Live Girls

by Ray Garton

  “Davey, you have to see a doctor," she said.

  His voice quavered as he whispered, “I'm afraid he'd have me put away. I just have to wait for it to pass."

  She reached the bedroom doorway and stopped. “What if it doesn't?” she asked. Tears were stinging her eyes; she was suddenly terrified of her best friend.

  “Then it doesn't. Like you said, it's my problem. I'll...” He turned away from her and went to the bed, sat down, and began rocking back and forth. He spoke rapidly, running his words together. “I'll handle it, now will you just go away please."

  He rocked and rocked, like a retarded child, his arms folded tightly across his stomach, acting as if she weren't there.

  “All right, Davey,” she said, trying to speak levelly and confidently. “I'll go. But will you do one thing for me? I have some Librium in my purse. Lisa gave them to me months ago. Will you take a couple? They'll calm you down, help you sleep."

  At first, she thought he hadn't heard her. Then he nodded rigidly.

  Casey got her purse in the living room, took out her pillbox, and went into the kitchen. As she held a glass under the faucet, she realized her hands were trembling.

  She was afraid. Davey was dangerous. Maybe the pills would keep him from doing anything harmful for a while. Casey was aware of no disease, social or otherwise, that exhibited itself so suddenly and with such symptoms. But what did she know about diseases? What if that woman, Anya, were spreading something around? Surely she was aware of what she had, knew she was exposing her customers to it. Could she really not care?

  She felt a rush of anger at the woman's irresponsibility. And at Davey's.

  What kind of woman could knowingly do that? she wondered, tightening her grip on the drinking glass. How could she —

  The glass shattered and a jagged edge sliced into the pad of flesh between her thumb and forefinger. She held the cut between her lips for a moment, then got another glass and filled it, ignoring the broken pieces in the sink.

  In the bedroom, Davey was still rocking himself on the edge of the bed.

  “Here,” Casey said softly, holding out the pills in her palm.

  Davey opened his eyes and stared at the blood on her hand. His lips parted and his chest heaved as he began breathing rapidly, shallowly. He crawled backward on the bed and turned his face from her.

  “Put them down and go!” he shouted hoarsely. “Just get the hell away from me!” He curled up on the bed in a fetal position.

  Casey's heart was hammering as she put the pills and water on the counter. The slip of paper with Benedek's number on it lay beside the phone. She picked it up, grabbed her coat, and, with weak legs, hurried out of the apartment.

  Outside, she hurried to a payphone. She deposited a quarter and dialed the number.

  “We're not in right now,” the man's recorded voice droned, “but if you'll leave a message, we'll get back to you. Thanks."

  After the beep, Casey said, “This is Casey Thorne. Davey's friend. Davey Owen. You left your number. He said your wife is a doctor and I think ... Davey's very sick and I think he's in trouble. Big trouble. He needs help. I left him just a few minutes ago. Um, right now it's...” She looked at her watch and started to say “seven twenty-two,” but the machine cut itself off and a dial tone hummed coldly in her ear. She slammed the receiver down and pushed out of the booth. She had to do something, but she was not certain what.

  After several seconds of thought, Casey hurried to a corner to catch a bus to Times Square.

  11

  ____________________________

  WITH HIS MOUTH DRY AS A DESERT ROCK, BENEDEK stared at the closed door for a long time. The blond waitress walked before him on her way to another table.

  “Miss,” he said.

  She spun around and approached him, smiling.

  Taking a quick sip of his drink, Benedek stood and said, “Where's the rest room?"

  She pointed a finger and said, “Right back there, sir."

  To the left of the entrance, Benedek saw a door with a small sign above that read, in blue neon letters, RESTROOMS.

  Resisting the urge to break into a run, Benedek walked across the room and went through the door. On the other side was a softly lit corridor; the ladies’ room was to the left, the men's to the right. At the end of the corridor was a door. There was no sign, not even a NO ADMITTANCE or EMPLOYEES ONLY.

  Moving quickly, Benedek fished a small leather pouch from his breast pocket. He took out two thin, flexible pieces of metal—lock picks—and replaced the pouch. The picks had been given to him twelve years before by his friend Grover Dumont on the occasion of Dumont's retirement from the police force.

  “I've used these puppies plenty of times in the pursuit of justice,” Dumont had told him with the twinkle of experience in his eye. “Maybe you can use ‘em in the pursuit of truth, huh?"

  Taking a cautious look over his shoulder, Benedek tried the knob. Finding it locked, as he'd expected, he slipped the picks smoothly into the lock and jiggled them delicately, precisely.

  The door at the other end of the corridor opened with a whisper and the music from the main room thundered in. Benedek jerked the picks from the lock, clutched them in his fist, spun around, and started back up the corridor at a casual pace.

  A short, dowdy woman in a long blue dress and a cream shawl came through the door, turned to the ladies’ room, and stopped to look at Benedek. She raised a brow, sniffed, and pushed through the door, ignoring his pleasant smile.

  “Jesus,” he breathed, returning immediately to the lock, working it until he heard the familiar click. The knob turned, the door opened, and he stepped through. Hoping there was no one on the other side to discover him, he closed the door silently.

  Widely spaced lights glowed a soft purple overhead. The corridor, lined with closed doors on each side, went left and right with thick carpet that would silence the footsteps of anyone coming around a corner.

  Benedek could feel his pulse throbbing in his throat; he turned to the left and began walking, hoping the corridor would lead him to the door through which he'd seen Vernon.

  A sound up ahead made him stop and listen.

  A giggle.

  From behind him, a sigh.

  A long and lusty moan.

  Benedek looked behind him. Pools of gentle light spilled on the carpet before door after door after door.

  Pressing a hand to the wall, he leaned toward the closest door and cocked his head.

  “Yes, yes, suck me...” He couldn't tell if the muffled voice was male or female. But he had no doubt what was going on behind the door.

  Prostitutes? Probably. That might explain the Asian man's nervousness. But what about the woman he'd seen escorted through the door earlier? Male prostitutes were not uncommon, but they were, more often than not, gay.

  In any case, there was more than just drinks being sold at the Midnight Club. That made sense considering its connection with Live Girls. But how many people knew? Surely not all of the patrons. Maybe just the members.

  Too many questions, Benedek thought as the voice behind the door began to cry out.

  “I'm coming! Don't stop, I'm coming!” It was still muffled to the level of a whisper, like a disembodied voice in a half-remembered dream. Something about it made Benedek uneasy.

  He moved ahead to an intersecting corridor. To the left was a door—the door leading into the main room, he was sure—and at his right, a wall of darkness. Ahead, the corridor led around a corner.

  Benedek heard a door open behind him and ducked into the blackness, hoping it would conceal him.

  Hushed voices from around the corner came closer; a door closed quietly.

  “...incredible as usual,” a woman purred. “Oh God, I'm weak-kneed.” She giggled.

  “The pleasure was all mine,” a deep male voice said.

  “Here, here, let me...” the woman breathed, rustling something.

  “But you already..."

  “No, n
o, this is for you, Cedric. And there's more where that came from. I've reserved a table for a week from next Friday. Will you be here?"

  “I'm always here.” Benedek could hear Cedric's smile.

  “My friend Pamela doesn't know what she's missing,” the woman went on. “She seems to prefer that black fellow."

  They were coming closer and Benedek pressed his back hard against the wall, willing the darkness to swallow him. His stomach was tight with fear as he held his breath.

  Turning left at the intersection, they approached the door with their backs to Benedek. He recognized the tall, sandy-haired woman from the main room.

  “Well,” Cedric said, reaching for the doorknob, “to each his own."

  Cedric opened the door, and the woman's laughter was drowned out by the music.

  Benedek let out a long breath once the door was closed again. He slid his hands over the wall behind him. The corridor ended just a couple feet to his right. Facing the back wall, Benedek lifted his hands and passed them over the smooth surface before him, looking for...

  A door. It swung open just a crack beneath his big hands. Finding the knob, he turned it; the door had been locked. Apparently, it had not been completely shut.

  A soft, fluorescent glow came through the narrow opening. Benedek could hear no movement, but there was a low, almost inaudible hum beyond the door. With a gentle push, the door swung open further.

  There was a small, square room on the other side. On a table against the far wall were two metal trays holding rows of glass tubes. The tubes had red stoppers and were empty except for a filmy gloss along the sides, as if they'd recently been emptied of a dark fluid.

  Light poured through an open doorway to the left.

  Benedek stepped into the room, his eyes darting around him cautiously. Except for the table, the room was absolutely bare. Walking on the balls of his feet, he went to the open door. The hum became louder and he could hear a soft clicking. No, it was a steady, rapid drip.

  Through the doorway, Benedek saw a refrigerator. As he drew nearer, he saw another.

  A kitchen? he wondered. The white linoleum floor and white walls shone beneath fluorescent lights.

  Across from the doorway was a row of cupboards above a white tile counter and sink. The faucet was dripping. There were more trays on the counter holding more glass tubes, but these were filled with a very dark red liquid. Benedek put a hand on the doorjamb and started to step inside when he heard footsteps. He pulled back from the doorway. There was someone in the room.

  He heard clattering; the faucet was turned on.

  Peering around the doorjamb, Benedek saw a man standing at the sink, head bowed, arms moving vigorously before him as he washed his hands. After turning off the water, the man spun around and smiled.

  “Walter,” Vernon Macy said, drying his hands on his white, red-stained smock, “I've been expecting you."

  Casey stood before a brightly lit hot-dog stand a few yards from Live Girls smoking a cigarette. A plastic clown's head with fat red smiling lips hung above the service window; a light flashed on and off behind the face, silhouetting the tiny insects that crawled and jumped behind the round cheeks.

  Her hand trembled as she raised her cigarette to her lips. Now that she'd arrived in Times Square, she wasn't quite sure why she'd come. She certainly had no right to be angry at the people in Live Girls because Davey had caught something from one of their girls, did she? What had Davey expected? It was his problem.

  No, she thought, no, it's their problem, too. One of their girls is spreading something around, and they should do something about it!

  Thinking that she was probably being very naive, Casey tossed her cigarette to the sidewalk and hurried into the cold wind toward Live Girls.

  She pushed aside the black curtain and stepped into darkness. The damp air and dirty, musky odor made her wince.

  The darkness began to thin as her eyes adjusted and she saw the bars to her right.

  “Hello?” she said, leaning toward the cage. “Is anybody—"

  “Tokens?"

  The deep female voice startled her and she pulled back.

  “Uh, I'm sorry?"

  “Would you like some tokens?” The voice sounded mildly impatient.

  “Tokens?” Casey asked, confused. She squinted, but could still see no one. “Uh, no, no, I'm here to—"

  “Then please go away."

  “No, wait a second. I have to talk to someone about one of the girls working here."

  “I'm asking you to—"

  “Believe me, I don't want to be here. Just give me a second. A friend of mine came in here a couple days ago. He claims that one of your girls...” She paused; it sounded so ludicrous. “He says she bit him. Since then, he's gotten sick. I mean, he's very sick. I'm worried for him. I think maybe your girl has—"

  “If you don't leave, I'm going to have someone take you out,” the woman said firmly.

  Feeling a jolt of anger, Casey stepped forward and snapped, “I'm not leaving until I'm finished! You've got a very sick girl in here and she's probably spreading some—"

  Casey stopped midsentence when she heard a sudden movement in the darkness before her. Her inability to see the woman made her feel very vulnerable, like swimming in dark, still waters, unable to feel bottom. She reached into her coat pocket, pulled out her butane lighter, and flicked it.

  There was a flash of white and red and, with a throaty hiss, a hand shot between the bars and clutched Casey's wrist in an iron grip. The light of the quivering flame flickered briefly over a long white face with blood-red eyes centered with pinpricks of black, an upturned, flattened nose—a snout, Casey thought wildly, dear Jesus, it looks like a snout! — above ruby lips and long white teeth that glistened wetly and narrowed to fine points; white hair fell around her face in long shiny waves through which two long tapered ears protruded and her eyes—large and almond-shaped, of a pure, deep red marred only by the tiny black pupils—seemed to pull on Casey's eyes like magnets, sparkling as if with a light of their own.

  The cigarette lighter slipped from Casey's fingers and clattered to the floor. The woman leaned forward so that her face became visible through the bars even in the heavy darkness. With shocking ease, she pulled Casey's arm through the bars so hard that her face almost slammed against them.

  “Let go of, of—” Casey made a gagging sound as the fingers tightened on her wrist like steel cables; she clenched her eyes in anticipation of the dull crack of her wrist.

  It never came. But the fingers tightened more and the pain shot up Casey's arm and caught in her throat like a lump of tough, dry meat. When she opened her eyes, she saw the woman's other hand sliding between the bars, felt the fingers wrap around her coat collar. She pulled Casey's face against the damp, rusty bars.

  With sweet, meaty breath, the woman hissed, “I told you to go!" She opened her mouth and her teeth sparkled like deadly needles.

  Casey began screaming and thrashing, scratching the skin of her face against the lumps of rust on the bars, throwing herself back and forth, back and forth, until suddenly—so suddenly she was startled—she was free! She fell back against the wall behind her and slid down to the floor. When she looked up, the woman was gone.

  Casey struggled to her feet and tripped. Leaning against the wall, she turned toward the doorway. But not before one last glance...

  Something was crawling beneath the bars, something long and sleek, glistening white, with little red eyes. Its mouth opened around razor-sharp teeth as it slithered under the bars in a fluidlike motion.

  A snake.

  And it was looking straight into Casey's eyes.

  She threw herself toward the doorway and hit the black curtain, slapping at it, trying to find the opening. It wrapped around her arms, blanketed her head, twisted around her neck like strangling hands; each desperate movement only tangled her up in the heavy material a bit more.

  Something wrapped smoothly around her ankle and began to spiral
up her leg beneath her coat and dress and Casey began screaming, her voice lost in the folds of the curtain.

  The snake was just below her thigh when Casey felt it swell and grow heavy on her leg until it was pushing up her dress and coat, reaching up her back and around her waist with strong, restricting arms.

  Casey struggled, but the arms were powerful and held her still, moving only enough to pull her from her black cocoon.

  A vile, soft voice spoke into her ear:

  “It's too late now..."

  Vernon Macy wadded up the smock and, still smiling, tossed it onto the counter. He wore dark blue slacks, immaculately pressed, as always, and a salmon-pink shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

  “I heard you were coming,” he said. “Malcolm mentioned your name earlier. He said Ethan Collier had called ahead for you. Malcolm was annoyed, but then”—he chuckled—“he always is, it seems."

  Benedek had almost forgotten how unnervingly soft his brother-in-law's voice was; his sibilant S's had always set Benedek's teeth on edge. Macy's speech, however, was not as discomforting as the smile Benedek saw on his face then. It was content and at ease, a genuinely happy smile.

  “Doris used to tell me you're a very clever, sneaky man, Walter,” Macy went on. “So when I heard you were coming, I knew you were looking for me. I don't know what led you here, but that doesn't matter. I knew you'd find me.” He lifted one of the trays from the counter and carried it to a refrigerator. The vacutaner tubes clinked together gently as he moved across the room. Opening the refrigerator and sliding the tray onto a shelf, he said, “Doris spoke of you often, you know. If you weren't her brother”—he smiled at Benedek over his shoulder—“I think I would've been very jealous.” He turned from the refrigerator for another tray.

  Benedek's throat burned with anger. The ease with which Macy spoke of Doris made Benedek want to throw up.

  “He's a good man,” Doris had told him upon announcing she'd decided to marry Vernon Macy. “He'll make a good life for me, Walter. And I love him."

  Arranging the trays on the refrigerator shelves, Macy said, “You were very dear to your sister, Walter. She was always terribly sorry that you and I didn't get on better. I remember saying to her once that we—"