Small g by Patricia Highsmith

the neighborhood who employed seamstresses. And she gave me Renate’s name but not the exact address.” Luisa gave a big sigh and drank some Coke. “Anyway, I finally got to Frau Hagnauer’s house—and I thought it was the luckiest thing that ever happened to me—a job and a place to sleep.”
    Rickie could understand. “But why is she so strict—with you? Just because you’re alone?” And because on an apprentice’s salary, Luisa couldn’t afford a Zurich apartment, Rickie was thinking. It was sadism, of a sort.
    “Y-yes,” Luisa said thoughtfully, “and also she’s teaching me all the time. She wants to make me a designer and—she thinks I have talent.” She spoke with a pride and amusement combined.
    “And you? You like that idea?”
    “Yes. I like inventing clothes. It’s fun. I sketch a lot. New ideas. Renate has stacks of cheap paper everywhere in the workroom. I do as much of that as sewing!” Luisa laughed, and finished her drink with a gulp. “Now I must go.” She stood up and her smile went away, as if she imagined facing Renate.
    “Are the other girls jealous of you?”
    “No. Because I can help them in little ways. They know I’m not conceited about special attention from Renate!”
    “She’s not married, is she—Renate?”
    “She was—for about seven years. She’s divorced.” Luisa shifted. “Rickie—I have a question.”
    “Yes?”
    She curled the red-and-blue muffler gently around both hands. “It was here—wasn’t it—that Petey—in the bedroom, I mean.”
    Anger and frustration surged in Rickie, hot and confusing. “He was stabbed to death when he came out of a cinema. He took a shortcut toward home—a dark street.” With effort, Rickie kept his voice steady and low. “I can’t understand why people think—he died here, when the stabbing was reported in the newspapers, the Tages-Anzeiger , Neue Zürcher , even the street name.” Rickie felt warm in the face. “Maybe Renate said he was murdered here.”
    “Yes. She did. She said by someone Petey had brought here one night when you were working in your studio.”
    “She hates homosexuals. I don’t think I have to tell you.” Rickie was inwardly boiling. “Funny, she goes nearly every day to Jakob’s, when she could go to that little tearoom nearer her—espresso machine, brioches—such a nice clientele.”
    Luisa’s lips gave a twitch of a smile. “I know. She loves to make remarks about people.”
    “Whole stories, it would seem!”
    Luisa looked embarrassed, unsure of herself. She went to the french windows, which were partly open, and looked cautiously out, stooped to see past the tree branches.
    “What’s the matter?”
    “I don’t want to bump into Willi. I’ll go out the front door, Rickie. Thank you!”
    “A pleasure! Come again, Luisa.” He opened the apartment door for her.
    “G’bye!” She opened the front door herself and fled down the front steps.

5
    S ome three streets away from Rickie’s flat, Renate Hagnauer waited nervously for Luisa. Had she started talking with someone, given in to an offer of another coffee? Renate clumped into the kitchen—clump, scrape, clump, scrape, dragging her right foot—to check the potatoes—still in their water with the gas ring off, all right. Clump, scrape. Renate didn’t care how she clumped when she was alone, and if the couple below didn’t like it, they could lump it. The nerve of them once, complaining about a handicapped person! Renate had given them a piece of her mind, made them feel wretched, she hoped.
    Luisa deserved a strong word. Not even the courtesy to telephone to say she’d be late!
    At last Renate heard the key in the lock.
    Frowning, Renate entered the high-ceilinged hall. Coat hooks sprouted all along one wall, as if a regiment had dwelt here, though the hooks were useful for the girls during the workweek.
    “What happened to you?” Renate asked sharply.
    “Nothing. I’m sorry if I’m a little late.”
    “A