The yellow Ford ran like an escaped con. We got to Chicago in two hours. We checked into a hotel in a slum neighborhood, around 29th and State Streets. We took our stuff out of the Ford’s trunk.
It was ten P.M. I threw some water on my face. I told the runt to cool it. I went out and cruised around to case the city.
I turned the wipers on. A late March snowfall was starting. About a mile from the hotel I saw whores working the streets.
I parked and went into a bar in the heart of the action. It stank like a son-of-a-bitch. It was a junkie joint. I sat sipping on a bottle of suds; I couldn’t trust the glasses.
A cannon with a tired horse face took the vacant stool in my right. His stall took the one on the left. The stall had a yellow fox face. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him pinning me. He snapped his fingers. I jerked my head toward him.
He said, “Brother, you are lucky as a shit-house rat. What size benny and vine you wear? I’m Dress ’em up Red. Stand up brother so I can dig your size. I got a pile of crazy vines dirt cheap.”
I stood up facing him. He ran his eyes up and down me. He unbuttoned my top coat. He pulled my vine’s lapels. He shoved me back toward Horseface. I stumbled, half turned to apologize to Horseface. There was a streaking blur behind me. It was so fast I couldn’t have sworn I had seen it. I found out later what it had been.
Horseface showed his choppers, got off the stool and trotted through the slammer. I faced the stall.
I said, “Jim, you got my size? Do you have any black mohairs?”
The stall smiled crookedly at me. He straightened my tie.
He said, “Slim, I got blue and black mohair, I can fit you like Saville Row in London. You want the blue too? The bite is two for fifty slats.”
I said, “Man, let’s go. I am ready to cop.”
His brow telescoped like I was going to open a door and catch his mother crapping in my hat. He started oozing toward the slammer.
He said, “Brother, I don’t know you well enough to trust you. I got to protect my stash. Wouldn’t it be a bitch if you went with me and copped? What if you came back later and beat me?”
“No, Slim, cool it. I’ll be back in twenty minutes with the vines. Here’s a slat. Get a taste on Dress ’em up Red.”
I ordered another beer. I was trying to stall that twenty minutes out. I sure needed those vines.
After an hour I figured Dress ’em up Red got busted or something.
I asked the fat broad tending bar where the swank joints were. She named a few, and gave me directions. My bill was eighty cents. I left a twenty-cent tip and walked to the Ford.
The wind wing on the street side gaped open. It had been jimmied. The car door had been unlocked through it.
I got in. I remembered the runt’s costume jewelry had been locked in the glove compartment. I unlocked it. Some slick bastard had slit the cardboard bottom from underneath. There wasn’t even an earring left.
I started the motor and turned the lights on. The snow had stopped falling. My headlights beamed on a squatting junkie whore with a Dracula face peeing in the gutter. She grinned toothlessly into the glare like maybe she was a starlet taking bows at a movie premiere.
I thundered the motor. She stood up wide legged. Her cat was a mangy red slash. She was holding up the bottom front of her dress with her rusty elbows. Her long black fingers were pulling her snare wide open to stop me.
As I shot by her, she shouted, “Come back here Nigger! It ain’t but a buck.”
I drove through the snow-slushed streets. The streetlights were dim halos in the murk.
I thought, “I can’t put the runt down in a spot like back there. I have to find somebody to give me a rundown.”
I drove a hundred blocks. Suddenly a huge red neon sign glittered through the gloom. It read “Devil’s Roost.” It was one of the joints the fat broad at the hype bar had told me about.
Gaudy Hogs and Lincolns were bumper to bumper. They pigged the parking spaces on the Roost’s side of the street. I parked across the street. I got out of the Ford and crossed the street.
I started walking down the sidewalk toward the Roost. “The Bird,” Eckstein and Sarah sent a crazy medley of soul sounds from the rib and chicken joint’s loudspeakers. The street was as busy as a black anthill. Studs and broads in sharp clothes paraded the block.
The hickory-smoked chicken and rib odors watered my mouth. I was at the point of stepping into one for a fast feast. The sign said “Creole Fat’s Rib Heaven.” I didn’t make it.
A long, stooped shadow stood in my way. He was chanting at me like a voodoo doctor. He pointed toward a storefront. Its window was blacked out with blue paint.
He sang, “Shootin’ ’em up inside, heavy and good. Scratch piled up like cords of wood. Geez you look lucky, Jack. Seven, eleven point right back. That’s sure you, Jack. Go in fast. Come out quicker. Lady Luck is a bitch but you can stick her.”
His topcoat was a threadbare green-checked antique. The tops of his shabby black shoes had criss-cross holes snipped out. His bulging corns were humps pressing through the vents. He stank like a bootlegger’s garbage. There was something ghostly familiar in the banana yellow, Basset-Hound face.
I said, “Jim, I’m not in the mood to whale the craps. Say, don’t I know you?”
His transient eyes jerked their bags. They moved over my shoulder, searching down the sidewalk for a fresh prospect. His bald head glistened like a tiny yellow lake under the street lamp.
He said, “Jack, I can’t put a pistol on you. I can’t force you to go inside and collect your scratch. Kid, you too young to know me. You might a heard of me. I’m Pretty Preston. I gave the whores blues in the night when I was pimping at my peak. Who are you?”
His name triggered my clear memory of him. He had driven a gleaming black La Salle car. I had shined his shoes back in the pressing shop days.
Then he had been sleek and handsome like a yellow Valentino. I remembered his diamonds. They had winked and sparkled brightly on his fingers, in his shirt cuffs, even on his shirt front.
I thought, “Could this really be the same dandy? What had happened to him?”
I said, “Preston, I know you. I’m the kid who used to shine your Stacy’s back on Main Street. Remember me? I’m pimping myself now. You sure pimped up a storm when I was a kid. What happened? Why are you steering for this craps joint?”
He had a dreamy, far-away look in his dull brown eyes. He was probably remembering his long ago flashy pimp days. He sighed and put his arms around my shoulders. I walked with him through the door of the craps trap.
The raw stink of gamblers’ sweat punched up into my nose. We sat on a battered sofa in the almost dark front of the joint. Through a partition I could hear the tinkle of silver coins. I heard the flat cackle of the bone dice laughing at the cursing shooters begging for a natural.
He said, “Sure, Kid, I remember you. Christ, you got tall. I gotta be getting old. What’s your name? Kid, I been getting funky breaks since I came to this raggedy city twelve years ago. I’m just steering for a pal who runs the joint.
“Hell he needs me more than I need him. I’m gonna catch a hot number, or a wild daily double. Old Preston’s name will ring again. How many girls you got?”
I said, “Slim Lancaster, but they call me Young Blood. Blood for short. I only got one now, but with all the whores here I’ll have bookoos in a month. I just got in town tonight. I want to put my girl to work. Give me a rundown on some streets after I dash next door for a slab of ribs. I haven’t dirtied a plate since noon. Anything I can get you?”
He said, “Blood, if you must do something, get me a half-pint of Old Taylor at the corner liquor store. I’ll rundown for you, but you ain’t going to like my tail-end rundown at all.”
It felt good to step out into the fresh, chilly air. I stopped in the rib joint and put my order in. I saw the front of the Roost on my way to the corner.
I tiptoed and peeked through the bottom of the window blind. The joint was jumping. Pimps, whores, and white men crowded the circular bar.
Some skinny joker with scald burns on his face was fronting a combo. He tried to ape the Birds phrasing and tone. His tan face had turned black. He was choking on his horn.
Mixed couples danced to “Stomping at the Savoy” on a carpetsized dance floor in the rear. Silk broads itching for forbidden fruit sat in booths lining the walls.
Their faces glowed starkly in the red dimness. Their long hair flopped around their shoulders as they threw their heads back. They laughed drunkenly with their black lovers.
I took my peepers out of the slot. I walked toward the corner to cop the bottle for Preston. I made a skull note to pop into the Roost after Preston’s rundown.
I was fifty feet from the corner when I saw him. He was in the center of a small crowd. His high crown white hat was bobbing a foot above it. He was a nut brown giant.
As I drew closer I could see his snow white teeth. His heavy lips were drawn back in a snarl. His wide shoulders jiggled. He was stomping on something. It was like maybe he was a sharply togged fire dancer or maybe a dapper grape crusher from Sicily.
I squeezed through the crowd for a ringside view. He was grunting. His labor was yanking the sweat out of him. The crowd stood tittering and excited like a Salem mob watching the execution of a witch.
The witch was black. She had the slant eyes and doll features of a Geisha girl.
The chill breeze whipped back the bottom of his benny. The giant’s thigh muscles rippled inside the pants leg of his two-hundred-dollar vine.
Again and again he slammed his size-thirteen shoe down on the witch’s belly and chest. She was out cold. Her jaw hinge was awry and red frothy bubbles bunched at the corners of her crooked mouth.
At last he scooped her from the pavement. She looked like an infant in his arms. His eyes were strangely damp. He wedged through the crowd to a purple Hog at the curb. He looked down into her unconscious face.
He muttered, “Baby, why, why do you make me do you like this? Why don’t you hump and stop lushing and bullshitting with the tricks?”
Still holding her tenderly, he stooped and opened the front door of the Hog. He placed her on the front seat. He shut the door and walked around the Hog to the driver’s side. He got in and the Hog roared away into the night.
The crowd was scattering. I turned to a fellow about my age. His eyes were glazed. He was sucking a stick of gangster.
I said, “That stud would have gotten busted sure as Hell if the heat had made the scene.”
He stepped back and looked at me like I was fresh in town from a monastery in Tibet.
He said, “You must be that square, Rip Van Winkle, I heard about. He’s heat. He’s vice heat. They call him Poison. He’s got nine whores. He’s a pimp. That broad is one of ’em. She got drunk with a trick.”
I went into the liquor store. It was five-after-twelve. I ordered the half pint. The clerk put it on the counter. I swung my topcoat away to get my hide in my hip pocket. I had two hundred in fives and tens in it. I had five C notes pinned to my shorts in a tobacco sack between my legs.
My fingers touched the bottom of the pocket. My right hip pocket was empty. I was sure my hide had been on that side. I dug my left hand into the left pocket. Empty!
Within seconds both my sweaty hands had darted in and explored all my pockets a half-dozen times. The clerk just stood there amused watching the show. His hairy paw slid the half pint back toward him away from foul territory.
He said, “Whatsa matter, Buddy, some broad ram it into you for your poke or did you leave it in your other Strides?”
My mind was ferreting. It back pedaled, tore apart the scenes and moves I had made. I was a confused, jazzy punk.
I said, “Jack, your score is zero. I’m not a vic. I just remembered I got my scratch on Mars. I’ll be back when I get back.”
He was shaking his head when I walked out. I crossed the street. I was headed toward the Ford. I wasn’t going there to look for my hide on the seat. I was going there to peel off one of those C notes next to my balls.
I had remembered the scene back in the hype joint. I saw that rattlesnake lightning again. For the first time I saw the thrill of the cop on the face of the horse. The Fox had sure held my balls in the fire for Horseface.
I thought, “As slick as those two bastards are they can’t miss making a million or getting croaked.”
From that day to this one almost thirty years later no scratch has ever been in my hide.
I copped the bottle. I was hurrying to pick up my rib order. Old Preston was back out there bird-dogging suckers. I saw him point a joker into the joint. He slapped the balking sucker on the rump. The vic went inside. He saw me and hobbled toward me. For the first time I saw his crippled walk. He grinned when I laid the bottle on him. He said, “Thanks Kid, want first suck?” I said, “Jack, it’s all yours. After I get my ribs I’ll duck back in the joint and rap with you.”
Preston had his bad dogs propped on a chair when I got back. I stumbled over his make-shift sandals beside the sofa. I sat down. His feet stank like a terminal cancer victim. Even a budding pimp has to have a cast iron belly. I unwrapped and started to gobble the ribs.
He said, “I guess you saw pimping Poison hanging that whore on the corner. He’s number two mack man in town.”
Through the peppery grease I burbled, “Yeh, she looked dead to me. I guess he checked her into the morgue. How does he cut the double action? Who, as strong as he is, could top him?”
He tilted the bottle straight up and drained it. He said, “She ain’t croaked. She’ll be back out before daylight humping her ass off. He’s the top Nigger vice roller in town. His pimping don’t faze the white brass just so he don’t kick no white asses. Poison is a nice sweet stud compared to Sweet Jones. Sweet’s the top spade pimp in the country.”
I said, “Preston, I want to be great like Sweet. I want my name to ring like his. I want to be slick enough to handle a hundred whores. Can you pull my coat so I can cut into Sweet and get down right and really do the thing.”
In the half darkness I saw his yellow jaw pop loose. His hound face was twisting sideways in quizzical amazement. His face jig-sawed like maybe I had asked him to let me knock him up. He starched like a corpse on the sofa.
He said, “Kid, you bang a cap of smack or something? Sweet’s crazy as a flock of loons. Your bell ain’t never gonna clang that loud, unless you go crazy too. He’s killed four studs. He ain’t human. He’s got every Nigger in town scared shitless. His whores call him Mr. Jones.
“He hates young punks. I can’t cut you into him. Kid, I like you. You’re good looking. You conned me that you’re intelligent. I am going to give you some advice. Take it or leave it.
“I came to this town twelve years ago. I was so pretty just my ass would have made you a Sunday face. I brought five whores with me. I had been one hell of a pimp back in the sticks. I was only twentyeight when I got here.
“Just like you, I had to cut into Sweet. It was easy for me. I was yellow and pretty. I also had three beautiful white whores in my stable. I didn’t know Sweet hated yellow Niggers and white men.
“He grinned that gold-toothed smile for a year. He conned me that he loved me. He was a hype even then. He started to rib me, called me a square. I tried hard to be like him, so I got hooked on H.
“My habit screwed my mind up. All I wanted to do was bang H and coast. Like a real pal he kept my stable humping. At first his angle was Uncle Sweet to my whores. In six weeks he was giving me and my whores orders. He tore my image down before my whores. He copped my stable.
“One morning, I was puking sick. Sweet was torturing me. He hadn’t brought me my stuff in twenty-four hours. I was cold as ice wrapped in a blanket, then red hot. I was naked, crawling on the floor, nailing my body bloody when he came in. He stood over me flashing that gold in his jib.
“Sweet said, ‘Easy now you pretty yellow bastard. There’s been a panic. Until this morning I couldn’t cop any stuff. I copped you a sixteenth in Spic town. You know I gotta love your stinking junkie ass to stick my neck out like that. Ain’t that a bitch. I just noticed when you sick you almost black as me.
“‘I wish that bastard white father of your’s could see you down there on your knees begging this black Nigger to stop your misery.’
“Sweet held the tiny cellophane pack out to me. I was too weak to take it.
“I said, ‘Please Sweet, cook it for me and load my outfit. It’s inside the candy-striped tie in the closet. Sweet if you don’t hurry, I’m sure to croak.’
“I was one big ache and cramp. He walked slowly to the closet. He fumbled past the striped tie on the rack. He was getting his kicks making the yellow Nigger suffer.
“I screamed, ‘Sweet you had your mitt on the right one. It’s there! Right there!’
“Sweet finally got the spike out of the tie lining. I was too weak to shoot the H when he got it cooked. I held my arm flat on the carpet. My eyes begged him to tie me up and bang me.
“He pulled my belt from my trousers on a chair. He tightened the belt around my arm above the elbow. My veins stood out like blue rope. He stabbed the needle into a vein in the hollow. The glass tube turned red. I lay there freezing to death waiting for the smack to slug the sickness and pain out of me.”
Preston stopped for breath. Bubbles of sweat had popped out on his bald head. While running down Sweet’s double cross, he had really relived it.
I licked the hot sauce off my hands. I crushed the greasy sack into a ball and sailed it into a paper box at my end of the sofa. I fished my handkerchief out and wiped my mouth and hands.
Those dice the house was using had a Ph.D. Every ten minutes a chump would shuffle from the rear with a tapped out look on his face.
I said, “Christ, Sweet’s slick and cold blooded. What happened after that?”
Preston said, “That shot took the fever and pain away. I wasn’t ready to go a fast fifteen with Joe Louis. I felt better. Sweet stood in the middle of the floor watching me. My legs were weak when I finally stood up. I stood there naked.
“I said, ‘Sweet, I know you have stolen my stable. I know I have been a prize sucker, I demand that you lay a grand or so on me. I got to kick this habit you conned me into. I won’t give you any headaches. You got to loan me that G.’
“Sweet just stood there like a black Buddha for a long moment. For a second I thought he was going to put his foot in my ass like I was a whore. He grinned. He pulled my robe from the foot of the bed. He draped it around my shoulders.
“Then he said, ‘Sweetheart, I ain’t stole no whores from you. Them whores would have blew to the wind if it don’t be for me. You got me. I’m just like your whore. Wouldn’t you rather I had them whores than some bastard you couldn’t cop a favor from? Course I’m going to give you the grand. I’m even going to give you back that buck-toothed yellow whore you had. I want you to straighten up. Sweetheart, I love you.’
“I said, Sweet when do I get the grand? I got to know it’s coming at a certain time.’
“Sweet said, ‘Look Sweetheart, you get it no later than tomorrow morning. I’ll bring the buck-toothed bitch with me. Today before noon I’ll send you a quarter piece. You got no reason to sweat. Sweet’s in your corner, Sweetheart.’
“He chucked me under the chin and walked out. The runner came with the quarter piece at eleven o’clock, I was beginning to think Sweet was only half rat.
“At noon two rollers broke the door down. I was coasting. I was draped in my P.J.’s. They found the H and booked me for possession. I got a fin. I kicked the habit cold turkey in city jail. I did three years, nine months in the state joint.
“I left my hair, teeth, and looks in the joint. A con ran a shiv into my plumbing. That’s why I limp and pee out of this tube in my side. I ain’t had a whore since.”
Preston had choked up.
He said, “Kid, you still want to try this track and cut into Sweet?”
I turned my face from him. He was mopping his tears away with his sleeve. I was sure a lost, stupid punk. After a rundown like that, I was still itching to take my crack at the fast track.
The rundown had only boosted my desire to meet the slick, icy Sweet. If I had been smart I would have jumped in that Ford and rushed back to the sticks.
I thought, “Sweet hates yellow and white. I am black like him. The runt is black. Sweet won’t have a black whore. I have no reason to fear him. I have nothing that he wants. I have to find him and pick his brain. I got to take that short cut to become a great pimp.”
I said, “To hell with the Sweet cut-in. I’m not bats, but I got to try this track. Yeh, Preston, you sure got the hurt put to you. Man, I feel for you. When I start pimping a zillion, I’ll do something big for you. You are overdue for a break. Now tell me the best spot to down my package.”
He said, “You gotta get your head bumped, huh? What kind of package you got?”
I said, “Black, eighteen, cute, stacked, and three way.”
He said, “Blood, we are sitting on the best street in town for a package like that. Only drawback is this street is crawling with fast, whore-hungry pimps.
“You would also be playing your girl against a half-dozen strong, jasper whores on this stem. They pimping tough as studs.
“They got some fancy con to lay on a fine young whore. If your game ain’t tight, you’ll blow your girl fast. How long you had her? What kind of wheels you got?”
I said, “About a week, but I got her up tight. The Bitch loves me. Nobody can steal her. Temporarily I got a Ford.”
He threw his head back and started laughing. I thought he had flipped his cork. He died laughing for a full minute. The tears were rolling down his cheeks when he stopped.
He said, “Blood Lancaster, Slim Young, Dizzy Willie, or whatever your name is, don’t get down in this town if you ain’t hip that a pimp don’t never have a whore tight. Do you believe any whore can love a pimp?
“You ain’t no pimp. These slick Niggers will steal that young bitch as soon as you down her. The bartenders and bell hops on this fast track are better pimps than the best in the hinterlands.
“You ain’t got no front and flash. Some of these bootblacks got Hogs. You’ll get that young bitch dazzled out from under you. Get out of town and be a good pimp in a chump town. Go to the West Coast. Believe me, you ain’t ready for this one.”
He stopped rapping. He sat there just looking at me like I should bolt out the door and head for suckerville. He sure thought he had spooked me. His ribbing had me hot as a Bull Run musket.
I thought, “What did this crippled flunky think I came here for? I knew I was slow. I sure didn’t intend to stay slow. I was determined to maybe get as fast and slick as Sweet Jones, the boss pimp. If I blew the runt it wouldn’t be the end of the world. This poor cry baby had let Sweets cross destroy him.”
I said, “Look Preston, I got lots of heart. I’m not a pussy. I been to the joint twice. I did tough bits, but I didn’t fall apart. I believe my whore loves me in her freak way. I believe I got her.
“If I’m wrong, and I blow her, so what. I won’t give up no matter what happens. If I go stone blind, I’m still going to pimp. If my props get cut off I’ll wheel myself on a wagon looking for a whore. I’m going to pimp or die.
“I’m not going to be a flunky in this white man’s world. You can’t convince me I can’t pimp here. I know I can get my share of pussys to peddle. I’m going to get hip to what I don’t know. I’m not afraid of Sweet. I’m going to cut into him and pick his brain like a buzzard.”
A heavy-set Greek with a carny face came in the door. I dummied up. He walked by us then went through the small door in the partition. Preston started to put his shoes on. He looked nervous.
I asked, “Who’s the big stud? Is he heat?”
He said, “Oh, he’s the owner of the joint come to check the bankroll and cut box.”
“Then you and your pal are flunkies for the Greek?”
Before he could answer the Greek came out. Preston was slipping into his topcoat. The Greek paused and glared at him.
He said, “I ain’t payin you a fin a night to sit on your keister. I can get a hundred boys to jump for that fin and the cot in the back. Your ass will grow icicles in the alleys if you don’t get on the ball. Get out on the midway and dump some suckers into the joint.”
Preston said, “Yes, Sir, Mr. Nick, but I wasn’t setting there but a minute before you showed. You know nobody can pull a mark better than me.”
I avoided Preston’s eyes when we got on the sidewalk. I knew what I’d see there. I felt sorry for him. I pulled a sawbuck from my pocket. I folded it and dropped it into his ragged coat pocket. He took it out and put it in his short pocket.
He said, “Thanks Blood, maybe I was wrong about you. Maybe you got the guts for the fast track. You’ll need all you got. Good luck, Kid.”
I said, “Preston, thanks for the rundown. In six months you’ll have to anchor your eyeballs. I’m getting down right on this stem tomorrow night. You can’t stop a stepper. Don’t worry if the Greek boots you out, I’ll cop you a pad.”
I peeped into my skull file and saw that Roost note. My Mickey Mouse read one-thirty A.M. I headed toward the Roost. I had been in town only three-and-a-half hours. It had cost me only two-hundred and twelve slats to find out how little I knew. It’s easy for a half-wise punk to lock his mind. Just this was worth a fortune.
I thought, “I have to keep my mind like a sponge. I’ll use my eyes and ears like suction cups. I have to know everything about crosses and whores.
“Fast, I got to find out the secrets of pimping. I don’t want to be a half-ass gigolo lover like the white pimps. I really want to control the whole whore. I want to be the boss of her life, even her thoughts. I got to con them that Lincoln never freed the slaves.”
The Roost was still jumping. I copped the one open stool at the middle of the bar. A Mexican broad in a red satin cocktail dress brought me a pink Planters Punch.
The combo was speed riffing “Tea For Two.” Through the barlength mirror I could see a black ugly stud playing stink finger with an angel-faced white broad in a booth behind me. He was playing pocket pool with his other hand. The broad had her eyes closed. Her rhinestone tiara looked like a phony halo. She was biting her bottom lip like maybe she was taking a heavenly trip right there in the booth.
My ear cups started sucking. The dapper joker on my right was rapping to the stud on the other side of him.
He was saying, “I want my three bills back. That pretty bitch ain’t turned three tricks since you sold her to me. The bitch is dying. She’s falling apart. She can’t walk the street.”
The seller said, “Jack, I sold you the package as is. I ain’t responsible for divine acts.”
The buyer said, “Divine my ass. You knew that dog was rotten inside and needed a grand’s worth of carving. Give me a yard and a half and take the bitch back.”
The seller said, “You a stick up man? The bitch was whole when I sold her. Maybe you trying to play con on me. Maybe you stomped on the package. Maybe you put the bitch in bad shape. I ain’t buying her back even if you only wanted a slat for her.”
The buyer said, “Ain’t this a bitch? I went for the okee doke. I’m out three bills for a black dog with a foot in the grave.”
The seller said, “I’m pimping for myself, Jack. I ain’t got no time to pimp for you. Just to get you off my ass, I’m going to rundown for you.
“There’s a whore house up state with all Spic trade. They don’t spend but a fin, but there’s a zillion of ’em. On weekends they line up on the sidewalk.
“All you gotta do is cop some pills. Patch the bitch up and take her up there. Up there, ain’t no walking. She can flat back and so long as she keeps breathing you can get some scratch. Jack, she may even last long enough so you can invest the scratch to overhaul her, and still show a profit.
“The bitch is black and pretty. She ain’t got much mileage on her. Them Spies are wild for black broads. Jim, I been running down the out for you. If you go for it call me at noon.
“In the meantime I’ll contact the joint. Me and the house broad are tight. It’s a cinch you can place your grief tomorrow.”
The buyer said, “Jack, you know I deserve some cooperation. I’ll try anything to break even on that dog. I’ll call you at noon. I ain’t salty with you now. Let’s split and make the scene at the lair. I’ll pop for a coupla rounds.”
The buyer stood up. He knocked his knuckles against the log. The cute Mexican broad came toward him to check him out. She stood before him. She was smiling.
The seller drained his glass and stood. He leaned across the log staring into her bosom. I was digging the action from that trap door in the corner of my eye.
She said, “Both tabs come to twelve dollars. Yours is seven. Your friend’s is five.”
The buyer said, “I’ve got ’em both. Here’s a double saw. Keep the change Miss Bet I Get You. Say Girl, was that bum your father who brought you in when you started to work here last night? Ain’t you afraid I’ll salt and pepper you and eat you raw?”
She said, “No, not my father, my husband. He’s no bum. He had on his work clothes. People are not good to eat. It’s not nice to eat people. Thanks for the tip. Come back soon.”
The buyer hurled his beak toward the ceiling and laughed. Flakes of grayish white dust clung to the hairs in his nostrils. He had snorted and loaded his skull with H.
Her mouth was still smiling. Her big black eyes had slitted in Latin fury. She turned away toward the register. She punched it. She came back. She stood staring at the buyer. She had a fin and three slats in her hand. She was crushing them into a missile. In the mirror I saw the seller shaking his head as he walked out the door.
The buyer was looking at her like the eight slats had made her his indentured slave. The four-carat stone on his left hand flashed like neon as he caressed his fly.
He said, “If that tramp was your man I’m stealing you. Shit, I should kidnap you right now. You ain’t got no business juggling suds. Bitch, you got a mint between your big hairy legs. I’m gonna show you how to make a grand a week. I ain’t never wanted nothing and didn’t get it. Bitch, I’m gonna get you. I’ll be back at four to pick you up.”
A massive black bulk with a face like a rabid bulldog had come on the scene. It had to be the joint bouncer. He was standing several feet behind the buyer, grinning like a starved croc. He was hunching his shoulders. The Mexican broad was shaking. She fired the missile. It struck the buyer on the tip of his beak. He threw his hands across his face.
She shouted, “You stupid ugly filth. You insane Nigger bastard. Do you think I’d let you touch me? I wouldn’t shit in your mouth to save your slimy life. If you ever look at me again I’ll cut your heart out!”
The bouncer streaked toward the buyer like a howitzer shell. His feet clickety-clacked like the wheels of an express train against the parquet floor. He vised the buyer’s rear end through the tail split in his topcoat.
He seized the scrawny neck with his other giant paw. The buyer was almost airborne. The tips of his shoes did a tap dance against the floor on his way to the door. The joint was silent. The buyer swiveled his head back toward the angry tamale.
Just before he skidded toward the sidewalk he screamed, “You square-ass greasy chili-gut bitch. I’m gonna triple-cross you.”
The joint got back on jump time. The combo started to riff “Mood Indigo.”
I thought about the runt. The Mexican broad had her hands on her hips. She was looking at me. She wanted me to say the buyer was a nogood bastard. She didn’t know I was up as a pledge in his club.
I put a deuce on the log and walked out. It was two-thirty in the A.M. I walked to the corner. Preston had been right. Poison’s black whore was standing in front of the liquor store. She hit on me. That terrible beating she had taken sure hadn’t cured her bad habit.
She said, “Hi Slim, give me ten and sock it in. I won’t put the rush on you handsome. Cop a jug and let’s go freak off.”
I jerked my head away from the sight of her like she was Medusa. I put my dogs in high gear and crossed the street. I had a quick vision of Poison’s thirteens giving me a butt ache.
I got into the Ford and made a U-turn. I was going to the runt and some doss. I caught Preston in my headlights on the turn. He was still out there trying to make the Greek richer. He waved. I honked.
The mercury had fallen. The icy streets were like a ski run.
Less than a mile from the Roost, I saw a clean front of a hotel. The blue neon sparkled out “Blue Haven Hotel.” I went into the blue-and-red lobby. A broad was on the desk. She had a razor slash on her tan cheek. She had the build and rapper of a heavyweight wrestler.
She said, “You want something permanent or just for the night?”
I said, “How much are the permanent pads? I want the best you got. Whatever it is, it’s got to be on the front with a view.”
She said, “The best single rooms are thirty-two-fifty a week. The best three-room apartments are a hundred a week.”
She got up and went to a red board behind her. She took several keys off and gave them to me.
The elevator operator was an old stud reading a wild Maggie and Jiggs comic book. He was whistling “When the Saints go Marching In.” His peepers were glued to it like maybe he had found the map to the “Lost Dutchman.” I got off on the third floor.
I looked at two single rooms. The carpets in them were stained and the furniture was battered. This was an underworld hotel all right. I could smell the odor of gangster grass in the hallways.
I took the stairs to the fourth floor. I looked into two apartments. I went for the second one. It was freshly decorated in gold and black paint. The furniture was blond and new.
It was spotless and flashy. The gold-draped front window gave a wide view of the stem. The pad was perfect for now. It would do until I hit the big time with a big stable.
I went to the elevator and pressed the down button. The floor indicator dial was stuck between floor number two and three.
I took the stairs down. I figured the antics of Maggie and Jiggs had put a lot of pressure on the old joker. Some whore in the hotel was probably down there with the old coot. They were maybe using the comic book as a guide.
I went to the desk. I registered and paid a week’s rent in advance. I put the key in my pocket and went to the Ford. I drove toward the runt. I saw a black whore leading a white man into the front door of the Martin Hotel, a hundred yards from the Haven. The runt could take her good tricks there.
It was four A.M. when I got there. I parked and went up the hotel stairs. An elevated train shook the stairway as it passed. Its shadow leaped through the second floor window and plunged like a rattling, speeding ghost across the wall.
I turned left to number twenty. I twisted my key in the lock and stepped inside. The runt was wide-eyed. She leaped from the bed. She had on red baby-doll pajamas. She squeezed herself hard against me. She acted like I had been gone a year.
She said, “Oh Daddy, I am so glad you’re back. I was worried like hell. Where have you been? Do you love me as much as I love you? Did you miss me? I’d die if anything ever happens to you.”
A heart-aching montage tornadoed through my skull. I gritted my teeth. I felt my fingernails ice-picking into my palms. The runt’s love con had resurrected sad old scenes.
I saw poor black Henry. He was on his knees blubbering his love for Mama. I saw his pitiful eyes begging Mama not to break his heart. I saw Mama kicking herself free of his clutching arms. I saw that terrible look of scorn and triumph on Mama’s face. I thought about the worms that had devoured his flesh, in his lonely grave.
I shuddered and punched the runt with all my might against the left temple. On impact, needles of pain threaded to my elbow. She moaned and shot backward onto the bed. She bounced like she was on a trampoline. There was a crunching, pulpy thud on the second bounce. She’d crashed face first on the steel edge at the foot of the bed.
She just lay there breathing hard. I moved to the foot of the bed. I grabbed a fist full of hair. I turned her face toward me. Her eyes were closed and there was a bloody gash just above her right eyebrow.
I went to the face bowl and drew a pitcher of cold water. I doused her full in the face. Her eyes flickered open. She just lay looking up at me. A scarlet trickle ran down her cheek across her chin.
She stroked the side of her face. She saw the blood. Her eyes fullmooned. Her mouth was open. I stood looking down at her. The guts in my scrotum were twisting. I could feel hot currents firing up that generator at the base of my weapon.
Then she said, “Why Daddy? What did I say to get my ass whipped? Are you high or what?”
I said, “Bitch, if I have you a hundred years don’t ever ask me where I been. Don’t ever try to play that bullshit love con on me. We’re not squares. I’m a pimp and you’re a whore. Now get up and keep a cold towel on that eyebrow.”
She got up and stood at the washbowl washing the blood off. Her big eyes were staring at me through the mirror. I didn’t know she had started to keep a revenge score in her skull. Seven years later she would tally up and happily cross me into prison.
She sat on the side of the bed pressing a towel against the wound. I got in the sack in the raw. In fifteen minutes the leak had stopped. It was now only a small puckered slash.
She crawled in beside me. She nibbled at my ear. That lizard did cross-country laps and then took the boss trek around the world. I lay there silently. I was trying to figure the real reason why I had slugged her. I couldn’t find the answer. My thoughts were ham strung by the razor-edge of conscience.
She whispered, “Daddy, do you feel like tying me down? Please. I want you to.”
I said, “Bitch, you got a one track mind. I’m gonna tie you down like a sow in a slaughter house. After you get your rocks off I’m gonna give you the rundown on that stem you’re working tonight. Get on your back. Stretch your legs out and put your arms above your head. That’s right you sweet freak bitch.”