Judge Me Not

by John D. MacDonald

  She lay limp in his arms, his left arm under her head, his right arm around her so that his hand was almost under her body. The fire made dying sounds. The red glow had faded a great deal. He held her tenderly, kissed her eyes, her throat. Whenever he kissed her lips, he seemed to taste resignation, a chronic despair. He brought his left hand around so that his fingertips rested, as though by accident, against the pulse in the side of her throat. Her pulse remained slow, steady, heavy. And after a very long time, when he kissed her eyes again, and then her lips, he felt a tiny quiver of her mouth, felt the pulse increase its tempo. Only then did he bring his right hand around her body, slowly enfold the heaviness of her breast, a globe of warmth, a cup from which honey could be drunk.

  As he kissed her again, he felt the stir of her lips, felt, against his palm, the subtle tautening, stiffening.

  All at once she stopped breathing. And then she took a vast shuddering breath. Her arms, which had been limp at her sides, slid up and around his neck, and she found his lips with an open, savage hunger.

  He was a man who had picked patiently, gingerly, at the stones at the base of a dam. And suddenly the whole structure had collapsed, overwhelming him in the torrent.

  She was torrent, and tempest, and whirlwind.

  Broken bits of meaningless words glittered in the darkness.

  On a dusty shelf in the back of his mind he found a distant childhood memory. They had been a gift—a lot of curiously shaped little wooden bits. The directions were on the box. He had worked at the puzzle until he had grown angry. And suddenly, when he was close to tears, the little wooden parts had fitted together perfectly. You knew at once that all the time they had been made to fit that way. You wondered how you could possibly have gone on that long without recognizing the essential and pure perfection of this part going here, and that part going there. It was such locked, perfect precision that it had taken him much longer to tire of that toy than the others that had arrived on the same birthday.

  And now, again, here was a coordinated rightness, a fitted precision.

  He was running up a long flight of black velvet steps. Each step was almost impossibly high, yet he was running with the buoyant fleetness that can be remembered only from dreams. He knew he had to run with perfect cadence. There was no top to the flight of stairs. They went on forever. They went on to the stars and beyond.

  And suddenly there was a group of stairs far steeper than any of the others. In spite of their steepness, he ran even faster—ran up and then out into empty space, into a high, wild, airless place full of the shrillness of a scream.

  As in dreams, he did not fall. He floated slowly down to a place where he could again feel the diminuendo of spasmed warmth under his hands, taste the metallic echo of blood on his lip.

  After a time she was apart from him. He said, in a slow whisper, “Oddest damn thing. Was in a school play once. Rehearsed every day for a month. You know, you make me feel as if all I’d ever done is rehearse. And now this was for real.”

  “Shut up!” she said tonelessly.

  He stared at her. There was just enough light left so that he could see she was on her back, with her right hand, palm upward, resting on her forehead.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “God, God, God,” she said in the same flat, dull tone.

  He reached for her and she thrust his hand away.

  “Now look! Just what have I done?”

  “You couldn’t possibly understand.”

  “Why don’t you try me? Try to tell me, darling.”

  “And don’t use that sappy, sticky, sentimental tone on me, Teed.”

  “You sound like a psycho.”

  “O.K., you get your explanation. Turn on the light.”

  “Why?”

  “Just turn it on.”

  He sat up, groped for the ceiling-light pull, found it in the dark. He squinted at the harsh impact of the light. She got lithely out of bed, turned and faced him. She stood in an ugly way, feet spraddled, belly outthrust, shoulders slumped. On her face was a hard and bitter expression, and a look of careless violence.

  “Take a good look at the stock in trade of a hundred-dollar-whore, my friend.” Even that posture could not make her body ugly. “Inspect the merchandise.”

  “Don’t do that to yourself, Barbara. Stop,” he said softly.

  Her voice coarsened. “Poor, poor, poor little Barbara. The delicate, sensitive little thing. Don’t make me laugh! Most of the customers want a good look at what they’re buying. What’s wrong with you? Shy, or something? I’ve been able to peddle this without fear or favor because it hasn’t meant any more to me than a… a topcoat. And it has been just as devoid of feeling. It has been like renting a coat. Do you see what I mean?”

  “I think I do. You mean it wasn’t like selling yourself, because Barbara wasn’t actually involved?”

  “They buy the trimmings, but they don’t buy me. I hide back inside myself and laugh like hell. Once upon a time I got paid for diving into a swimming pool. This isn’t half as hard, and the pay is better. But do you see what you’ve done to me? Now I’m selling too much of myself. Nobody else bought what you just bought, Mr. Morrow. Body and soul and emotions and wanting and…”

  “Please, Barbara.”

  “I could go on doing this if you hadn’t come along. Now I can’t go on with it. Maybe it seems like a pretty delicate moral point to you, my friend, but it’s important to me. I hate you for it, Teed. And I hate myself worse.”

  He lunged quickly, captured her wrist, got the light pull with the other hand. He pulled her roughly back into the bed. She struggled and caught him once across the throat with her nails before he pinned her arms.

  “Let—me—go!”

  “Stop it! I didn’t buy a damn thing, Barbara. Not a thing. I won’t give you a cent. Whatever you want to think, just keep remembering that it wasn’t a commercial transaction.”

  “No matter what you say, whether you pay me or not, you’re just another customer.”

  His voice was thick. “Barbara, listen to me. Can’t you remember? We’ve known each other for years. This was a date for a picnic and a moonlight swim. It just got out of control—changed into something else. It could happen to any date.”

  “Crap!” she said.

  “Have you forgotten old Albert so quickly? And the sleigh ride, and the barn dance?”

  “Don’t try to help me. Please don’t try to help me, Teed,” she said, in an entirely different tone.

  Suddenly, unaccountably, his eyes were stinging. He said, “What a load of guilt for one human being to try to carry, Barbara! You are a crazy, wonderful, damn-fool girl.”

  She freed one hand gently. She said, “Teed, your voice sounds so odd. I don’t know…” He tried to turn his head away, but her fingertips brushed his cheek, just under his eye, brushed the dampness.

  “Big baby,” she said huskily, tenderly. “Big baby to bawl over a thing like me.” And then her voice broke and she began to cry again. He held her as he had before. This was a different sort of weeping. After a time she said, “Help me, Teed. For God’s sake, help me.”

  His answer was to tighten his arms around her.

  When the tears were over, she moved away a bit. “Got a cigarette?”

  “On the floor under your side.”

  She found them, gave him one. The match flared briefly and he saw her cheeks go hollow as she took the first drag.

  “When they’ve asked, I’ve given them a story. A lie every time. No two alike.”

  “You don’t have to tell me, Barbara.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. I do. I have to tell the truth to somebody. I guess I’ve always known that someday I would have to tell the truth to somebody. I went to the right schools, lived the right way. Got engaged to a boy named Roger. A sweet boy, I thought. I told you how you remind me of him, Teed. We were going to be married. I was a virgin. We started sleeping together. It got… pretty physical. I mean we were goo
d together. It was in my home town. Baltimore. Roger’s boss was a bachelor. We began to see a lot of him. I knew he was a sort of a wolf, but I didn’t have to worry. I was Roger’s, and we were going to be married and have a zillion kids. One night Roger told me his boss was out of town and we could use his boss’s house. I didn’t like the idea very much, but he was insistent. We went out there. Roger kept making drinks for me. The whole world got pretty fuzzy. I went to bed with Roger. When morning came, I found out that I was in bed with his boss. Roger had gone home. Roger got a promotion two days later. His boss had made the offer, obviously, and Roger had accepted, prepared the groundwork, dutifully left me there.

  “I tried to kill myself. I didn’t have enough courage.”

  “Or you had too much,” Teed said.

  “The worst part was hearing Roger tell me that we could keep on just like we were. I told him what he had turned me into, and what that made of him. He didn’t care to be called a pimp. He slapped me. I left town. I didn’t care where I went. Maybe I was a little crazy. I came here. A man picked me up. I didn’t even care about that. It didn’t matter. I made him give me twenty dollars. The next afternoon a woman named Gonzales came to the hotel room. I don’t know how she found out. She explained things to me. I didn’t want anything to do with her. After she left I went for a walk and the police picked me up. She came to the jail and explained again. So it was either spend ninety days in jail, or do it her way. And that, Mr. Morrow, is how I got my start.”

  “Roger gave you the name, so you took over the game.”

  “I suppose that’s it.”

  “And all this is just a process of getting even with him, getting even with life.”

  “Oh, it’s very simple, Teed. I buy nice clothes, live in a nice apartment with an unlisted phone. I’m always honest with myself. I get up in the morning and look into my mirror and say, ‘Good morning, you whore.’”

  “Maybe I’m a prude. I just don’t like the sound of that.”

  “And of course I do.”

  “Don’t get angry. How about your family?”

  “The usual thing. They think I’m a model. Isn’t that almost standard procedure?”

  “What are you going to do now?”

  “I… I just don’t know. I don’t know what you’ve done to me. I feel as if I’d been sick, somehow, ever since Roger. Now I’m getting well. And that makes a problem. I just don’t know.”

  “All right. I’ll rephrase the question. What are you going to do this minute?” he asked, reaching for her.

  She moved joyously toward him, her laughter soft in the night. “Oh, Teed, I can answer that question. I can answer it.”

  “We can answer it.”

  “Teed, not fierce and… desperate, like before. Tender, this time. Slow and tender. Can you pretend tenderness?”

  “I don’t have to pretend,” he said, his voice thick.

  “Can I say a silly thing to you?”

  “Of course.”

  “Forget, Teed, that the body is shopworn. Just keep remembering that the emotions haven’t been used much. They need tenderness. Oh, so badly.”

  “That isn’t silly. I can understand that.”

  “And we must have a new pact. We won’t use one word. It’s verboten, that word. Love. Never say it to me, Teed. Never, never, never, my darling.”

  “No love, no pasts, no tomorrows.”

  “Just here and now, Teed. Right here and right now I’m your girl. My heart is your heart.”

  The red glow of the fire was entirely gone. The wind had died. Far away a car droned through the hills and a dog bayed, sadly, forlornly. The night sky was vast over them, and the dark side of Earth turned slowly toward the sun. For a little time they were able to forget that the only constant in life is the utter loneliness of each individual.

  Later, when she whimpered in her sleep he touched her shoulder and, without waking, she made the tiny warm sigh that is the only thing left of a fear that has suddenly gone away.

  In the night he shut his fist until his knuckles ached, and thought that maybe one day he would make a trip, call on a man named Roger something.

  Chapter Seven

  Morning sun was slanting into the small window and Barbara Heddon was shaking him awake.

  “Teed! Someone at the door. Wake up, Teed!”

  He crawled across her, snatched his trousers off the floor, pulled them on. He shook his head hard, grinned at her. “Don’t get up. I’ll chase them away.”

  “I think I better get dressed.”

  The hard knocking came again, and a man’s voice called, “Open up, Morrow!”

  “Coming, coming,” he bellowed angrily.

  He flung the door open. The pasty cop named Harry stood there, perennial match stick in his mouth, hat shoved back. Behind him was a gaunt, hard-shouldered, rock-faced man with dull eyes and a gold tooth.

  “What do you want?”

  “We come with your mail, Morrow,” Harry said. “See, in the mail you get a warrant. Search warrant. And we’re taking you in for a couple questions. I’m Detective Pilcher and this here is Detective Boyd, and that guy getting out of the car with the big black case is named Broznahan and he’s from the lab. You alone?”

  “There’s a lady here. A guest.”

  The match slid over to the other corner of his mouth. “Now aren’t you the one! Great entertainer, aren’t you?”

  “Why the search warrant?”

  “We got a hot tip, Morrow. We got a hot tip that you been tipping over the Mayor’s wife up here in your camp.” He nudged Boyd. “Get the joke. Tip. Tipping?”

  Broznahan had thick glasses and a thin sharp oversized nose. Teed heard a sound behind him and turned in time to get a glimpse of Barbara, clad only in the wool shirt, scurrying into the bathroom, her clothes over her arm.

  Teed stopped blocking the doorway and the three men went in. “What are you after?” Teed asked.

  “Oh,” said Harry Pilcher, “just a little evidence that Mrs. Carboy was here, say Monday night.”

  “I thought she was killed Monday night.”

  “Gee, you catch on real quick.”

  “Am I supposed to be charged with murdering her?”

  “Did we say that? We just want a little chat with you, that’s all. You know, sit around and chat and giggle and scratch ourselves.”

  Broznahan went to work in the kitchen. With his powder and brushes and lens and camera and tape, he was a busy little man.

  “Why don’t you take this delightful opportunity to put on your city suit, Morrow?” Pilcher asked.

  Teed shrugged. He got his clothes from the closet and put them on in the bedroom. Barbara’s purse was still there. He took the five twenties back out of it and put them in his wallet. He was back out, completely dressed, a few seconds before Barbara came hesitantly out of the bathroom.

  Both the detectives stared at her. Boyd snapped his big fingers. “Wait! Don’t tell me. Hell, you’re on Marie Gonzales’ list! I see you once in the line-up.”

  “You paying for it now?” Pilcher asked Teed incredulously.

  “Clever of you to figure it out, Sergeant,” Barbara said acidly to Boyd. Her face had hardened and her voice had gone thin and flat.

  Boyd sauntered closer to her and fingered her breast roughly. “You know, I was wondering were those real,”

  Barbara neither flinched nor moved away. “Now you know, Sergeant. So take your hand away.”

  “How about a quickie, baby?” Boyd said earnestly.

  “Cut it out!” Teed said, anger filling his throat.

  Boyd stared at him. “Hell, your time’s up, ain’t it?” He turned back to Barbara. “Right in that room there. Come on. What’s the fee?”

  “I told you…” Teed said.

  “Please, Teed. I can handle this.”

  There was a look of warning in Barbara’s eyes. She smiled at Boyd. “Sergeant, I like you. You’re so direct and so manly. I’ll make you a special price, just bec
ause I like you.”

  “How much?” Boyd said, reaching for his wallet.

  “I like you so much, it will cost you five thousand dollars.”

  Boyd froze with his hand on his wallet. Then he whipped his arm around and hit her over the ear with the heel of his hand. She bounced off the wall beside the bathroom door and landed on her hands and knees.

  Teed reached Boyd in one step, swinging as he stepped, swinging as Boyd turned blindly into the blow and caught Teed’s fist flush on the nose. Teed felt the cartilage and bone go under his knuckles. He chopped hard with his right, followed the reeling man back to the wall, hooked with his left to a belly that felt as hard as a board fence. Boyd doubled and as Teed moved back to measure him for the blow that would knock him down, there was a soft thud against the back of his head. It did not feel like a violent blow, but the vibration shuddered in his brain and turned his knees to water. He felt as though it were taking him forever to turn around. Barbara swept by in the range of his vision, just getting to her feet. There was a dance of steps behind him and another of those soft thuds. This time his legs folded and he went down onto his knees. He waved his arms like a man on a tightrope and got one foot under him again, came back up onto both feet, feeling as though he stood at a dizzy height.

  Boyd came toward him, both big fists held low, chin on chest, blood patterning the white shirt. His eyes were squinted almost shut.

  “Now, don’t mark him! Don’t mark him!” a far-off voice yelled.

  Boyd hit him under the heart. It was like being hit with a slow sledge. Boyd had swung from close to the floor and the blow lifted both Teed’s feet off the floor. He sat on the end of his spine, rolled back and tried to kick feebly at Boyd’s knees.

  Boyd picked him up and swung toward the wall. Teed flailed with arms that felt as light and ineffectual as those long balloons sold at circuses. Boyd moved in close to him and tucked a massive shoulder under Teed’s chin. And with his fists, with slow measured fury, he began to tear Teed’s middle apart. He snorted with each blow. Teed could no longer lift his arms. They dangled loosely and his head bobbled on Boyd’s shoulder. He tried to grin across the room that seemed full of red mist. Barbara, her face too white, stood flat against the wall. Harry Pilcher stood tapping his palm with a leather sap, his lips pulled back from his teeth. Broznahan stood transfixed, jar in one hand, brush in the other, the light catching his glasses so that his eyes were invisible.