Death Turns A Trick (Rebecca Schwartz #1) (A Rebecca Schwartz Mystery) (The Rebecca Schwartz Series) by Julie Smith

came.
    Jeannette was properly impressed with the yarn. When I had supplied every scarifying detail she asked for—except, of course, Senator Handley’s identity—I asked about the proposition she’d mentioned the night before.
    “It’s this way,” she said. “We need a lobbyist. We’ve been using one of our members, and she’s been reasonably effective, but she wants out. She says the legislators don’t take her seriously because she’s been a prostitute. And furthermore, they expect her to put out. Can you beat that?”
    “I’m supposed to be surprised?”
    She ignored me. “The stigma follows you for the rest of your life. No one ever thinks of you as Jeannette, with a mother and dad in Iowa, or Jeannette with a degree in English lit; they just think of you as Jeannette the prostitute. Does that seem fair to you?”
    “It only makes sense. People think of me as a lawyer. So what?”
    “It’s another example of horizontal hostility. And male chauvinism as well.”
    “I think it’s an act of male chauvinism for a legislator to proposition a female lobbyist, but I can also see the problem of getting him to take an ex-prostitute seriously. I’m sorry, Jeannette, but it’s cultural bias and you’re stuck with it.”
    “Well, that’s what I’m getting to. We don’t want to replace her with another member. How would you like the job?”
    “What, you’re not satisfied with my work?”
    “We are very satisfied with your work. Otherwise, I wouldn’t ask. You’re well known and well respected. And we can trust you.”
    I shook my head. “No thanks. I’m one of those rare people who actually like their work. No sense taking any chances.”
    “That’s what I thought you’d say, but it doesn’t hurt to ask. Can you recommend anybody?”
    “Not offhand. I’ll give it some thought. Right now, I’ve kind of got my mind on other things. Would you mind if I pumped you about Kandi?”
    “Not at all. Though I didn’t know her very well, and from what I gather, that’s just as well. She was a tramp.”
    I laughed. “Isn’t that horizontal hostility?”
    “No.
You’re
exhibiting it. You just made it clear that you think a tramp and a prostitute are the same thing.” She patted her neat publicist’s coif, as if to emphasize her own respectability and worth. “There’s an ethical code among prostitutes, which is very strongly adhered to by HYENA members.”
    “Kandi wasn’t a member?”
    “No. She wasn’t a feminist. She didn’t get along with other women at all. She was a kind of hanger-on, and she came to a couple of our meetings, but she actually laughed out loud if anyone mentioned the word ‘sisterhood.’ Used to say we were fools if we believed in it. And she made fun of Elena’s co-op. I say ‘Elena’s’ because it’s easier, but I hope you understand that I don’t think of it that way—Stacy and Renée and Hilary are just as much a part of it.”
    I nodded, to pacify her.
    “No one liked her. But Elena kept her because she brought in a lot of business. She was very popular with the customers, although I suspect she had as much contempt for men as she did for her sisters.”
    I almost said I could see how the nature of the business might easily breed that, but I thought better of it. Instead, I asked how often Kandi had worked at the co-op.
    “Once or twice a week, I think. Even though she was popular, Elena was uneasy about her. After she started working there, she became the favorite of a couple of Elena’s best clients. Influential men, well known in the community, who’d been clients of Elena’s—I mean of the co-op’s—for quite a while. They started asking for Kandi specifically, and then after a while they stopped going to Elena’s.”
    “Elena thought that had something to do with Kandi? That she was driving them away?”
    “Either that, or seeing them somewhere else, so she wouldn’t have to split the money with Elena. That’s what I mean by ethics. An