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said, examining his pipe for defects and appreciating the embers. “I’ve just delivered a collection of stories to my publisher, none of which is as bizarre as this. I was going to start by saying—as I told the police—that I have killed no one.”
    â€œI understand how you feel,” I said, scratching away to visible lead with my grimy thumb so I’d have a pencil to work with.
    â€œUnfortunately,” Faulkner went on softly, “I don’t need sympathy. I need professional help. My inclination is simply to be irate and insist on my release, but apparently someone has gone through quite an effort to make that impossible.”
    â€œYou mean you think you’ve been framed?” I said, to stay in the conversation.
    â€œConsider the alternative,” he continued. “It is either that or else I have gone mad, which is certainly a possibility, given the state of the world, though I doubt my madness would manifest itself as an attack on my agent. I would be much more likely to attack a publisher. May I suggest we sit down?”
    I nodded, and he sat in the chair across from the desk, leaving me Phil’s chair in which I was forbidden to sit on pain of decapitation. I sat. It helped establish a client-professional air in the rancid room, and it gave me a little extra to worry about. Faulkner crossed his legs and examined the back of his right hand. My feet started to go up on the desk. I resisted and planted them on the wooden floor.
    â€œMy tale is simple,” Faulkner began with clear distaste for the task. “I met Jacques Shatzkin but once, for lunch at that restaurant with the aquarium window on Sixth Street.”
    â€œBernstein’s Fish Grotto,” I supplied. “Why did you meet?”
    Faulkner shifted the ashes in his pipe with a thin finger, cleaned his finger on a handkerchief from his tweed jacket pocket, made sure his tie was in place, and spoke softly.
    â€œHe called me and said he wanted to discuss a business arrangement that might be reasonably lucrative for me. I have an agent, but Mr. Shatzkin has—had—a good reputation, and I am somewhat in need of money.”
    â€œMay I …” I started, but stopped when I looked at Faulkner’s face. It had turned slightly red.
    â€œI do not suffer from false humility,” he said, “or at least I so delude myself. I earned less than thirty-two hundred dollars last year. I have a home and a family, and I carry the burden of assumption on the part of the public that I am financially solvent as the result of a family estate that does not exist and enormous royalties that have never existed. I have had but one economic success.”
    â€œ Pylon ,” I tried. I had fond memories of the book. I had once hidden evidence, a pornographic photograph, in my copy.
    â€œ Sanctuary ,” Faulkner corrected. “And the money from that has been long dispersed. I am in Los Angeles to seek employment from Warner Brothers with the help of my agent and Mr. Howard Hawks. Mr. Warner, so far, has not seen fit to make me a generous offer, or a firm offer of any kind. I am inclined to accept whatever offer I may get. So, when Mr. Shatzkin called …”
    â€œWhere did he call you?” I asked.
    â€œAt my hotel, the Hollywood,” said Faulkner, finding a match and getting his pipe going.
    â€œHe called you and you met at the restaurant?”
    â€œWe met at Mr. Shatzkin’s office building,” Faulkner puffed, “and then went to the restaurant where I had lobster naturale and he had a large shrimp salad. You have that?”
    I wrote it down. In spite of Faulkner’s sarcasm, it might be something to check. It might not be, probably wouldn’t be, but you took what you could get and carried it. I was tempted to tell Faulkner to stick to his writing and let me stick to my job.
    â€œMr. Shatzkin offered me the rings of Saturn, the moon, and Biloxi,”