A couple more acts floated by while I wondered when they'd get to the strip-tease. Then a tall, slinky brunette walked into the circle of light on the edge of the dance floor. She walked like a stripper. I waited for the MC to take the mike away while she stood poised on the edge of the floor. She looked like a stripper. The mike was still there and damned if she didn't walk over and start singing into it. She sang like a stripper.
She was immensely healthy on her chest. A high-necked silver gown clung to her voluptuous curves and she rocked back and forth easily as she sang. It was nice watching, anyway.
She finished her number, bowed without falling on her face and smiled as the lights came on accompanied by applause. She was only about ten feet away so I gave her a big, toothy grin as she walked off stage. She looked at me, through me, away from me and back at me again. I kept on grinning and applauded boorishly. She walked off to her left around the bandstand and up to the velvet-covered archway I'd gone through earlier. And there was my old pal Red-Nose talking to a tuxedoed Victor Peel. The healthy singer stopped and talked a minute with them, looked over her shoulder at me, then chatted some more. She went through the archway and out of sight.
Kelly stood up. I gotta go,” he said thickly. “Grab a cab.”
“I'll take you,” I said.
“No, no. No, no, no,” he mumbled. “Cab's fine.” He shook himself, “Brrr. My wife'll kill me.”
“If you live, call me tomorrow,” I said.
He nodded and started off. I remembered something. “Hey,” I yelled. “Come back.”
He stopped, turned around, aimed and made it back. I gave him the check room stub. “For your hat,” I told him. “Tell the blonde Shell sends his passion.”
“Hat. Shell sends passion.” He left.
I gulped coffee and looked up. Victor Peel stood at the side of the table looking down at me out of his icy blue eyes. More important, the babe with the healthy lungs stood by him, smiling. Not at him, at me. I stood up.
“Hello, Peel.” I pointed at the table. “Expense account. Delicious.”
“There is no expense account.” He lifted a thick lip over his crooked teeth. I guess he was smiling.
No expense account; a tough guy.
He turned to Chesty and got gracious, “Gloria, this is Mr. Scott, Sheldon Scott. Mr. Scott, Miss Gloria Wayne.”
I said how-do-you-do. She took my hand and sort of kneaded it in hers. It was fun. She said, “How do you do, Mr. Scott?” and took her hand away.
“Join me?” I held a chair for Gloria and let Peel sit down all by himself. A waiter came up, brushed ineffectually at the table cloth, removed my coffee and took our order for drinks. Almost immediately the gal and I were on a “Gloria—Shell” basis.
Peel broke up what was beginning to be a most enjoyable conversation. He said, “Have you anything you want to discuss with me, Mr. Scott?
I hauled my eyes away from Gloria and looked upon Peel's much less pleasant brown mustache and five o'clock shadow. “Not yet. I've covered a little ground but there's nothing solid yet. I think things are going to start happening, though. When I get anything good I'll check with you.”
The drinks came and Peel sipped at his champagne cocktail. He said, “Do you still think my request is so, what was it, screwy?”
“Still screwy, but it's starting to make sense. It appears that you're right.”
He said matter of factly, “I'm seldom wrong.”
Red-Nose came up and tapped Peel on the shoulder, “Guy wants a big check cashed, boss,” he said hoarsely. His voice sounded as if he'd left it out in the rain. Peel excused himself and got up.
Red-Nose breathed in my face. “What's with gardenias?”
I looked at his lapel. No gardenia. No bulge. No nothing.
My,” I said. “You do take things seriously.”
He grinned happily, then turned and followed Peel toward the rear of the club. His right hip bulged as though he'd sat on a wasp's nest.
I turned back to face Gloria. “Maybe Peel won't be back,” I said.
“Probably not. I asked him who the man with the fangs was and he knew you, so I asked him to introduce me.”
“I'm flattered. Only I really don't have fangs.”
“I know it. Aren't I brazen?”
“Hussy.”
She still had on the silver gown. It fit her like skin. She had her right elbow on the table, her chin resting in her hand. She was leaning over the table. Way over. I wondered if they were real or made out of plastic or something. If they were real, I wondered if they were insured. I wondered if I should have anything more to drink.
“How about another drink?” she asked. Well, that settled that problem.
We got drinks and sipped and stared at each other.
We sat like that for a while and she said, “You can take me home, Shell.”
I hated to say it, but I said it.
“Can't. I'm half stinking now and by the time you get through, I'll be seeing flying guppies. Besides, we've both got work to do.”
“I'm through,” she said. “You're what?”
“Through. Finished.”
“Aren't you in the show?”
“Sure, but it's over. There's only two shows a night here and they're both different. Nothing but the best.” She added apologetically, “Not that I'm the best.”
I grinned at her, “You're the best.”
“So you can take me home.”
“I've got work to do.”
“Sissy. Want me to walk?”
I looked at her. I thought it over. I looked at her some more.
She said, “I dare you.”
I gave up. I tossed down the rest of my drink. “O.K. Come with papa.”
“Yes, papa.”
I leered at her and we fought our way out of the place. Passing the check room I saw Maxine standing with one hand resting on her hip. She looked at me. Coolly. I winked at her behind Gloria's bare back. As we passed her, I said softly, “Shell sends his passion.”
She said explosively, “Baloney!”
Chapter Six
OUTSIDE it had cooled off a little more and it seemed quiet as a grave after the hum and laughter of the Seraglio. Gloria clung to my arm as if it were a roll of thousand dollar bills while the uniformed attendant got the Caddy and drove it around front. I climbed behind the wheel. She scooted in and kept right on scooting till she was pressed, plumply, against me.
“Look, baby, I've got work to do. I ought to at least go through the motions.”
She giggled. I wondered if she was giggling at what I thought she was giggling at.
“It's not far,” she said.
“What's not far?”
“Hmm?” Her breath was tickling my ear.
“What's not far?”
“My place. Over on Parkview Street. I'll show you.”
After about fifteen minutes of her showing me, breathing in my ear and being plump, pleasantly, against me, we turned off Wilshire onto Parkview and pulled up in front of a tiny little house like the bride's cottage with roses. She gave me the key and let me open the door for her.
“Come on in.”
“Look, I've got work—”
“Oh, come on. It's too late to do anything, anyway. Or were you thinking of going home to bed?”
“I was thinking about it.”
“Well, stop thinking about it.” She smiled roguishly. “Think about me instead. Sleep later in the morning if you want to. I want company and you're company.”
“Well...”
“Come on in; I'll mix you a drink.”
What the hell, I could use a drink.
She had a nice place. The front door opened into a little living room with a small kitchen off to the left in back. Just this side of the kitchen was a door I supposed was to the john. On the right was another room with, instead of a door, a solid, dark blue drapery or heavy cloth curtain with big brass rings attached to the top and looped over an iron bar. The drapery
had been left hanging half across the entrance and inside the room I could see a big dressing table with a huge mirror and the foot of a white-covered Hollywood bed. Bedroom. On the dressing table were a couple of pictures—one on each side. One of them was nobody I knew; the other looked very much like Victor Peel. In fact, it was Peel.
“Cozy,” I said.
“Just my size,” she said. “I love it. Sit down and I'll mix that drink.”
I said, “I see you've got a couple of men in the bedroom.” She looked startled and I added, “On the dresser. In frames.”
“Oh,” she laughed, “those. You surprised me.”
“Isn't one of them Peel?”
“Yep. The boss. He's been wonderful to me.” She frowned. “I don't sing so good, do I?”
I let it lie there and looked around the living room. A big color TV set, plus AM-FM radio and a record player was just this side of the bedroom entrance; a soft, gray chair a little farther down on the other side of the drapery; two more of the same on the left in the far corner. Half the wall directly across from the entrance was occupied by a huge window with dark blue draperies at each side. In front of the window was a long lounge. I lounged on it.
Gloria disappeared into the little kitchen and I could hear her rattling glasses and ice cubes; then she stuck her head out the door and asked, “What do you want? Scotch? Bourbon? Gin?”
I got up and walked over to the kitchen doorway.
“Bourbon, please. With water, not too much water.”
She busied herself with the fixings and I watched her as she measured by guesswork—she wasn't a scientific bartender. She poured and fiddled around, then leaned over and the front of her dress pulled delightfully tight against her plumpnesses. I wondered again if they were real or came in the ladies’ stores under the trade name of “Top Secret.”
“There.” She guided me back to the lounge, sat down at least six inches from me, and handed me the drink. It was good, smooth bourbon. She took a sip at her drink and the sip turned into a swallow, then into a gulp and she put the glass down on her knee, empty.
“Wow,” I said.
“I don't really like it much,” she confessed. “I just drink it to feel good.” She rocked her head back and forth like a pendulum. “I feel good, too.”
“I'll bet you do.”
“Excuse me.” She got up and drifted around the end of the lounge.
I inhaled half of my drink, slowly, then I heard the metallic, sliding sound and craned my head around. Gloria wasn't in sight, but the dark blue drapery of the bedroom entrance was closed and swinging gently back and forth. I inhaled the last half of my drink. Fast.
I could hear her moving around inside, humming snatches of a tune. It started running through my mind while I kept one eye on the drapery. It took her about five minutes. The curtain swept back and she stood there for a minute with the light warm and soft behind her.
She'd changed. Oh, how she'd changed. She had on a smoky gray negligee that might have been a week's work for a small spider. She smiled and walked toward me like a gal doing the mating dance of the early Tahitians.
I didn't stop her. I like dancing.
She walked over to the big window with a wicked smile on her lips and a wicked swing to her hips and pulled a tassled cord that shut the drapes over the window. She turned around and leaned back against the wall.
“Like?”
“Love. Love immensely.” My tongue flopped around as if it were disconnected.
She laughed deep in her throat, half a chuckle. “You're empty,” she said. “Let me mix you another.”
She came over close and took the empty glass from my hand.
They were real. Really real.
She leaned over, dangerously, and put one hand on each side of my head and tilted my head back while she laughed at me with her eyes and her mouth. I could feel the glass in her hand, cold against my ear, and then her lips warm, burning against mine. They were soft lips. Soft as the velvet curtains. Softer. At first. Then hard, insistent, demanding.
I wondered if I was going to get that other drink. I decided I wasn't.
I was right.
I unlocked the door of my apartment and went in and flipped on the small desk lamp at the right of the door. I've got two tropical fish tanks in the front room, and fish are like people. They don't like having bright lights flashed in their eyes all of a sudden.
I felt as if I'd been up for a week. I went into the kitchenette and peered into the refrigerator for a bottle, found it and mixed myself a stiff nightcap. It was 3:30 A.M.
I've got a living room-kitchenette-bedroom-bath combination in the Spartan Apartment Hotel on North Rossmore in Hollywood. It's just about two hundred yards as a golf ball flies from the Wilshire Country Club.
It's comfortable. In the living room, one deep leather chair—for me; two chocolate-brown overstuffed chairs; an oversized chocolate divan; three hassocks, never in the same places; a yellow-gold, wall-to-wall carpet with a thick shag nap that makes your feet feel as if they're walking on a mattress; big, low, black-lacquered coffee table with the current copies of Playboy, The Aquarium, and Cavalier artfully arranged to cover the water rings left by long gone highball glasses; and a fake fireplace under a yard square nude done in garish oils.
Like it? Then the hell with you; I like it fine.
Bedroom: Hollywood bed, hassock, two chairs, dresser.
Bathroom: combination bath and shower, form-fitting porcelain chair, medicine cabinet with mirror, no nude.
Kitchenette; gas range, refrigerator, breakfast nook, bottle of bourbon. Also food.
I carried my drink into the bedroom and started climbing out of my clothes. I hung the gray gabardine suit alongside the other suits in the closet, put my tie on the rack, stuck shoetrees in my brown Cordovans and tossed my shirt, shorts and socks into the laundry bag.
In the shower, I let a stiff spray of steaming water beat against my chest while I wondered about the people I'd run into during this long but interesting evening. I'd already bumped into more peculiar characters than you'll find on a ticket from a Chinese laundry.
It had been quite an evening.
I soaped up, rinsed, turned off the shower and rubbed down with a thick towel. In bed, a sheet over me, both alarm clocks set for 8 A.M., the windows open and halfway cool at last, I thought about Gloria, Maxine, Robin and Joe till I fell asleep.
Chapter Seven
I CAUGHT the tail end of the first alarm, rolled over deliciously and started dropping back again into a beautiful never-never land where sloe-eyed houris in transparent brassieres and cellophane skirts danced wickedly around my throne. A girl with a thirty-six inch bust and masses of rusty-red hair tickled my cheek with foot-long eyelashes. I looked along the sloping white bridge of her nose to slanted green eyes a yard away and the eyes turned into two lumps of polished coal. The eyelashes started growing, lengthening, then they thickened into pointed iron spikes and started pressing into my neck. The second alarm, the big one, went off like a gong in a rain-barrel and a nightmare died a-borning. I sat up, swore and looked at the clock. Eight A.M. Morning. A thoroughly disgusting and miserable time of day.
I slid my tongue distastefully along the roof of my mouth, smacked my lips together, blinked and rolled out of bed. The jar as my feet slapped the floor damn near took the top of my head off; the inside of my skull must have been a shambles.
I managed to get a robe out of the closet and tottered into the bathroom feeling old and broken. I threw water on my face, brushed my teeth and ran a comb through my hair. It didn't make any difference to my hair. In the kitchenette I put water on to boil, started a pot of coffee and got down the box of mush. That's right, mush. Plain old mush. Breakfast. Even without a hangover, the thought of a hearty breakfast in the morning gives me that condemned-man feeling.
I poured a handful of the flakes of mush into the boiling water and watched it cook.
It bubbled sickeningly. My stomach bubbled sicken
ingly.
I took the mush into the bathroom and poured it down inside the form-fitting porcelain seat. Quick and simple; breakfast was over.
I did manage a piece of toast and two cups of black coffee, and woke up.
I got dressed in a teal-blue gabardine suit. I stopped long enough to turn on the aquarium lights and feed the fish some live daphnia, squared my shoulders and went out.
It was going to be hot again; the sun burned halfway up the sky as hard and brazen as a Main Street hustler and there wasn't any wind. Smog bit at my eyes and the American flag above the Wilshire Country Club hung limp and still, hazy through the smog. I got in the Cad, turned off Rossmore at Rosewood and headed toward North Windsor.
I think I liked her better in the blouse and clam-diggers, but she still looked like the answer to monkey glands in a tight-fitting yellow pullover sweater, a pleated white skirt, sheer nylon stockings and tan-and-white spike-heeled shoes.
She said in the soft, pleasant voice, “Well, good morning, Mr. Scott. You're up bright and early.”
“I thought of something I missed last night. Decided I'd drop over for another chat.”
She might have frowned a little, but she opened the door and asked me in. I walked inside and well, well. There on the same low, green divan was the irritable Mr. Kash. He had on a fresh brown tweed suit this A.M., but the same sullen look was on his face.
I said cheerfully, “Good morning.”
He got up slowly from the divan and spread his legs wide. He glared at me. “For Christ's sake, snooper,” he said nastily, “why don't you go peddle your papers? Don't you ever stay home?”
I'd already had enough of this lug's glares and growls so I said without thinking, “Don't you ever go home?”
He clamped his teeth together, his nostrils flared, and two steps brought him face to face with me. He grabbed me by the front of the coat and shoved. “Out!” he barked. “Out, snooper.”
There is nothing that makes me madder, quicker, than for some guy to start imagining he can shove me around, but I kept my hands down at my sides and said slowly, “Now, wait just a minute, friend.”
The Scrambled Yeggs (The Shell Scott Mysteries) Page 5
