“It was guns, all right. Just a minute.” I walked to the bedroom window, shut it, and pulled the shade, then went and latched the screen and back doors. There wasn't much I could do about the busted door lock, but I turned on the living-room lights and propped a straight-backed chair under the knob. I went back to Sherry.
“All locked in,” I said lightly. “And you'd better stay that way for a while. Those noises were shots. The character who sapped you was out back when I got here. We had a war, but it was a draw.” I got serious. “Give a good listen to this, Sherry. Whoever it was meant business. There's not much doubt in my mind that the guy who sapped you is the one who killed Zoe. And there must be a good reason why he was here—particularly carrying a gun.”
She swallowed and sat quietly for a moment; then she said, “It was a man?”
“I suppose so, but I don't know. It seems likely. But right now, how's your head?”
She looked at me and blinked her blue eyes. “It hurts.”
I took a look at the bump on her head, but the skin wasn't broken. I was all for calling a doctor, but after some argument during which she insisted she was O.K. and didn't want a doc, she won. We hunted up a couple of aspirins, and that seemed the best we could do. Then I said, “You got any liquid anesthetic in the house? Anything to drink?”
“I've got gin,” she said brightly. “Gin and orange juice.”
I stared at her, aghast. “Gin,” I echoed. “And orange juice. You sure you wouldn't rather have your head hurt?”
She laughed. “It's not too bad—the head, I mean.” She winced. “Not too good, either.”
I spent the next five minutes mixing a couple of perfectly foul concoctions and chatting casually with Sherry while she got back to normal. Then I said, “O.K., let's get down to business.”
She smiled impishly and said, “O.K.”
I grinned at her. “Finish what you started to tell me at the studio—when Swallow walked in. And believe me, it's important now.”
“I believe you.” She thought a minute, then went on. “Well, I told you Zoe hated Swallow, but that was just lately. They were fairly close for a while. Then—well, then he didn't treat her right.”
I interrupted. “Sherry, the police told me Zoe was pregnant. That have anything to do with it?”
“Oh,” she said. “Yes, it did. That was"—she looked at me—"Swallow. He didn't want anything to do with her after that. And Zoe naturally—you know.”
The woman scorned, I was thinking, mad at the world and the focus on Swallow. Probably the greatest hurt was to her pride, I thought, but that's as deadly a hurt as any. Incongruously I thought of Helen.
I said, “So she was out to get even and found something she thought would do it. That brings us to Thursday night. You don't know what she was up to?”
“No. But she said Swallow wouldn't be around town any more. She wouldn't have to look at his silly face.”
“She was still working for him, wasn't she? I mean as his secretary?”
“Uh-huh. Right up till the last. Sort of an armed truce till she ... could get even with him. When she didn't show up Friday at the studio, I was worried. That's why I asked Genova for her job till she showed up. I still thought she'd show up. But I wanted to be where I could see how he acted.”
We talked some more and I learned only that both Zoe and Sherry had been doing stenographic work at the studio when they'd met, liked each other, and rented this house together. Sherry had been sipping on her orange-colored drink; I'd been afraid to try mine so far. I took a cautious sip. Wasn't bad. Tasted like orange juice. I'd put two jiggers of gin in the things, I remembered. Still tasted like orange juice.
“Well,” I asked her, “now what? We're up to here and now. Why this business tonight? The guy must have been looking for something in the house. Probably in Zoe's things. Any idea what it would be?”
She shook her head. “I haven't any idea at all.”
“Let's take a look around. You feel up to it?”
She upended her glass. “I feel surprisingly good, considering,” she said. She beamed at me.
She also looked surprisingly good. She looked soft and lovely and warm. Not to mention that amazing development of hers. She stood up right in front of me and pulled the sweater down tight over the amazing development. I stared. When I remembered the way this case had started at Raul's, and what had followed—Helen, Fanny, the studio, Dot, Helen again—it was brought home forcibly to me that I was about as close to exploding from various kinds of frustration as a man can get.
“Say,” I said. “Haven't you got an old bathrobe or something similar you could slip into? A thick, lumpy old bathrobe?”
She looked down at me. “A bathrobe? Why, yes, but—” Then she laughed mischievously. “Now, Shell, stop it.”
“To tell you the truth,” I said, “that pink sweater makes conversation difficult.”
She laughed merrily. “I can't help it,” she said. “And I can't take it off.”
I came very close to getting into a pleasant argument with her then and there. But she said, “Come on, Shell, let's look at Zoe's things.”
Hell, I wanted to look at Sherry's things. But I got up and said, “You lead the way, honey.”
She frowned. “I don't know what to look for.”
“Frankly, neither do I. But apparently that guy was looking. He had to have some reason for sapping you.” I added seriously, “If he'd wanted to kill you, Sherry, he'd have done it. It would be all over by now. So he must have been looking for something.”
“Look,” she said. “I hadn't paid any attention before.”
She pointed to the dresser. The top two drawers were pulled out and the things inside had been disarranged, but none had been tossed onto the floor. We went through all the drawers but found nothing that meant anything to us. Then Sherry led me into the front room and stopped in front of a bookcase.
“About half of these are Zoe's books,” she said. “And those are her magazines and letters in the bottom.”
We went through all the books, flipping the pages as if expecting a clue to leap out, but nothing happened. I pulled the stack of magazines from the bottom shelf. The bunch of letters fell to the floor and I put them back on the shelf for the moment. “These magazines hers, Sherry?”
“Uh-huh.”
There were a couple of old pulp magazines, science fiction of the old school with lurid and sensational covers. The rest were recent slicks. Sherry left for a moment and came back with two more orange drinks. I hauled off and had right at mine this time. Still tasted like orange juice.
“You put any gin in this?”
“You'd be surprised.”
I wondered how this would mix with that handful of bourbon. Seemed to be mixing O.K. I was sitting on the floor in front of the bookcase and Sherry stood over me. I grinned up at her, then picked up Fanta Science, one of the pulp magazines, which depicted on the cover an eight-legged monster chasing a busty, half-naked lovely over hill and dale.
“Ah,” I said, “for the life of an artist. Uh, if I learn to paint, will you pose for me?”
Her lips twitched slightly and she looked at the cover. “Like that?”
“Why not?”
She hesitated only a moment, then shrugged, and her amazing breasts got restless under the sweater. “Why not?” she said. Her eyes sparkled and there was laughter in the turned-up corners of her mouth.
I cleared my throat, wondering what my next line was.
She pointed. “That thing's a greeble, I think.”
“Doesn't look very agreeable.”
She laughed happily. “I mean greeble.” She spelled it. “The thing with the legs. Up on Mars or somewhere.”
“Oh.” I had at my drink again, then watched Sherry while she took a long swallow of hers. We flipped through the pulps and the slicks. No clues. I picked up the bundle of letters.
“What are these, Sherry?”
“Some of Zoe's, but I never looked
at them before. I hadn't even thought about them since—since it happened.”
I examined the top one. In the upper left-hand corner it said simply, “Swallow,” with a local address. “I think we'd better look at them now,” I said.
There were an even dozen letters, and we both read them all while we sipped on our drinks. The letters were all from Swallow to Zoe, but I couldn't find anything wrong with them. They were mushy in spots, but hardly incriminating; no breach of promise, no passionate avowals of love undying. Mainly Swallow had referred to places they'd been together or plans they'd made for an outing. A careful boy, this Oscar. But all the letters were signed, “Love, Oscar.” I wasn't sure whether or not that would mean anything in a court of law.
Finally we finished, stacked the letters again in the bookcase, and got up off the floor. It didn't seem that we'd accomplished anything. We went through a writing desk Zoe had used and I picked up a bulky book of mimeographed pages bound in a green paper cover. The name “Jungle Girl” was on the cover.
“This the movie?” I asked Sherry.
She took it from my hands and flipped through it. “It's a copy of the shooting script on ‘Girl.'”
“What would Zoe want with the thing?”
She shrugged. “I don't know, Shell. Sometimes she brought work home with her.”
“I don't know the score, but there wouldn't be any work on this, would there? I understand they've been shooting for two weeks or so already, so this must have been finished weeks ago.”
“Maybe she wanted to study it; she did a little writing herself. I don't know.” She shrugged again. I almost spoke to her about that shrugging. Then she added, “But, Shell, whoever was in here wouldn't be looking for this. There are lots of them around the studio.”
“Yeah. Only there doesn't seem to be anything else here anybody would want. Hey, maybe he wanted you.”
She laughed and walked away from me. We spent twenty minutes more looking over the house, then went into the kitchen, where Sherry mixed more drinks.
“I still don't know any more,” I said, “except that the guy was after something. Of course, maybe he got it.”
There was only a little gin left in the bottom of the bottle, so Sherry turned the bottle upside down and split the remaining drops between our two glasses. “That's all she wrote,” she said brightly. “No more.” She smiled at me, her lips curving in that rainbow look I'd first noticed about her.
“Think it's enough,” I said.
Somehow we wound up back in the bedroom. I got into my uncomfortable chair and Sherry sat opposite me on the bed again. “Shell,” she said slowly, not looking at me, “do you think ... anything else will happen tonight? I mean, like that man coming back. I never had anything like that happen to me before.”
It was odd, but the thought hadn't even occurred to me until now. We'd been busy looking around and talking and I just hadn't thought about it. I knew it would have occurred to me eventually, though.
“I don't know,” I said. “There's a chance.” I thought about it. “Yes. Yes, indeed. Look, Sherry, what say I stay here tonight? I could ... sleep on the couch. Or on the lawn or something, ha.”
She looked straight at me. Funny thing, she didn't appear frightened. “I'd feel lots safer,” she said. Her face was solemn at first, but then a slight curve appeared at the corners of her soft mouth. The curve widened perceptibly and soon she was smiling. “You wouldn't mind, would you, Shell?”
I had a gulp of my drink. “No, no. Sure not.” She drank the last of her highball and put the glass on the floor. She straightened up and started to yawn, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. Then, deliberately, she put her arms above her head and stretched.
I sat right there and stared, remembering everything all over again. Old frustrated Shell Scott, that was me. I was an ambulatory emotional shambles, and at the rate I was going, pretty soon I'd be gone. My nerves were about to peel open like artichokes at a free banquet. One more frustration and there'd be no more tomorrow; I'd just die right here, stewed in my own juice. I was glad I'd had that last drink; right now no gin could even trickle down my throat.
Sherry sighed and I echoed her. She stood up. “Then it's all settled?” she asked me softly.
I nodded. She walked over to the door of the closet in the wall I was facing, opened it, and reached overhead for some sheets and blankets on a shelf. She carried them into the lighted front room and I saw her drop them on the couch. She came back into the bedroom.
“Sleepy?” she asked me.
I'd never been so unsleepy in my life. “Not exactly,” I said hoarsely.
“Talk to me a little before we go to bed?” She laughed and said, “I mean before we say good night. Maybe we can forget all this trouble for a little while.”
“Love to.” I finished my drink and placed the empty glass beside hers on the floor. I said, “If I can talk, that is. I think I already mentioned something about your making conversation difficult.”
She stood in front of me and looked at me for a long time. Finally she took my hand and pulled me up out of the chair. “Turn around,” she said.
I was confused. What was going on here? Turn around? I turned and Sherry pushed me back toward the bed till my knees hit it and I sat down, more confused than ever, but not minding a bit.
“Now you sit there, Shell,” she said. “And don't look around. I'll try to make conversation less difficult.”
I had a vague idea what she meant and there was a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach, like a sickness. Like sleeping sickness. “Oh?” I said. “Ha. Ho. O.K.”
She walked around the bed to the closet, which was now at my back. I heard her open the door again, then she said, “And don't look around, Shell. Please, I mean it. Promise?”
“Sure.” Hell, I'd have promised to jump over the house.
I heard her moving around, things rustling, and that I didn't look is a tribute to my will power that will never fade. She said lightly, “A thick, lumpy old bathrobe, I think you said. There's an old one around here somewhere. If I can find it.”
I didn't really care if she never found it. She said, “Oh, here it is. It's certainly old enough.” Then came some more rustling, and finally she said, “There. Now it's safe.”
I took that to mean I could look. At least that would be my excuse. I turned my head and Sherry was walking around the foot of the bed. She was wearing a heavy blue robe that she held together at the waist with her hands. Though the material was thick, I could see the mounds of her breasts moving under the cloth, and I knew she wore nothing underneath it. That cloth was as thick as my tongue.
She stopped six feet away from me. “Is this what you wanted, Shell?” She was smiling easily, and if she was as wound up as I was, she didn't show it. She looked as though she had everything under control. She sure as hell had me under control.
I said, “That's exactly what I had in mind, Sherry, but I've got a feeling it won't help conversation.”
She laughed, throwing back her head, still standing a few feet away and holding the robe loosely, with one hand now. The robe gaped slightly open above her curled fingers and the swell of one heavy breast gleamed whitely from underneath the blue cloth. She looked at me again with her lips parted and her even white teeth pressed together in a tight smile.
“I'll tell you the truth,” she said. “I didn't think it would. But you like it?”
“You need an answer?” I still sat on the edge of the bed, but after several seconds I raised my hands and held them toward her. “Come here, Sherry.”
She didn't move for a moment. Then very softly she said, “I don't want you to leave me tonight, Shell.” She looked down at the hand that held the robe together. “Isn't it silly?” she said in an almost amused tone. “I couldn't find the belt for this.”
Then she let go of the robe, held her hands toward mine, and walked toward me. The cloth fell apart and first one smooth leg and then the other slid out of the robe as sh
e stepped toward me. There was nothing underneath it. She was smiling still, her teeth pressed together. She suddenly looked hot, wild.
I took her hands as she stopped in front of me, held them tightly, then slid my hands inside the robe against the velvety skin of her hips and pulled her toward me.
She resisted, pulling back away from me, teasing me. She laughed softly, and it was obvious that she was enjoying herself. I was enjoying myself right along with her. It was out in the open now and we both knew it.
“All right,” she said. “Wait.”
She shrugged, dropped the robe from her white shoulders to the floor, then shrugged again. For effect, I guess.
No matter why she did it, she got an effect. Never in all my life had I seen an effect like that. I pulled her closer to me again, and this time she flowed smoothly toward me and moved her shoulders slowly from side to side.
It was damn near spontaneous combustion.
As a kid I'd made fire by rubbing two sticks together; I'd never be caught with two sticks in my hands again. I was in the jungle and the savages had me. I was tied to the stake and the flames were licking all over me.
Then Sherry put one hand on each side of my face and bent toward me as I slid one hand up her back to her neck and pulled her head down to mine. I pulled her gently and she moved around me and I felt the bed sink down at my side. I turned toward her, feeling her lips against my mouth, lips that were amazingly soft and smooth, warm and gentle against mine. Our mouths were pressed together as we slid farther onto the bed until our bodies were pressed together too. She pulled slightly away from me, her eyes half opened as were mine, and she looked at me for a moment, then said in a near whisper, “Kiss me, Shell, kiss me. Hold me and touch me.” Her voice wasn't light now, but thick and warm. “Kiss me, Shell. Hold me close. Closer, Shell ... tighter.”
After a minute I left her, turned out the lights, and came back to the bed as she pulled down the bedclothes. In a moment I slipped in next to her, held her tightly and warmly against me, her mouth barely touching my lips as she said again, “Closer, Shell. Hold me...”
Way of a Wanton Page 11
