Marijuana Girl

by N. R. De Mexico

  It was a hard thing for him to do, and Tony wasn't quite sure he could manage it, even when he was standing in the hallway where Estelle, the Taylor's maid-of-all-work, had left him when she went to find Priscilla Taylor. You can always make some excuse, he thought, and beat it out of here. So then he tried to think up an excuse, such as Mom sent me over to see if I could borrow a cup of sugar.

  But when Priscilla Taylor came into the hallway, all Tony could think of to say was, "Miss Taylor, where's Joyce?"

  The questions caught the woman completely off guard. Yet it struck her like a blow that she had always known would have to come.

  Priscilla said, "Come in the other room, Tony. Leave your coat there on the seat."

  He followed her into the living room. The room was immaculate and fussy. Victorian chairs confronted battery-driven electric clocks under glass domes, and annoying antimacassars and tidies cluttered the chair arms and table surfaces.

  "Sit down, please," the woman said.

  "Thanks, but I can't stay," Tony said. "I just wanted to know where I could reach Joyce?"

  "I don't know, Tony." Suddenly she dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief she held crumpled in one hand. "I haven't heard from her since she left."

  "Well, where was she going?"

  "I don't know, Tony. I don't know what to do." Her voice broke completely. "I don't know anything about that girl. How could she go away like that and not even suggest where she was going?"

  "You mean she just went away like that, without even saying where she was going?"

  "I've been so distraught, Tony. You can't imagine how this has upset me."

  "Let me get this straight, Miss Taylor. Joy just went away and didn't say where she was going. Is that what happened?"

  "Yes."

  "Well what did you do about it?"

  "What could I do?"

  "What does Mr. Taylor say?"

  "He doesn't know yet."

  "You mean you haven't told them that Joy's gone?"

  "I couldn't, Tony. I just couldn't. How could I write them over there in Europe that their daughter has run off? Heaven only knows where the girl has gone."

  "What about the police? What do they say?"

  "I didn't talk to the police."

  "Look, Miss Taylor, I don't like to tell you your business, but you'd better call Mr. Taylor, wherever he is, right this minute. Did Joy leave a note or anything?"

  "Yes. She left me a note. She just said that she was going away, and wouldn't be coming back. She said I wouldn't hear from her anyway, so that there was no reason for me to worry about her. That's all she said."

  "You better start placing that call. It takes a long time to put a call through to Europe. Where are they now?"

  "In Rome. My brother's arranging a contract there. But how can I call them? At first I thought she'd be back in a day or so. How can a young girl like that go out on her own? I knew she'd be back. And then time went by, and--and then I just couldn't. I can't."

  "This happened in August, Miss Taylor. They have a missing persons bureau, the police, I mean. You call them first and then--No. I have a better idea. Let me see what I can do. I'll be back later." He went into the hallway and snatched his coat from the bench. On the porch he stood for a moment looking at the December rain and planning his movements. Then he ran across the lawn, cutting across backyards until he reached the Thrine garage. He opened the doors and backed his car out into the turnaround. For a moment he stopped there. "What if--?" But he decided there were no what-ifs, and drove on out, swinging into Central Avenue and keeping straight until he reached Randolph Road.

  They had been building up to Christmas for weeks now--all three of them. All four, really, because Don Wilson, the pianist was in on this deal. The tree was purchased and mounted, and stood in the cool of the paved backyard behind the brownstone house on Twelfth Street.

  It was a time of conspiracies and counter-conspiracies. Out of small sums, quietly conserved, Joyce had bought a tape recording unit for Jerry, a watch for Don, and a fine string of cultured pearls for Ginger.

  She knew that Jerry had ordered a car for Ginger, because she had been with him when he had made the down-payment, and she knew that Ginger had laid out a fortune for uniformly bound Bach scores which Jerry had been studying lately.

  Don had inquired of her whether she thought it would be all right if he gave Ginger lingerie and, when this scheme was rejected, had settled on a vast vase of costly perfume.

  There remained only a week now till Christmas, and Joyce was working on a complex scheme of small presents to be stuffed in stockings by the useless fireplace.

  With Ginger she had just returned from an expedition to secure a final miscellany of small gifts, that particular Saturday afternoon, when the doorbell rang long and loud--as though whoever were below could not wait patiently for admission, but intended to deafen them into an immediate response.

  Joyce said, "Stick everything under the couch. I'll buzz downstairs." She went to the kitchen and pressed the door release. The ringing stopped, then she ran back to the hallway and, leaving the chain on, swung the door inward. Jerry came up the stairs three at a time.

  He said, "Let me in, Joy." His face was hard and angry.

  When she released the door-chain he brushed past her. She followed him into the living room. Ginger was still bent over, stuffing things under the couch when Joyce reached the doorway. She saw Jerry stalk across the room, stop behind Ginger, draw back his foot and kick her squarely.

  Ginger toppled to the floor, then quickly twisted around to look up at Jerry.

  "What's the matter with you, man?" she said.

  "Got a present for you, honey. Man left this with me. Man named Roy Mallon. Roy Mallon the pusher." He tossed a small, manila-wrapped package no bigger than a ring box on the couch,

  "What you talking about?" Ginger's voice was shrill and whining.

  "I told you once, I want no junkies with my band. I got no time for junkies. I want nobody from my band going to any hospital, and I don't want to get hung up on no narcotics rap. Bad enough there's a law against charge. But charge ain't got no hook, and I think it's a good thing, a fine thing. But this--nobody's going to have it around me."

  "Jerry!" Ginger got to her feet and came toward him.

  "Get away from me. I got a few words to say. I don't know how bad hooked you are. I seen--I saw them little marks on your arms, but I couldn't believe you'd shoot it I thought they were just blackheads or pimples or something. I tried to convince myself and I let it pass. But no more. We got a wire from a Miami place, a big place. We're taking it. But you ain't coming along. I got a replacement for the band and I asked Bob Michell to let us go to Miami. It's only for two weeks, through Christmas and New Year's. He said it would be okay. So then, when I found out about you buying horse from that pusher--then I called Bob and told him you were staying. So that's all right. But when I come back if you're still on that stuff, girl, that's the end." He turned and walked out, without a word to Joyce. It was as though Joyce's whole world had exploded before her very eyes.

  The dark girl stood for long seconds, just as Jerry had left her, unmoving until the slamming of the downstairs door came up through the walls. Then she ran into the bedroom and banged the door behind her. For a while Joyce could hear her sobbing. Then, after a time, the sobbing stopped.

  Joyce thought, I'll wait a little longer and then I'll give her some coffee. She went to the kitchen and ran water into the pot.

  Frank led Tony into the living room, trying to choke down the fear that had caught at him as he saw the boy's face framed in the doorway. When he had opened the door he had started to say, "What's the matter, Tony?" Then, hearing Janice behind him, he had laid his finger on his lips and, turning to Janice, had said, "Could you excuse us a few minutes, Jan?" And she had gone up the stairs, looking pale and terrified.

  He said nothing, waiting for Tony to speak.

  "I just want to know where Joy is, Mr. Burde
tte."

  "Frank," Frank said, automatically. Then, "Don't you know?"

  "Of course I don't. I wouldn't be asking if I did."

  "I haven't seen her." The fright wag growing. What had happened to the kid? Had she been hurt?

  "When was the last time you saw her?" Tony demanded.

  "Not since the summer. What's the trouble?"

  "Neither has anybody else."

  "Sit down," Frank said. He dropped into a chair and extended a cigarette to the boy from a crumpled pack on the coffee table. "Let's get this straight now. I haven't seen her at all since the left the paper last summer. Sit down, fella." Tony sat down. Frank picked up the table lighter and fired both cigarettes.

  "Now," he said, dragging deeply at the cigarette, "you tell me what happened and I'll tell you." Frank was getting some control of himself now.

  "I had a fight with Joy just before she left. It was about you. Then, after that, we broke off. A few days later I noticed she was never around. See, I didn't really want to break off. I just thought that if I sort of blew up, well, it might bring her to her senses. Anyway, I called up a couple of times. Kind of disguised my voice so nobody would recognize it and asked for her. The maid, Estelle, said she'd gone out of town. And then, another time, she said, Miss Joyce has gone away. Nobody knows where. I let it go and let it go. But--but I couldn't get it out of my mind. I mean, Joy is very important to me. I know I'm still not of age and all that, but ..."

  Frank said, "I know what you mean." Then he said, "I think we could both do with a drink, don't you?" He said, "Where ...?" Then he said, "Let's have the drink first." He went to the sideboard in the dining room and brought out a bottle and two glasses, placing them on the coffee table before the two chairs, and then poured out two stiff shots, all the time searching desperately for a way to begin.

  Then he said, "I did have an affair with Joyce last summer. I know how that hurts you, but it's a thing we've got to get clear. And maybe I'm to blame for her going away. So we need to know that, too. What about her aunt--what's her name? Priscilla?"

  "Her aunt only knows that Joy went away a few days after we had the quarrel. I don't know exactly when. She left a note that said not to try to find her. I didn't find out about it until just tonight. I thought--I thought you might know. I don't know. I thought you might have her in New York somewhere, or something."

  "I don't," Frank said.

  "Do you have any idea ...?"

  "Not any. Has her aunt notified--oh, but of course she has."

  "No. She hasn't. That's just it. I don't know what's happened to her. I don't know, even, if she's alive. I don't know what to do."

  They talked for a long time, and after a while Janice came down and talked, too.

  "Mostly," Janice said, "I don't think either of you were to blame. A lot of the blame belongs to the aunt. But it's hard to blame her, really, either. The ones really to blame are Joyce's parents. Somebody's got to notify them, of course. But I don't think it will help much. The only real thing anybody can do about Joyce is wait ..."

  12 ~ Narcosis

  After Joyce made the coffee, she set the pot on a tray with cups and saucers and spoons, and got some cookies from a box in the cupboard. These she arranged on a plate for maximum attractiveness. Then she laid out the cream and sugar, and carried the whole tray to the bedroom door. She listened for a moment and then tried the door. It was locked.

  She knocked, gently, and then louder.

  Ginger said, "Wait a second, honey." She heard Ginger getting up, heard the sound of a drawer being shut, and then the door opened. She carried in the tray, and Ginger watched her setting it down on the little night-table beside the bed.

  "I thought you might like a little coffee or something." Joyce said.

  She looked at the dark girl who stood there, her hand still on the knob of the door as though opening it had somehow frozen her to silence. In the light of the dim ceiling fixture Ginger's face looked strange, and there was something odd about her dark brown eyes that Joy couldn't quite place.

  After a second the dark girl moved. "Gee, that's awful sweet of you, honey. That's the very sweetest. An' I hope you won't be awful mad if I don't drink the coffee right away, on account of I'm just a little upset to my stomach."

  "No, Gin. Of course not. Is there anything I can get for you?"

  "No, honey. Except you can sit down here with me."

  That was when it really struck Joy--when she sat down on the bed beside Ginger and took the dark hand in her light one. It was as though Jerry had suddenly destroyed her home, ripping it out from under her. She thought of the things it was going to mean. No Christmas. No tree. No presents. No being together. No more evenings in the Golden Horn. No more lighting up together in the comfortable evenings, and no more going out together in the afternoons. No more feeling of safety--of being protected by the tall, handsome colored man with the small mustache; no more having a place to come home to, because it wouldn't be quite the same with just Ginger there. Her stomach seemed to be quivering with the idea, and her head ached with it

  Then Ginger said, "You heard what the man said?"

  Joyce nodded, holding back the tears.

  "He's wrong, Joyce. This time the man is wrong."

  "What do you mean?"

  "What's so different about gauge and the white stuff? Nothing. You don't see him knocking off the gauge. He never put gauge down. Only reason he's so down on horse is on account of his old man."

  "What do you mean?"

  "What I say. His old man got on horse when Jerry was a kid. He didn't get on like a sensible guy. Not like I do. Not like other people. He used it till it was using him--till he was carrying a monkey bigger than he was."

  "Who? What monkey?"

  "Jerry's father. He had a bad habit. He was a real junkie. Used to get himself committed to the Government hospital for the cure, just so he could get the habit down small enough so he could afford to start all over again."

  "Is that why Jerry's so down on it?"

  "That's right. When he was a kid his old man used to sometimes send him out to make the contact for him. Finally they had a real hassle about it, when Jerry was in high school, and he left home."

  "What's it like, Ginger?"

  "It's like gauge--only a great big kick, like it takes you right through the ceiling. You get so high. You can really dig this kick." Then Joyce knew what she was going to do. She thought, I've got to find out so I'll know what to do about Ginger. And there was something else, too, that she thought. It was something fleeting, that made fleeting sense. If I know what it is, she thought, then I can tell Jerry about it and he'll come back, because we've got to get him back. Ginger and I do. She said, "Gin?"

  "What's the matter, honey?"

  "I want to try that stuff."

  "Oh, no, honey. You don't want to get on that kick."

  "Yes I do, Gin."

  It went on like that, back and forth for a few minutes. Then Ginger went to the bureau drawer and took out the little packet Jerry had thrown on the couch. She opened it, unfastening the brown paper secured with scotch tape. Inside were a series of little packets, made of waxed paper and fastened with the tape. Each measured about one-and-a-half inches square. Carefully Ginger removed the tape from the packet and spread it out flat.

  "Get yourself a dollar bill," Ginger said. Joyce went to her pocket book in the other room, thinking it was funny that Ginger wanted her to pay for it. When she came back, she saw that Ginger had split the little pile of powder on the wax paper into two tiny piles. Joyce thought, where's the needle? She had seen the needle when the drawer was opened. "Give me the bill, honey," Ginger said. She took the rectangle of paper and rolled it into a tiny tube--tight, so that the opening down the center was smaller than the thickness of a toothpick.

  "You do it like this," she said. She put the waxed paper with its burden of white powder on the edge of the bureau, then inserted the dollar bill tube into one nostril and bent down. Holding
the other nostril, she inhaled deeply through the tube, sucking up the white powder through the tube like a vacuum cleaner tucking cigarette ash from a rug. In a moment she had disposed of the one half of the white powder. Then she rose to her feet, still inhaling at the dollar bill. When she had taken the bill from her nostril she held both nostrils for a moment, as though to keep from sneezing, batting her eyes rapidly.

  "You make like that, Joy, honey," she said.

  Joyce followed the same detailed procedure, holding her nostrils when she had done. The inside of her nose felt strange, a funny, cool tingling. It wasn't like tea, this stuff.

  Suddenly she heard Ginger rushing from the room and saw her run to the bathroom. Then she heard the dark girl being sick--and in a moment knew why and followed her.

  She vomited, strangely without effort, and then was s-o-o-o-o happy.

  The pain of Jerry's going had vanished, and a million reasons why it was a good, thing came swiftly flowing into her mind. How could he not understand about this? How could he be against this? What was a "hook" compared to this? Where was marijuana when you could get like this?

  Why, you could do anything, make anything, be anything. There was nothing impossible. If it were cloudy, you could make the sun shine. This was really grooving. This was being right at the top.

  She followed Ginger into the living room and sat down. You could do anything, except that it was so wonderful not to do anything--just to think and feel the fine sensation of blood rushing through your veins, and hear the thoughts ticking off inside your head, and follow the thoughts as they dashed swiftly about the room, thinking things out for themselves.

  After a while she said, "Ginger? Isn't the light pretty bright?" And Ginger got up, very slowly, and turned it off. Then the peace and beauty was suddenly perfect.

  The great thing about it was, it was so mental. Everything was so mental, now. You could go back and relive every wonderful moment of your life, skipping all the bad parts and all the little things that had gone wrong at the time. And you could live them better than you had before, because now there was only pleasure and nothing but pleasure.