The Promoter

by Orrie Hitt

  “It sounds a little ridiculous in view of what she has done,” Dr. Frank observed. “But I see no harm in it.”

  I thanked him and left the hospital.

  Although I am not the kind of a man who is inclined to drink to excess I felt in need of several quick ones as soon as I entered the dimly lit bar and sat down to wait for Lucy Miller. Head shrinkers, such as the doctor I had met at City Hospital, will tell you that people drink for a variety of reasons. I can’t tell you just why I drank so much that afternoon any more than I can explain why the stuff didn’t make me drunk. I just know that I needed it and that the bartender seemed surprised that I didn’t fall off the bar stool.

  “Oh, Mr. Gordon! How are you?”

  Lucy Miller sat down beside me.

  “Hi,” I said. “Drink?”

  “Just a teeny one. Mother phoned the office a few minutes ago. We’re having company for dinner and I have to run.”

  I ordered a martini, dry, for the girl and told the bartender to make it a single on the rye.

  It was easy to set up a Friday-night appointment. Her face was all flushed, her eyes sparkling, and I guess if I’d told her to go out and model bras in the middle of the street she’d have made a try at it. I explained that I was embarking upon a new concept in modeling, that of having my girls show expensive dresses and coats in the privacy of the customer’s home rather than in a showroom. Her first job, I told her, would be at a private estate a short distance from the city and I said that I would drive her out there.

  “It sounds fascinating, Mr. Gordon.” She finished her drink. “And thank you so very much!”

  I suggested stopping at her home to pick her up but she said that was no good. She didn’t want her mother or father to know about this new work until she got ready to tell them.

  “I’ll meet you here,” she said. “I’ll tell them I’m staying down to shop with a friend. They won’t think anything about it because I often do that.” She slid off the stool and smiled up at me. Warm fingers touched my hand and moved away. “But they’ll be surprised when they find out, won’t they?”

  “Yes,” I agreed, watching her go. “They sure will.”

  I pushed my glass across the bar and waved for another drink. Her old man would be furious. Where, I wondered, would the whole thing end?

  I sat there for a long time, drinking and wrestling with my conscience. I could go to the police, appeal to the top brass in the department but, if I did that, what did I have to offer? Those in the syndicate could go underground at a moment’s notice and, even if they didn’t, how did I know that Miller’s influence didn’t go all the way to the top? Forgetting about the local police, there was always the FBI but, according to the law, they could not investigate unless federal statutes had been violated. I felt, without a doubt, that such violations existed but I could not prove it.

  “Where you putting it all?” the bartender wanted to know, refilling my glass.

  “In my gut,” I told him.

  He left me alone after that and I went back to drinking. Sure, I could try the authorities but I could see little future in it. If I went to them and told them the truth they might even lock me up for procuring which, in a sense, was what I had accomplished when I had hired Mary Sharpe. The glaring truth about what I had done hit me suddenly. Hell, if I kept this up, I’d end up as rotten as the rest of them.

  I left the bar and walked aimlessly through the darkness, trying to think, attempting to rationalize my situation. Reluctantly, I acknowledged that I had gone down the sewer a number of feet since my first visit to New Rockford.

  It was still early in the evening and I had no urge to return to the dark and dreary room which I occupied on the South Side. I guess you could say that I was ill, not from what I had been drinking, but sick of all the things I had seen and felt. And sick with fear. I’m not denying it.

  I drank a lot more that night. I kept thinking of Sandy, remembering how wonderful it had been with us, but whenever she seemed close, so close that I could almost touch her, I found the face of the minister’s daughter there instead. And I saw other faces, too — the twisted, anguished faces of those who lived in the twilight world. Some of these were the faces of clean young girls, fresh out of our schools and our colleges, their eyes dulled by an inner misery as they realized, much too late, that the best part of their lives had been ruined. But some of the faces smiled — the faces of the Millers and the Eudora Channings and all the others like them. They smiled because there was nothing else left for them to do. Tears or regrets were human luxuries which they could no longer afford.

  “Hey, bud! You sick?”

  The bartender’s face was an indistinguishable globule of white before my eyes.

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  “So long, bud.”

  I told him something, I’m not sure just what, and staggered out into the street. A cab slid alongside the curb and I got into it, falling across the back seat. The driver cursed, said something about hating to pick up drunks, and asked where I lived. After what seemed to be a long time I remembered the address on Arlington Square. The cab began to roll down the street.

  I’m not at all sure just how I got up to my room. Perhaps I paid the driver to help me but, if I did, I don’t remember having done so. All I know is that I leaned against the door, trying to unlock it, when the thing opened up suddenly and I fell inside.

  “My God,” Elsa Lang whispered, bending over me as I lay there on the floor. “Where have you been?”

  I managed to sit up without assistance and grinned, I suppose, somewhat foolishly.

  “Celebrating,” I said. “It’s the turn of the century.”

  The cold air and the cab ride had helped sober me some and the fall to the floor jarred me awake. I could smell her perfume and see the way she had her blonde hair pushed back in sort of a bun. She wore a pair of black slacks, rather tight, and her red sweater looked as though it might be two sizes too small.

  I rolled over and got hold of the edge of the bed. I think I got up on it by myself but it may be that she assisted me. I don’t know.

  “I want to help you,” Elsa said. “You have to get a good night’s sleep and then we have to figure out what to do with Judith. She’s at my place.”

  “She’s at your place,” I repeated drunkenly. I sighed. “Well, that’s fine.”

  I pawed at my head, throwing my hat aside.

  “Not bad,” she observed, kissing me lightly on the cheek. “But I believe I liked the old Bill a whole lot better. What made you change your face?”

  I didn’t know why she was there in the room with me, or what her motives were, but I was much too tired to defend myself. I lay there in an alcoholic stupor while she stripped the clothes from my body. It wasn’t until after she’d turned out the light that some of the fog in my mind began to lift.

  “I’ve missed you, Bill,” she said.

  Soft, wet lips touched my mouth and I wondered how she could be enthusiastic about kissing a man who had been drinking so much.

  “I’ll help you, Bill,” she promised. “In any way I can. Don’t fight me. I want it this way, Bill.”

  She stayed with me all that night.

  17

  LUCY MILLER, when I met her at the bar on Friday night, was in a state of extreme excitement and she gratefully accepted my offer of a drink before we started out on our “assignment.”

  “I’m so thrilled!” she confided, smiling at me across the narrow booth. “I haven’t been able to think of another thing the whole week long.”

  “I hope you don’t get in any trouble with your mother and father over it.”

  She shook her head and the shine of her dark hair reflected the soft lights.

  “I told them I was going shopping with a friend,” she said. “And, after, to a show. They won’t expect me until midnight and, even then, I don’t think father will be home. He had to go somewhere on business.”

  Out to Eudora Channing’s, I thought. That
’s where he’d be, at the huge colonial house on Westminister Drive. Waiting, as were the rest of them, for the appearance of the sacrificial virgin.

  “I don’t mean to be rude,” I said to the girl. “But I do think you should give your face a once-over before we leave. While you’re doing that, I’ll order another drink.” I smiled, meeting the look of understanding in her eyes. “Don’t worry, I know how it is on your first job. Every girl is nervous.”

  “You’re very kind, Mr. Gordon.”

  She wore a tan skirt, white blouse and short brown jacket. My glance followed her as she went back to the ladies’ room. She had a nice young body, supple and alive, and she carried it well. I felt sorry for her.

  The waiter brought us two more drinks and, while Lucy was busy repairing her face, I dumped the contents of one of the little yellow capsules into her martini. The listless attitude the powder would install in the girl would not, of course, solve everything but it would make it easier to handle her and, I hoped, it would help to eliminate some of the memories of what I must make her do.

  I sat there, waiting for the return of the girl and thinking about the events of the week. Actually, it had been mostly a matter of sitting around and brooding over the situation. Elsa, following that night in my room, had returned to her apartment and Judith Call. The minister’s daughter was still with her and Elsa had begged off from the model agency, saying that she was ill. From what I had been able to learn, the agency was in a bad way as a result of the fire and Elsa’s employers had been more than willing to save the expenses of her services for one week.

  Diana Sanderson was, as far as I knew, still at City Hospital and I had read nothing further about the incident in the newspapers. I had phoned Eudora Channing twice during the week, once on the previous morning when I had informed her that I was back in town, and again, just prior to meeting Lucy Miller, to arrange to pick up one of the capsules at the brownstone on Tenth Street. I had outlined my plans in detail, stating that I would give my girl the deadening treatment before our arrival and that I would make all of the arrangements to present her to the party.

  “This is my first try at something like this,” I had told her, “and I want it to go over with a bang.”

  She’d gotten a kick out of that, me talking that way, and she’d assured me that I could handle it any way I wanted to. She said that everybody would be there, almost fifty people, and that they were all looking forward to the affair.

  On the way uptown I’d had Nelson stop at the offices of the Morning Star while I went in and talked to George Castle, the reporter who had worked on the sex stories earlier in the year. I explained a little bit of what I had done, told him that I had written the facts out in detail and that I had mailed them to him in care of the paper.

  “Just in case something happens to me. It’ll give you a lot of angles to work on. You’ll get the letter in the morning.”

  He received my suggestion that he arrange to stop out at Eudora Channing’s home later that night with only lukewarm interest. I had left his office, feeling that he regarded me as another crank and that nothing would come of it. This had been a disappointment. I was going into this alone, without any help, and I had felt that I could trust Castle. It had been necessary for me to confide in someone and I had selected him as being the best bet. But I was fairly certain that I had not succeeded in convincing him. I was still alone, with the exception of Nelson who had been furious about the treatment given Mary. But he seemed to be loyal to me, as well as greedy for money, and I was of the opinion that I could rely upon him. However, I reasoned, he was just a cab driver and could hardly be of much help.

  Lucy Miller returned from the ladies’ room, her face radiant and eyes sparkling.

  “There,” she said, sliding into the booth. “Am I pretty enough now?”

  Her face was beautiful, the kind of strangely eager face that you see among children. I couldn’t look at her as she lifted her glass and tasted the drink.

  “We’d better hurry,” I said.

  She smiled and finished her martini.

  “I hope I don’t let you down,” she said.

  I choked against the burning sensation in my chest as I guided her to the door. In a few short hours she would be hurled into the slimy filth of the syndicate and the terrible realization that her father was a part of it would be with her for the rest of her life. But I had been unable to think of another way. There just wasn’t any. Lucy Miller was the only card I could play.

  “Good evening.”

  I nodded at Nelson as he opened the cab door. He was waiting for me, in accordance with my instructions.

  I gave him the address on Westminister Drive. We sat back as the cab picked up speed and I watched dozens of gaily lighted store windows flash past.

  I wondered if it were the martinis or the dope going to work on her so quickly and after we had traveled a couple of more blocks I put my arm around her. She didn’t protest but just sighed a little and snuggled in close. I let my hand go inside of her coat, and she made no move to stop me. Shuddering, I took my hand away and let it rest on her shoulder. From this point on the future of this trusting girl at my side was in my hands. It was, I realized with a sense of shock, a tremendous responsibility.

  When the cab reached the parkway it turned left instead of right. As I bent forward to speak to Nelson about it, a second figure appeared beside him and a gun pointed straight at my head.

  “Sorry, Mr. Morgan, but your plans have been changed. Just rest easy, please.”

  “Elsa!”

  “Surprised?”

  I sat back, saying nothing. My hands felt sweaty and cold as I looked at the girl beside me. Her eyes were closed and there was a smile on her lips.

  “We’ll have a nice party,” she said. “Judith and you and the kid here. Won’t it be fun?”

  I wet my lips with my tongue and managed a grin.

  “Is there any other kind of fun?” I wanted to know.

  She turned her head, briefly, and smiled at Nelson.

  “He’s real smart now,” she said. Then, looking back at me, “You should have been smarter before, my darling Bill. Didn’t you know that every call girl in this town — and every cab driver who works with them — are all tied up in one great big bundle?”

  Nelson swung the cab left again and I knew that we were going over to the brownstone on Tenth Street.

  “I do now,” I admitted, with feeling. The snout of the gun threatened me again as I hunched my shoulders. “Look,” I said. “You can do what you want with me, but leave the girl out of it. Dump her off on one of these corners and let her go.”

  Her hollow laugh echoed through the car.

  “Who are you kidding, anyway? Nelson and I split a grand if we get the two of you over there.”

  “I’ll give you that much to let her go.”

  “Forget it,” Nelson told me. “It isn’t that kind of a game.”

  “You were a sucker all the way through,” Elsa Lang scoffed. “You fell for everything and you took all kinds of chances. What makes guys like you so stupid?”

  I remembered Dr. Call, back in New Rockford, and I remembered the Sunday I had spent with Judith in my room.

  “You’d never understand,” I answered truthfully. The girl stirred beneath my arm and I felt myself tremble. “You had me fooled,” I said. “I’ll go along with that.”

  “You fooled yourself,” she advised me. “When you came to my place, looking for Judith, I thought we had another heavyweight lover on our hands. That’s why I gave you a lot of good sex free-for-nothing. After you phoned your way into the agency to do that story and you didn’t come back, nobody wanted to believe me. But when you showed up at Eudora’s with that car and she had the license number checked she found out that the car selling gimmick was another trick. After that we put two and two together — adding your crew cut, glasses and moustache — and we got a very simple answer. We had a snoop. Mary Sharpe played her part very well, don’t you
think?”

  “To say nothing of Nelson,” I said. “He and his kids!”

  Elsa Lang threw back her head and laughed. Had I been quicker, I think I could have gotten the gun away from her, but by the time I got ready to move she was staring at me again.

  The cab came to a stop in front of the brownstone and Elsa told me to get out. It took me a few moments to waken the girl but after I succeeded she followed me in a docile, sleepy sort of way. We went up the steps, Nelson directly behind me with Elsa Lang, the gun concealed beneath her coat, bringing up the rear.

  “Oh, there you are!” Eudora Channing exclaimed, coming along the hall. Her smile mocked me. “Isn’t this rather quaint?”

  I nodded absently, considering the possibility of trying to take the gun from Elsa. But it was no use. She was too far away, near the foot of the stairs, and the girl clung to my arm, holding me fast.

  “Well,” Eudora said, inspecting Lucy. “Aren’t we the pretty one, though?” She snapped her fingers twice in front of the girl’s face and was greeted with a smile. “I see you used the capsule, Bill. Oddly enough, I thought you might not.”

  Only once, when Eudora tried to pull the girl away from me, did Lucy make any effort to resist.

  “Oh, please, Mr. Gordon! I feel so — sleepy.”

  Helplessly, I watched as the Channing woman and Nelson took the girl down the hall and disappeared into a room.

  “We’ll wait here,” Elsa advised me. She now held the gun in plain sight.

  “You’re going to regret this,” I told her. “Believe me, you are.”

  “Like hell I am.”

  “What about Judith?”

  “She’s upstairs, too.”

  “And what’s going to happen to her?”

  She laughed.

  “You ought to be asking the same question about yourself, Bill. Because you haven’t got anybody and no one will miss you. Do you know what I’m saying?”

  I didn’t bother answering her. I was a man and the only thing they could hold over me were those pictures. But it wouldn’t be enough and I felt sure they realized it. My death would be their only safety.