Anything But Saintly

Chapter 7

I had hardly resumed my seat in front of the television set when there was a soft rap at the door. Rising again, I went to open it.

A buxom blonde of about twenty-one or two stood in the hall. She wore a simple but tasteful print dress and carried a small white bag. She was buxom only through the torso and hips, her arms and legs were becomingly slim and her waist was small enough to encircle with my hands. I doubt that I could have gotten both arms all the way around her at chest level, though. She had a pretty, round, smooth-skinned face and there was a tentative smile on it.

“You’ve got the right room,” I said. “Come on in.”

She moved past me and I closed and locked the door. After a glance around, she turned to face me and exposed even white teeth in a friendly grin.

“You’re nice,” she said. “I like big men. I’m Jolly.”

“I’m pretty jolly myself,” I said.

She emitted a little giggle. “That’s my name, silly — Jolly. What’s yours?”

“Matt.”

“Urn. That’s a fine masculine name. I like virile names for men, not sissy names such as Lyle and Leslie and Ethelbert.”

I was a little bemused. As a rule prostitutes, even the aristocrats of the trade, the call girls, don’t have very extensive vocabularies. “Virile” is hardly a pedantic word, but it was surprising to hear a hustler use it.

I said, “How about Mateusz?”

“Mateusz? Is that what it is? What are you? A Russian?”

“Polack.”

“Well,” she said, pleased, “my mother was Polish.”

“You speak the language?”

She shook her head. “We never spoke it around the house, because my father was Irish. That’s why I didn’t recognize Mateusz as a Polish name. You’re certainly a big one. How much do you weigh?”

“Around two-ten.”

“Urn. And no fat on you. Where’d you ever get such big brown eyes?”

My eyes are the cross I have to bear. At some point of acquaintance every new woman I meet feels impelled to make some crack about my eyes. I’ve examined them in the mirror and they just look like eyes to me, but women seem to find something in them I can’t. When they make cracks in front of the boys, I take a squadroom riding for days. I was glad we were alone.

I said, “I had a deer mother.”

Her face assumed a look of mock pain. “Don’t you know a pun is the lowest form of humor? Samuel Johnson said that.”

“You must read more books than I do,” I said. “I thought it was Mark Twain. Want a drink?”

“Let’s get the business part over with first, shall we? Then we can relax.”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, taking out my wallet. “What’s the fee?”

“For all night, or just a quickie?”

“I’m a hog. All night.”

“Fifty dollars.”

I took out a marked fifty-dollar bill and handed it to her. Tucking it into her bag, she laid the bag on the dresser and smiled at me brightly. “Now I’ll have that drink.”

This was the point where I was supposed to flash my badge and inform her she was under arrest. But I had been doing some thinking since she entered the room. It was now nine-twenty, the television set was still on, and a newscast was due in ten minutes. There was a good probability that Jolly knew Kitty Desmond, since they were colleagues, and most call girls’ friendships are restricted to other call girls, pimps and procurers. If she didn’t already know Kitty was dead, the shock of hearing it on the air might jolt some information out of her. Homicide wasn’t my business, but I felt a personal interest in this case, and the murder seemed more important than the routine arrest of a call girl.

I mixed her a drink and refilled my own glass.

While I was making drinks, Jolly reached around to the middle of her back and pulled down her dress zipper. Opening another zipper at the side of her dress, she untied the slim black velvet rope which served as a belt and casually slipped the dress off over her head. Opening the closet door, she carefully put the dress on a hanger and replaced the hanger in the closet.

Despite her profession, Jolly hadn’t been dressed to inspire passion. Call girls seldom are because they have to look respectable when crossing hotel lobbies. If a call girl slithered into a lobby wearing a low-cut gown and made up like a burlesque queen, she would be stopped by the house dick before she ever reached the elevator. With her dress on Jolly had merely looked like a stylishly smart young woman. And beneath it she wore the full quota of undergarments.

Pulling a slip off over her head, she placed that on another hanger and put it in the closet. Still in brassiere, panties, stockings and shoes, she moved to the dresser and picked up her bag. Taking out a comb, she looked in the mirror and rearranged her hair where pulling the garments off over her head had slightly mussed it.

Meantime I had finished mixing the drinks and could give my undivided attention to her performance.

Satisfied that her hair was properly groomed, Jolly returned the comb to the bag. Reaching behind her back again, this time with both hands, she unhooked her brassiere. She watched me with a slight smile on her face as she slowly removed it, folded it in half and laid it on the dresser. Then she arched her back to make her breasts jut out and waited for my approval.

She merited it. You would have expected some sag in a bust of that dimension, for it must have measured forty inches. But with all that weight, her breasts stood out as straight and firm as a teen-ager’s.

I brought my palms together in a silent gesture of applause.

Grinning at me, she kicked off her shoes and bent to un-snap her nylons. Gracefully peeling them off, she draped them across the dresser top, then pulled off pink panties and laid them atop the folded brassiere. That left her wearing nothing but a slim garter belt, and a moment later that was on the dresser top too.

For an instant she stood facing me, her back arched to push out her magnificent breasts, then did a pirouette and picked up her drink. Carrying it to the easy chair facing the television set, she sat, tucked her bare feet beneath her and gave me a chummy smile.

I pulled a straight-backed chair over next to the easy-chair, picked up my own drink and sat down. A private eye thing was playing on television, but I didn’t look at it. You can see those any night, but how often do you see a bare forty-inch bust that doesn’t require support?

“Cheers,” she said, elevating her glass.

I raised mine too, and we drank.

“I’m glad you’re not a hurry-up Joe,” she confided.

“What’s a hurry-up Joe?”

“A fellow who can’t wait, and starts pawing the minute you walk in. I like to get acquainted a little first, so it’s not like you’re doing it with an utter stranger. Don’t you think it’s nicer to start a little slow and gradually build up momentum?”

There was another word outside the average call girl’s vocabulary — “momentum.” Again it was an ordinary enough word, but hustlers seldom converse in words of more than one syllable. Most of them would have said “speed.”

“I guess it’s a little less commercial,” I allowed.

“Yes, that’s what I mean. This may sound funny to you, but sometimes I like to forget there’s any money involved. With some fellows you can’t. It’s just a matter of getting the unpleasantness over with as soon as possible. But when I like a man, I feel like taking my time and getting some enjoyment myself. I’ve got an idea you can make me squeal.”

“Um,” I said noncommittally.

“Are you a straight lover?”

“What’s a straight lover?” I inquired.

“You know. Some fellows have odd ideas.”

“Oh,” I said. “Sorry. I’m the old-fashioned type.” I made my voice apologetic.

“Silly,” she said, making a face at me. “I wasn’t suggesting anything. I was just asking. I’m the old-fashioned type myself, but you’d be surprised at how mixed up some perfectly normal looking men are.”

“Like how?”

“Well, for instance, some of them don’t even take their clothes off and don’t even want to touch a girl. They just want her to parade around in front of them.”

“Voyeurs,” I said.

She gave me a delighted smile. “You do too read as many books as I do. I read a lot, you know, and I like intelligent, well-read men. I’ve done a lot of reading on abnormal psychology. Do you know much about it?”

“Some,” I said. “What else do you run into?”

“Well, there are the masochiste, who like to be whipped. Not many, but every so often one turns up. And the sadists, who like to whip girls.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Do you put up with that?”

She lifted bare shoulders in a graceful shrug. “Not with a leather belt. Did you notice the belt on my dress?”

“Uh-huh. Black velvet.”

“Yes, with no buckle. Most of the girls wear something like that, just in case. It hardly hurts at all. Just stings a little and doesn’t leave any welts. If they won’t settle for that, it’s no go. I just leave. Usually they will, though. One of the most prominent businessmen in this town is a whipper.”

And I had thought being a cop was a hell of a way to make a living. “Don’t these cuckoos ever give you trouble?” I inquired.

“Oh, no. I know how to handle myself when things get out of hand. I’ve only run into one psycho. He wanted to burn me with cigarettes, and he got insistent. I clipped him on the jaw and knocked him colder than a carp.”

The girl’s frank, cheerful attitude toward her profession began to get to me. She had the moral outlook of an alley cat, but there was an odd mixture of callousness and naïveté about her which was strangely appealing. Despite my low opinion of whores in general, I found myself beginning to like her.

The private eye drama on television ended at that moment and a commercial came on. “I want to catch the news,” I said. “Like another drink before it starts?”

“Sure.” She drained her glass and handed it to me.