by McBain, Ed
“Has he started bleeding again?”
“Cindy,” Sands said slowly, “take off your clothes.”
She stared at him as if she hadn’t heard him.
“What?” she said.
“I’d like to look at your legs, Cindy. I’d ’preciate it if you took off your clothes.”
“What?” she said again, stunned. “What?”
The smile dropped from Sands’ face. “I want you to take off your clothes,” he said. “I want you take them off right now, right this minute. An’ then we’ll see about tellin’ you this information.”
“Is that what you want?” she said. “Just that?”
Sands smiled again. “No. Not just that.”
“You must be crazy,” she said.
“You got a choice, Cindy,” Sands told her.
“I thought so. From the second you came in here.”
“You can either—”
“No. The answer is no. Get out of here before I vomit. Get out of here before I—”
“You can either kick me out,” Sands persisted, “or you can hear me out. If you hear me out, considerin’ Johnny’s bad arm an’ all, you can likely save his life. He’s out there someplace, you know.”
“No,” Cindy said. “Get out.”
“Sure,” Sands answered, smiling. He got up and put on his coat. “He’s your boy friend, not mine.”
“How do I know this information is the goods? How do I know you’re not lying just to—just to get what you want?”
“You got to take my word, honey. You ain’t got a choice.”
“Your word is about as good as—”
“Take it or leave it. Yes or no?” Sands said tightly.
“How do I know you’ll tell me after … afterward?”
He could see it was gnawing at her. He could see the idea didn’t appeal to her, but she sure as hell wanted this news. She bit her lip and stared at him worriedly.
“You got to take my word,” he repeated.
She seemed to consider for a long time. Sands shrugged, figuring it was now or never. He had to force her hand, and there was only one way to do that.
“Well, honey,” he said, “you done had your chance. I’ll see you ’round.”
He went to the door and put his hand on the doorknob. He started to open the door.
“Wait,” Cindy said softly.
Sands turned and looked at her expectantly.
“Sit down,” she said. And then, in almost a whisper, “I’ll … I’ll do what you want.”
Sands took off his coat and sat down on the edge of the bed. Cindy looked at him again, and he saw the disgust on her face, and somehow the disgust pleased him immensely.
“Go on,” he said. “I’m waitin’.”
She pulled the blouse out of her skirt and began unbuttoning it. She folded the blouse over a chair, working like an automaton. She unhooked her skirt and then pulled down the zipper, letting it fall to her feet and stepping out of it. She took off her stockings, and then she hesitated, and Sands looked at her again, and she seemed to decide that hesitation was the wrong thing with him watching her. He leaned forward anxiously now, feeling the heat at the pit of his stomach, watching her uncover her body. She undressed rapidly, and then she stood naked near the stove, looking at him hesitantly, trembling a little.
Sands smiled and stuck his hands out in front of him, as if he were weighing the air.
“Come here, baby,” he said.
She got out of bed immediately afterward. She lighted a cigarette to take the taste of his foul kisses out of her mouth, and then she threw on a robe and crossed her arms over it. She felt filthy. She had never felt like this before, never in her life. Even the first time, and she’d been forced that time, even then she had not felt this filthy.
“Tell me,” she said. She did not look at him. She kept her back to him, not wanting to see him as he dressed.
“Tell you what?” Sands asked.
She whirled rapidly. “You said—”
“The news, you mean? Oh, the information. That what you want me to tell you?”
“Yes. What is it about Johnny?”
Sands dressed quickly. “I tell you, honey,” he said, pulling his jacket on, “I tell you, I really enjoyed that. I sure did.”
“For God’s sake,” she shouted, “is Johnny hurt?”
Sands buttoned his jacket and put on his coat. “I really liked it. I think I’ll come back for more tomorrow.”
“What?” She looked at him, stunned.
“Or maybe tonight. Maybe I’ll stop by tonight, Cindy, an’ we’ll see about it then, huh, Cindy?”
“You … you didn’t have anything to tell me!” she said, shocked with the realization. “It was all a trick!”
“I got something,” he said, “an’ maybe I’ll tell it to you tonight. I’ll stop by ’fore you go to the club, Cindy.”
She stared at him for a moment, and then she said, “Oh, you rotten sonovabitch.”
She flung herself across the room, tossing away the cigarette, her fingers spread wide. Her nails caught at the flesh under his eyes, and she pulled downward with all her strength, feeling the skin rip. She clawed higher, wanting to get at his eyes, wanting to rip the bastard’s eyes out. Her nails raked his forehead, tore his nose, and she heard him scream like a woman. He turned his head, and then he brought his hand up in a sharp punch that caught her on the chest. She staggered backward and he went after her, hitting her again, still with a bunched fist, catching her on the mouth this time. She fell to the floor, tasting the blood on her lip, the robe pulling back over her legs.
Sands reached into his back pocket. He pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at his face, and his eyes opened wide when he saw the bloodstains.
“You’ll never find out now,” he said. “Never! You hear me?”
She looked at him, trying to think of a way to reach him, wanting this news about Johnny, thinking, I’ve given you the most I could give.
“Hank …” she said, the anger out of her now, only the desire for the information, remaining.
Sands laughed shrilly, a high laugh that fled to the ceiling of the room. He kept dabbing at his torn flesh and laughing.
“Hank, is he hurt? Can you tell me that? Is Johnny hurt?”
“You dumb li’l whore,” Sands said. “You think I’m goan tell you now? You can bust, an’ you can rot, but you never goan get it out o’ me no more. No matter what you do now. You understan’ that? You ain’ gettin’ nothin’ from me!”
“Hank, I did what you said!”
“Shut up! Shut up an’ listen to me. I got information, all right, I got mighty pow’ful information. But you ain’ gettin’ nothin’. You give to me, but you ain’t gettin’ nothin’ in return. Not a damn thing.”
He walked to the door, about to leave, and then a new idea seemed to strike him. He turned and said, “I’ll tell you sutthin’ else, Cindy Matthews. I hope that sonovabitch drops dead out there. I hope we has a blizzard tonight, an’ I hope his goddamn arm falls off, an’ I hope the mis’able bastard freezes hisself to death, thass what I hope.”
He opened the door and then slammed it shut behind him, and Cindy lay on the linoleum covering the floor, and she listened to his laughter outside in the hallway. She wiped the blood from her lip, and then she kept listening to the laughter until it drifted down the staircase and faded.
Twelve
He felt weak all at once.
He’d felt fine up on the roof, and later just roaming the streets, trying to think of a lead to Luis’ killer. But it was dark now, and there was a cold wind in the streets, and up ahead he could see the lights of the Savoy, and he could hear the muted beat of the music, and then the weakness came, suddenly.
It hit him in the legs first, a drained feeling, as if someone had suddenly stolen his bones. And then the lassitude spread to his groin, and then he knew he would really be sick because he always felt that weak draining in his groin when he was ill, even wh
en he was a kid and had bronchitis.
He thought, I should have eaten more.
I should have seen a doctor.
The weakness spread, and the lights of the Savoy began to merge with the street lights and then the stars until the whole business pinwheeled around in his head. He didn’t want to collapse, but he couldn’t control his legs. He stumbled sideways, slamming against the fender of a new car. I can’t pass out, he thought, I can’t.
But the pinwheel spun into a crazy gray, and the gray turned black and then blacker, and he heard “The Two-O’Clock Jump” blasting from up there someplace, and then his shoulder hit the fender of the car, and he fell to the pavement and didn’t hear the music any more.
Marcia Clarke had added the “e” to her name when she was nineteen. Until then, she’d been plain Marcia Clark, daughter of James Clark. The addition of the “e” was a way of declaring her independence, and also an attempt at sophistication. When Marcia added the “e,” she also left the apartment of her parents on Pelham Parkway and found herself an apartment in Washington Heights. She was attending Brooklyn College at the time, and what with traveling time and asserting her new-found independence, Marcia was a very busy little girl.
For a little girl, Marcia was not at all unattractive.
She had blond hair and green eyes that were flecked with an inner circle of deep yellow. She owned a trim figure, with a narrow waist and a 34C bust, a bust she was inordinately proud of. She liked men to look at her bust. She also liked men to look at her legs, which were good legs, and she liked to remind men and women alike that “good things come in small packages.”
Marcia was a model of deportment, except the time she’d worn a very low-cut gown to a senior tea, distracting most of the red-blooded Brooklyn College males, and driving some members of the faculty practically frantic. This, too—in Marcia’s reasoning—was a way of showing her independence. When she was graduated from Brooklyn, she took a job as a laboratory technician. She still maintained her apartment in Washington Heights, but, being denied senior teas, Marcia was forced to find other means of asserting her independence.
Tonight she had danced with a total of twelve colored men. She was very proud of that fact. She had never been to the Savoy Ballroom before, and here, her first time, she’d danced with twelve colored men.
At first she’d been a little frightened. She was not nineteen any longer, nor was she twenty-one and attending a senior tea in a low-cut gown. And wearing a low-cut gown to a senior tea is not exactly the same thing as wearing a low-cut gown to the Savoy Ballroom.
And her gown was cut low. Apparently a lot of people had been looking. She’d danced with Mark only twice, and since then she hadn’t been free once, and all the men she’d danced with were colored, and she was truly excited. It was like being in a foreign land. She couldn’t understand a lot of the talk, and the local jokes passed over her head completely. The music was strange, too, a wild sort of music that spread to the bones. She’d have to do this more often, even if Mark didn’t like it.
Mark definitely did not like it.
Mark had not liked the idea to begin with, but she had insisted.
He had a few fortifying shots before they drove into Harlem, and the fortifying shots had put him into a semi-stupor. In that stupor, he watched Marcia cavorting about with various men of various hues.
When the thirteenth man asked for her hand, Marcia smiled graciously and curtsied, bowing over low, the front of her dress billowing out over the 34C bust.
“You’re number thirteen,” she said, and Mark mumbled, and the tall Negro just smiled and whisked her onto the dance floor. She watched Mark from the circle of the Negro’s arms.
“You like Harlem?” the Negro asked.
“Oh, yes,” she said. She felt his arm tighten around her waist. She felt his cheek against hers, and she wondered if she should pull away, but she thought, Oh, the hell with it.
“This is only a small part of Harlem,” the man said. “You should see all of it.”
“Should I?” she asked coyly.
“I mean, if you’re of a mind to.”
“I hadn’t thought of it.”
“I mean, if your boy friend wouldn’t mind.”
“He’s not my boy friend,” she said, giggling. “He just escorted me here.”
“Then mightn’t we ditch him? I mean, if you—”
“I don’t think so,” Marcia said, but she did not take her cheek from the man’s, nor did she move away from his tight embrace.
When he brought her back to Mark, he said, “I’ll see you a little later,” and she smiled pertly. Mark was still sulking.
“Are you angry, little boy?” she asked.
“Nope,” Mark said, his speech a little thick, the liquor still reeling around inside his brain. “You can go to hell with one of these jigs, for all I care.”
“Mark! For heaven’s sake!”
“What’s the matter?” he asked, lifting one eyebrow.
“Watch the way you’re talking,” she whispered. “If one of them should hear—”
“Hell with ’m,” he said grandly, using his arm in a musketeer gesture. “Le’s get the hell out of here, Marcia, right now.”
“I’m having fun,” she said simply.
“Well, I’m not.” Mark nodded emphatically, the gesture made bigger because he was still feeling the liquor. He lowered his voice intimately. “You should see the poisoned darts the girls’re flingin’ at you, baby. They don’t like you one bit, not one little bit, nossir.”
“Are they really?” Marcia asked, smiling and sucking in a dress-filling breath. She could not keep the smugness off her face.
“They are really,” Mark affirmed. “They will probably rip off all your clothes soon, an’ carry your head on a pike.”
“Mark!”
“They will. An ol’ tribal custom.”
The thought of having all her clothes ripped from her was not unappealing. A sort of a white goddess. Stripped naked, with the tribesmen at her feet. She toyed with the idea, picturing it with her mind’s eye.
“Well,” she said, “I’m enjoying myself.”
“O.K., Marcia, honey, sweetie, baby, doll, I’m leaving. You can stay here if you want to, but I’m leaving.”
“Why don’t you dance with some of the women?” Marcia asked.
Mark nodded sourly. “Change my luck? No, thanks. I’m goin’ home. You comin’ along, or do you want to stay? You pays your money and you takes your cherce.”
“I’d really like to stay a little longer. The music is so—”
“So stay. I’ll be seein’ you, Marcia doll. Lessee now, wha’s your number again?”
“Oh Mark, you’re being plain stupid.”
“Agreed. ’Night Marcia.”
“Wait.”
He whirled unsteadily. “Uhm?”
Marcia was angry. It showed in the flash of her eyes and the heave of her breasts. “What are you, a coward or something?” she asked.
“Me?” Mark considered this. “Yes,” he said gravely. “I am a coward or something. ’Night.”
“Wait,” she said, “for God’s sake, wait.” She paused to catch her breath, looking very pretty when she was angry, and knowing she looked very pretty. “I’ll be very angry if you force me to leave.”
“Nobody’s forcin’ you. Stay. Stay, honey. I don’t care. I’m goin’.”
“I’ll go with you,” she said suddenly, a little frightened at the thought of being left alone in Harlem. “But this is the last you’ll see of me, Mark.”
Mark shrugged. “O.K., if tha’s what you want.” He paused. “I’ll get our coats.”
They went out onto the sidewalk, and she did not take his arm. He walked crookedly, and she said coldly, “You’re drunk, do you know that?”
“So I’m drunk. I must’ve been drunk to take you here in the first place.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“You sore at me?” he asked.
“
Yes.”
“Well, I don’t care. Whattya think of that? I don’ give a damn.”
“I wonder how you’ll feel in the morning, when you start remembering.”
“I’ll feel fine. Whattya think, you own me or something? We date a few times, an’ right away—”
“A few times?”
“Yas, a few times,” Mark shouted. He lowered his voice. “All right, a few months, all right? Still, I don’t have to go chasin’ to Harlem to see you dancin’ with a lot of jigs.”
“Stop calling them that!”
“It’s what they are, isn’t it?”
“You’re making me sick,” Marcia said. “You’d better shut up.”
“I didn’t know you were so in love with—”
“It’s not that. It’s just that I can see nothing wrong with frequenting a Negro dance estab—”
“Oh, here comes your Public Speaking Two voice. Three-minute speech. Watch your ’nunciation, now. You’re being timed. Go!”
“Oh, go to hell,” Marcia said.
They walked in silence for a block, and then he said, “Here’s the goddamn car.”
“Look,” she said. “On the sidewalk.”
“Huh?” Mark glanced down to where the figure huddled against his right front wheel. “Oh, f’r crissakes, tha’s all I need.”
“He’s hurt,” Marcia said, her hand to her mouth.
“Hurt, my ass. He’s drunk. Come on, give me a hand here.”
“Mark, he’s hurt. We’ve got to help him.”
Mark stooped down and lifted the man’s hand out of the gutter. “There,” he said. “Now I won’t run over him. Come on, Marcia, get in.”
“He’s sick, Mark, I know he’s sick. Can’t you see that? My God, can’t you see that?”
“I can see he’s drunk,” Mark said doggedly. “What the hell do you think I am, Alcoholics Anonymous?”
Marcia stooped down and opened the tweed coat. She felt the man’s heart. “He’s sick,” she said. “Let’s take him to a doctor.”
“You’re out of your mind.”
“Help me get him in the car.”
“My car?”
“Yes, your car. Mark, if you don’t help me now, I’ll never—”
