Kill Her- You'll Like It!

by Michael Avallone

  "I passed my burlesque exams when I hit twenty-one. After that, I went out with real live girls. Now who is Jellybean Jackson and where does he fit into your picture, Ada?"

  She tugged at her left ear and then pressed her cold glass against her other cheek. The green eyes were thinly amused.

  "Didn't he tell you when he went to your place?"

  "He didn't tell me a lot of things," I said drily. "That's why I'm asking you. I have to know everything you know, you see, so there won't be any bad surprises for me later."

  She either misunderstood the connotations of the remark or it pleased her vanity to comprehend it her own way. She let out another of her booming, hearty Tallulah laughs. Her enormous Yo-Yos danced behind the thin sheen of silk as if they wanted to break out.

  "Relax, Ed. Jellybean's my manager. He arranges the dates and the bookings. He's good at it, too. We used to be married, but that's past history. You wouldn't believe it, but that squirt's got a tool most big men haven't an idea he might own—people are all wet about midgets."

  "Please," I begged, "stick to public facts, okay?"

  "Okay!" she snapped, the green eyes glinting yellow again. "So he's my manager. So he manages me. Great brain, the little guy. He used to be a magician, but gave it all up for me. No loot in magic any more, anyhow. So Jellybean's my boy. He lives with me, but like I told you, muscles he hasn't got. I can beat him up myself and I have—plenty of times. How about you, Ed? Ever beat up on those thirty-nine dames?"

  There was so much sadism in her tone and in her eyes that my recent good opinion of her began to plummet rapidly. Even the Scotch tasted a little sour. I set the glass down carefully near an ottoman. There were no tables of any kind to speak of. I began to think very suddenly of the front door and how much I might like to walk through it on my way out of this stripper lady's parlor. Five gees wasn't the world.

  "What about this Gingerbread Man thing now? Tell me about that. What you feel and, more importantly, what you think. Did you know the other four victims, by the way?"

  "Know them?" she echoed, shaking her head. The red hair did a trailing tumble down her sleek length. She was propped against one of her heavy ottomans, one long leg extended, the other sort of doubled beneath her. The silken cover-up that covered nothing was letting me see all the horizons that are supposed to be lost ones until Mr. Right finds them for himself. "Second-raters, all of them! Not a pro in the bunch. Just some of these wild kids that show a lot of flesh and think stripping is nothing but peeling. No finesse, no style. Why, it's a damn shame what strip's come down to. In the old days, you had attractions like Lili St. Cyr, Winnie Garrett—that's who they compare me to, in case you want to know—and Pepper Powell and Blaze Starr. They were real stars. Performers. All of them knew what to do. They could shake it and make it a real art. But now?" She allowed her shoulders to shudder very theatrically. "This new batch of peelers is from hunger. They might as well be peddling their asses in some cathouse. It'd make more sense, believe me."

  "Now why do you mention those ladies? They have to be before your time. They were big in the Fifties and Sixties. And you can't be much past thirty-odd, Ada. I know you're a real pro but—"

  "I'm twenty-seven," she flared, thundering it at me, "and drop dead, Noon, baby. Ever hear of film—and besides, I got myself up on them, same way some kid actors study Brando. Geezis, why don't I throw you right out of here? You're worse than Don Rickles!"

  "I'm just a cop," I said, apologizing with my low tone. "With a cop's instincts. You have to ask questions and you have to check them out. Okay, so you have opinions. Now what about those dead girls? Did you know them personally—to talk to?"

  I had somehow reminded her of that great terror or whatever it was that had made her get in touch with me in the first place. She let out a low moan of some kind and clasped her hands around the extended gam, drawing the knee up to her middle. Her green eyes held a memory of something. She shook herself again, breathing hard.

  "Yeah. Saw them around. Trails cross in this business. Worked someplace once with Dimples O'Shaughnessy. That name's a gag, you know. She was a Korean girl, actually. Her act was with a bowl of fruit. Apples and bananas. Every time she took a piece away, the customer saw more of her. Not bad, but not great, either. Cleo Patra was the one with the bangs and all the Egyptian props. She was a ringer for Liz Taylor, so she played on that. And you take Gardena Eden. A black baby who came on with a phony ten-foot snake—not the real thing—and horsed around with it like it was King Kong's wang. You know the bit, I guess. Met her at a convention we did together in Chicago for some bigshot businessman's testimonial dinner. The pay for that gig was fabulous. Made more in one night than I make all week at the Del Rio and they're paying me top dollar. I'm number one, baby."

  "What about Heavenly Blue?" I reminded her while she was preening.

  Ada Ven grinned wickedly, as if I had caught her in a lie.

  "You got me there, Noon, baby. She was a new one on me. Fact is, she was fresh fish. First season on the circuit. Eighteen years old with size forty-four bazooms. See what I mean? Flesh, nothing but flesh! What kind of art is there in showing forty-fours if that's all you have to offer the bald heads in Row A?"

  "I don't know," I said, watching every one of her reactions very closely. "Then none of those four girls were what you'd call stars? You know—big-time names in the art of strip?"

  "Not a one," she vowed, holding her right hand up as if she was taking the oath. "Not even in my league. No way. It was like I'm Raquel Welch and they're models you see in the Sears catalogue."

  "I'll take your word on that and I know what you mean. Now this Gingerbread Man. Have you received any crank calls or mail from him? Or would you have a hard time separating him from the usual obscene routines you probably have to put up with somewhere along the line? Level with me, Ada. This is very important."

  She smiled at me, her face still not quite losing her eternal bewilderment with me. I was just not behaving the way a red-blooded male should and probably would have. The room was nice and dim, pale lights suffusing the entire layout, and the floor was a foot deep in shag rug and we were all alone and there was a pleasant hush over everything. That street down below, the Manhattan sidewalk, could have been a million miles away. Ada Ven moistened her red, lower lip and showed me her teeth.

  "Jellybean and I have a signal, Ed. He won't just walk in on us unless I give him the go-ahead. So don't let that stop you."

  "Answer the question, Ada."

  "What's to answer? No, that loony hasn't made any contact at all with me. I can read, though. He's slicing strippers. Strippers that are working right here in this town. That's good enough for me. He's bound to come around to me sooner or later. Well, I'm buying myself some insurance. You. Now will you relax? Take off your shoes—"

  "Have the cops been around to question you at all?"

  "What do you think? So they ask a lot of questions, ask if I'd seen anybody acting strange around the club. So I tell them there's always strange men around the club. Faggots, swingers, bums, even a turned collar or two. So what does it mean? Nothing, that's what. And putting cops on each place won't help none, either. Loonies are too smart for everybody else. That's why they are nuts. I don't think they're going to catch Gingerbread hanging around any stripper. Oh, no—this baby works in the dark and then when nobody's there and nobody's looking—bingo!" Her voice had risen, losing its hearty boom, and graduating into tones of thinner more dangerous hysteria. When she made a chopping motion with her empty right hand, symbolizing the killing knife thrust, she followed the motion through and wound up at my knees, hugging them and looking up at me with her great green eyes. Seeing wanton glims like that, just about a foot from two of the most superbly constructed breasts of all time, was a little too rich even for my blood. But before I could pull back or stand up, she had released my knees and placed her two hands under her breasts and cupped them for me to appreciate better. Like I've tried to indicate, she was imp
ossible. Believing in her own sex appeal above everything else.

  "Don't you want to take them in your hands, Ed? To touch, to squeeze, maybe to take a nice big bite out of—"

  Such an approach went out with the Model T Ford, but it still can't be beat for making thermometers climb and resistance drop.

  "Ada?" I smiled down into her treasure chest.

  "Yes, Ed." She was unable to hold back a smirk of triumph. I either sounded or looked like it was uncle time in the sex wars.

  "What am I supposed to do to earn the five thousand?"

  "Stay here with me. Swing with me. Until Gingerbread's all through with his nutty game, whatever it is. It'll be a ball, baby."

  She was still kneading and molding her own body, letting the green-and-yellow lights of utter abandon and willingness show me the way to get to the hills of home. And to her bed, which I was certain had to be a water bed under a full-length ceiling mirror. She was just the type from her carnal toes to the top of her flaming hair.

  "Let's see the color of your money," I suggested. "Then we'll start all over again where I just came in and you said hello."

  "Yeah!" she chortled again, the way she had behind the Judas window at the door and scrambled erect in a flurry of mounds and curves and swells of perfectly fashioned girl centers of interest. I wasn't completely convinced I was going to walk out on her, but I was fighting my basic urges down to the last gene. She wasn't an easy woman to refuse. And it was amazing the way she could make herself forget the Gingerbread Man. It was either raw nerve or sex did turn her on more than anything else on earth. I couldn't be too sure of that, either.

  She was in a class by herself, somehow, for all her vulgarity.

  I also thought she had given Jellybean Jackson instructions to get lost, Frankie French poodle and all. Either that or she had signaled him in some phantom way I didn't understand. Like the music trick. With a dame like Ada Ven, the unexpected must have been the first order of the day. And the evening too, of course.

  Anyhow, while Ada was crossing the deep rug, heading for a doorless entrance behind the room, a telephone rang. She cursed mightily, veered from her route, and swept up a pink telephone that must have been hiding behind some of the whacky furniture. I hadn't seen it at all. Ada turned her shapely back to me as she answered the thing in a low, indistinguishable monotone. I had a rear view of all that she owned. Like I said, it was more than considerable.

  When she spun around, her painted eyebrows were up again.

  "This'll kill you. It's for you. Some guy. Wouldn't introduce himself. You tell anybody you were seeing me?"

  "Not lately." She extended the pink receiver, I took it and she made a small curtsey, which made her bosom bobble, and then continued on into the next room. I dug out my cigarettes, which help me think, and put the phone to my ear while I lit up. The room was very quiet.

  "Noon here," I said curtly, and waited, half-knowing who it was.

  "What, may I ask," Michael Monks' dumbfounded, sarcastic voice seethed over the wire, "the hell are you doing there?"

  "Flatek called you. Figures." I blew a smoke ring. A bad one.

  "Never mind Flatek. He's got a job to do and I've got a job to do and what are you? A crystal-ball gazer or what? And you still have to answer my first question."

  "She's my client," I said. "She wants a bodyguard for hire."

  "Bodyguard?" Monks' blast of exasperation made the word an oath. "Ed, get the hell out of there. Stay off this one. The whole police force is working straight eights to nail this maniac. Ven may be a target and that's why she's being covered. You don't have to tell her that and don't tip her who I am, either. This is important, Ed. And you're not needed. Tell her no. You could scare off Gingerbread if you're spotted with her. Come on, now, you don't need her money and she's small potatoes for a guy who's worked for the feds. I'm asking you as a friend, Ed. Walk out of this one."

  "You sound pretty anxious, Michael. You seem pretty sure that Ada Ven is on the list. Maybe you could tell me something."

  "Forget that!" he barked, more authoritative and official than was usual. "Of all the fat, lousy luck! At least a hundred PIs in town and she calls you—how the hell do you do it all the time? I've never seen the beat of your damn horseshoes. Now get out of there and that's straight from my desk. The DA has made this a personal case."

  "You're expecting the Gingerbread Man to kill again tonight," I said. "And you've got a hot lead. But please remember why I'm in the kind of business I'm in. Nobody tells me what to do, not even you. So I'm not saying anything right now. I may take her money, I may not. But it's my decision and not yours. Okay?"

  There was a strangled gasp from him and when his voice came back, it was as tight as a new drum. "Okay, Ed. If that's how you want it. But don't make any waves this time. Even a smart operator like you could get drowned."

  He hung up, quickly and angrily, and I had a lot to mull over as I replaced the receiver on its pink base. Ada Ven had come swishing back into the room, waving stacks and sheafs of green money in each slender hand. The bills all looked so fresh and new they could only have come out of a bank that day. She gave me a real close look at the loot as she posed before me, holding her stuffed hands up to my face.

  "All yours, Ed. With me thrown into the pot. Just for a little baby-sitting time. Come on, hotshot. You'd be nuts to turn all this down. Ada from Decatur and five thousand green ones."

  "You're from Nevada," I said, moving away from her as if I wanted to retrieve my drink. I had to do some thinking. Hard thinking. "Give me a few minutes, will you? Something's come up—"

  "Baby, I hope so," she laughed maliciously in her booming sound and then she remembered the phone call. "What was that—bad news?"

  "Uh-uh. Just the voice of a tired old turtle who's been very good to me for a long time." I didn't bother explaining. "Stack that dough in a nice even pile on the floor there, will you? It might help me think. Might help me make up my mind, too. You know how it is."

  She had begun to understand me. She didn't push it, any more. She nodded, almost to herself, squatted Yogi-style on the deep rug and began to count out all the new bills—twenties, fifties, and hundreds they looked like—in neat orderly piles in front of her rounded knees. I finished the rest of my drink, watching her, trying to reach some kind of decision. I owed Monks a lot. If I stayed with Ada Ven, I was certainly going to have to bed down with her or defend myself if I didn't. And then there was Jellybean Jackson, ex-husband and midget, who was sure to be somewhere in the neighborhood during the bodyguard routine. And a French poodle to boot. And then there was the Gingerbread Man. I didn't figure he'd dare come to the Alamo to try his art out on Ada Ven.

  And then there was the five thousand dollars.

  And my loyalty to Monks and all the other considerations.

  And the five thousand dollars. . . .

  I made up my mind faster than I would have thought possible. I put the drinking glass down, stubbed out the cigarette in a wide stone ashtray near the pink phone, and moved back toward Ada Ven. She was still making like a teller, chuckling to herself and swaying in a private orgy of sensuality, pleasure, and who knew what else? She was way out, Ada was.

  "Ada," I started to say. "This may shock you out of your panties, but the time has come for—"

  I never finished that particular sentence. I never would, either.

  For suddenly, with all the impact that surprises and genuine shocks can have, Ada Ven's Suite C became the black hole of Calcutta. Or maybe just a place where Con Ed was paying everybody back for not taking care of their monthly bills. Or maybe a silent storm had come up in the city.

  All the lights went out and total blackness closed over everything in less time than it takes for a college demonstrator to call a cop "pig." And Ada Ven and her fantastic body, the stacks of green dough, the red rug, the exotically tawdry surroundings—all vanished in a flash.

  And a dog started yipping furiously as if somebody had stepped on its t
ail or was trying to. The dog kept on yipping, as if fighting back.

  With all that going, somebody screamed.

  A high, terrified, piping bleat of sound that barely could be called human. It made you think of a small boy screaming in fright.

  It wasn't me.

  It wasn't Ada Ven.

  The darkness only seemed darker as I plunged in the direction of the barking dog and the screaming whoever it was.

  And whatever it might be.

  In these oddball times, the sky seems to be the limit on weird events.

  Anything can happen these days.

  And usually does.

  Just see your local newspapers.

  And weep for all Mankind.

  OPEN SEASON ON STRIPPERS

  The Stygian blackness disintegrated into a glowing shaft of light somewhere ahead of me. Hurtling forward in the general direction of the scream and the barking dog, I instinctively made it to the hallway door. I was right on target. Forty-five drawn, eyes adjusted, aware that Ada Ven had remained riveted and motionless in the room behind me, the scene on the threshold of Suite C left nothing to my imagination. If anything, it cleared a lot up. For the scream had ended and even the furiously barking dog had somehow subsided into a series of low, little, less noisy yips. As if terror had ended.

  With the door pulled back, allowing the illumination from the long, funereal outer hallway in, I saw the sagging little body of Jellybean Jackson propped against the jamb, his short legs poked out before him. The jaunty straw hat was lying in the hall and Jellybean was staring dazedly, in a hypnotic sort of trance, toward the elevators. I bounded over him and he barely noticed me. The French poodle was on his tiny lap, standing on its hind legs, alternately licking at his hairless face and making those small barking noises. I couldn't hear or see anyone in the hallway, but when I reached the elevators and shot a glance up at the indicator arrow, the numbered light was descending. Any kind of pursuit would be useless. Even if I had been able to phone Flatek, on duty in the lobby, assuming he was still on duty, I wouldn't have known what to tell him. For that matter, I didn't even know what had happened. I went back to Suite C and tried not to fume. Life's little mysteries, especially the stranger ones, always throw me off my feed. My confusion and disgust only grew. For there was Ada Ven helping Jellybean Jackson to his feet, picking up his straw hat for him and dusting and fussing over him like he was a kid who'd just come in out of the rain. The French poodle, a small bundle of scraggly black hair and a face almost indefinable, was still puffing around, licking, trying to be noticed. Harnessing my gun, I followed the strange trio back into the apartment. The lights were on again, same old red-tinted subtle Con Ed, and behind me no one had popped a head into the hallway to see what the commotion had been all about. That little bug in me, that sees a trick in just about everything, was standing back, faintly amused.