by John Roeburt
“I hope I’ve set your mind at ease, Mister Winters. I enjoyed our little get-together, but I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave. I have an appointment shortly.”
I stood up and looked at him. His brown eyes were twinkling.
“I don’t have much choice,” I said. “I can’t buy your answers, but then that doesn’t make a hell of a lot of difference to you anyway.”
“Not a hell of a lot, no.”
The door to the office flew open suddenly and the crew-cut stumbled his way into the room. I was surprised to see him up and moving.
So much for late hours and weak hangovers.
His suit was a mess where his breakfast had landed and he walked bent over with his hand at his crotch like something was hurting him.
He stopped just inside the door and glared at me.
“You sonofabitch, I’ll kill you,” he rasped.
“Straighten up,” I said. “You’ll get round-shouldered.”
“You bastard!” he whispered and started for me.
This kid had a lot of heart. Of course, the .45 in his bosses’ hand might have had something to do with it.
“Hold it, Blade!”
It was Zato. The kid stopped and faced him. “Sit down, Blade. Before you fall down. Mister Winters was just leaving. He crossed to the door and opened it. “Good-bye, Mister Winters. Please don’t come back.”
I walked to the door. “So long, Manny,” I said. “Give my best to Chico.”
It didn’t get a rise out of him, but as I walked past the bartender on my way out I figured it might at least eliminate one slimy bastard from the streets of New York. I could picture the headstone: CHICO—POPULARITY’S PRICE.
I grinned and went out to the Jag.
I called Toni an hour later from the apartment and told her to dress and be ready when I picked her up at eight. She bubbled with enthusiasm until I told her we were making the rounds in beat land. Then she accused me of using her for purely decorative purposes while I worked on the case. I got a yes finally, and she promised to be ready on time.
I hung up hoping the Village would turn something up for me that night. Manny Zato sure hadn’t helped. His arguments made sense on the surface, but there was still the fact that the killer had been searching for something. Was it something Manny wanted? I couldn’t picture the immaculate pusher as a sadistic madman; but his boy Blade had all the makings.
By 2:30 I was taking a nap on my sofa. The hangover had ebbed to a dull throb by now, and I was counting on the sleep to get me in shape for a return performance later that night. Only this time I’d have Toni along to play governess to my bending elbow. I fell asleep and dreamed about smoky-eyed governesses.
CHAPTER TEN
It was warm and the stars blinked from a clear sky. Things seemed right with the world. I had the top down on the Jag, and the warm air felt good on my face. Two shots of Scotch were doing a lazy breast-stroke through my veins and Toni’s warm thigh was pressed cozily against mine as we cruised Broadway.
It was nine o’clock and the apple was coming alive all around us. At mid-town the sidewalks were crowded with thousands of people.
Times Square was a mess, as usual. But tonight I didn’t mind the constant stopping and starting at obstinate traffic lights. It was a kick to roll along slowly and dig the eager faces that jammed the streets.
As I pulled up for the fifth time in a row Toni reached over and squeezed my arm.
“I wish we could park the car and get out,” she sighed. “I’d love to just mingle with the crowds for awhile. How come I have to go for a private dick?”
I grinned at her and blew her a kiss.
“I know, kitten. It’s a drag and I’m sorry, but—”
She sighed again.
“Oh well, maybe I’ll meet a fireman or something, with reasonable working hours.”
“Fat chance. You’d get bored to death.”
She snuggled next to me and showed me the pout.
“It would help, you know, if you weren’t so damned sure of yourself,” she complained. I nibbled her lip as the light changed.
She was beautiful tonight, as always. Her white shantung dress buttoned demurely up to her neck and cupped her upthrust breasts nicely before it flared at her hips in long, wide pleats. She looked about seventeen with her midnight hair hanging loosely to her shoulders where it curled softly like inky foam. I felt like stopping right there just to hold her for awhile. But it wasn’t long before we reached the Village.
The spot I had chosen tonight was about three blocks from the Cloistered Id. Unlike the Id, it featured a small combo. Louise had named it as another of Ricky’s haunts. It was called The Purple Pit. I hoped only that it wasn’t mobbed with limp-wristed party boys as the color indicated.
The closest parking place I could find was a block away. The club was on the corner of the block. It had a long, violet awning supported by four weird-looking poles that made me think of a song I had heard once. Most of the lyrics escaped me but I could remember a sexy, sepia voice crooning, “I dreamed I built a reefer ten feet tall…”
I chuckled and Toni glanced up at me. “Something funny, shamus, or just youthful bubbles on a balmy night?”
“Bubbles,” I smiled, leaning down to brush my lips across her cheek. “You, the night, the music.”
The music was coming from The Purple Pit. It met us halfway there—heavy, funky stuff from a baritone sax that throbbed around our heads like a pulsing mist.
We had to walk down a short flight of stairs to get into the place. Inside, the music was louder and more contained. We stopped in the ante room and I deposited my stingy-brim with the plunging brunette behind the check counter. When she leaned over to stick a check inside the hat brim, the front of her topless blouse fell away from a hell of a lot of woman. But Toni dug the action and I barely had time to get the check, much less do any private ogling.
The club was divided into two crowded rooms; a large, table-strewn main room where a combo improvised on a raised platform at the far end, and a smaller room to the left connected by a brace of opened French doors through which I caught a glimpse of a long, cushioned bar. Both rooms were up to capacity, but the bar was better lighted and had fewer distractions. I guided Toni in there through the open doors. We found seats where we could still watch the bandstand and ordered drinks.
Toni sipped her Crème De Cocoa and wrinkled her nose at me. “Icky, huh?” she said, meaning the club in general. “I wonder if we’ll get thrown out when they find out we’re together?”
I knew what she meant. The joint was plushier than I had expected. But whatever it lacked in local color it more than made up for in off-beat customers. I remembered Valerie Coe’s observation about negative characters and decided that she had just about summed it up in a word.
Gay people were everywhere—male, female, and borderline question marks. The bar was predominately male—or female, depending on how you looked at it, and the club proper seemed to be catering mostly to their distaff counterparts. I didn’t see any men in female rigging. Of course, the light was bad. But I did catch glimpses of a few short haired man-girls in pants and sport shirts. Some of them weren’t bad, either.
From a corner of my eye I saw Toni discreetly rubber-necking, and I grinned. The joint might be icky but she wasn’t missing a thing.
The combo was a seven-piece group of young Negro disciples of that Cool School. They all wore black sunglasses and bored expressions that hardly changed even when they took their individual solos. They looked high, collectively.
The needle element was represented, too. Here and there I spotted hung-up junkies, male and female, nodding quietly to themselves under dark glasses.
I’ll say this much for the scene; it was unique.
“See anybody you know?” Toni asked. She was leaning against me for a better look through the doorway.
“Uh-uh. People like that don’t meet people like me. We run on different currents.”
I let my arm rub against the fullness of her breast and smiled at her.
“Like AC and DC, you know?”
She moved away a little and picked up her drink. “How well I know,” she said. “But if we’re here to look for leads you’d better forget the sneaky feels, lover. They’ll really kick us out. And be shocked, to boot.”
“Tell me more,” I said, going back to my highball. “You seem to be well up on off-brand etiquette.” I grinned at her. “You sure you never—”
Her eyes went smoky and she grabbed for her purse.
“Cole Winters, I’ll—”
I put my hand on the sensitive little thing’s arm.
“Easy, doll. I’m only kidding.”
She still smoldered a little, but she let go of the purse.
“Well, you better be,” she threatened. “If anybody knows the condition of my hormones, you do.”
What do you do with a chick like that? I touched her lips with my finger and got a tiny kiss.
“I think your hormones are the nicest I’ve ever seen—uh, felt—uh, used? Oh, the hell with it. You know what I mean.”
She smiled and things were all right again. “What exactly are you looking for?” she asked a while later. “I mean, someone special or just pot luck?”
I had brought her up to date on the case earlier in her apartment while I waited for her to finish getting ready. She knew about as much as I did. I do that a lot with Toni. She makes me think more clearly.
From a reasonable distance, I mean.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Just sort of ad-libbing, I guess, till somebody gets sick of seeing me around these joints and decides to pull my coat. I’m—”
I stopped abruptly, sounding pretty silly to Toni, I guess, who was watching me and didn’t see Valerie Coe weaving her way toward the bar between the tables.
Watching that woman weave was enough to stop anything abruptly.
She was poured into an ice-green, silk creation that covered her curves like a wet Kleenex and the way her hips moved under the taut material made heads spin all around her, even in this audience.
Toni dug her just before she reached us and her lips compressed into a straight line. I gave her a quick glance and she looked ready to do battle. Intuition or something.
Valerie stopped beside us, smiled, and took a deep breath. The green silk tightened to its limit and quivered. So did I.
“Whew!” she sighed. “Getting through that mob is like running the rapids. Hi, Cole, who’s your friend?”
“Valerie—Toni Dahl. Toni—Valerie Coe. She writes,” I added lamely.
Toni smiled graciously.
“How do you do, Miss Coe? I’ve never met a writer before. It must do wonders for one’s inhibitions. All that sex and stuff.”
I closed my eyes.
“Oh, it does,” Valerie smiled. “Perhaps you’d let me use you sometime. A biography or something.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t want to write about me,” Toni cooed. “I like men.”
“Toni—” I groaned.
Valerie laughed and turned to me.
“It’s all right, Cole. I don’t blame her for getting the wrong impression. This place is infamous.” She smiled at Toni, giving her that tolerant cat-grin that women use with each other. “But you’re wrong, Miss Dahl. I’m only writing a book.”
“How nice,” Toni said.
Her claws were withdrawn—slightly.
“Join us for a drink?” I asked, avoiding Toni’s eyes.
“Thanks, but I can’t. My date’s waiting for me. I saw you from the other room and just stopped over to say hello.”
“Maybe some other time,” I said. “Have fun.”
She exchanged catty good-byes with Toni and left. The rear view of her in that glued silk was criminal.
“Nice girl,” I ventured.
“M-m-m.”
“She writes.”
“You said that.”
“I hardly know her.”
“That’s odd. She’s very beautiful.”
“If you like the type,” I lied.
Her hand slipped over mine on the bar. “Cole?” she whispered.
“Yeah, kitten?”
“She’s not the reason you’re here, is she?” Her voice was so low I could hardly hear her. Her eyes looked hurt.
I palmed her chin and softly kissed her moist lips.
“Does a begger ask for paste when he’s offered pearls?” I whispered.
She smiled and squeezed my hand.
“Remind me to thank you later,” she grinned, “when we’re alone.”
I ordered refills as the combo climbed back up to their heroin cloud and picked up their instruments. They stuck bored grimaces on their faces and went into a takeoff on ‘Satin Doll’, with the baritone blowing a lazy background.
Toni picked up her purse and wiggled off the stool.
“Don’t go away,” she said. “My nose is shiny.”
I looked at it.
“You could have fooled me,” I said.
“Just be good, honey. I’ll be back.”
My eyes followed her and I found myself watching the graceful way the pleats of her dress swayed around her thin calves.
Some day I’ve got to make her Toni Winters, I thought. Some day.
The kid at the piano fell deftly into a thirty-two bar solo just then, and I returned my attention to the bandstand. He was hunched over the keyboard with his left hand digging out complicated chords while his right hand redecorated the melody. ‘Satin Doll’ is frantic when Ellington does it, and he wrote it, but this kid really blew strong. The kid had class.
I felt a hand pluck at my sleeve and I turned around to look up at heaven.
“Crazy, no?” she smiled. “That’s Wilt Phillips. He moves.”
She was about five-feet-three, with more curves than the Jersey turnpike. Her hair was jet black and pulled back from her little, elfin face in a pert pony tail. Her eyes were deep brown and slanted exotically, with a faraway look of humor sparkling from somewhere deep inside. Her sooty eyelashes looked an inch long.
She grinned at me, showing her tiny white baby teeth.
“I’m China McCoy, pops. I hear you’re paging me.”
Automatically, I eyed her slim, full-breasted figure and swallowed. For a junkie, this girl was put together. For anybody, this girl was put together.
I returned her smile and stood up.
“Hi. I’m Cole Winters. You’re not exactly the easiest girl in the world to find.”
She giggled sweetly.
“I’ve been hung up. Can I sit?”
She slid onto Toni’s stool, making my “please do” a little belated.
“Well,” I said, when we were both seated, “can I buy you a drink?”
She shrugged. “I’ll have a glass of milk.”
“Milk?”
“M-m-m. I dig milk.”
I motioned to the bartender and ordered the milk. Now that I had become somewhat accustomed to her upper measurements I studied her face. It was easy to look at. There was just enough of an Oriental cast to her features to make her beauty mysterious, with the added spice of Irish coquettishness to make it warm.
Her big eyes stared coyly at me through a heroin fog.
“So here I am pops. Explain!”
“I was a friend of Ricky’s,” I said.
Her smile died and her eyes clouded. “Ricky?” she whispered.
“Yeah. I’m pursuing his murderer.”
Two tears appeared at the corners of her eyes and clung to her lashes.
“Are you the fuzz, pops?”
I shook my head.
“Uh-uh. Just a friend.”
The tears slid down her cheeks. The Oriental sadness made her suddenly very fragile looking and small.
I touched her chin.
“I need help, China. A lot of help.”
She sniffed and looked up at me.
“He didn’t have a chance. Not a crummy chance.
Nobody does on smack. Did you know that? I loved him, pops. I really did. And he loved me, too. We were like—close, you know?”
I nodded, letting her pour it out. She brushed at the tears with the back of her hand.
“We used to lay in bed and rap, you know? All kinds of weird stuff we’d talk about. Like kicking and getting married and having kids. He used to kid me about little slant-eyed redheads running around the house with his hair and my eyes. He was like that. Always kidding and making me laugh. Even when we couldn’t cop and got sick. He’d hold me and talk to me, and it wouldn’t seem so bad.”
She bit her lower lip.
“But he didn’t have a chance, pops. Neither do I. Or anybody else with a spike in their arm. I tried to quit once. Ricky helped me, but it didn’t work out. I was too weak and he loved me too much to let me go through it.”
She sighed softly.
“And now he’s dead and don’t have to worry about copping any more. Maybe he’s lucky.”
“Why don’t you quit?” I asked. “Check in voluntarily and take the cure. You can.”
“It’s no good,” she said. “It’s a drag when you’re sick, but I just can’t picture life without it any more.”
I played with my highball for a minute while she straightened her face.
“What about Ricky? Can you help?”
“You mean do I know who killed him? It could have been anyone. A sick gowster who thought Ricky was straight. A mark who found out Rick had beat him for some cop-money. Who knows? This is the Village, pops. One little life just doesn’t mean much down here.”
I looked up and saw Toni coming along the bar.
“Think!” I said. “If anybody can help, it’s you. Can’t you think of anything?”
Her face tightened with earnestness as she clutched my arm. “Look, Mister Winters, if I knew anything, don’t you think I’d tell you? I loved Ricky. I just don’t know.”
Toni came up and stopped behind us. I waited for the inevitable, but it didn’t come. I got up and introduced them. Toni smiled at me, reading my mind.
“I wasn’t worried,” she said. “In the first place, you wouldn’t have the nerve, and besides, I liked her—even from back there.” She turned to China, who had slipped off the stool and stood beside her. They were almost the same size.
