“No kids allowed,” growled the bartender, who was busy wiping a glass.
“We’re just looking for a friend.” Sam spoke up quickly. “Reginald Anderson . . . ?”
The bartender gave a harsh bark of laughter. “Yeah, kid. Me, too. If you see him, tell him I’m still waiting on the ten bucks he owes me. He hasn’t shown his mug around here since I creamed him at the tables.” And the bartender nodded, slightly, toward a group of men playing pool in the corner.
They were halfway to the door when a man with bleary red eyes and a face covered in stubble put a hand on Max’s arm.
“Try Honest Louie’s, on Third Avenue,” he whispered, blasting Max with hot breath.
“Thanks,” she said, wrenching her arm away from his.
They headed to Third Avenue. But there, too, they learned that Reggie Anderson owed money, and had not been seen for at least a week. The bartender directed them to try the Empire Diner, but there they found out that Anderson hadn’t paid his last two tabs and had been banned from the restaurant. One of the waitresses, a big blond woman with candy-colored lips, said they might find him at Deluxe Lounge, on Denton Place.
“Let’s hurry,” Thomas said. The sun was a large round drop hovering just over the horizon, and the sky above them was a deep, electric blue. It was nearly seven o’clock. “Dumfrey’ll skin us if we don’t get back before dark.”
The Deluxe Lounge was very small and very dirty. A bartender with the sad, drooping look of a wilted lettuce leaf was quietly mopping under one of three large oak tables that dominated the center of the room. A skinny black cat was perched on the bar, picking at a plate of sardine bones. Dusty bottles lined the shelves, and the air smelled like rubbing alcohol and old potatoes.
There were only four patrons, and every one of them turned to stare when Max and the others pushed through the door. Two of them had been throwing darts; one of them was bucktoothed and bleary-eyed. A man with a long, curly beard, which looked like an overgrown hedge tacked to his chin, paused with his hand raised. And the largest person Max had ever seen except for Smalls, with fists as big as pork chops and a face as broad and flat as a stone, stopped with a mug halfway to his lips.
“S-s-sorry,” the old bartender stuttered. “No kids allowed.”
“Let ’em stay.” The man with the bushy beard lowered the dart he’d been about to throw. The bartender gave a nervous squeak and scurried through the swinging doors at the back of the bar.
The bearded man smiled. His teeth were yellow and very crooked. “Well? What do you want?”
The others had gone quiet. Sam was studying his shoes, Pippa was opening and closing her mouth like a fish. Even Thomas seemed nervous.
Max lifted her chin. “We’re looking for Reginald Anderson,” she said.
The bearded man snickered. “You are, are you? What do you want with that sorry scrap?”
“He’s a friend of ours,” she said, forcing herself to hold the man’s stare.
All four men exchanged a look and chuckled unpleasantly.
“What’s so funny?” Max said. She didn’t like feeling as though she were on the outside of a joke that didn’t include her.
“A friend of yours, huh?” The bearded man took several heavy steps forward, hitching his belt up over his stomach. “Then maybe you’ll be so kind”—he emphasized the word by spitting into a polished brass spittoon in the corner—“as to take care of a few of your friend’s debts.”
“He owes me two dollars,” grunted the huge man, cracking his knuckles. Each sound was like a thunderbolt.
“He owes me five,” said the man with the bleary eyes.
“We don’t got any money,” Max said.
“Have,” Pippa whispered. “We don’t have any money.”
“Well, that’s too bad for you.” The bearded man took another menacing step forward, so he was standing only a foot away from Max. He leaned forward. “Because any friend of Reggie Anderson sure ain’t no friend of mine. Jerry, how about you show Reggie’s friends the door.”
Jerry was the man with the hands like pork chops and a chest as broad as a barrel. He stood up from the table. Max reached into her pockets, but before she could withdraw her knives, Sam stepped in front of her.
“All right, look,” he said, his voice breaking slightly. “Everybody just calm down. We don’t want to hurt you—”
The bearded man roared with laughter. “Did you hear that, fellas? This little pipsqueak’s worried about hurting us.” He shoved a sausagelike finger in the middle of Sam’s chest. “You’ve got some nerve, boy.”
Max tried to swing at him, but Sam held her back with one arm.
“You’re the pipsqueak!” she cried.
“Max, stay out of this,” Sam said.
“Yeah, Max.” Pippa’s mouth was a fine white line. “These idiots aren’t worth it.”
“You better watch your mouth, sweetheart,” growled the bearded man.