Death Wore Gloves

by Ross H. Spencer

  Florence helped Willow to his feet. She said, “Poor baby!” She dusted him off. She adjusted the rose in his lapel. She said, “Who’s the jackoff?”

  Willow said, “Joe Orlando.”

  Florence said, “Who’s Joe Orlando?”

  Willow said, “At the moment, one very unconscious sonofabitch.”

  Florence dipped into an apron pocket. She said, “You left your cigarettes on the bar.” She tucked the package into a pocket of Willow’s sports jacket. She kissed him lingeringly. She patted his cheek. She said, “Drive carefully for Florence, innamora mia!”

  Willow got into his bone-tired old Buick and slammed the door weakly. When he pulled out of the parking lot Florence Gambrello was kicking a prostrate Joe Orlando in the sugar plums.

  11

  Monday

  She opened the door just a crack. She said, “What’s the password?”

  Willow said, “Blood.”

  She said, “Wrong. It’s disestablishmentarianism.”

  Willow said, “Okay, what does it mean?”

  She said, “It means you should get the hell in here!” She threw the door open, grabbed his wrist, and tugged him into her living room. She was wearing a starchy white short-sleeved blouse, skintight dark blue satin slacks, and fourinch-heeled red leather pumps with little beaded bows. Willow looked her up and down. He said, “Hooray for the red, white, and blue!”

  Gladys Hornsby said, “Oh, beautiful for spacious skies!” She kicked the door shut with a bang, locked it, hooked the night chain, and stepped tightly against him. She said, “How damned thoughtful of you to drop in.”

  Willow said, “I hardly ever turn down invitations from licentious ladies.”

  Gladys peeked up at him. “Licentious—that means they can be taken to bed?”

  “It means they have orchids tattooed on their asses.”

  “Which means they can be taken to bed.”

  “Does it?”

  “It certainly does. Drink?”

  “Frequently.”

  “Scotch all right?”

  Willow nodded. “How are your neighbors—inquisitive?”

  “No problems. The girl across the hall is a hundred-dollar hooker. She thinks I’m in the same game.” Gladys giggled. “Which I am, essentially.” She kissed as she’d always kissed, hot, openmouthed, darting tongued. She winked a smoky blue eye. “I’ll make it a double because you’ll need it—I’m taking the day off from the studio!”

  Willow sat on a couch just a few feet longer than a volleyball court, and Gladys brought Chivas Regal on the rocks, then perched across the room on a Corinthian leather ottoman. Willow hoisted his glass to her, took a short nip of the scotch, and looked around. He said, “Helluva layout!”

  It was. Lake Michigan sparkled frothy blue and silver beyond a spacious wrought-iron balcony, pecan paneling gleamed softly, the three-tone beige carpeting was four inches thick, a stereo the size of a pickup truck throbbed something from Victor Herbert—“To the Land of My Own Romance,” Willow thought. The paintings on the walls were original oils by a Robert E. Mason—haymows, harvest scenes, old mills, corn cribs, sagging red barns, stuff to put a catch in the throat. There was one of a split-rail fence stretching erratically into infinity, and it reminded Willow of the course of his life. Everywhere he looked there was money, lots of it.

  Gladys shrugged indifferently. “It’ll have to do for the time being.”

  Willow lit a cigarette and said nothing. It had been an ambitious statement, if he’d ever heard one.

  Gladys was saying, “Oh, by the way, that Joe Orlando you asked about—he’s been involved in an accident.”

  “Serious?”

  “Apparently not, but he wouldn’t go into it. He just bought a new Corvette and I suppose he racked it up. Joe drives like a maniac. He’s at home and he wanted me to come by.”

  “Will you?”

  “No, I was honest with him. I told him that it’d been fun but that there’d be nothing more for us. Joe hasn’t grown up yet. He’s an impulsive, headstrong youngster. He likes his sex in strong doses, but he needs someone to lean on. I can’t provide both.”

  “The former, but not the latter?”

  “Yep.” Mincing words had never been an ingrained habit of Gladys Hornsby’s.

  “This Orlando—he knows about your, er—arrangement?”

  “Yes, he knows—he knows more than he should. Joe’s the jealous type and he doesn’t let go easily. Somehow he’s managed to keep close tabs on me. He has it all—Casey Bucknell, my new address, my telephone number, my job at Seely Studios—whatever.”

  “And the Great Dane?”

  “And the Great Dane.”

  “Will he interfere?”

  “Not right away. Joe’s an egocentric. He figures that I’ll come back to him—won’t be able to do without him.”

  “How does he get his information—a detective?”

  “Possibly—Joe could afford one. He makes damned good money—he’s chief makeup man at UBS and he moonlights. He’s worked at Seely. That’s how I met him.”

  “You ran into Bucknell at Seely?”

  “Yes, ten minutes after I met Joe. I was doing a series for Malibu Fashions, and Joe was working on me when Casey walked in.”

  “Orlando was working on you?”

  “Applying makeup, for God’s sake!”

  “Oh.”

  Willow sipped his Chivas Regal, watching her over the rim of his glass. She returned his stare for a few silent moments, then popped to her feet. She said, “Look, Tut, I hate to appear overanxious, but, goddamnit, I’m overanxious!” She unbuttoned her crisp white blouse, removing it to toss it onto the leather ottoman. She wore no brassiere and her breasts were full, tight, rigid pink nippled. She stepped out of her spike-heeled red pumps, her eyes riveted to his face. The dark blue satin slacks slithered to the floor, and Gladys Hornsby was an naked as she’d been on the delivery table thirty years earlier. Willow’s heart was thumping like a carousel drum. She crossed the room to the couch, turning her perfect posterior to him, bending over, peering back at him around the soft curve of her shoulder. She said, “Tutto?”

  Willow crushed his cigarette into a hundred-dollar crystal ashtray and said, “Yeah?”

  Gladys said, “Kiss my orchid.”

  Willow said, “Sure, why the hell not?”

  12

  Monday

  Gladys Hornsby wasn’t as physical as Florence Gambrello, and that figured. Florence was a Clydesdale mare, Gladys a thoroughbred filly; they hailed from different stables. Florence was loud, unpolished, overwhelming, getting it done by virtue of raw desire and brute force, and Gladys had accomplished her purposes of that Monday afternoon with a delicate expertise that comes only with consummate knowledge of the adult male body. She’d been a sorceress, weaving a teasing gauzy web of touches, signs, kisses, and gentle demands before she’d destroyed him with a silent, sweetly savage barrage of sexual artillery, the likes of which he’d never encountered, not even in bed with the Gladys Hornsby of years ago. In those days Gladys had been superb, but now there were no words to describe her. She’d devoured him with thorough finesse, he’d been outclassed, and his suspicions had been confirmed—he wasn’t what he’d once been, at least not in the boudoir of a woman who possessed a sexual master’s degree. At dusk he stroked her orchid and said, “Amazing! We didn’t fall out of bed—not once.”

  Gladys murmured, “Why should we? Good Lord, Tut, what have you been sleeping with?”

  Willow pawed the nightstand for his cigarettes, lit two, and handed one to Gladys. She accepted it and sucked on it hungrily, inhaling deeply. She said, “Balls.”

  Willow knew her very well. He said, “Go on.”

  She said, “Tutto, have you ever felt like pitching the whole thing, and settling down?”

  “Not seriously—have you?”

  “Recently, yes—every minute of every goddamned day.”

  “Don’t try it, Glad—your keeste
r is on fire. A relaxed life would drive you bonkers.”

  “My keester used to be on fire, but I’ve been there—I’m fed up with the bright lights and the bed-hopping. I want off of this merry-go-round—I’m all tuckered out!”

  “You haven’t conveyed that impression this afternoon.”

  “That’s only because I’m with you. You always light me up.”

  “That’s a crock. You were born lit up.”

  “Granted. I had to see it all and do it all, but the genies busted the bottle. If I can hold Casey Bucknell on the rails until he conks out, I’ll take my five hundred thousand and buy a farm where it’ll cost my next-door neighbor six hundred dollars to telephone me.”

  “Yeah, I saw those paintings in the living room. Buy a farm—then what?”

  “What’s the difference? Raise asparagus, grow petunias, write a book.”

  “Baby, you could write one helluva book!”

  “Tutto, don’t you have a dream—one that just won’t go away?”

  “Yeah, I want to get new rubber for my car.”

  Gladys nodded. “There’s been no change. Tut Willow, boy bedroom comedian.”

  “Comedian? Have you looked at my tires?”

  “Tut, this is my last waltz. If I blow it, I’ll go down the drain! You’ll help me, won’t you?”

  It was back, that edginess he’d detected at Mickey’s Mirror Lounge. “Glad, I’ve thrown Sister Rosetta a red herring—what more can I do?”

  “I’m coming to that.”

  “Before you get there, tell me, do you feel anything for Casey Bucknell—anything at all? How do you see the man?”

  “I see Casey Bucknell exactly as Casey Bucknell sees Gladys Hornsby.”

  “You’re selling, he’s buying.”

  “How else? It’s a fair swap—an all-obliging sex toy in return for lifetime security. There’s nothing original about that—it’s been going on since Christ was a corporal.”

  Willow shook his head. If he wasn’t stroking the naked ass of one of the most pragmatic, unprincipled, shoot-the-moon females on earth, he certainly wasn’t missing by much. He said, “Glad, I wish you luck.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you do, but I’m going to need more than good wishes. I’m going to need assistance!”

  “Such as?”

  “Will you pick a lock for me?”

  Willow snorted. “Hell, no!”

  “You could do it! You picked my lock on Cicero Avenue one night.”

  “That was because you’d left your keys in your apartment—nothing illegal about it.”

  Gladys pulled his ear. “Just one little old lock, Tutto—just one?”

  Willow’s scowl was a darkly forbidding thing. “Lady, you do wonderful things to me, but I wouldn’t go to jail for my own mother!” He put out his cigarette. “What kind of lock?”

  She was smiling—she had him, she knew it, and so did Willow. “I don’t know—it’s just a lock.”

  “That’s like saying, ‘It’s just an animal.’ It could be a rabbit or it could be a Royal fucking Bengal tiger—there’s an appreciable difference. Where is this lock?”

  “On South Michigan Avenue.”

  “Uh-huh—I had a hunch on that. Sam Brumshaw’s office?”

  “Right.”

  “Brumshaw has no dead bolts and his lock is a Flexner. I just happened to notice—force of bad habit.”

  “Are Flexners rabbits or Royal fucking Bengal tigers?”

  “Rabbits—thirty seconds, outside. You’re thinking of that file Brumshaw has on you?”

  “Yes, I want it—I want it very badly!”

  “I’m listening.”

  “The slippery sonofabitch is trying to blackmail me with it!”

  “That’s a mighty tall step for a nickel-and-dimer like Sam Brumshaw. What’s in the file?”

  Gladys stared at the little white flowers on her blue satin bed-sheet. Gratingly she said, “One dozen of the horniest pictures you’ll ever see.”

  “Starring Gladys Hornsby?”

  “None other—sweet little Gladys, out in the barn, naked as a jaybird, spread wide open, smiling, using a carrot for the June shot, a cucumber for July, an ear of corn for August, a __”

  “Hold it, Glad, you’re getting into watermelon season! Sounds like Wow-Wee Calendar stuff.”

  She nodded dismally. “The biggest mistake of my screwed-up life!”

  “You posed for Wow-Wee?”

  “Yes, but I reneged—I wouldn’t sign a release.”

  “Then how did Brumshaw get the pictures?”

  “Sammy’s a fox, he has connections, including a shirttail relative who works at Wow-Wee.”

  “Can’t you sue Wow-Wee?”

  “The pictures were stolen, they told me, and I believe that. Wow-Wee’s taking a lot of heat—Women’s Lib, Moral Majority, Anti-Pornography Union, that Glass Cathedral fruit cookie, plus half-a-dozen libel suits—Wow-Wee wouldn’t run the risk of selling them, not now! How Sammy got the pictures doesn’t matter. What matters is, he has them!”

  “And the price of photographs is up?”

  “Out of sight!”

  “How far out of sight?”

  “Sammy wants seventy-five thousand.”

  Willow whistled. “Or?”

  “Or he’ll send them to Casey Bucknell.”

  “The pictures would queer you with Bucknell?”

  “Instantly!”

  “Why so? Bucknell must know that any woman who’ll take on a Great Dane before witnesses probably isn’t Bernadette of Lourdes.”

  “You don’t know Casey Bucknell! It’s a matter of conceit. I’ve done some way-out things for Casey, and he’s just vain enough to think that I’d do them only for him. If he knew about Jake Bora’s Irish wolfhound, or if he were to see the Wow-Wee poses, I’d be out on my rosy pink ass, believe me!”

  “Why in the hell did you pose for Wow-Wee in the first place?”

  “At that time Casey was sniffing around, but I didn’t anticipate him going overboard for me. The calendar job would have paid well—ten grand plus royalties—it would have amounted to serious money.”

  “But hardly as serious as five hundred Gs.”

  “Hardly!” Her half-smile was bleak. “Jesus, Tutto, I’ve got both tits in the wringer!”

  “You can’t scrounge up the seventy-five grand for Brumshaw?”

  “Not a chance! Casey’s generous, but he’s not that generous! Anyway, Sammy would cross me—how thick is that folder?”

  “I’d say an inch, give or take a sixteenth.”

  Gladys winced. “Then he has the pictures in triplicate or better. He’d give me one set for seventy-five thousand and next month he’d come back for an encore. You can’t satisfy a blackmailer!”

  Willow sat up, scratching his head and squinting. “All right, how do you see it? I can’t pop that lock after hours—the building will be secured and if it isn’t wired there’ll be a night watchman. I might run into both!”

  “No after-hours stuff. This is going to be relatively simple.”

  “That’s what Doug MacArthur said when they asked him if he could defend the Philippines—‘Relatively simple.’”

  “Listen to me. Sammy goes out for lunch at eleven-thirty sharp—usually to Rosenbaum’s Cafeteria a couple of blocks north on Michigan Avenue. I’ll call him and arrange to meet him there.”

  “To talk turkey?”

  “Yes. Do you know Womer’s Wigwam?”

  “The antique gin mill on East Adams? I’ve been there.”

  “All right, I’ll meet you in Womer’s at say eleven-fifteen. We’ll have a drink and about eleven-thirty-five I’ll call Sammy’s office. If there’s no response we’ll go up there, you’ll pick the lock, I’ll grab the folder, and we’ll disappear. Five minutes should do it, probably less.”

  “Not so fast. What about the other tenants on Brumshaw’s floor?”

  Gladys brushed it away with a wave of her hand. “There are four second-floor offices a
nd two have been vacant for years—there’s just Sammy and a sleazy divorce lawyer named Mattfeld. I’ll call Mattfeld tomorrow—I’ll make a deal to meet him in Womer’s at eleven-thirty. I’ll be a pissed-off rich bitch looking for a fast divorce and a fat settlement. Mattfeld works on percentages—that’ll jingle his balls.”

  “Do you know Mattfeld?”

  “I’ve seen him.”

  “Does he know you?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Don’t kid yourself. If he’s seen you, he’ll remember you. You’re a stickout!”

  “No matter. When I see him come in I’ll go into the phone booth and call Womer’s. I ask that Mattfeld be called to the phone. I’ll tell him that I’ve been detained and that I’ll be just a few minutes late. That’ll hold him long enough to suit our purposes.”

  Willow had been making mental checkmarks. He added them, nodded, and said, “Okay, Mata Hari, when do we pull this off?”

  “Wednesday would be ideal. Rosenbaum’s always has chicken paprika for a Wednesday luncheon special. Sammy never misses the chicken paprika.”

  Willow said, “Glad, the CIA could certainly use you.”

  “The CIA doesn’t pay my kind of money.”

  “One question—what if you can’t find the damned folder?”

  “I’ll find it—I know Sammy’s office inside out!”

  Willow sat in silence, considering possible pitfalls, and Gladys studied him. She placed her tattooed right hand on his arm. Very softly she said, “You still love me, don’t you, Tutto?”

  Willow shrugged. “No comment.”

  “You still love me, but you don’t want to—is that it?”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  “Why don’t you want to love me?”

  “You’re no good, Glad—you’re rotten, just plain old flat-out rotten.”

  She giggled her lilting giggle and ruffled his hair. “How’d you like to visit my farm this winter?”