her.
    Mimi, looking in her compact-mirror to see her mouth had not been smeared, asked: “She wasn’t peevish about it?”
    “No, I squared it. What do you have to do to get a drink?”
    I said: “You have to walk over to that table where the ice and bottles are and pour it.”
    Mimi said: “You drink too much.”
    “I don’t drink as much as Nick.” She went over to the table.
    Mimi shook her head. “These children! I mean you were pretty fond of Julia Wolf, weren’t you?”
    Dorothy called: “You want one, Nick?”
    “Thanks,” I said: then to Mimi, “I liked her well enough.”
    “You’re the damnedest evasive man,” she complained. “Did you like her as much as you used to like me for instance?”
    “You mean those couple of afternoons we killed?”
    Her laugh was genuine. “That’s certainly an answer.” She turned to Dorothy, carrying glasses towards us. “You’ll have to get a robe that shade of blue, darling. It’s very becoming to you.” I took one of the glasses from Dorothy and said I thought I had better get dressed.

 
7

    When I came out of the bathroom, Nora and Dorothy were in the bedroom, Nora combing her hair, Dorothy sitting on the side of the bed dangling a stocking. Nora made a kiss at me in the dressing-table mirror. She looked very happy.
    “You like Nick a lot, don’t you, Nora?” Dorothy asked.
    “He’s an old Greek fool, but I’m used to him.”
    “Charles isn’t a Greek name.”
    “It’s Charalambides,” I explained. “When the old man came over, the mugg that put him through Ellis Island said Charalambides was too long—too much trouble to write—and whittled it down to Charles. It was all right with the old man; they could have called him X so they let him in.”
    Dorothy stared at me. “I never know when you’re lying.” She started to put on the stocking, stopped. “What’s Mamma trying to do to you?”
    “Nothing. Pump me. She’d like to know what you did and said last night.”
    “I thought so. What’d you tell her?”
    “What could I tell her? You don’t do or say anything.”
    She wrinkled her forehead over that, but when she spoke again it was about something else: “I never knew there was anythingbetween you and Mamma. Of course I was only a kid then and wouldn’t have known what it was all about even if I’d noticed anything, but I didn’t even know you called each other by your first names.”
    Nora turned from the mirror laughing. “Now we’re getting somewhere.” She waved the comb at Dorothy. “Go on, dear.”
    Dorothy said earnestly: “Well, I didn’t know.”
    I was taking laundry pins out of a shirt. “What do you know now?” I asked.
    “Nothing,” she said slowly, and her face began to grow pink, “but I can guess.” She bent over her stocking.
    “Can and do,” I growled. “You’re a dope, but don’t look so embarrassed. You can’t help it if you’ve got a dirty mind.”
    She raised her head and laughed, but when she asked, “Do you think I take after Mamma much?” she was serious.
    “I wouldn’t be surprised.”
    “But do you?”
    “You want me to say no. No.”
    “That’s what I have to live with,” Nora said cheerfully. “You can’t do anything with him.”
    I finished dressing first and went out to the living-room. Mimi was sitting on Jorgensen’s knee. She stood up and asked: “What’d you get for Christmas?”
    “Nora gave me a watch.” I showed it to her.
    She said it was lovely, and it was. “What’d you give her?”
    “Necklace.”
    Jorgensen said, “May I?” and rose to mix himself a drink.
    The doorbell rang. I let the Quinns and Margot Innes in, introduced them to the Jorgensens. Presently Nora and Dorothy finished dressing and came out of the bedroom, and Quinn attached himself to Dorothy. Larry Crowley arrived with a girl named Denis, and a few minutes