was shake money, just for cops.”
As I said, in many ways Doc reminded me of Nate. Doc was lonely, which I suppose was one reason why he put in such long hours on the job. I didn't mind; police work wasn't work to me. But many a night after we finished he would ask me to have supper with him at some odd restaurant, listen to him philosophize and run his mouth. Sometimes we'd even take in a movie together. I took a small room in Doc's hotel. I was seeing less and less of Elma, but I was giving her thirty-five a week, plus rent, and she didn't seem to care that I was so busy.
And some nights Doc didn't want me around, would go to his room early and spend the night reading.
If I never quite understood Doc, I knew he liked me. Once I had a fever and chills during the night. I was shaking like a cement mixer. Elma had an HIP doc in the first thing in the morning and he said I had malaria, told her to give me quinine. Doc phoned at eight thirty to ask where I was. When Elma told him about the attack, he shouted over the phone, “Have you given him any quinine yet?”
“No. I'm getting dressed to go out now.”
“I'm coming right up. Don't do a thing.”
With me still flashing hot and cold, Doc got me dressed, drove me to a V.A. hospital. I'd had sand-fly fever a couple of times in Korea, and when I was released from the hospital three days later, I was set for a small pension, less than twenty dollars a month, for the rest of my life. See, that's what I mean by Doc being smart—if I had taken the quinine first the blood test at the hospital would have showed negative and I never would have got the pension. True, it wasn't much, but it took care of my taxes. In fact, I spent my first check buying Doc a fancy lighter.
One night as Doc and I were having supper in a French restaurant, we started talking about marriage. Doc told me he had once been married for a few years, a long time ago. For some reason I was surprised; I could never picture him as a homebody. “She was a good woman, Bucky—beautiful, talented, intelligent. She was an artist. I nearly had a breakdown when her heart gave out. She was only twenty-eight. I was fortunate in having those few years of happiness. It's very difficult, under modem tensions, for two people to live together smoothly.”
Doc stared at me as he sipped his coffee, asked, “It's none of my business, but how did you ever get hooked by Elma?”
“She lived next door when I was a kid. Might say it was one of these quickie war marriages.”
“Are you happy with her?”
“Happy? If I had the money, I'd get a divorce.”
“No, it's cheaper and better to stay married—if you can stand it. Insurance against getting hooked again. But a strong stud like you should have something better in bed. What time is it?”
“Almost eight.” Along with his always asking for “fire” for his cigarettes, Doc never looked at his own watch.
“Pay the check while I make a call. I'll fix you up with a real woman.” Doc stood up.
“Nobody has to fix me up. I can get my own women.”
“I might even fix you up with a real watch, too.”
“Doc, mind your own damn business!”
He smiled down at me. “This one is a trifle slimmer than your Elma.”
“I told you, you don't...”
Walking away from the table, he called out softly, “At least see the merchandise.”
A half-hour later we were in the lobby of a ritzy apartment house off the Avenue. This not only had a doorman, but even elevator operators. Her name was Judy Low, and she was the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. Fairly tall; a strong, lean body; a cute face with hot, heavy lips and bright eyes; and certainly the smoothest blond hair in all the world reaching her shoulders. There was something about her that got me—perhaps the wanton look on her face. Okay, that may sound corny, but there
The apartment was lush, too; two neat, large rooms with modern furniture in a blaze of colors, lots of books, and a hi-fi that played odd but soothing music. Doc gave her a familiar squeeze as he said, “Judy, this is my partner and friend, Bucky Penn.”
She said in a silky voice she was glad to see me and did we want a drink? Judy was wearing a heavy robe with Arab writing, or something, woven into it. When she walked across the room it was simply amazing. No big hip-sway or anything cheap—this was a very expensive watch movement.
We had a few drinks, and the liquor was the best, too; and then, like a hammy actor, Doc said he had to be leaving. Two minutes later Judy was on my lap.
I began dropping in to see Judy three or four times a week. Doc wisecracked how we were made for each other: Punch and Judy. Like I said, I was never the lover-boy type, but Judy drove me nuts—for a time. Perhaps it was her slim, hard body, after the years of Elma's sogginess. Or it could have been that just as I was now having my clothes made by Doc's tailor, having a high-priced call girl was a new kind of living for me. It got so I couldn't wait until I saw her early in the evening.
Judy had a peculiar clientele. She was busy between three and seven in the late afternoons with top executives who stopped to see her before they commuted to their suburban homes. Doc said she got a hundred or more a trick and limited her business to about fifteen steady customers. Doc claimed that even with her pay-off, she was making twenty grand a year. When I asked him if the brass wouldn't be sore about us horning in on the graft, he said, “You're not horning in, merely on her free list. And they won't kick about that. Taking prostitution money would make any politician a dead duck—if it became known. Enjoy yourself and don't worry. She likes you.”
I figured she went for me because I was young while most of her customers were old clowns. I got along fine with Judy. She was a shrewd babe and smart; had once worked as a physical therapist, or something like that, in a hospital. She never went in for dirty talk, only drank now and then and could handle her liquor. She had books on physical culture, and actually worked out three times a week with a light bar bell. Sometimes we went night-clubbing, and that cost me a bundle. I'm not much of a dancer, but Judy loved it. What she enjoyed most of all was when we went to some hotel pool for a swim. She also liked to have me strike a pose, like a strong man, and she would talk about my “muscular definition.”
There was another reason she went for me. She didn't have a pimp and had a deathly fear of strange men. There's a type of jerk, probably a queer of sorts, usually in his twenties, who, if he happens to find a girl selling it, thinks that makes her open season. They like to slap the girl around, don't hesitate to maim 'em.
Once she phoned me at the squad room that a guy was calling from downstairs, making a pest of himself. Being Judy's customers were a select group, she rarely had that sort of trouble, but this joker claimed he was a friend of one of her regulars. I told her to phone the guy at once and check; I didn't want to get into a jam by beating up some society slob. She phoned me back that the guy indignantly denied he had ever given her name out.
I knew the doorman had to be on her pay-off list, so I parked outside and told him to give me the nod if the character returned. About an hour later a big guy, looking like a college football guard, walked in and the doorman gave me the sign. I waited until he came out again, started walking toward the park. I didn't want to make a fuss in the lobby. I caught up with the guy; he was really a big kid of about nineteen or twenty, with wide shoulders, chain-store clothes, and sort of a freshly scrubbed face. Flashing my badge, I told him, “You've been making a pest of yourself back at that apartment house.”
I flashed my tin fast, so maybe he thought it was a gag, or I was some kind of private operator. Or he might have been going for rough. “I don't know what you're talking about,” he said, walking away.
He had a lot of inches and at least twenty pounds on me. I grabbed his shoulder, spun him around. “Stop annoying the lady, punk.”
“What lady?” He lingered on the word “lady.”
“Buster, you want me to run you in?”
“What's this, the police protecting a call girl?”
“I don't know anything about any call girl. And neither do you. A big mouth like yours can wind up on the wrong end of a libel suit. What's your name?”
“Are you arresting me?”
“I'm a police officer asking you to identify yourself.”
He hesitated. The courts of our city have ruled a person doesn't have to give identification unless caught in a suspicious act. But few people know that. He finally took out his wallet. I took down his name and address— relieved it was an average address. I told him, “If I get another complaint, I'll come and get you. Now get the hell out of here.”
The thing was, I had an itch to tangle with him. I don't know why. Maybe I thought it would impress Judy, maybe I didn't like his being bigger and better built than me. Most of these big muscle boys are clumsy with their hands. His face didn't have a mark, so I was fairly certain he wasn't a pug.
He put his wallet back, started to move away. That would have been the end of it, but he had to turn and sneer, “She got a police pimp?”
I stepped in, fooling with my hands, kicked him on the shin as he threw a wild right. That swinging like a gate was the tip-off. I moved in and to my right, smacked him on the eye, cutting the skin under it. He stood still for a second, fear coming across his face, and I set myself, belted him hard as I could in the belly. He sat down fast staring up at me stupidly, some blood on his baby-skin face.
A couple people stopped to look. A beat cop came on the run, an old cop. I showed him my badge, said, “This dummy thinks the police are pimps.”
The cop rapped him across the back of his shoulders with his night stick as he asked me, “Shall I run him in? Or you want to
