“Blondie said, ‘But Max, she ain’t no hard leg. She’s just a beautiful young sexy kid with a mother to support. You know how tough it is for Boots to get three squares and a roof in this town. Let’s give her a break and cut her loose. Jesus Max, this broad has got a pair of thighs on her. She’s soft as kitten fur.’
“Nasty said, ‘Carl, you sure got a weak spot for spades. This broad says she’s broke. That black ass of her’s ain’t enough to buy a pass from me. If she ain’t too shy to show what her Derby’s like, maybe, I say just maybe, I might give her a break.’
“I’m driving into this alley. Carl, you test her lid and snatch. If you ain’t raving how great it is upstairs and down when you finish, I’m gonna wheel outta this alley and toss her black ass in jail … I’m gonna book her on those eight counts of larceny. If she’s lucky she’ll get a deuce.’
“Daddy, Blondie pushed my head down to his lap. Then I got on the back seat with him. That freak bastard, Max, turned around and kept his flashlight on us the whole time. I made Blondie holler.
“I finished with Blondie. Max got back there with me. For a half hour he called me filthy names. He punched and pinched me. I’m sure sore all over. Blondie begged him to stop. My ass feels like he split something back there. I had a rough time.
“Finally they let me out. Max told me to never let him see me again. I was scared so I came in. That’s why the scratch is short. Max will bust me if he sees me again. You gonna have to find me another street to work.”
I said, “You square-ass stupid bitch. You think you’re a brain because you’re hip that white men sneak through the stockade to lay black whores. Ain’t a Nigger sealed in here that don’t know that. It don’t make you great because those white sick fools leave that fine pussy in Heaven to find your stinking black ass in Hell.
“You chicken-hearted bitch. You got a roust. They conned you to believe they could slap a bum rap on you. You’re too dumb to know I’m gonna raise you. You rammed your funky finger in your sore ass. You took a powder from the track with a lousy double saw. You let those peckerwood coppers fuck you front rear, sideways, and across. You simple bitch, I’m gonna find you another street to work? Now you got like a license to hustle this one?
“You ain’t got to worry about Max and that other roller. Bitch, you can work it forever just so you don’t get cancer of the cat or lockjaw. Bitch, if you don’t get outta my face I’m going to the chair for slaughtering you. Get your clothes on. Get in the street and hump up some scratch. Bitch, don’t come to that door unless you call me first. I ain’t going nowhere.”
She had been taking sucks on the reefer while she was rapping. She was high when I gave her the rundown on how she had been conned by the rollers. She leaped off the bed and went to the closet. She dressed and jerked her head around the whole time.
She knew I was angry. She was maybe afraid after that slaughter crack that I might goose her in the butt with my knife. She got out fast. I had Silas bring me some food and take my shirts and things to the cleaners. I ate and snorted some Girl. Later I banged some. Except for the bump on my skull that still ached a little I felt all right.
I remembered Satan and the Demon wanting to see identification. I called Silas. He told me where to go. I could get a driver’s license without a test for a saw buck under the counter. I dressed and made the trip. Sure enough I copped. I was back home in an hour.
I pulled a chair to the front window. I had my spy glass. It was still daylight. I didn’t see the runt on the street. I spied into the greasy spoon across the street. The runt was sitting at the counter talking to a big black stud in overalls. He had trick engraved all over him. I saw them leave together and come across the street toward the Martin Hotel.
The scarfaced horn tooter who lived in four-twenty-two across the hall came out behind them alone. He got into a battered Ford and chugged away. It gave me an idea. After all, I could blow the runt. I picked up the phone and asked for connection to apartment four-twenty-two. The pretty yellow ex-whore “helloed.” I was glad old Silas had given me a rundown on her. I could tailor my pitch.
I said, “Now try to control yourself baby. I’m the tall stud with the dreamy bedroom eyes across the hall in four-twenty. I’m the guy with the pretty towel wrapped around his sexy hips. I got the same hips on now that you x-rayed. Remember that hump of sugar your peepers feasted on?”
She said, “Maybe, but you shouldn’t call me. I don’t want an incident. What do you want? A lady doesn’t accept phone calls from strangers.”
I said, “A million dollars and a trip to the moon with a bored, trapped, beautiful bitch, you dig? I’m no stranger. I’ve been popping the elastic on your panties ever since you saw me in the hall.”
She giggled. I could hear the thrill in her voice. The horn blower had taken her off the track, but the whore was alive and thrashing inside her. She had class. She had done more than screw on the fire escape at high school.
She said, “I don’t drink and besides I don’t know you.”
I said, “You met me in your first hot dream, remember? You know that pretty joker in your little girl dreams that always faded when you woke up wet between the legs. You waited and wished.
“You lucky bitch, I’ve stepped out of your dreams. I’m alive and real across the hall from you. Get over here, I’m gonna turn you on. Don’t worry about the watch dog. I saw him split out of the greasy spoon ten minutes ago. Baby, I’m gonna have to make one of my whores bake you a cake with a saw in it.”
She said, “You’re not married to one of them? I don’t want my throat cut. I don’t want to break an old habit, breathing.”
I said, “Yeah, I’m married. I’m married to the whore game. You’re still a member of the club yourself. You just ain’t paid any dues lately. Maybe if you ain’t full of shit I can put you back in good standing. Now get over here!”
She said, “I’m raw. I’ll have to slip on something. I’ll come over for a minute. You’re not a hype? I’m not hip to anything but grass.”
I said, “No, sugar, I’m a lover and a beggar. I got black gunion, baby. You hip?”
I hung up. I went to the dresser mirror and powdered my face. I brushed my hair with a damp brush. My mop was black, bright and curly. I went to the closet and slipped on a wild yellow lounging robe. I had bought it the day before Dalanski busted me at the dance.
I had peeped at her hole card that day in the hall. I knew she was a freak. I remembered her eyes chained to my crotch. Now I didn’t have on any towel. First chance I got I’d flash her into a boil, through the split in the front of the robe.
Maybe I could shoot some cocaine into that yellow virgin arm. That would open her up for sure. I might even steal her from scarface and put her back on the track tomorrow.
I thought, “This fine bitch is my speed. She’s not a hard-leg dog with a million miles on her. She’s no more than nineteen and sexy as the rear end of a peacock. I’ll play it cool and quiz her. Maybe some asskicker booted her off the track. Maybe that’s how scarface copped.
“I’ll stay in the pimp role, but I’ll sweeten it with a little highclass bullshit. Maybe I’ll rap some of that gigolo garbage I overheard the white pimps in the joint rapping.
“I better call Silas. I’m not ready for trouble with Scarface. I went to the door and unlocked it. I picked up the phone and got Silas.
I said, “Listen Jack, this is important. I’m gonna be rapping to the big-butt yellow broad who lives in four- twenty-two. I’m gonna give you and the broad on the desk a fin a piece. You gotta wire me here when Scarface shows. I’m not ready for him to wise up. Got me?”
Silas said, “You lucky young sonuvabitch. A faggot in a Y.M.C.A. shower room ain’t no luckier. You got salt and pepper, kid. We’ll wire you. I’ll stall the cage on the way up with him. Can I peep a little, kid, huh?”
I hung up. I felt a cool puff of draft on my ankles. I went into the living room. She had slipped into almost nothing. She was crossed legged in the chair at the window. She turned her head from the street and looked up at me.
She had on a thigh-long black negligee with pink butterflies sewn on. A pair of white silk panties gleamed through the black gauze. She curved inside it like a yellow Petty Girl. Her ebony hair was steepled on top of her skull like a black satin crown. I saw a frantic tic jerk at a corner of her melon-red mouth. If she turned out to have entasis, I swore I would give up whores and get hip to the sissy game.
She said, “Hi. I ask myself why I’m here?”
I said, “Baby, don’t drag the party. Don’t ask yourself stupid questions. You can’t escape that freak,
