So I scrambled to my feet. I leapt upon the rear man-the barrel-chested man-grabbing him by the belt and collar. The attack took him by surprise-hell, it took me by surprise. Though my head was ringing like a church-tower bell, though my eyes felt as if they were rattling in my skull like dice, I was able to swing the bigger man around and hurl him off the porch so that he tripped and fell into the mud and concrete.
I stumbled off the porch after him. I regained my balance just in time to see the shaved-headed thug turn away from the door and come for me. He hit me in the stomach first, and when I bent over with my lunch in my throat, he really clobbered me with another one of those head punches.
I have a hard time remembering much about what happened after that, but I think I know the gist of it. The barrel-chested guy got to his feet and kicked me a couple of times in revenge. Then, muttering with annoyance, both men headed for the door again.
And I got up again and went after them.
A pattern developed. Again and again and, yes, again, I flung myself ineffectually at these two sadistic gorillas. Again and again and, yes, again, they hammered me to the damp earth and kicked me where I lay beneath the pattering rain. Then we repeated the process. I don't know how many times. By the end, I think, these guys were staying around just to watch the show. Standing there with their hands on their hips, shaking their heads in disbelief, laughing in wonder, as I clawed my way up off the pavement one more time in order to stagger toward them and get myself pummeled and battered and kicked back down.
So it was, in that rainy Nevada backwater, that I became admirable, beaten to jelly in the mud outside a whorehouse door, trying to buy Weiss another second, another minute, to do whatever it was he had to do.
44.
Weiss went down the brothel stairs, into the lounge, into the shadows. He grabbed the little madam by the arm and dragged her out of her office. The blood from his hand stained the sleeve of her brown cardigan.
'Hey,' she snarled at him.
'Shut up,' said Weiss. 'Where's Kristy?'
Her eyes flitted to the front door. She was waiting for the two enforcers to arrive from across the lane.
Weiss gripped her arm hard, dragged her closer.
'You're hurting me!'
'Come on,' he said. He shook her. Her football tits stood solid, never wobbled, but her wig came askew, curls covering one eye.
'In the back,' she told him.
'What room?'
'I don't know.'
She knew. He glanced out the door. He saw the enforcers charging. He saw me step in front of them. He figured he didn't have much time. He shoved the madam away.
He plunged deeper into the shadowy lounge. From the corner of his eyes, he caught the flutter of fabric on every side of him as girls drew back against the walls. In the center of the room, in the island of light, the two bikers stood straight, holding their pool cues-ready, in a casual sort of way, to beat him to death if the need arose. But he went right by them. They let him pass.
He saw the door at the rear. He went for it. He tried the doorknob. It wouldn't turn. He looked over his shoulder. The enforcers were now pounding me into the mud. He didn't think it would take them long to finish up. He faced front, lifted his foot, and planted a kick just beneath the knob.
The door flew in. He was through.
Now he was in a hallway lit by red light. There were doors on either side of him. He grabbed the nearest knob. Threw the door open. Went to the next door. Threw that open too. He marched down the hall to the next door, then the next. He threw the doors open. In each room, he saw what he saw-quick, chaotic. Tumbling glimpses of raw human meat hinged together. A half second of flesh and confusion, the red light bathing everything. There were snarls and cries. A woman on her hands and knees. A man shackled to bedposts. Dark circles of wide open mouths. Damp patches of pubic hair. Straining limbs, straining faces. Scalding nakedness without tenderness or glamour. Nakedness like a blow.
Voices rose around him. Men shouted threats. Women spat rough, ugly curses. The smell of sweat and sex washed over him. The red light washed over him.
He kept going. Any second he expected the enforcers to barge in behind him, to grab him, beat him down, drag him out. But they didn't come so he kept on. Storming down the hall. Throwing open doors. A woman on her knees, her face impaled. A fat man squatting. A trio of sodomists tangled in a mess of flesh.
Then, up ahead of him, near the end of the corridor, one door opened on its own. A whore in spangled red panties stepped out to see what the commotion was. She was young, maybe thirty. A sharp face framed with long hair dyed blond. A small body, painfully thin but with large round breasts, implants, bare. She saw Weiss. Startled fear came into her eyes. That's what gave her away.
He pulled up short, his heart pounding, his lungs work- ing hard. He and the whore looked at each other. Shouts and cries and curses filled the air around them.
'You talk to me or you talk to him,' Weiss told her, breathless. 'You know who's following me, right? You talk to me or you talk to him.'
The fear in the whore's eyes turned to terror.
Then the lounge door banged open and the two enforcers rushed in.
The whore glanced around Weiss's shoulder. He turned to follow the glance and saw the enforcers at the end of the hall. They were lined up shoulder to shoulder to block his way. They were pressing their big fists into their big palms. Their pale eyes were gleaming. They were getting ready to come for him.
But they were too late. Weiss had already said what he had to say. He turned back to the whore.
'It's all right,' she told the two thugs. She lifted her chin. 'Forget it. It's all right.'
Weiss took another look at them. The light died in their eyes. He smiled. The enforcers punched their palms, turned around and went back through the door, and were gone.
The other doors began slamming shut all along the corridor. The cursing stopped. A murmuring quiet fell over the hallway. Finally, Weiss was alone in the red light with the bare-breasted whore. Kristy.
'Come on,' she said.
She slipped back into her room. He followed her.
45.
There was a little fat man hopping around the middle of the floor. He was pulling his jockey shorts over his leg, then up to cover his bare ass. When Weiss came in, he grabbed the rest of his clothes off a chair and held them against his chest. Weiss stood aside and the man carried his clothes out into the hall without saying a word.
Weiss shut the door on him. He faced the girl in the redspangled panties.
They were in a narrow box of a room. The bed, a queen size, almost filled it. There was a two-drawer bedside table with a lamp and a radio and a vase of flowers on it. There was a window, covered with blinds and with some kind of lacy stuff draped over the top of it. Betadine, baby wipes, condoms, and a pair of fur-covered handcuffs were piled discreetly in a little wicker basket in a corner on the floor. A cheap blanket-a trick towel-lay over the floral bedspread. It had a gray stain at the center of it.
Weiss went to the basket. Reached in, pulled out a baby wipe. He swabbed the blood off his hand. The cut wasn't deep. The bleeding was almost done.
He lifted his chin at the whore. He was still out of breath. 'Listen…,' he said.
Tense, the whore gestured to the bedside table. Weiss looked. He saw the lamp, the radio, the vase. But he knew how these places worked. There was an intercom in one of the drawers. The madam would sit in her office and listen in while her whores negotiated the price of their party. That way, the madam knew the girls weren't
