Read Online Scarlet Night by Dorothy Salisbury Davis - Free Book Online

you’d have to tell me why you want it.”
    “For one thing, I think I’d be good at it, interviewing people, even writing about them, but I don’t seem to be able to get started on my own. I need an apprenticeship.”
    “You’re already apprenticed to a master,” Tony said.
    “That’s part of my trouble.”
    “I understand what Julie’s saying,” Fran put in.
    “So do I,” Tony said. “I didn’t think she was paying me the extreme compliment. I’m not in Jeff’s class myself.”
    Jeff shifted uneasily in his chair and kept his eyes on the martini glass.
    “But I like where I am,” Tony growled.
    “So do I,” Julie said. “That’s my whole point. This spring I met a lot of people, some pretty bizarre types—police, prostitutes, pimps, a priest…”
    “A gangster or two, some theater originals,” Tony added. Then, with a twinkle: “Don’t think we haven’t followed your career, Friend Julie.”
    “Oh, boy.”
    They all laughed, even Jeff.
    “I must have twenty thousand index cards on bizarre types,” Tony said. Then, turning to Jeff: “I was thinking the other day, I may have to destroy those files if the Supreme Court doesn’t straighten out this First Amendment business.”
    The men fell to a discussion of the reporter and his notebooks at issue in a murder trial. Julie was glad to get offstage. Her heartbeat slowed to nearer normal. She sipped her drink. She wondered where Tony had learned about Friend Julie. Was it common knowledge among their friends? Jeff’s kookie wife? Talk about bizarre types…
    Tony wheeled around on her. “You were thinking of ‘In the Spotlight.’ Is that it?” Once a week he devoted most of the column to a profile, just short of actionable, on someone in the news. “I’ve got a deal for you, Mrs. Hayes: you do me an interview with Sweets Romano and I’ll take you on.”

NINE
    “I UNDERSTAND PERFECTLY,” JEFF said later that night.
    “It’s not that I’m trying to compete with you. Ha! As though I could.”
    “Would that be so terrible?”
    “I hate women who compete with their husbands. I’m not all that great a competitor with anybody.”
    “And yet, Julie, you’ve asked for a job in the most competitive field in journalism, the gossip column. Of all the people I know you’re the least susceptible to gossip.”
    “But I’m curious. I’m a very curious person.”
    “You certainly are,” Jeff said, grinning. He shook out his bathrobe and put it on.
    “But Sweets Romano. That really threw me.”
    “Tell me about him. Why is he called Sweets?”
    “Somebody told me it was because he looks that way—rather plump and immaculate and cherubic. And then I heard it was because he owned a piece of a chain of candy stores.”
    “That sounds more likely. But his main line is pornography?”
    “That’s how I got to him.”
    Jeff laughed aloud.
    “It’s true. Pete Mallory had made a porn film…”
    “Acted in it?”
    “Yeah. He was one of the principals. He needed money. It was when Laura Gibson, the actress, was dying and he was trying to take care of her. When I first went to see Mr. Romano, I thought it was Pete he was interested in…”
    “Is Romano homosexual?”
    “Jeff, I don’t know what he is. He told me he’d been in love with Laura Gibson for years. He called himself the ultimate voyeur. He makes a great thing of not having touched another human being in twenty years. And yet he has all this marvelous painting and sculpture, and the first thing he said to me when I was looking at one of the sculptures was, ‘Do touch. It is the greatest tribute.’ He speaks beautifully, Jeff. And it sounds natural. But natural he isn’t.”
    Jeff grunted. “Are you afraid of him?”
    “Well, I was pretty shaky when I got out of there.”
    “Concentration will help. It always does for me.”
    The idea of Jeff’s ever being afraid hadn’t occurred to Julie.
    “Oh, yes,” Jeff said, reading her eyes. Then: “Did he like