One Good Deed

Chapter 12

These boys just don’t take a hint, thought Archer.

The subject of his frustration was the burly and unkempt Dan Bullock, who was currently following Crabtree. This was why Archer had left his post at the Cat’s Meow. His fellow ex-con was stealthily making his way from cover point to cover point as the woman walked along.

Archer felt he was back in Italy threading his way through a bombed-out village as he slipped along in the hopes of uncovering some information to help him and his fellow soldiers. He knew very well what Bullock was doing. He just didn’t know the exact particulars of his intentions in following a woman late at night. But he knew that none of them were good for Crabtree.

They had entered a neighborhood of cute bungalows with little shutters on the windows and tiny brown lawns. Archer thought it seemed like a nice place to call home. Bullock seemed to like these surroundings better for his purposes; he picked up his pace, closing the distance between him and his prey. There was no one else around.

Except for Archer, twenty yards behind.

Bullock took something from his pocket. Under the moonlight, Archer saw a flash of metal.

It was a knife.

Archer started to sprint forward.

He needn’t have bothered.

When Bullock was still five feet from his target, Crabtree turned. From her sizeable envelope purse the woman had taken a walnut-gripped .38 Colt Detective Special snub-nosed with a three-inch barrel. She took aim at Bullock’s broad chest as the big man came to a stop so fast he nearly toppled over.

“What in the hell!” he cried out.

Crabtree calmly looked him over and noted the knife in his right hand. “Mr. Bullock, first, drop the knife before I put a large hole in you.”

He immediately did so.

“Second, I hope you see that this means your parole is hereby revoked. The authorities will be coming to arrest you just as soon as I tell them what you’ve done.”

A pale Bullock took a step back. “Look here, ma’am, I don’t want to go back to no Carderock.”

“Then why were you following me, with a knife?”

“I—”

“Clear out!” she barked, startling the man. “Now!”

He turned and sprinted off.

Crabtree watched him go until she could see him no longer. She bent down and, using a handkerchief, picked up the knife and put it in her purse. She continued on into one of the bungalows. A light came on in the hall, and then another in the front room on the right side of the bungalow.

Archer drew closer and assumed this was probably her bedroom. He could see her silhouette against a lowered window shade. Then she drew the curtains across it, cutting off his view.

He turned and hustled back to the Cat’s Meow, his already high respect for Crabtree growing immeasurably.

He had barely taken up position behind the sycamore tree when the door to the bar opened and out staggered Hank Pittleman, with Jackie on his arm. Yet, she seemed to be carrying him more than he was carrying himself, and it was apparently a struggle for the woman.

While Archer was standing there, Pittleman turned and slapped her across the face, knocking her beret off. The sudden blow almost caused Jackie to fall over and take him with her.

Archer had stayed his hand in the bar when Pittleman had acted the same. And he’d held his objection because of the look Jackie had given him. But not this time, he decided. He rushed across the street and came up beside the pair.

Pittleman didn’t seem to have the capacity to recognize him or anyone else, but as he lifted his hand to take another swing at Jackie, Archer smoothly put his hand under the man’s arm, blocking him from doing so. Jackie, her cheek reddened where he’d struck her, looked over, smiled, and mouthed, Thank you.

She bent down and retrieved her hat. Instead of attempting to put it back on, she simply shoved it into her jacket pocket.

“What the hell!” snapped Pittleman. Then he clutched at his head and spit something up. Archer had to move his foot out of the way to avoid getting his new shoes besmirched by the man’s vomit.

“Too much to drink?” he asked Jackie as Pittleman started to rattle nonsense once more.

“How’d you guess?”

“You okay where he—”

“I’m fine. I’ve been hit a lot harder than that.”

They lurched along with Pittleman talking mostly incomprehensibly.

“Where are we taking him?” asked Archer.

“He’s got a place in town.”

He nodded, and they kept walking, cradling the gimpy-legged Pittleman between them.

It surprised Archer when Jackie led him to the Derby Hotel.

“What, this is where he stays?”

“Yes. He’s on the top floor.”

Archer’s jaw slackened another few degrees. “What room?”

“Two of them they’ve put together for him: 615 and 617.”

“I’m in 610.”

Jackie looked over at him, her features full of possibility. “Why, that’s right down the hall, Archer.”

When Pittleman failed completely to continue standing even with assistance, Archer took off his hat and said, “Hold this for me, Jackie.”

He squatted down and hefted Pittleman into the air over his shoulder with one clean thrust of his legs.

“You are a strong man, Archer,” she said approvingly.

“Yeah, well, at least I’m something. Lead the way.”

With the load he was carrying, Archer forced himself to ride the elevator up, though he closed his eyes while doing so. They got to the room and Jackie dug into her purse for the key. She stuck it in the lock while Archer stood there with Pittleman slung over his shoulder like a carcass kill. Jackie swung the door wide and waved Archer in.

He strode in, saw the bed, and deposited Pittleman there. Quiet snores were now emanating from him. Archer looked around as Jackie handed him back his hat.

“What’s he need two rooms for?”

“He doesn’t need them. He just wanted them.”

“Well, that makes no sense whatsoever.”

“Makes sense to him. And didn’t you know?”

“Know what?”

“Hank owns the hotel.”

Archer took a step back and looked down at the sleeping mess of a man. “Hell, what doesn’t he own?”

“Not much.”

Archer looked her over. If anything, her dress was even tighter and more revealing than the one from the other night. Jackie caught him eyeing her and sat on the edge of the bed, taking all the time in the world to cross one gleaming stockinged leg over the other.

“Well, he’s taken care of, now what?”

He looked down at her. “Any ideas?”

“We can go to your room for a drink.”

“I had some gin, but it’s gone now.”

She reached into her purse and pulled out a small flask. “Problem solved.”

“Last gal I saw with a flask pulled it out of her stockings.”

Her smile was wide, warm, and inviting and caused Archer to go weak-kneed.

She edged her skirt high enough to get his undivided attention. “Well, as you can see, I am wearing stockings. But, I’ll keep that in mind for next time, Archer.”

“You’re counting on a next time?”

“I like math. I can count really high.” She rose. “In fact, to 610. Let’s go.”

“Okay to leave him like that?”

“I leave him like that all the time.”

They made the short walk to Archer’s room after she locked Pittleman’s door behind them. He opened the door to his room and let her go in first. He shut the door behind him and pocketed the key.

She picked up two short glasses off the scarred dresser and poured out a portion of the contents of the flask into each one. Archer observed that she measured with precision.

“You like things just so,” he noted.

“Just so,” she replied, handing him a glass and then clinking hers against his.

She pressed the glass against her injured cheek.

“You’re gonna have a bruise there,” he said.

“Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“Back in the bar that night?” He looked down at her wrist.

“Men have to show off, Archer. If they can’t do it with their brains, and most often they can’t, they do it with the fact that they’re stronger than women. Hank’s not stupid, but he’s no better than most men when it comes to that.”

“Doesn’t make it right.”

“Are you telling me you’ve never struck a woman?”

“Never even thought about hitting one.”

She raised her glass to him. “Glad to hear it.” She took a drink and looked him up and down. “So you never told me why you got the new clothes.”

“Want to look the part.”

“What part is that?”

“Professional debt collector for one drunk asshole.”

He grinned and took a swallow of his drink, while she laughed loud and long, something that both surprised and pleased him.

She ran a hand up and down his jacket, while he tossed his new hat down on the bed.

“Where do we go from here?” he wanted to know.

Jackie moved slowly around the room while she sipped her drink, swaying maybe to some tune in her head. She reached the window, drew back the curtain, and looked out onto the dryness of Poca City.

“I have no plan, Archer. I’m just feeling my way. What were you doing outside the bar tonight?”

“Waiting for you to come out with Mr. Pittleman.”

“Why?”

“Needed to update him on things.”

“Like what?”

“Like your daddy torched his 1947 Cadillac, so there’s no way for me to get it back.”

“And how do you know this?” she said, looking at him with interest.

“I went out there last night with the idea of getting the car. It wasn’t where you thought it might be. I found it in a little clearing not too far from there, in the middle of a bunch of pine trees.”

She continued to gaze at him, her hand perched on one hip. “That used to be my secret spot, Archer, when I was little. I’d go there and pretend to be all sorts of things. A princess, Amelia Earhart, Jean Harlow, and Madame Curie.”

“Well, right now it’s got a mess of a burned-up car. And it’s been there a while, long before I went out there asking about it.”

“I wonder why he did that?”

“To spite Pittleman. Make sure the man’s never gonna collect so long as you’re with him.”

“Then he’s a fool.”

“Not sure about that. Pittleman told me he’s not taking Tuttle to court because it might cause embarrassment for his wife.”

Jackie smiled and said, “He really told you that?”

“I went out there to see him and that’s what he said. You don’t think he was telling the truth?”

“Who knows? I find the truth coming out of folks’ mouths less and less these days.”

He sat on the one chair while she slipped off her shoes, taking so long to undo the straps around her ankles that it forced Archer to look down into his drink before something happened he might later come to regret. But that water might already be over the dam.

She dropped her heels on the floor, took her legs up under her haunches, and perched there like a queen on her throne. But it wasn’t a throne; it was Archer’s bed.

“This is getting interesting, Archer, don’t you think?” she said in that husky and now whiskey-draped voice.

He looked up, cradling his drink and taking another short swallow.

“Could be.”

“You know, all the others just tried to steal that damn Caddy in the middle of the night.”

“May they rest in peace. I took a different tack. Just my nature.”

“You’re the path-less-traveled sort of man, are you?”

“It seems to me that if I just follow along with everybody else, my life will always be crowded with folks I don’t necessarily care to spend time with.”

“Now you can’t accede to my father’s request, and you can’t fulfill Hank’s, either. And you spent money and you can’t pay Hank back.”

“You seem different than you did in the bar that first night. I mean, the way you talk and all.”

“Hank likes me a certain way. So, I’m that certain way when I’m around him.”

“What way is that?”

“You’re a college boy. Do you know what chattel is?”

“Like property.”

“Right. That’s what Hank likes, owning things. And he also likes girlish giggles, flighty, flirty, his hand freely grabbing my ass, and all that goes with it. That also includes the occasional insult, slap, or punch.”

“And you’re okay with that?”

“If I weren’t, I wouldn’t let him do it.”

“You’re educated, aren’t you? I mean, you sound it.”

“I went to college, too. Only I graduated.” She tacked on a smile and eyebrow hike to this.

“What’d you study?”

“Psychology.”

“How’s that work for you?”

“I can read people pretty well. Now, Hank, he’s easy. You, not so much.”

“Always thought I wore it on my sleeve.”

“You might be wearing something, but it’s not you, Archer. Not by a long shot.”

“Why do you want to be around a man like that? He’s more than twice your age. And he’s married, too. Marjorie Pittleman seems nice and respectable.”

“That’s not my issue, that’s his and his wife’s. As to my reasons, Hank treats me pretty well for the most part. We go out, we have a good time, and then I have my own time.”

“Where do you live?”

“In a house on Eldorado. Number 27. Hank got it for me.”

“A house, huh, then you’re a kept woman of sorts.”

“You got that from a book, I think.”

“I think you’re right about that. You have long-term plans with old Hank?”

“I don’t really think past tomorrow. I only live in the moment. Spontaneous.”

He shook his head and finished his drink. “I don’t think I believe that.”

“Believe what you will or won’t. But let me give you an example.” She set her drink down, stood, and slipped off her jacket, revealing her dress straps and bare shoulders. She pulled down the straps, reached around to the back of her neck, undid a clasp there, pulled down the zipper, and commenced to wiggle herself free from the dress’s constraints while Archer could only watch with rapt attention. Finally, the fabric hit the floor. She stepped out of the pile of dress and stood there with not much on except her stockings, garter belt, and underwear.

Archer found he could not look away, not even if a regiment of Nazis were bearing down on him with Hitler leading the pack. He had seen naked or nearly naked women before, in four different countries. He had never seen one that stirred his heart like this woman. Her body was icy pale and soft in every place that mattered to a man. Her mouth was infinitely kissable. And her contrasting Veronica Lake dark peekaboo had never seemed more in reach for a man like him.

She put an exclamation point on this by twirling around for him.

“Are my intentions now made clear?” she said, coming to face him. “Because I’m not sure what else I can do, quite honestly.”

“I think I get the point.”

“I’m truly relieved.”

“And Hank?”

“He’s not here now, is he?”

“Do I have a say in this?”

Her face fell. “I think that’s a given, but if you’re not interested?”

She bent down to pick up her dress, but he gripped her by the shoulders, pulling her straight up.

“You’re taller without my shoes on,” she said, looking up at him.

“I suppose I am.”

“You have a nice mug, Archer. Good bones. Not too handsome and not too scary.”

“Moderation is a good thing.”

“But not all of the time.”

He looked down at her and noticed the bruises on her arms, upper thighs, and obliques.

His features darkening, he said, “What the hell happened there? You fall?”

She didn’t even look at where he was staring. “Nothing important, Archer. Nothing at all.”

“You sure? I mean, if Pittleman did—”

She put a hand over his mouth.

“Focus. I need you to focus. The night’s not getting any younger and neither are we.”

She stood on her tippy-toes and put her lips against his.

A moment later, they toppled, as one, onto the bed.