The Spiked Heel

Griff headed down the corridor, thinking about the memo, and the more he thought about it, the more stupid it seemed. After all, what was this, an international spy ring? He could understand the coding of materials and colors, yes, because it was certainly a hell of a lot simpler to write “43” than it was to write “blue faille.” But what was the purpose of memorizing a bunch of letters, gray and white indeed — and besides they’d spelled gray wrong, hadn’t they? Shouldn’t it be an e? — to substitute for numbers? Who in the factory gave a damn about the pricing of a shoe, anyway, other than Cost, Production, and IBM? Hell, were the factory workers going to leak information to De Liso or I. Miller? Were they going to skulk up to Andrew Geller’s and whisper, “Andy boy, I got a hot tip for you, boy. You know this Julien Kahn glitter cloth job with the seal strip over the vamp? Fourteen ninety-five, Andy. Mark it down.” Now, that was plain nonsense. No, he’d have to talk to Joe about this. He’d have to set it straight now before the memo had a chance to foul things up.

He pushed open the door to Manelli’s office and walked directly to the secretary’s desk. He was surprised to see a new girl behind the desk, expecting to find Mr. Kurz’s beloved and trusted secretary, Mamie Lord. He realized then that Mamie’s head had probably joined G.K.’s in the sacrificial basket and that Joe Manelli had undoubtedly brought in one of his own favorites from Accounting. The girl wore her dark hair long, framing an oval face. He stood before her desk, and he could smell the subtly insinuating scent of her perfume. The girl was busy typing, and she did not look up.

“My name is Griffin,” he said pleasantly. “I’d like to see Mr. Manelli, please.”

The girl looked up from her machine.

He was startled to see that she was really exceptionally pretty. Her eyes were very wide and very brown, and she turned them up toward his face slowly, until they held his own eyes. And the moment they did, he read a dark knowledge in those eyes and on that face, a resigned sadness he had never seen on the face of a young woman before. No, he was suddenly shaken to realize, he had seen it once before. He had seen it on the face and in the eyes of a prostitute in France. Embarrassed, he dropped his gaze to the small brown beauty spot huddled in the hollow of her throat like a fugitive misplaced period. He concentrated his attention there.

“What did you say?” she asked. Her voice was unusually deep. He raised his eyes, and was surprised to discover that the disturbing impression was gone. He studied her then, frowning at his snap judgment, wondering how he could have seen anything here other than a sweet, young, pretty girl.

“I’m Ray Griffin,” he said. “I’d like to see Joe.”

“What department are you from, Mr. Griffin?” The girl’s voice had turned brusquely businesslike. If she were at all aware of him as a man, she showed no sign of it now.

Griff smiled, almost relieved. “Cost. Joe knows me, Miss. I want to talk to him about…”

“Mr. Manelli is in conference,” the girl said.

“Oh.” He remembered McQuade. “How long will he be?”

The girl looked up at the wall clock. “He asked me to buzz him at eleven-thirty. He has a luncheon appointment with someone from the Chrysler Building.”

“Well,” Griff said, glancing up at the clock too, “maybe I can catch him on his way out. I’ll wait, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” the girl said.

Griff walked to the easy chair opposite her desk, sitting down and folding his hands. The girl went back to her typing. The white-faced clock on the wall read eleven twenty-two. He listened to the busy clatter of her keys, studying her hands as they worked, glancing up at her face. The girl had a good profile, too, a damned good profile.

“How do you spell gray?” he asked.

The girl looked up. “What? I’m sorry, I…”

“Gray. How do you spell it?”

“Oh, the memo,” she said. She started to smile, but then she thought better of it. “Mr. Manelli spelled it out for me. He wanted it g-r-a-y.”

“But that’s not the way you spell it, is it?”

“No, I think e is the preferred spelling.”

“But Joe wanted an a, huh? Well, you know what the Bible says.” He smiled. “An a for an e.”

The girl stared at him blankly for a moment. She got it then, and said, “Oh.”

“No, e,” Griff said, still smiling. The smile expanded on his face. “Oh, I,” he said, “I’m probably bothering you.”

This time, the girl returned the smile. “I’m really quite busy,” she said apologetically.

“I’ll be quiet,” Griff said. “I promise.”

“He won’t be much longer.”

Griff nodded and then looked among the magazines on the table for something to read. He passed by the several retail shoe journals, and then opened a copy of Vogue, looking for the Julien Kahn advertising spreads.

“Here’s a pretty shoe,” he said.

The girl’s typewriter stopped. She looked up. “What?”