Vermilion

by Aldyne, Nathan

  “Good God,” said Clarisse, “you took out the dog, fixed real coffee, made the bed. As long as you’re playing domestic, why don’t you get me a couple of aspirin?”

  Valentine rose and went into the bathroom. In a moment he returned with his hand outstretched. Clarisse took the aspirin. “God,” she breathed, “I forgot to call in sick.”

  “I did that too,” said Valentine.

  “Thanks. What’d you tell them?”

  “That you had yellow eyes and it was either malaria or hepatitis, the doctor didn’t know for sure which yet. How well do you know Boots?”

  “Boots?” She looked vaguely under the table at her bare feet.

  Valentine sighed. “Miss Lash LaRue. How well do you know her?”

  “I don’t know anything more than what I’ve told you.”

  “We’ve got to talk to her.”

  “About what?”

  “Searcy.”

  Grimly, Clarisse swallowed the aspirin with a long gulp of coffee. She looked to Valentine to continue.

  “At first,” he said, “I thought he was just another homophobic cop on a routine investigation. But now I think there’s something else.”

  “Sure, the games that he likes to play with Boots and Hougan.”

  “No, not just that. That’s interesting, sure, but that’s not much more than good gossip. In case you didn’t notice, I also bought the paper this morning. Scarpetti told the Globe that the police have narrowed their investigation to within the gay community, or as he puts it, ‘the homosexual underground’—as if the light of day injured our eyes…”

  “Hurts mine,” piped Clarisse.

  “They don’t know it was a fag that did it,” said Valentine, ignoring her interruption, “that’s just what they want to think. So Searcy is pushing hard. He pushed on Randy Harmon, he pushed on Mack, he’s starting to push on me a little too, I think. I want to know why because I want to be able to stop him if he starts to come down any harder. None of us killed that little boy but Searcy might be able to pull out an indictment somewhere. I don’t intend to stand around and let myself and my friends get victimized.”

  “I think that little bomb we dropped on him last night should slow him up for a bit.”

  “I don’t,” said Valentine. “That’s why we’ve got to talk to Boots.”

  “You mean that’s why I’ve got to talk to Boots, right?”

  Valentine nodded.

  “Sure,” Clarisse shrugged: “But why exactly?”

  “I don’t know, just talk to her. Maybe it’ll help.”

  “All right,” said Clarisse, a little less groggily now that she was drinking her coffee, “but how do I go about this? Stiff-arm my way in, and scream, ‘All right Slater, we’ve got the goods—come clean or it’ll go hard with you!’?”

  “Maybe something more subtle,” said Valentine.

  Clarisse stared out the window a few moments. Then she turned back to Valentine. “Phone book,” she demanded.

  Valentine reached over the back of the sofa for the Boston white pages.

  “No,” said Clarisse, “my own book.”

  Valentine swerved and snatched the thick dog-eared black leather book from the end table, and carried it with the telephone to the table by the window. He returned to the sofa.

  Clarisse turned the pages of her book rapidly, apparently not able to find the number she wanted.

  “Slater,” suggested Valentine, “or Hougan.”

  “No,” said Clarisse, squinting in concentration. “Remembrance!” She quickly flipped the pages.

  “Remembrance?”

  “Of things past. I’m calling Marcel.”

  “He’s dead.”

  “Not Marcel Proust. Marcel Wave. Du Côté Chez Marcel. I’m calling Raymond.”

  Valentine turned away in disgust. “Look, your hair can wait, OK? Why don’t you call Boots?”

  Clarisse ignored him and dialed. She fought a yawn just as a female voice on the line intoned: “Du Côté de Chez Marcel.” The accent was less French than Flatbush. “Ici Albertine.”

  “Raymond Craven please,” said Clarisse in her smoothest voice.

  “Pardon?”

  “Swann,” replied Clarisse reluctantly.

  “Mais certainement, madame.” The line clicked to hold.

  “Swann?” said Valentine skeptically.

  “They’ve all got professional names. Get your hair shampooed by the Baron de Charlus, and your nails trimmed by the Duchesse de Guermantes.”

  “Cute,” said Valentine, “real cute.”

  Clarisse uncupped the receiver when a male voice came on. “Oui, ici Swann.”

  “Raymond, this is Clarisse Lovelace.”

  There was a slight pause as the accent was dropped. “Hi, Clarisse.”

  “Raymond, listen, I need a favor—a big one.”

  “Sure. I owe it to you. You got an enemy you want hennaed to death?”

  “Why do you owe me?”

  “You got my landlord to put in new tile in the bathroom and kitchen without raising the rent.”

  “Good,” said Clarisse. “I’m calling in the favor. Can you do two heads at once?”

  “At the same time?”

  “No, but during the same hour?”

  “Yes, sure.”

  “Two for one o’clock this afternoon?”

  Raymond paused: “That’s my break, Clarisse, and I didn’t have any dinner last night. Nobody stays around this place at one except Albertine.”

  “Please, Raymond!” cried Clarisse desperately. “I’ll bring you a two-inch slab of pâté en croute and a quart of Perrier. I wouldn’t ask except that it’s just the most important thing in the world! I have this friend and she needs a really good cut, and she’s awfully shy. She’s been a Carmelite for the past eight years and she just left the order three weeks ago and she’s never had her hair cut professionally before and it’s just a mess. Tonight she’s got a hot date with that cute man who works at the charcuterie in Quincy Market—you know the one I mean, the one that you’re in love with except that he’s straight—and I told her that she wouldn’t get to first base with him unless she got Swann to do her hair.”

  “Why does it have to be at one? Why can’t you just schedule her in the regular way?”

  “Oh,” cried Clarisse, turning in the chair to avoid Valentine’s glare, “because, Raymond, she’s so shy. She was a nun—you know how shy nuns are, especially ex-nuns. You saw The Nun’s Story. She wouldn’t be comfortable if there were a lot of women getting their hair cut at the same time, but if it’s just me there, she’ll be fine.”

  “Well,” said Raymond, “I’ve never crimped a Carmelite before.”

  “Don’t be irreverent. Listen, we could both use manicures too.”

  “No way. The Duchesse de Guermantes wouldn’t give up lunch to do Patty P. Hearst’s nails.”

  “Well,” said Clarisse, balling her fists, “skip the manicure.”

  “Be here at one,” said Raymond with a sigh.

  “At one,” said Clarisse. She hooked the receiver over her shoulder and broke the connection with her index finger. With her other hand she flipped forward through her phone book. “Don’t say a word,” she said to Valentine, “just give me your bandanna.”

  Valentine rose and stamped across the rug. He pulled his blue bandanna from his back pocket and threw it at her. Clarisse shook it open and draped it over the mouthpiece.

  Valentine returned to the couch, and sat with folded arms, staring at Clarisse.

  The line connected on a series of hacking coughs. Clarisse held the receiver away from her ear and rolled her eyes. When the coughing had subsided a soft female voice dragged out an unintelligible greeting that Clarisse took for “Hello?”

  “Could I speak with Ms. Winifred Jean Slater please?” Clarisse asked in a low sophisticated voice.

  “Who? Oh sure, yeah, that’s me.” Her voice was thin and whiney.

  “This is Ms. Slater?”

>   “Uhhh, my name is Boots, that’s right.”

  “Yes, well, Ms. Slater, I am pleased to inform you that you have been awarded a free shampoo and hair cut at Du Côté de Chez Marcel located at Number—”

  A loud clunk sounded in Clarisse’s ear as the telephone was dropped on the other end. After a moment filled with curses, the phone was recovered. “Wait a minute, lady,” said Boots, “let me go into the other room.”

  Then, after the flushing of a toilet, the running of water from a faucet, spraying from an aerosol can, and soft stumbling footsteps, there was a small sigh. “OK, I’m back. I won something?”

  Clarisse explained to Boots what she had won. “I tried to get hold of you for the past several days, Ms. Slater, but haven’t been able to reach you. Your prize must be claimed at one o’clock this afternoon.”

  “Today?” asked Boots.

  “Yes, dear. Doesn’t this make you happy now?”

  “Uhhh yes, I guess it does. Except that I don’t need to get my hair cut. Is it one yet?”

  “No, dear, you have plenty of time to get dressed and ready to go. I believe you live on Commonwealth Avenue between Berkeley and Clarendon? Well Chez Marcel is located only one block away, on Newbury Street, also between Berkeley and Clarendon. And Ms. Slater, this is a wonderful opportunity to have your hair done by a top French designer, Monsieur Swann, who just last week was chosen to style Julie Nixon Eisenhower’s head.”

  “Oh yeah? Look, I don’t know if—”

  “Please do me a favor, Ms. Slater.”

  “What?”

  “Examine a strand of your hair. Is it dull and lifeless? Lacking in body?”

  “Uhhh…yeah, that’s right. How’d you know?”

  “Many women have this problem, Ms. Slater. And unless it is corrected in time, your hair may be permanently damaged. In six months it might be necessary to shave your head entirely. And how would you like that, Ms. Slater?”

  “Well, you know, I’ve thought about it, but I don’t think I’d like to have it done in winter. Maybe if—”

  Clarisse grimaced and interrupted. “I forgot to mention one other thing, Ms. Slater. If you claim your prize this afternoon you will also qualify as a runner-up for an all-expenses-paid month-long vacation in sunny Puerto Rico. There are only nine other runners-up, so your chances are one in ten.”

  “Puerto Rico?”

  “Think of being in Puerto Rico at this time of year!”

  “Oh, yeah. I like Puerto Rico. I’ve been to Puerto Rico. Ummmm listen, I’m a little stoned, could you go through this again?”

  Clarisse made a face, stuck out her tongue, struck her fist violently against the windowsill, and said politely, “Of course, I’d be happy to, dear.”

  Five minutes later she hung up, having extracted a promise from Boots Slater that she would be at Chez Marcel at one.

  Clarisse neatly folded Valentine’s bandanna, and brought it over to him on the sofa. Valentine shook his head, and said nothing.

  After a quick shower and two more aspirins, Clarisse changed into a gray silk dress with wide padded shoulders, black seamed hose and matching gray heels. She replaced the thin gold chain about her neck with a silver one, and applied a fresh Band-Aid to the finger she had punctured on Veronica Lake’s leash. She wore no makeup except for a slight blush on her cheeks.

  “How do I look?” she said, turning before Valentine. “Chic enough for Newbury Street?”

  “The butterfly’s boots,” he said languidly. “Why all the bother?”

  Clarisse sat on the edge of the sofa and tightened a strap on one shoe. “I have to pick up my winter’s supply of perfume today. If I go into Bonwit’s dressed like this, that little twerp at the perfume counter will never dream of checking my account—I haven’t paid a cent in four months.” She took a cigarette from a pack on the coffee table and lit it. “Well, what kind of information do you want out of Boots?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  SITTING COMFORTABLY in a padded designer armchair, Clarisse Lovelace studied her reflected image. She tapped the ashes from her cigarette into a small porcelain ashtray on her crossed knee. Raymond pushed her head from one side to the other as he decided on the most flattering cut for her.

  They were alone in Chez Marcel, except for Albertine, stationed well away from them, at the receptionist’s desk by the front door. Speakers strategically placed around Raymond’s dais at the back of the shop played quadraphonic Rameau.

  Raymond left off knocking Clarisse’s head about and caught her gaze in the mirror. Clarisse raised one eyebrow in question. He glanced at the ornate mantel clock on the marble fireplace behind them; it was chiming.

  “Fifteen after one, Clarisse. Where’s our nun?”

  “She’ll be here any minute,” said Clarisse confidently.

  He looked away. “Anyway, you don’t need a full cut yet. Just a smart trim will do you.”

  “Whatever.” She drew on her cigarette, and glanced nervously toward the front of the shop. She had a view of Newbury Street also but Boots was not in sight.

  Raymond opened a cabinet under his counter and pulled out a nylon smock—sewn in imitation of the French flag—and tied it about Clarisse’s neck.

  She placed her ashtray on the armrest and stubbed out the cigarette. Raymond turned back to the counter and arranged his scissors and combs on a mirrored Art Deco tray. He glanced up at himself in the mirror absently, and ran a comb through his wavy brown hair. Then he took up a pair of tiny clippers and pricked at his moustache.

  “Thanks for the pâté,” he said, “but I wish you had brought Daniel instead.”

  “He’s taking Veronica Lake for a run on the Common. I’ll tell him you were asking when I see him later.”

  Raymond nodded and leaned closer to the mirror, turning his swarthy cheeks in the light to check for recent flaws.

  “Monsieur Swann can have his facial later,” said Clarisse.

  “Sorry,” he said, unapologetically, and stepped back behind her. With long strokes he quickly combed out her hair.

  “Ummmm—” said Clarisse, but did not continue.

  “Ummmm, what?”

  “I have a confession to make, Raymond, I, ah—”

  The opening bars of “The Marseillaise” chimed as the front door was opened. Both Clarisse and Raymond turned to watch Boots Slater stumble inside.

  Raymond’s hands dropped heavily onto Clarisse’s shoulder. “That,” he exclaimed quietly, “was a Carmelite?!”

  Boots’s motorcycle hat was pulled so far forward that her eyes were completely shadowed. Her tailored black leather jacket was zipped tight about her slender body, the collar turned up high. Her leather pants, with the heart in gold studs nestled in her crotch, outlined almost nonexistent hips and sinewy thighs. Her shiny black boots, thick-soled and heavy, were laced to the knees.

  “I’m here about the trip to Puerto Rico,” she whispered hoarsely, and struggled to remove her mirrored sunglasses.

  Albertine turned with wide eyes, and stared at Raymond.

  Raymond moved to the edge of the dais, and leaned forward. “She’s all mine, Albertine.” He motioned Boots over.

  Raymond turned quickly back to Clarisse. Avoiding his glance, she was bending over the side of her chair and rummaging in her leather envelope for cigarettes. Raymond grabbed a chair and pushed it next to Clarisse, angling it toward the mirror. “So who is she, Sister Birgitta of the Apostolic Whip?” he hissed.

  Boots crossed the front part of the shop unsteadily, and took her time mounting the two steps to the dais. She paused on the second step, both hands on the railing, and looked about.

  She was in her late twenties, with a pale complexion that was only accented by her dark vague eyes and the pink rouge high on her cheeks. Her mouth was full and bright pink. For all the black severity of her outfit, Boots Slater had something about her of naïveté and innocence. After a few moments, her eyes alighted on Raymond, who had been staring at her intently. Clarisse had
turned her chair so that her back was to Boots.

  “Ms. Slater?” Raymond asked.

  “Oh,” she said thinly, “are you the man who’s supposed to cut my hair so that I can get to Puerto Rico?”

  “Yes, of course,” he said, and snatched another French flag from his cabinet. “Won’t you sit down, s’il vous plâit.” He waved her into the chair next to Clarisse’s.

  Boots took a deep breath, and walked toward the chair. She stared at it a moment while she drew off her gloves. She unzipped her jacket and sidled into the chair as if she were boarding a very small boat on a very turbulent sea. She folded her tiny hands into her narrow lap and stared blankly, and with something very like resignation, into the mirror.

  Raymond fastened the French flag around her neck.

  Clarisse suddenly sat up, cigarette in hand, and whirled around in the chair. “Do you have a light…?” She stopped, and surprise overspread her face. “Boots?” she cried.

  Boots raised her eyebrows and turned slowly to Clarisse.

  Clarisse bent forward, smiling warmly. “What a surprise to find you here! How have you been?”

  “Hi,” said Boots, with a smile that was friendly, but didn’t show her teeth. “I’ve been great. How about you?”

  “Oh, the usual. Do you have a light?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She fumbled under her smock, and Clarisse counted the number of buttons that got unsnapped. After the sixth, Boots’s hand emerged with a pack of Marlboros. Beneath the cellophane on one side were four joints, and beneath the cellophane on the other was a folder of matches.

  She took a cigarette for herself, and then lit both. Clarisse set the ashtray on the arm of her chair for them to share.

  Boots looked hard at Clarisse. “Do I know you?”

  Clarisse laughed and avoided Raymond’s eyes in the mirror. Briefly, she reminded Boots who she was. Boots nodded and looked back to the mirror.

  Raymond set his mouth, and then pulled off Boots’s hat with a flourish. Straight dull brown hair fell to her shoulders. Raymond gathered it in both hands, and let it fall through his fingers. “You don’t use a conditioner, do you?” he said tonelessly.

  Boots shook her head.

  “The human head has twenty thousand individual strands of hair. Nineteen thousand of yours have split ends. The best thing I can do for you, Ms. Slater, is give you a short cut.” He looked at her hard in the mirror. “Something soft and feathery.”