by P. N. Elrod
With difficulty, I turned my attention from the girls to the rest of the place. It was very noisy. The barrage of conversation trying to be heard over the brassy orchestra was like a riot in a large dog kennel. With that image in mind it was easy to categorize the patrons. There were a few high-class ones with pedigrees, but the overwhelming breed represented were the mutts; well-dressed, but mutts all the same.
Another blond came up and led me to a table the size of a dinner plate and told me the waiter would be by shortly. The place was surprisingly busy for a weeknight, but well organized. In less than a minute a young man appeared and took my order for Irish coffee, which also appeared in less than a minute. I pretended to sip, though bringing it to my lips was an act of will, and I had to stifle a gag. For distraction I looked around and caught several unescorted young ladies giving me a hopeful eye. I wasn’t that handsome—they were working girls. I had no inclinations for that at the moment, so my gaze slid past to the swaying couples on the floor below. The band wound up the music, the dancers dispersed, and the lights went down. A single spot picked out another platinum blond leaning against the grand piano. She was in something long, white, and silvery, a nice contrast to the brief black skirts of the other girls and a perfect complement to her long shimmering hair.
She sang something sad and shallow in a voice that was surprisingly good, filling the room and hushing even the worst drunks. As with any woman I noticed, I was comparing her to Maureen, looking for something wrong, but for once the lady was holding her own. She finished her song, and the lights faded and came up, but by then she was gone, leaving her audience wanting more. The band cut to another number and couples began to venture onto the floor again. I looked up and saw a pretty girl smiling at me, holding a tray full of tobacco products.
“Bobbi always knocks ’em dead,” she observed with a nod toward the stage. I made a business of picking out some cigarettes and got her to talk a little. In two minutes I found out where she lived, when she got off work, the time of Bobbi’s next number, the location of the gambling rooms, and the requirements to get inside, which were specifically a lot of cash and the willingness to lose it fast. Her interest cooled and she moved on, apparently having had experience with gamblers. I’d seen the type as well; men who would rather gamble than make love, more fool they.
And here I was trying to imitate them. I abandoned my table and drifted over to a guarded door marked PRIVATE. The large man there asked my name. I gave the one I was using that night and was slightly disappointed to get no reaction. He consulted a telephone, a buzzer sounded, and he opened the door wide.
It was another big room, but much quieter, lit by crystal chandeliers and dimmed by cigarette smoke. I’d been in places like this before, but never when they were in one piece. Usually I was hot in the wake of a police raid making a written account of the destruction and noting down who had been arrested for what. Prior to tonight I had never been able to afford this sort of decadence. It felt great.
At the money cage I bought two hundred dollars in chips, blanching inwardly at the small pile they made in my pocket. For something to do, I lit a cigarette and studied faces. Not one of them was familiar, which was all for the best, since I didn’t want to be noticed right away. I wandered around, looking for Slick Morelli. He was either not there or my memory was not cooperating the way it had at Frank Paco’s. Maybe I was expecting too much from my traumatized brain.
Giving it a rest, I found an isolated corner and got into a blackjack game, winning ten dollars and losing fifty before realizing I could cheat without getting caught.
The dealer’s face had about as much expression as a dead fish, but he had no control over his heart rate. When the immediate noise level occasionally subsided, I could just hear it. Every time he dealt the house a good hand it beat just a little louder and faster, and after some concentrated practice at sorting out the internal signals my rate of winning rose marginally. I didn’t win every time, that was impossible with the other players and the natural fall of the cards, but I had enough of an edge to win more than lose. In an hour I left the table a thousand dollars ahead, excited at the prospect of a new vocation in life.
Circling the room again, I looked at the new faces, checking out the suckers at the roulette tables and slot machines. One of the machine patrons was the singer, Bobbi. She looked just as good, if not better, close up as she did fifty feet away on stage. Now she was wearing a black sequin-trimmed wrap over her bare shoulders. It must have been to provide some modesty to her stage gown, but since the black material was practically transparent it had just the opposite effect.
She pushed a coin into the slot and hauled the lever down with just enough precise force, indicating long practice. She got a cherry and two lemons. Her face revealed no disappointment. Her moves were automatic: push in a coin, yank the lever, and wait, push in a coin . . . I was getting hypnotized. She won a small pot, added the money to the stack she kept ready, and started over again. I wondered if she’d rather gamble than make love.
She noticed me out of the corner of her eye. Just my luck, the first emotion I inspired in her was annoyance. “The floor show’s in the next room, ace.”
“Sorry, didn’t know I was intruding.”
“You shouldn’t look over other people’s shoulders.”
I moved around to her front field of view and angled so I could look out across the room. Tapping out a cigarette, I offered her one.
“They kill the voice and stain the teeth,” she told me, pulling the lever down with decidedly more force. I put my props away unlit and offered to buy her a drink.
“No, thanks, and before you ask me why I’m here, I’m supporting my crippled mother down on the farm.”
At least she was talking to me. She didn’t say anything I wanted to hear, but she was talking. I watched her play the machine. There was more strength than grace in her automated movements, but the view was very absorbing.
“You know Slick Morelli?” I asked.
She kept up the rhythm, but her eyelids flickered. “Doesn’t everybody?”
“Where is he?”
“Somewhere around.”
“Can you point him out?”
“You think I’m the party hostess or something? Go talk to one of the boys over there.” She jerked her head in the direction of the door. The movement dislodged a wisp of hair. She paused long enough to brush it with her fingertips, using the gesture to glance at me before going back to the machine. I tried to keep my smile neutral and non-threatening.
“I hard that yacht of his is for sale,” I tried. “The Elvira.”
She laughed. Another coin, down came the lever. I didn’t see the result. She put in another coin.
“Why not? He needs the money.”
This time the lever stayed up. Her eyes slid over to mine. I expected blue, but they were hazel. She studied my face, trying to fit me into a category and finally deciding; it was anything but complimentary. “What do you want?” she said wearily.
“An introduction to Slick?”
She almost said why, but thought better of it. “Go talk to one of the boys.”
“They’re not as pretty. My name’s Gerald Fleming . . . I think Slick will want to talk to me about my brother Jack.”
The names meant nothing to her, which was a relief.
“Jack met him two weeks ago, they were aboard the Elvira.”
Her heartbeat went up suddenly, but she kept her face straight.
“He’s built just like me and much the same in the face, but he’s in his mid-thirties.”
Nothing new, she was still reacting to the mention of the yacht.
“Frank Paco and a guy named Sanderson were there, too. Fred’s dead now and Paco is headed for a nuthouse. . . .”
She went white at those names, but still tried to cover it with a kind of defiance. “So what?” She wore a soft flower scent, but underneath the roses I could smell fear. I asked her why she was afraid. She didn’t deny it
. “Death and taxes, what else?”
Slick Morelli or me?
She kept her eyes on the machine. “I think you’d better go now.”
“I’d rather stay.”
“Suit yourself, it’s no skin off my nose.”
“A guy could get discouraged.”
“Good.”
“I know Slick killed my brother.”
She had a lot of control, but now the fear smell was drowning the perfume. She went on playing, pretending she hadn’t heard.
“If you see him tonight, pass that on. I’ll be around.”
“You’re not kidding, are you?”
“No.”
“Why do you think he—”
“Because I was at Frank Paco’s last dinner party, the one with the hot finish that made all the papers. I overheard things. Slick’s name came up in the course of the conversation.”
“Aren’t you being kind of stupid to march in here like this?”
“Maybe, but Slick won’t hurt me because I’ve got something he wants.”
“What?”
“The same thing he wanted from my brother Jack, but didn’t get.”
“Okay, be cagey.”
“The less you know the better it is. I don’t think you want to be in the middle of things.”
“So everyone tells me. Why should you care?”
“You remind me of someone.”
“Thanks a heap.”
“She was afraid sometimes, too.”
She watched me, troubled and wary. I shut up and moved away, there was no more to say to her and I couldn’t trust my voice. Maureen was still too strong within me and I was feeling guilty for being attracted to Bobbi. She was as beautiful as Maureen, but in a different way; she was also vulnerable and worked hard to hide it. She gave me a lot to think about and I drifted blindly for a while. I lit more cigarettes, but didn’t inhale. My body allowed me air to speak with, but rejected all foreign substances but one, and I had tanked up on that last night. I puffed superficially and added to the haze.
In one of the alcoves a little way from the noise, a serious poker game was in progress. There were five players, but most of the chips were on one side of the table in front of a totally bald fat man with a tangled brown beard bunching along the edge of his jowls like a baby’s bib. Just as I strolled up one of the players threw down his hand and folded for the night. He left with a sweat-slick face, his body giving off the kind of reek that only comes from a habitual gambler, the kind that loses. I was the only observer of the game, the fat man probably won far too often for it to be of any interest to onlookers.
The cards went down and he raked in another pot, neatly stacking his chips according to color with his short, flat fingers. There must have been nine thousand dollars in front of him.
“Care to join?” he said, not looking up.
“No, thanks, I’ll watch.” I didn’t like poker, tending to agree with Ambrose Bierce, who defined it as a game played with cards for some purpose unknown. I’d been listening to heartbeats and knew my little trick would be totally useless at this table with these veterans of the bluff. To test it, I mentally played a hand against the fat man, looking over the shoulder of another player. I lost repeatedly, as he registered about as much emotional reaction as the felt-covered table. All hands were alike to him. Bored, I finally left, sliding quietly out of the alcove. The fat man’s glassy soulless eyes followed me before they snapped back to his cards.
After patrolling the room once for Morelli, I went back to the blackjack table and settled in for some serious gambling of my own. As a game to play, it was much faster, and I enjoyed the mental workout it gave. Before I knew it, two hours were gone and I was the only player left. It increased my odds of winning, I had the dealer’s reactions down well enough by now to practically read his mind.
I flipped up my last card—it was a straight blackjack, I got them occasionally. It was time to quit. Hardly believing it, I gathered up fifty-eight hundred dollars in chips. At this rate I could buy Dad a whole new chain of stores. My conscience wasn’t chafing a whole lot. It was Slick Morelli’s money and he owed me.
Shuffling the chips away, I looked up, my gaze locking on to Bobbi’s face. She moved without hurry across the room, not smiling, not frowning, carefully blank. She sat on the stool next to me and gave the dealer a quiet signal. He closed the table and left.
“You gave up on me pretty fast. Why?” she asked.
“I thought that’s what you wanted.”
“I don’t know what I want right now.”
Dance music filtered in sporadically from the club room as the door opened and closed. I caught her scent again—roses and fear. It was strangely exciting. Her skin was very light and in the shadow beneath her jaw I could see the veins throbbing with life. I could smell that, too.
Keeping very still, I waited for her to look up at me. She was so very beautiful and the first woman I’d wanted in a long, long time. When she finally looked, I suggested we leave the room. She stood and let me follow her through an unmarked door at the back. We were in a dim hall, silent for her; for me it was filled with the uneven rhythm of her lungs and the booming of her heart. She let the wrap slide down from her shoulders as her arms went up around my neck. The length of her body pressed warmly against mine, just as I had wanted it. I caressed her hair, tilting her chin up and kissing her red lips.
But the passion was all one-sided. Her face was empty of all thought or feeling, her mind was in some neutral state, waiting for my next suggestion. I backed off in doubt, then, suddenly knowing it was wrong, I turned away.
As a living man I’d never forced myself on a woman, and I wasn’t going to start now. My changed nature had provided me with an all-too-easy route to seduction. Maureen completely avoided the use of this ability. She had wanted a willing lover, not a slave.
Bobbi’s arms hung loose at her sides, and gradually awareness returned to her eyes. If she had some clue of what I’d been doing, she made no sign. Perhaps she thought her own idea had brought us here. I put a hand on the doorknob, hers stopped me.
“I think I should go.”
“No.” Her voice was hardly above a whisper. “I had to tell Slick what you said.”
“I know, it’s all right. That’s why he sent you after me.”
“Was it that obvious?”
“Just unexpected.”
“I can get you out from here. I’ll tell them you got wise and ran.”
“Too risky for you, though.”
“I’ll be all right.” Her breathing was back to normal and she still held my hand. Her face was tilted up again and she was free from any form of suggestion now. I lowered my head and kissed her and felt elation when she responded. I wanted to stay there, but reluctantly had to draw away. There was a pleasant kind of pressure building in my upper jaw. It was different from hunger pangs, but just as intense, pushing out my canines. While things were still manageable, I pushed them back into place with my tongue. Now was not the time or place for that sort of thing.
“This isn’t Slick’s planning,” she said.
“I know.”
“Look, maybe I can meet you tomorrow—”
“Tomorrow night. I have to talk with Slick first.”
“Why?”
If I tried to answer that one we’d be there all night, which under any other circumstances would have been most desirable. I shook my head and smiled a little. “I’ll take you back before you’re missed.”
She crumpled. “I hate it when he makes me do this. He said it was a joke, but I know better. He wanted me to get you outside, for you to meet me out front so you’re seen leaving the club.”
“I’ll oblige him, but we’ll leave you out of it.”
“But you’re a fish on a hook now. Don’t you see?”
“Like my brother?”
She was trying not to shiver. “I don’t know about him, I really don’t. Two weeks ago Slick spent several days on the yacht. He came bac
k exhausted and in a bad temper, maybe your brother had something to do with it, but I just don’t—”
She looked like she needed a pair of arms around her, and I did the best I could. “Don’t worry about it, it’s my choice. I’m leaving now, by the front door.”
“He’ll kill you,” she said with certainty.
“No, he won’t.” It was too late for that, but a person doesn’t have to have a bullet drilled through his heart to be emotionally dead. I smiled again, got hers in return, and felt alive for the first time in years.
8
I traded my chips for cash at a grilled window under the hard gaze of two gunmen and folded the money away. The cashier made a big point of inviting me back again tomorrow night. He must have figured my beginner’s luck would have worn out by then.
The band was playing a last slow number and I emerged from behind the door marked PRIVATE. Bobbi had gone around by another door and was on the dance floor, floating in the arms of a man who was holding his face close to her gleaming hair. Some guys had all the luck. It might have been Morelli, but I was only guessing.
The tables had lost most of their patrons. One whole section had been roped off and the mop-and-bucket boys were busy cleaning it. I collected my top hat and scarf, giving the girl at the counter enough of a tip to wake her up, and left by the front entrance.
I wondered how much line they were going to give me before hauling me in.
The cool night breeze off the lake felt clean and moist. The place was probably an Arctic hell in winter, but now things were just right. There were still a few hours before dawn. If they planned to try anything, I hoped the night would be long enough to accommodate them. I turned left along the front of the club, walking slowly. Behind, two sets of shoes were keeping pace with mine. I stifled a smile.
Between streetlights I paused and glanced back. One of them was the walking mountain, the other was the guard from the casino door. I tried to not be overly optimistic that they were after me. They could be underpaid enough to just want my newly acquired money. I continued on and turned the corner. There were two more men standing in the way. One of them plucked a toothpick from his mouth and flicked it away. He must have seen that one at the movies.