enovel House Of Harlots J.X. Williams [Future Story Codes]

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House Of Harlots ....(79k)    by J.X. Williams

In his book, FEMALE HOMOSEXUALITY, Frank S. Caprio states: " ... definite sado-masochistic trends characterized by behavior actions of hostility alternating with feelings of self-pity (exist in Lesbians). All Lesbians invariably display marked feelings of ambivalence toward themselves, their love partners, their parents and people in general." It only took one such female to introduce stag movies by forced participants, thereby planting the seed of corruption in the respected leaders of the community.

CHAPTER ONE

I had a feeling I was not alone in my car. I pulled up at one of those crossroad stop signs. I-was far out in the country; there-were no houses in sight. I let a couple of cars go by on the crossroad and then pulled out across it. I had gone about a hundred yards beyond when I suddenly pulled over to the shoulder and stopped.

I turned around in the seat quickly.

"All right," I said. "Sit up,-whoever you are. I know you're back there under the blanket."

I saw the blanket move a little, and waited. The motor was still running; I had not shut it off.

"Come on out of there," I said. I wished the gun I had in the glove compartment was loaded. But it wasn't.

The blanket was tossed aside now and I saw it was a young girl. She couldn't have been much more than high school age. She was a pretty brunette. Her eyes were dark, her face pale. She sat up straight in the seat and looked at me sullenly.

"What's the big idea?" I said harshly. "Who are you?" I was angry as hell.

She managed a small grin. She pushed back her hair. It was all messed up; it looked like she hadn't combed it in a week. I saw that her dress was wrinkled, too.

"I saw you go into a bar back there," she said. Her voice sounded slightly nasal; there was an odd and sullen tone to it. "I saw all this stuff in the rear. I figured you were heading for the north country and that's where I-wanted to go, so I just climbed in the back and hid. Are you gonna kick me out, mister?" She stuck out her lower lip-it was a pretty lip.

"That's right," I snapped. "Get out, sister." She reached over quickly and grabbed hold of my wrist.

"Please...." she said, her voice sounding strained. "Please ... let me ride with you. Please...." Her hand tightened on my wrist.

I shook it off. "No. Sorry. Get out. You got a lot of nerve, kid. Don't you know-haven't you heard the police are looking for a guy?"

"What guy?"

"A guy who is supposed to have picked up some girl," I said.

"What's wrong with that?"

"Get out of my car," I said, ignoring her question.

"What's wrong with picking up a girl?" she said, grabbing my wrist again. "Look, mister, I ain't no kid. I know what it's all about."

I looked at her set white face. "I'll bet you do," I said, "But out you go."

She began to cry. Goddamn it, I thought, women, girls-nuisances, all of them.

She hung on harder than ever. I shook her hands free of my wrist again. She startled me by climbing over the seat.

She began to unbutton her blouse hurriedly. I swore at her. But she had the blouse half off. In spite of myself and my dislike of all women, I looked sharply at her small, pointed breasts. She was not wearing a bra and the nipples were fairly quivering with excitement. They were unusually large and pinkish. I felt the sweat running down my back.

I swore at her again. She came closer to me.

"I'll bet you'll 'want to give me a ride now," she said, laying her head on my shoulder. "I'll bet you-won't be able to help yourself." She put her hand between my legs and pressed gently.

Somehow or other I kept control over myself-though it took a lot of doing. I pushed her hand away, and reaching over, opened the door on her side.

"Get out," I said between clenched teeth. "Hurry up. Get out of the car, kid."

She kissed me on the side of the neck and ran her tongue along it up to my mouth. I gasped, and she darted her hot little tongue inside my mouth, sending ribbons of fire through me.

"Take me along with you," she said. "And do it to me, mister."

Slowly, I closed the door on her side of the car.

"All right," I said thickly. "I will."

She ran her hand up and down my thigh, causing my brain to nearly explode. I was sweating.

"Gee, mister," she said, "you're awful hot, aren't you?"

I took a quick breath. She giggled. I reached over and touched one of her little breasts. The warmth of it almost made me drool. She giggled again.

"I like to make older men hot," she said. "It's fun."

She snuggled her head on my shoulder again and moaned softly. The sweat was really coming out on my face now; I was like a man gone suddenly nuts. I wanted to get at her there and then. I reached over to turn off the ignition, but a pressure from her other hand on my arm prevented me from doing so.

"Drive to a side road," she whispered. "Not here. Someone might come along and see us."

Reason returned to me, partially. "Button up your blouse," I said tightly. "For the time being. We'll drive up ahead and find a road to turn off on."

She straightened up and buttoned her blouse, then she put her head back down on my shoulder as I started the Ford in motion. I drove away from there quickly. Luckily, we were the only car on the road.

She began feeling my legs again. I couldn't drive the car straight enough with this going on.

"Cut that out," I said hoarsely, "please...."

She laughed softly. "But you love that, mister. I can tell you do."

"You're damned right I do, but I want to stay on the road, too. Wait till we get to the side road."

She withdrew her hand and laughed again. I drove on, my brain going around in circles. A picture of my ex-wife, Irma, flashed into my mind, but I shut it out quickly.

It was a funny thing all right. Here I hated women's guts and was letting one of them-a young girl, an underage one, at that-lead me into a mess that I knew damn well was in the making.

But I drove the car on anyway. The hell with thinking now, the hell with being sensible, the hell with all of that.

I saw the side road and was about to make the turn when she made a quick movement and jumped over the back of the seat. I turned my head and saw her climbing frantically beneath the blanket in the rear of the car.

Then, looking into the rearview mirror, I knew why she had done this.

I took a deep breath to steady myself. A State Police car was coming up on us from the rear. I did not take the turn but kept going on the highway, slower now. The police car was now almost abreast. A quick glance in the mirror told me the girl was now underneath the blanket. I let out a long sigh and pulled over onto the shoulder as the red light of the police car began flashing.

I stopped the Ford and sat waiting for them. My heart was going like atrip-hammer. Play it cool, I told myself. Maybe they won't guess she is under the blanket, maybe they did not see her sitting in the seat beside me, maybe-a lot of things.

The cop was a tall guy, young-looking. He wore glasses; the college type. He had a set look on his tanned face.

"See your driver's license, buddy," he said.

I wondered if he was noticing all the sweat on my face. He didn't seem to be looking me over too closely. In fact, he struck me as being rather bored. I breathed easier.

I drew out my driver's license, handed it over, and he inspected it briefly. "Stay right here, buddy," he said, and walked to the police car. I saw him hand over the license to the other cop. The other cop looked it over. The police car was parked directly in front of me. I stole a glance into the rear-view mirror. I couldn't see anything in the back seat but the top edge of the blanket. I wasn't sure, but I thought it was quivering a little. I almost laughed but the gravity of the situation prevented it. If those cops spotted that young kid back there....

I cursed my stupidity silently. Of all the lousy stupid tricks, getting caught with an underage girl was the worst. There was no sense to it. It was the dumbest thing a man could do-and I had fallen into it with hardly a thought about the consequences of it.

I was certain they had not seen her in the seat with me. Otherwise they would have made a hell of a fuss about it the first thing.

It was at least five minutes before the cop brought my license back to me and handed it over.

"All right," he said. "Just take it easy. You were weaving all over the road back there. That's why we stopped you. You been drinking, buddy?"

"I had a couple," I replied.

He looked at me. "That's what they all say. Where'd you have them?"

"At a place called Bear's Creek. A bar just outside the town."

"You only had two, eh?"

"That's right. Two. No more."

He looked into the rear seat and I damned near passed out.

"What have you got in the back?"

"Personal belongings. Nothing of any importance."

"What do you do for a living, buddy?"

"I used to work for an importing-exporting firm. I'm on my way to Franklin to do some work of my own."

"What kind of work?"

"I'm going to write a book."

I could see the interest spring into his gray eyes. "Going to write a mystery?" he said, looking at me and grinning a little.

I grinned back. "Maybe," I said.

"About the State Police?"

I managed a laugh; it came off fairly well. "Could be."

"Good luck to you," he said, grinning, and went back and crawled into the police car. I let the air out of my lungs slowly, slowly. I sat still while the other car took off, turned about and headed back in the direction it had come. It had been a close call-too close for comfort. I waited until the police car was nearly out of sight and then I drove out onto the highway and headed north.

After about two miles I felt a hand on my shoulder. The girl was leaning close to my ear.

"Brother," she said, and sighed.

"Yeah," I said crossly. "Just as soon as we get close to the next town, out you go, sister."

She climbed over into the front seat. She sat close to me, I kept my eyes on the road up front. I did not look at her. I wasn't getting into that mess again.

She felt my arm.

"Cut it out," I said. "Don't start that again."

Surprisingly enough, she stopped it. She moved over' on the seat and hunched against the door on her side. She said nothing, and I did not look at her for a long time.

When we came to the outskirts of a town, I pulled up and stopped at the side of the road. I looked over at her significantly.

"Look, mister," she pleaded. "I heard you tell the cop you were going to Franklin. That's where I'm going, too. I'll be good. Can't I ride with you? Please? I haven't got any money."

At that moment it began to rain hard. I hadn't the heart to make her get out in it. Damnit, I thought, everything is against me today, even the weather.

"All right, I'll let you ride partway," I said. "But as soon as the rain stops and we get to another town you will have to get out."

She looked at me with her brown eyes. They were pleading. She was a very pretty kid, but that was the whole trouble. She was desirable-too much so. I knew damned well if she started that sex deal again I would get myself' into a fine pickle. She had it, this kid, she really did. There was something about her that shouted Sex, I sighed. Why the hell couldn't I have picked up a 'woman instead of a young girl? Then I thought, No. No women. The hell with them. Keep clear of women, Joe.

"Thanks," she said, and I was sure I saw a smug little grin creep over her pale face.

I glanced at her after a time.

Her breasts showed very plainly through the tight-fitting blouse. They were heaving up and down and I had to tear my glance away from them. Watch it, Joe, I told myself. This little bitch is still after you, make no mistake about that.

She sat over against the opposite door and looked at me. I could see her out of the corner of my eye. She never took her eyes away from me. She was smirking. I reached into my pocket and drew forth a pack of filter-tips. I nervously offered her the pack. She took it and when she did so managed to give my hand a quick little squeeze. I handed her my lighter and she lit two of them. I had not intended her to do this. When she gave me mine I looked at it. There was no lipstick on it. I shoved it into my mouth and took a drag and exhaled.

"You said you lived in Franklin," I said, trying to speak easily. "What's a girl your age doing so far from home?"

She flared. "I'm nineteen! I'm no girl. I'm a woman."

"Okayl So you're a woman. Do you live in Franklin?"

She was silent for a moment. "I'm going to work there. I got a job there. I'm supposed to start tomorrow morning."

I drove on for perhaps ten miles before venturing to say anything more to her. The rain was still coming down but not as hard. We passed through a town, but I did not ask her to get out of the car. I wished I had-later.

"I've got a half pint of whiskey in my purse," she said, surprisingly. "You want a drink, mister?"

Yeah, I thought, that's all I need. A drink of your juice. "No thanks," I said. "And neither do you, sister, not while you are in my tub."

But she had already got the jug out and was taking a long pull at it. She coughed a little and offered it to me. Like a fool I took a drink and handed it back. Immediately, she sat over next to me and began playing with me.

I stopped the car quickly.

"Get out, goddamn it," I said. "You're nuts, sister."

Instead of getting out she lifted her skirt and I saw the firm roundness of her cream-colored thighs above the nylons. She had put the bottle down on the seat. Now she reached up in under her skirt and drew down her pink panties. She pushed them down over her shoes, taking them completely off.

She leaned back in the seat as far as she could and panted.

"Do it to me, mister," she gasped. "Do it to me all the way. Hurry."

Something exploded in my brain all over again. There was a narrow turn-off ahead about fifty feet from where the car was standing. I headed for it. It led into a field. There was some shrubbery there. I drove it behind it.

She was already working on my belt getting it unloosened. She unzipped me. She got her hand inside my pants.

I felt her fingers working me. Rigidity took place immediately. I thought my brain was going to explode when she pulled me forth and lowered her head to me. I felt the warm sweet wetness of her lips encircling me. I wanted her to keep on with this but after a few moments of this maddening treatment she raised up her head and threw her arms about my neck. Her mouth found mine and she pressed her lips over mine hard. Her skirt was high on her legs and when she straddled me, sinking down on me, I nearly went berserk with desire. I forgot for the moment about hating women. All I could think of was the heat of her young body and the way she was sitting on me jerking her loins about frantically. She managed to affect the desired position probably quite by accident. The inner moisture of her hot young body was really something. I felt my spine tingling like crazy but I knew that sitting like this, in this position, was not what I wanted, so I forced her over on the seat, not breaking contact, got above her searing loins and began to batter her with all the strength I possessed.

She pulled my hair. "Oh ... mister ... that's the way. Do it to me good, mister."

I "did it to her good" and kept on doing it good. I gave her all I had but even that was not enough for this young kid, apparently. She kept pushing her loins up at me so frantically, kept yanking my hair so hard, that I thought I'd have to tell her Jo cool it a bit. But I didn't. I knew she was just very excited as I was. There was no point in talking to her. What she wanted was action.

So action was what I gave her, plenty of it.

"Oh, mister," she moaned. "You're so good for me. Can't you go faster, harder?"

I went faster, harder. I could scarcely get enough air to breath.

"Mister," she sobbed frantically. "Can you bite my breasts, too?"

"I'm not a contortionist," I gasped, "but I'll try anything once."

She wrapped her youthful legs about mine and grabbing my head, shoved it down to her breasts. She seemed to pull her breasts up somehow for the next thing I knew I had one of them between my lips. She wriggled her hips about almost causing me to release too soon.

"Hey," I said, breathing hard, "Watch it, kid. You want to spoil everything?"

She bit me on the side of my face. "Oh, mister ... do it to me good," she said, repeating herself.

I wondered what the hell she thought I was doing-playing handball? "I am," I muttered. "Don't expect the impossible, kid."

"Bite me, mister, bite me hard."

So all right, she wanted to be bitten. I bit her and bit her so hard she screamed from the pain of it. I could taste the blood in my mouth.

She yanked her breast out of my mouth and began to swear at me, but I could not make out what she was saying.

I had a crazy out-of-context thought then. I thought of having gone to my employer, Mac Gibbon's earlier in the day. I remembered telling him I was quitting, that I was going to try to become a writer. I recalled how he had congratulated me on this, how he had actually given me a pat on the back, had written down the address of this woman in the town of Franklin, how he had told me to go there, and rent a room and do my writing, how he had....

"Mister," she cried, breaking into my crazy thoughts, "what are you slowing up for? I want you to do it to me good, man."

I placed my hands behind her buttocks and yanked her up more tightly to me. At the same time she placed hers on mine and pressed me down harder on her. What a hot young kid, I thought vaguely. I've really got a passion flower here. She wants sex and can't get enough of it. Well, I'll show her a thing or two.

"Mister," she cried out again, "take me hard, please. Give me all of it. I gotta have it."

I really went to work on her then. I battered her hot young body like I had never battered a woman before. I took long, powerful strokes and when I did this she stiffened her entire body and moaned.

"Oh, mister ... you may be an old guy but you sure know how."

I wasn't so sure I cared much for her opinion of my age. Hell, I was a young guy, but I supposed a kid like this one would think anyone over twenty was old.

"Hit me," she moaned, and I did not know what she meant. "Hit me with it, mister."

Now I knew what she meant.

I picked up the tempo even more, still holding her firm young buttocks in place. I gave her everything I had to give her.

"Mister," she hollered. "That's it, that's what I want from you."

I did not attempt to reply to her. Talking was a lot of nonsense at a time like this.

"Mister, oh mister...." she sobbed.

I looked at her face. She was crying real tears. There was something about this that set me off even more. Now I really battered her, really battered the hell out of her. The harder, the faster, I went, the more she loved it. She kept pushing her searing loins upward against me and once she nearly broke our contact, but I held her down on the seat firmly and gave her what she was begging so hard for.

CHAPTER TWO

It was several minutes before I was calm enough to sit back in the seat. I saw her reach down and pull her panties back on. She was breathing fast and moaning in a low-pitched key. Her blouse was open and her pointed breasts were goingup and down. She buttoned the blouse up slowly.

I felt like I had been completely drained of all feeling. But there was one feeling, if you want to call it that, that staggered around in my brain. That was simply this:

I was a goddamn stupid sucker.

"What's the matter?" she asked me after a few more moments. "You look funny in the face."

I said nothing.

"Hey," she said. "What's wrong? Didn't you like it?"

I still didn't say anything. But I was thinking plenty.

"Do you want to do it to me again?"

"No."

"Wasn't I any good?"

"Shut up."

"Say ... what's wrong with you? Why are you looking at me so funny-like?"

"Get out of the car," I said tensely. "For your own good get out of the car. Right now."

Something in my tone frightened her. She got out of the car. The rain was still coming down, but I didn't care now.

"You ain't gonna leave me here, are you, mister?" she said, sobbing.

"Yes. That's right. I'm leaving you right here, sister."

"You son of a bitch," she screamed. "You lousy son a a bitch."

I started the motor and backed out of there. She stood, the rain cascading around her head, watching me. She was sobbing real hard now. I didn't care. Goddamn women, anyway.

I drove away and left her there. And as I drove away I thought about having stopped in the bar back aways, of having a drink, of hearing about the guy who had picked up a young girl and raped and killed her. I shuddered. At least, Ms young girl had been willing, more than willing. Supposing she told the cops that I had raped her however, which I had done in the legal sense; she was not old enough to give consent-what would happen to me then?

It was a good question.

It was after seven o'clock in the evening when I arrived at the city limits. I saw the sign which said: Franklin, Population 12,000. For a Visit or a lifetime-A Good Place to Be. I slowed down to look for a bar or some place where I could ask about the location of Hoffman Street, the street where Mrs. Willows lived. She was, of course, the woman Mac had told me about. She rented out rooms to aspiring writers and such-like, so Mac had said. He had told me about other men having gone there to attempt their first books. He had said it was the ideal place for it. He had been there himself once, long ago, but not for the purpose of writing a book. He had not told me why he bad been there. But there had been other men there at the time, all of them writing books.

I had felt remorse all the way to Franklin for what I had done to the girl. Both the taking of her and the leaving of her in that field. But now I pushed such thoughts oujt of my mind. I would forget about it. She had asked for it and I had given it to her. The hell with her, I thought now. But it still bothered me some, leaving her like that. I wasn't really that much of a heel. I had just gotten panicky and pulled a stupid thing.

I thought of my ex-wife, Irma, and the lousy deal she had pulled on me. I thought of my hatred for all women because of her, and decided that that was why I had cut out leaving the kid in the field.

It was a hell of a thing all right, but I had done it.

Up ahead I saw a sign saying BAR, so I stopped the Ford and parked it. I went inside and asked the bartender where Hoffman Street was.

"You're on it," he said. "This is Hoffman Street. What number?"

I told him after glancing at the paper Mac had given me.

"Four blocks up the street," he said.

I thanked him and returned to the car. I drove up the street and found number 816 easily enough. It was a big four-story brick house with a lot of elm trees around it, and a big yard.

I drove into the driveway and got out. I walked up to the front door and rang the bell. The door opened.

A tall, good-looking woman stood there. She looked to be about thirty-eight or so. Her hair was just beginning to gray a little. She was very attractive, in a self-possessed way. She looked like she knew a thing or two.

"Yes?" she said, looking me up and down swiftly.

"I'm Joe Harms," I told her. "Mac Gibbons wrote you about me, I believe."

She became more cordial. "Oh yes. Come in, please, Mr. Harms. You're the-writer, aren't you?"

I grinned and stepped by her into the long hallway. This was a very old house, I saw. At one time it had been quite a place; still was, in fact.

"Nice place you have, Mrs. Willows," I said.

The woman laughed. "I'm not Mrs. Willows. I'm Olive Grant. I'm an artist. I live here now, too." She frowned. "Check that. I did live here. I'm moving out in about one hour. Can't stand it here any longer. I-"

She looked around quickly. I wondered what was wrong.

"Well ... I'm glad to meet you, anyway," I said. "Is Mrs. Willows in? I'd like to see her."

She shook her head slowly. "Mrs. Willows," she said carefully, "is in no condition to see anyone right now."

It was an awkward moment, I couldn't think of anything to say to her. What had she meant?

"She told me you were coming, however," Olive Grant said, after a moment. "She asked me to tell you your room would be number ten. That's on the third floor. You're the only one up there. The others-what few are left-are all on the second floor."

I looked around, found a chair, and sat down without asking her. She looked at me.

"Care for a cigarette?" I said, just to have something to say. She shook her head. I lit one for myself. I thought she seemed quite nervous, agitated. About what?

Finally I said, "What seems to be the matter with Mrs. Willows?"

She bit her lip. Then, "She's drunk-again. That's all. She gets stoned all the time. Awful woman."

I studied my cigarette. "How do I find my way to the room I've been assigned?"

She got to her feet and I did, too. "Come along and I'll show you the way," she said.

The stairs were at the end of the long hall. It was an open stairway, very wide-the type you seldom see any more. When she got to the second floor Olive Grant turned sharply to the left with me bringing up the rear. We walked up one more flight. My room was the first one at the top of the stairs on the right. She pointed it out to me. I saw the number 10 above the door, as though the place were a hotel.

"It's supposed to be unlocked," Olive Grant told me. "But you better try it to make sure. Half the time around here one never knows if one can get into one's room or not. That's the kind of a jumbled-up household this has turned out to be."

"I take it," I said carefully, "you don't especially like it here, Miss Grant."

"Like it!" she spat. "This damned place is enough to drive a person out of his mind. That's how well I like it."

She turned and walked down the stairs leaving me standing there puzzled. I frowned and wondered what was wrong with her. I went to the door of number ten and tried it. It was locked. I turned and walked down the two flights of stairs and down the hallway to the front door. I went out to my car and began to unload my stuff. It took me ten minutes to get it all up to the third floor. I stacked it in front of my room in the hall.

I went back down the stairs determined to find Mrs. Willows, pay her the money to cover the rent, and get a key. There was no one, apparently, around. I saw a door leading off the hall, and went to it and opened it. The room I now entered was a mammoth one. It was at least sixty feet across in both directions. It looked like it had been, at one time, a ballroom, or something of that order. Now it looked like anything but a ballroom. It was a mess. There were whiskey bottles, empty ones, all over the place. Empty glasses rested on every piece of furniture, including the sofa; It looked like someone had been having a ball here.

"Hi," a voice said, and I swung around quickly.

I saw a woman of about thirty standing in the doorway. She was blonde and dressed in thin pajamas. Purple ones. She was smoking with a long cigarette-holder. She surveyed me with half-closed eyes. She had a certain look about her I had seen on women in tough joints in the city. A half knocked-out look, like with dope or something.

"Hi," I said, taking a couple of steps toward her.

"Who might you be?" she asked, without taking the holder from between her very red lips.

"I'm Joe Harms," I said. "And who might you be, if I may ask? Are you Mrs. Willows?"

"Yeah, I'm the lady in question. You aren't ... oh ... sure you are. You're the fellow that is going to write a book. Well, what do you know. You're younger than I thought you would be. Not bad-looking, either. What's your name again?"

I told her.

She looked me up and down like she was inspecting an animal and wanting to know if it was worth buying. She had a really sensuous look about her. Her lips were too thick, too wet-looking, as if she were in the habit of running her tongue over them too often.

I took out my wallet and extracted fifty dollars. I handed it to her and she took it, giving me an odd look.

"For two weeks ... in advance," I said. "Is that right?"

She shoved it down the front of her purple pajamas, in between her breasts, and laughed. She took the holder out of her mouth when she laughed, revealing rather nice-looking teeth and a pink tongue.

"You'll find a key in that drawer over there," she said, pointing to a table nearby. "It's just a skeleton key. Not much sense in locking your room here, though."

"Why not?" I asked, suspiciously.

She laughed again. "Oh, never mind. I was just kidding. Are you really planning on staying here all summer, Mr. Harms?" She took a drag on the holder. "That's what Mac writes."

"I think so," I said. "Any reason why I shouldn't? If there is what is it, please?"

She laughed again. "She was a maddening creature. That laugh of hers annoyed me. I held my temper, though I wanted to wipe that smirk off her face.

"Mr. Harms," she said suddenly, "are you a sex deviate?"

I looked her over; looked at her blonde hair, her hazel and somewhat bloodshot For a moment I felt like smacking her.

"I think I'll take that fifty back, Mrs. Willows," I said abruptly. "I guess I made a slight mistake in coming here. No, I'm not a sex deviate. The fifty, please."

She reached down in her pajamas and pulled forth the money I had given her. She threw it on the floor.

"Get out of here, you fool," she said, and turning about, closed the door in my face.

I picked up the money and put it back in my wallet. Then I opened the door and walked up the two flights of stairs. I picked up my two heaviest grips and started down the stairs.

That's when it happened. My feet went out from under me. I fell all the way to the bottom of the stairs. I remembered the grips falling along with me. I passed out from pain a moment later. But before I did I caught a quick glimpse of Mrs. Willows standing at the top of the stairs. She looked to be laughing again. I had just enough time to wonder what the hell was so funny. Then blackness took over and I passed out.

CHAPTER THREE

When I came to I was still on the floor. It was quite dark at the bottom of the stairs now. I sat up and felt my arms, legs and head. There was a little dried blood on my face-it felt like dried blood, at least. I got to my feet. I felt a bit dizzy, but outside of that I was okay.

I looked around and found a light-switch. X flicked it on. There was no one in the hall. My two grips were still laying on the floor. I picked them up and carried them outside and put them in the rear seat of the Ford. I retraced my steps and got the rest of my things and carried them out to the car.

"Are you leaving, Mr. Harms?"

I looked up and saw Olive Grant standing on the porch. She had a grip in her hands, too. Obviously, she was leaving also.

"Yeah. Want a ride somewhere, Miss Grant?"

"You had better call me Olive," she said, smiling. "Not Miss Grant. I've been married twice and divorced twice."

"Sorry."

"Look," she said. "Take me to a hotel, will you We can come back here tomorrow if we want to."

"I don't think I want to,? I said. "Come back here, I mean."

"It'll be all right then," she said. There was an odd look on her face now.

"I don't follow you, Olive." Before saying anything she reached over and wiped the blood from my face.

I thanked her.

"You don't dig what is going on here, do you, Mr. Harms?"'

"No. Not exactly. And call me Joe."

"All right, Joe. I'll tell you. Mrs. Willows has a whole goddamn houseful of queers. Seven of them. That's why I want to get out of here until tomorrow. They are all leaving in the morning and it's about time, too. The damned lice." Her tone was strange-sounding.

"I figured something like that," I said. "Come along. I'll take you to a hotel and tomorrow we can figure something out. I'd planned on staying here. I have work to do."

She came down the steps and handed me her suitcase which I put in the rear seat beside my own things. I had turned on the car lights and now I could see her better. She was a ravishing-looking woman-the kind of woman who could make a man's blood boil.

She looked at me and grinned. "My, but it's pleasant to talk to and be around a man again. Those crumby queers were driving me nuts. I've been here two weeks now."

I helped her into the car. "Can't say as I blame you any. I wouldn't care much about beating them off all the time, either."

She laughed a short little laugh. "These are female ones. They wouldn't bother you any. It's women they're after."

"Lesbians, eh? I see what you mean, Olive."

She moved over closer to me. "Joe," she said, "don't think me forward...." She stopped and giggled a little. "Hell," she said, "I am forward, why kid myself? I want you to do something for me, Joe. I-"

"Yes?" I was suddenly very interested in her.

"I want you to take me to a hotel-and lay me good."

The air seemed to crackle around my ears.

"Did I hear you right?" I asked carefully.

"You did. Will you?" She giggled a little.

I started the motor and backed out of the drive. I knew she was looking at me closely. What the hell?

"I'll take you to a hotel," I said stupidly. "We'll see what happens. I'm a funny guy, Olive. I don't get along with women too well."

She pressed my arm. It was a nice feeling. I couldn't explain it if I tried. Why is it some women can touch you and it seems different? Damned if I know. But I knew this woman was okay. Somehow I knew it. I felt it.

"You had a rough experience, too, I take it," she said. "With your wife maybe?"

"Yes, Olive. I was married once. She was a no-good bitch. She laid every guy in our neighborhood, made a fool out of me, and I never knew a thing about it. We were married four years, too. I never had the least suspicion she was that kind of woman. She had a way of hiding herself from me that I can't explain. I guess I was just a dumb, trusting jerk of a husband. But it did something to me when I found out. There was something else, too. Left a scar, I mean. That was three years ago. I suppose I should be snapping out of it by now, but I haven't. Not entirely. Maybe I never will, either."

"What happened? How did you discover it?"

We were moving along the wide street now. There were a few other cars coming from the opposite direction. I reached over and switched the lights from bright to dim.

I felt the pressure on my arm again. "Don't tell me if you don't feel like it, Joe," she said.

"It's none of my business."

"No," I said, giving the wheel a sharp turn to avoid a woman driver who was trying to drive in two lanes at once. "It's okay. I found out about her because the guy she was laying with at the moment blew his lid and stuck a pair of shears in her neck."

"How awful," she said softly. "Poor guy."

"He was a bastard," I said bitterly. "Supposed to be my best friend."

"I mean you, Joe. When I said 'poor guy.'"

I was silent for a while.

"Joe," she said. "Maybe I can help you forget all that. Maybe when we get to the hotel ... Well, who knows?"

I gave the wheel a turn and up ahead a sign read Hotel Condon. Olive touched my arm.

"Joe," she said. "There. Stop the car. It looks all right. Besides, I'm hungry. There is a cafe alongside of it."

I found a parking lot nearby and swung the car into it. We got out and I locked the car after taking one of my suitcases and hers too. We walked around to the entrance of the hotel and went in.

"Make it husband and wife, Joe," she whispered. I nodded and wewalkedup to the desk. The clerk said hello and shoved the register over to me. I signed my name and added "and wife."

A bellhop came and took our bags. We followed him to the elevator self-consciously.

We inspected the room and when the boy had left I asked her if she wanted to go down and eat. She told me yes and we went back down in the elevator and found the cafe. There was an entrance to it directly from the hotel lobby.

Because of the hour-it was after nine o'clock-we had not much choice of food to order, but we managed to get ham and eggs and they-were tasty.

When we were through eating I asked Olive if she would like a drink.

"Let's get a bottle and take it up to the room," she suggested. I got the bellhop to rustle up a jug and he charged me plenty for it. We were in the room now and I ripped the cap off the bourbon and hunted up two glasses. I poured Olive a good stiff one. One for myself, too.

"You know something," she said. "I didn't even notice the name of this hotel. Did you?"

I laughed. "You must have been anxious, or something. It's the Hotel Condon."

She smiled. "Could be I'm excited at being alone with a man in a hotel room. I haven't had a man in over a month. That's too long to go without it, Joe. You know that."

I wasn't ready for that kind of talk-not yet I wasn't. I changed the subject.

"Does Mrs. Willows," I asked, "have a husband?"

A funny look came over her pretty face. "Didn't you know about that, either?"

"What?"

"She's got a husband all right. Poor bastard. He stays in his room on the fourth floor most of the time."

"Why?"

"I'm not sure. I have heard he is ill, but I don't know if its the truth. I've only seen him once. He had a fit or something in the hall one evening. Awful thing. His wife just laughed at him. Two of the queers had to carry him back up to his room. He got all right then. Mrs. Willows wouldn't talk about it afterward to me. She just told me to forget about it."

"She sounds like quite a nice character," I said.

"I wonder why Mac recommend this place to me. He couldn't have known all these things."

"Probably not. Neither did I when I first came."

The phone on the little stand rang out sharply. Olive was nearest so she picked up the receiver. She listened for a moment without saying a word,. Then slowly she replaced the receiver on the hook and turned to me.

"What was it?" Iasked, wondering why the odd look on her face.

"That was Mrs. Willows. She just asked me why I was staying here in the hotel. Then she hung up without waiting for an answer. How did she know we were here, I wonder?"

"You mean she mentioned me, too?"

Olive Grant nodded.

"What a curious creature she is," I said. "Is she crazy?"

"Something," she said evasively. "She surely is something or other." I did not know exactly what it was, but there was something about the way she said this that struck me as being phony.

I took a drink. It tasted good. Olive tried hers and made a face. "I wish we had a chaser," she said. "I never could drink liquor straight." But, nonetheless, she tossed it .off and asked for another. I gave it to her. She looked at me. "Drink up, Joe. I'm one up on you. You don't want me to get ahead of you, do you?"

I finished mine and poured out a bit more in the glass. Olive got up and went into the bathroom. I sat staring into my glass.

A knock came on the door and I got up and opened it. The bellhop was standing there.

"Yeah? What is it?" I asked.

"There's a woman down in the lobby. She claims she is a friend of yours, and your wife, too," he added. "She says her name is Mrs. Willows. She wants to come up. Shall we allow her to? The clerk asked me to come up and tell you this rather than phone it up."

I hesitated. The truth was I did not know what to think.

"Send her up," I finally said. He left and I closed the door. Olive came back into the room and I told her about Mrs. Willows. She paled. Grabbing up her drink, she tossed it off hurriedly. I saw that her hands were shaking.

A knock came on the door after a moment, and it was Mrs. Willows. She entered the room and stood looking at the two of us. There was a snarl on her face. But that wasn't what surprised me the most.

It was the gun in her hand.

Olive' gasped. I stepped back away from Mrs. Willows. She had a wild look on her face. Her hair was disheveled and her lips were pressed together like she was biting down hard on something. Her breathing was coming in little quick jerks.

"Put that gun away, Mrs. Willows," I said harshly. "What's the big idea?" I took a step toward her and stopped, for she had turned it directly on me.

"Stay right where you are, Mr. Harms," she said, her voice sounding thin. "I've come to take Olive back to my place."

I looked at her. I looked at Olive Grant and wondered what the hell was going on. Olive had put her wrap on, I noticed, "Are you going with her?" I asked in surprise.

"I'm sorry, Joe," she said. "I must."

I shrugged. "Whatever you say," I said. I looked at Mrs. Willows. "You heard her. She's going back with you. Why, I can't figure out, but I know this, nay dear Mrs. Willows. Either you put that goddamn silly gun away or I'll take it away from you and right now. Put it away. Quick."

"You can't frighten me, Mr. Harms," Mrs. Willows said. But she put away the gun. She put it in her purse and snapped the thing shut.

"Looks like you were the one trying to do the frightened,'" I said.

Olive said, "Oh, come along, Clare. We'll go back to the house if it's that important to you. Though I can't imagine anyone acting more silly than you just have."

Olive went to the door and opened it and Clare Willows followed her out into the hall.

"See you, Olive," I said dryly. "Now I can drink this pint all by myself. What fun."

Olive turned and faced me through the doorway.

"I'm sorry this had to happen, Joe," she said. Then she was gone. The Willows character closed the door and I heard their footsteps going toward the elevator. Of all the silly, goofy affairs, this deal had been the silliest and goofiest.

I picked up the bottle and looked at it and, on an impulse, filled my water glass up to the top. I took Olive's glass to the bathroom, rinsed it out, filled it with cold water and brought it back into the room. I'd drink alone.

I sat sipping the stuff and trying, in an idle sort of way, to figure out what the hell Mrs. Willows had on Olive Grant. The only thing I could come up with was the obvious one. A sex deal of some sort.' Maybe Clare Willows was queer. How did I know? It was even possible the two of them were perverted lovers. I dismissed the whole thing from my mind. The hell with trying to figure out that crap.

I drank most of the glassful of whiskey before it hit me, and when it did hit me it hit hard.

I went over and half fell, half crawled onto the bed. I closed my eyes. It seemed like the top of my head was coming off. It ached horribly. Maybe, I thought, that fall hurt me more than I had known. The word concussion kept coming to my mind. I think I groaned quite a bit. Things were pretty hazy at first; then were a hell of a lot more of the same thing. My head felt like it was going to explode.

I think it did.

And then a picture of a half-forgotten event flashed into my mind, I seemed tobe in another room, another bed. I seemed to be going back in time.

CHAPTER FOUR

I raised my head off the pillow and looked at the sleeping woman beside me. Her back-was turned and in the half darkness I could not see much of her face. I sat up in the bed and ran my fingers through my hair. My head ached like hell. I started to reach over and awaken the woman, whoever she was-I could not remember where the hell I had picked her up, if I had picked her up. My mouth tasted like a garbage pail. I needed a drink, but a drink of water, not liquor. The thought of liquor made my stomach rebel, and I retched. With my head spinning around like an egg-beater working on an omelet, I crawled out of the bed, found my way to the bathroom, washed my face with cold water, and returned to the bedroom.

"Well ... hello there," she said, brushing hair back from her face. She was blonde, very much a blonde She was also a complete stranger. I tried to summon up some recollection of who she was, but nothing came.

"Hi," I said. That's all I felt like saying. I found a comb on the dresser and began to comb my hair. I had to stand in front of the mirror to do this, and when I did so I saw a tall red-headed guy there. He looked like he had a hangover big enough for a half-dozen people. He did, too. I shifted my position a little so I could see the girl's reflection in the mirror. When I got her in range I saw she was staring at the back of my head. I turned around slowly.

"Look," I said, trying to make it sound easy-like casual. "I'm sorry as hell. But so far I can't seem to remember who you are. I guess I must have gotten pretty awful last night. Mind telling me your name?" I tried a small laugh, bit it did not come out too well. Sounded more like a cackle.

"Hey, man." she said, rubbing her neck. "You aren't the only one that's fogged. I feel like I don't know who I am, either. It's that horrible. We must have really tied one on together. Don't laugh now when I say this, but I can't remember your name, either."

This had its funny side and we both laughed and I felt better-some better.

I turned back to the mirror, took one quick look, and glanced back at the girl.

"Do I look as bad as I think I do?"

"Probably. Do I?"

"You look better than I do," I said.

"Naturally. I'm a girl."

We were feeling a little silly now. We laughed at this, too.

"I need a drink," she said. "Can you get one for me?"

"I think so, but you haven't told me who you are yet."

She looked at me differently now. "You're serious, aren't you? You can't remember who I am, can you? Well, okay. I've had days like that, too. I'm Irma. Now do you know?"

Irma? Irma who? I thought.

"And the last name, too, please?" I said, trying to make a joke out of it, but I realized she knew damned well I could not remember that either.

"Farrington," she said impatiently. "Irma Farrington, damn it all. Stop giving me that old stuff, Joe. You carry it too far." She had used my name.

So, I thought, she does know me.

"Thank you," I said, making a mock bow which I immediately regretted, for the whole top of my head threatened to fall off.

"Hey," she said, throwing back the sheet and revealing her nakedness, "what a guy. Picks me up, has a fight with my boy friend first, knocks him cold, buys me drinks, gets me loaded, bring me home with him, makes terrific love to me half the night-it was terrific too,. Joe-and the next morning he can't remember it."

I felt slightly ridiculous. "I'll go out and get you that drink."

"Out? Out where?"

"To the kitchen of course," I said. "Where else?"

I brought the drink back to her and she took it down in one fast, furious gulp.

"You're healthy, at least," I remarked. "Wish I could do that. Maybe I'd come alive again."

She was half-dressed now and why is it a woman looks more naked when she is half-dressed than when she is all naked?

"Say, you're stacked," I said, eyeing her with interest-despite the fact I felt like dying-and liking what I saw.

"I'm a good lay, too, Joe. You said so yourself. Last night you said so. You told me that three or four times."

"I believe you," I said somberly. "If I could remember it, I'd like it better."

"You'd better struggle down a drink, man. You look awful."

I went back to the kitchen and got the bottle and brought it into the bedroom. I poured a small one and got it down. Right away, I felt better. In a moment I had another.

"This is a nice apartment, Joe. How come a single guy has such a nice place? Seems odd."

I didn't answer. I poured myself another drink instead.

"What are you going to do, Joe, get drunk all over again?"

"Keep quiet," I said harshly. "Don't talk so much. Anything I can't stand is a woman who has to talk all the time."

I looked at her. She seemed not only surprised by this outburst, but, odd as it sounds, pleased, also. Her eyes began to shine strangely. She came over to where I was sitting and knelt down beside me and started running her hand up and down my leg. She kept running her tongue over her lips, too.

"Can I, Joe?" she said suddenly. "CanI, please...."

I looked down at her. "Can you what?"

She didn't look me in the eye. "You know."

I was silent. "I want to, Joe," she said simply.

I felt a prickly sensation up and down my spine. I'd heard of women like this, but this was the first time I'd met one.

I stood up and her hand fell away from me.

"You'd better get out of her, Irma," I said. I felt ugly. "Come on. Get the rest of your clothes on and beat it-or I'm liable to take you up on your proposition. I feel pretty degenerate this morning. Hurry. Get dressed. I want you to get out of here. Right now."

"All right, sorry, Joe...." She was hurt and angry, I could tell. I was just ... shocked. Yeah, shocked and confused.

She put' her dress on. She didn't bother doing anything to her hair or face and that struck me as being pretty far out for a woman. She just opened the door and walked out. She never said a word to me.

Just walked out and closed the door.

I was sweating like a guy in a steam bath.

I sat there in the chair for a long time. I felt like I had just witnessed something pretty foul and dirty. I couldn't explain exactly the way I felt, but it was something like that. Such a thing had never happened to me before; the thing she had offered was the sort of thing men laugh and joke about but seldom experience-at least not right out of the blue and suddenly.

Maybe I was just naive and young. I was twenty-three.

I was also sick to my stomach. I went in and tried to heave. I couldn't. I climbed into the tub after a time and sat there soaking in the heat of it. I got out and dried myself, then got dressed. I felt better and cleaner.

I did not see Irma Farrington for three months after that. I did not go out much and that was probably the reason I did not run into her, for she was always running around the town, especially at night and with some guy willing to buy drinks and so forth. She was quite a night-chick all right, she certainly had the reputation for it, I found out later.

When I did happen to see her she was sitting in a booth in a restaurant-it was Conner's on Fourth Avenue-with two dandies. Two great big fierce-eyed female queers who looked like they could have filled in at halfback for a small college eleven.

She did not see me and I was glad of it. I got out of there, but I could not forget her being with those two freaks.

Was that how the ball bounced with Irma?

About that time I went into a new business. Sol Herman, head of the Acme agency, gave me a job booking dance-bands.

He had called me up and asked me if I was interested. Since I had come to this town I had been engaged in a variety of small deals, none of which had turned out well, and I jumped at the chance. I told him I would come down to his office right away, but he advised me to wait until the next day.

I went to see him at the appointed time. I had known Sol before in Chicago, but only slightly. He was a fat little boy with a great sense of humor, a pretty good guy, a rather likeable sort. His office was on the fifth floor of the Metro Building in downtown Highland Park. I took the elevator up and walked down and opened the door of his office. A redheaded gal sat there behind a dinky little desk.

She looked up when I entered.

I walked over to her desk and stood looking down at her. She had a pair of boobs that looked as though they were trying to have a life of their own. They strained at the tightness of her very sensible business dress.

"When you are through looking," she said sweetly, "perhaps you can tell me if you have an appointment. Your name, please?"

I straightened up with a jerk and grinned at her.

"Mr. Harms. Joe Harms, baby. Mr. Herman is expecting me."

She smiled, revealing the whitest teeth I had ever seen.

"He is indeed expecting you, Mr. Harms. In fact, he was just now commenting on the fact that you were ten minutes late."

"Sorry," I said. "I had to hunt for a cab. They hide them in this burg it seems."

"You may go right in, Mr. Harms."

"Thanks, baby."

"My name," she said, "is Miss Burns. Not baby."

"Crazy! Is that the right door there?" I pointed at the only door in sight.

She grinned, but said nothing. I opened the door and Sol Herman's voice boomed out at me.

"Joey. Joey B. Harms. Glad to see you, boy."

We shook hands and I looked at him. He was fatter than he had been. He had a grin from ear to ear. He also had a cigar stuck in place in his mouth. He was totally bald now.

"Sit down, Joey. Have a cigar, boy."

I sat down. I refused the cigar and lit a cigarette.

"Didn't you play in a band at one time, Joey?" he began by saying.

I nodded. "It was only kid stuff, though, Sol. Nothing that amounted to much."

"Well, you should know something about the business then. How do you feel about tackling my proposition? Think you'd like it? It'll mean quite a bit of raveling, you know."

"Sure, Sol. I think I'd like it. I'm a pretty restless guy, you know. I like to be on the move."

"You aren't too restless, are you, Joey?"

"No. Not too restless." I grinned at him. "Just enough to do myself some good now and then."

He explained what it was I had to do. Took him two hours of solid talking. I sat and listened, nodding from time to time and putting to a question or two at times. There didn't seem to be too much to it.

When he was through with me we shook hands and he handed me a tiny book.

"Write down your expenses as they occur," he said. He advised me as to which expenses would be allowed and which would not, grinning all the while he talked.

I got the idea-most anything short of meals and whores.

He told me I would have to have a car and I told him I already had one. That was all there was to it. I had a job. I got up and left the office.

When I came out of the elevator I bumped into Irma Farrington.

"Joe," she said, smiling. "How are you?"

I had forgotten about her and seeing her unexpectedly like this caused me to flush. She watched me changing color with an amused expression. I felt like a fool.

"Can I buy you a drink, Irma?" I stammered. "There's a bar next door, I think."

"Sure you can, Joe. I'd love to have you buy me a drink. I'd rather have you buy me a drink than anyone else."

I laughed.

Well, we had the drink all right. We had half a dozen of them and just as I hsd expected we ended up in my apartment. She was quite witting to come along.

I had a bottle and poured her a drink from it.

She took it, looked at me for a moment, then said; "Joe, I've made up my mind. I'm going to marry you. What do you think about that?"

I saw she was apparently quite serious about it, but I just grinned. "Not if I have anything to say about it, Irma. I don't want to get married. Marriage is a trap, my dear, and I'm having none of it-now or later. Maybe later. But certainly now now, nor to you, doll."

She took a swallow of her drink. "What's the matter with me, Joe? I'd make you a good wife."

"Maybe, but I just told you. I'm not about to get married."

She grinned. "You won't be able to help yourself."

"Thanks for warning me," I said dryly.

She came up close to me and squeezed my arm tightly. "Joe," she said softly, "I have an idea I shocked you a little the other time I was here. Were you offended by what I wanted to do?"

I pretended I did not recall the incident at first. I could not think of any other way of handling it.

"Come off it, Joe. What are you-an infant?"

I stiffened. "Why talk about it?" I countered. "You had a bad hangover and so did I. Both of us were way off base that day probably."

She looked up at me. "Not me, Joe. I wasn't off base. I'm not now, either. I just know what I like and I like you."

"You're a hot little devil, aren't you, Irma?"

"I always said, Joe, that when I found a man I wanted to do that to I would marry him, one way or another."

I looked at her blonde beauty, her light-blue eyes that held, or seemed to hold, the innocence of a mere child, and I wondered what the hell it was with this woman. Was she just oversexed or was she some kind of a nut-a sex nut?

To look into her eyes was almost like looking into the eyes of a ten-year-old kid. There was no cunning there at all. Just a sort of innocent gaze that the cleanest thinking kid in the world might have, but there was something else there, too, and it did something wild to me.

I put my arms around her and held her close to me. She purred like a kitten. I raised her chin with my finger and kissed her. She wanted to keep it going, but I pushed her away.

"Joe," she said. "How do you do this to me?"

"I don't know what it is," I said huskily, "but I know it is a weird deal. I know that all right. It's just too-weird for words."

She sprang back and slapped me on the face at the same time.

"You son of a bitch," she said. "You son of a bitch. I tell you I like you and you say it is weird-you goddamn son of a bitch. I hate you."

"Cut that out, Irma," I yelled at her. "Cut it out."

She slapped me again and there was nothing to do but one thing. I clipped her-hard.

Then I waited awhile, looking down at her on the floor.

She was bleeding from the mouth. She just sat there and bled. I looked at her some more.

"Now then," I said. "Next time you feel like blowing up at me, think it over for a moment or two."

She looked up at me. "Help me up, you louse, please help me up."

"Sit there, until you remember how to talk."

She actually laughed. "Joe, how did you know-that this is the way to handle me, you smart son-"

"Cool it off and don't say it, Irma."

She shut up. I went to her and kissed her.

And in this screwy manner we began the craziest love affair any guy and gal ever had. At least I think we did.

CHAPTER FIVE

I knew I had been dreaming about the time I had met my former wife, Irma. When my eyes came open all the way I looked around. Some dame all in white stood by the bed.

"Well, Mr. Harms, you feel like you want to wake up for a while? That's good. The doctor is here and wants to have a talk with you." She smiled at me.

I tried to raise up, but a pair of hands pushed me back down. They were gentle but firm.

"You have to lie very still, Mr. Harms," a man's voice said, "until we are sure you haven't a concussion. How did it happen?"

I managed to focus my eyes on him. He was a young chap, obviously the doctor.

"Can you see me well?" he asked. His tone of voice sounded familiar.

"Pretty well."

"You are Joe Harms. Right?"

"Yes, that's correct."

"Can you see me well enough to recognize me, Joe?"

I looked at him more closely now. "Why ... aren't you Jim Hale? Didn't you use to work in Tom Terrens's band?"

He laughed. "Nothing wrong with your memory, Joe. I'm Jim Hale all right. Only now I'm Dr. Hale. Do you feel well enough to talk a little?"

"I feel weak, Jim, but not too much so. So you are a doctor now. How did I get here? Was I sick or something in the hotel room?"

"A woman named Olive Grant called the ambulance, I hear. She had returned to the hotel and found you lying in a daze on the bed. That's the story, the way it was told to me. How did you happen to fall down the stairs, Joe?"

I told him. He got up. "I won't talk to you any more right now, Joe. You need to sleep some more. I'll be back later. You get some more rest and don't try to move your head."

"All right. But I think it is strange we should meet again like this, Jim, I mean Doc."

He laughed. "We'll talk about it later on. Bye now."

He left the room and the nurse gave me a pill to take, plus a glass of water. I could barely swallow, but got it down.

"Now you sleep, Mr. Harms," she said, tucking the sheet up around my shoulders. "I'll look in on you after a while."

I nodded and watched her as she walked out of the room. I tried to recall something about the hotel room and what had actually happened, but everything was too foggy and vague. The only thing I could recall was Clare Willows sneering face. I drifted off to sleep then and it must have been a long time later that I felt the hand gently on my arm. I opened my eyes.

"Miss Grant to see you, Mr. Harms," the same nurse said. "She can only stay for a moment. You mustn't talk too much just yet."

I looked at Olive Grant and was enough awake to wonder if she would correct the nurse's calling her Miss, but she did not. This was the sort of half-baked thinking I was doing right then.

"Joe," she said, grinning at me. "The doctor tells me you can go home tomorrow or maybe the day after.

He says you have to-they need the bed. I have come to tell you I will be here to take you to the Willows place, if you want me to. You have to have someone to look after you for a few days, you see."

I stared at her. "Are you sure, Olive, that you know what you're saying?"

She flushed. "Yes, I do, Joe. Let me tell you. Clare Willows is terribly sorry about that scene at the hotel. I convinced her that you were okay. You see, she has some sort of nutty idea I need .protection from wolves. She knows about my past, you must understand, Joe. I-"

The nurse walked out of the room then.

"Look, Olive," I said. "I think you are a hell of a nice gal, but don't give me that crap. I know a queer when I see one."

She stood up, and I was sorry I had gone off half-cocked at her. I told her so and she sat back down, but looked coolly at me now.

"I thought I would come to see you and tell you that Clare will not be around for several days. The house is empty. You must have someone to look after you for a few days. That is what the doctor told me just a while ago on the phone. I only want to help you, Joe."

"Thanks, Olive," I said, feeling like a heel for the way I had blown up at her. "If you want to put up with me when they release me from here, then I'll come and stay with you."

"Good," she said. "When the doctor tells me I can take you out of here I'll come after you. Okay?"

"All right and thanks, Olive. I appreciate this. I really do. And I'm sorry I acted so badly to you a moment ago. Why don't you get my car? The keys are probably in my clothes. You can drive it when you come after me. That will save cab fare.

She stood up and smiled. "Oh, I already have your car, Joe. It's outside in the parking lot. Haven't I got my nerve though?"

I grinned at her when she left the room. After a moment the nurse came in and gave me another pill. I drifted off to sleep again-later. I had no dream this time.

I had wanted to see the doctor again, but I did not. He had been on another floor when I was sent "home" the following day. I thought it odd he had not looked in on me and I remarked the same to Olive out in the car as we were driving along in the sunshine.

"You were probably asleep, Joe," she said. "I know he came in to see you. The nurse told me so. How are you feeling? Any stronger?"

"I feel okay," I said rather shortly.

"What's wrong?" She turned in the seat and gave me a quizzical look.

"I still don't feel right," I said, "about going to that Willows dame's house to convalescence."

"Don't be silly, Joe. A single guy like yourself has to have friends look after him when he decides to try to fracture his skull. You ought to realize that."

So I was installed in number ten after all. It was a big room with a lot of windows that looked down on the rear yard. This yard was large enough to have been a park for the city. It stretched back for nearly a block. There was no street in back of Hoffman Street, but a high school was to be seen in the distance. In between the house and the school was a football field with a high fence around it.

Olive had left me in the room alone. She had gone down to "fix" me a "bite to eat" as she put it.

It was eleven o'clock in the morning.

I looked up when someone entered the room carrying a tray of food. I had expected to see Olive, but it was not her. It was a young, dark-haired, dark-eyed girl.

I was sitting on the side of thebed in my pajamas when she came in. My heart gave a jump and my blood seemed to stop circulating for a moment. It was a definite shock.

She put the tray down on a table and looked at me.

"Yeah," she said. "I'm the girl you left in the field, you bastard,"

"I'm sorry for that," I said, flustered and trying to appease her. "I'm very sorry, I have been sorry ever since I did that-to you."

"I'll bet you are," she said but she did hot seem to be angry at the moment. "You are a bastard, mister."

"Probably," I said. "At any rate I apologize to you for it. I really am sorry, honestly."

"You're a bastard, mister," she repeated. "A damned mean bastard."

"Okay, I'm a bastard. Can't you forgive me for it?"

She looked at me and her face softened a little more. "I might, at that," she said.

"All right. Do so then. I don't like having people sore at me. Don't be mad at me, girl."

"My name is Helen," she said. "I guess I'll forgive you. But for a price. You gotta do something for me to help me forgive you."

I knew what was coming, "What?" I said carefully.

"Tonight, when she is asleep," she said, obviously meaning Olive. "I'll come in here to you. You can do the same thing to me that you did in the front seat of your car. Okay, mister?"

I looked at her. She looked to be even younger than she had seemed before in the car.

"How old are you, Helen?"

"I told you I was nineteen."

"How old are you really?"

"Seventeen."

I shook my head. "No. You ought to know I can't fool around with a seventeen-year-old girl. You think I'm crazy!"

She swayed her hips and I followed it with my eyes.

"Yes," she said. "I think you are. I'll be here when she goes to bed. Don't lock the door on me, or else."

"Or else what?" I said nervously.

"You'll find out. There is a law, you know, about raping young girls-like me." She laughed and ran out of the room and I sat there, sweating.

About an hour later Olive came into the room and sat down by the bed. She looked atme for a moment.

"Helen," she said slowly, "hasbeentellingme she knows you. Is that true?"

I raised up in the bed and stared at her. "She didn't lose any time, did she, the little bitch?"

"Helen," Olive said quietly, "is my sister, my kid sister," she added, with the accent on the word kid.

"Oh ... I'm sorry ... Olive...."

"She says you picked her up on the way here and laid her. Is that true, too?"

"Yes. It is. I must have been nuts or something, but that's what happened, Olive."

She reached over and slapped me across the mouth.

I made no move. I said nothing. There was nothing to say. Olive looked at me with what I took to be loathing, though I was not sure of it.

Then she surprised me-greatly.

"It's all right, Joe," she said. "I should not have done that."

I rubbed my hand over my mouth. And shrugged. "If it makes you feel better slug me again. I deserve it, Olive."

"I shouldn't have hit you, Joe. I had no right to do that. I know my kid sister. I know what she is like. She has been that, way since she was thirteen, laying every older man she can trap into doing it to her. You were right. She is a little bitch, a real one. I ought to know. I wish she were some other place than here, but Clare gave her the job working in the kitchen and there is nothing I can do about getting rid of her. But you watch yourself around her, Joe. That kid can really fix you, but good."

"I believe it," I said. "Maybe I had better get out of here pronto."

"No. You can't do that."

I looked at her with surprise. "Why not, Olive?"

She bit her lips. "I'll tell you, Joe, because I like you. Because I want you to maybe help me-a little."

"Help you? What sort of help do you mean?"

She bit her lips some more. "I don't want to talk about it-now, Joe."

"Okay. Tell me later then."

I heard running footsteps going by the door but could not see anyone. I got up slowly-my head was still aching somewhat-and walked over to the door and looked out into the long hall. There was a window on the southeast side which contained different colored panes of glass as a church window does and the sun was pouring through it making the hall itself look varicolored.

The screaming of the man had ceased. I could hear the footsteps moving about on the fourth floor. Then they stopped. I stood listening for several minutes. There was no more sounds from the floor above. All the other doors-there must have been a dozen of them leading into the various rooms-were closed tightly.

I attempted to take a few steps in the direction of the stairway leading up to the fourth floor, but my head was bothering me too much. I returned to my room and sat down on the side of the bed again.

A wave of nausea swept over me and I was forced to crawl onto the bed to rest. Almost immediately I felt better and was able to straighten up again. I heard someone walking rapidly by the door. Whoever it was seemed to be heading for the stairs leading to the top floor. I listened carefully as he went to the foot of the stairs, apparently, and stopped there.

I could hear footsteps again moving slowly about on the fourth floor and then the near silence was broken by loud curses, someone throwing something heavy like a piece of furniture-perhaps a footstool or something of that nature-then more loud curses and next more silence.

Some fifteen minutes passed by. My head was aching like hell.

The door opened and Olive came in. She looked harrassed and worried. There was a scratch on her chin. I saw right away. Her hands were trembling a little. She took a chair near the bed and looked over at me.

"Well," she said, "I suppose you heard all the rumpus on the fourth floor. I nodded my head.

She seemed to be staring at me. "Aren't you going to question me about it? Aren't you curious?"

I looked at her. "Some. Not too much. It was her husband, wasn't it? What's the matter with him?

She did not answer for a moment but looked me over carefully. She got up and locked the door with the skeleton key, then she came back to the center of the room and looked down at me. I was still on the bed propped up on one elbow.

"You have a wild look about you, Olive," I said casually. "What's going on in that mind of yours?"

"Just this, Joe," she said quietly. "Just this. Watch."

She began to quickly unbutton her blouse. She removed it and I saw the large breasts straining to get through the tiny bra. Her breasts were round and full and pink.

She reached around in back of herself and undid the bra. It fell to the floor and her enormous breasts jumped out of their confinement.

She was slipping the skirt down off her hips and legs now. She stepped through it and I saw the pink panties that she wore. Her nylons were hooked to a garter-belt and the creamy flesh above them and below the panties caused the sex in me to rise swiftly. I could not take my eyes off her as she peeled down the nylons and removed them from her legs. Her legs were long and beautifully shaped in just the right eye-catching contours.

Her pelvic structure was wide and exciting looking. She was grinning at me now, her eyes bright and even feverish-looking. I continued to stare at her body; I was fascinated by its slim though well-rounded perfection. Her waist was narrow, her hips spreading.

I watched with avid anticipation while she slowly inched down her panties. Then, with thrills running through me a mile a second, and with heart pumping blood even faster, I looked at her pubic hair, the little van-dyke shaped patch of loveliness. She moved slowly toward the bed, her hips swaying suggestively, her lips parted, her pinkish tongue darting in and out between her red and moistened lips. She came closer to me while I sat up straight on the bed and got my feet over the edge of it, waiting for her, my breath coming faster.

She came to. me and put her hot hands on each of my shoulders. She pushed oh them gently. I went back and she fell on top of me. She began the movement with her hips against me.

I thought I would go nuts.

"Goddamn you, Joe," she muttered. "Goddamn you, you lovely man; take me good, Joey boy. Take me hard. I need it so."

I threw her over on her back and ripped off my pajamas. She spread her long beautiful legs and I went between them-frantically.

She screamed a little when I gained entrance, then she stopped screaming and groaned.

"Faster, Joe, faster, do it to me-faster, Joe."

I increased the speed as she had asked. I went deeper with each stroke, the perspiration rolling off my body onto hers. She thrust her loins up to receive my battering. I grabbed her by the buttocks and held her high as I went deeper, even deeper. The friction of our bodies rubbing together was enough to drive me almost out of my mind. And then, at last, came the long shuddering release.

CHAPTER SIX

We lay panting upon the bed, our arms encircling each other's bodies. My quivering sex was still buried deeply within; my heart was pounding madly.

"Joe!" she gasped, "You're such a lovely man. I never saw such a man as you!"

"Olive!" I said harshly, my breath coming out in a great rush of sound. "Olive ... I"

She stirred underneath me.

"Can you ... Joe? Again ... Joe? Please ... Joe ... please...?"

"Yes," I said. "Yes, yes, Olive. This is wonderful."

It took much longer this time, and was even greater than the first time. When release came we both sighed together and lay engulfed in each other for a long time.

"Darling, darling," she breathed into my ear. "My darling, my wonderful man. How I needed that. Oh, but I needed you, Joe, you'll never know how much."

"I needed it too, Olive. I-"

"Oh ... Joe ... Joe!"

The door was flung open suddenly and looking up, I saw Mrs. Clare Willows standing in the doorway. A terrible kind of rage came over me, I yanked the sheet over our nakedness.

I noticed the Willows dame had a skeleton key in her hand. Olive moaned and whimpered beneath me. It was a hell of a situation-I wanted to kill this-woman, Clare Willows.

I looked at her again. Her face was contorted in fury. It could only be described as insane fury.

She looked at the two of us for a long moment. There was a heavy silence in the room. The only sound seemed t obe my own unsteady breathing and the hammering of all our hearts.

Then, looking like she had been stabbed with a knife, she was gone; the door slammed after her.

Olive and I lay there on the bed, not speaking.

Then she began to weep. For some strange reason, a feeling of profound disgust spread over me. I arose from the bed. Olive said something, but I did not hear it. I staggered over to the table, found a pack of cigarettes, Ht one and inhaled the smoke. My back was turned to the door and I did not hear any sound then, nor did I see Clare Willows swiftly enter the room again.

"Joe! look out!" Olive gasped. I whirled around in time to take the full force of a bull whip against my naked flesh. It cut across my chest and legs. I knew an intense pain, and rage poured out of me like water from a waterfall. I could barely see the Willows woman.

I could hear Olive screaming, but it seemed to come from a great distance. Perhaps if I had not had the concussion to slow up my reflexes I could have escaped those punishing blows of the whip, but thought would not come to me easily and swiftly enough. I only knew I was being quickly beaten perhaps to death by a Lesbian who was possessed of an insane and jealous fury, the like of which I had never dreamed possible. I fell to the floor helpless.

I think Olive kept on screaming, but I cannot be certain of this. The blows finally ceased and darkness took over. Life seemed to halt abruptly though I knew I was not dead. I could not afford to die. I had a piece of killing to perform myself-upon a certain so-called woman named Clare Willows.

When I came to I was lying in a ditch. There was no one around and it was dark. I got to my knees and tried to think clearly. Where the hell was I? I could not know that of course, but I did remember having been shoved into a car at the rear of the Willows place.

So Clare Willows, probably with help from someone, perhaps the lovely Olive Grant, or the two men, had loaded me into her car, driven me into' the country somewhere away from Franklin and dumped me out in a ditch.

I felt something pinned to my shirt. I reached up and got it. It was a piece of paper. It was far too dark to see what it was without lighting a match to do so. I wondered what the hell it could be.

I found a match and struck it on my shoe (someone had dressed me) and held it to read the note. The whole thing struck me as being damned odd. Why should they have done this, pinning the paper to my shirt?

The note said simply enough: "She is going to leave you near the house where Helen lives."

Olive must have written-the note and pinned it to my shirt.

Well, it wasn't much help, nor did it make any sense to me, but, of course, none of this made any sense to me. How does a guy make any sense out of the doings of weirdos? He can't.

I struggled to my feet and tried to see what sort of place I was in. There was some sort of light coming from across the road. It looked like a street light at first, but then I saw it was closer down to the ground. For the first time I noticed that a fine mist was forming in the air. Rain.

I managed to get across the road. It was a dirt street and that told me I-was on the edge of town somewhere, but of course I had no idea of exactly where. The light I was looking at went out. I stopped in my tracks and waited, but it did not come back on. I kept on in the direction of the place where it had been shining. I came to a driveway and staggered up it weakly. I was wearing a pair of pants, not my own, plus the shirt and a pair of shoes that were mine, I was wide awake enough to notice the shirt did not stick to my back. Maybe I was not bleeding now. It was a good comforting thought.

I came up to what looked in the dark to be a small house or shanty. I found a door and knocked.

Then I simply kneeled over and passed out again.

When I came back to life again I looked up at the girl standing over me. It was Helen. She gazed down at me, her lips parted j her breath coming fast.

I wondered why. Then I knew. I was lying naked on a couch.

I tried to get up, but she pushed me back down and grinned.

"For heaven's sake," she said, "what happened to you, Joe?"

So she had found out my name, had she. From her sister?

"Don't you have any idea?" I countered.

She shook her head and I realized she probably did not know much about her sister and her female lover.

"Have you got any brandy?"

"There's some gin," she said and went and got it. When I had swallowed a little of this I felt a lot stronger.

"What happened to you, honey?" she said, sinking down to her knees and putting her dark little head on my naked stomach.

In spite of my pain and illness I felt the sex beginning to stir within me.

She raised her head up quickly, looked down at my cock, then at me, then up into my eyes.

"Oh ... Joe ... are you able to?"

I reached for her and pulled her up level with my face. I tipped back her little dimpled chin and kissed her hard on the mouth. Her tongue snaked between my lips and darted around inside my mouth frantically. She began to run her hand up and down me in the correct places.

My blood began to boil and I reached for her dress to tear it off of her, but she pushed my hand away.

"No, Joe, no," she sobbed. "Wait a little while ... please."

"No," I said. "Right now, Helen." She squealed. I grabbed for her, but she eluded me.

I swore, but she had arisen from the couch and was not standing across the room from me, her lips parted, her breath still coming fast.

"Come back here, you little vixen," I said loudly. I was surprised at myself. Why the hell didn't I just lie there and rest? Was I cracking up or something as Olive had said?

Helen stood looking across the room at me. She had shaken her head when I had asked her to come to me. Now, she shook her head again. "Not until you tell me what happened to you, honey. I have a right to know. Did my sister and her lousy friends do this to you, honey? Tell me. I'll kill them. All of them. I'll peel the skin off their lousy backs-all of them-if they hurt my man."

I looked at her. So she considered me her man, did she. Hell. Well, why not let her-for the time being.

I told her what had happened, leaving out part of it-the part having to do with her sister and I.

"Why should Clare beat you with a whip?" she asked me dubiously. "Were you trying to get it into her precious little Olive?"

"Maybe," I admitted. I looked over at her and saw her lips were quivering. She came slowly across the little room then and threw herself on top of me. My head felt like it would explode again.

She moaned. She moaned again. It was a curious kind of moan. There was something wild and primitive about it. She bit me suddenly and hard on the shoulder. I did not care.

"Joe," she sobbed. "Oh, Joe, my man, my own man, you've been hurt. They tortured you, didn't , they?"

Before I could answer she sprang up and ripped her clothes off, every stitch of them. She stood holding her breasts in her hands.

I reached up for her waist, but she grabbed my hand and bent it back until it hurt like mad.

"That's it, Joey, that is what I want. Oh, Joe ... please ... Do it to me ... torture me awhile ... first ... I want you to hurt me like they hurt you ... first ... please ... Joey ... "I rose up hurriedly and grabbed her, bending her backward while the spittle ran down her chin.

If that was what she needed, I would give it to her! I had had enough experience with this!!!

I thought swiftly of Irma ... I shoved her out of mind. Screw Irma ... I had a seventeen-year-old here ... now! I slapped the hell out of her while she screamed and hollered-in ecstasy. It did not last long ... One cannot keep this sort of thing going too long ... that is the trouble with it ... it hurts too much. I finally stopped slapping her. This wasn't what I wanted. This was silly. I wanted something better. I grabbed her. She squealed. I pulled her down on the couch. She just looked up at me. And grinned.

I did not grin back at her. I was too busy.

She had great strength in her body. Wrapping her legs about me she made a sudden move-I did not resist her and I found myself on my back with her above me. She pumped at my loins savagely and I thrust upward at her in similar fashion. There was a terrific feel of suction in her hot loins and I could feel myself being worked up to the draining point by her passionate movement. She kissed me hard on the mouth, her tongue darting in and out quickly. I thrust upward at her with all the battering power I could muster, lying in that position. She hollered her head off when she, finally, felt the inner heat of my body, pouring into her own.

I lay there beneath her, my quivering maleness deeply imbedded within her as she sought to regain her breath.

I did not know how long we remained in that exciting position. It must have been for quite a while.

CHAPTER SEVEN

It was morning. I raised up from the couch and looked around. There was a clock on the shelf. It said none o'clock.

I did not see Helen in the room.

Man, I thought, what a crazy bunch of people I had run into in this burg. Was everyone sex-screwy here? And, incidentally, had I gotten a bit that way also? I knew from past experience with Irma that it was fairly easy for any imaginative person to go off the deep end-if he wasn't on his guard. And, I thought ruefully, who really wants to be on guard?

I got to my feet and walked to the bathroom. I was still naked and when I got there I stood in front of the mirror to inspect my bruises.

I damned near jumped when I saw myself in the mirror. There was not a single welt or bruise on my upper body where Clare Willows had struck me repeatedly with the bull whip.

There was not a sign of a mark.

I left the bathroom slowly. I found the kitchen and the bottle of gin. As much as I hated drinking anything in the morning, I needed a drink now-and I took it. I had another one, too.

I went back, curiously, to the bathroom and stood looking at my back and neck in the mirror. I heard a step and whirled about. Helen stood there watching me.

"I thought you were gone from the house," I said.

"The bull-whip," she said easily, "is made out of cloth. It leaves no marks. Otherwise they would not use it, Joe."

"I see. They make a habit out of this sort of thing, do they? Whipping people? Do you mean all the people in that house do this, not just Clare Willows?"

"Certainly," she said. She seemed to be surprised by my putting this into words.

"I see. Nice people, aren't they?"

"They don't usually mean anything by it," she remarked. "I know that much about it. It is just their way of-"

"Beating the hell out of people. Is that it, Helen?"

She shrugged. "Takes all kinds of people to make a world. You should know that, Joe. Or do you?"

That was a laugh. A seventeen-year-old kid telling me about the world and its sadism. Me, a guy who had been married to the worst-

"Shut up, kid," I snapped. "You are kidding yourself by trying to talk big to me. You're just a kid, no matter how much you know about screwing."

It was a cruel thing to say, but she had irked the devil out of me. I had had too many silly things happening to me of late to be bothered by the half-baked comments of a seventeen-year-old. My head ached bad, too. I felt ugly.

She stood there looking at me for a full minute.

"I don't really think you should speak to me like that, Joe. You are the one who taught me about it, you know."

"I'll bet. You seemed pretty experienced the first time, in my car. So what are you talking about, Helen?"

"Nothing," she said, and turning around, walked from the bathroom. I followed her out. I found my clothes and put them on. I went to the door without speaking to her.

"Are you leaving?"

I opened the door and stepped out. She came after me. She threw her arms around my neck and kissed me on the mouth.

"Don't go, Joe, please don't leave me here alone."

I disengaged her arms from about my neck. I pushed her away from me.

"Don't leave me, honey, please," she begged. "I'm just a kid like you say. I won't try to talk smart to you any more. Please stay here with me, honey."

"I've got someone to kill," I said grimly. "Can you guess who it is, baby?"

Her eyes got big. She was scared. It stuck out all over her. She was just a kid and my words had really floored her.

"Please, honey Joe, don't do that-don't talk so mean and awful. You scare me, Joe, honey."

She threw her arms around my neck again. I let out a sigh and drew her into the house and closed the door.

"Joe," she said anxiously. "I'm just a kid, yes, but I know something maybe that you do not. About them."

"All right, what is it?"

"Tell me if I'm wrong. The whole thing-everything that happened to you-the beating with the bull-whip, everything was just an act-sort of."

"That beating was no act, Helen."

"Listen to me. I wasn't there, but I can tell you what happened. I know I can."

"Then tell me."

"My sister came to you, into your room, didn't she?"

"Yes. You have that much of it right. What else?"

"You-you made love to her. She tantalized you into it, didn't she?"

I said nothing to this. She looked at me.

"And-and when you were making love to her-or while you w-err, someone-I mean Clare Willows of course-came in and either watched you or else she...."

"Go on, Helen." I was feeling strange.

"Well, Clare came into the room with the whip and took you by surprise and beat you with it. Isn't that the way it happened-almost?"

"Almost exactly," I said slowly, my voice sounding hoarse and strained, "but how could you have guessed it?"

She put her arms around me. "I know them," she said. "They are friends, both of them, all of them, I mean. They are fiends. They are horrible people, Joe. But, Joe, listen. You do not have to ... you do not have to kill her ... She has done a thing like that many times ... the two of them have ... they get their-kicks that way ... they are weird ... crazy ... Joe, don't you see?"

"I'm beginning to," I said quietly. I was shocked all over again. Good grief, were there really people like this around?

I knew damned well there were. Plenty of them.

Helen looked at me closely. "You believe me, don't you? That the two of them planned the whole thing the way it happened? That-"

"That what?"

"That they even wanted you to come here afterward and have me? That they purposely dumped you out near my place? That they wanted to think you would come here and take me? So they could think about it even if they could not witness it or even know of it for sure?"

In spite of the strangeness of the thing I had a small piece of admiration for this girl, Helen. She was a hell .of a lot sharper, in a way, than I had given her credit for being. It struck me as being odd for a young girl to have to explain such a fantastic affair to me, an older man, but that was the way it was. It was that simple, or else I had been that simple. The trouble with me was that I did not go about looking for fiends or freaks and so when I ran up against them they could perform their sadistic deals and I might not suspect it. Not necessarily.

I looked at her hard now. "By any chance, Helen, did you know I was being dumped, as you put it just now, in that ditch across the road?"

I watched her.

She started to bite her lower lip, but caught it in time. It was just about all I needed to know.

"Thanks, Helen," I said. "Thank you-for everything."

"Joe...."

"What?"

"Joe ... I-"

"Save it, Helen. You forgot to tell me one thing during all this."

"No ... Joe ... no...."

"Yes. You did not tell me that your sister and Clare put you up to telling me this cock-and bull-story. Did you?"

"Joe...." She fairly screamed it at me. "That's not true."

I opened the door and walked out of there. I did not look back, either. I knew what would happen.

I heard her coming. Footsteps running after me. I stopped in my tracks and waited for her. She came up to me.

"You were wrong, Joe," she said. "They did not tell me to do that. That is the truth. Believe me, Joe."

"Why should I believe any of you creatures?"

"Please. Joe, I love sex but don't class me with them."

"Why not?"-

"Because I'm not a sadist. That's why. I may be crazy, but I am not like they are. Can't you see that?"

I relented a little. "All right, Helen, but still...."

"Still what?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me, Joe. Still what?"

"I still have to kill that creature. She bull-whipped me. I don't exactly like being made a whipping-boy, or whatever. Can you understand that, Helen? I'm a man and I have been the victim of a sadistic act, Because I am a man I want revenge and I'll get it, one way or another."

"But you don't understand. They can't help it."

"I'm not concerned with what they can or cannot help. I'm only concerned with what I am going to do. And that is to get revenge on Clare."

"But you can't kill her. The law will get you and then where will I be?" She stopped talking suddenly, aware of her blunder. "I did not mean that, Joe ... not the way it came out."

"I'm sure you didn't," I said. "But it doesn't matter to me at all. Say whatever you feel like saying, Helen."

"Then stay here with me until you cool of a little. Don't go looking for trouble, please,"

"Trouble has already looked for me," I said icily. "Helen, you take an odd way of viewing me. What would you have me do, glory in that bull-whipping?"

"Please don't go to Clare's house and cause trouble. Come back inside and make love to me instead. I need you, more than you'll ever know. I guess I've always needed someone like you, a real man, to take care of me. And now that I've got you I want to hang onto you. Don't go there. They'll insult you, enrage you and you will blow your top and get into awful trouble. Look, Joe, I don't blame you for feeling this way, but it will only cause both of us trouble, and what good is more trouble?"

"I've got to get rid of this hellish feeling inside of me, Helen, and I can only do that by going there and beating the living hell out of those creatures, both of them. They want to be like men so let them take a beating like a man does."

"I don't care what happens to them, not even to my own sister, but I do care what trouble you get into. Don't go, please don't go there."

"It seems to me," I said cruelly, "that you have fallen in love with me awfully damn easily, Helen. Your sister is probably some kind of a queer. How do I know you haven't some :nutty ideas yourself?"

She slapped me full in the face, and I deserved it.

"Now I'm going to tell you something," she cried angrily. "You listen. You Hsten to me. Do you know why, exactly why, they staged that lousy act in the bedroom? It wasn't only because they get their kicks out of watching and participating in it. This will make you more angry and wild still, but I don't care now if it does. In the corner of that room, number ten, where you were, is a slot leading into the next room. And do you know what is in the next room, Joe. Can you even guess what is there?"

"How can I?"

"A camera, Joe." She fairly spat out the words.

"I see," I said slowly, as it began to dawn on me. "That's the deal, is it?"

"Yes. That is part of the deal. Clare's husband, Nick, was there with the motion picture camera. He was photographing every move that was made in that room. They develop the film and invite their sadistic friends in to view it. Isn't that a dandy deal, Joe? Everyone can watch you making love and taking thebeating. So-now go ahead and go there, Joe. They will probably want you to come so they can get more pictures of you blowing your lid."

I got out a handkerchief and wiped my face.

"All this, Helen," I said, "is pretty fantastic, you know."

"Yes," she said, looking me squarely in the eye, "isn't it?" and saying this, she turned and walked back into the little house.

I stood still for a moment. Then I followed her inside.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I stayed there with Helen for a week. Then I left without telling her. I managed to get my car away from the Willows drive without being seen. I did not dare go inside the Willows place-not because I was afraid of them, but because I was afraid of myself.

I drove back to Highland Park and went to see Mac Gibbons.

I found him in his office. We shook hands and he looked at me strangely. He seemed nervous about something.

"Don't tell me," he said, lighting the inevitable cigar, "that you have written your book this quick, Joe. It won't be any good written that quickly."

I frowned. "I have not even thought about it, Mac. As a matter-of-fact, I have just about lost interest in that project. I came to ask for my old job back."

He puffed nervously on the cigar far a moment. "When I told you to come back to work if you wanted to," he said carefully, "I certainly had no idea you would be back so soon, Joe. The truth is I have no job for you right now." He looked away.

"I did not expect you would have, Mac. I don't really want to come back to work Maybe I was just talking."

He gave me a funny look. "By the way, Joe, I saw Nick Swolli yesterday." He fastened his gaze on me closely.

I felt the anger rise in me. I stood up. "You know damned well, Mac, that I asked you once never to mention that son-of-a-bitch te me. Why are you doing it now?"

He flushed. "Sorry, Joe. I guess I forgot. Accept my apology, old man."

We examined each other for a moment. Then I laughed and sat back down. "Didn't mean to pop off, Mac. Sorry for it."

"What are your plans, Joe. Got any?"

"Yes. But I don't want to talk about them."

"Okay, sorry I asked."

"I guess I'm out of sorts today. Maybe I had better leave and come back some other time when I feel better."

He laughed. "I know how it is. Would you believe it if I told you I went to the place in Franklin once and when I came back here I was just as jumpy as you are?"

I looked at him. "What makes you think I am jumpy? Does it show that much?"

"Frankly ... yes. It does. It shows to beat hell. What exactly is wrong with you, Joe? You look worried."

"Mac," I said carefully. "Why did you send me to that place? For what reason?"

He seemed uncomfortable now. He shifted about in his chair and puffed rather furiously on the cigar.

"Does there have to be a reason?" he said. "You asked me to tell you a good place to go to write in peace and quiet. I figured it was a good place. That's all."

I lit a cigarette and took a couple of drags before saying anything. "Sorry. I don't believe that. I think you had some good reason for sending me there. Why? Tell me why?"

The cigar smoke was going to the ceiling now in great clouds.

"Joe, don't ask me that ... please."

"Then there was a good reason for it. I wish you would tell me what it was. I'm damned curious and besides I think I have a right to know. Tell me."

He shifted about in the swivel chair some more. "All right, goddamn it, Joe, I'll tell you. Just a minute ago I mentioned a guy's name to you and you got mad,"

"Nick Swolli. Okay, what about him?"

"Nick Swolli is the husband of Clare Willows," he said, and looked at me hard. "Do you understand that, Joe?"

"Not quite."

"Turn the name Willows around backward, Joe."

"I see. Swolli, Willows, almost the same if you do that. Thanks, Mac. I think I get it now."

"I don't think you do, Joe. I don't think you ever will, really. I'm sorry, Joe."

"What are you talking about?"

He clammed up. "Nothing. Figure it out for yourself, Joe."

"All right. I will-sooner or later."

I got up and without saying anything more, left the office. I did not give a damn if he liked it or not. I don't like people playing games with me.

I walked out into the street, into the hot glare of the sun beating down on the pavements, on the windows of the shops of the downtown section. There was an ice cream boy selling iced something-or-others and I bought one, gave him a dime, and stood there eating the silly thing.

I felt just silly enough to buy a quart of bourbon. I took it to the hotel room. I began to drink it-too fast, I guess.

I got pretty drunk. I fell over on the bed and passed out. I had a hell of a-wild dream. It was like I was standing off to one side and viewing the whole crazy scene objectively.

I guess it was a dream-maybe it was one of those so-called realistic nightmares. I have heard of such things.

As I said-it was like I was viewing the scene objectively.

Funny thing it was, too, damned funny-only I don't really mean "Funny", at all.

I was there in some apartment with them, but they could not see me, apparently. At least, when I tried to prevent the thing they ignored me just as though I wasn't there.

Nick Swolli and my wife, Irma

"Darling," my wife said to Nick, "I really ought to be getting home. It's late and Joe will be wondering about us. You know how he is. I-"

"No," Nick said drunkenly. He looked to be half-plastered. "I don't want you to leave. I want to make love to you again. There is no one as hot as you, Irma. That goddamn stupid Joe doesn't realize what he has. The ass."

I saw then, for the first time, that my wife was naked. Nick was dressed only in his pajamas, the bottom half. They were sitting on the sofa and nearby was an end-table. On the end-table was a half-empty bottle of bourbon.

"He knows, Nick," Irma said, reaching over and kissing him. "Damned right Joe knows. He is just too scared of me to enjoy it. That's all. He cramps my-style."

Nick laughed. "What a lovely way of putting it, Irma. Your style."

Irma ran her hands over his bare chest lovingly.

"I'm just a hot bitch, Nick. You know that, Nicky boy."

"I like them that way, baby."

She kissed him again. "I know you do, Nicky, but he doesn't like it that way." Her face grew red. "Sometimes I think Joe is just a babe in arms."

He took her in his arms and kissed her hard on the mouth.

"I'm not, baby. I've been around. I know what the sex score is. Don't I, doll?"

"Sure you do. But I wish you wouldn't call me baby or doll. I don't like that. Sounds cheap."

He raised his black eyebrows. "Cheap?" he said, his voice sounding harsh. "Why, there is nothing cheap about you, baby."

"Don't call me 'baby'", she snapped. "How many times do I have to tell you, Nick, goddamn it?"

I took a step toward them, but they retreated from me.

"Sorry," Nick said. "I won't call you names like that again."

She did not say anything I could hear.

"I'll call you other, better names," Nick said leeringly, "like no-good bitch, like freak gal, like goddamn do-it-the-other-way gal. I'll even call you goddamn queer, Irma baby. How do you like that, slut?"

She hit him squarely in the face and he fell off the sofa to the floor. While he sat there he put a couple of pills in his mouth and swallowed them without any water for a chaser.

I tried to go where they were, but I couldn't. I heard her screaming at him, using every foul expression I had ever heard and a few she made up there and then. I was appalled by it all, the whole scene. I tried to shut my ears, but I could still hear those words. I saw him get to his feet and walk unsteadily to the shelf where a pair of long-bladed antique shears were hanging on a hook. He took them down grimly and came back to where Irma was lying on the sofa, fear in her eyes.

"What are you going to do with those shears, Nicky?" she asked in horror.

I tried very hard to break through to them then. I knew what was going to take place. I knew, some-how.

I couldn't do it. I could only stand there and watch while he grabbed her by the hair and plunged the shears into her neck.

Somebody screamed. I did not know which one of us did it.

But, perhaps it was two.

"What's the matter with you, mister?" the bellhop said. He was standing by the bed peering down at me. I saw that the door was open. I remembered my dream. Yelling like that-on account of a goofy dream.

I sat up, and looked at him coolly. "Can't a guy have a nightmare without someone bursting into his room, boy?"

He looked perplexed and embarrassed. "Take it easy, dad," he said. "You called out for help a minute ago. So I came running. I thought someone was murdering you, the way you were yelling. If you don't want me, I'll go."

"Beat it," I snapped. "You people must be nuts around here."

He said something or other and left the room, closing the door after him softly, too softly.

I shouldn't have spoken like that to the Md, I guess, but that lousy dream had upset me.

I wondered if that was the way it had really happened--when it actually happened.

It was a strange dream; an odd dream. Damned odd.

I took a shower, a cold one. I came out of the fog a bit. I shaved and got dressed again. My stuff was all in the car yet and the car was down in the hotel parking lot. I went down to the lobby.

The bellhop and the clerk were standing together talking. When they saw me they shut up. I grinned at them; they grinned back self-consciously. I went out to the car, got in and started the motor.

I drove out onto the freeway and headed for Highway 21.

I knew now why my former employer, Mac Gibbons, had sent me to the Willows place in Franklin in the first place. Well, I would go back and settle my score with one Nick Swolli-backward for Willows.

Mac, I figured, had known how badly shaken I had been for a long time. Badly shaken because Nick Swolli had beaten the rap of killing my wife; gotten off scot-free. Self defence he had claimed, and it had taken a stupid jury only one hour to let that son-of-a-bitch go free. I had never seen Nick after that. He had left town. But Mac had found out where he had gone and had sent me there in the hopes I would find him. Mac had the idea of me beating the hell out of Nick, or something of that nature. Mac evidently had been of the opinion that this sort of action would bring me out of myself.

He may have been correct in assuming this. I had been acting odd lately. Or had I been? I was not sure.

And if Helen had been telling me the truth about the Willows place and the people in the house, then there were two good reasons now why I had to look up Mr. Swolli.

Two fine reasons. Both of them had their roots in hate.

There was one thing that bothered me about Mac. He had told me in his office that he had seen Nick Swolli yesterday. I knew he could not have seen Nick yesterday because Nick was in Franklin, wasn't he? And if I could believe Olive Grant, and there was no particular reason why I could, then Nicky boy was not able to leave the house due to his supposed illness. What kind of illness? This was a good question. Had Olive Grant meant addiction to drugs, or would a sex-happy woman like herself mean addiction to something quite different-like perhaps the drug of sadism?

So if Nick was unable to leave the place in Franklin, then how could Mac have seen him-unless? Unless, for some reason I could not understand yet, Mac Gibbons had found it necessary or expedient to make the trip to Franklin himself.

So-why would he?

I did not know, but I had the idea of finding out, if possible, and if it was not easily possible, then I would make it so. There was another thing that bothered me.

Why would anyone be crazy enough to spell his name backward? Apparently, Nick Swolli had married Clare and then turned the name around. Why? To cover something up? What?

When I arrived at the town of Bear's Creek, I stopped at the same bar and went inside and ordered a drink. The same bartender was there. He gave me the drink and I paid him. He looked at me questioningly.

I said, "Yeah, you probably do."

This seemed to startle him a little. I grinned.

"What I mean," I said, "is that you probably do recall me being in here some three weeks ago. I was here the day the state police had been in asking about some guy who had picked up a young girl and raped her. Killed her, too, I think you told me."

"Yeah," he said. "I remember you. They came back in after you had gone. Asked a lot more questions." He coughed. "I had to tell them about you."

"What?"

"Well, they asked me the first time to keep a sharp lookout for a guy answering your description. So, when they came back the second time I had to tell them about you."

"Oh...."

He laughed. "Don't look so hot and bothered. They got the other guy in jail." He laughed some more. Very funny, I thought. I finished my drink and started for the door.

The door opened suddenly and a man entered. I knew him. He apparently did not see me at first. I was going to pass on and not notice him-I did not want to talk to Sol Herman, but he saw me at the last moment going out the door.

"Joe Harms," he said, looking surprised and fairly happy about it, though I don't know why, after what had happened between us five years before. "How are you, Joe, old boy?"

"Hello, Sol," I said soberly. "Long time since I've seen you. This is a coincidence."

"Just got some bad news," Sol said. "Do you remember Tom Terrence, Joe?"

"Yes, the band leader. Of course I remember him. Why wouldn't I? I booked him for nearly two years for you."

"He's dead. Died this morning. Just got a wire.

Seems odd I should run into you the same day, Joe."

"What do you mean?"

He flushed a little. "Sit down over here and have a drink with me, Joe. Are you in a hurry?"

"I'll have one with you," I said. "Over there. At that table." We went over and sat down and the bartender came over and took our orders.

"What did you mean when you said it seems odd we-"

He broke in. "Oh, nothing in particular, Joe. But you remember the scuffle, don't you?"

"With Tom-over-my wife? Yes, I do. I don't want to talk about that. You ought to know that."

"Sorry, Joe. Didn't mean to drag out the past."

Tom Terrence had gotten drunk one night and had tried to rape Irma. That was what Sol had made reference to.

I had beat the hell out of him and of course after that had happened relations between Tom and his booker, meaning me, was strained. I finally had to get out of the business.

Sol had hated to see me leave. He had told me so at the time, but what good was I to him when I could not get along with his number one attraction-Tom Terrence.

That was when I had gone to work for Mac Gibbons, who was an old friend of Sol's.

Now Sol looked at me over his drink, asked me what I was doing, made a lot of other small talk, both of us drank our drinks, we shook hands, made more small talk, and then left the bar. He got into his car and I mine.

I headed for Franklin. Funny I should have run into Sol.

When I arrived at the small city I drove immediately to Helen's place. It was not far from the

"Willows house. I got out of the old car and went up to the door. I tried the door, but it was locked. I walked around to the rear and tried that door. I found it unlocked and walked in.

Helen was lying on the floor of the kitchen. She was unconscious. My heart began to jump about crazily. I went to her. I knelt down beside her and felt for her pulse. She wasn't dead; there was a faint pulse.

I picked her up and carried her into the front room and put her down on the couch. I got the bottle of gin and forced some of it between her lips. After a few moments she stirred. Then she passed a hand over her eyes, opened them and looked up at me. I saw there were no bruises on her, as near as I could tell, for she was fully dressed.

I looked at her dark loveliness. She seemed so young and small and helpless-looking there upon the couch. She smiled at me feebly.

"What happened to you, Helen?"

She just looked at me and smiled some more.

"Tell me what happened?"

"I slipped on the kitchen floor," she said. I knew she was lying. Why was she lying? What the hell for? I touched her on the shoulders gently.

"Tell me what happened, Helen," I persisted.

"That was the truth, Joe." I-I slipped."

"No, you did not slip," I said firmly. "They have been here, haven't they? Clare and your sister and maybe Nick, too."

She began to cry. I held her in my arms and tried to comfort her, but it only made her worse.

Finally, she told me what had happened. Clare and Nick, not Olive, had come in around three o'clock and asked where I was. Helen had told them she did not know. They had persisted in questioning her. She had steadfastly maintained her lack of knowledge as to my whereabouts, and they had finally taken the bull-whip to her.

I knew a fury then I had never known before.

"What are you going to do, Joe?" Helen asked me, far in her look. "Please do not go there. There are too many of them. Don't leave me alone, either. I'm scared now."

"You'll be all right, Helen. You can lock the doors. I think I can handle a few queers."

"There is more than a few now, Joe. The whole house is filled with them. Maybe ten of them."

"I don't care how many there are. It's time those creatures found out they cannot wield that whip whenever they feel like it. I think it is time I knocked a few heads about."

I was trembling with anger. I could barely speak for my voice shaking.

"Joe," she said. "The doctor if there now. That Jim Hale. He is one of them. There are others there, too. A man named Mac is there. He knows you, too. He seems to be the big guy in the deal."

"Mac Gibbons? Would that be his name?"

"Yes. I think he is more crazy than any of them."

I thought about this for a while. It was hard to believe this about Mac.

"Why are they so interested in me, Helen? Why am I so goddamn special to them? Do you know that?"

She shook her head. "I only wish I knew, Joe, but I can't figure it out. There must be some reason for it, but what it is I do not know. I can't even imagine what it is."

"Helen, tell me this. Clare gave you a job working at the place, didn't she? What were your duties supposed to be?"

She looked away.

"Tell me, Helen. I have an idea it is important."

"They wanted me to pose naked for the cameras. With men. You know. I wouldn't do it. I'm not working there now. I quit when I found out the nature of the job-the so-called job."

"This Dr. Hale," I said. "I can't figure him being in on a weird deal like this. He-"

She broke in with, "But he is under suspension with the medical society, Joe. I know that. I overheard it."

"But even then-"

"When I told Clare and Nick that I did not want to be a part of their deal, that I would not pose for the pictures, Clare told me that they could give me something, a drug, that would make it easy to go through with it. Now do you see?"

"Joe, I think they have been doing that with my-sister, Olive. I think they have kept her filled with some drug. That's why she is doing what she is."

"Maybe," I said soberly. I looked at her. "And then, maybe Olive is really in on it of her volition. Don't overlook that, Helen. I'm sorry to have to say that."

She reached up and grabbed hold of my neck with both arms.

"Joe," she said, her eyes bright. "All this talk. I cannot help it. It excites me-"

I looked at her. I did not know quite what to make of this.

"Joe?"

I looked at her again. "Yes?"

"Do it to me, Joe, right now-quick."

"All right. Come here, come closer to me."

She, instead, raised her dress up over her head and spread her pretty long legs. I .could see all of her. She was not wearing any panties. I saw the lovely cream color of her flesh. The sex came up in me. I took off my trousers-while she stripped off all her clothes and lay panting on the couch.

"Hurry, Joe. I'm hot. I can't stand it.

I-was on her. I effected entrance easily. It was wonderful.

"Faster, Joe, faster!!! she maoned."

The top of my head felt like it was coming off of me.

"Oh, Joe, you are my man. I love you so. My wonderful man, my Joey."

I knew right then I was in love with Helen.

She squealed happily and I knew the feeling I had for her was returned.

When it was over we lay there panting and feeling wonderful. I felt like a real man instead of a guy who had been used by a sex-freak.

It was a good feeling.

CHAPTER NINE

Helen prepared supper for us and afterward we were sitting in the front room watching her portable TV set when there was a commotion at the rear of the place.

Before I had time to get to my feet Nick Swolli and three other men were inside the house and in the room with us.

Nick held a gun on me. He had a mean look on his ugly mug.

"Hello, Nicky boy," I said tauntingly. "To what do we owe the honor of this expected visit?"

"Shut up," he said. He gestured to the two men. They came and grabbed Helen. I rose to my feet and got slapped for my trouble. Darkness fell, but just before it did I heard Helen say, "You won't get away with this, Nick. We've told the cops...." I thought that was what she told them, but I was not positive of it.

When I came around again I saw, after a moment of focusing my eyes, that I was in a large room, a strange one, or was it strange? I sat up on the floor and looked around. It was the same room, that is-number ten at the Willows place.

I looked down at my naked body and felt sick. I heard a noise then and looking across the room-there was only a very dim light on. I saw Helen stretched out on the bed. She, too, was naked. Immediately, I thought of the movie camera and crawling across the floor, I got upon the bed with her and pulled the sheet over the two of us.

At first I had thought she was asleep, but she was not. She had been watching me all the time.

"Helen," I said. "Are you all right, darling?"

She turned her eyes and looked at me. Her eyes looked a bit odd. I could barely see under the sheet, maybe that was it. Her lips were a little bloody, dried blood, as though she had been biting down hard on them.

"Both of us," she moaned. "They got both of us, Joe. We won't be able to help ourselves. They've got us." Her voice sounded different.

I reached over and shook her, hard.

"What are you saying?"

"They have doped us, Joe, both of us. Can't you feel it, honey? They shot us full of some kind of dope. I saw them, the doctor, doing it to you. Then they gave it to me. I couldn't fight them off, honey. Do you know what it will do to us, Joe?"

"What?" I asked hoarsely.

"After a while it will turn us both sex crazy. We will do anything that they tell us to do! "Are you sure, Helen?"

"I think so. I heard them discussing it. I don't think they are sure of what it will do to us. We are the first ones this new drug has been tried on."

Her voice sounded so strange when she spoke.

"Keep yourself covered," I said. "They are very likely in the next room now waiting to photograph' us. together, the bastards."

I pulled the sheet down a little. The light was so dim I could barely see her form on the bed beside me. I wondered why it was so dim. If they wanted to take their pictures why wouldn't they have a brighter light turned on? I reached over for Helen's face to pull her mouth close so that I might kiss her. I had the sheet well enough over us so that we could not be seen from the corner where the slot very likely was.

She came to me and kissed me hard before I could kiss her.

There was something strange about her kiss. It tasted different. I froze. A-hellish thought popped into my mind. Clare Willows looked something like Helen. I jerked back away from the woman next to me.

I knew a great disgust then.

It was not Helen in bed with me, but Clare Willows.

I leaped up from the bed. The lights came on bright. I whirled about. I could not see where the light came from, apparently it came into the room, indirectly, from without.

I grabbed up the sheet and yanked it off the reclining figure and wrapped it about my nakedness.

Clare Willows lay upon the bed naked, looking up at me, a strange and wild look on her face.

"You cannot get out of it, Mr. Harms," she said mockingly, "you will have to do it with me. That is what we have you here for, you know. You might as well get back in bed with me."

"You lousy slut," I said between clenched teeth. "You filthy lousy goddamn bitch. Goddamn you, goddamn you...."

She laughed. It was the laugh of a crazy woman.

I watched her as she began to gyrate about on the bed. The lights were on very bright now. I could see every detail of her body-and her body, I could not help noting, was perfect in every detail. But I was not interested in her body-not then I wasn't.

The only thing I could think of was that here before me was the wench who had bull-whipped me.

I stood looking down at her. She, in turn, looked up at me, her body writhing about, a look of patient waiting on her face. There was hot passion there, too.

"You will not be able to withstand this long," she said, "for the drug will soon take over for you, Mr. Harms. Why not get in the bed and enjoy me while you can. Come, Mr. Harms, I am waiting for your love. I hear it is remarkable efficient. I am anxious to feel it, you see, I have heard so very much about you and your sexual prowess. Come, climb into the bed. They, as well as I, are waiting for the fun to begin."

"You lousy fiend," I said tightly.

Quickly, I stepped across the room and tried the door. It was locked. I stood there wondering what my next move would be. I still had the sheet around me.

I went back near the bed. An odd, unaccountable feeling was beginning to creep over me. It was a hell of a thing, a damned hell of a thing, it was enough to make a man scream.

But I did not scream, I had no time for screaming.

I reached down and grabbed her about the middle. I could do one thing. I could slap this bitch silly, I could knock her lousy head off. Maybe the camera would record it, but the hell with that.

This was the woman who had bull-whipped me. I would break her in two pieces, slowly, slowly, until her buddies came to help her. I would smash this bitch if they did not.

She let me grab hold of her. She offered no resistance, though she must have known of my plans. She just giggled idiotically and, so help me, put her arms tightly around me and the touch of her made me want to vomit.

"You've got to do it to me, Mr. Harms. There is no way out for you. You'll see what I mean."

Horror spread over me in a hurry. But something else-was spreading over me in a hurry too.

A dumb sort of numbness, if there is such a thing.

She was caressing me now, all over my body. She was giggling, giggling, giggling and caressing me all over.

We were down on the bed now. I could not help it. I knew that the drug had taken over, I was powerless to combat it. I was just a tool of the drug's action now.

She had me on top of her and was moving about frantically.

I had no choice, no choice at all.

I had to make love to her and it was a fantastic thing.

Then when it was done, she was gone, bounding from the room, laughter coming from her. I was alone in the room, shaken, sick and ready to go crazy.

I was dizzy and weak; the drug was taking its toll, but I managed to get out into the hallway. There was no one around, no one in sight anywhere. I stumbled down the hallway in the direction of the next room, went past the door, then had to come back a few steps. I tried the door and found it locked, I put my ear against it and listened. I could hear low voices. I thought about putting my shoulder against the door and crashing through, but I knew I was too weak for it. I stood there nearly helpless, my brain was not quite able to clear itself in order for me to think coherently.

"Mr. Harms ... Joe...." a voice said. I turned around slowly.

It was Olive Grant. She looked awful. She looked like she was ready to keel over. It could have been the way I was seeing, thinking, but she appeared that way to my out-of-focus eyes and my jumbled-up mind.

I looked at her. She touched me lightly on the arm.

"Come with me, Joe," she said, and I followed along after her so meekly that it amazed me.

She took me up to the fourth floor of the big house and into a small room, small in comparison with number ten.

"Lie down on the bed, Joe, and get some rest. You will need it."

She spoke the words without any expression, listlessly.

I nodded. For some strange reason what she said seemed quite logical and sensible. Of course I would lie down and get some rest. Why not?

Olive Grant watched me curiously as I climbed onto the bed, the sheet falling away from me. When she saw my nakedness her breath was quickly indrawn.

"I'll get you a pajama bottom," she said quickly, and going to a drawer, proceeded to yank it open. She got the pajama bottom and brought them to me. I put them on without caring one way or the other about wearing them, "The drug will wear off after a little while, Joe, and then you will feel normal again."

"I hope so," I heard myself saying.

She look, d down at me lying upon the bed. She seemed wistful. "I wish it could have been me, Joe," she said, "on that last session." She laughed a bit. "Maybe I'll get you on the next one, huh, Joe?"

I said nothing, for I could barely understand her.

"I'll go away, Joe, and let you sleep now," she said, and kissed me on the mouth. It was nothing. It was like being kissed by nothing. There was no feeling there at all.

I saw her, vaguely, slip out of the room. I fell into a deep sleep almost immediately.

My subconscious mind was trying to tell me something about all of this. I know that now. I did not realize it then. I only knew then that I had another dream-nightmare, if you will. I know that there was a certain something in my past life that directly connected me with all of these people. That was what all of these dreams were intended for-to wise me up, I think.

This particular dream was even wilder, probably due to the drug they had given me, than the others I had had.

I was in this room. It was a gigantic room. Irma was there and so was Nick Swolli. Only this time, they knew I was there with them. They acknowledged my presence. They did not seem to mind that I was there watching them.

Strange to say, I did not care much one way or the other about what they were about to do, if anything.

Nick looked over at me and then at her. "Have you been doing as we planned?" he asked her. She said yes.

Then she looked at me. "Poor sap," she said, "You have no idea of what I have been doing to you, have you?"

I grinned a little. "Only a vague conception of it, Irma. Why are you doing this to me?"

She looked at me archly. "Well, Joe, if anyone should know. After all, you are the one with the equipment we want to photograph."

All three of us laughed. "I'm flattered," I said foolishly.

"It was Nicky's brilliant idea," she explained. "This deal is a money-maker, don't think it isn't. But we have to have a man to go along with my photogenic body. Nick is no good."

Nick laughed. "Oh, I wouldn't say that, Irma. You seem to like me okay."

Joe is better than you, Nicky. Or he could be if he wasn't so shy about himself." She looked at me again. "You see, Joe, every night I have been giving you a mild sleeping powder. Then when you are half asleep I whisper in your ear over and over."

This seemed very funny to me. I laughed like an idiot.

"I say to you, 'Joe, you are the one man in the whole world-who can do it to me better than anyone else. We should try to make some money out of this gift of yours, Joe.'"

"But that is pure nonsense," I said, laughing. "Who do you think you are kidding?"

"I admit," Irma said, "that it has not worked worth a damn yet, but maybe it will when I have said it often enough."

"Fantastic," I said. "You two are out of your minds."

"We'll see," she said, and saying this she began to strip off her clothes.

"Hey," I said. "You going to do that in front of Nicky boy?"

"Nicky boy knows all about me, Joe. He knows all about you, too. That's what makes this thing interesting."

"It's crazy," I said. "Absolutely crazy."

"Come here, Joe," she said abruptly. "You know what I want to do to you. Nick, get the camera going. Hurry."

"Hey!" I said, suddenly provoked beyond en- durance. "Cut out this silly crap, Irma. You too, Nick. You make me sick, both of you. I'm not going to stay here with you people. You're both nuts.

You don't know what you are doing."

I seemed to come awake....

"Yes, we do know what we are doing, Mr. Harms," Nick said to me. I saw he was standing by the bed with two other people.

I tried very hard and got my eyes all the way open. Was I dreaming now?

It came to me that this was not a dream at all, but the real thing. I was back in room number ten, "You always called me Joe before, Nicky boy," I said foolishly, "why the mister stuff now?"

I was still under the influence of the drug. I know this. Else I would have been at his throat and not making idiotic statements like this.

Nick laughed. "Doc, you must have given this jerk too much of that crap. He's talking like an idiot. Can't you give him an antidote or something? How the hell can we get photos of him if he doesn't know what he's doing?"

"Thirty seconds over Tokyo," I mumbled. It must have sounded funny for I laughed like mad.

I could see Jim Hale now. He was standing beside Nick and grinning down at me.

"Feel pretty wild, do you, Joe?" he said.

"Awful," I said, "What's the big idea of all this crazy deal? What are you doing to me, Jim?"

"Shall I tell him some of it, Nick?" Jim asked.

Nick shrugged. "Go ahead, but not all of it."

Jim looked at me. "We've had you in mind for quite a while, Joe," he said. "At least the others have. I'm fairly new at this. You see, your wife-"

"Not that, you damned fool," Nick roared. "I didn't think you would tell him that part."

"You tell him then," Jim said quietly. "The hell with it."

"Never mind," Nick said. "There's no need for telling him any of it. Not right now. As soon as he feels like joining us will be time enough."

"Joining you in what?" I asked, my mind seemingly becoming clearer, more lucid now. "What is going on here?"

"You know what it is, Joe, if you will only stop and think," Nick said.

"I guess I do, at that. You are a bunch of bastards. How do you think you can get away with this sort of thing? Isn't this kidnapping, too?"

No one answered that.

"Where's my girl-Helen?"

"She's-around."

"If you give her any of that drug, I'll kill you, Nick. I'll kill you too, Jim. Do you know that, you two?"

The other man spoke up now. "There's me, too, Joe. You going to want to kill me, too, Joe?"

I strained my eyes and saw that Mac Gibbons was standing next to Nick, on the other side of him.

"You too, Mac," I said. "You too. You first, maybe."

"You aren't going to kill anybody, Joe," Mac said easily.

"That's your opinion," I said "No. You won't kill anybody, Joe, old boy."

"Leave Helen alone, you bastards."

"Right now, we are interested in you, Joe, not Helen."

"Why me? Damn it all. Why pick on me?" There was a silence, a long deep one. "Because, Joe...." Mac Gibbons said easily. "Yes?"

"Because you have already killed and raped one young girl, you know. You picked her up on the highway three weeks ago."

"You damned fool, that wasn't me. It was another guy-who looked like me. What are you trying to pull, Mac?"

There was a silence. Then Mac said to the others, "Well, apparently he knows about that, so that won't do."

"No, it won't," I said. "How about letting me out of here. Where's Helen?"

Nick reached down and smacked me on the side of the head. I tried to get up but could not move.

"Shut up, you goddamn simpleton," someone said to me.

They all turned and walked out of the room.

I lay there half asleep and half awake and tried to get awake all the way. A lot of time went by; how much I had no clear idea of. Then the door opened again. The light was flicked on. I saw that it was Clare Willows. I clenched my teeth. I felt like vomiting, just to look at her.

She was only half-dressed. She wore a sort of shirt over her upper half, but the lower half of her body was naked. I tried not to look at her there, but even now I found it hard not to. I seemed to be fascinated by her body. I could not understand this. On the one hand, the women repelled me and on the the other hand there was a fierce unreasoning compulsion within me to feast my eyes on her.

She giggled.

My stomach retched, but I continued to look at her body.

She turned around slowly showing it all to me. She giggled some more. She came closer to me. I could see every detail of her lower body now. I tried again to take my eyes away, but I could not do it.

"Mr. Harms," she said, looking down at me. "Tell the truth now. Aren't you beginning to enjoy the effects of this drug?"

"Bitch," I said, spitting it out.

"Sure I'm a bitch," she said, winking at me. "All of us here are either bitches or bastards. That's what makes it so wonderful. There are no phony morals around here, Mr. Harms. We can do just as we please. If we feel like being weird that is okay, too. We can do anything. Anything we like."

"Goddamn slut," I said, but I kept on looking at her.

"Mr. Harms," she said. "Would you like me to crawl in the bed with you and do things to you?"

"Get away from me, you bitch."

"What would you like to have me do to you, Mr. Harms? There is no camera watching us now. I'll do anything. For fun."

She reached down and did something to me. In spite of my hellish loathing of her," I began to get an erection.

She came at me. The sweat was running off of me like mad. I tried to move away from her, but I was too weak.

Her hands were running all over my body. They were soft and hurt. I was fast losing what little control I had over myself. I shouted again. The door came open and Nick was standing there.

"Clare," he yelled. "Get out of here. I've told you not to bother him for a while. Besides you know there is no camera now, you fool."

She whimpered. This was entirely unlike her. What had happened to the arrogant woman I had first met?

"I just wanted to have some fun with him, Nicky. That's all. I get tired of doing it for the camera all the time."

"Shut up," he said, "and get out of here, you fool."

She sulked. "Why can't I have a little fun, Nicky?"

"Get out of this room, damn you, Clare. Go to your own room. Maybe later you can have your fun. We'll see."

Before she left she ran her hot hands over me and I retched.

Then she was gone, leaving Nick there by me.

He looked at me for a moment, grinned, and walked out of the room, locking the door after him.

I think I went to sleep again. At least it seemed a long time later that someone came into the room and spoke to me.

It was Olive Grant. "Joe," she said. "How do you feel?"

"What's it to you?" I snapped. "You're one of them, aren't you?"

She hung her head, "I cannot help myself, Joe. I'm just like you, a captive here. They have drugged me so often that I cannot get along without it. I'm sorry for you, Joe."

"I see. Then what are you doing here-in my room, may I ask? Is it your time for me, Olive?"

She did not look at me.

"I'm to take you to number ten now," she said, and that was all she said.

"Supposing I won't go?" I said harshly. "What then?"

She did not answer.

"I refuse to go," I said.

She looked at me. "Come along, Joe," she said quietly. "You have to. You can't help yourself any more than I can. Not now you can't. While you slept they gave you more of it."

"I see," I said. The funny thing about this was that I did see, so to speak. What is more, I did not care now. All decent feeling seemed to have left me. I was a different man. I was not even a man, I was more like an automaton.

"Will you get up and come with me to number ten?"

"I guess so. Why not?" I said, and got up from the bed.

Together, like two dumb, inhuman creatures, we walked down the hall, down the flight of stairs to the third floor and into room number ten. There was a dim light on again. She closed the door after us. In a moment I heard someone outside the hall locking the door. I wondered idly which one of them that would be. It did not matter much.

Olive walked over to the bed and began to arrange the pillows. I watched her dully. What the hell difference did it all make?

The lights came on a little brighter.

I removed my pajamas bottoms when I saw her doing the same.

It seemed perfectly sensible and all right then.

I looked at her large full breasts, her wide hips, her face, her hair, and back at her breasts again, I noticed I was erect, but there was no feeling of sex stirring within me. I felt dead. I wondered how they would like this-this ' lack of feeling, lack of enthusiasm?

"Come here, Joe," she said listlessly. "The show is about to begin."

I walked slowly over to her. She put out her hand and I took it and sat down on the bed beside her. The lights came on still brighter. I could hear a faint whirring sound like that of a movie-camera.

I felt sick, sick and completely inhuman and helpless.

Together we went through the motions of the love act. It was nothing. There was no feeling at all, or very little. It took a very great length of time, and vaguely I understand why they did not want us to have much feeling-it made the act last long enough for a complete length of film. The longer the film the more money it would bring.

Neither of us spoke all during the time. Neither of us cared about it. Neither one of us barely thought about it, at least I did not. It was ghastly.

And then we were done with it. The lights dropped back to dim again, the whirring sound ceased.

CHAPTER TEN

I am not certain of how long I was there in that house. It may have been weeks, months. I know I did not see Helen at all until one day she came into my room. She had been crying. I was still enough of my former self to recognize her, but that was about all I cared about the matter.

"Hi," I said dully. "You are Helen, aren't you?"

"Oh ... Joe...." she said, and buried her head on my chest.

I made no move to caress her, I did not care about it.

"Joe ... They have gone, I think. They forgot to lock my room. There is no one about. Can you understand me, Joe?"

"Sure," I said. "Go away."

She shook me hard. "Joe, there was another man who died here last night. I heard about it. That's the second man who died on them. The first man was named Tom Terrens. He-"

I came alive. "Did you say Tom Terrens?" I came alive some more. "Then ... Sol Herman ... I saw him in a bar ... He told me ... about Tom. So Sol is in on this too. Who else?"

"Listen, Joe. You have to pull yourself together now. We can escape. They are out in the rear of the place. Come on, Joe, get up."

I managed to get up from the bed. I was very weak. By leaning heavily upon her the two of us managed to get me out of the room, down the front stairs and out the front door without being stopped, nor seen, as far as I knew.

We had a hell of a time getting to her place. It was nearly a mile from there, but we finally made it. Helen locked the door and barricaded it.

"If I only had a phone," she sobbed. She was tired out from holding me up. "I could call the police."

"Give me a drink of something, Helen."

"Joe ... you can't drink anything. I know that. Clare tried that, it nearly killed her. You can't drink anything when you have been taking that drug. It stones you. I'm not going to let you have a drink. Not till that drug is gone from your system."

I sat down on the sofa and ran my hands over my face and neck. I had lost a lot of weight since being in that house.

"Joe," she said, putting her arms about me. "You've had a rough time of it. Why don't you lie down and rest for a while? I'll fix you something to eat."

"No. I don't want anything to eat. I couldn't possible eat anything. I just don't feel like it. Did you lock the doors-the windows too? Those bastards will know where we have gone. They'll be here after us, too. They won't let us get away-me especially." I sat up suddenly and looked at her. "Did they-did they force you, too, Helen?"

She shook her head. "Not yet. They have enough women. What they need is men more than women. I heard them talking. They can't get enough men."

"Seems to me they have enough men around that house. Why not use some of them?"

She looked away from me. "I think it is because those men like Nick and Mac and the others have already been given so much of the drug they can no longer respond to it."

The sweat began to roll off of me. "Then that means it is only a question of time-if they catch me again-before I'll have no manhood left, either. Those fiends."

" She said nothing.

"Is all this really taking place?" I asked wearily, "or is it just some fantasy of the mind? I'm so mixed up I can't seem to reason anything out very well."

"I'll go and get you something to eat," she said firmly. "You need some decent foot. They could not give you good food. It is not a good idea to feed the men well when the drug is in them."

My brain began to work a little better. A hell of a suspicion crept into my mind.

"It seems to me, Helen," I said slowly, "that you know an awful lot about this drug thing. How come?"

She flushed. "It's not what you are thinking, Joe, honey. I just keep my ears open all the time. I listen. That's how I know." She gave me a reproachful look. "After all, it is my man they want to ruin. Why shouldn't I be anxious to find out these things?"

"Sorry, Helen," I said, feeling like a heel. "I don't know quite what I am saying, I guess."

"Listen to me. I'll get you a glass of milk and a sandwich for now. Then I'm going to the police."

I shuddered. "Supposing they are outside right now, waiting for one of us to show?"

"We will have to take that chance. We can't fight them alone. There are too many of them."

She went to the kitchen and returned a moment later with the sandwich and milk. I tried to eat a little and managed to swallow some of it.

"I'm going now," she announced. She went to the window and looked out in each direction. I got up and helped her as well as I could, but I was still too weak to stand for long.

She opened the front door a crack and put her head out. It was late in the afternoon, and being summer, of course, the sun was still shining brightly.

"When I step out, Joe, you close and lock the door after me."

"All right, Helen. Please be very careful. If you see any signs of them, come back and come back in a hurry. I'll be watching for you from the front window. Get the police in on this and come back safely."

She kissed me briefly and left. I stood in the doorway and watched her disappear in the direction of the high school. The Willows house was on the other side of the school, I knew.

Time passed, an hour or mere of it. I saw her then, coming back to the house. She was walking rather slowly. There was no one about the place that I could see. She came to the door and I unlocked it and let her in. She looked very pale and tired as though she had been doing a lot of walking-and perhaps thinking, too.

She sat down and looked at me.

"Yes?" I said. "Did you talk to the police?"

She shook her head. "I had forgotten something, Joe," she told me softly. "I can't go to the police because of my ... sister, Olive. She is mixed up in this thing. I could not involve her. Do you understand that, Joe?"

"You didn't go there then?"

"I couldn't. I just couldn't do it. I'm sorry."

"I understand, Helen. Of course, you couldn't."

She took something out of her purse and set it down on the table. I saw it was a gun. I picked it up and looked it over.

"Where did you get it?" I asked her.

"At the hardware store," she said, flushing.

They wouldn't sell you a gun, Helen," I said. "Did you-steal it, honey?" She flushed some more.

"How did you get the gun, Helen?" I persisted.

"The man-there-in the-store. I-"

"I see," I said bitterly. "So you did-buy it-but you paid for it in personal currency. That makes me very angry with you, Helen."

"It was the only way I could get it," she protested. "We need the gun."

I sighed. This girl could only think about one thing-sex. She thought everything could be fixed up with sex.

Well, maybe she was right after all.

I looked the gun over carefully. "You got gypped, honey," I said. "The hardware man took you in with this gun."

She looked startled. "What do you mean, Joe?"

"It's no good. In the first place he did not give you any bullets. In the second place the damned thing wouldn't fire anyway. It's been jammed." I gave the gun a toss across the room. It landed with a clatter on the floor. "The next time you buy something make sure you know what you are getting."

She looked terribly put on. I didn't care.

"Forget it, Helen. We all make mistakes."

She pouted. "He was only half a man anyway," she said, as though that made her even with him for the gyp. "He could only do that other thing to me. I hate half men, damn them. You are the only real man around, I guess. Most of the others are half female or something."

It was sometime during the night that I came out from under the effects of the drug completely. I woke up and knew it. I knew I was feeling all right again. My breathing was coming in a more normal manner. But more important, I was feeling strong again. I turned the light on and looked at Helen's dark little face near my own on the pillow.

A facetious thought popped into my mind. Here I was in love with this seventeen-year-old girl and I did not know her last name. The incongruity of the thought hit me and I laughed outright. It must have awakened her, for she sat up, saw me, and smiled.

"What?" she asked, reaching over and touching me.

"I don't even know your last name, honey," I said.

"Farrington," she said. "Helen Farrington. I was born in Cleveland, Ohio. Want to know anything else about me?"

My heart had damned near stopped beating. I guess I got a little white. She was looking at me very curiously.

"Did you," I began saying slowly, "ever know anyone by the name of Irma Farrington, Helen? She came from Cleveland, too, I think."

"She was my half-sister," she said in surprise. "My real name was Harvey, but I took my stepfather's name of Farrington. Did you know my sister Irma?"

So-she did not know I had been married to her sister. I wondered why. Surely she would know who her own sister's husband had been. Maybe not, however. Apparently, she did not.

"Yes," I said carefully. "I knew your sister, Helen. I knew her-quite well." I did not want to tell her I had been married to her sister.

"I never knew my sister very well," she said. "She was a good deal older than I. She left home when I was only nine years old. I never saw her again. She was killed, you know. Murdered, my father always thought. The man who killed her was acquitted, I understand."

So-she apparently did not know, either, that Nick Swolli was that man. What a mixed up affair this was getting to be.

Well, I would be damned if I was going to tell her about Nick. That would mean I'd have to talk about Irma to her. I did not want to do this. I hoped she would never find out about her sister and me. I knew she probably would, but I was not going to be the one to tell her.

She came close to me, putting both her arms tightly about my body and pressing her warm femininity against me. I could feel the snug little breasts pressed against my chest. I could feel the heat of them and it excited me. I wrapped my arms about her body pulling her even closer. Her breathing was now coming as fast as my own.

"I never thought I would ever want sex again." I breathed in her ear, "but honey, I want you-right now. This instant. May I, honey?"

"Oh ... yes, Joe. Take me, take me. I need it so."

It was a wild and furious sex act that took place then. I suppose all that force that had been used on me had done something to me. Now I was free to enjoy sex of my own accord and with the woman I loved. There was a great difference.

When it was over and done with I lay panting upon her and she lay panting beneath. Neither of us wanted to move.

Our sweat had intermingled as well and we lay there happily content. We were both in love and that was all that mattered then. We forgot about the Willows house and what went on there. We forgot our danger from those people.

We slept-finally.

It happened later in the night. I guess I knew it would. I was stupid about it. I should have gotten up and gone to the police myself, after I had regained my strength, but I had not done so. I had procrastinated, foolishly, and this was the payoff. They came.

They came and dragged me out of the bed, Helen too. They took us back to the Willows place. I did not see where they locked her up, but they put me back in number ten. I sat there on the bed and cursed my stupidity to hell and gone.

But it was too late now. There was no use in cursing myself. There was no use in anything. When they came in later Nick and Mac and Dr. Jim Hale-I just looked at them numbly.

Nick stood looking at me.

"If you want to join us, Joe," he said. "And let us photograph you and the women, willingly I mean, then we could dispense with giving the drug. We don't want to give it to you. We would rather you cooperated and went through with it of your own free will."

"You bastard," I said. "You louse."

All of them laughed.

"How about it, Joe? Willing to join us? There's big dough in this."

"How do you bastards think you are going to get away with this deal? You won't be able to indefinitely. Someday they will find out about this."

"The point is, Joe, we are getting away with it, and I'll tell you why we are, too. It is because this is a brand new racket and no one is wise to it. Nobody even suspects there is such a racket yet. That's why we can get away with it."

"Look," I said. "Tell me this. Why all the concentration on me. Why not get someone else for a change?"

Nick grinned. "There are only certain blood types this drug will work on, Joe. That's why Clare tripped you on the stairs. You had to go to the hospital. At that time Jim was still on the staff there. Now do you see? When Jim took a sample of your blood, he called up and told me you'd do just fine" for our purposes."

"Crap," I said. "That sounds like crap."

"Nevertheless it is true, Joe. Why not come in with us? Save everyone a lot of trouble. You'll share in it, Joe. For each film we make we get over ten thousand bucks. There's a big market in South America for these films. Those people love to look at Americans making love."

"It's a lousy business," I snapped.

"Sure it is. What isn't? But there is dough in it and it's fairly safe with our set-up, Joe."

"What is wrong with one of you being the male model, or whatever you call it?"

There was a brief silence. Then Nick said, "None of us can take the drug any more, Joe. After a time it stops being effective and someone else has to take over."

"Are you sure it isn't because none of you want to risk death, Nick?"

More silence.

"Like Tom Terrens did?"

Nick cut loose with an oath. "Wise guy, eh, Joe? So you are a wise bastard, are you. You know about that. Okay, Doc. Give it to him. We'll hold him."

Before I could move they had grabbed onto me, pinning me back against the top of the bed. I was still fairly weak. At any rate, I could not fight off three of them. I felt the needle jab into my flesh. It was done. They let go of me.

"I'll kill you bastards one of these times," I said grimly. "I hope you all remember that. Because as sure as I'm here I'll get you guys for this."

They looked at me for a moment or two and then left the room. I sat there dejectedly, waiting for the stuff to take effect. I shuddered. I wondered dimly why they had not decided to use Helen in these awful deals. Then, I knew the answer. Nick had said the films sold well in South America. Those people were all dark. That was why only light-complexioned people were photographed. I was a redhead. Both Clare and Olive were blondes. Helen was dark. There was the answer. South Americans loved to watch light-skinned people making love. What a racket.

The door came open and I saw the one man I would never have thought would become mixed up in this sort of thing-Sol Herman.

I looked at him as he came closer to me. "You, too, eh, Solly? I guess everyone I ever knew is in on this deal."

He pulled up a chair, sat down, and surveyed me for a time. Then he cleared his throat and said, "We have a new girl for you, Joe, my boy."

"Don't call me your boy, Sol. You're as much a bastard as any of them. All of you are no-good bastards."

He flared at this. "Joe, it was your own wife who first got the idea for this deal. You don't have to feel so virtuous about it. Your own wife organized the whole business."

I was silent. I had vaguely suspected this, but I had not know for sure.

"Do you remember the girl in my office, the one who used to be there several years ago, Joe?"

I searched my memory. "I think so," I said dimly.

"Miss Burns is her name. Cleo Burns. She is only twenty-three now. She was eighteen then. She's a redhead. We thought it might be more interesting to get two redheads together. The South Americans will love that." He leaned over and patted me on the knee. "Give them a good show, Joe. Miss Burns is very anxious to meet you again."

"Get out of here, damn you," I growled, getting to my feet. He beat a hasty retreat. I watched him go out through the doorway swiftly. I sat back down and tried to think, but thoughts were not coming to me easily now. The drug was working. My will was getting weaker and weaker. I could feel it slipping away from me. I knew it would not be long before I turned back into an automaton. I shrugged. Right now I did not care very much. I had been through this before and so the shock of it was not quite as apparent with me as it had been previously.

I sat there.

I waited.

The door came open and I did not even look up. I knew who it would be-the new girl, Cleo Burns. Idly, I wondered what she was feeling, if anything. Was she excited? Or was she scared to death? It did not seem to make much difference to me, no matter what it meant to her. I didn't give a damn what it meant to her. I was past that now.

I sat on the side of the bed looking down. There was a silence in the room. She apparently was standing still over near the now closed door. I did not look at her. I heard a light step, it seemed to falter a little.

I could hear her breathing hard and fast now.

I wished I had a cigarette, but of course they had taken them away along with my clothes. I was now dressed only in the pajamas I had worn before.

It was dim in the room. They had not as yet turned on the brighter lights for filming. I looked over at her now.

She was still standing uncertainly by the door.

"Come here, Miss Burns," I heard myself saying to her. I heard her sharp intake of breath and I realized this was probably the first time for her. I did not care if it was. I only wanted to get it over with. The hell with her feelings.

"Come here, Cleo," I said firmly. "By the bed."

I watched her as she took a couple of faltering steps in my direction. I heard a sound at the other end of the room and I knew the photographers were getting ready for their job.

The lights came up just a little and I could see her more plainly now.

She was frightened. I shrugged. The drug had taken care of all of my more worthy feelings. Right now, I didn't care how scared she was.

"Come here," I repeated. "Let me look at you, please."

She came reluctantly to me then. I put out a hand and touched her on the leg. She drew back.

She was fully clad. They had not told her to undress, apparently. It came to me then. I was supposed to undress her, an unwilling subject, more or less.

That was the kick of it. They wanted to take pictures of me taking the clothes off her.

All right. I would give them a show, one hell of a show. To hell with them.

I reached out and touched her again and she began to sob.

"Miss Burns," I said. "This is a rough racket. You are here. I am here. We are supposed to do something for the camera. If you're scared why are you here?"

She stopped her sobbing. "Oh, I want to, I want to, but I'm scared stiff of you. I've never had sex before."

A virgin, eh? What next? Now I had to lay a virgin for those bloodsuckers.

The drug had worked faster on me this time, perhaps they had given me a larger dose of it. At any rate, the slight bit of morality I had had before was no completely gone. I had no such feelings at all, now. I felt, if I felt anything, like a' beast must feel. Sex was what I craved; raw uninhibited sex. I would take it if she did not want to give herself easily and voluntarily. I knew they were counting on my being this way, but it did not matter now.

"Miss Burns," I heard myself saying, "I am going to have to undress you. Please do not try to resist."

"I-I'll try," she said bravely. She was shivering all over. Well, the hell with her. I reached over and grabbed her. She screamed a little. I told her to cut it out and she stopped.

She was a lovely girl. A fine figure, all curves, and many of them. Her breasts threatened to burst through the filmy dress she was wearing. '

"Sit down on the bed beside me," I told her. She obeyed. I was breathing hard now, even if I did not feel quite normal about all this.

I pawed her legs. They were rounded and firm. I noticed how fast and quick her breathing was, and I knew she was excited. Well, when I got through with her she-would know what it was all about.

She moaned and leaned against me hard. I put my hands on her breasts and she moaned again. I slid the dress up over her head and she was entirely naked. They had not wanted her to wear undergarments apparently.

What a figure this girl had; it was better than either Clare's or Olive's. Something like Helen's too. The lights came on fully now. I heard the whirring of the camera and knew the show was "on stage." Her lips were quivering like mad. Sweat was running down the side of her pretty, well-shaped face. Her eyes looked glazed with a wild sort of fear. I put my arms about her and she moaned like I had never before heard a woman do. I became quite excited now.

"You won't hurt me?" she whimpered.

"No," I said as gently as my crazy passion would allow. "I won't hurt you. I'll take you to heaven instead."

She screamed when I touched her. I ran my tongue along the side of her neck and she screamed again. The camera was really whirring now. The lights came up even brighter. Suddenly, she was upon me, clawing at me like a frightened, sex-crazy animal. She knocked me off balance and was screaming in a wild sort of ecstasy. It was weird.

It did not last long. She was too frantic; too good, too.

I heard the camera being shut off. I lay upon the bed exhausted while she kept on with her moaning. I think I knew Clare Willows was standing over me and whipping me savagely with the bull-whip, yelling, "You fool. You are supposed to make it last a long time. We can't have you putting an end to it so quickly."

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I was in the basement of the house. I could see the cement walls all around me. There was a little-window I could look through, and I could see the ground level outside.

The door opened and Nick came in. Another man was with him, but he was a stranger to me.

"Okay, Joe," Nick said harshly. "That's all for you, buster."

"Yeah. What does that mean?"

"The drug didn't work on you," he said. "That means you have had all of it you can take. It is too bad, Joe."

"What do you mean it didn't work? I did the act for you. Certainly it worked. You're crazy."

"No. The drug failed. Otherwise you would have kept it going longer. That's the purpose of it. You ruined a whole goddamn film. Twenty-five seconds was all it took."

I could see that he was insanely angry. I decided to play it cool, stall for time. No telling what this son of a bitch had in mind for me. He might be planning on getting rid of me, too; like the other men.

"Perhaps it was because you brought me a virgin," I said cautiously. "She excited me more than I usually become, Nick. You should have warned me she wasn't used to sex."

He frowned. "You may be right, Joe, at that. It is worth thinking about. Well, we'll just have to try you out once more, see if it takes."

"I'm pretty sure it won't, Nick," I said hastily, realizing I had really pulled a boner with my remark.

"I'm going to take you back upstairs," he said. "They have fixed your girl up and we want to get some pictures of the two of you together. It should be something different than we have got so far. You see, I happen to know you two are in love." He rubbed his hands together gleefully. If I'd had an axe I would have buried it in his brain then and there. The louse.

"No," I said. "Take me up, but leave her out of it."

"No," he said. "Don't worry about her. We have another man now. We are going to put him in with you two lovers. Let you and him fight it out, so to speak. It should be a dilly of a film."

"You rotten louse," I cried, and jumped him. It was a foolish move. I was still weak and the two of them beat the hell out of me and left me lying on the floor.

I got to my feet after a time and took stock of my injuries. I was groggy, but I managed to get the window up part ways and the air revived me a little. It must have been nearly daylight. I could see out but not too well.

Standing there and remembering what he had said about Helen and this new man, aswell as myself, brought me out of the fog completely. I knew then, if I had never known it before, that I had some killing to do, and I had better figure out some way of doing it pretty quickly.

I forgot about trying to get in touch with the police. This was something I had to take care of myself. A personal matter. These bastards were threatening the woman I loved.

Somehow or other I would smash this racket.

I knew I was badly out manned. I was still half ill from the effects of the dastardly drug. I had taken a whipping with the bull-whip at the hands of an insane woman and another beating just now from Nick and the other man, but smash this racket I would. Or I would die in the attempt.

I had never been the kind of guy who imagined it would be a splendid thing to be some kind of cheap hero, but nonetheless I knew now that I was about to make my fight.

Nick had said they had done something to Helen. What could that mean? Did it only mean they had made a blonde or redhead out of her, or did it mean they had given her the drug?

Probably both, I thought.

Olive Grant came down after a few minutes. One thing had been bothering me. Helen had said she and my wife were half-sisters. Then how could Helen and Olive be real sisters?

I asked this of Olive Grant and got the surprise of my life. She told me, finally, that she, Olive, was Helen's mother and not her sister. But they had not wanted any of the others to know this, for some reason. She did not state why. She left me then, promising to come back later.

I realized that Olive Grant was a good deal older than I had at first thought her to be. Why would any mother try to entrap her own daughter in such a mess as this? It was a good question and one I could not answer.

Nick and the two other men came and got me several hours later. They did not take me to number ten, but into the room next to it, where the camera was. I saw that there were several peepholes in the wall. They made me sit down in front of one of these. Then they strapped me down so I could not get away.

Nick opened up the slot in front of me-which enabled me to see into number ten easier than through the small peephole.

"There you are," he said, leering. "Now you can watch the whole deal. You can close your eyes if you want to, but why not watch like the rest of us do? It's a kick, Joe." He paused.

"We like our kicks and you aren't kidding us any, Joe. You like them, too. You pretend to be a pretty noble fellow, but you like your offbeat sex as well as anyone does. So watch now. See her there on the bed?"

In spite of my anger I found myself looking into the room. I tried at first looking down at the floor, closing my eyes, thinking of other things, but it was no use.

The lights in number ten were rather dim, as usual. But I could see Cleo Burns lying on the bed. There was no one else in the room yet. Miss Burns, I thought, appeared to be drowsy, probably drugged. She lay still upon the bed.

I could see the lovely shape of her body lying there on the white under-sheet. Her eyes were closed now and her breathing caused her breasts to rise and fall rhythmically.

I saw the door being opened then and I held my breath. I wondered which of the other men it would be this time.

And then I saw who it was. It was no man. It was Clare Willows. She was naked. She was carrying the bull whip tightly clenched in her hands. She walked to the bed. The girl on the bed did not stir.

Nick came over beside me and nudged me with his elbow. I would have liked to kill him then and there. He stood watching the scene in the next room.

He seemed fascinated.

My own eyes were riveted to the spot beside the bed. I saw Clare raise the whip and bring it down, though gently, on the back of the sleeping girl. The girl stirred and moaned. Clare raised the whip again but instead of striking the girl with it, put it down on the door.

And climbed into the bed with her.

The camera was whirring away next to me. I felt like I was going to flip. I closed my eyes.

I don't know how long I sat there with my eyes closed. I couldn't watch it happening. I was just as hot for sex as any man, but not this kind-beyond a certain mild curiosity; my curiosity had already been satisfied.

After a time the camera stopped its whirring sound and I opened my eyes. Nick touched me on the arm.

"You ain't seen nothing yet," he said drooling. "Watch this next one, Joe."

"Let me get out of here," I snapped. "I have no interest in your scenes. Why are you forcing this on me?"

"You'll see. Watch through the opening, Joe, old boy."

I looked through it in horror then. Helen, was being led into the room by two men, neither of whom I had seen before. All three were naked. Helen was now a blonde. They had fixed her hair that way purposely. My brain whirled as I saw the men lead her over to the bed and make her lie down on it. She seemed dazed.

That was all I saw. My horror gave me strength I had not before possessed. I ripped out the leather straps that held me and jumping across the room, knocked the camera operator away from the machine.

I shoved the camera over and off its stand. It went clattering to the floor. I whirled about to meet the rush of Nick and another man.

I hit Nick flush on the jaw and he went down. The feel of my fist smacking against him was exhilarating.

Then something hit me behind the ear and blackness took over.

I knew dimly that I was lying on the floor of that room, but it seemed to my dulled mind that I was elsewhere. I could see cars moving about on the street. I seemed to be driving a car myself. There was someone from out of the past beside me on the seat.

"Joe," she said, "watch where you are going. You nearly ran into that truck ahead of us. What's wrong with you?"

I ran my hand over my eyes. "I guess I'm tired, Irma. All this driving in the past few days. Maybe we ought to stop somehwere and get some rest. I could use it."

She touched my arm. "Isn't that a motel sign up ahead, Joe? Yes, it is. Turn in when we get there. We had better do as you suggested. We don't want to get involved in a car accident. Your eyes look awfully heavy."

"All right. I will."

I turned into the motel and parked the car. I got out and, leaving her in the car, went into the office. There was one vacancy. I took it. It was number sixteen. I went back outside and told Irma to get the suitcase. I was that tired. I did not even want to carry it.

When we entered number sixteen Irma flicked on the lights.

"Joe," she said. "Just look at these."

The walls were covered with pictures. Dozens of them. Men and women. I was burned up and wanted to go and tell the clerk off, get another room, but she said not to.

"For heaven's sake, Irma," I growled, "who wants to look at that kind of crap all evening. I ought to go bust that clerk in the jaw for giving us a place like this."

She was studying the pictures and grinning.

"I kind of like it," she said, surprising me. "It sort of excites me, Joe. Hell, they won't hurt you any."

I shrugged. "Okay," I said. 'If you don't care, then I guess I shouldn't. I'm too tired anyway."

I took off my coat, my tie and shirt and lay down on the bed. My head ached like mad. All that driving had taken a lot out of me. Nearly a thousand miles in two days with a lot of stop-offs in between. I was pooped. I wished we had a bottle of something or other. I lay there with my eyes closed, debating whether or not to get up and go out and buy one.

"I'll bet there's a lot of money to be made out of it." Irma said musingly. I opened my eyes and looked over at her. She was standing with one hand on her hip looking at the pictures on the wall.

"You're really taken up with those deals, aren't you?" I said innocently enough.

She whirled about and faced me. "So what if I do like them?"

I stared at her. "Nothing," I said. "I wish we had a jug."

"You and your jugs. I never say anything about that, do I?"

"Huh?"

"Then why should you rave about me being interested in sexy things?"

I stretched my arms above my head and yawned.

"All right. Let's don't have another argument now. If you want to look at that stuff, go ahead. I'm too tired to fight."

"The hell with you, Joe Harms."

"What did you say?"

"You heard me. I said, the hell with you, Joe Harms."

"That's pretty strong language, Irma. You're just tired."

"No, I'm not tired. I'm just sick and tired of you being such a goddamn prude. That's all,"

"Do you think I'm a prude, Irma? Why?"

"You never want to talk sexy to me when I need it."

I sat up on the bed and looked at her. What the hell was eating her now? I had never heard this sort of talk before.

"What are you sore about?" I asked at length.

"Shut up, damn you."

"All right. I will."

"I suppose you think it's awful, me saying that about needing to hear you talk sexy once in a while?"

I said nothing. Let her rave, I thought. She's tired.

"Answer me, Joe Harms, damn you,"

"What do you want me to say, Irma?"

"Well, why can't you talk nice to me once in a while? Why do you have to be so damned noble all the time?"

"For Christ's sake, Irma, you are talking like a psycho."

She went over to the door and opened it. "Sometimes I just hate you, Joe Harms, you bastard."

"You're nuts," I snapped, "You're absoultely nuts."

She went out and slammed the door. I could not figure out what had come over her so suddenly. Was she really nuts? I had never seen her as screwy about sex as now.

Talk sexy to her, she had said. Did that excite her? Was that the kind of woman I had married. Who ever heard of a woman who needed to be talked sexy to? I hadn't. Was my wife off her trolley? She certainly was acting like it.

She came back in a few minutes carrying a bottle. I was mildly surprised at this. She put the bottle down and looked at me for a long time.

"Now, damn you, Joe. Get drunk. Maybe if you get drunk you'll have some thought of me."

"Oh, shut up, Irma. You're talking like a fool."

"I guess I am a fool at that. I was a fool to ever have married a holy man like you-a goddamn prude."

"That'll be enough of that talk," I said. I was angry now.

"Screw you. I'll say whatever I want to say. I'm tired of you being holier-than-thou. It so happens I like what you call filth. Go ahead and be shocked. All of us aren't pure and holy, you know. Some of us like to be thrilled once in a while."

"There's nothing wrong with getting your kicks," I said slowly. "I just can't understand the type of thing you want."

"You never understand anything about me, you jerk."

"Don't say that word to me again, Irma. I don't like it."

"I don't care what you like-you jerk."

I guess I hit her then, rather hard. It seemed to feel good to hit her. I was ashamed of it-but it felt good.

She lay on the floor for several moments. Then, siowly, she got to her feet, went to the bathroom and closed the door. I stayed on the bed until she returned. Then I got up. I had made up my mind to apologize to her-not for hitting her because I thought she had it coming-but for not trying to be more the man she apparently thought I should be, whatever that was.

But I did not do it. She uncapped the bottle, took a deep drink out of it which was surprising in itself-she did not often do that-and flung the bottle in my face. I managed to catch it before it spilled too much.

I got the cap and put it on the bottle. Then I set the bottle down.

"What exactly is eating you?" I said softly.

"If you don't know you never will."

"Then I guess I never will, Irma."

"I want you to get good and rough with me. I want you to hurt me. I want you to be free and flexible about sex. That's what I want. I want our sex life to be something, not just a jump in the hay, quick-like."

"I see. You want me to change into some kind of a nut. Is that it, Irma? Is that what will make you happy, a nut for a husband?"

She said nothing.

"Is it, Irma?"

"That's just a term." she said.

"I think," I said unwisely, "if that is what you want you will have to find it elsewhere. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to get some sleep."

"You're as naive as my kid sister," she snapped. "What I married you for is beyond me."

"I'm beginning to think something is beyond me. And I never knew before you had a kid sister."

"There are a lot of things you don't know about me, Joe."

I looked at her. "Such as "what else?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

I reached over, got a cigarette and lit it. "Not particularly. Not if these things I don't know are as weird as this other thing, this dirty talk routine you say you like."

"Oh shut up, Joe. You're-"

"I'm what?"

"Nothing. I don't want to get smacked again."

"I thought you liked to be hurt."

"Not that way."

"How do you like it then?"

"Oh ... you know ... Joe, can't you get with anything?"

"Maybe I happen to believe there are other things in life besides seeing how much crap I can think of, Irma."

"Oh, you love your sex just as much as I do. Don't give me that."

"Sure I love sex, but I don't think your way of viewing it is the only one. I'm sorry I'm not like you. I really am. Maybe we could get along better if I was. But I'm not. I'm just a fairly normal guy, not a nut."

"You don't have to keep using that word."

"I should think you'd like to hear me using that word."

"Well, I don't. You know what I'd like to see sometime. I'd like to see someone force you to get, sexy. I'd love that. It would do me good and it might make you more human."

"No one ever will," I said calmly. "Let's get some sleep."

"Go ahead and sleep if you want. Me, I'm just going to sit here."

"Suit yourself."

I lay down on the pillow and tried to go to sleep. I did not hear a sound from her. I reached and flicked off the bed lamp. My brain was going around from all this wild talk about sex and filth. Irma was without a doubt going off the deep end little by little.

Strange woman.

And she got stranger and stranger as the months went by. The next time she brought up this crazy subject was one night when we had arrived back in our apartment after having gone to a party at friends. It was after two o'clock in the morning. I was feeling a little high and so was she. We had been visiting at the Fairbanks. He was something or other in a mental institution-not a doctor but an orderly or something. I was not too surprised when Irma brought a certain object out of her purse and showed it to me. It was a leather strap, four of them, in fact.

"Those leather deals," I said, "that Fairbanks gave you. What the hell are they for, Irma? How come you asked him for them?"

"I had a bright idea," she said. "They are restrainers. Want me to show you how they are used?"

I was pretty high and so I told her to go ahead.

"Lie down on the bed," she said, giving me a push in the direction of the bedroom. "I'll show you."

Well, like an idiot, I went in and lay upon the bed and let her fasten the things around my feet and hands. Hell, I could not move.

"Hey, take this contraption off me," I said. "This is no fun."

She was standing in the middle of the room looking at me with that odd look of hers.

I saw her begin to remove her clothing slowly.

"What the hell are you up to?"

She continued to take off her clothes until she was stark naked.

"Cut this foolishness out, Irma. Take these things off of my feet and hands, damn it."

"No, Joe. Not until I do what I want to, Joe."

I looked at her. "Are you going to rape me, Irma?" I said, trying to make it sound facetious.

"Yes," she said. "And in my own way, too, Joe. Wait and see what I'm going to do to you, honey. You'll love it."

And I lay there and let her.

It wasn't nearly as startling as I would have thought it to be.

Later, I said to her, "Do you feel satisfied now, Irma?"

She said yes she was, very much so. I sighed and wondered at all the different kinds of people in the world. Well, I thought, it takes all kinds.

We got along better for a time after that. I still could not put that act of hers out of my mind, it bothered me.

Then-she wanted it that way all the time.

But the trouble with this was that she wanted to tie me down each time. It got to be a nuisance. I just was not cut out for such wild stuff. It did not set well with me. It made me feel lousy.

Then, when I told her off-gently, I thought-when I said the hell with any more of that stuff, she blew her top and walked out.

When she returned the next day I was angry. It was nearly noon before she got home. She looked like she had been fighting wildcats. Her hair was disheveled, her lipstick smeared.

I knew then and there I would have to get a doctor for her. During the next several days, even weeks, I tried to talk her into going to different doctors, but she just laughed at my idea.

"There's nothing wrong with me," she .said each time I brought it up. "It's just you, Joe. You're a prude."

I made my biggest mistake then. I went and talked to my old friend, Nick Swolli, about her. Nick promised to do what he could to help me. Nick was a smooth talking guy. Irma liked him, I knew. Maybe Nick could get her to visit a doctor.

I arranged for her and Nick to have a talk in our apartment. Seems odd now when I think of it, but then I was getting desperate.

I took a walk. When I came back I was both relieved and surprised when Irma told me Nick had convinced her of the advisability of her seeing a psychiatrist.

Nick gave me a half wink and left us alone. There was no way for me to know then that he had merely invited her to come and visit him when she felt that way.

I was a dope, that's all, a silly dope.

And for the next year and a half, I thought, she was busy going to the doctor each Tuesday afternoon and trying to follow out his advice or whatever. I know she seemed more happy.

All the time she was simply going to Nick's apartment. She kept this up until even he got sick and tired of it and finally killed her in a rage.

But in the meanwhile-I am only guessing here, but I am quite certain it must have been this way-she was selling him on some plan of hers to make money out of people who were as she was-i.e., sexually off-beam.

I had gone to work for Mac Gibbons, and somehow he had found out something about her.

I had also begun to write a little on the side.

Not that this matters any, but it did cause me to get mixed up in what has gone before and what follows.

CHAPTER TWELVE

They had drugged me again and put me in number ten. I lay on the bed, my head giving me a lot of trouble. I could think fairly well, fairly clearly, but physically I was not right; I was weak, giddy and dizzy at first, but after a while some of this left me. I got up from the bed and holding the sheet around me, walked over to the door and began to beat on it. No one came for several minutes.

When I heard someone coming I went back and sat on the bed and waited.

The door opened and Jim Hale entered carrying something. I watched him as he set the object down on the floor.

He came over to me. "I want to take your blood-pressure reading, Joe," he said. "Are you going to be good and allow me to, or do I have to call in the strong-arm guys?"

"Go ahead," I said.

He wrapped the cloth tube around my arm, hooked it up with the thing on the floor-I had never seen one of this type before-and got busy.

"Whew," he said. "Pretty high, Joe. Look, I'm going to give you-an antidote for the drug. That will restore you, bring you down where you belong."

"Will it help this feeling in my head?"

"Yes. Stick out your arm, Joe."

"How do I know you aren't giving me more of this sex drug?"

He looked at me. "Hell, Joe, I'm not interested in giving you that stuff. It has never been my idea. I'm forced to do it, same as you are. I'm kept here by force."

"Jim," I said, as he sank the needle into me, help me to start feeling well so I can break out of here, will you?" He said nothing. He withdrew the needle from my arm and put it away. He had-a small case for this purpose. He put the case in his coat pocket and looked at me briefly.

"No," he said, coldly. "I cannot do that, Joe. Don't ask me, either."

"Tell me this then ... about my girl, Helen ... Is she...?"

"She's all right," he said shortly. "I guess you could call it 'all right.'"

I gasped him by the arm. "If she has been harmed in any way, Jim, I'll personally kill every one of you, ever son-of-a-bitch mixed up in this lousy deal. Do you get that?"

"I heard you," coldly.

"Help me, Jim. I'm so damned weak."

He stood up. "I'm weak, too."

I looked at him trying to figure out what he meant.

"I like money, for one thing," he said. "That's my weakness. Can you help me, Joe, with that?"

"I'll get the dough when I get out of here," I said.

"You haven't got that kind of dough, Joe. Sorry."

"So you are a bastard, too, are you, Jim?"

"I guess I am. I've got to leave now. See you later."

He started for the door.

"What about me getting out of this room for a while?" I asked him. "As long as I'm to be of no use to you guys."

He gave me a hell of a look. "Oh, but you are going to be of use, Joe. They have a brand new deal all set for you. I'm sorry about this one. I don't like it, but I do not have the say on it. They have these orders from South America for these pictures, you see."

I knew fear then, great fear. "What sort of pictures, Jim?"

He looked at me again with that awful look.

"Homosexual stuff, Joe," he said, and stepped quickly from the room, closing the door after him.

A rage came over me that was awful. Then it was displaced by a calmer feeling. Did those idiots really think they could force me to commit a homosexual act? If they did they had another guess coming. I was quite calm about it now. I'd like to Bee them try it-just once.

They did.

An hour later. I got wise then. Hell, Jim Hale had not given me any antidote as he had said. It was a trick. He had only wanted to know how much more of the sex drug he could give me without killing me. I'm certain of this. He had given me a hell of a large dose. Already I could feel the effects of it. I began to struggle like mad against it. I knew I was up against the foulest, toughest deal I had yet faced.

They brought the gimp in then. I looked" at him when they left him alone with me. He was a real deal, a sis from the word go. The gimp was excited about it, too.

I wanted to vomit, but I kept control of myself. I knew exactly what I had to do. It was a hell of a thing. It was tough on the gimp, but who cared about that.

There was this thing I could do now that would discourage those bastards from ever attempting this sort of deal again, and I was ready for it.

"Come here, Gimp," I said. "Come over here close to me."

The gimp's eyes got big. "Why," he said, "they told me you would very likely object to me." He was simpering.

"Come over here by me," I said, hanging onto my nerve. "I'll show you."

"Oh ... goodie...." he said, and I damned near vomited all over again. He swished over to me, all smiles. Bastard.

It did not take long, not long at all. He never had a chance in the world, poor gimp bastard.

I got my hands about his throat and squeezed like hell.

It took about one full minute, maybe longer. He fought and scratched like a crazy fool, but it did him no good.

I let the body fall to the floor with a crash. Then X stood waiting for the others to come charging in.

It wasn't long.

They beat the hell out of me. They dragged me out of the room and shoved me into my room again. They locked me in and left me. One dead gimp.

No more trying of that scene by them ... perhaps.

Olive Grant came in and got me. She was dressed up fit to kill. She no longer looked bedraggled and worn. In fact, she looked nearly as beautiful as she had when we had first met.

She had brought me my-clothes. Someone had cleaned and pressed them. She also brought me a brand new sport shirt.

"What goes with all this?" I asked her suspiciously.

"They are letting us go, Joe. You and me."

"What about Helen? Where is she?"

"She has already been taken home, to her place."

"I don't get it," I said slowly. "Why?"

"Why what, Joe?"

"You know damned well what I am talking about Olive. Why are they letting us go? It stinks."

"Why, Joe. I thought you would be glad to get away from all this awful stuff. Don't you feel well or something?"

"I feel fine," I snapped. "I just don't believe a word you have said. It's just another deal of some kind."

"Here are your clothes, Joe. Put them on and come down to the first floor, if you want to. If you don't, then stay here and rot." And she was gone.

I got dressed wondering what all this was about. I left the room and walked down the hallway.

I looked at the sun shining in through the colored glass of the windows. It made the hall look bright and cheerful. I thought wryly about just how bright and cheerful this hell of a place really was, and grimaced, I turned to go down the stairs. The same thing happened as before. I tripped. Ifellallthe way to the bottom.

I lay there moaning for a time. I thought I saw the face of Clare Willows peering down at me from the top of the stairs, but I could not be sure of it.

I finally managed to get to my feet, I limped to the door and got it open, I stepped out onto the porch and looked around, I had not seen anyone else around the place, nor did I now. It looked deserted.

My car stood there. Someone had fetched it over from Helen's place, a mile away from here. I stepped down off the porch and went to the car and opened the door. I shut the door, quick-like. The body of the gimp was lying in the rear part on the floor. I stepped back from the car. What the hell could I do with that?

Was that why they had let me go? To get rid of the gimp's body, Seemed likely. What other reason could there be? Why hadn't they simply buried Mm?

Well, the hell with them. I steeled myself into touching the gimp, got the door open again, grasped him under the arms and dragged him out onto the ground. I lifted him and half carried, half dragged him inside the house. I left him on the floor of the ballroom, came out and locked the door. There was a key in the lock. I yanked the key out, after locking the door, and gave it a toss.

Where was everybody? Had they all left the place. Was their deal all done here? Had things finally got too far out of hand in some way? Had someone else died on them? What exactly was going on now?

I opened the doors of several rooms on the first floor. There was no one in any of them. Some of the furniture had been turned over, some of it had been smashed. The place looked like a storm had hit it. Had there been a brawl?

I went back outside and got into my car. I pushed the starter down and the car sputtered a little came to life and just as promptly died on me. I tried the started again. Again it sputtered a little, ran for a moment and died.

The gas was gone from it, apparently. Hell, I had filled the tank before arriving in Franklin. Someone had been driving it around a lot to have used up a tank of gas.

I set out for Helen's place on foot. It was beginning to get dark now. The sun had gone down some time ago.

I walked carefully around the mammoth place and out through the back yard. The yard was an enormous thing, like a park. There were even a few benches at various spots, and tables. You'd have thought it really was a park. When I had passed through the yard I could see the high school straight ahead of me. I walked around it and in ten minutes or so I could see Helen's house.

It took me another few minutes to get to the door. The door was locked, just as we had left it before they had come and got us. I looked in through the front window and could not see her inside. I went around to the rear.

When I got there I looked over in the direction of the school building. I saw a light on in one part of the long, low structure. It looked to be coming from what must have been the gym.

I tried the rear door and it was locked. I knocked hard. I could not hear her coming to the door so I put my shoulder against the door and it gave quite easily. I stumbled inside in the dark and found the light-switch. I gave it a flick and the single bulb in the kitchen came on.

She was lying on the couch. My heart jumped and I was scared. I went to her immediately. She was not dead, only in a deep sleep. I shook her, after a moment. She did not respond. I shook her again-hard. She opened her eyes and looked at me in a dazed manner. They had drugged her with sleeping pills, I saw. The look in her eyes told me.

"Helen, darling," I said. "It's me, Joe. Wake up."

She woke up then. With a glad little cry she threw herself into my arms and began to weep.

"It's all right, honey," I said. "Everything's okay."

"Oh, Joe, I was dreaming. I dreamed they had killed you."

"No, they actually let me go. I don't understand why they did it exactly, but they did. Here I am. Are you all right?"

"I think they drugged me, Joe. That's why I was sleeping so hard. Are you all right, honey? You look better now."

It took about an hour for her to come around in good shape. I found the gin bottle and gave her just a little of it, not enough to harm her-I was still afraid of that sex drug being mixed with alcohol in the system. The gin made her feel a lot better almost immediately.

"Helen," I said at length. "You are Olive Grant's daughter, aren't you?"

She looked startled for a long moment, then she relaxed and nodded. "So mother told you about it," she said, kissing me.

"Not all of it. Just told me your real relationship. But never mind that now. Have you any idea of how long you have been sleeping here?"

She raised up and looked at the clock. It was five after eight. "They brought me here, I think, about four o'clock."

"I wonder what is going on at the school. It's all lighted up at one end."

She looked startled again. "I heard them talking about the kids," she said. "I did not know what they meant. Maybe they are planning something in connection with the high school."

I thought for a moment she was talking out of her head.

"What do you mean?" I asked her.

"I remember what it was now," she said thoughtfully. I looked at her closely. Her eyes were looking better now. "They said something about having to get rid of us temporarily so as to bring the kids over."

"Maybe they are having a dance at the high school tonight," I said, thinking hard. "The school, sure that's it. The school is probably having a dance and Nick and his cohorts are planning on enticing some kids over to the house. To take pictures. They'll probably try to get the kids drunk. What a lousy deal to pull. Providing I am right about it."

"Joe," she said I just remembered something else. You did not drive your car here, did you?"

"No. Couldn't. It was out of gas."

She released along sigh of relief. "Thank heavens, Joe. I heard them talking. They had attached a bomb to the car. After you had driven it a ways it would have blown you to pieces."

"I'm beginning to get it. Good thing they did not use a starter bomb. I would have been killed."

So that had been their big plan-to get rid of me and the body at the same time. Smart, but not quite smart enough.

I looked into her dark eyes and grinned. Then I kissed her. She kissed me back passionately.

"Looks like the nasty old monsters are all through with us, honey," I said, trying to make my tone light. "So maybe we can begin getting back at them, huh?"

She put her arms around my neck and snuggled close.

"How, Joe? How can we fix those people up good?"

"God, honey, how can I think when you snuggle close to me like this?" She startled me-but pleasantly then.

"Joe, honey," she said, "do you get a hard on when you feel my body close to you like this?"

"Always," I said seriously. "Absolutely always."

She gave me a sly look.

"Why are you-wasting it then?" she asked.

It was a good question, and I answered it in the best way I could think of. I pushed her back, her legs coming apart eagerly to receive me. I lay down on her and unzipped myself quickly. I thrust at her femininity and she cried out half in pain and half with pleasure.

"Stick it in further, honey," she gasped.

I pressed home and she hollered a little. I laid on her luscious young body and went to work.

She wrapped her legs about my body, her mouth found mine and I felt her hot tongue darting in and out between my lips. She made her tongue move in the same tempo I was using lower down. I accelerated the speed and she lifted her loins high to better receive my love. We moved together in perfect unison. It was as if we had practiced the act together for years. Only we had not ... and that made it better, fresher, more exciting. I could feel her warm sweet moisture surrounding my maleness and it drove me almost crazy with ecstasy. In a few moments I added my own to hers. And then we lay, quietly, our bodies locked together in the embrace of love, for a long time.

I could feel her body quivering beneath me for several minutes. From time to time this quivering caused a rippling sensation up and down my back, and I could feel the pleasures of involuntary and further release of my love for her. Each time she would sigh and press her loins upward. She was so eager to receive all of me.

At nine-thirty I left the house to go for a bit of air. I felt good. Helen was taking a shower in the tiny bathroom. I figured I might walk down toward the middle of town and maybe buy a bottle of something or other. Apparently, the gang was through with us and it was a good free feeling.

Though I knew I was not through with them. Not by a long shot. A plan was formulating in the back of my mind and I was beginning to pluck at it.

I went out the back way and my footsteps led me in the direction of the high school.

I had no definite idea of why I was going there; I just seemed to be drifting that way.

When I got closer to the gym I could hear a dance band playing a Rock 'n Roll deal. I knew then it was some kind of teenage dance, no older person would have hired that type of band.

I was careful not to be seen, for I had a strong feeling that Nick and his buddies were somehow tied in with this affair-that they were already at the school. I crept closer to the south side of the building and looked in through a window.

There were a lot of teenagers dancing, all right. But what made me grin coldly was the sight of Nick, Mac and Sol Herman standing near the bandstand. I then saw that Jim Hale was directing the little band.

I nodded. The deal was beginning to become a bit clearer to me. I thought of Mac Gibbons and his importing business. Import and export.

A fine set-up for the sale of photographs to foreign markets.

I saw Nick walk over to a couple of teen age girls and smile down at them and begin talking to them.

I thought-What kind of a town is this? Doesn't anyone know about these bastards, or don't they care what happens?

The whole deal was obvious to me of course.

Nick and his Crew were recruiting kids for the Willows house. They were going to entice some of the girls over and take pictures. This was not at all difficult to see through. Why the hell else would Nick and his boys be here? I shuddered. Maybe they wanted the boys, too.

I watched the kids dance for a while and considered going to the police. Then, I knew that was out-way out for me.

There was the matter of the gimp I had killed.

I was sweating now. I stood there for a long time, perhaps an hour or even longer.

Then I retraced my steps slowly back to Helen's place.

I went in and found her cuddled up on the couch with a cup of coffee in front of her. She looked even better now, fresh and svelte-looking. I went over and kissed her impulsively, "You were over at the high school weren't you, Joe?" she asked, giving me a kiss.

"Helen," I said, sitting down beside her on the couch, "We were right. Those bastards are planning on grabbing a bunch of kids tonight, but good."

I then told her what I had seen. She seemed frightened.

"But what can we do, Joe? We are helpless against them now."

I knew what she meant all right-the dead gimp.

"I'll think of something," I said, "or we will. We must. We can't let that happen. The people in this town apparently do not even suspect what is going on."

"Nick is clever. So is that Mac-guy, and Sol. They'll know how to get those kids over to the house later on. They'll promise them a beer session or something."

"Come on, get your purse or whatever and let's go there."

"To the house, Joe? Gee, I don't know. I'm scared of going there."

"Then I'll go by myself," I said firmly. "It's time I did something about these guys. I've been a jerk long enough."

"I don't want you to go there, Joe. I'm frightened they will do something to you again."

"No, I don't think so. The way it was before they got me filled with that drug, I could not react properly. Now that I know about the deal they won't get close enough to me to inject it this time."

She reached over and kissed me. "Be careful, honey."

"Don't worry. I will be. Be sure to keep your doors locked tightly. I'll be back after a while."

I kissed her and left the back way. It was now after twelve o'clock or thereabouts.

It was very, dark now. The moon had gone behind a cloud. It smelled like rain in the air, too.

I walked through the fields toward the school. When I got there I saw no lights at all. The party was over.

That probably meant that Nick had already gotten some of the teen-agers over to the house. I hurried along. When I arrived close to the Willows place I saw my car sitting out on the street and over a block away. I wondered who had moved it and why.

I hardly knew what to do now that I was here. I did not want to attempt going in the front door. That would be too dangerous for me. I saw that only one light was on and that in the ballroom. While I stood there looking at it the light was turned off. It was now dark throughout the house. They would probably have the kids up on the third floor, I reasoned. That is, if they had been successful in enticing any of them here. I had no doubt but what they had been successful.

I walked around to the rear and found the window leading down into the basement room I had been in previously. I found it open. I got down and managed to crawl through it into the room. It was dark there, very dark. The door leading out of the room was not locked. I opened it and stepped out into the hall. llp the basement stairs I moved, careful not to make any sound. At the top was another door. I pushed it open and made the first floor. There was a dim light on at the far end of the hall. I kept to the shadows, inching my way along until I came to the stairway going to the second floor.

Once there I stepped lightly down the hall to the third floor stairs. Then I was standing directly in front of number ten. The door was closed. I could hear a faint sound coming from somewhere near by.

I heard it again, in back of me. I whirled about just in time to catch the descending bull-whip. Clare Willows had come up in back of me. She stood now, her pale face contorted in fury, clutching the whip and trying desperately to yank it free of my grasp, I thought she would yell out and give away my presence, but she did not, I think this woman hated me so unreasonably that she wanted to do battle on her own with me.

I set my teeth. Very well. I had a couple of old scores to settle with this savage female, this crazy queer, or whatever in the world she was.

"You son of a bitch," she said in a low throaty tone, "let loose of the whip. I'll blister you with it, you fool."

"No, Clare," I said softly. "You have used your little whip for the last time on me." I gave a yank on it and she, still holding to it, lost her balance and fell hard against me. Her fingernails went for my throat immediately.

I grinned. I grabbed her arm and bent it until I heard the bone crack. She moaned and struck out at me with her other hand. She was viscious as a tigress. I grabbed her other arm and bent it until she fainted. Then I let loose of her and she fell to the floor. I had absolutely no sympathy for this creature. Reaching down, I yanked her to her feet and slapped her hard. Her head bounced this way and that, spittle ran from her mouth. I picked her up bodily and carried her into an empty room nearby. I threw her on the floor like you would a bag of wheat.

I guess I went a little nuts then, looking at her on the floor and recalling the whippings she had so sadistically given me. It was not pretty what I did then. I did not care. I was a man with only one feeling in my heart right then.

Hate.

Her face was a mess when I got through with it.

My shoes are large ones.

I went out from the room, not one bit ashamed of myself-she had had that coming, woman or not, and she had taken it. She had wanted to play it rough when she had held the upper hand, so I had felt no compunction about kicking her face in.

A real woman I could never have done that to, but Clare Willows was not a real woman.

I shut the door and locked it. Then I stood and listened a while to see if anyone was coming, if anyone had heard us. Apparently, no one had. No one came.

I went to the door of the room next to number ten and tried it. It was unlocked. I pushed it open suddenly and stepped into the room. It was empty now. They had removed the camera and everything else.

I closed the door quietly and walked down the hall to the stairs. At the bottom of them there was another door leading into the ballroom, or what had once been a ballroom.

When I was inside this room for the first time I could hear the sounds of music. It was either a record machine or a small band playing softly. I put my ear against the wall and listened. I could not hear any better that way so I looked around and found a pair of French doors. I pushed these open slightly.

They had cleaned the ballroom up nicely.

The sound of the music was suddenly louder, much louder. I looked into the ballroom and saw that several couples were dancing. I stared at them. They were the teen-agers from the high school. The band was here too. Jim Hale was directing it as he had been at the school. Nick, Mac and Sol, as well as three other men, were standing around watching the kids dance.

Fine deal it was, giving a dance in the house for the kids.

The trouble was-the kids looked like they were high as kites. The way they danced. Slow, mechanically. The expressions on their faces told me they were all flying high, probably on beer and reefers. The way they were dressed told me a lot too. It told me they had been given the sex drug, without a doubt.

Both the sexes were stripped to the waist. It was a seductive manner of dressing all right. I could only stand there and stare excitedly at the young girls, their bosoms bare and pressing up tightly against the boys' bare chests. The lower parts of their bodies were moving about, up and down, in and out in perfect rhythm with the music, which was slow and sensuous sounding. Both the girls and boys had dazed expressions on their young faces. I could tell that they were dancing in a kind of weird rapture. In ecstasy the like of which they had only thought about, probably, before, and had not experienced. They seemed to be in seventh heaven, which of course they were. For once they could let go without anyone telling them to "go slow, take it cool."

The way their bodies were rubbing against one another suggested to me that it would only be a matter of minutes before the boys would have the girls down. The lights were on rather dimly, but as I watched they seemed to be coming on stronger and brighter. I looked straight across the large room and saw the slot.

I knew there was a camera in the next room waiting. Waiting to photograph them when things warmed up a bit more.

The lights came up brighter then, rather suddenly.

The band increased the volume of the music. It sounded more hectic and sexy now, even frantic.

I could not hear the whirring of the camera of course, but I knew that it was now operating and recording every bit of this frantic, sexy scene. Everyone was going slightly mad.

I could tell from the expressions on their faces of the men who watched the kids with such set unnatural looks.

As though by a signal prearranged somehow, each couple-there were perhaps ten of them on the floor-increased the movements of their bodies. They seemed to be trying to rub each other harder, faster, ever faster. It was a hell of a scene. My own heart was beating faster than it had ever gone before.

The lights came on a little brighter. The girls were now rubbing their breasts against the boys. I'm sure they were all moaning, but I could not hear it for the noise of the band. I could tell this from the way their faces looked and the way their lips were parted.

Then, again as though by prearrangement, the girls began darting their tongues into the boys' mouths. It was incredible.

The boys were pressing the female bodies closer and closer.

I glanced at the men again though it was unbelievably difficult to tear my eyes away from the kids. The men's eyes were sticking out of their faces. Their faces were strained terribly. Sweat was pouring down the sides of their heads, every one of them. I knew what my own excitement was doing to me. It was happening to everyone in that room. At any moment, hell would cut loose.

And break loose it did. I did not dare to take a chance. I could only stand there and watch, fascinated more than I had ever been before in my life, as the boys pushed the girls squealingly to the floor and topped them.

It was mass sex, make no mistake about it.

The band was now playing something wild and fast. It was crazy. Crazy mad. The camera, I thought, is really getting a scene here, a far better one for their purposes than could ever be staged. This was the real thing. This was sex without fear. This was total sex, young sex, kid sex, hot sex ... ready to blow ... the roof off perhaps.

I watched in excited fascination as the boys worked upon the young girls. It-was-wild and hectic and unforgettable.

Then something crashed on my head like a thousand tons of stone. I went out quickly; painlessly, almost.

I was lying naked on the bed of number ten when I came to. My hands and feet were strapped down. I could barely move. The lights were on only dimly. But I could see the writhing forms of young girls moving about and around the bed-which had been placed in the middle of the room now-as though in some sort of ritualistic dance.

I saw the face of one girl. She was just a little thing. The face was contorted in a wild kind of sex-ecstasy. I could not take my eyes off her. It was plain to see she, nor any of the other girls for that matter, did not realize what it was she was doing.

All of them had been heavily drugged.

Around the bed they moved, holding the upper parts of their bodies stiffly while the lower parts moved in and out suggestively.

Their upper bodies were bare; the lower part covered with the mini-skirts they all wore.

Their slim well-shaped little hips moved about as though in a mass invitation to partake of what lay underneath the skirts. It was a maddening scene, one which I will never forget.

I could hear the whirring of the camera now as the lights came up brighter.

Every now and then one of the girls, her lips parted and breathing hard, would reach down and touch my body. I thought I would take leave of my senses. They seemed to take a hell of a sensuous pleasure out of seeing me tied up this way. They would dance by and reach out and pull on the leather straps about my hands and feet.

Now and then a girl would catch my eye and stare down at me hard. Then, quickly, she would bend over and dart her little pink tongue into my mouth only to withdraw it swiftly and dance on by and around the bed again and again.

The lights were on brighter now. With the madness going through my mind I could not think coherently at all. I only knew that this was some sort of heaven on earth, even though it was a barbaric thing.

One girl lifted her skirt and climbed onto me briefly as though she could not stand it any longer, but she was immediately dragged off of me by the others. I did not know whether to be relieved by this or angry. I was all mixed up.

I knew this: Never in my life had I known such intense excitement as now. I was more of a physical man now than I had ever been before. But that was all. I was none of the things other than this that a man is supposed to be-by society.

I was like a trapped beast-waiting to be set free.

I was like a roped stallion. Waiting to be released.

Like a caged animal.

The dance went on and on. Sweat was pouring off of me at a terrific rate. My eyes were watering, my breath was coming faster and faster.

I could have died there on that bed. The agony I stood was too much, far too much for any real man to ever stand.

But I did not die. Far from it.

Then,-suddenly, it was all over with. The lights went dim, the door was yanked open and the girls were dragged out of the room. They went screaming, fighting, mauling at their captors but without success.

Evidently, there were other things planned for them and it would not do to allow them to work out from under the drug beforehand. The film was probably all used up for this time.

I lay there for a long time until my heart resumed normal beating and my blood had cooled down considerably.

Nick Swolli came in carrying a sheet. He threw It over me.

"Damned nice of you, Nick you bastard," I said. "You're a real fine louse, you know. I hate your goddamn guts."

He stood there looking at me, an evil grin on his dark face.

"Hell with you, Joe, you ass," he said, grinning like a devil.

"Tell me something, Nicky boy. Did Irma really give you the idea for all this?"

"Yeah. Irma was smart in her own way, Joe. Hell of a lot smarter than her husband Joe ever was."

"She was a god awful bitch, wasn't she, Nicky?"

"Depends on how you look at it. Her idea is paying off for all of us who knew her. That's all we care about."

"Just what was her idea, Nicky?"

"Her idea? Well, it was this: Get some dumb guy who is a lousy hypocrite about sex and force him to commit certain not-highly-thought-of sexacts, and take pictures of him doing it in these different ways, and then sell the pictures to people who like to watch. Very simple idea, don't you think?"

"Simple all right. Simple minded."

He shrugged. "A lot of people in this old world like it."

"You are getting rich off her idea, I take it."

He nodded. "We've got a honey of a set up; no one knows about what goes on here. No one outside that is. We are safe from the cops too. They do not even suspect the kind of house we are running here."

A scream penetrated the room. It came from the fourth floor apparently. Sounded like a young girl.

"A house built for screaming," I said.

"Call it whatever you like, Joe. We are coining dough."

"Wait until the cops find out about it, Nicky. Then what?"

"No, they can't find out about it. We are leaving in the morning. We have made our pile. Nearly seventy-five thousand dollars worth of films we have now. Most of them made from your activities, Joe."

"Glad to be of help," I said bitterly. "I never thought I was cut out to be a movie star."

He thought this was funny. He laughed.

"Too bad you will not be alive to hear the applause of your public, Joe."

He started to leave the room.

"Wait a minute, Nick. Supposing I were to join in with you? Wouldn't that be better than killing me?"

"Sorry, Joe. We don't have any need for you now. You're all finished, buster."

"But I have a need for you," I said, talking fast. "I don't want to die, Nicky boy. Let me join up with you. I have changed my mind about sex now. I like it-all ways. I could be a big help to you-as a sort of director, say, when you plan your future scenes. After all, who knows more about it than I do?"

A crafty look came over his dark face. "You may be right, at that, Joe," he said slowly. "You just might have an idea there, you know. But how do I know you won't double-cross me?"

"Now who is being a hypocrite? What the hell good will I be in the world now? Everyone who sees those pictures...." ... "Will know you ... I see. Will you give me your word to play it straight, Joe?"

I nodded. "What else can I do, Nick?"

"All right," he said at length. "I'll give you a break."

"Thanks, Nick. Come and untie me. I want to get up from here."

He came over to the bed and undid the straps. I got to my feet and, rubbed my arms and legs.

"Kind of stiff, are you, Joe?" he said, grinning.

"Yeah!" I said. "But not too stiff to kill you, buster."

I got my hands around his throat and squeezed like hell. His tongue protruded. He fought like a wild man, but his strength was no match for my fury. I held on for a long time. Then I let him slide to the floor.

I hoped my wife, Irma, wherever she was, was able to see him lying there on the floor. I doubted it. There are no slot-holes leading out of hell.

I went to the fourth floor and looked at the sight there. The young girls were lying on the floor naked. The boys were tied up to hooks on the walls. The girls seemed to be unconscious, though some of them were still moving their loins about in ecstasy and groaning aloud.

I wondered what kind of a deal this was-the boys tied up with leather thongs. Then I found out. I was standing in an alcove and none of the others could spot me. Two men came out, both of whom were carrying bull-whips.

They began to whip the boys-not too hard at first.

It was the most sadistic sight I had ever seen. How any human being could stoop that low was beyond me. Some of the girls moaned louder as though they enjoyed it.

The men doing the whipping had guns on their hips. I did hot dare interfere. I crept back down the stairs. Somehow and from somewhere I had to get help.

But where? Could I get out of the house and go for the cops? I rejected that. This had to he my job. I had to clean up this awful mess as a sort of retribution for what they had done to me.

It was a good thought-but could I do it alone?

God knows I wanted to-I had to.

I went back to the room next to the ballroom. I found Mac Gibbons there on the floor. I looked at him closely. He was dead. His throat was sHt from ear to ear. I tried to figure out who had done that, but I couldn't. Something had gone wrong with the organization apparently. Were they fighting among themselves? Had they fought over the division of the loot?

Well, that was three of them taken care of. Clare Willows, Nick and now Mac.

I had to locate Sol Herman now. Sol, the Jolly man. Sol, my former employer who also had managed to get hooked up with these weird creatures. Some guy he was, too.

I went to the slot and looked into the ballroom. It was a good thing I did so. The band had left. There was no one in the ballroom now.

And it was on fire. The flames were spreading rapidly.

I turned about and ran up the stairs. I had to get those kids out of here and quickly. I found the girls still on the floor all knocked out yet. The men who had been whipping the boys were not there fortunately. I untied the boys and got it through their foggy minds that the place was on fire. They managed to waken the girls and get them down the stairs and out of the house. The girls were still naked, but that did not matter much now. The important thing was to save their lives.

I ran back down the stairs stopping along the way to make sure there were no more of them in any of the rooms. The rooms were empty. A guy rushed up to me. I recognized him as being one of the whippers.

"The films," he shouted. "We got to get the films out of the house."

"Where are they?" I said.

"In there," he said, pointing at a room.

"You get out," I said. "I'll get the films."

He ran out of the house yelling his head off.

I went into the film-room. I saw box after box of them lying about. I struck a match. I set fire to them. I would help the other fire along.

I ran out of the house after making sure there was no one left inside. There was a crowd beginning to gather outside. Neighbors who had no idea of what had been going on in their midst. Maybe now they know.

They stood there looking at the now high shooting flames, their mouths open in wonder-and even enjoyment, it seemed.

I ran around to the back to see if I could catch a glimpse of Helen's house lights. I saw them. I breathed a sigh of relief. I was glad she was not here, for I had not found her mother anywhere in the house and she might have been caught in the basement. I had had no time to search there for her. I hoped Olive was not here at all.

But I was afraid she must be. Unless she had left earlier.

I heard a scream coming from the third floor and I looked up at one of the windows. It was Sol Herman. I shook my head. It would be impossible to get him out now. Just as I looked I saw his face disappear from the window and the flames came out of it in a gust of red.

In no time the whole building was a mass of flame. Cops had arrived in squad cars and the fire department was now busy getting the hoses set up. They would never be able to save this place. Already it was over half gone.

I walked away from the scene and headed for Helen's.

I wondered what I could tell her about her mother. There wasn't anything I could think of.

I had gone but a part of the way when I thought of my car on the street. Maybe I could push it to Helen's place. It was all downhill. I retraced my steps and went back to the spot where the old Ford sat. I opened the door.

Olive Grant was sitting on the seat, her face covered with dried blood. At first I thought she was dead, but when I touched her she moved her head and blinked her eyes.

"Joe!" she said, when I had flicked on the lights.

"Who hit you, Olive? Are you badly hurt?"

She shook her head. A small smile found its way to her lips. "I'm okay, Joe," she said. "Thank goodness you got out."

"I was worried about you being in there, Olive. I thought-"

"No. It was I who set fire to the ballroom."

I looked at her with admiration.

"I was afraid you were in there, Joe," she said. "I'm glad you made it out. You see, Nick caught me setting the fire to the draperies. He hit me and knocked me down. I guess he knocked me cold."

"How did you get here?"

"I don't know," she said. "When I came to just now I thought you had brought me here."

Jim Hale, I thought. He was the only one who would have, could have got her out of that place. But where was he now? He had, at last, done one good thing before cutting out, if he had cut out for parts unknown. I hoped he had.

"Come on. Get out of the car, Olive. We'll go to Helen's place."

I helped her and she climbed out to the ground. Leaning on me-she was badly bruised-we made our way slowly across the field until we came up to the rear door of Helen's.

I knocked and called out to Helen. It seemed to take her a long time to answer the door, but she finally did, letting us in. When she saw her mother she drew back.

"It's all right, Helen. Your mother was hurt a little, but we can fix her up okay. Have you any bandages? Her face is cut some."

"That's not what Helen is frightened about, Joe," Olive Grant said. "She thinks I am still one of them."

"Aren't you, Mother?" Helen said rather coldly.

"Not any more, Helen. I admit I was connected with it at first through Clare Willows. Don't ask me why. I won't tell you that. But I quit them over a week ago. I finally saw the evil of the things they were doing. Don't ask me how I came to find this out, either. I won't talk about it. Now, may I come in or would you rather I just left right now?"

Helen looked at her mother for a long moment. Then she turned her eyes on me. I nodded slightly.

"Come in and we'll take a look at your injuries, Mother," she said, stepping aside and letting us in.

"Do you know what has happened, darling?" I asked Helen. "The Willows place is going up in flames.

She nodded. "I thought it was. I caught a look at it through the window. I wasn't sure where the fire was, hut I figured it was that house. It is a good thing. That place deserves to be burned down."

She took her mother to the bathroom to apply bandages and I sat down on the sofa and lit a cigarette. I wished there was a bottle of gin or something. I got up and looked around, found none and sat back down. They returned from the bathroom. Olive Grant looked a lot better now in spite of the bandages on her face and neck and arm, "She'll be okay," Helen told me. "But that was a bad cut on her neck. Near that big vein whatever it is called."

Olive Grant sat down. "Sol Herman gave me the cut. I might as well tell you that. He also cut Mac Gibbons' throat. I tried to stop him. He accused Mac and Nick of trying to ease him out of his share of the profits."

"Gang of thieves all right," I said. "Couldn't even trust each other."

Helen came over and kissed me impulsively on the mouth. I held her tightly. Then I released her. I saw that Olive Grant was watching us with interest.

"So it is that way between you two," she said, nodding. "Good for both of you. I'm glad."

"Mother," I said rather facetiously, "I would like to ask you for your permission to marry your lovely little daughter. Do you mind?"

"Go ahead," she said. "That's between you and her. I don't think I have any right to be playing the heavy mother now. Not after all this."

All of us laughed.

THE END
House Of Harlots ....(79k)    by J.X. Williams





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