Francie Jordan was sure she would rise to the top in New York's fashion world, but just to kill time before her big break as a model, she worked in a dime store ... finding love when and where she could. Until her first modeling job, in a loft, for Burton Schiller. Not at all what she had expected ... just set after set of nude photos..."art studies." And the frustrating thing was that Burton kept her excited all the time and declined all her favors. Forcing her to pick-up someone ... like Jim, in the darkness of the movie theater ... then back to her apartment for an entire night of uncontrollable degradation. Finding herself out of funds, with the rent due, she easily persuaded Mr. Grant, the rental agent, to effect a trade ... a little shame in exchange for a little back rent. With no place left but down ... into the helpless gutters where the movie films were made, as the whips fly cruelly toward tortured flesh...
CHAPTER ONE
It was a four-story building on the lower end OF Manhattan. The streets were narrow, so narrow that even with one-way traffic the trucks and cars were parked with their curb wheels upon the sidewalk. From eight o'clock in the morning until five o'clock in the evening the entire district was bedlam. The air was filled with the flatulence of the exhausts of the big trucks, with the deep, threatening growl of air horns and with the high, shrill protests of automobile horns. Behind these noises rumbled the steady thunder of heavy machinery. The pace was frantic. Everyone, everything seemed to be scrambling. Even the unmoving vehicles in a traffic jam seemed to be scrambling to make that extra nickel or dime.
Francie Jordan stood on the corner of Gardner Avenue and West Willoughby Street. She wasn't lost. She knew where she was and how to get back where she'd come from. like all out-of-towners, Francie had discovered that there really did exist a predictable pattern in this confusing maze of a city. In fact, what made the whole thing so confusing was that there were so many patterns for naming and numbering streets and houses. The whole system could change within three blocks.
Willoughby Street carried traffic across the lower end of the rock-based island called Manhattan. On one side of the island it was called East Willoughby Street and on the other side, West Willoughby Street. Somewhere between, there was a demarcation line. There was one avenue which divided the East Side from the West Side.
This East-West separation was without political overtones at least of an international nature. The problem obtained in that dividing line, the no-man's land, the line of demarcation, changed several times as you went north along the length of the island. Streets and avenues were not straight lines. They cut back and forth across one another. They ended, then continued again half a mile further on with solid masses of buildings between.
Because this was West Willoughby Street Francie knew she was on the other side of the line of demarcation. Willoughby was one-way from east to west, from the Lower East Side to the Holland Tunnel. The other street was Gardner Avenue. This was a big, wide street which carried five lanes of traffic and still left two parking lanes, one on either side. But Gardner was one-way, too. It was one-way south, toward the lower tip of island. The five lanes of traffic all moved in the same direction and it was almost frightening. And despite the ample room for parking at both curbs, there was no parking allowed. There were tremendous signs proclaiming this fact, both on the wide thoroughfares and on the narrow side streets, and it was funny to see so many vehicles parked everywhere that many of them were stacked three deep out into the traffic lanes; which practice caused innumerable hardship to those vehicles whose intention it was to use the streets as roadways.
Francie stood on the corner and checked her watch against the electric clock visible through the dirty plate glass window of the luncheonette. She was early. There was still more than half an hour before her appointment This was the first time she'd been in this part of the city and her eyes took in everything.
Along the wide street were store fronts at ground level. Above the stores were offices and lofts. Most of the stores dealt in new and second-hand office furniture. There were a couple of small eating places. And that was about it. This was a business district.
While Francie looked around she was also being looked at. That wasn't surprising. Every male in viewing distance threw her a second look. Truck drivers jerked their eyes away from the snarling mesh of traffic for a dangerous instant. Delivery men momentarily forgot the addresses they were seeking. Behind the windows of the buildings there was the tiniest pause in the frantic business of the day.
Francie was neither too tall, nor too short. In her spiked heels she stood five feet six inches. Her hair was raven black and tumbled down to her shoulders in a shimmering, ebony cascade. Her skin was fair and smooth, without the slightest visible blemish. She did have a strawberry birthmark but it wasn't located where it would normally be seen, even in the most revealing bikini.
She was dressed in a knit three-piece outfit. The skirt tightly molded the shafts of her strong full upper legs, pulled tight across the wide point of her hips, and lovingly hugged the double contours of her rear. The hem of the skirt came just to the center of the joint of her knee. Above the skirt she wore a lighter-colored sweater whose synthetic material developed a strong static electrical charge and clung to her body. The sweater swept in and out and around her bounteous curves, molding the twin basketballs of her breasts, bumping over the straps of the heavy brassiere required to support those twin weights. On top of the sweater Francie wore a waist-length, long-sleeved jacket the same color as the skirt and opened in the front.
She carried a small purse and a large, imitation alligator hatbox. Her stomach was a tight knot of apprehension. With a half hour to kill she decided on a cup of coffee and turned into the luncheonette. It was past the noon hour now and the place was virtually empty. There was only a pockmarked, dark-skinned counterman. He was busily scraping the blackened surface of his grill and he looked around at the sound of the opening door.
Francie put her hatbox and purse on one counter stool and sat down on the one next to it. She looked around the place with distaste. The few small tables were still littered with the debris of the lunch hour crowd. The counter had been cleared of dishes and glasses and cups, but had not yet been wiped clean of the spills and smears and crumbs of a hundred hurried sandwiches and a thousand gulped cups of coffee.
The counterman shuffled down to where she sat. He wore a badly soiled white apron, a T-shirt with a dark ring at the neck and sweat stains at the armpits, and a pair of baggy, creased trousers. His back was bent, one shoulder dipped, and one arm was withered.
"Yeah, what'll ya have?"
"Coffee," she said, not really wanting the coffee any more.
The man turned away, shuffled a few steps, then came back with a cup of coffee. He set it down before her without looking down. His eyes stared at her body. He was trying to see right through her clothes and he gave her a crawly feeling.
When he didn't move away she grabbed her purse and rummaged through it until she found a dime. She dropped the dime on the counter and pulled the cup and saucer closer to her to add sugar and milk. She kept her eyes on the cup but her ears were tuned toward the counterman. She could hear the asthmatic wheeze of his breath as he stared a few moments longer before picking up the dime and shuffling off. The coffee was lousy.
She took three sips, pushed the cup away, and lit a cigarette. She wished she had had a drink instead of a cup of coffee; and that was funny because she wasn't exactly sure what good a drink would do. She only knew that in all the movies and television programs she'd ever seen, when the character was nervous or afraid, he always wanted a drink.
She'd had drinks before in her nineteen years of living if you could call it living. And she was familiar with the effects of alcohol on her body. First there was a warmth in the pit of her stomach which spread slowly through her until it flushed her face. Then there was some light-headedness and a kind of sticky feeling in the hinges of her jaws and in her tongue. After four drinks she began to get a headache and after six she inevitably became ill.
The only time her own reaction to alcohol had even remotely approached the fictionalized reaction was that one time when she was seventeen. She'd been a junior in high school and her date had been a senior. They'd gone to a drive-in movie and after the first half hour her date had offered her a drink from a pint bottle which he produced from the glove compartment.
She'd accepted the drink, then a second. The liquor seemed to give her the courage she'd needed to permit the boy full freedom with her body. She'd wanted to do those things for a long time now, but she'd always been afraid.
That time the liquor really helped.
And that time had been so good that she didn't need any bottled courage the next time. Or any time after that.
But now the thing she felt was not the same kind of fright. This was like being scared without being afraid if that made any sense at all. This was her first modeling job and she had every right to be nervous, she decided.
Eight whole months in this city and this was her first modeling job. And in those eight months she'd met no one, nor made any permanent friendships. The first month, when she was living in that cockroach-farm of a hotel, should have been the worst.
Day after day she'd tramped around the city; from one modeling agency to the next, and from one producer's office to another. By the end of every day she had just enough energy to take a light supper and tumble into bed. And as the days passed she saw her savings dwindle away.
Finally, when the money was all gone, she'd had to make a choice. Either give up and go back home, or take a job. Her pride wouldn't let her go back home and admit she'd failed. She couldn't fail I She was too beautiful and had too much talent to fail. Everyone back home had been telling her for years how much prettier she was than the women they saw on television or in the movies or in the magazines.
She found a job. It wasn't much.
Hell, it wasn't anything. Counter girl in a five-and-ten. But the steady salary afforded her the opportunity to move out of that flea-bag hotel and take a tiny apartment. There she'd been lucky, too. She'd found a one and one-half room apartment one large room with a sleeping alcove in a renovated building within walking distance of her job.
On her small salary she didn't save any money, but there was enough to pay her expenses and to keep her in medium-quality clothing.
This was the hardest part, those first few months of working behind the counter. She came to know some of the other employees well enough so that there was at least some warmth when she was at work. But that was the limit of her relationships. She passed her evenings in loneliness in the apartment, trying to lose herself in the flickering image of the tiny television set she'd bought. It was one of the Japanese-made things, all transistors and printed circuits and a seven-inch screen.
When the emptiness of her apartment became unbearable she went out to neighborhood movies, but that really wasn't much different. Several times a week she spent her lunch hour in the phone booth with a handful of dimes. She called all the agencies at which she'd registered in the faint hope that one of them might have some modeling work for her.
Life became a little more bearable after the assistant manager of the place asked her for that first date.
He took her to dinner at a good restaurant, then to a first-run movie house in Times Square, and finally to a couple of night clubs.
Of course he expected her to invite him in when he took her home. And she did invite him in. She asked him in because the empty apartment seemed all the more horrible after such a wonderful evening of companionship. His expectations reached far beyond the one nightcap he'd asked for. And she'd complied willingly, even eagerly.
The assistant manager dated her a few more times. Each time the date finished in her apartment, in the dark, with the sleeper sofa opened. After all, Francie was a healthy young girl and the assistant manager was not repulsive. He was also possessed of sufficient skill in the arts of love-making to make the whole thing a satisfying affair for both parties.
And she even got a raise out of the deal! It was only five dollars a week but it was a raise. Then the assistant manager moved on to one of the other girls and Francie's loneliness returned.
She stood it for as long as she could until, finally, it became absolutely unbearable. One night, after work, she ate a quick supper, showered, and dressed in her best clothes. She spent the early part of the evening in a mid-town movie. When the movie let out she strolled over to the Upper East Side and found a quiet bar. Fifteen minutes later a man was buying her drinks and telling her how pretty she was.
She let him take her to his apartment in one of the luxurious apartment buildings nearby. Afterward she was ashamed of herself, but that shame lasted only until her loneliness and desire built up again. Soon she was going out almost every night of the week.
The first time one of the men tried to pay her she spit in his face, kicked him in the leg, and ran away. She wasn't a professional! But what was the real difference between what she was doing and professionalism? The pro gave herself for money. Francie was giving herself in return for the easing of her loneliness.
Of course, Francie only went with men she liked. But, then, she liked most men, especially after two or three drinks. And if she was going with them anyway, they wouldn't really be paying her for her services. It was like a present, a gift from an admirer.
So, the next time an offer was made she accepted. Sometimes there were real gifts instead of cash, and sometimes no gifts at all. She'd given a few of the men her phone number and they called now and then for dates. The others were only pickups. And most of her night life continued to be this pickup routine.
There was something very satisfying about being selected from among many choices as she sat at a bar. In the dimly lit places she could almost feel the men's eyes search out the rich contours of her body, and when they approached her she could look into their eyes and see herself naked there in their minds.
And then, just four days ago, had come the letter. It was from a man, a photographer, who wrote that he'd seen her file at one of the modeling agencies and was interested in using her for a series of pictures.
She was puzzled.
Shouldn't the call have come from the agency? Wasn't the man supposed to deal through them? But she was too inexperienced to be sure. In fact, she was so inexperienced she didn't even know what it was that models were supposed to carry around in their hatboxes. In hers was a light smock and a small, but complete make-up kit.
And everything seemed legitimate. The letter was on business stationery with a corporation name and address. The photographer gave her his phone number and asked that she call for an appointment.
She called the next day during her lunch hour. He wanted to see her that afternoon. It was impossible. She had to work. She explained and the man on the other end of the line agreed to an appointment for Saturday afternoon.
"Hey, you ain't drunk your coffee."
Francie looked up out of the depths of her thoughts to see the counterman. She checked her watch. It was time!
"Nobody could drink that slop," she said, as she picked up her things and left the lunchroom.
The address was on the narrow side street. It was in the middle of the block and as she walked toward it she got several whistles and a couple of honks from truck horns. That made her feel better and in return she exaggerated the sensuous sway of her hips for the lookers.
She found the right building. It was narrow and grimy and seemed to be right in the center of the thunder of all the machines in the district. The sidewalk out front trembled rhythmically each time some heavy machine somewhere nearby thumped.
There was a narrow stairway crowded into the front corner of the building. The names of four companies were painted right onto the wall at the foot of the stairs. The one she wanted Brooks Novelties was, of course, on the fourth floor. And there didn't seem to be any sort of elevator.
She walked.
At the top floor she was puffing for breath and she stopped outside the door to wipe away the beads of perspiration on her forehead and upper lip. She gathered her courage, reached for the doorknob, and went in.
She found herself in a tremendous room. The ceiling was at least twenty feet above her head and the wall opposite the door was all the way at the other end of the building. Toward the back an area had been walled off and there was a door. Except for that space this one huge room took up the entire width and depth of the building.
There were floor-to-ceiling windows in front and they were coated with a five-year accumulation of soot and dirt so thick it was almost opaque. Inside the room it didn't seem to be much cleaner. The floor was dirty and littered with crumpled coffee containers and shreds of paper. There were clumps of things spotted around the room: light stands, furniture, reflectors, oddly-shaped piles covered with canvases and blankets. In several places light bulbs hung down from the ceiling on long bare cords and a little more light filtered down through a soot-covered skylight.
There didn't seem to be anyone there.
"Hello!" Francie shouted.
There was a click and a loud voice echoed in the big room. Francie jumped, startled.
"I'm in the darkroom," the voice said. "Please take a seat. I'll be with you in a few moments."
Francie looked around. Shoved against one wall was a desk and beside it was a chair. She walked over. There was a rag lying on the floor nearby and she used that to wipe off the seat of the chair. She set her hat-box and purse down beside the chair and sat down, sua was nervous and fidgety and fumbled in her purse for another cigarette.
On the wall above the desk were several framed photographs. One was a shot of a nude girl, her hip and back turned toward the camera, her lean body bent in an awkward pose. Another was a shot of a misty city street seen at night. Still another seemed to be an early morning shot of driftwood on a beach. And the last one looked for all the world exactly like a picture of a tenement roof taken against a setting sun.
Beneath the four pictures was a framed plaque. A gold disk was set in the center and beneath was written an award of first prize to Burton Schiller for the Best Picture of the Year. The award was from the American Photography Association. The date on the plaque was 1938. That was seven years before Francie had been born.
The ash on her cigarette grew long and she looked around for an ash tray. She rummaged among the papers on the desk, holding the cigarette at an awkward angle as she did so. Finally she gave up her search and flicked her ashes on the floor. The place was already filthy and cluttered and littered with ground-out cigarette butts and soggy coffee containers. A few more ashes certainly weren't going to make much difference.
Her nervousness betrayed itself when she heard a door open somewhere behind and to the right of her. She started so violently she almost came right out of the chair.
Burton Schiller looked like he was in make-up and costume for the role of Svengali. He was tall, cadaverously lean, and stoop-shouldered. His face was covered by a scraggly and unkempt beard of grizzled gray and black hairs. The hair on his head was of the same mixed hues; it was long, matted, curling at the temples and over his ears and collar. In front a great tangled lock of it hung down before his eyes. The effort to push those strands back out of his way had become an almost constant, nervous gesture. His cheeks were hollowed and gaunt.
His eyes were most startling of all.
They were black, glowing orbs in the center of his face heated by some feverish light. There were wrinkles and squint marks at the corners of his eyes and on his forehead. And beneath his eyes were the unhealthy-looking pouches of a man who has had too little sleep for too long a time. Those pouches were soft and puffy and black.
He looked like he belonged in a hospital-preferably one for the criminally insane!
Francie was frightened and it must have shown in her face and bearing, for the man walked past her and sank into the chair before the desk he smiled and spoke. His teeth were uneven and yellowed from too little attention with a toothbrush and too much smoking.
"Relax, Miss Jordan," he told her. "I'm not as bad ac I look. You'll get used to my appearance."
His voice was deep and rich and smooth and his diction was excellent. There was something about him-an aura, a feeling, a flavor-that bespoke a European background. It might only have been the Germanic name combined with the too-precise speech. In any case, the voice did not match the appearance and Francie was a little more at ease.
"You are Mr. Schiller, aren't you?" she asked.
He nodded, fumbled a cigarette out of his shirt pocket, straightened it, and lit it with a kitchen match which he struck on the side of the desk, adding one more scar to the already numerous ones there. He shook out the flame and tossed the match, still smoking, carelessly over his shoulder. Throughout the entire procedure his eyes had never left her. They were squinted against the blue-gray smoke curling from the end of the cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth; and they carefully inspected every part of her.
The intensity of his searching look made her uncomfortable for a moment and she squirmed. Then she sensed a subtle difference between his look and the hungry look of a lustful man. Despite the febrile brightness of his eyes there was only cool, calm professionalism. He didn't say another word until he'd finished with his evaluation.
"Yes," he said then. "I think you'll do perfectly."
Francie wasn't as sure as he was. This wasn't at all what she'd expected. Models were supposed to work in glamorous surroundings; wearing beautiful clothes and posed against exotic backgrounds.
"How come this wasn't handled through the agency?" she asked Schiller.
"I couldn't see any need to pay their exorbitant commission," he answered candidly.
"Well then, how did you get my name and address? And how did you know what I looked like?"
Schiller leaned back in the chair until it creaked and put his feet up on the edge of the littered desk.
"You are very cautious, my dear. Perhaps that is a good thing. Let me explain from the beginning. You can ask any questions you wish when I have finished."
She nodded, and felt some of the tension flow out of her. His tone gave her assurance as it reverberated inside her. As he spoke it was almost as though she felt, rather than heard the words.
"I have a contact at the Mayfair Agency," he explained. "When I have the need of a model I give my requirements to my contact. He goes through the files there and gives me a name and address."
"That's a funny way to do business."
"Please, let me finish."
"I'm sorry. Go ahead."
"What I have in mind is not just a few hours' work at an hourly rate. Your most important qualification is that you've never been seen before. I need an absolutely fresh face and figure. I can tell you no more about the job until you answer some questions for me. I can, however, tell you that if you're right for the job and if you consent to it you will receive surprisingly generous recompense."
"This is getting weirder by the second. But I'm here, so go ahead with your questions."
"You seem to be quite generously endowed," he said. "Is all that flesh your own?"
"I'm not padded," she said proudly, arching her back slightly to make her breasts more prominent.
"Good. And your figure, it is ... ah, youthful and firm?"
"Well, I don't droop or sag, if that's what you mean."
"Exactly, my dear. Exactly. Would you mind removing your clothes so I can get a better idea of how you'll photograph?"
"Wait just one minute! What kind of job is this?"
"I assure you, my dear, I didn't lure you up here just to trick you into undressing for me. That is necessary for the job I have in mind."
Curiously enough, she believed him. But she still was not about to strip before she heard more of the details. She shook her head.
"Let's discuss the job first," she told him. "If I decide I'm interested we can work from there."
"All right, Miss Jordan. I'll lay my cards on the table. This is no ordinary modeling job. I'm not taking pictures for some advertising campaign. I have it in mind to take an eight-shot series of nude studies of you. We'll start off with one group of pictures, distribute them, and see how they sell. If the response is good-that is, if you become popular with the aficionados there will be many, many more. For the first series, perhaps two hour's work, you will receive one hundred dollars. Later on we can work out a royalty arrangement on the number of sets sold."
"You mean dirty pictures?"
Burton Schiller laughed. "That is a very ambiguous term, Miss Jordan. There are some who claim there is no such thing. There are others, on the other hand, who would call a Reubens dirty. Within the limits of the legal definition of the category the pictures I have in mind are not dirty."
"I'm not even sure I know what you're talking about now, Francie said.
"Just a minute."
Schiller took his legs down from the desk top, swiveled around in the chair, and opened one of the desk drawers. He removed a sheaf of glossy photos and handed them to her.
"This is the kind of thing I'm talking about."
She looked at the pictures. The one on top was a shot of a generously endowed blonde girl. The blonde was completely naked. She was smiling and looking straight out from the picture. Her hands were cupped beneath her breasts, holding them out, offering them to the camera. She was posed with her hips twisted to one side to hide part of her body and to show one hollow-cheeked buttock. The blonde's smile, the excited state of the nipples of her full breasts, the glint in her eyes all indicated a kind of physical excitement. It was as though the girl in the picture was inviting the beholder to join her in all kinds of fun and bed games.
The rest of the pictures were much the same. There were different girls in different poses. There were some pictures of two women posed together. Not all of the women were completely naked. Sometimes panties were worn, sometimes black lingerie.
They weren't really dirty pictures, Francie decided. They were very much like the shots in the magazines the boys back home used to buy and pass around among themselves. Objectively, no more of the girls in these pictures was revealed than was shown in the gatefold photos which appeared regularly in major magazines.
"What magazines are these pictures from?" she asked when she was finished looking at them.
Schiller shook his head. "These were not sold to publications," he explained. "As I told you before, they were sold simply as sets of pictures. I believe the current retail price here in this city is two dollars for a set of eight different poses."
"You mean people actually buy just pictures?"
He grinned and nodded. "Some men need the excuse of a magazine to look at pictures of an undressed female. Other men are more honest. They like to look at pictures of woman so they buy pictures of woman. It's that simple."
"But if they only cost two dollars a set how can you afford to pay me a hundred dollars?"
"My dear, I'll take perhaps ten or twelve shots, from which I will select the best eight. From those eight masters will be approximately three thousand copies. We'll begin with a small run until we find out how well you are accepted by the public. Those three thousand sets of pictures will be distributed right here in this city. I receive seventy-five cents a set. It costs me slightly less than half that sum to make those pictures. Now do you understand?"
Francie nodded. She was beginning to see the light. Her brain was rapidly making some calculations. Three thousand sets at seventy-five cents a set came to twenty-two hundred and fifty dollars, approximately eleven hundred and twenty-five dollars of which was profit.
Schiller went on. "Now, if there is a good response that is, if your pictures sell well we increase the size of the run and the profit is greater. The pictures go into national distribution at a run of about fifty thousand sets."
Francie almost fell out of her chair. Fifty thousand sets at seventy-five cents a set was close to forty thousand dollars! With a bigger margin of profit, yet! That was a fortune! It was unbelievable!
"I know that sounds impossible," Schiller said, reading her mind. "But it's true. And to make the whole thing even better there are a couple of side angles we can use to pick up even more money from each set of pictures."
"What-what would be my share of all that money?" Francie asked, holding her breath, hardly daring to hope that any sizable percentage of Schiller's great profit would be hers, should she accept his offer and take this strange, exciting job.
"As I said," Schiller answered her, "we would have to test the customers' response to you first, In the beginning, perhaps, you could expect to receive a few hundred dollars' royalty for a set of pictures."
"And then--? " she pressed.
"And then," Schiller shifted in his chair, readjusted his feet on the desk, gazing at them thoughtfully, and then he raised his remarkable eyes to hers for a moment "And then, I would suppose, if we continued to increase the size of the runs, your share could easily come to a minimum of a thousand dollars for a set."
A minimum of a thousand dollars for a few hours work. It staggered the imagination. Why; if she only worked a few hours every two months she could earn enough to live very comfortably. Six sets a year would be a minimum of six thousand dollars per year. And it would be more if you added in the percentage.
Her thoughts must have been written on her forehead.
"You are interested then?" Schiller said.
"Interested! I I ... "
Suddenly her face darkened. A terrible thought came to her mind. The pictures would be sold across the country. Probably even in her home town. What it someone who knew her were to see them? There was less eagerness in her tone when she spoke again.
"I'm interested, all right. But I have to think about it a while. Could I have a few days to make up my mind?"
Schiller nodded. "I can give you the week end to consider," he told her. "But you must decide by Monday to give me time to look for another girl."
She nodded and handed him back the pictures. "Monday will be plenty of time."
She rose and started for the door. "I'll call before noon."
"Wait!" he called.
She turned back.
"You've forgotten something."
"What's that?"
"I still have to be sure, myself. I want to get an idea of how you'll photograph."
"Oh yes, that. Well ... uh . . .I thought we'd wait until I made up my own mind one way or the other I mean, if I decided not to take the job there would be no point in ... in what you want."
"Miss Jordan, if the mere idea of removing your clothes in my presence causes you this much difficulty perhaps we'd better forget the whole thing. I can find someone else, I'm sure."
"Oh no, it's not that. . Well, I guess it was. It's just that this is the first time I've ever done anything like this."
"Perhaps the experience will help you make your decision."
She shrugged. "Where do you want me?"
"Right where you are will do just fine. It really doesn't make any difference."
She glanced nervously around her and gnawed at the corner of her lower lip as her hands moved to the lapels of the short jacket of her outfit. "The door." she said. "It's unlocked. Anyone could walk in."
"Miss Jordan," Schiller said with a sigh, "there is nothing beneath your clothes that I, or any other man for that matter, haven't seen a hundred times before. If the idea of one man looking at your naked body upsets you, what will happen when it occurs to you that there will be fifty thousand men looking at you in the privacy of their bedrooms?"
Francie gathered her courage. What Schiller said made sense. She didn't have anything that every other women in the world didn't also have. It was a body, a commodity.
She pulled off the jacket and the sweater and looked around for a clean place to put them down. Schiller shoved a chair over to her and she draped the two garments across the back. Then came the skirt. The button at her side opened, the zipper went down, and she shifted her hips from side to side as she forced the garment down past her hips.
Now she was wearing only her bra, panties, and garter belt and stockings. And suddenly she was again aware of the machinery noises in the building Those noises indicated the presence of men, and she had the fleeting thought that the moment she was naked a great horde of slavering workmen would come rushing in through the door.
Schiller tried to make things easier for her. "You have no need to wonder about me," he said softly. "I've been in this business a long time. My tastes are somewhat dulled. Love long ago ceased to be a source of pleasure to me, at least love as you know that."
Francie stopped with her hands bent up behind her back and the hooks of her bra opened. She looked at him quizzically.
He laughed. "No. Nothing like that. When I do take my pleasure with women, the only way I can find any thrill is through a particular variant of loveplay."
"Oh! I think I know what you mean."
Francie had in mind an activity which had been requested of her by several of her gentlemen friends. She'd always refused that request. The idea nauseated her.
Schiller was reading her mind again. "I don't think you do know what I mean," he told her softly. "It is only through taking the role of the active performer that I receive any pleasure at all Don't try to understand. I don't. That's just the way things are."
His statement only confused her instead of clearing things up. But she couldn't bring herself to form her question into words. Instead she shrugged out of the bra and placed the harness on top of her sweater and jacket.
Schiller's face didn't change when she bared her breasts. "Stand straight," he told her. "Turn around ... slowly."
She did as he ordered.
"Good," he murmured. "Excellent! Now the rest, please."
She hooked her thumbs in the elastic of her panties and shoved down, bending forward to strip away the lacy garment. Then she put one foot up on the seat of the chair, unhooked the stocking from the garters, and rolled the nylon casing down the full, rounded column of her leg. When the other stocking had been removed the unhooked the garter belt and stood completely nude before him.
She stood straight and proud, her arms hanging loosely at her sides. Schiller said nothing for a long time. His eyes moved slowly over her opulent flesh, taking in every single square inch of her, every curve, every fold, every crease. He made a motion with his hand and she turned slowly around.
"Stop!" he said when her back was toward him.
She stopped, feeling the intensity of his gaze prickle her bare skin. Her ears were tuned behind her, listening for the slightest sound which would betray movement toward her. There was no sound and after a moment she relaxed.
"Lean to the left," he said. "Now the right. Move your feet apart and put your hands on your hips ... that's right. Twist your shoulders around toward me. Bend over and touch the floor with the tips of your lingers."
She did everything he said as the feeling of being watched grew stronger and stronger. That wasn't a bad feeling, either exciting somehow. She could feel light shudders run through her. Her nipples hardened to the fullest and her breasts seemed to ache. There was a warmth in the pit of her stomach exactly like when she had a drink of straight liquor. That warmth seemed to seep completely through her.
Her breathing was shallow and rapid and she longed to smooth her own hands upward from her hips to still the aching in her bosom. She wanted to hold those two smooth, white globes of flesh and squeeze them as hard as she could.
He made her assume a hundred more poses before he was finished. And finally, when he told her she could dress once again, her legs were heavy, and warm, and numb.
Her hands trembled when she reached for her clothing and it took her a long time to dress. Through that all he continued to watch her and his watching kept her excited. At last she was slipping her arms into the knit jacket. The tightness of her bra across the sensitive tips of her breasts was agonizing torture. And her skirt, molding around her waist, hips, and buttocks, seemed to make breathing difficult.
"You'll do very nicely," he told her as she picked up her purse and hatbox. "I sincerely hope you'll decide to take my offer."
She heard him above the roaring of her blood in her ears but her tongue was too thick in her mouth to answer. She was intoxicated with the exotic sensations. Somehow she managed to make it out the door and start down the stairs.
It was such a shame he didn't have a normal appetite. She would have welcomed his advances. Hell, she needed a man. The whole thing had been very peculiar. She'd never been that excited before in her entire life. Even at the peak of love-making she'd never felt quite the same intensity of sensation.
There was a strange magic to being looked at like that. Other men had seen her. But that had always been in a situation in which she'd known that she and the man would be twined together seeking the piercing joy of release. This was entirely different.
Schiller's eyes were the eyes of fifty thousand men she would never see. Her body was the fuel which fed the flames in those eyes, the catalyst which triggered fifty thousand exciting fantasies. All the men in the world were making love to her in their minds.
Her excitement seemed to abate, at least a little, when she got down to the street. She walked the three long blocks to the subway and went down to the platform.
At midtown the train jammed up with afternoon shoppers. They were all squeezed in like sardines in the can, one pressed against another. At one point Francie felt something brush against the taut fullness of her buttocks. She looked over her shoulder. Behind her was a man reading a newspaper, his shoulder turned to her.
The train came into a station.
Passengers got off and others got on and the train was still crowded. Once the train was rolling again she felt that brushing. She leaned back against the touch, feeling now a hand cupping one buttock. That touch sent sparks shooting through her body. A red haze fell over her eyes and the roaring in her ears increased.
Her legs trembled weakly and she could hardly stand up. The hand squeezed and caressed and she began to shiver and shake. Her brassiere held points of live flame. The surface of her skin burned. From hips to shoulders her entire torso tingled. Muscles in her body shook convulsively.
Her station came up and she shouldered her way through the press of people. There was a bench on the subway platform and she sat down to fumble in her purse for a handkerchief to wipe away the beads of perspiration.
Her legs were stiff and awkward as she walked from the subway station to her apartment. Once inside the door she literally tore off her clothing and threw herself down on the bed.
Now, she thought. Oh God, I could hardly wait.
Her hands filled with the flesh of her breasts, squeezing hard, the nails digging deep at the softness and hurting so wonderfully. Her nipples brushed against the palms of her hands. She changed her grip to allow the nipples to poke out past her fingers.
First the aching tip of one breast, then the other did she raise to her lips to be soothed by her kiss. Her pulsing excitement made her want to scream and she stifled that desire by biting on the upright brown points of her breasts.
She continued her fantasy, lightly stroking her eager, sweating flesh. Her nails scraped against the skin as her hand crept slowly over her body.
She touched herself until her body went rigid.
Not yet, her mind screamed silently. Wait! Make this last!
The hand remaining at her bosom left now, reached out and picked up the receiver of the telephone. She set the receiver down on the pillow beside her and reached back again to dial a number. All the while her other hand was busy, caressing.
The phone rang six times.
Oh God, I hope he's still there.
Then, in answer to her prayer Schiller was saving, "Hello."
The sound of his voice was enough. Her body went rigid. She arched up off the bed.
"I'll pose! I'll pose!" she screamed into the receiver.
CHAPTER TWO
Francie spent Sunday thinking about all that money. Thousands of dollars! Hundreds of thousands of dollars! These were staggering sums to a girl who came from a six-thousand-dollar-a-year family and neighborhood. She'd had a typical lower-middle-class background. There'd always been enough money for the family to dress nicely and eat well. There was a new car every few years. The Jordans had possessed the same "unnecessary" luxuries as all their neighbors. And they had the same confusing and continuous conglomeration of time payments.
So much a month went to pay for the car; and by the time the last payment was made the car was worn out and they were ready for a new one. There were mortgage payments on the little house, installments to pay on the washing machine and the television set. Occasionally a windfall would come their way that they could drop into the small savings account and that was cause for celebration.
And always there were the insurance payments. like so many of his peers, Francie's father lived in abject fear of dying. He didn't think of it that way, though. He told himself, and everyone else, that he was just making sure his widow and children were provided for. This was not quite the truth. In some mysterious way, unconsciously, the regular payments were a superstitious offering to the Angel of Death.
The car was insured six ways from Sunday. The only thing it wasn't insured against was destruction from a nuclear explosion and then only if the explosion was an act of war. Everything else they owned was also covered. Even the household appliances on which they were still making payments were insured against any conceivable damage. To top the whole thing off, all the installment plus carried additional insurance which would pay off the balance due in the event of Mr. Jordan's untimely demise.
Then, of course, there was life insurance; of which there was never too much. There was health insurance, hospitalization, unemployment insurance, mortgage insurance.
Insurance was a god to which the Jordans regularly tithed a minimum of ten per cent of their income!
So, they were never really poor. They lived comfortably, if modestly. It was the kind of life wherein there was never quite the surplus of funds to be indulgently extravagant for the sheer luxury of it.
When Francie got old enough to pick up money baby-sitting or working at the soda fountain after school her allowance stopped. From that day on her parents provided her with only the absolute essentials food, clothing, and shelter. Any frills, she bought herself. And there were damned few of them. Francie denied herself because that was the way she's been brought up.
At sixteen she began to smoke on the sly, snitching the cigarettes from her mother's pack. When this was discovered the Jordans gave Francie permission to smoke if she wished, but they demanded that she support her own habit. She stopped then and didn't smoke again except for an occasional cigarette offered by a date until she was almost eighteen.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars!
It was like a dream which she had never allowed herself to recognize. By the time Sunday evening rolled around Francie was ready to quit her job at the five-and-dime. She didn't need that lousy sixty-five dollars a week when she could make a hundred just for a couple of hours' work tomorrow afternoon.
She occupied her Sunday evening alone at a movie. And even while she watched the picture the thought of all that money was bubbling intoxicatingly in the back of her mind. When she thought of it consciously it made her dizzy. In her mind's eye she could see stacks and stacks of money, just like at the federal mint that time the high school class had gone on that trip to Washington, D.C. Stacks of bills were piled as high as the ceiling and in another part of the room there were equally large stacks of coins.
She could only think of the money as cash, not in terms of the things it could buy. In the light of those riches what did it matter who saw her pictures? What did she care if the people back home found out?
After all, the pictures weren't really dirty, were they? What was the real difference between those photographs and the great paintings in the museums, or the famous statues? Why, some of those paintings showed more than the pictures, especially the ones of the men. Right here in this city there were statues and pictures of men and women fully revealed and nobody thought twice about that.
And secretly, slyly, just below the surface of her conscious thought, was the memory of the strange and wonderful effect posing in the nude had had for her. Since that moment her body had operated on a level of greater sensitivity and awareness. Excitement constantly bubbled inside her. It wasn't strictly a physical excitement. Her body was not constantly aroused. Rather it was a kind of joyous anticipation; a child-like thing. It was almost the same kind of thing a child felt the day before Christmas.
Francie had come into the theater just before the feature of the double bill. That picture ended and she decided to stay and see the grade A mystery thriller that was also being shown. She was sitting in the loge. having decided to splurge the extra forty cents for the additional comfort of more leg room between the seats.
About halfway through the second picture she was disturbed by the usher lighting the way for another customer. The theater employee shined the light almost directly in her eyes to get her attention. She'd been slumped down low in the aisle seat and no one could pass to the inside seats.
She mumbled an, "I'm sorry" as she straightened and swung her legs to one side. A figure slipped past her and sat down beside her and the usher went away. On the screen the scene changed from a night scene in a dark alley to a daylight scene on a sunny street and there was more reflected light in the theater.
Out of the corner of her eye Francie could see that the person beside her was a man. Her surreptitious glances told her the man was concentrating on the movie. He didn't glance at her once.
She turned back to the screen, too, for a few minutes, then looked beside her again. There was still plenty of light and she saw that the man was young and not bad looking. He was about six feet tall, slim, and clean-shaven. He wore slacks, a sport shirt, and a long-sleeved, V-necked. pull-over sweater. His hair was brush cut in the collegiate style.
She wondered if he were going to try and pick her up.
And she wondered what her reaction would be. She turned back to the screen, firmly resolved not to initiate anything between them. If he wanted to pick her up, let him start the whole thing off. Up until then the man had been very still. Now he fumbled in his pockets and twisted and turned in the seat. Francie could see him out of the corner of her eye but would not look over at him.
She knew he was going to speak to her even before he did so.
He leaned close and tapped her on the shoulder.
She turned slowly toward him and saw the unlit cigarette clamped between his teeth.
"Light?" he asked in a whisper.
"I think so," she answered in the same tone as she reached for her purse.
She took out a pack of cigarettes, placed one in her mouth, then found her matches. She opened the match book and tore out one of the sulphur-tipped paper strips. Before she could strike the light the man was taking the match book and match out of her hands.
He struck a light, cupping the flame between his hands and lighting his own cigarette first. Then he held the cupped match out to her and she leaned close to thrust the tip of the cigarette into the glowing shelter of his hands. For a moment she was puzzled at what appeared to be rather rude behavior. Then she remembered the item in the etiquette column of the daily paper. It was more proper, when using a match, for the gentleman to light his own cigarette first. In this way there would be none of the sulphur taste when the flame was applied to the lady's cigarette.
"Thank you," she said, taking back her matches.
"My pleasure. It was stupid of me to come up here without a light."
The interchange seemed completed and there was nothing for either of them to say. They turned back to face the screen, each now more aware of the other.
Francie was conscious of his physicality. Speaking to him seemed to have reinforced his reality. She could smell the sharp aroma of his after-shave lotion and the scented hair preparation which he used. Even the wool smell of his sweater came to her nostrils.
She became very fidgety, shifting and turning in her seat. Finally the young man turned back to her.
"This picture's a real dog. How's the feature?"
"Not too much better," she told him. "It's not as good as they say in the ads."
"It would be a crime to waste my time after wasting my money. Do you want to stay and see the end of this dog?"
"No. I've had enough."
"Can I offer you a drink?"
"Why not!" she said.
His teeth flashed in the darkness. "Good. Let's go then."
She rose from her seat and stepped into the aisle. He came after her, took her arm, and escorted her from the theater.
It was only ten o'clock in the evening when they reached the street. Francie had planned to get to bed fairly early in order to get to the five-and-dime to quit and pick up her pay. But the plans weren't important enough to forego an evening's pleasure.
Besides, she thought quickly, there were five sick days coming to her. It might be better to call in sick in the morning and stay out for the week. That way she'd have seven days in which to get herself settled in her new job. If things looked like they might not work out she could always go back to work again a week from tomorrow. She didn't need the pay envelope. There was enough cash in the apartment to take care of her needs for one week.
They stood beneath the brightly-lit marquee and took full measure of one another for the first time. Francie could see the appreciation in his eyes as he slowly looked her up and down. And for her part, she could find nothing disappointing. He was about six feet tall and handsome. His face was smooth and lean and, combined with the crew cut, surprisingly young looking. His eyes were pale gray, the pupils almost melting into the whites; and somehow they didn't seem to fit in his face. They were the eyes of an old man, or a sick one; a man who'd seen too much or lived too long.
And when she looked closely she could see the beginning of grizzled gray at his temples. It wasn't much, no more than a few short silver strands. But they were there and she knew he was older than he looked.
"Do you have any place you'd like specially to go?" he asked.
She shook her head. "I don't care. And we're limited anyway the way we're dressed."
She was referring to the fact that he was dressed so casually, without jacket and tie, while she was wearing a black silk suit with enough jewelry to make her attire admissible at all but the most fashionable places. He was not dressed properly for any of the places on the Upper East Side and she was overdressed for the more casual places.
"Maybe we'd just better make it a cup of coffee and settle for that," she said.
"Nonsense! I know a few places where they don't care what you wear."
She smiled brightly. "Let's go then."
He whistled up a cab and gave an address way downtown. Once they were settled back in the seats with the driver skillfully threading his way through the evening traffic she turned to him and said, "That's in the Village, isn't it?"
He nodded.
"The Village is a funny place," she told him. "I've been down there once or twice to look at all the weirdoes walking the streets but it all seemed so phony."
"Most of it is. There are only a few good places left. And a stranger can't get into them. That is, he can get in, but he doesn't stay long. He gets lousy service, exorbitant prices, and hostile stares."
"Were you born here in New York?"
He grinned and shook his head. "I don't think anybody was. People born here don't stay here unless they've got an awful lot of money. The rest of the natural citizens get out of this town as soon as they can.
They go out to Queens, or Brooklyn, or the suburbs. I don't think anyone who spent a childhood here can really appreciate the city. They're too close to it. They've lived with it too long. They see only the bad things after a while."
She nodded, agreeing. "Me too."
"You too, what?"
"I wasn't born here either. I come from a small town upstate. How about you?"
"I'm from even farther away. I've lived just about everywhere in this country. This is the second time around for me in New York." He gave a snort of laughter then.
"What's so funny?"
"We're already starting on autobiographies and we don't even know each other's names. I'm Jim Collitch."
"I'm Francie Jordan."
"What do you do Francie?"
She hesitated for a moment, then said proudly. "I'm a model. How about you?"
"I'm a writer," he told her vaguely.
"What do you write?"
"Words."
"No, that's not what I meant."
"I know what you meant. I write words. I write whatever people are willing to pay me for."
"Who do you work for."
"No one. I'm free lance."
"Oh, you mean like stories and things."
"Yes, something like that."
"Well, I thought maybe you worked for a magazine or an advertising agency."
The conversation carried them all the way downtown. The words stopped once the taxi was weaving through the narrow, garish streets of the commercial sector of the Village. All the shops were open, the ones that sold the handmade jewelry and sandals and the incomprehensible paintings and sculpture. The sidewalks were filled with strolling people.
There were fat sweating tourists. There were lean, long-haired young people who wore skin-tight slacks, sweat shirts, and no socks. Some of them carried guitars and there were beards and sun glasses everywhere.
But the taxi didn't stop here. It continued on through this sector, past the strip-tease parlors and coffee houses, stopping finally on the fringe of the Village. One block further on and they would have been in the warehouse district. One block to the left was a residential area where apartments in old brownstones brought fantastic rentals. One block to the right was the edge of a business district. Actually, this place wasn't too far from Schiller's studio.
It was one of those cellar clubs that might have been a speak in the twenties; half a story below street level in a four-story brownstone. There was an awning protecting the six descending steps. Before they went down Francie saw that the upper portion of the building was given over to offices. There were signs denoting the presences of a dressmaker, a hypnotist, a fortune teller, and a telephone answering service.
There was no name for the bar either on the awning or on the door into the place. They entered a surprisingly large room; warmly but not too brightly lit. There was a long bar running from front to back on the left as you entered. On the rear wall were three doors and a phone booth. One door led back to the kitchen and the other two were entrances for the bathrooms, which were segregated by masculine and feminine silhouettes.
There were no stools at the bar and a four-foot open space was left between the front of the bar and the tables and booths opposite. Almost everything about the place was surprising, from the quiet, low-pitched background music to the dress of the waiters and bartenders.
The two men working behind the bar wore clean shirts, black bow ties, and short red jackets. The waiters wore dress suits and seemed to move quietly and efficiently. The place was more than half full and the murmur of conversation overrode the music.
There was a kind of catch in the breath of the room when Jim and Francie entered. It lasted no more than a quarter of a second. Francie could see the dart of inquisitive eyes for that moment. Then it was over. Evidently Jim was not a stranger. They accepted him and turned back to their own conversations.
Jim led her to a small round table with two chairs. Immediately there was a waiter there to pull back her chair for her.
He greeted them with a quiet "Good evening" and waited for an order once they were seated. "You hungry?" Jim asked. She shook her head.
"Make mine Beam on the rocks," Jim said, then looked at Francie.
"Gin and tonic," she said.
The waiter nodded and disappeared. He was back before they could begin a conversation. He set the drinks down and waited. Jim raised his thick-bottomed, stubby glass to his nose and sniffed lightly, then he swirled the ice around and took a tiny sip.
He nodded, then smiled at the waiter's disappointed look.
Francie was puzzled. When the waiter was gone she asked Jim, "What was that all about?"
"It's a kind of game," he explained. "I once got into an argument with the owner here over whether or not it was really possible to identify a particular brand of liquor by only the aroma and taste. He said it couldn't be done and I said it could."
"But what about the game?"
"I'm just getting to that. Whenever I come in I order liquor by brand name. Sometimes the bartender will use the brand I requested and other times he'll use another brand. I have to tell if it's the stuff I ordered, or not. If I'm right there's no check that night. If I'm wrong I pay double for every drink."
Francie laughed. "That's the silliest thing I ever heard of."
"Silly? Why?"
She shrugged, the movement of her shoulders drawing his attention to her breasts for a moment. "I don't know. It's like something out of a very old novel. I guess, from the waiter's face, that you were right tonight."
Jim nodded. "I guess it is a curious custom. And everyone takes it so seriously, too. That waiter, for instance; he'll get a bigger tip now than if I'd had to pay double for the drinks but he was disappointed because he couldn't trip me up."
"Do you know everyone here?" she asked.
"Most of them. Only a few by name, but almost everyone else I've seen here before."
"And all the waiters and bartenders know you?"
"Yes. I come here quite often. I have an apartment not too far away."
Francie picked up her drink and leaned back in her chair to look around the room. It was as Jim had told her. There were people in evening clothes and there were people dressed quite casually. It seemed quite a mixed group. There were middle-aged people and young people. There were a couple of beards, though the men sporting them were not otherwise in the uniform of the beatnik. And several of the younger females wore tight slacks and rice powder make-up, but they also had clean necks and ankles.
After the fourth drink Francie was in love with the place. The service here was better than in most good restaurants. But more important, there was an aura here of quiet comfort. There was never any hostility or challenge when her eyes locked with someone else's. Instead there was a friendly smile and a nod, then the locked gazes slid past one another.
The drinks were good, potent, and she was feeling their cumulative effect. Francie knew she'd reached her limit and was wondering how to avoid taking another drink. One more and the side effects dizziness and nausea would outweigh the main effect.
They'd talked as they drank. Or, rather, Francie had talked. Jim was amazingly good at listening and she found herself telling him much about her first year here in New York. And always, in the back of her mind, was the question of what would happen later in the evening. Already it was past midnight and he hadn't even told her one dirty joke. He'd made not the slightest effort to steer the conversation to matters of love.
She began to wonder if he had any intentions at all
He settled the problem of the fifth drink when he said, "It's getting quite late. I guess I'd better take you home now. I've got to work this evening."
She agreed quietly. Jim dropped a five dollar bill on the table and helped her up. He returned a few nods and waves as they left the place.
Francie didn't want him to just take her home and leave her at her door. She wanted him to make love to her and she seriously considered making the first move. But she didn't do that. He was too different from any of the other men she'd known. She sensed in him a steely inner strength. If he wanted to sleep with her he would make the move. And if he didn't want to sleep with her there wasn't a thing in the world she could do about that.
She tried a subtle tack. "I live all the way back uptown," she told him as they waited for a cab on the corner. "You don't have to take me home. I don't mirud, really. It seems a shame for you to have to go all the way uptown and then all the way back."
"I don't work that way," he said, ending the thing.
A cab came along, finally, and they settled back for the ride. There was no conversation now and they sat quite close together, touching at knee, hip, and shoulder. At the traffic light at Thirty-fourth Street he changed position slightly and she thought, eagerly, he was going to put his arm around her shoulder.
He surprised her by taking her hand instead. Her hand felt peculiar with her slim fingers entwined with his. His wrist was narrow and his palm long. His fingers were extremely long and square-tipped. And his whole hand was very strong and smooth. There wasn't the slightest callus or roughness on the pads of his fingertips or his palms.
By the time they reached her apartment building she was almost certain there would be nothing but a good night kiss. Yet, when they got out of the taxi, Jim paid the driver and waved him away. If he didn't intend to stay a while he should have asked the driver to wait.
She used her key to unlock the inner door of the vestibule. Jim followed her in and up the three flights of stairs to her apartment door. Here she used the key again and turned back to face him once the door was unlocked.
He grinned at her but said nothing. "Would you like to come in for a minute?" she asked softly.
"You got coffee in there?"
She nodded quickly and pushed the door open. He followed her inside, standing in the doorway while she fumbled for the light switch. The big overhead light was much too bright and she left it on only long enough to get him inside and to get two of the lamps switched on.
With only the lamps it was much better. The one large room was illuminated by two soft pools of light while the rest was all cozy shadow.
"Sit down," she told him, waving a hand at the sofa. "I'll get the coffee started."
He dropped onto the sofa and lit a cigarette. She was conscious of his eyes upon her as she moved to the louvered doors which hid the small stove, sink, and refrigerator. She filled the percolator with cold water and put four spoonfuls of fresh coffee into the basket.
Now there was nothing to do but wait for the stuff to brew. She set out two cups and saucers, poured milk from the container into a creamer, and brought out a box of cookies.
She was surprised to discover that she was nervous as they sat down at the small wooden table close to the kitchen area. He tasted his coffee and nodded his approval.
But he didn't say anything. And the silence seemed to become more and more awkward. Finally she could stand it no longer.
"You're a funny guy," she said softly.
"How's that?"'
"Most men would have been all over me the moment we came inside. Most men would have been making passes from the moment they asked for a light. But everything you do is unexpected."
"Would you rather I'd spent the evening mauling you?"
"No, not really, I guess. In an odd way I had a very good time tonight. It was ... I don't know ... more fun, I guess. Most of the time isn't fun at all. Do you understand what I mean?"
"I think so. But you seem disappointed that I don't do what all the others do."
She turned her eyes down. "I am, in a way," she said huskily, hoping he couldn't see her blush. "Or, at least, I was. Now I don't know what I want. I mean, I don't want you to think I'm a tramp. Yet, I don't ... Oh, forget it."
He reached across the table and put his hand over hers. "It's all right. I do understand."
"Well, I don't. Why should I care what you think? It never mattered before. I'm not little Miss Innocent. When you sat down next to me in that theater I hoped you'd pick me up. I wanted you to and I wanted us to finish here."
He stood up, took her hand, and pulled her over to the couch. When they sat down she was tucked into the comer and he was quite close to her. There was a light in his eyes. Her hands were folded in her lap and he took them both in his. She could feel the knuckles of his hands pressing against the tops of her legs through the tight fabric of her skirt and had to fight to keep from moving.
"I have an hour or two before I really have to go to work," he said softly, looking into her eyes. "Do you want me to stay?"
She hesitated, afraid that if she gave in to herself this would be only a one-night stand. Somehow she wanted there to be more than that. There were depths to this man she wanted to explore.
"Forget about what you think I'll think. We're two people together in a city of eight million people who are alone. Here, wait ... "
He let go of her hands and took his wallet out of his trouser pocket. From it he produced a scrap of paper and looked around for a pencil.
"In the drawer there," she told him.
He found the pencil and scribbled his name, address and phone number on it, saying, "I want you to keep this. I want to take you out again."
She took the paper from him and put it aside, smiling as she opened her arms to him.
They embraced and his lips set fire to her mouth. One of his hands found the aching swell of her breast and soothed the pain with gentle caresses. She tightened her arms around him and twisted sensuously in his embrace.
The kiss ended and she pushed him away.
"Wait," she whispered, rising from the couch.
She moved away a few steps and shrugged out of the jacket of her suit. Beneath the jacket she wore only the heavy harness of her bra. Her hands quickly opened the fastening of her skirt and let that garment drop to the floor. She stepped out of the circle of cloth and kicked off her shoes.
His eyes burned her flesh as she bared more and more of her luscious body. Now she wore only bra, panties, garter belt and stockings. The panties went next, out of proper sequence and more exciting because of that.
She knew there was enough light for him to see everything. The black lace of the garter belt, with the elastic garters stretched down to the tops of her stockings, was in breath-taking contrast to the milky whiteness of her skin.
The tightly-stretched garters running down the lengths of her upper legs, and the black slash of the main part of the garment across the width of her body, emphasized her desirability.
She reached slowly for a garter, aware that his eyes were drinking her in.
"No! Leave them on!"
She did as he asked, his tone making her pulse pound. Her hands bent up behind her and unhooked the bra but she held the cups against the front of her breasts.
His chest was rising and falling rapidly with shallow breathing and his eyes were wide and staring. There was a flame of desire in his gaze and she knew he was excited.
She turned her back to him, wanting to cry out at the flick of his eyes against the smoothly sculptured spheres of her buttocks, dimpled, imperfect. Keeping her back toward him, she shrugged out of the bra, cast that aside, and covered her breasts again with her hands.
When she turned around again he was already half out of his own clothing. The sweater and shirt were gone, tossed carelessly away. His shoes were off and he was just kicking out of his clothes. He wore now only his shorts and socks. Her heart began to thud in her chest at the sight of him.
He stood and she walked to him. He wrapped his arms around her, causing her breasts to flatten against his smooth, hairless chest. Her nipples scraped against his muscles in the most delightful agony.
He kissed her lips and the line of her jaw and the column of her throat as his great strong hands smoothed downward from her shoulders, across the planes of her back, down over the strip of the garter belt, to fill with her naked globes.
"Yes," she hissed, twisting and turning eagerly against him, her nails digging into his heavy shoulder muscles for a moment before her hands moved down his back and slipped beneath the elastic of the waistband of his shorts.
There, again, her nails pierced his muscled flesh.
She'd intended to open the sleeper sofa but now a great urgency filled them both. There wasn't time. His hands, holding her, lifted her off the floor. She tightened her arms around the back of his neck. He teetered for a moment, adjusting to their combined weight, then steadied.
She slid one hand away from his neck to adjust her weight properly. At the first contact her teeth sank into the lobe of his ear and she could taste the trickle of warm, thick blood in her mouth. He turned around to face the sofa and they were both falling.
A short, sharp scream escaped her lips.
They landed heavily on the couch, the fall sending the breath rushing from her lungs. Her flesh was on fire. The pathways of her nerves shrieked in protest at the intensity of the signal they transmitted to her brain. Her eyeballs rolled back in her skull and fireworks went off behind her closed eyelids.
He moved quickly, then slowly, then quickly again. The change of tempo seemed to prolong the inevitable. Each eager moment was like the last second before the end of the world.
That was as though her heart were swelling in the cavity of her chest. Her heart grew larger and larger stretching the tissues and membranes, squeezing tighter each time her blood leaped. Any second now her heart would burst and she would die.
But she didn't care.
That didn't matter at all.
All that mattered was the loving. Her hands once again clasped him to pull him close and hold him there. For a long moment then neither of them moved. The flame of passion burned her skin to wispy ash.
His hand reaching across the tops of her breasts, enfolding the smooth, warm spheres, squeezing them, lifting them so the nipples were offered to his lips.
He kissed first one then the other and her body responded eagerly. He took one nipple firmly to his lips and shifted his weight slightly. His hands left her breasts, slid down along her sides to the globes of her buttocks as he began once again to work.
The finish sneaked up on her. One moment she was only riding a moderately high wave of passion. The next moment she was being torn apart by a wrenching, frantic convulsion.
She screamed and kicked and bit and her nails tore strips of skin from his back. She sank into a temporary state of semi-consciousness from which she arose to realize he was still with her.
Now, her own pleasure completed, she worked to give him joy. She cradled him with her arms and whispered and cooed at his ear. Her hands stroked lightly, searching his body for the most sensitive places.
She sensed the approach of his release and gloried in the reflection of his ecstasy.
When that was over neither of them moved. They remained locked in the embrace of love while the wonderful languor washed over them.
CHAPTER THREE
Tames Collitch whistled softly between his teeth as he skipped down the three flights of stairs and stepped out into the night. It was late enough now so that a group of five teen-agers stood out as they strolled nonchalantly toward the corner.
There was something about the way they walked that arrested Jim's attention and he stopped to watch them from the top of the stoop. The street seemed different than it had been an hour ago when he and Francie had gotten out of the cab and gone upstairs.
The kids turned the corner and disappeared. Jim looked up and down the street, noticing, finally, that the difference was that it was much darker now. The two street lights nearest the building were no longer lighted. Where the globes had been, high above the street, were now only sharp fragments of glass.
Collitch relaxed and grinned.
That was all it had been. The kids had knocked out the two street lights, with slingshots probably. That accounted for the way they'd been walking. He could have read something" into five kids wandering around the city and smashing street lights at one o'clock in the morning, but there was such a thing as being overly cautious. The odds were against the incident's having anything to do with him.
Collitch hitched up the belt of his trousers and started down the steps. The touch of his fingers against his belt assured him the money was still safe. That leather belt he wore through the loops of his trousers served double duty. It prevented his pants from falling down and it served as his own personal First National Bank. Between the inner and outer layers of leather, and accessible through a zipper on the inside, was a space which contained fifteen carefully folded thousand dollar bills.
In his wallet, in smaller denominations, there was another one thousand dollars in American currency. And in the front right pocket of his trousers there was a roll of perhaps several hundred. If he wanted to take the time, Collitc could calculate to the exact penny how much money there was in his pockets at that moment. If called upon, he could tell exactly how much cash he'd been carrying yesterday, or last week, or six months ago.
It was a function of his business to be able to do so and he was good at it. Collitch had a mind like an electronic computer. He could add or subtract five-place numbers in a flash. He could multiply and divide four-digit numbers into one another at the same rapid speed. Five and six-place numbers took only a little longer.
It was because of the sum of money he carried that Jim Collitch was so cautious. Of course, no one in the world knew exactly how much he was carrying, but there were several people who knew he had a large sum and were not above trying to take it away from him on a dark street.
At the corner of the wider, brightly-lit avenue he waited for a cab. He leaned against a lamp post, lit a cigarette, and checked his watch. He was going to be a little late, he knew. But he'd probably be better off that way. Having those four drinks had been a foolish thing to do. In fact, picking up the girl had been pretty stupid when he knew he was going to work that night.
So, he'd used the coffee and the love-making mi more than the obvious reasons. He'd needed the time to become perfectly sober. In his business the competition was cutthroat and a man required all his faculties to be successful.
A group of people burst noisily out of an all-night beanery across the street and he turned at the sound of their raucous voices. A second look told him they were a group of couples, who kidded and laughed with each other as they made their way up the street, their voices loud as though they had been drinking.
When they turned the corner onto the next side street Collitch was alone again. The avenue was one-way heading downtown and he looked anxiously up the street for the telltale dome light of a cruising cab. He hadn't counted on the lightness of the traffic at this hour. It would make him even later.
He could, of course, go directly to the place in which business was being conducted that night, but it wasn't a good idea. It would mean he would have to present himself dressed as he was-which was definitely the wrong appearance for him to make.
No. He had to go back to his apartment; shower, shave, and change his clothes. For a moment he kicked himself for letting his stupidity make him this late. Then it occurred to him that he might turn the lateness into an asset. This depended in large measure on chance. For him to be able to do so, he would have to arrive calm, icy-cold, and suave at a feverish moment in the activities. Also, he would have to arrive while there was still an opening for him.
A couple of private cars came by and he had to fight down a growing sense of urgency. Impatience was making him nervous, he realized. Employing a mental trick he'd developed for himself he turned off ninety per cent of his mind and concentrated the remaining ten per cent on adding an imaginary column of figures.
A downtown bus came along before a cab and he boarded it to ride down close to midtown where there were more taxis. He got into one of the cabs and gave the driver his address.
At that hour there was no traffic to slow them down and only a few short minutes later the cab was pulling to a stop in front of his apartment house. Jim peeled a twenty dollar bill off the roll in his pocket and handed it to the driver.
"Jeez, Mack," the driver complained. "Ain't you got nothin' smaller? It's hell to get change at this hour. The meter's only a buck eighty."
"Keep the twenty and wait for me. I'll be inside about fifteen minutes. Let the meter run."
"I got a better idea," the cabby said. "If you'll be gone fifteen minutes I'll run around the corner and grab a quick cup of coffee."
"All right. But be here when I come out. I'm in a big hurry."
"I'll be here. I won't even move the cab."
The two men got out of the vehicle at the same time. The driver headed across the street and up toward the corner while Jim ran up the front stoop two steps at a time.
Once in his apartment he stopped rushing. With no wasted motion he stripped out of his clothes and jumped into the shower. While he soaped and rinsed he wondered if the cabby would be waiting for him. Eighty per cent of the cab drivers in New York would still be out there in less than fifteen minutes from now. But there was that twenty per cent who would run with the money and pocket the difference between the meter reading and the twenty dollar bill. That made the odds about four to one that the cabby would be waiting; good odds in any man's book.
Jim scrubbed himself dry with a towel, wet his face again, and coated it with a thick layer of shaving cream. He put a new blade into the razor and shaved quickly and expertly. Then he applied after-shave lotion and talcum and went back into the bedroom of the four-room apartment.
The soiled under things he'd been wearing were tossed into a corner. He hated to leave them there like that but he didn't have time to straighten the place up. From a drawer in the dresser he pulled out a pair of silk shorts and an undershirt of the same material.
He slipped into the fresh and expensive under things and walked to the closet to take out one of the three-hundred-dollar suits the dark one with the light striping. He removed the belt from the other trousers and threaded it into the trousers of the suit, then slipped them on. From another drawer he removed a fresh white-on-white shirt with tab collar and French cuffs.
The cuff links were of platinum with large square-cut emeralds set in them. He added a dazzling white tie, held in place by an emerald tie tack, and fastened the tabs of the collar. Then it was a pair of black silk socks before he slipped his feet into the forty-dollar handmade Spanish dress boots.
Now he was almost ready. He transferred the things from his other pockets to the pockets of his suit, putting the wallet in the inside breast pocket of the jacket. From the top drawer of the dresser he took out the silver cigarette case and matching lighter, opening the case to see that it was full. He patted the pockets, running through a mental check list as he did so, turned out the lights in the bedroom, and walked quickly toward the front door of the apartment.
Just before he left he took from the hall closet a Borselino hat and adjusted it carefully on his head. Then he locked the front door and hurried out to the street.
The cab was still there and the driver was sitting behind the wheel, the dome light on to give enough light for him to read the newspaper. There was a toothpick tucked in the corner of his mouth.
The cabby whistled softly when he saw Jim. "Man, are you dolled up."
Jim slid into the back seat and slammed the door. He gave the driver the address and caught the surprised look in the rear view mirror.
"The twenty's yours," Jim said as they pulled away from the curb. "And there'll be another ten if you get me there in less than ten minutes."
The cab spurted ahead and screamed around the corner on two wheels like a jack rabbit evading a pursuing wolf. The cabby stayed off the wide main streets and Jim had to hold on to keep from being thrown from one side of the back seat to the other as they sped down narrow streets, wove around double-parked cars, took two-wheel corners and ran red lights.
Eight and one-half minutes later the cab was screeching to a stop. Jim gave the driver the promised ten dollars and waved him away. He stood in the middle of a block of darkened store fronts. Down close to the corner a little candy store was still open.
Between every third store front was a doorway which opened onto a staircase leading up to the second floor of these two-story buildings. Jim leaned back and saw the lights behind the large, plate glass windows on the second floor. The lower half of the window had been painted black. Above, in the unpainted area, was lettering which read, "AMALGAMATED FURNITURE WORKERS LOCAL 193."
Jim started for the door, then stopped. Take a minute, he said to himself. Make sure everything's perfect. Calm it down.
He took several slow deep breaths and lit a cigarette, making a production out of opening the silver cigarette case, selecting a cigarette, and striking the matching silver lighter.
Tonight he knew, if things worked out well, he would be using the money from the wallet. He was out of the small change, front pocket class. He reminded himself one final time that he was going to work and suppressed a grin at the idea.
If this was his business, and it was, then the product in which he dealt was money. Nothing was bought, or sold. And the element of risk was surprisingly small. He didn't even remember the lie he'd told Francie about his occupation. It was the standard one he used with any stranger he met. It was a perfect cover. It easily accounted for the odd hours he kept and for the large sums of money he occasionally and inadvertently flashed.
Now, in perfect control of himself, he went inside and up the stairs to the union hall. The room was big, and dirty, and crowded. It was filled to the ceiling with a haze of cigarette and cigar smoke. Near the back wall was a delicatessen style showcase and behind that a big walk-in refrigerator.
Along the two walls of the room were rows of small, square, four-place tables. Then there were two aisles, and in the center of the room was a double row of the same kind of tables. Four men sat at each of the tables with circles of men gathered around them. Back next to the showcase was a larger, round table over which had been securely fastened a white tablecloth. There were ten chairs at the round table and all of them were occupied, too.
All the seated men were playing cards!
At the big table there was poker, with the house supplying chips and a dealer, and cutting five per cent of every pot. At the smaller tables other card games were being played-rummy, pinochle. At these tables the house charged by the hour for the seats.
There was surprisingly little noise for a gathering of more than a hundred men. All conversation between non-players was in whispers and the players themselves were too busy concentrating on the games to do any talking.
A short, bulldog of a man looked up when Jim came in the door. Jim nodded to him. The man nodded back and turned away again. If Jim had been a stranger there would have been several quick questions asked. If the answers to those questions were not the right ones the stranger would suddenly find himself, battered and bruised, back at the bottom of the stairs. If he were lucky he might never find himself again. Nor would anyone else ever find him.
Jim threaded his way past the small tables toward the showcase at the back. The man in the apron nodded a greeting and jerked his head in the direction of a small door close by.
"How's the action?" Jim asked.
"The deck's still cold," the aproned man answered.
"Seat open?"
"One left. They were expecting you earlier."
"Ah, too slow to bother with then," Jim said nonchalantly.
The aproned man shrugged and Jim walked past him. He went through the door and found himself in a smaller room. Here there was just enough room for two crap tables. Jim walked quickly through the room to the one beyond, this one smaller still.
Several heads turned when he entered, but no one spoke. In the center of the room, beneath a low-hanging light with a metal reflector, was a round table at which there were nine chairs. This table too had a white cloth fastened down over its top. Between the wooden table top and the white cloth were several thicknesses of blanket for padding.
Seven of the nine chairs were occupied by men dressed in suits. The eighth chair was held by a man in shirt sleeves who wore an eye shade. The cuffs of his shirt were buttoned at the wrists and the sleeves were pulled taut by a pair of rubber bands around the man's upper arms.
Jim walked to the ninth chair and sat down.
The man in shirt sleeves was snapping cards out to the players with practiced and graceful motions of his wrist. Each player had before him one card face down, and two cards face up. The third upcard was being dealt. In the center of the table was a large pile of chips of various colors.
Jim had taken the seat immediately to the dealer's I left hand, making him the first player. The fourth player had before him, besides cards and chips and a glass of water, a shiny penny. After each hand was completed the penny would be moved on to the next player. The player who had the penny before him was the first man to receive cards from the dealer and the man to his right was the last one to get cards. This practice prevented the man sitting immediately to the right of the dealer from having the permanent advantage of being last.
The last card was dealt and the hand ended. The dealer quickly and expertly counted the pot, took the five per cent house cut, and gave the rest of the money to the winner.
This was only the third time Jim had played here in the back room. He'd played out at the table in the front room for more than six months before having been invited back here. Out front there was a two dollar betting limit. Back here the limit was ten dollars.
Jim removed his wallet, counted off some of the money, and shoved it across the table to the dealer.
"Five hundred," he said flatly.
The dealer riffled through the bills and echoed, "Five hundred." He handed the money to a skinny old man behind him and counted out five hundred dollars' worth of chips. The old man added the five hundred dollars to the fistful he already had and started out of the room. At the door he stopped and turned back.
"Any orders?" he asked in a cracked voice.
After a moment of silence he left the room.
Jim counted the chips as he received them and nodded that the count was right. The dealer began to shuffle the cards. Jim stopped him.
"New deck," he said softly.
There were several sighs and murmurs from the other players but no one actually protested It was the unwritten right of any player to demand and receive a fresh deck of playing cards at any time during the game.
The dealer ritually tore the old deck in half with the one twist of his powerful wrists. He brought out a fresh deck of cards, still sealed in cellophane, and handed them to Jim. Jim inspected the package closely, found nothing wrong, and handed back the deck.
"Anyone else?" The dealer looked from man to man.
When there was no reply the dealer tore open the cellophane, slit the stamp across the flap of the box with his thumbnail, and took out the fresh deck. He removed the jokers and spread the cards across the padded table-top in a perfect fan. He did this once with the backs of the cards up, and then once again with the faces showing.
The eyes of all the players never left that deck.
The dealer gathered the cards again, shuffled them several times, and offered them for a cut. After the cut the dealer re-formed the pack and dealt.
With the penny having been moved to the next man Jim was the third player to get his first card. Cupping his hands, he lifted one corner of the card and saw the king of hearts. Then he took his hands away and looked up just as the first round of upcards was being dealt. His second card was a ten, also of hearts. There was one other ten on the board, no kings, and no hearts.
The highest card on the board was a jack. The player in whose hand the jack was made the first bet. He bet five dollars. At the end of the first round of betting only five players remained.
The third card was dealt the second upcard and Jim received a trey of hearts. No kinds had shown. There were no pairs. And the jack was still high. The jack bet eight dollars this time and there were no raises. Neither were there any folds.
Jim counted three hearts in the other hands and gave up any idea of a flush as he waited for his fourth card. This was the ace of hearts. Two other aces were dealt out that round, but no kings and no more hearts. Jim's hand was ace-ten-trey of hearts. The high hand was the ace-jack.
The ace-jack made a limit bet of ten dollars. There were two calls and a fold and it was Jim's turn to bet. He considered for a moment. With three aces showing there was a good chance the ace-jack was trying to look like a pair of aces.
Jim raised ten dollars and the pace of the game seemed to quicken. There were only four players left now. The ace-jack came back with a ten dollar re-raise. Jim hit him with another limit raise and one more player folded, leaving only three remaining. The ace-jack only called this time.
The last card was dealt. Jim's trey was paired and the pair made him high man. He bet ten dollars and waited. One player hesitated for a moment, then folded his cards in disgust, leaving only Jim and the ace-jack still in the hand.
Ace-jack picked up ten dollars in chips, then another ten. But he didn't throw them into the center of the table. When he hesitated Jim knew he was holding a pair and was trying to decide whether Jim's raises and bets indicated two pair, three of a kind, or a bluff.
The ace-jack had an eight and a six also showing. Any of his cards, if paired by his hole card, could beat Jim's hand. Though it didn't make any difference Jim thought quickly while the man was making his decision.
The aces were doubtful, three of them having shown. The eights were impossible, the three remaining have shown in hands that were already folded. One other six had appeared and no other jacks had shown at all. So it was sixes or jacks. If it was sixes there was a very good chance the man would not call with so low a pair.
The other player shot Jim a look of pure hatred as he folded his cards and Jim only smiled. The dealer cut the pot and gave Jim his winnings, then shuffled for the next hand.
Jim settled down to the play of the hands. He played cautiously, bluffed only once more in the next two hours, and won steadily. The game settled into a rhythm and Jim let one small part of his mind wander. This did not interfere with his concentration.
James Collitch had come to New York a little more than two years before. He came from the Midwest and had spent the five years before that playing poker for .a living. In those five years he'd sharpened his skills and talents and at the end of that time had considered himself ready for the big-time.
He came to New York with three thousand dollars in cash and a name on a slip of paper. The name belonged to a man who could make the right contacts for Jim. It sounded like the easiest thing in the world. All he'd had to do was come to New York, contact the man, and start playing big-stakes poker.
It didn't work out quite that way at all. Gambling is illegal in New York. And, like every other illegal activity, it is very tightly controlled by a branch of a nationwide criminal organization. This organization, called the Cosa Nostra by its members and the Mafia by the uninitiate, took a slice off the top of every imaginable operation.
Of course, Jim had been aware of these people. Their presence was felt even in the Midwest. But out there the operation was much looser. Here in the city they ruled everything. The only good the contact had been able to do for Jim was to show him where the games were being played and to get him admitted.
The rest had been up to Jim. And it had been a long hard struggle. He was new to this area and was allowed to play in only the smallest games at the start. Even at that it had almost proven too much. Jim had dropped most of his three-thousand-dollar stake in the first week. He'd paid very dearly for some post-graduate lessons in the art and science of poker playing.
It had taken quite some time to work himself up again. He'd been reduced to nickel and dime games in neighborhood barbershops and construction shacks until he'd built up a stake again. Even there the organization took its cut of every pot.
One of the most frustrating things about the two years was that Jim was aware that it was a sucker's game to sit m where the house took a cut of the pot In such a game, over the long haul and strictly according to mathematical principles and the laws of chance, the only winner was the house.
Oh, a guy could make some money in one of those games but he had to buck something more than the luck and skill of the other players. He had to buck the strictly immutable laws of chance which said that in the long haul any player received the same number of good and bad hands, the same number of winning and losing hands.
The idea was to play hard when the cards were running with you and to back off when they were running cold for you.
Well, he'd done the impossible. In the two years he'd managed to increase his original stake by five times. And in that same time he'd increased his skill in equal measure. The bigger players had finally noticed him and had invited him to play with them.
But even this wasn't the major league by any stretch of the imagination. Ten-dollar-limit was a pretty good game by the standards of the average man. But Jim was shooting for the games in which there was no limit at all the games in which the pots ran upward of a thousand dollars each.
Only the top poker players in the country played in those games. And there was no house cut. The games were held in hotel rooms with each of the players contributing a flat sum toward the costs including a team of dealers, food and drinks, cards, everything. Some of those games went on for thirty and forty hours without more than ten or fifteen minute breaks along the way.
But a man had to be invited into a game like that. And he would only be invited when his reputation grew large enough, when his skill was sufficient to command respect from other players. In the gambling fraternity there were no more than fifteen men in this major league. They earned most of their money from playing rich, foolish amateurs.
When a man became known in the big leagues he was sought out by non-professionals who took some sort of curious delight in playing against the reputation. Some of the amateurs were pretty good players, but none of them could be as good as a top-flight pro.
The big men existed in a kind of limbo between the everyday, legal, nine-to-five world, and the shadowy world of the criminal organization. They weren't criminals themselves. They didn't cheat. But they weren't squares, either. They were respected by the highest echelon of the Cosa Nostra and were allowed to exist on the fringes of the organization.
At four in the morning Jim's luck changed. He had about eight hundred dollars in winnings stacked before him at the time. An hour and a half later, against an incredible run of bad luck, the eight hundred was gone and so was his starting stake of five hundred.
He had to go into his wallet for the other five hundred dollars and about half of that disappeared in the next twenty minutes. All the same players were still in the game and Jim was sure he had them all pegged by then. All he needed was a fair hand each time and he'd be able to come out with a profit. Providing, of course, the game didn't end before he got his chance.
He tightened up his play so much it hurt and rode out the run of bad cards. The game lasted until two in the afternoon, which made it a little less than twelve hours of playing for Jim. By then he'd recouped his original thousand dollars and was winning an additional fourteen hundred.
By then there were only four active players remaining, the others having busted out, and Jim was the only winner. As such, he was almost obligated to continue playing until the remaining losers decided they'd had enough. During one hand in which he folded his cards early Jim calculated that some six or seven thousand dollars had come into the game. The difference between that sum and his winnings had disappeared into the voracious maw of the house percentage.
It was an old, old story. It seemed stupid to play in that kind of game. But there was no choice for most of the men. Unless they played in private, small stakes, neighborhood type games, this was the only card game in town; this one or fifty others just like it in other locations.
The game ended at two-thirty in the afternoon. Jim cashed in his chips, pocketed his winnings, and left. It was the curious nature of the game that there were no parting salutations. Throughout the game no one player had addressed another by name, yet each one knew the names of all the others.
Jim didn't relax until he stepped out into the afternoon sunshine. In outward appearance he was exactly the same as he'd been when he'd walked into the building. His collar was still buttoned and his tie knotted perfectly. There wasn't a strand of hair out of place or an untoward crease in his suit.
But inside his head there was the chaos of fatigue. His mouth was so dry hk tongue stuck to the roof.
Down the back of his neck and across the width of his shoulder blades there was a fiery band of pain. His legs were stiff and the muscles in the backs of his legs were knotted.
He hailed a passing cab. gave the driver an address, and settled back against the soft seat. Sleep was impossible just then. It would take time to ease the tension from his mind and body.
The cab took him to a narrow, three-story building on the Upper West Side on the fringe of the Harlem ghetto. Except that this building seemed a little cleaner than the others in the area, there was nothing to distinguish it.
Jim stepped into the vestibule and rang the bell. After a moment a tall, hawk-faced Spaniard opened the door. The Spaniard would have been a handsome man except for the scar. It had been made by the sharp edge of a broken beer bottle in a barroom fight a long time ago and it was a miracle the man hadn't been blinded.
The scar began on the right cheek just in front of the ear. It ran out across the cheek for an inch and a half, angling upward toward the eye. There it divided into two branches. The upper branch increased in angle, sliced through the outer edge of the eyebrow narrowly missing the corner of the eye and ran straight across the forehead. The lower branch of the scar flattened in direction, ripped through the pouch beneath the right eye, streaked across the hump of the nose, and ended just beneath the center of the left eye.
The disfigured Spaniard recognized Jim immediately, smiled a greeting, and opened the door wide. Jim stepped into the building, hearing the door close and lock securely behind him.
He was in a wide, well-lit, sumptuously furnished corridor. There was carpeting from wall to wall. There were mirrors and paintings and leather sofas and chairs. Three were stacks of magazines and newspapers and against one wall was an ornate antique desk. It looked like the waiting room of a wealthy physician's office.
The Spaniard walked past Jim to the desk, sat down, and motioned him to a soft chair nearby.
"You won," he said in an unaccented voice. It was a statement rather than a question.
Jim nodded tiredly. "How can you always tell?"
The Spaniard smiled. "Very few come after a losing night. What is it you wish?"
"Better make it the full treatment," Jim said. "I feel like I'm going to fall apart."
"Do you want anyone special?"
"Who's available?"
"At this hour there is very little business. Only two of the girls are working."
It seemed too much of an effort to make the decision. "I don't really care," Jim said. "Just as long as she's good."
"Here all the girls are good," the Spaniard said softly. "Take room seventeen and I'll surprise you. We have a new girl you haven't seen before. She is excellent."
Jim stood up again, dropped a hundred dollar bill on the desk, and started up the stairs. The Spaniard reached for the telephone and dialed a two digit number.
On the second floor Jim found the door numbered seventeen. He went in and found himself in an exquisitely furnished bedroom. The double bed was covered with a satin spread. He walked to it, kicked out of his boots, and stretched out on the bed without bothering with the rest of his clothes. He rolled onto his back and threw one arm across his eyes.
It was quiet and comfortable in the room; soothing. But as soon as his eyes closed he saw on the screen of his imagination the innumberable poker hands which had been played. The cards flashed dizzily and he fought to shut his mind off.
When the door of the room opened he looked up. Standing in the doorway was an Oriental girl Japanese or Chinese, he couldn't tell which. She was tall. For an American girl she was tall. For an Oriental she was a giantess. And for any woman of any race she was beautiful. She wore a white silk robe belted tightly around her lean, small-breasted body, and she waited until Jim smiled and nodded his approval before she came all the way into the room.
She was followed by a Puerto Rican woman of indeterminate age in a maid's uniform. The maid closed the door and waited as the Oriental girl walked slowly toward the bed. As she walked Jim was aware of the whisper of the silk wrapper against the nude body beneath. Her breasts moved only slightly as she walked.
She stopped beside the bed and smiled down at Jim. "They call me Lotus."
Jim.
"Hernandez said you want the whole routine. He said you're a special customer."
"I guess I am."
"Let's get started then."
"Go right ahead." She did.
Lotus helped him to a sitting position and eased him out of the jacket of his suit. She handed the jacket to the woman in the maid's uniform. The woman emptied the things out of the pockets of the jacket and placed them on a nearby table.
Lotus quickly and expertly stripped Jim to the waist, handing each article of clothing to the maid. Then Jim stretched out again and the Oriental girl removed his trousers, shorts, and socks. When he was naked the maid took all his clothing and left the room. Lotus locked the door after her and came back to the side of the bed.
Her eyes traveled slowly over Jim's naked body but he felt no embarrassment, just as he'd felt none in the presence of the maid. The first time he'd been here, more than a year ago, there had been some embarrassment at being stripped naked in the presence of two clothed females but that feeling was long gone.
"Roll over," Lotus said.
Jim rolled over onto his stomach, felt the bed dip as she put one knee on the edge of the mattress, and then felt her hands touch lightly against the muscles of his back. Her fingertips prodded against the knotted masses of muscle at his shoulder blades, then traveled all the way down to the base of his spine.
"You do need the works," he heard the girl say. "Those muscles are like overdrawn springs about to pop."
Her hands left his body and she stepped back from the bed. "You can turn over now."
He turned over.
"I'll be right back."
He watched her walk to another door in the room and open it. Through the opened doorway Jim could see the tiled walls of a bathroom. He heard her moving around in there for a minute and then she was back. She helped him up from the bed and led him into the tiled room.
It was a large room, almost as big as the bedroom itself, and completely tiled, walls floor, ceiling. On one side of the room there was a sunken tub at least eight feet long, four feet wide, and three feet deep. Opposite the tub there was a long flat table with a padded top. Against another wall there was a steam cabinet, and beside that, one of those Finnish sauna things.
"How do you want that, dry or wet?" she asked, pointing at the two cabinets.
"I've never tried the sauna. Which is best?"
"For you, I think the steam."
"Okay."
She opened the top and front of the steam cabinet, seared him inside, and closed everything up again. Only his head stuck out through a round hole in the top. She adjusted the controls and put a towel around his neck.
The heat came fast and sweat began to run down his face. Inside the cabinet he could feel sweat running off him in rivers and being absorbed by the towels on the seat and floor of the cabinet.
She wiped his face with a cold washcloth and gave him a sip of cold water. "Let me know if you get too hot," she said.
He nodded, feeling some of the muscles beginning to relax. She left him in the cabinet and walked across the room to the sunken tub to start it filling, then came back to wipe his face and give him another sip of water.
He stayed in the cabinet twenty minutes. She let him out when the tub was filled. There were wisps of steam rising from the surface of the water. She led him to a low wooden bench near the edge of the tub and seated him there.
He watched her dip a bucket into the tub and pour the scalding water down over his head. His body was already heated from the steam cabinet and the water felt only hot. After she poured the water over him she put the bucket to one side and picked up a bar of soap and a washcloth.
Lotus soaped him from head to toe, missing nothing and spending the same amount of time in every area. She dipped up two more buckets of water to rinse him off, then helped him into the tub itself.
The water temperature, he knew: was around one hundred and forty degrees and he could feel the heat seeping deep into his body, loosening the knots, relaxing him. He leaned his head back against the edge of the tab and closed his eyes and that was wonderful
Lotus let him soak for fifteen minutes more and his body absorbed the heat of the water. Sweat beads broke out on his face again and she sat beside him and wiped them away every couple of minutes. The flashing cards were gone now, along with most of the aching fatigue; but he was still too tense to fall asleep.
She tested the state of his body by reaching down into the water and kneading his leg and back muscles for a moment. Then she said, "All right, you're cooked enough. Everybody out of the pool."
She helped him up and led him to the padded table. He stretched out there and she patted him dry with a thick, soft towel. When he was dry she said, "Which do you want, alcohol or oil?"
"Make it oil," he said in a deep, relaxed tone. "The alcohol's too cold after all that hot v er and steam."
She laughed as she reached for a bottle. "What's the matter, can't you take it?"
He shook his head slowly, rolling it from one side to the other. "Not today, I can't."
She poured a bit of oil into her palm, rubbed her hands together, and began with the massage. Her skillful fingers probed and kneaded every individual muscle, only moving on when she was sure the last knot had been untied.
Jim closed his eyes, enjoying her skillful manipulations. Her touch was like magic and he drifted lazily on the edge of sleep.
"Mmmmm," he murmured contentedly. "Hernandez was right. He said you were good."
"Good, hell! I'm the best this overrated clip joint has ever seen."
He smiled without opening his eyes. "Where'd you learn that? You sound like you were born right here in this country."
"I was," she told him as she continued with the massage. "But I learned over in Japan. I went there with a show troupe and got stranded. Then I got hungry. I didn't speak the language so there wasn't much I could do about a job. I tried hustling but the competition was too keen. Those gals over there work for next to nothing. I ran into a gal who told me about the private baths they have there and who fixed me up with a job.
"That was a hell of a lot better than hustling. Once I learned what to do I became very popular with the customers. Those little runts were intrigued with my height and were willing to pay double for my services. I'll tell you, over there they've got private baths that make this place look sick. Some of the gals are so small they hop right up on the table and walk up and down a guy's back as part of the massage. I'm too big for that, though."
While she was talking she massaged his arms and chest and shoulders, then moved down to his upper legs and calves. She even did each individual finger and toe, as well as the palms of his hands and the soles of his feet.
Next she moved around behind his head and worked on the muscles in the sides of his neck, in his face, and in his temples. The top of his skull pressed back against the softness of her beneath the silken robe and for the first time he became aware of her as a female. Up until that moment she'd been only a person performing a service for him. He'd been too strung out to think of her in any other terms.
When she finished with his face and neck he rolled over onto his stomach. Now came the difficult part. All down his back from the tops of his shoulders to the hollows behind his knees the muscles were still bunched and tensed, though not so severely as before. He felt actual physical pain as she kneaded away the tenseness.
She worked down from his shoulders to the small of his back. Her hands were surprisingly strong and he grunted and groaned as she squeezed and prodded. She gripped his flat, hard buttocks in her two hands and squeezed and he was surprised that even those muscles were tense. When she finished with his rump and moved on down to the backs of his legs there was a pleasant warmth spreading through his body.
Finally she was finished with the massage. She rubbed the excess oil off his skin with another towel and he sat up, his legs dangling from the edge of the table.
It was miraculous. He felt wonderful, as though he'd been rebuilt from top to bottom with all new parts replacing the worn out ones. She looked him over critically, then nodded with satisfaction. Her hand went to his cheek for a moment and rubbed against the stubble of his beard. It was only little more than half a day since he'd shaved.
"You want a shave?" she asked. "Or are you too tired for that?"
He tested his beard. "I feel pretty good now. Give me the shave, too."
He hopped down from the table and followed her back into the bedroom. She spread towels over an easy chair, seated him, and covered him to the throat with a sheet. From a large closet she took out a wheeled cart and pushed it into the bathroom. A few moments later she was back.
Set into depressions in the top of the cart were two bowls of steaming water. Also there was a washcloth, a shaving mug and brush, a straight razor, and a strop. She worked up a thick lather in the mug and spread it over his face.
Just then there was a knock at the door. Lotus opened it to admit the maid. The girl was carrying his suit, freshly pressed. His underwear and shirt had been washed and ironed. The maid hung the suit away, put the other things on top of the dresser along with the stuff from his pockets, and left. Lotus locked the door again after her, and came back to finish the shave. She was as skillful with the dangerous straight razor as she'd been with the massage.
Despite the fact that there had been more than seventeen thousand dollars in his clothes when he'd come in Jim wasn't worried about the money. He had learned, after his first time here, that his personal possessions were perfectly safe. If so much as one dollar was missing there would be hell to pay. Hernandez couldn't run his business without the complete trust of his customers.
Only the men of the night world of which Jim was a part were customers here. This place was a kind of sanctuary which was recognized even by the Organization itself. No business was transacted here. No narcotics, no gambling, no meetings of rival groups. So complete was the sanctuary that a man marked for death was safe here. Of course he couldn't hide out here, but while he was here he wouldn't be touched.
Lotus finished with the shave, wiped away the excess lather, and wrapped his face in a hot towel. "Are you going to stay?" she asked.
He knew what she meant. He'd paid for the room and had the option of sleeping there for a while. Most men, after the steam and massage routine, were too relaxed to want to dress and leave.
"I think I will stay," he mumbled through the hot towel.
He heard her moving around the room, closing the blinds, drawing the drapes, turning down the bed. After she had removed the hot towel and the sheet he climbed into bed and pulled the light blanket up to his chest. He was propped up on two pillows and he watched her clean the razor and put away the towels and shaving gear. The room was only dimly lit by the sunlight filtering through the drawn blinds and drapes.
Lotus finished in the bedroom and went back into the bathroom. He heard the water gurgling from the tub. She came out several minutes later carrying a cloth bag filled with the towels and cloths and sheets she'd used. She unlocked the door, set the bag in the corridor, and locked the door again.
He watched the sinuous sway of her lithe body beneath the robe as she walked slowly back to the bed. She sat down on the edge and smiled at him.
"You want to go right to sleep?" she asked in a low, husky voice.
"No," he answered with a grin. "I think I'll stay awake for a while. Get me a cigarette, will you?"
She found his pack of cigarettes, put one between her lips, lit it, and gave it to him. Then she moved over to the bench before the mirrored dressing table and sat down with her back to him. He could see her reflection in the mirror.
What was happening now was an extra, added attraction; something not included in the price he'd paid. The girls who worked here were, of course, available. But that particular part of the transaction was left to the customer and the girl. Hernandez took only twenty per cent of that fee.
She took the pins out of her hair and shook it loose down her back in a shimmering ebony cascade. Her hair was so long it reached all the way to her seat. She combed it first, then brushed it, and he watched the rise and fall of her breasts beneath the front of the robe in the reflection.
Next she removed all her make-up; lipstick, eye shadow, everything. Then she opened the front of her robe and he saw her pear-shaped breasts in the mirror. They were the same olive-golden color as the rest of her, with small, dark circles of pebbled flesh at the ends. She put a dab of perfume between them, and another behind each ear. Then she did something that surprised and excited him.
She took a tube of lipstick in one hand, and held a breast with the other to apply the lipstick liberally to the tip. She did the same to the other breast. The attentions made her nipples start to come alive. They thrust out from the ends of her breasts like the buds of flowers seen in time-lapse photography.
When she finished she stood up, turned around, and shrugged out of the robe. She stood proud and still, posing her beauty for him. Her long, lean legs were well padded with muscle. Her breasts were like giant teardrops. Her flawless skin was stretched taut over her ribs and flat across her narrow waist and hips.
Now he could see the reflection of her back in the mirror. Her buttocks were tiny, no more than two tightly clenched fists and tucked under her hips to make an almost flat plane all the way down from her shoulders.
She was breath-taking!
She waited and there was no need for words between them. He moved over close to the farthest side of the bed and kicked the light blanket away. She walked slowly to the bed and stretched out beside him, their bodies so close he could feel the warmth of her flesh against his own.
He reached out and put his hand flat on the middle of her chest just below her breasts. Flames leaped in the depths of her dark eyes.
He slid the hand up beneath one breast and hefted its weight as he leaned over her for the caress of his lips.
She laced her fingers behind his neck as the bud of her nipple slipped to his kiss. He bit lightly, annoyed at the lipstick.
She pulled his head against her firm bosom and soon his face was smeared with the lipstick she'd applied. Back and forth his attention traveled from the tip of one breast, down the slope, across the deep valley, to make the climb to the twin peak.
While his kiss was busy there his hands were busy elsewhere, stroking, caressing, searching for the secrets of her body. And finding them.
She was passive in the beginning but became more and more aggressive. Her hands left the back of his neck and did a little searching of their own. That wasn't much of a search. She found him quickly and her expert hands made him wild with desire.
He moved his mouth from her breasts to her lips and their kiss became the age-old battle of lust. But when he tried to throw himself at her she twisted out of the way and pushed him onto his back again.
Now she was kneeling beside him. One hand held him gentle prisoner and the other was pressed against the middle of his chest to keep him flat on his back. Her head darted down and he gasped at the sensation when her lips flicked against his bare chest. Her teeth scraped against his skin and her warm mouth made the blood pound in his veins. She covered his chest with loose kisses and he gasped and panted with helpless desire.
Then she raised her head from his body and stared into his eyes for a long moment during which neither of them breathed. In the depths of her eyes he could read the excitement of the core of her being.
Her hands left his body and her head shook violently from side to side. The shimmering cascade of her hair dropped down onto his fevered nakedness. She grasped great handfuls of hair and rubbed them against him. The strands of her hair were like tiny whips stinging his body.
From shoulders to shins she rubbed him with her hair, exciting him beyond belief. When he could stand that no longer he threw her down. She fought like a wildcat; scratching, biting, even kicking, though she was quite careful where she kicked.
His greater weight and strength was an advantage she could not overcome. He held her shoulders pinned to the mattress and forced her slowly.
She fought him every step of the way. She turned him into a brutal, lustful animal. His hands gripped her breasts and squeezed so hard they almost crushed the delicate ripeness of the fruit. Her legs and hips were bruised unmercifully.
They struggled, panting and silent, until the last ounce of resistance was gone. She went limp for a brief second, then became as voraciously eager as she'd been fiercely resistant a moment before.
Her arms locked around him and pulled him tight against her. A shrill scream, like the whinnying of a frightened mare, erupted from her throat at that moment of pleasure.
From then till the end that was quick. They were both fantastically excited. She moved with the sinuous strength of a golden panther as he brutally smashed again and again.
They attained the peak of ecstasy together and he heard her scream once again as the blood-red haze in his brain exploded with the brightness of a thousand suns.
Afterward, when they'd drifted slowly back to earth and were glorying in the soft lassitude, he kissed her gently at the corner of her mouth and fell asleep with their bodies still entwined.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE ROAR AND SHRIEK OF A FIRE ENGINE SPEEDING down the street roused Francie from her sleep. She came awake cursing the fire, the fire department, the fire engine, its air horn, its bell, and its siren.
She was startled and her heart thudded in her chest. For the first fraction of a second she was disoriented. Then, when her brain identified the sound, she slumped back to the pillow and began mumbling her curses.
It wasn't bad enough, she thought, that she had to be awakened that way. What made it worse was that the sounds still echoed inside her skull. The actual wail and roar and gong faded off into the distance but they were still as loud as ever inside her head.
She opened one eye, then quickly closed it again when the light sent a lance of pain through her brain. Keeping her eyes closed she threw back the sheet and swung her legs over the side of the bed. When she tried to stand up a wave of vertigo washed over her and she wavered for a moment. Then, hands outstretched and eyes still closed, she stumbled the three steps to the wall and felt along it until she came to the window. She found the cord on the Venetian blind and jerked the slats closed with a painful clatter.
Still there was too much light. Even through her closed eyelids she could tell that. She slid one hand along the wall until she came to the corner of the room and found the draw rope of the drapes.
That was much better.
She squinted open her eyes in the dimness for a second, then opened them all the way. The bedroom was a real mess. The satin spread of the huge circular bed was crumpled on the floor. Every article of furniture was adorned with underclothing. A bra on the chair. A stocking on the vanity table. A second stocking hanging down over the mirror. A pair of panties on top of a lamp. A garter belt peeking out from beneath the bottom of the drapes. There were two blouses lying in soiled heaps on the floor and two pair of slacks and a skirt across the back of the chair.
To make matters worse she was sick!
Nausea bubbled in her stomach and sent a bad taste all the way up her throat to the back of her mouth.
Her head ached so badly the roots of the individual strands of her hair seemed to hurt. Her mouth tasted like cotton that had been soaked in alum and then left in the sun to dry.
She stumbled back to the bed and eased herself down on it. The dial of the clock radio told her it was ten o'clock. It had to be ten a.m. because the sun was shining.
The last clear memory she had was of four o'clock in the morning, and it must have been later than that before she got to sleep, because at four in the morning she'd still been at the party.
She closed her eyes again and for a little while it was better that way. But her nausea grew worse, forcing her off the bed and into the bathroom on the run. She made it just in time, dropping to her knees before the bowl and retching up the foul contents of her stomach.
The vile odor made her sick all over again and she heaved and heaved even though her stomach was already empty. The vomiting drained what little strength she had and when the heaves passed she couldn't even rise from the floor.
She eased herself down and stretched out on her back, thanking God she'd decided to carpet the bathroom floor. At that moment the feel of cold tile against her skin would have been sheerest agony. Her breathing was rapid and shallow and painful.
She knew she couldn't remain where she was. The odor was getting to her again. Through sheer force of will she managed to get to her knees and find the flush handle of the toilet. The rushing gurgle of water was terrible but at least the smell was gone. She pulled down the lid and sat down, resting her elbows on her knees and holding her head, almost afraid it would drop from her shoulders.
Her mind seemed filled with molasses. She couldn't seem to think clearly at all. Nor could she make her limbs work properly.
Get up, she told her body. Get upl
But nothing happened.
After ten minutes she managed to get to her feet and cross the bathroom to the shower. The glass and metal of the enclosure was cold against her naked body as she leaned against it and reached inside to turn on the water.
The first faucet was hot and she turned it off again. Then she got the cold water running. It was there. Just inside. Only two steps away. But she couldn't bring herself to go into the shower stall and bear the shock of the coldness.
Francie compromised.
She reached in again and added hot water to the mixture until the temperature was tepid. Then she went in. Very slowly, she reduced the amount of hot water in the mixture and increased the amount of cold. She stood with her back to the spray, letting it hit her at shoulder level. When her teeth were chattering and her body was covered with gooseflesh she stepped back one pace so the spray could hit the top of her head.
That was a mistake.
Somehow it was colder that way, too cold. The shock made her dizzy and doubled the pain in her head. She gasped and trembled, clenching her teeth against the impulse to scream and against the urge to get out from under the water.
After a while she felt better. She turned off the water and stood shivering with the droplets running down her body. When she stepped out of the shower it was right into a puddle of cold wetness and she realized she hadn't closed the shower door.
Well, the carpeting would absorb most of the water.
She found a towel, dried her face and arms and legs, then her torso. But the water from her wet hair still dripped coldly down her back and she was still trembling. She wrapped the towel around her head, wincing against the pain, and dried her hair as best she could.
The towel dropped to the floor of the bathroom when she stepped back out into the bedroom. She made it back to the circular bed and eased herself down gently.
The nausea was gone, leaving an empty, hungry feeling and the world's worst headache. Staying in bed would do no good. She needed food and black coffee and tons of aspirin.
Hell, she needed medical attention!
Preparing anything was absolutely out of the question. She had the shakes already and standing upright for more than fifteen or twenty seconds would bring dizziness. A fumbling hand found the receiver of the telephone. The dial tone made her headache worse and for a moment she couldn't remember the number of the restaurant on the corner. Then she dialed the number and it was terrible agony to listen to the ring at the other end of the line.
Finally, after eight or nine rings in her condition who could count? someone at the restaurant answered and she placed an order for a full breakfast and a quart of coffee. And she asked the man to have the delivery boy stop off at the drug store and bring her a bottle of aspirin the large, economy size, naturally.
The man at the restaurant promised to have the order there in less than ten minutes. It wasn't the first time she'd had meals sent up and it wasn't the first time for the hangover breakfast, either. In the last two months there had been quite a number of hangovers.
After she hung up she fumbled around for a cigarette and managed to get it lit. But the first puff made her gas. The first one was always lousy, yet she always lit that cigarette. The second puff was easier to take. The third one didn't bother her at all.
But the cigarette didn't help the foul taste in her mouth, either. When it was smoked down to a short stub she crushed it out and went into the bathroom. Brushing her teeth was too much of an ordeal, her head was so bad. Even her teeth hurt. So, she settled for several swishes of mouthwash.
At last she was beginning to feel more human. But she didn't yet dare turn on the light in the bathroom and look at herself in the mirror there. Besides the pain of the light she was afraid of what she would see.
When she was crawling back into bed she heard the knock at the front door. She tried to yell for the delivery boy to come in but couldn't raise her voice enough to carry that far. So she padded out into the living room and opened the door herself.
Standing in the corridor was a young Negro boy, about fifteen, with a big paper bag in his arms and an apron around hie waist. His eyes went wide, hie jaw sagged, and he almost dropped the bag.
That was when she knew she'd forgotten to put on a robe. She started to turn away, then changed her mind.
"The hell with it," she mumbled to the boy. "Come on in."
He licked his lips nervously and stared with eyes so wide they threatened to pop right out of their sockets. It was too much trouble to go scampering for a robe. In the last two months Francie had become accustomed to the idea of her own nakedness and felt not the slightest shame or embarrassment. With a figure like hers there was nothing in the world to be ashamed of.
The boy came in and she closed the door.
"Take the stuff in there," she said, flinging a careless hand in the direction of the kitchen.
He jumped at the sound of her voice and she looked around for her purse. It lay on the floor in front of the imagine, three-piece, curved sectional sofa. She walked to it, started to bend down to pick it up, then thought better of the idea. That was all she needed. To bend over when she felt this badly was to fall flat on her face.
"Hey!" she called. "Come in here."
The delivery boy came back into the living room.
"Pick this up for me, will you? I'm afraid to bend over. I'll kill myself."
The boy edged nervously toward her.
"Come on, come on," she hurried him.
He couldn't take his eyes off her lush nakedness.
"What are you staring for?" she snapped. "Don't you know what a woman looks like?"
"Yes ma'am. I know."
"Hurry up then."
He picked up the purse and handed it to her, keeping as far away as possible. She opened the purse and found her wallet.
"How much?"
"Tuh ... Tuh ... Two dollars, ma'am."
The smallest she had was a five dollar bill. She took one out of her wallet, thrust it at him, and dropped both wallet and purse onto the sofa.
"Go on, keep the change," she told him. "Stay here ten seconds longer and you'll go blind staring that way."
"Thank you, ma'am," the boy said.
He literally ran out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him.
Francie winced at the sound and went into the kitchen. She clenched her teeth against the rattle of paper as she tore the bag open. There were two containers, one large and one small; two aluminum pie tins with cardboard covers, and a large bottle of aspirin.
She opened the smaller container and washed away the taste of the mouthwash with a swallow of orange juice. Then she opened the aspirin bottle, shook out five of the little white tablets, and swallowed them with the rest of the juice.
The plastic of the kitchen chair was cold against her naked bottom when she sat down. She opened the larger container and poured steaming black coffee into a cup. Half a dozen sips seemed to work wonders. Now she could face the prospect of regular food.
She removed the lids from the two aluminum pie tins. In one was a mess of bacon and scrambled eggs. In the other there were two buttered and toasted English muffins and two small plastic containers of jelly. She opened the jelly and smeared it thickly over the four muffin halves. She ate one half while she finished that first cup of coffee.
The bacon and eggs and the three remaining muffin halves disappeared in short order along with two more cups of black coffee. By then the aspirin was really doing its work and she felt remarkably well considering how sick she'd been before. She felt well enough, in fact, to get up and walk into the bedroom to get a cigarette to have with the remaining cup of coffee.
When she was finished she dumped the papers and containers and tins into the garbage, and set the coffee cup and utensils into the sink. Now she hardly minded the clatter of metal and glass against porcelain.
On her way back to the bedroom she stopped at the front door and retrieved the morning newspaper that had been delivered about five o'clock. In the bedroom she plumped up her pillows, stretched out, and read slowly through the paper in order to give the food and coffee and aspirin a chance to do all their work.
When she finished, having skimmed the headlines and looked at the pictures, she tossed the paper away, closed her eyes, and let her mind run over the events of the night before.
That had been quite a party.
The only reason she'd gone was because Jim had had to work. The only person she knew there was Marge, the girl who threw the blast. Marge Francie didn't remember ever having heard her last name also worked for Schiller and the two girls had met in his studio. Francie had been early for a session and Marge was just ending one. Schiller had introduced them and they talked, one undressing and the other slipping into her clothes.
That had been a few weeks ago. Since then they'd crossed paths coming and going a couple of times. And once, when Schiller got some kind of phone call and had to postpone a session, they'd gone out for a cup of coffee.
Marge had been in the business for more than a year and filled Francie in on a lot of little things. They seemed to strike it off pretty well, so when Marge threw her party it was natural she should invite Francie.
There had been liquor. Lots and lots of liquor. There had been music and dancing. There'd been lots of people, too. Marge's small apartment was jammed with people. By midnight everyone was bombed.
Some joker got the bright idea of having a beauty contest. And, since the girls didn't have bathing suits, the contest was held in the nude. All the males were judges and no one single girl won the contest. The girls had paraded back and forth for a while, giggling and showing themselves off. The men couldn't decide who was the most beautiful girl.
They argued back and forth for a while and settled the argument by awarding prizes for the best individual parts. In order to do that, of course, they had to touch and squeeze a little. And all the girls, Francie included, were a little too drunk to mind. Prizes were awarded or the best breasts, the best nipples there was one official tester the best rear, the best legs, the best knees. There were so many categories every girl was a winner.
When the contest was over some of the girls had gotten dressed again and some of them hadn't bothered. Francie seemed to remember dressing, but she couldn't be a hundred per cent sure.
There were more drinks; many, many more drinks. Francie remembered a succession of darkened corners and hands squeezing and caressing her body. She remembered also seeing some pretty wild things going on right there in the room with all the others.
But she didn't remember doing anything herself.
And she wasn't sure if she'd come home alone, or with company. If she'd come home with company, that was a sure bet she'd made love. The way she felt then she couldn't tell for sure. She looked down at her body and saw a few bruises on her breasts and legs, but they might well have been from overzealous hands early in the evening.
Anyway, she promised to watch herself more carefully at the next party. What bothered her was that she didn't know whether or not she'd made love, but that she didn't remember that. There was no use having the pleasure if she couldn't remember.
Today was a kind of anniversary.
It was exactly three months since that day she'd walked into Schiller's studio. She remembered the naive kid she'd been then and laughed at herself. That following Monday Schiller had taken his first set of pictures of her. He'd paid her and sent her home to wait for his call. He'd promised to call as soon as he got some kind of report on the way her pictures were selling.
That took almost two weeks and she nearly went out of her mind with boredom and worry. Then, finally, he'd called and given her the good news. She'd rushed right down to his studio to sign the contracts and had been too excited to read the damned things. All she could think of then was all that money that was waiting for her.
It turned out there wasn't quite as much as he photographer had promised. Oh, his figures were correct, bnt her cut was a lot smaller than he'd hinted at. When she raised the subject he'd told her the facts of life. He wasn't in business alone. He had partners who took the biggest slice right off the top.
Still, once she'd really gotten started, the smallest week she'd had was five hundred dollars. That wasn't exactly coolie wages for the few hours of work, either.
And she spent the money almost as fast as it came in. There were so many things she wanted and needed.
First, and most important, had been new clothes. Scads of expensive, under things, evening gowns, cocktail dresses. And none of it bargain basement stuff, either. She bought in the most exclusive and expensive shops in town.
Then, of course, the old apartment wasn't anywhere near good enough. Jim had been a help there. By then she was seeing him on an average of twice a week. Sometimes they went out to imagine restaurants and night clubs, other times they stayed home and made love all night.
Jim helped her find a good, three room apartment down here in the Village. It was much closer to Schiller's studio and closer to Jim's own apartment. She'd been in his place only once. It was a two bedroom affair, with one of the bedrooms fitted out as an office. That, he said, was where he did his work.
But there was something a little peculiar about Jim. It wasn't anything specific, more a feeling she had when she got to know him better. Several times she'd phoned him when he'd said he'd be working and there hadn't been any answer. He always had a plausible excuse, though.
In the three months of working for Schiller Francie had learned some important facts of life. One was that the popularity of the average model lasted about six months. After that the men who bought the pictures were looking for fresh flesh and new faces. That was kind of a shock. It meant Francie only had about three months left in which to make her pile. And so far she hadn't managed to save a dime. Every time she turned around there was something else. A two-hundred-dollar-a-month apartment on a two-year lease, furniture, carpeting, more clothes.
Every time she looked at the balance in her checkbook she swore to cut down on spending. But she never quite managed that. Anyway, the six month's life span wasn't necessarily everything. There were other angles to the modeling racket, though none she knew of were quite so lucrative. Still, a picture spread in a men's magazine every couple of months would more than pay her expenses.
And Marge had a nice little gimmick working for her. The other girl had ads placed in several of the magazines. Those ad were worded so they promised the utmost in pictures of the undressed female. They invited the reader to write, telling exactly the kinds of pictures he wanted. For the small sum of two dollars the reader could receive a sample set of photos.
The ads didn't bring in a fortune. But Marge swore there was a steady seventy or eighty dollars a week in the angle. The letters came in; addressed to a post office box number, and Marge sent back regular Schiller sets, regardless of the requests for specific poses. Some of the letters were real howlers, too. It seemed that the average American male had some pretty weird tastes, occasionally.
One thing though, was still the same as when she'd started. Posing for Schiller's camera got her so damned excited she wanted to scream sometimes. They were doing two sets a week. A set took about two and a half hours. By the end of a session Francie was so excited she was climbing the walls. And Schiller, damn him to hell, wasn't interested. At least not so far.
The clock-radio beside the bed came on and Francie came out of the depths of her thoughts. It was noon now. She had a one-thirty appointment at the studio. All but a few twinges of the hangover were gone. She got out of bed once again, took a hot shower, and spent twenty minutes fixing her hair.
It took quite a bit of makeup to cover the circles under her eyes and she wondered what the old man wculd say about the bruises. She rummaged through her drawers in search of clean underwear and came up with only a pair of panties. All her bras were dirty. She'd have to do a wash this evening. Hell, the whole apartment could use a thorough cleaning.
Francie slipped on the sheer silk panties and paused to look at her reflection in the mirror. The high life may have put a few lines in her face but it certainly hadn't done any damage to her body. If anything, her figure was better than ever. The wispy cloth of the panties fit snugly across her hips. The panties were very brief, cut high on the sides and riding low on her hips. They hugged the double-swelled curves of her buttocks. In front, the elastic of the waistband rode below the shadowed hollow of her navel and the sheer cloth emphasized her other charms.
Francie searched through the drawers again for a bra and still did not find one In the end she. decided to go without one. She'd only have to take it off when she got to the studio, anyway. She found a pair of stretch pants and pulled them on. They fit like a second skin, showing even the line of her panties beneath.
And for the upper half of her body she selected a striped jersey pullover with three-quarter sleeves. She slipped it on, tucked in the tails, and checked herself in the mirror. The soft clinging material seemed glued to her breasts. The jersey rubbed against the sensitive nipples, making them plainly visible.
She took a couple of steps toward the mirror and saw that the movement beneath the pullover was almost wicked. Dressed like that she'd have half the men in New York drooling from the mouth by the time she arrived at the studio.
Things were even worse than that. So bad, in fact, that after only two blocks she found it necessary to take a cab. In that short distance there were three men already following her and she'd nearly been the cause of at least one automobile accident.
Things were only slightly better in the cab. The driver divided his time unequally between looking at her through the mirror and watching the road, with more of the time spent looking in the mirror. They had several close calls on the short ride.
Schiller was in the darkroom when she got to the studio. Through the intercom he told her to get ready. She stripped and smoked through two cigarettes before the photographer came out.
The session went quite rapidly. He posed her on a sofa against a dark backdrop. There were several stuffed animals for props. He took one head-on shot with her sitting on the sofa. Her knees were pressed tightly together and there was a large rabbit on her lap. She leaned forward far enough so that even her breasts were hidden from the eye of the camera.
There was more.
In one shot she was facing the camera, sitting on one of those tremendous stuffed lions, her knees bent, her hands lifting her huge breasts toward the camera with her fingertips covering her nipples. In another shot, this one a side view, she lay on her back on the sofa, her face turned toward the camera and smiling wildly. A stuffed dog stood on her stomach, its black nose reaching out to a breast tip.
By the time the last shot was taken Francie could feel the familiar excitement coursing through her veins. Schiller turned off the floodlights, came over, and sat down beside her on the sofa. He gave her a cigarette and lit it for her, then another for himself.
"I've got a couple of ideas for some art studies," he said. "The kind of thing I used to do before I got into this racket. But I need a model. Want to help me by being my model for them for a while? The job doesn't pay anything."
"It depends on when you want to do them," she told him.
"Well, if you have time now I suppose we could get right to work. All I have to do is change to black and white film. I want to shoot against a plain white backdrop.
"How long will they take? I've got a couple of hours I can give you."
"I don't know how long. The time depends on how quickly I can get the lights set up. I've got some ideas for the use of shadows and silhouettes but it might take a while to set things just as I see them in my mind. I hope you won't mind a slight delay."
"Well, let's start. If we run out of time we'll do more next week."
"Good," he said, rising from the sofa. "You stay here and relax. I'll set up across the room."
Francie smoked her cigarette and watched him drape the white sheet and set up the lights. He put a high stool a few feet in front of the sheet and climbed up and down his ladder for ten minutes before he had the lights the way he wanted them.
He marked the spot where the stool had been and called her over.
"Stand there," he said, pointing to the marked place.
"How do you want me?" she asked.
"No way, yet," he told her, stepping out of the light. "I've got to get the camera focused first. And then I'll tell you how to pose."
This kind of posing was different from the other. The lights were hot and blinding and she had the sensation of being all alone in a very special world. From out in the darkness she could hear Schiller moving and talking, but his presence was unreal. It was as though he were a disembodied spirit and the only reality existed within the lighted area. It was as though she were the only human being alive.
"All right, I've got it," he called. "Now, face straight out. Put your feet close together ... that's right. Uh, can you let down your hair?"
"Yes."
"Okay, do that."
She pulled the pins out and let her hair down.
"Fine," he said. "Pull your hair in front of your shoulders and let that hang down over your breasts." She divided the sheaf of her hair into two parts and pulled one part across each shoulder.
"No. That won't work Try all of that across one shoulder. Let one breast show."
She rearranged her hair as he ordered.
"That's good. That's much better. Now, let your hands hang down at your sides. No, clasp them together in front of you. But let them hang down all the way. Yes, yes. Hold that while I change the lights!"
It took more than ten minutes and her muscles began to stiffen up. But Schiller seemed very excited. His excitement showed in the tone of his voice. He worked as quickly as he could, shifting the lights so that streaks of shadow fell across her bared body. Then he was back at the camera and talking again.
"Okay now, drop your head forward until your chin touches your breast. That's right. Good. And kind of hunch your shoulders forward. Let them droop. Yes, yes. Hold that just like that."
She heard the shutter click twice, then the scrape of the legs of the tripod as he moved the camera. Two more clicks and he moved again. Then two clicks more.
"Okay, relax."
She dropped out of the pose and worked her shoulders to ease the ache.
"Hey," she called out to the darkness. "That's hard work."
He laughed. "All art is hard work. Take it easy while I change the lights a little bit. The spot is marked. You don't have to stand there."
Gratefully she moved out of the glare of the lights and watched him work. He made adjustments that seemed almost infinitesimal and sent her back to the spot.
He took three more poses, each succeeding one more difficult to hold. He took each pose from at least three angles and he snapped two shots of each angle. The extra posing wasn't easing Francie's excitement any. The all-seeing eye of the camera seemed to pierce the very core of her being and lust bubbled in the pit of her stomach. Tendrils of desire spread through her limbs. She was exhausted.
"Tired?" he asked after the fourth pose. "Want to quit?"
"A little. But I can go on for a while if you want me to."
"All right, then. Let's try for one more. They've all been great until now. Let's make this one really perfect."
But that was difficult. He directed her from the shadows. She got the general lines of the pose but couldn't seem to get the details and the exact mood he was looking for.
"Point your right foot out," he told her. "No! Too much. Turn it back a little."
She turned her foot back.
"No, no!" he screamed. "Here, let me show you."
He came walking out into the lighted area and dropped to one knee before her.
"Just like this," he said, moving her foot. "This will give me the line of the entire leg. Now just keep that there."
He rocked back on his heels and looked up at her thoughtfully for a moment. Then he reached out and put his hands on her hips, his thumbs pressing into the softness of her waist and his long fingers pressing into the small of her back. Slowly he began turning her gently to one side.
"Hold your hips at this angle," he said, shifting her body. "That makes a whole series of planes and hollows for the shadows."
She heard him only barely through the roar of her excitement. In all the months they'd worked together this was the first time he'd ever touched her. He was on his heels, with his face only inches away from her legs, and this was the closest he'd ever been to her. That made her very excited.
His touch added fuel to the fire of her desire.
Then he was standing up. She was holding her arms across her torso. He lifted one arm away from her body a few inches and tucked her breast behind the arm. Then he pushed the arm back against the breast so that the soft flesh bulged out on either side.
Her knees almost gave way.
She fought the urge to fall to the floor and drag him down to her. He turned his back and walked out into the shadows once more.
"Hold that!" he shouted. "That's almost perfect. Lift your chin just a fraction of an inch to give me some more of that neck. That's good. Ten seconds and we'll be finished."
It was more than ten seconds. It was almost ten minutes. But finally the last shot was snapped.
"Relax," he called. "We're finished."
She let her body slump and walked back to the couch on the other side of the room. He turned off the floodlights and joined her a few moments later, a happy grin on his lined and wrinkled face.
He lit a cigarette for her and brought a towel so she could dry the sweat from her body.
"That was really hard work," she said. "I had no idea that would be like that." Her voice was tense and high-pitched from the desire coursing through her.
"Hard work? Nonsense! That other stuff we do, that's hard work. This is only pleasure."
He dropped down to the seat beside her.
"Pleasure for you, maybe," she told him. "But you're behind the camera giving orders, not out in front taking them."
"I suppose there is a difference. But you know what that's like for me? That's like having a woman."
Talking about that, she thought, wasn't going to make things any easier.
He took another drag on his cigarette and turned toward her. "You know," he said in an amazed tone. "You're really a very beautiful woman. I never noticed before."
"If anyone should know, you should. You've seen me without clothes more times than even my mother, I guess."
"I don't mean that," he said. "That's not beauty. It's been such a long time since I worked like that I almost forgot how. I'm grateful to you, really I am."
He was looking at her again and there was a new light in his eyes. There was the kind of look she'd seen before in the eyes of other men, but never in his. He seemed to be seeing her for the first time as something more than merely an object of certain dimensions and shapes to be seen through the view finder of his camera to be photographed.
Their eyes met and locked and he put his hand on her bare leg. There was no need for words but she spoke anyway.
"Yes," she whispered softly. "Oh yes."
His hand tightened on her leg and his head came forward. His lips, dry and cool at first, pressed against the side curve of her breast. Then his lips grew warmer.
They fluttered over her white skin to the coral tip of that breast. They tormented the swollen and aching nipple, brought leaping flame to that sensitive bud of flesh.
She sighed and squeezed her eyes shut tight.
His lips traveled slowly to the other breast and she reached to pull his head tighter against her, nearly smothering him against the smooth, sweet, softness of her flesh. Then he was kissing the valley of her breasts. And once there he traveled along that valley toward the gently rolling countryside of her middle.
Fireworks were going off inside her skull and she'd lost control of her limbs. Her arms and legs twitched and jerked spasmodically. Her nostrils flared. Her lungs burned.
Her hands were still holding his head but there was no strength in her arms. His lips caressed her navel and she was only dimly aware that he'd moved from beside her on the sofa to before her on the floor. His touch was doing wild things to her. And moving, always moving.
His beard prickled her tender skin where he brushed against her. Then he was twisting his head rapidly from side to side to drop tiny kisses on her, tiny kisses that turned her into a blazing inferno of passion.
She screamed with lust as his lips kept working. Her hands tightened to fists in his hair and yanked hard. Her arms locked and squeezed him as tightly as they could.
There wasn't one finish; there were an entire series of peak moments.
One, two, three, four. One right after another with no rest between. Each one stronger than the preceding one. Until, finally, she was consumed by the white blaze of ecstasy.
When her senses returned, Schiller was looking at her face and smiling softly.
"My God!" she breathed. "That was ... That was . .
"I know."
Her expression clouded. "But what about you? There was no ... You didn't ... I mean . .
He continued to smile. "That was for me, too."
"That's what you were talking about that first day when you explained that you were different?"
He nodded. "Didn't you know what I meant?"
"I only heard about this once before. I was a kid in high school and two older girls were whispering after gym class. I didn't know what they were talking about either."
"This was the first time anyone has ever done that for you."
"Yes."
"I'm glad, in a way."
She began to laugh.
"I said something funny?"
"No, no. It's me I'm laughing at. Posing does funny things to me. Posing makes me very excited."
"I know. I could tell."
"For three months I've been climbing the wall after each session and cursing you because there was nothing you could do for me. And all the time you could. You could do this. Oh, my God!"
He turned his face slightly and his lips pressed against her for a moment. That was long enough for the warmth to begin to rise for her again. When he looked at her face he saw, and smiled.
"You won't have to climb any more walls. This I promise."
"I'm going to hold you to that," she answered, her voice rising as his lips sought her again. Torturing her!
Rushing her to heights of total ecstasy that Francie had not ever even imagined for herself before this brash revelation brought on by Schiller.
Faster and faster.
Reaching closer, every passing moment, to that one illusive pinnacle of passion toward which Francie beat her own path.
There!
Now, Francie opened her mouth and allowed her scream of tortured happiness to shatter the shrouded gloom of the loft-studio.
Schiller relaxed, too, gasping and smiling, pleased with himself and with the fact that he had, so obviously, been capable of bringing Francie to such exalted heights of passion.
"Thank you," Francie gasped, reaching one delicate hand out to touch him tentatively. "You'll never know how happy vou've made me."
"Think nothing of it, my dear," Schiller said, still gasping himself. "The pleasure was almost totally mine, you know . . ."
CHAPTER FIVE
It was time to make a report. Jim Collitch took out his wallet and removed a two-inch square of white paper. On that paper was written only a date. That date was a week more than four months ago.
Yes, he'd report today.
He tore up the square of paper and dropped the pieces into the wastebasket beside his desk. From one of the drawers he took out a blank sheet of paper and tore off another square exactly like the first. On that square he wrote the present date, folded it, and put it in his wallet in place of the old square.
In the bedroom of his apartment he selected his clothes with care. He chose the cheap dark suit that didn't quite fit, a plain, white cotton shirt with button cuffs, and a dark knit tie which neither blended nor contrasted with the suit. The socks he took out of the drawer were of still a third dark shade and the shoes he chose were brown, worn at the heels, and in need of a shine. The hat he took out of the closet matched the tie instead of the suit.
Dressed, he transferred his wallet and keys and loose change to the pockets of the suit. He shoved a fresh pack of cigarettes into the handkerchief pocket of the jacket and dropped a heavy lighter into the side pocket to distort the drape of the cheap poorly-fitted garment.
He checked his appearance in the mirror and made only one minor adjustment, setting the hat back farther on his head to show a little too much forehead. He seemed to carry himself differently now, too. And he took a couple of trial steps before the mirror.
His walk was heavier and he rolled slightly from side to side with each step. Satisfied at last, he left the apartment. In the street, he turned and walked to the furtherest corner, and went down into the maw of the subway.
There was nothing really different about him nothing specific. But in some subtle way he'd undergone a complete transformation. He seemed broader, beefier. There was a suggestion of a double chin and a redness about his face.
So complete was the transformation that only the closest acquaintance would recognize him. And even then, in a crowd, or at a quick glance, there was a good chance he would go undetected.
It was mid-afternoon and the subway trains and platforms were neither too crowded nor too empty. Most of the passengers were women shoppers. Collitch changed trains three times on the short ride uptown. Each time he got off one train and waited on the same platform for the next train. By the time he reached midtown he was certain there was no one following him. He'd been almost certain of that fact even before he left his apartment but there was no reason not to be careful.
In the midtown area he walked around until he found a luncheonette in the arcade of one of the big office buildings. He had a sandwich and a cup of coffee there, taking his time over a cigarette and the last of the coffee. Then he paid his bill and walked directly to the bank of telephone booths.
All the booths were occupied and he had to wait until one chattering woman finished describing bargains to someone on the other end of the line. She ran out of change before she finished her conversation, opened the booth door, and looked up at him.
"Have you got two nickels for a dime?" she asked in a whiny voice.
"No," he snapped.
Leaving the door still opened the woman put the receiver back to her ear and shrilled into the mouthpiece, "I got to go, Janice. I got no more nickels. I'll call you when I get home."
She hung up, squeezed herself and all her packages out of the booth, and threw Jim a nasty sneer. He gave it right back to her and stepped into the vacated booth. She stood beside the door until she heard him drop the two nickels into the slot, then walked away in a huff.
Jim Collitch dialed a memorized phone number, let it ring twice, hung up and dialed the same number again. This time he let it ring until it was answered.
The voice at the other end said only, "Go ahead."
"I want to make a report," Jim said.
"What was the date of your last report?"
Jim gave it.
"Wait."
Jim waited. He knew the date he'd given would serve both to identify him and to verify his identity. In short time the voice was back.
"Routine?"
"Routine."
"Where and when?"
"I'm downstairs now. Are you clear up there?"
"No. Do you know the Columbia Theater? It's one of those grind houses on Forty-second Street. They show nudist movies and barely legal foreign films."
"I can find it."
"Twenty minutes. First balcony, center aisle, fourth row left side. There'll be a hat on the second seat. You'll ask if it belongs to me. I'll say no. You'll pick it up and try it on for fit."
"I've got it"
"Twenty minutes."
"Right."
Jim broke the connection and left the phone booth. He was only one block away from the meeting place and killed the time looking at pictures of nude women which were offered for sale in a bookstore. He leafed slowly through the packets, came across one that was vaguely familiar, and looked harder.
He was surprised, almost shocked, when he recognized Francie Jordan. He bought that packet and dropped it into his pocket. There was no time to look at it now.
The rendezvous went off smoothly, both sign and counter-sign. And they were virtually alone. The nearest person was five rows back and four seats over closer to the center of the section.
Jim put the hat down on the floor and slipped into the second seat.
"Take it easy with that hat," the man beside him said. "It's my own."
"Be a sport," Jim cracked. "Buy yourself a new one. Put it on the account."
"This is not the time for banter," the other man said, his voice cold, and low, and sharp. "You've got a report to make."
"Right. Sorry."
"Get on with it."
"I'm making progress slowly, as ordered. And it's not hard at all. I don't even have to hold back. Some of the competition is very good. At the present rate I should make the inner circle in about six months."
"That's fine. Just about perfect, in fact. There's a major upheaval on the way. It should occur around then. Did you pick up any tips?"
"Nothing at all. These are bigger fish up here. They don't do as much loose talking as the small fry. There's one thing, though. I'm not sure of it yet and I'm not even sure it's the kind of thing you're interested in."
"Well decide that. What is it?"
"I may have a connection into the picture racket. It's only a possible."
"How'd you make the connection?"
"A girl I met about seven months ago. Strictly a social contact. She told me she was a model. I just discovered what she modeled for."
"What?"
"Those packets of photos they sell in the bookstores along the street. That might be all or there might be more. You interested?"
"Does it interfere with the other things?"
"Not at all. i gave her the writer routine and she swallowed it."
"How sure of her are you?"
"Completely I followed her into a movie, watched her for an hour, then picked her up."
"All right," the other man said. "See where it leads."
"What about combining the two things."
"How?"
"I'll let her find out I'm a gambler. If she's really involved in the worst stuff she'll be more disposed toward reciprocating my confidence with one of her own."
The other man thought for a minute. "No. It's too risky. It might reach the point where she'd want to meet some of the others and there'd be no easy way for you to refuse "
"All right then, I'll need some things."
"What kinds of things?"
"I'll want a fairly diversified assortment of material. Movies, books, slides, the works. She can discover them in my place and we'll see where that leads."
"The idea is good but we can't supply."
"Why not?"
"She might want names of salesmen. And she might do some checking. Best we can do is an address where you can buy whatever you need, just like any other jerk off the street."
"Whose money do I spend?"
"Whose have you got?"
"My own."
"Exactly. You'll have the address by tomorrow afternoon. Anything else?"
"Nothing right now. If anything comes up I can always make an emergency report."
"Look, on this picture business."
"Yes?"
"Don't push it. It's not that important. I'm giving you the okay on my own hook. We might get a veto from higher up. Move slowly so you can break off if the veto does come down."
"Right."
Without another word the man sitting in the aisle seat, got up and left. Jim remained in his seat and for the first time focused his attention on the screen. The picture was in Technicolor and appeared to have been filmed by a nervous cameraman using a hand-held camera. The giant screen was filled with naked bosoms and heaving buttocks as a group of far-too-pretty young women faked a volleyball game in a nudist camp setting.
There was no dialogue to the picture, only narration. But Jim knew he had to stay for the rest of that picture and all of the co-feature. He slumped lower in the uncomfortable balcony seat and let his eyes unfocus. There was nothing really worth watching.
Jim Collitch lived a double life. Primarily, almost totally, he was a gambler. The other side of his existence only came into being four or five times a year, at most. The gambling side of him has already been seen. This other side bears some explanation.
Many years ago someone, somewhere in the vast bureaucracy of the federal government, discovered the advantage of having a friend in the enemy camp. This was a fact that had long been known to the bureaucrats of the major foreign powers.
This country entered that aspect of international politics somewhat late in life and has always made a decidedly poor showing in the world of spies and counter-spies. But, we make the effort. And sometimes, though not usually, those efforts bear fruit. The particular department which controls those fruits is known throughout the world.
Despite our singular lack of success the principle is sound At another time another bureaucrat in another place donned his thinking cap and pondered this and several related problems. He ascribed our lack of success to the fame of the department and to our seeming inability to identify our true enemies.
These conclusions called for action. First, the famous department known only by its initials, was allowed to continue operations in the same bungling manner and at considerable expense to the taxpayer. Second, another organization was formed. This one was highly secret. Outside of the members themselves, of which there are relatively few, only half a dozen men in the world are aware of its existence. This organization is so secret it doesn't even have a name. How could it ever become famous without a name? Therefore, it is highly effective, though the results it achieves are always ascribed to other departments ... well-known departments.
Sometime after this nameless organization was formed one of the six non-members who knew of it he was then the President of the United States made some further decisions. He decided, and rightly so, that not all our enemies were across the oceans and borders. We had an enemy within This enemy was not the American Communist.
The internal enemy was the American arm of an international criminal organization with its roots in Palermo, Sicily. Once this real and present danger was identified, further decisions concerning it had to be made. It was granted that it would be virtually impossible to stamp out the enemy completely. Any mass attack would only drive him deep underground. It was decided that in the long run it would be to the best advantage of the society to allow this organization to function almost in the open so that a constant watch could be kept on it. But limits were set. There were certain kinds of activities which would be ignored at least on a federal level and there were other kinds which would not be tolerated.
Now, remembering that a friend m the enemy camp was tactically advantageous, it was decided that a long-range plan of infiltration was logical, necessary, and worth any cost.
Jim Collitch was one of the infiltrators.
He had not the slightest idea of who the others were, or how many there were. He had no knowledge of them whatsoever, whether they were trained men or men who'd been recruited as he'd been. In fact, he wasn't even sure there were any others.
Someone, somewhere, had taken note of Jim Collitch very early in his gambling career. His entire background was quite carefully investigated. Then he was offered the job. Being young at the time, and a patriotic citizen, he accepted the offer. And it was a lucky thing he had. For so high was the priority on this plan and so great was the need for secrecy that had he refused he would have been executed on the spot to keep the knowledge of the plan from spreading.
Jim did his jobs well: both of them. His little niche was perfect for the kind of work he did The casual and friendly relationship between real, professional gamblers that is, men who gambled rather than men who operated gambling establishments and members of this criminal organization was such that the gambler was usually in a position to hear, or overhear, bits and pieces of highly valuable information.
For instance, Jim had been instrumental in intercepting several multi-million dollar shipments of smuggled narcotics. In one case even diplomatic couriers were involved. Then too there were pieces of information concerning the relationship between racketeers and certain labor organizations which had proven invaluable to the federal government.
The relationship between Jim Collitch and his civil service superiors was a loose one. Except for a minimum of four reports per year which had to be made in person Jim was on his own. The system worked well. A phone call could pass along information without the slightest chance that Jim could be discovered by the enemy.
It was, all in all, a good life. Only one or two minor points troubled Jim. Sometimes he felt foolish playing the spy game. And there were other times, albeit rare ones, when he felt the lack of social and emotional ties and responsibilities. He bad no family. He had no real friends. He had no roots, no status. He was little more than an efficiently functioning machine.
The financial relationships and contractual agreement between himself and the government were relatively simple. He paid his own way out of the money he made at gambling. This was his sole source of support. If he should lose all his money, then he would have to do what every other losing gambler in the world did. But, at the same time, there was paid into a secret bank account every month, the sum of one thousand dollars tax free! At the present moment there was in that account, including accrued interest, almost exactly one hundred thousand dollars.
The contractual agreement was equally simple. Jim could quit, resign, chicken out-depending upon your point of view at any time he so desired. If, and, or when he did so, the money in that secret account would be turned over to him in total. Hands would be shaken, thanks would be given for service rendered, and the entire matter would be immediately forgotten. There would be no medals, no pictures in the newspaper. Then, as now, Jim would have no special standing. Right there, sitting in that cheap theater, a policeman could walk up and arrest Jim and there were no strings to be pulled. In fact, Jim could possibly be arrested, charged with a crime, tried and convicted, and sent to prison without his superiors ever discovering it.
There was one other clause to the agreement. Should Jim come to an early end, through malice or accident, while still in the employ of the government, the money in the secret bank account would automatically revert back to the coffers of the nameless organization.
On a more personal plane, Jim Collitch took certain parts of his job more seriously than others. He kept himself in top physical condition, all the while blessing the man who'd discovered the principles of the isometric exercises which enabled him to keep in condition with a minimum of sweat.
The physical conditioning served, of course, a dual function. It helped him be a better gambler, and it maintained him in a state in which he could best cope with any unforeseen circumstances. It was because of his excellent health that he appeared to be fully ten years younger than his true age of thirty-five.
He'd begun his dual life with no formal training in the skills of espionage. He'd asked questions about weapons and had been told that he wouldn't require any. This answer he never accepted. He considered for a long time before finally selecting the proper weapon for himself a knife. A gun was more powerful, but not really more effective than a knife in the hands of an expert. And there were psychological aspects of six inches of cold, gleaming steel which were valuable. The average man was more frightened when threatened with a knife than when threatened with a gun. There is something vicious and deadly about a knife. A gun is only ugly. And, what's more, a gun is difficult to conceal on one's person.
Jim selected the knife as his weapon and trained himself in its use. He purchased two dozen identical knives, six-inch replicas of a samurai sword, which were intended for decorative desk top use as letter openers. They had four inch, high-carbon steel blades, and two-inch wooden handles. He ground the blades until they were double-edged razors and almost paper thin. It took almost two years of intermittent practice before he became expert in throwing the weapon. Now he could put the point of one through the center of an ace of hearts at thirty feet, and could hit a moving target with the same accuracy.
Concealment offered no problem with the weapon. He merely carried it in hij pocket. When anyone noticed it, he said it was a souvenir he'd recently purchased. It was not deadly looking, nor was it of great enough length to be considered a concealed weapon. He did not always carry the knife and had never been in a situation which required its use. But he was confident that if he should have to use it he would have it with him and would use it effectively
Of course, Jim's success at both endeavors was due, in large measure, to certain native talents. He had a good mind; observant, cautious, quick. He had large strong hands which helped in the manipulation of cards when such a thing was necessary. It hadn't been either necessary or feasible in more than five years, though. He was an instinctive actor. He could don the proper costume and play the role to perfection.
When the Technicolor breasts came onto the screen again, Jim roused himself from the depths of his thoughts and left the theater. It was evening by then and he went to a nearby restaurant for supper. After giving his order to the waiter he went to the men's room and locked himself in one of the cubicles.
There he removed from his pocket the cellophane wrapped package of photos, opened it, and inspected each one carefully. There was no doubt in his mind that the girl was Francie He was too familiar with her naked body not to recognize pictures of her.
Having satisfied himself, he replaced the pictures in his pocket and returned to his dinner. Even with dawdling over each course there was still more than four hours to kill before the earliest possible starting Te of that night's poker game.
He took the subway back to his apartment and considered various possibilities. He could call Francit but thought better of it. He changed into his gambling attire and left the apartment again. There was a restlessness in him that needed to be exorcised before he played that night.
A cab took him uptown to Hernandez' place and the Spaniard looked surprised when he let Jim in.
"It is the wrong time of day for you," the man with the scarred face said.
"I don't think so," Jim said. "There's some big action tonight and I've got to go into it real relaxed, know what I mean?"
The Spaniard nodded "I heard about you moving up. There isn't much higher to go, you know."
"Yeah. Is Lotus available?"
"I'll check and see."
The Spaniard picked up the phone, dialed a three digit number, and spoke in a whisper. Then he returned the receiver to its cradle.
"She's available. She was on her break. But I told her who it was and it's all right. Room seventeen."
Jim dropped two fifty-dollar bills on the desk and said, "Call me exactly at midnight."
The Spaniard nodded.
Jim went up to room seventeen and found Lotus already waiting for him. She moved immediately into his arms, her soft, naked body warm beneath the thin fabric of her silken robe. They kissed and his hands wandered over her body.
"You haven't been here in more than a week," she chided when the kiss was ended.
Jim said nothing, knowing no answer was required. He slipped out of the jacket of his suit while the Oriental girl locked the door.
"I've got the biggest game of my life tonight," he told her when she came back to him. "And I'm a little jumpy. That's no good."
"Leave that to me," she told him. "I'll fix you up just perfect."
She removed her own robe, then helped him out of the rest of his clothes. When they were both naked she led him into the tiled bathroom and helped him up onto the massage table. Her hands were feather light and she worked over him foi the better part of an hour. There was no strong tension and most of the effect was psychological.
When she finished they went back into the bedroom, turned out the lights, and crawled onto the bed. He lay beside her in the darkness, still and relaxed, and let her take the initiative. Her hands found him and discovered that he was not prepared.
"What's this?" she asked in the darkness. "You sick?"
"No. Just relaxed. You're going to have to work hard tonight."
"That kind of work I love," she answered, crouching beside him.
Her hands squeezed and in the darkness her mouth found his collarbone. From there her lips knew the route to every part of his body. They took first one path, then another, until his passion trembled on the brink of urgency.
The last caress was the most exciting. She was kneeling beside him, her hair fanned across his bared body. Her lips pursed for a kiss, tickling him.
With that caress she brought him almost to the peak of pleasure before she stopped once again. And her voice was husky in the darkness when she spoke.
"How do you want me?" she asked. "Easy, or wild?"
"I thought I wanted you easy," he answered. "But I changed my mind. Let's make this wild. The wilder the better."
"All right, baby. Get up and stand on the floor close to the edge of the bed."
He did as she ordered in the darkness of the room she was only a shapeless shadow He stood with his knees pressed against the edge of the mattress, waiting for something to happen.
The bed dipped and bounced as she moved around, and when he felt her he understood.
He caressed her curves with his hands, bending forward quickly in the darkness to plant a kiss on her. This brought a gasp from her and she began slowly to move.
He straightened and pressed himself against her. Her hand reached out, found him, and helped him.
That was wild. Wilder than ever before. And that lasted so wonderfully long. And though he enjoyed every second to the fullest, he remained always in complete control of himself. This constant control augured well for the evening ahead.
Then they lay down again and she began the deliciously slow process of preparing him again.
Jim Collitch had been at that particular house of pleasure many times before. Enough times to run the entire list of all the pleasures they had to offer. And of them all he found Lotus the most appealing.
Lovely, lush, Lotus who had worked so diligently to turn room seventeen into an exotic passion pit, the-likes of which had never existed in reality outside the darker byways of Hong Kong and, in certain selected alleys, in San Francisco and New York's Mott Street.
But all her efforts at interior decoration fell to unseeing eyes as far as Jim Collitch was concerned. After all, he needed Lotus for one thing only.
Her special favors...
The incredibly exciting things that Lotus could have performed for him, equally well, from the center of Madison Square Garden, or even the matinee stage oi the Winter Garden, between acts.
And perform she did. Collitch hardly even had time to recover from her last efforts before he found the lovely Lotus working eagerly again. Striving, urging him ever nearer to the passion peak from which it is impossible to turn back . , .
CHAPTER SIX
THE business with the rental agent had been a real hassle. Francie was already a month behind in her rent and knew she wouldn't be able to carry the two-hundred-dollar-a-month apartment. His name was Grant and his early morning call had roused her from a deep, badly needed sleep.
He called to make an appointment with her for late in the morning, around eleven. He'd wanted her to come to his office. But she was mad because he'd awakened her in the first place and she refused to go anywhere. If he wanted to talk to her he'd have to come to the apartment.
She'd dropped back to sleep right after the call and came awake again at the insistent knocking on the door. She stumbled out of bed and was halfway to the door when she remembered the robe. She went back to the bedroom and pulled a robe out of the closet.
As robes go it wasn't much. The material wasn't heavy enough to be warm when the weather was cold and was too transparent to hide any of her charms. But it was a token effort in favor of the cultural morality.
"All right! I'm coming already!" she shouted, slipping her arms into the sleeves and belting the robe loosely about her waist as she hurried to the door.
"I was asleep," she said sullenly as she pulled the door open to admit Mr. Grant.
He hurried busily into the room without really looking at her. "We had an eleven o'clock appointment," be said over his shoulder "It's ten minutes after eleven. I've been knocking on that door for the whole ten minutes."
He walked directly to the sofa and sat down without even being asked. It was then that she saw him really for the first time. He was a skinny little man, bald, fifty-ish, with steel-rimmed glasses and a matching vest under the jacket of his suit.
When he saw her his eyes bugged out, his jaw dropped for a second, and he had a coughing fit. She went over to him and pounded his back until the coughing stopped. There were tears in his eyes when he looked up at her again.
"Look, can you wait five minutes more?" she asked.
"I just woke up and I want to wash my face and comb my hair. Then I'll make a pot of coffee and we can sit and talk like two intelligent people."
She was back in the bedroom before he had a chance to answer And she'd left the bedroom door about halfway open. She had had him pegged from the moment she saw the look on his face. She was willing to bet that right then he was looking at the partially opened door and dying to get up and walk through it into the bedroom. But he wouldn't have the nerve to pick himself up from the sofa.
She did indeed wash her face and comb her hair. She also brushed her teeth and put on some make-up. While she did all these things she tried to make up her mind what she wanted trom this little man. He didn't seem to be the type who would accept a permanent arrangement of rent payments in trade; and she wasn't sure she'd be willing to start something like that with him.
No. It would be better for everyone if she moved out. But there was the matter of a lease with a year and a half left to run. If she moved out she would be responsible for the rental on the apartment until it was rented again or the lease ran out, whichever happened first. All she wanted from Mr. Grant was a waiver of the month's rent she owed and to be released from the lease.
She finished with her preparations and considered adding, removing, or changing clothing At length she decided to remain just the way she was. Grant looked like the kind of man to whom she would appear more naked dressed this way than if she were completely naked. She dabbed perfume in a few strategic places and swept back into the living room.
He was still sitting on the sofa. And there was stark, naked fear in his eyes when he saw her again.
She smiled sweetly and said, "I feel much better now. Let's start all over again. Good morning."
"Uh ... good morning."
"That's better. Come into the kitchen with me and we can talk while I brew a pot of coffee."
She heard him following her and stopped in the doorway to give him the full effect of the sun behind the diaphanous gown. He swallowed loudly. When he came into the kitchen she almost pushed him into a seat just inside the door. This meant she would be moving back and forth across the brightly lighted window, which would repeatedly turn the nearly transparent gown as clear as window glass.
He didn't say a word for the first couple of minutes as she walked back and forth filling the percolator and pouring herself a glass of orange juice.
"You just go right ahead," she urged blithely. "I'm listening."
"Well, uh, it's about the arrears in your rent payments."
"Oh, that."
"Yes."
"Well ... you see ... I simply haven't got any money right now. I just can't pay you. Oh, would you like some orange juice?"
"No thank you."
She sat down two feet away from him and felt his eyes jumping from one point of interest to another. When she crossed her legs the flaps of the robe slid away to bare the top leg almost to her torso and he looked at that, too. Several times he tried to speak but couldn't seem to find his voice.
To Francie this was almost fun. The poor shnook was helpless.
The first sip of scalding coffee seemed to loosen his tongue.
"I'd like to point out," he said. "That you are obligated for the full term of the lease."
"What does that mean?"
"It means that even if you move out the unexpired term of the lease is still in effect. And it is payable upon demand in a lump sum."
"Could you explain that?" she asked, leaning forward so that the bodice of her robe gaped away from her body and bared her already revealed breasts.
He was improving.
He didn't lose his voice that time. He just choked up for a second.
"Well, it works this way," he began, taking out a large yellow pad of paper and a pencil from his brief case. "You signed a two-year lease. That's twenty-four months at two hundred dollars a month. Altogether that comes to forty-eight hundred dollars which you agreed tc pay us over a two-year period."
He was writing figures on the pad and she moved her chair over close to his so she could see what he wrote. They were so close their shoulders almost touched and she intentionally brushed her leg against hie.
"I understand so far," she said. "Go on."
He started to talk again but he wasn't looking at the pad any more. His eyes were glued to her breasts and his nostrils were drinking in the delicate fragrance of the perfume she'd used.
"You owe us forty-eight hundred dollars and you've paid five months' rent, or a thousand dollars. That leaves a balance of thirty-eight hundred dollars. Now, if you moved out today you'd still owe us that thirty-eight hundred dollars."
His voice was on its way to disappearing again.
"But what if someone else rented the apartment the day after I moved out?"
"That doesn't mean a thing. According to the terms of the type of lease you signed you're obligated for the entire sum anyway."
"That sounds like a pretty sneaky thing," she said. "It's not fair."
He cleared his throat "Well, if you didn't like it you shouldn't have signed it."
"Let's forget about me for a minute," she said. "If you were looking for an apartment would you sign a lease like that?"
"Well ... no."
"Then you don't think it's fair, either."
"Not really. But I have no control over that. I just work for the corporation that manages these buildings."
"But it is a dirty, sneaky thing."
"I suppose it is."
"As the agent, couldn't you just rent the place right away without forcing me to pay all that money? I mean, who would know if I was still living here or it someone else were paying the rent."
"No. That's out of the question. I couldn't do that. Besides, there's the month's rent you're already in arrears. What about that?"
"Well, I suppose I could raise that much without too much trouble."
"But I still couldn't let you out of the lease."
"Oh, sure you could And I'd be ever so grateful. If you were nice to me, why, I'd. . . " She left her words hanging in the air like that but he couldn't escape her implied meaning.
He blinked his eyes several times before be spoke again.
"Well, it might be possible. But there's a big risk for me. If the owners ever found out I could lose my job."
She was out of her chair and onto his lap before he quite realized what was happening. And by then it was too late. Her warm, rounded bottom, separated from him only by the layers of cloth of his trousers and the thin wisp of a robe she wore, was resting firmly on his lap Her arms were wrapped around his neck, and his face was only inches away from her magnificent bosom.
She put her lips to his ear and whispered softly "I won't tell a soul. I promise." She let her lips touch against his ear lobe as she talked.
He gave in completely then and put his hands to her hips, his spidery fingers trembling as he let one hand slide down and back to the swell of her buttocks. Her hands behind his head exerted a small amount of pressure and he leaned his face against her breasts.
She moved one hand down to the belt of the robe and opened that, then slipped her arms out of the sleeves and let the top of the garment crumple about her waist. He was like an overeager child searching for hidden candy.
His skinny little hands were too small to fully encompass her large breasts but he did the best he could. He finally managed to get one nipple to his kiss and she almost laughed when he momentarily lost his prize in his fumbling excitement.
But she managed to fight down the laugh and to guide him to the other breast. He was in his glory then, and almost bounced with his eager excitement.
She wriggled away from him then, her robe falling to the floor and leaving her completely bared. He moved half out of his chair after her.
"Not so fast, Grant," she said. "First you fix up that lease, then you can have your fun."
He grabbed the copy of the lease agreement and scrawled across it in ink, "Canceled by Management A.G." The two letters had to be his initials, which made it official as far as she was concerned.
Then he was up out of the chair and moving toward her.
"Take things easy, Grant," she said, backing away from him. "I'm all yours. Everything you see. But let's go into the bedroom, at least."
He nodded his agreement, too excited to speak. She stepped past him and he followed her into the bedroom. She walked slowly, exaggerating her sensuous walk. The white moons of her naked buttocks jiggled and bounced and slid silkenly with each step. Behind her she could hear him panting and gasping for breath.
In the bedroom she stretched out on the circular bed and watched him undress. He never took his eyes off her, as though he were afraid if he looked away she would turn out to be a figment of his imagination. He was skinny, and ugly as hell without his clothes on. He had a paunchy mid-section and stringy muscles and a pitiful mat of gray hair on the middle of his chest.
He went over to the bed, climbed up, and reached immediately for her. She took him in her arms and held him close as her lips again found his ear.
"Take this easy, honey. Make this slow. Make this last a long time. Make this good for me, too."
He put his mouth to her breasts again but there was no improvement in his technique. She sighed and closed her eyes.
"Be nice to me," she murmured. "I won't run away. I want this as bad as you."
Her words seemed to excite him greatly. He grabbed one of her hands and pressed that against his body She could sense that he was very close to ending before he had begun. He needed another shock to slow him down.
She shoved him violently away and rolled from the bed. "There's one more thing," she said, stopping him as he started after her.
"What's that?" he whined.
"The two hundred dollars. I want you to cane that, too."
"Oh, I couldn't do that. I mean, that's cash. I have to make that up out of my own pocket."
"So what! Isn't this worth a lousy two hundred dollars? You can see me. I'm worth that much, at least.'
He was in a pretty poor bargaining position and he knew that.
"Ail right, all right! The two hundred, too!"
"Good, then all you have to do is give me a receipt for last month's rent."
"I don't carry receipts with me."
"Oh no, baby. Pay in advance. And no refunds. I know you've got to have a receipt pad in your brief case. If not you can write one out on a plain sheet of paper."
He climbed off the bed and disappeared through the doorway. When he came back a few minutes later his excitement had subsided somewhat and he was carrying a piece of paper.
"Here," he said bitterly, thrusting the paper at her.
She took it, checked it over, and put it away in the drawer of the bedside table.
"Now come to momma," she crooned, turning back to him and holding out her arms.
She kept the pace slower this time. So far things had worked out perfectly for her. She kept pleading with him to be good to her and to be slow and to be gentle, while in the back of her mind was growing the idea that she might get him to do Schiller's little favorite for her.
She really liked that!
That was almost the greatest thing in the world.
In some ways that was better even than regular love-making. Since the discovery, she'd become devoted to Schiller's delight and she let him please her that way two or three times during every posing session.
Now that the posing sessions were over, she missed him.
And what really puzzled her was how a man could get all his kicks that way Sure, a guy could get a bang out of that once in a while simply because the gal enjoyed herself so much. But Schiller got all his thrills that way and she couldn't quite figure him out. He never even so much as opened his clothes, but when that was over he was just as peaceful and happy and tired as was she
When Grant was placing his face against her breasts she kissed the top of his bald head And he made no protest when she urged him further He willingly kissed her ribs and her flat stomach and her own excitement began to grow.
But he stopped short of making her score a point and tried to get on with the action.
"Not yet," she whispered pleadingly "I'm not ready yet. Kiss me a while longer, honey. Please?"
He bent his lips to her again for a while and kissed all around. Then, he tried once again to further the action.
She pleaded with him once more and he pulled himself angrily away. He crawled up to kneel beside her shoulder and look into her face.
"I know what you want," he said angrily. "And I'm not going to do that. We made a deal. Let's get this over with."
"Honey! Don't you want me to enjoy you too?"
"Sure. Sure I do."
"But that's the only way for me. Unless that's first I don't have any fun at all. I need that to start me off." That was an out-and-out lie. She was already pretty well started. For an awkward and fumbling man, he'd done a serviceable job of preparing her.
Suddenly the old man smiled. The bargaining positions were reversed now and he knew they were.
"I'll do that," he said through his smile. "On one condition."
"Yes?"
"You have to do me first. The same thing."
She'd done that only once before. And that time had been an experiment when she was with Jim. He'd really enjoyed her and she hadn't minded. She'd discovered through that experiment that that gave her no particular pleasure, though.
The idea of obliging this wasted old man was entirely different That horrified her.
"No. I couldn't"
"All right then, let's just finish up here and I'll be on my way."
She hesitated "Wait ... "
She was excited and she knew she would never find fulfillment with him the normal way. Then too, she wanted that special thing very badly.
"You do me first," she told him.
"Oh no! Pay in advance. Remember?"
"All right. But not ... you know .the whole thing. I'll do that for a while but you'll have to keep yourself under control."
He shook his head, glorying in the feeling of triumphant power "All or nothing," he said.
As a clincher to his argument he kissed her as he had before.
"Oh God!" she murmured as the desire over whelmed her. "All right! Hurry I"
He moved toward her on the bed again. She held him with one hand and leaned forward. That didn't take him long But the wave of revulsion which washed over her at his completion almost ruined her own desire. Finally he found the peak, then relaxed.
After a moment he sighed and began his part of the agreement. In seconds she was riding the ever-growing tidal wave of passionate lust as he fulfilled his end of the bargain. She clenched her teeth tightly and whipped her head from side to side, fighting the impending ecstasy to make that last as long as possible.
That was good.
Wonderful...
Magnificent . .
The peak was a jagged ripping of pleasure as her body knew the ultimate joy. Her strong arms held him prisoner for long seconds after the peak passed as she sought every last shred ol pleasure.
Finally she released him.
He rose, dressed, and went into the kitchen to gather the rest of his things together. She lay limp and languid, floating on the gentle sea of after-pleasure. He ruined that for her when he came and stood in the doorway.
"Remember," he said. "You've got until midnight tonight to get moved out of here. Anything left in the apartment after midnight belongs to the corporation."
Then he was gone
She was up out of bed and after him but he'd already made it out into the corridor. Forgetting her nakedness, she followed him.
"You dirty, rotten louse!" she screamed. "You low-life pig!"
"Midnight tonight," he said happily.
One of the other apartment doors opened and she turned to find a ten-year-old boy standing there staring at her She ran back tc her own apartment, breasts bouncing wildly and slammed the door
It took ten minute? for her to cool down enough to realize she had nothing really to be mad at. She'd gotten everything she wanted from him. It had cost her somewhat more than she'd anticipated but it wasn't that bad a deal.
There was still some revulsion when she thought about her active role in a part of the proceedings. But that hadn't been too bad either.
Now she had to figure out somewhere to go and something to do with all her furniture. There was an outside chance Jim would let her move in with him, at least on a temporary basis. In his arms she would enjoy paying the rent.
And he certainly had the room. There was that extra bedroom he had fixed up like an office. She'd long since decided the writer bit was a phony. He was very vague about things of his that had been published and he never showed her anything he had written. But that made sense in light of the hours he supposedly put in working in his apartment. He was never home during the day. And most nights when he said he was working, he wasn't there either.
But she didn't really care what he did for a living. In a strange way, outside of the physical thing, she really liked him. And the love-making with him was terrific. They'd known each other quite a while now but didn't have anything remotely resembling a steady relationship. In fact, in recent months they seemed to have been seeing less of each other. Back in the beginning that had been two and three times a week. Now it averaged once a week that they saw one another. And some of those times they didn't even make love. But he continued to call her and that was a hopeful sign.
She dialed his number and gave up after the tenth ring, wondering where in the world he could be at twelve-thirty in the afternoon after being out all night. She'd called his apartment several times between midnight and dawn and he hadn't been at home. Either that or he wasn't answering his phone, which was highly unlikely.
And she knew of no other place to look for him. His life away from her was a deep dark secret. Well, there were two more chances. The other model, Marge, might be willing to take in a roommate. If that didn't work she was pretty sure she could borrow a little money from Schiller and get him to let her store her furniture in a corner of the big loft-studio. God knows, he had the room. About eighty per cent of that space seemed to go to waste.
But Schiller was a last resort. She still resented the sudden ending of the regular income. He'd explained it all to her and had assured her he would be able to use her for an occasional thing. But there would be no more of that regular money.
She had Marge's phone number written on a piece of paper in her wallet. She got it out and dialed. There were six rings and she was just about ready to give up on Marge too. when the receiver at the other end was lifted.
There was a long silence, then a sleepy, "Hello."
"Marge? This is Francie Jordan. I'm sorry if I woke you up but I've go' a problem."
There was some mumbling, out of which Francie was able to decipher a "Wait a minute."
Then came a loud thunk as the phone was dropped.
The wait seemed ten years long, then Marge was back on the phone, sounding much more alert.
"Francie, what time is it?"
"Almost a quarter of one."
"Oh, I thought it was much earlier."
"Hey Marge, I'm in trouble. I'm a month behind in my rent here and I've got to move out before midnight tonight. I need a place to stay."
"The picture money dried up, huh?"
"Like a mirage in the desert. What do you say, have you got room for me?"
"Well, there's room. But this is no charity ward."
"Oh no. Nothing like that. I figured we could split expenses. Even if I had to take a job I could meet my half, I'm sure."
"Well, under those terms I've got plenty of room. There're two bedrooms here, you know."
"No. I didn't know. The only time I was up there I got too drunk too quick to count bedrooms."
Marge laughed. "You certainly must have been drunk. If I remember right you were in and out of both bedrooms at least twice, each time with a different man."
"I wouldn't know. I couldn't remember the next day, let alone this long afterward. Now, how about your living room?"
"How about it?"
"Well I've got three rooms of furniture here and no place to put them."
"Bring it all over. We'll pool all our stuff, keep the best of it, and get rid of the rest."
"Wonderful ... Oh, there's one more thing."
"What's that?"
"I'm broke. I need the loan of enough cash to get my stuff moved. I can't carry it over there on my back."
"Hold on a minute. You were just talking about splitting expenses and now you want to borrow money."
"All I need is about fifty dollars. And I've still got that much coming from Schiller. It's only for a day or two until he gets his split."
"On, I guess it's all right. Come on over and we'll make the arrangements."
"I'll be there in ten minutes."
"Pick up a quart of milk on the way, will you? I'm all out and we'll need it for coffee."
"Right."
Francie hung the telephone receiver up slowly. She was relieved to have found a place to live for awhile, but she didn't know for sure how she felt about Marge and the kind of things that went on in her apartment.
That party had been wild, all right, but just what was she letting herself in for? She experienced a moment of self-appraisal that left her frightened and a little sick: She had come a long way from her teenage experiments in love-making, occasional drinks, borrowed cigarettes. What had Schiller done to her and her soul in that foul, littered loft under the lights?
What had she done to herself?
She had become a depraved pleasure-seeker. She could think of few things which she had not done, or which she might object to doing with a man.
Then she shrugged philosophically. She had just become more sophisticated, that was all. She had learned that some of her ideas when she first came to the city were childish. She still had her luscious body, she was still young, and she still had a good long life to live fully.
CHAPTER SEVEN
It had been a pretty hectic couple of days for both Marge and Francie. It had begun on the afternoon of the day before yesterday when Francie had made the telephone call to Marge. Francie had gone over to Marge's apartment and they'd made all the plans and arrangements.
There was a shoe-string moving outfit just getting started down there in the Village and they agreed to move all of Francie's things that same afternoon and evening for only forty dollars. Marge had gone back to the other apartment with Francie to help with the packing.
They'd worked like fiends, jamming stuff into cartons and suitcases and boxes toward the end when there wasn't much time left. Even doing it that way there'd still been stuff left to pack when the moving men came and started carting the furniture down to the waiting truck. The girls were just closing the last box when the truck man came up to say everything else was loaded.
Then, when they got over to Marge's it was the whole damned thing in reverse. The truck men had dumped everything, furniture, boxes and all, right in the middle of Marge's living room. It was evening by the time they got that much done and they were in a hurry to get finished.
Marge and Francie worked until midnight at getting things unpacked and had had to quit with only half the job completed. And they hadn't even begun on the furniture. Things were still such a mess Francie couldn't even get to her bed. That first night she slept in the big double bed with Marge. They laughed when they discovered the coincidence of their mutual preference for sleeping in the nude and the reluctance of each to do so with another girl in the same bed. And once they laughed about that there was no longer any reluctance.
They slept late the next morning and both of them awakened with aching backs and sore muscles. Hot showers were in order, then solid breakfasts cooked by Marge. It was just before noon when they attacked again the mess of furniture and boxes and garments and hangars.
But even when the unpacking was completed there was still the hardest part of the job still ahead of them. Francie's bedroom set was far superior to the one Marge had in the second bedroom. So the old one had to be dismantled and hauled out to make room for the new one. The bed was easy. The dresser and chest of drawers were damned heavy pieces of furniture for two girls to lug.
It was the same story with the kitchen set. Francie's stuff was far superior and they elected to get rid of Marge's older pieces. That left only the living room, which had had a full set of furniture to begin with, and to which had been added not only a full second set, but also a dismantled bedroom set and a kitchen set.
They really couldn't do anything in the living room until they got someone to haul away the bedroom and kitchen furniture. The super and his son promised to take the stuff downstairs to the storage room for five dollars apiece but they didn't get to the job until after dinner time that night. But the time they finished neither of the girls was in any mood for more work.
They cleaned up, left the living room looking like it had been in the path of a tidal wave, and went out to a bar to have a few drinks. It was Marge's treat in honor of Francie's arrival.
They went to a bar frequented exclusively by women dressed in men's clothing. The place was so dimly lit that they were there a full half hour before Francie realized what kind of place it was. When she did, she spoke of it to Marge.
The older woman only laughed. "Of course I I thought you knew right from the first. I always corn-in here."
"But ... but they're Lesbians!"
"So what. They won't bother you unless you war;' to be bothered."
"Not me!" Francie said vehemently. "How can you even stand the sight of them?"
"I like it here. Nobody bothers you. The drink? aren't watered and the prices aren't outrageous. Here I can relax without half a dozen guys trying to pick me up."
They stayed for a couple of hours. During that time several of the mannish women stopped by to say hello to Marge. Francie was introduced to them. They were all polite, and really seemed quite nice; if you could forget about the way they were. By the end of the evening Francie had almost come to accept them on their own terms. She didn't want to have anything to do with them physically, of course, but the ones she'd met seemed like nice people.
They went home a little high and in good moods, neither of them really ready for sleep. They stripped and showered, then both stretched out on Marge's bed to watch a late movie on television.
Marge got playful and teased Francie about showing how the Lesbians made love. When she grabbed the younger girl there were several moments of wrestling, the two naked female bodies locked together in the struggle, and for a moment Francie was almost afraid Marge wasn't really kidding.
But nothing happened and when the movie ended Francie went in to her own bed. She lay awake in the darkness for a long time, her mind a whirling jumble of thoughts.
She was still troubled about the bit with Grant for one thing. What bothered her was the almost overpowering need to have him perform Schiller's favorite variation. She realized after a while that that particular thing represented for her the lost excitement of posing before a camera. That was something she would really miss; perhaps as much or more than she would miss the steady income. Somehow the act of posing represented for her a domination over all the faceless men who would buy her pictures and lust after her in their minds. They were helplessly caught in the spell of the beauty of her body and that was thrilling.
Another thing that occupied her thought was the uncertainty of the future. She'd discussed finances with Marge. Her share of the rent and utilities amounted to approximately ninety dollars a month. If she watched herself carefully it shouldn't be too difficult to make ends meet with only an occasional modeling job. She might not have to go to work after all.
The wrestling with Marge didn't really trouble her. Once she was assured Marge was only joking she'd actually enjoyed that in an odd sort of way. Of course, if that ever got serious she'd have to leave. That sort of thing wasn't for her. She got too much pleasure from men to bother with women. That sort of thing was dirty and perverted; when that was serious, at least. As long as that was only fooling around, that couldn't do any harm.
She wondered, also, when she'd be able to get in touch with Jim Collitch. Now that she'd moved he wouldn't be able to find her. She'd have to find him and tell him all about it.
There was one hopeful note, too. Marge had hinted that there were a couple of things around that might pay some good money. She wouldn't say anything more before she talked to the people involved. If she got the okay from them she would tell Francie all about it.
Francie finally fell asleep.
When she awakened the next morning her blanket was kicked off, baring her body, and Marge, also still naked, was sitting on the edge of the bed tickling her breasts to wake her up.
She woke up slowly, coming out of a dream of passionate love-making with Jim, and she was all excited when she was finally awake. By three that afternoon the two girls had finished rearranging the living room. By shifting furniture around they managed to keep all the major pieces of both sets of furniture. And all there was to put downstairs were a few tables and lamps.
Now Marge was out somewhere and Francie was alone in the apartment. There was nothing good on television and Jim's phone didn't answer. Bored, Francie was prowling around the apartment, sort of snooping in closets and drawers and things.
She knew, of course, it wasn't the right thing to do. But she was bored and more than a little curious about the older girl. She really didn't know very much about Marge. But, then, neither did Marge know very much about her.
The last place she poked around in was Marge's bedroom. And she almost talked herself out of snooping in there. But, in the end, she couldn't resist. In one of the dresser drawers, beneath a pile of panties, she found two curious items. One was a six-foot length of braided silk that looked for all the world exactly like a whip. But who ever heard of a silk whip?
The other thing was a large manila envelope. Inside the envelope there were pictures. At first she thought they were copies of sets taken of Marge. Francie had copies of every picture Schiller had ever taken of her and she assumed Marge had the same.
She almost put the envelope back without looking at it. But on second thought she pulled out the pictures and turned them over.
The first one shocked her so much she nearly fell over.
It was a picture of Marge all right. But this picture wasn't like anything Schiller had ever taken. In this picture Marge was fully and completely exposed to the camera. In itself this was not so shocking. The really shocking part was that Marge was not alone in the picture.
Seated beside her was an equally naked man I The two people were caressing each other and grinning straight into the lens of the camera!
Some of the other pictures were even worse. In those shots Marge was trying every conceivable variety of love with several different men. One particularly wild picture showed Marge with three men on a bed.
She lay on her side between them and the camera angle was such that Francie could see, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that each of the men was loving Marge. The third man was kneeling on the bed and Marge was treating him the same way that Grant had demanded of her.
With shaking hands Francie shoved the pictures back into the envelope and replaced the envelope as she'd found it. She went out to the living room and sank down onto one of the sofas.
The shock reaction passed surprisingly quickly and she found that she could think quite clearly about her discovery. She figured that those pictures had been taken sometime after Marge had finished with the photo sets with Schiller. Another obvious fact was that they were professional pictures and not amateur stuff.
Actually Francie wasn't as shocked as she thought. Except for one or two of the really far out scenes, like the one with the three men, there wasn't anything shown which she hadn't done herself with one man or another.
What was puzzling was why Marge should let herself be photographed in such situations. And Francie was in a quandary. She couldn't tell Marge about finding the pictures, yet, at the same time, she wanted to know more.
An hour later, when she heard Marge's key in the door, she ran into her own room, closed the door, stretched out on her bed, and pretended to be asleep when the older girl looked in.
But she knew she couldn't stay in there all night. Around supper time she came out of her room and went to the kitchen. The door of Marge's room was opened. When she passed Francie glanced in and saw the older girl sitting Indian style in the middle of her bed. She was naked and there were pictures spread all around her.
Marge looked up, saw her, and smiled.
"Hey, you're awake at last. Come in here a minute. There's something I want to show you."
The pictures on the bed were the ones from the drawer and Francie had to fake now the shock she'd felt earlier. Marge only laughed.
"But why would you pose for pictures like that?" Francie asked.
"For the same reason you posed for Schiller. Money. Good old U.S. greenbacks. And lots of them, too."
"But ... but isn't that illegal? Couldn't you go to jail?"
Marge shrugged her shoulders and her breasts bounced with the motion.
"Ah, the people against these things aren't interested in the models. They want the photographers and distributors. This is the kind of thing I was talking about last night. I talked to my friends and they're definitely interested in you."
"Oh no. I couldn't pose like that."
"For God's sake why not? You get your kicks and a picture and money to boot. You're no different from me. You get a funny thrill when you pose for Schiller Well baby, let me tell you, that's nothing compared to the kick you get from doing these action shots. And the movies! They're really way out. That's the biggest charge of all."
"You mean you get excited when you pose, too?"
"Sure."
"I thought that was only me."
"Honey, most flesh models feel that way. That's the biggest reason they do that kind of thing. And like I say, posing is better with action and best with movies."
Francie tried to deny the excitement rising within her at the thought.
Marge caught the expression on her face and pursued the advantage.
"You're out there in the lights, see. Only you're not alone. There's a guy with you. He's handsome and he's built well and he really knows his stuff. Out there behind the lights there's a photographer but he's not really there. Know what I mean?"
Francie nodded quickly. "I felt the same way a hundred times."
"Right. All that's out there is that ever-lovin' camera. You can almost feel it taking your picture. The guy with you starts to fool around, see. He does all sorts of great things with his hands and you're all excited
"And then you're loving with him and that's like nothing else in the world has ever been. You know the way you feel when Schiller does his stuff with you? Well, this is ten times as great. This's the living end."
Francie was so excited by then she was gasping for breath.
"Interested now?" Marge asked.
All the younger girl could do was nod her head. Her hands were gripping her breasts and squeezing them hard and she was trying not to groan. Right then she wanted a man so badly she would have done anything he asked just for the touch of his hands against her body.
"Hey, you want to see a movie I made a few months ago?" Marge asked.
"You mean right here?"
"Sure. I've got a projector."
"If that's like you say, maybe I shouldn't. Right now I'm going out of my mind and you only talked about that. God, I need a man!"
"Hey, you're all strung out and there isn't one available, either. The most I can do is offer a substitute to get you over the rough spot."
"A substitute?"
"Yeah. Me!"
"Oh no! I couldn't. That's ... "
"That's nothing except a girl helping out a friend I'm not suggesting we give up men. It's just that there aren't any members of the opposite sex around right now. Hell, if you say no you'll only have to lock yourself m your room and manage somehow. There's no difference between that and me doing something for you except that if I do that you'll enjoy yourself far more."
"Well, that wouldn't be anything serious. I mean that would be just because I hurt so bad ... "
"Sure, I understand. Tell you what, I'll set up the projector and you can watch the movie at the same time. How's that? That'll make this even better."
Francie nodded in agreement and Marge climbed down off the bed. From her closet she took out a collapsible screen and a movie projector. She set them up, threaded the film, and turned out the lights in the room. Then she started the projector rolling.
Francie lay on the center of the big double bed, her head propped up on two pillows so she could see the screen. Marge knelt beside her and began to remove her clothes.
On the screen there was a shot of an empty bedroom. A door on one side opened and a woman Marge came in, rubbing herself with a towel. She dropped the towel to the floor and stretched out on the bed. The camera panned in for a series of tight close-ups of her, missing nothing.
The camera dollied back for a long shot and Marge seemed to be asleep. Now the camera panned to the window of the room and showed a burglar breaking in. The man wore black slacks, a black, turtle-neck sweater, and a black mask.
He climbed into the room, looked around, and did a double take when he saw Marge sleeping naked on the bed. He stared at her for a moment, then quickly began stripping off his clothes. As he did, his excitement was evident. And he was the biggest burglar Francie bad ever seen. The sight of him doubled her own excitement.
The man removed every stitch of clothing except the mask. That remained in place for the remainder of the film. The naked, masked burglar climbed up onto the bed beside the sleeping Marge and rubbed himself against her hip. Then he reached out and delicately touched her breast. Next he kissed her breast and after that he kissed her everywhere else.
The Marge on the screen came awake bubbling with lust. She pulled the man to her and wrapped her arms around him. From the foot of the bed the camera zoomed in for an extreme close-up, stayed there for several moments of subsequent activity, then dollied back again to take in the entire scene.
There was more.
Less than a quarter of the two-hundred-foot reel had shown so far. , But Francie didn't see much of the rest.
By then her own clothes were completely gone and gentle feminine hands were softly caressing her aching breasts while soft smooth lips fluttered in the hollow of her throat. The lips moved down to pluck at the aching nipples.
The hands left the breasts but the lips remained. The hands slid downward to clutch and squeeze the heavy buttocks and to cause Francie's body to begin a restless twisting.
One hand stayed on her buttocks and the other moved. Now the lips moved, too. They paused to pray at the temple of the navel and then went toward their eventual goal, at which place the other hand was already stroking and caressing.
Marge struck with the fury of a rattlesnake.
To Francie that felt like the entire top of her skull had blown off and her brains had splattered against the walls of the room. The cataclysm was so intense she actually hurt, yet the pain only seemed to make the pleasure greater. She lay in a semi-aware state for many long minutes before her senses returned in full.
Marge was lying beside her, curled into a tight ball, and crying with pain.
"Marge! What's wrong?"
"Damn it," the older girl muttered through clenched teeth. "I got myself all worked up now ... "
There was a clear and undeniable obligation. Francie saw her duty and moved to do that. The movie was still running but she didn't even glance at the screen.
"Marge," she said softly, touching her friend's shoulder. "Let me help you. You helped me."
The older girl rolled onto her back and stretched out. Francie touched first with her hands, holding the other woman's breasts gently, but firmly.
"You'll have to tell me if I do something wrong," Francie murmured.
She held the nipple firmly and nibbled gently. Marge groaned and curled her fingers in Francie's hair. From then on the older woman was in complete control. She guided Francie wherever she wanted her to go.
Francie was doubly surprised.
First, that there was no revulsion, and second, that she was actually enjoying doing this for her friend She enjoyed that so much that she became excited again and Marge showed her how they could both work at the same time.
Finally they were both spent and the film had stopped running. They lay side by side in the darkness, peaceful and sated bodies touching. After only a little whispered conversation Francie agreed to meet with Marge's friends later that same night.
She was anxious, even eager, to have the experiences Marge had described. She no longer thought of those things in terms of bad or good, but only in terms of pleasure.
Nothing, she decided, which afforded pleasure, could be wrong.
Jim was puzzled by Francie's disappearance. The girl had simply moved out without leaving any kind of forwarding address. Jim was surprised that he felt sorry she was gone. He explored the feeling and discovered there was some subtle difference which set Francie apart from all the other women he'd ever known. She was not better, or worse than any of the others, only different.
But, he still had Lotus up in the Spaniard's establishment. And there wasn't a woman in the world who could excel her in technical skill. She was the absolute best there was. Though, he could not deny, he'd enjoyed Francie in equal measure with a different kind of pleas-
The disappearance of a girl he'd known only slightly more than casually was not uppermost in his mind just then, however. There were far more disturbing thoughts.
He'd finally made it!
He'd been accepted into the inner circle!
He'd been recognized as one of the dozen best poker players in the entire country. And poker being primarily an American game, this meant in the entire world. His name was now known by every gambler from coast to coast every pro and every amateur with more money than brains.
This status, besides the reward of satisfaction in knowing you were the best, also carried with it the opportunity to become extremely wealthy in a short period of time.
Then why, damn it, didn't he feel the way he'd always supposed he would?
It was a hollow victory. For some crazy, stupid reason, it didn't mean anything to him. He took another drink from the bottle on the floor beside his chair and felt the raw liquor burn all the way down his throat to the pit of his stomach.
He'd been sitting here in the darkened living room of his apartment for hours now wrestling with the questions in his brain. And he couldn't find the answers. The booze didn't really help any. It only made the frustration a little easier to bear.
This was something he'd been aiming for all his Hie. And now that he'd reached his goal he didn't want the prize.
He took another drink.
And another ...
And more time passed.
When dawn finally came he'd drunk so much he was sober again. And a big part of the answer came to him all of a sudden, like a flash of lightning. The success was meaningless because he'd ceased thinking of himself primarily as a gambler and only secondarily as an agent of the government. Now the dual roles were reversed.
The reversal had something to do with being in New York, he felt sure. Here, for the first time, he'd seen the full strength and evilness of the criminal organization at work. Being in New York had changed his entire perspective. The big-timers were no longer the admirable men he'd thought them to be. He'd met several of them now, face to face across a card table. They were human beings, not gods. And somewhat faulty human beings, at that.
Suddenly, coldly and without emotion, he was sick of the entire business. He wanted out, wanted nothing more to do with either of the long-played roles of his life.
On the screen of his mind he saw a little house somewhere. In that house there were a woman and a couple of kids ... His kids ... His house . His woman. They belonged to him and he belonged to them.
Another thought brought him up short.
His woman? Where would he find a woman? Who would marry him? He could never feel real, genuine love for another human being. He'd frozen those emotions out of himself a long time ago. They no longer existed within him.
But that didn't alter his decision to quit. He wanted nothing more to do with the government or with criminals. He had enough money to last him for the rest of his life and there was no one else to provide for. Beyond the microcosmic world of gamblers and thieves was another, greater world, which awaited his restless, wandering exploration.
Those were his last thoughts before drifting off to sleep.
When he awakened the sun was shining in on him through the window and he was sweating. He also had a terrible hangover, but refused to give in to it. He got out of the chair, stripped off his sweat-stiffened clothes, and refreshed himself with an ice-cold shower.
Then he had a big breakfast with two glasses of tomato juice and three cups of black coffee. He topped the meal off with a handful of aspirin and soon felt quite normal. He dressed in clean casual clothes and went down to check on the mail.
There were a couple of circulars in the box along with one regular envelope. The letter was addressed in a spidery feminine hand and had a return address in Portland, Oregon. It looked like a little note from an old maid aunt.
But Jim knew better.
He knew where the letter had come from and waited until he was back in his apartment before opening it. He slit the envelope neatly and took out the single sheet of scented paper.
On that paper, in the same spidery hand, was written a cryptic message.
It said-
Disengage secondary investigation. Possible gains not worth risk to man of your value.
There was no signature.
So, they were calling him off the picture thing because they didn't think it was worthy of him. Man, were they all in for a surprise when he showed up at the office that afternoon.
He slipped on a sports jacket and put the letter in the inside pocket. From his dresser top he picked up a pair of sun glasses and left the apartment. This time there was none of that silly business of changing trains three times and looking around to see if he were being followed.
He stayed on the one train and made the whole trip uptown in less than fifteen minutes. And he didn't bother with calling from the lobby pay phone either. He went right up to the office on the twenty-third floor-really the twenty-second because there was no thirteenth floor-and walked in as big as life.
There was a receptionist in the outer office who didn't know him. And he didn't know the name of the man in the inner office. They'd only met in dark places and talked on the telephone.
Since he didn't know who to ask he didn't bother stopping at the receptionist's desk. He walked right past her and into the office marked: PRIVATE.
The man behind the desk looked up, startled for a moment, then relaxed and said, "What are you doing here like this?"
"I came to resign."
The man's eyes widened slightly with surprise and he didn't speak for a long time. Jim stood there, letting the other man look at him and coolly returning the gaze.
"Your mind is made up?"
Jim nodded. "I'll pick up my money in Washington. But you can notify them I'm through as of right now."
"Care to teD me why."
"No."
Jim turned on his heel and walked back out of the office, and passed the amazed receptionist who still didn't know who he was. By the time he reached the corridor he felt good. And by the time he reached the lobby he felt marvelous.
A great weight had been lifted from his shoulders ... a weight he'd been carrying around for far too long. He felt like a kid again and he grinned at total strangers as he walked back toward the subway.
He walked springily, resisting an impulse to whistle. He thought about what he was going to do next, and he was so impatient to begin on his new life that he thought the subway train must be running behind schedule, deliberately. Time couldn't pass quickly enough for him.
And all the time be was traveling, his mind was filled with images that so delighted him he almost laughed out loud, images of himself in the new life he was planning.
After Washington, New York again.
And after New York . , , CHAPTER EIGHT
They were on the plane together sitting beside one another, their hands clasped tightly together. The dark terrible time was behind them now and they were beginning the slow process of forgetting.
Francie still shuddered when she realized how close she'd come to missing him just when she'd needed him so badly.
After the lustful love-making that evening Marge and Francie had gotten dressed, had supper out, then gone to meet Marge's friends The studio was in another loft in another part of the concrete jungle of New York.
The photographer looked her over with a leer and told her to strip. There were half a dozen other people in the room but she ignored them and removed all her clothing. The whistles of approval told her she had passed inspection with flying colors and she stood proud and naked before all their eyes.
She enjoyed having them all look at her and didn't bother to dress again as the photographer explained the payments and the routine. It would be less work and more fun than posing for Schiller. She was to receive three hundred dollars for each one-hundred-foot movie.
And they intended to shoot four of them that night. Since she was a new face she could be the star in all four of them. The magic Marge had described began to work the moment she stepped out under the warmth of the lights.
The photographer told her each movement and she went through them. In less than five minutes, before her co-star even appeared on the set, she was aflame with desire. The movie had no plot at all. They started out with a scene of a naked woman who was joined soon by a naked man. And the two of them did everything imaginable for one another.
She didn't balk at all when she was directed to attend the naked man with her kiss. And she gloried in the sensations when the scene was reversed. She peaked a dozen times before that first film was ended.
And when that was finally over her body trembled with fatigue.
The fatigue disappeared, of course, as soon as they started shooting the second film. As long as she was under those lights and in front of that camera she could go on all night forever.
The second film was a little more complicated than the first. There were three characters here, two women and one man. The film opened with a shot of all three of them naked on the bed. Then they proceeded through some of the wildest scenes Francie had ever imagined
By the end of the second film she was in a semi delirious state. Her mind was fully aware of everything that was happening, but she seemed to have no control over her body. Her body obeyed the disembodied voice of the cameraman.
The third film had four characters. In this one there was an element of violence and Francie was to play the helpless victim. From the time the camera began rolling she was truly helpless.
The two men carried her to the bed and held her down while the woman, Marge, made perverted love. Then each of them loved her in the normal way. Next, she was forced to love each of them with her kisses. And for the finish of the film both men made love to her at the same time.
There was pain then.
The attack of one of the men was brutal. Her mind recoiled from the pain but her body loved every twinge.
Her mind recoiled from everything else, too. A voice shrieked in agony inside the silence of her skull. This was all filthy, disgusting, perverted. She didn't want to do any more.
But she did want to do more. Or, at least, her body wanted to do more and her body was in control, over riding the protests of her brain.
The fourth and last film was a sadist fantasy. Again she was the victim. She was tied to a rack, her arms and legs fastened. And a whole host of people took turns kicking and biting and scratching and whipping her until every square inch of her was either bleeding or black and blue.
And there was more to that film.
When the others got tired of using their hands and a whip they turned to other implements of torture. Lighted matches were held against her flesh at the most sensitive places and now she really screamed with the pain.
That ended, finally.
The bright lights went off but they left her hanging from the rack. The others, Marge with them, dressed and carried off all the equipment. One of them, whose name she didn't know, took pity on her and cut her down before he left.
She lay there in the darkness in the sheerest agony and slowly came to realize this had all been a plot against her. She wasn't going to be paid at all. Marge had lured her here and been paid for her work. Marge had taken pleasure from Francie's body, had accepted all her property, and then had lured her here with false promises, to be used in a manner worse than the foulest fiend.
They hadn't taken her clothes with them. Hours later, when she found the strength to move, she crawled to them and dressed despite the increased pain.
She stumbled down into the street, almost delirious again, this time from the agony of her wounds. Her mind was succumbing, too. The only thing she could think was Jim Collitch's name and the address of his apartment.
It was late at night and at that hour the loft district was deserted. No one noticed her as she stumbled along, not really conscious of her direction. Those few people who did see her took her for just another old drunk.
With the last dregs of fast-waning strength she arrived at Jim's apartment and beat feebly at the door with her open palm as she sank slowly down. That was the last thing she remembered for a long time. Only when Jim came to see her in the hospital did she learn what had happened.
He'd been home then, just finishing packing to leave the city for good. He'd tried to find her but had been unable to do so. He called for an ambulance after one look at her face.
Actually there was no major physical damage. Her wounds healed quickly and Jim's constant presence helped her mental state. In the long hours while he sat beside her bed she told him the whole story, leaving out nothing from that first time in high school. She told him how she'd sunk lower and lower into the depths of degradation and how she deserved this final punishment.
He listened to that all.
When she finished he told her about himself about the gambling, and the women, about Lotus and all the others like her. He left out any mention of the government aspect. On that topic he was sworn to secrecy.
And she listened to his story.
"I guess we're neither of us much good," she said when his story was finished.
"You may be right," he said softly. "But I don't think so. I've had a lot of time to think during the last few days and I've come to realize things about myself I never realized before. It could be that neither of us are much good. But together we might be very good indeed."
"Jim! Is that ... Are you...?"
"Yes. It's a proposal. I'm not making any promises except to work hard at making you happy."
"Oh Jim, I can't, I can't. I'm too dirty! I'll never be clean again!"
"You will. You are. But I don't care about that. I can't do without you, don't you understand? I thought I could never love any human being but I was wrong. I love you."
She said no the next ten times he asked her. But she was a captive audience. She couldn't escape. His persistence wore her down slowly. First he got her to admit that she loved him. Then, finally, he got her to accept his proposal.
They were married the day she left the hospital-only a few hours ago and now they were on their way to Washington for a brief business stop about which Jim would not talk. And from there they were off to find a home for themselves somewhere far away.
