Sharky's Machine

Chapter Six

‘Jesus,’ Friscoe bellowed as he swept debris into one corner of his desk, shoving into a single disordered pile case reports, tile folders, bits of paper, a half-eaten Swiss cheese on rye and a cardboard container of coffee with what looked like penicillin floating on top. ‘I wish to hell we could get the goddamn clean-up committee down here. What we got here is the makings of a bubonic plague.’

He was stringing a reel of tape on the Sony which now sat on the cleared space on his desk.

‘What we got, Sharky, is about two hours of phone taps here, spread over about three, four weeks. It’s all legal — Judge Alvers gave us the flag. Now before we get into this good I want you to listen to this take just so’s you’ll get an idea of the range of this little operation. We got each take tagged on front, so you’ll know who, what, and where. The rest, it speaks for itself.’

He turned on the switch and adjusted the volume. The tape hissed for a moment and then Livingston’s voice came

on.

LIVINGSTON: This tape is PC-1, a recording of a telephone conversation between the subject, Tiffany Paris, made from the phone in her apartment, Suite 4-A, the Courtyard Apartments, 3381 Peachtree Street, Northwest, November 22, 1975, one-ten P.M., and two male callers, the first identified as Neil, n.l.n., and the second Freddie, n.l.n., also referred to as Freaky Freddie.

Click.

TIFFANY: Hello?

NEIL: What’s happening?

TIFFANY: I’m dead. That joker last night belongs in the zoo.

NEIL: Yeah, well, his money’s as green as anybody else’s. Guess who I’ve got on the phone?

TIFFANY: I’m too tired for guessing games, Neil.

NEIL: Freddie.

TJFFANY: Freaky Freddie?

NEIL: Freaky Freddie.

TIFFANY: Don’t tell me. What’s on his mind?

NEIL: Now what the hell you think’s on his mind?

TIFFANY: Oh not now. I’m just not ready for him. I haven’t even had a bath.

NEIL: Hey, you know the score. When he’s ready, he’s ready, and right now he’s ready.

TIFFANY: I’ve got to get my head on straight. Tell him have him call back in twenty minutes.

NEIL: Now! Twenty minutes, he’ll beat off and save the money.

TIFFANY: Christ, Neil -

NEIL: I said it’s now, baby. Now straighten your head up and let’s get it on.

TIFFANY: (Groans) Okay, five minutes, stall him for live.

NEIL: I’ll give you three.

Click.

LIVINGSTON: Tape PC-2, same subjects, one-thirteen P.M.

Click.

TIFFANY: Hello.

NEIL: You ready?

TIFFANY: I guess. This won’t win any prizes.

NEIL: I’m looking at a bill-and-a—half, not any Academy Awards. I’m patching you in now.

Click.

FREDDIE: H-h-h-hello?

TIFFANY: (Very softly) Hello Freddie.

FREDDIE: I, uh, h-h-how you b-b-been?

TIFFANY: Just fine, and you?

FREDDIE: Okay.

TIFFANY: Freddie, guess who I’ve got here with me?

FREDDIE: (Excited) I d-d-don’t know. I g-g-give up.

TIFFANY: My photographer friend.

FREDDIE: Y-y-you mean the one w-w-with

TIFFANY: The redhead, Freddie, with the big tits.

FREDDIE: Oh y-y-yeah.

TIFFANY: She’s shooting for Penthouse this time.

FREDDIE: P-P-Penthouse?

TIFFANY: She looks really wild today. She’s wearing a silver, uh, lamé jumpsuit.

FREDDIE: W-w-with z-z-zippers?

TIFFANY: All the way down the front. Why don’t you just relax Freddie? Lay back and relax and let it happen, baby. You have some music on?

FREDDIE: B-B-Berlioz.

TIFFANY: Perfect.

FREDDIE: Are the z-z-zippers p-p-pulled down?

TIFFANY: Give me time, honey.

The zipper goes all the way down the front. And...

she’s zipping it down,

now...

real slowly,

down...

down

It’s spreading open, Freddie. I can

just see.

Oh, wow, I can see the edge...

of her nipples.

The suit zips aaaall the way down

and under, you know?

When it’s open, Freddie,

you can see it all.

FREDDIE: W-w-what else?

TIFFANY: You know what I’m wearing, Freddie? She brought it. It’s black,.

silk, very thin silk,

with beige lace

across my tits...

and on the bottom, too. Just under my hair. And you know what’s under it, Freddie?

FREDDIE: W-w-what?

TIFFANY: A white garter belt

and white stockings.

Sheer white stockings.

Her zipper’s pulled down

below her stomach

I can just see...

I can see the edge of her hair,

bright red,

curling over the slit in the zipper...

FREDDIE: The p-p-pop-p-poppers, d-d-don’t forget. TIFFANY: Oh, wait until I tell you about that.

She has this, this special little inhaler. It has two little tubes,

one for each nostril.

She’s breaking the poppers,

putting them in the tubes...

and.. . she’s

waving it...

waving it under my nose.

Oh! Oh, my God, Freddie... I’m tingling...

tingling all over. Even my skin is tingling...

and my tits are hard . ..

hard like you, Freddie.

My pussy

feels like it’s going to

FREDDIE: C-c-cunt. . . say c-c-cunt, I love it w-w-when...

TIFFANY: My cunt

is burning up.

It’s throbbing

It feels like it’s . . . it’s

vibrating

and getting wet.

I’m getting ready and

she’s beginning to shoot,

she’s straddling me.

Can you hear it, Freddie, the camera?

Sound of camera discharging.

FREDDIE: Oh yeah . . . I hear it

TIFFANY: She’s making me

spread my legs. And she’s

kneeling

in between them . .

leaning over.

Her knee is so close

1 can feel the heat of her body. I I’m going to just

move down a little..

maybe just, touch it against her... But she’s moving away, her knee is moving away.

I can’t stand...

Oh Freddie, she’s pulling down one of the straps

on the...

the...

oh, oh.. . on the negligee, sliding the lace over my nipples.

Back and forth.

Jesus, I’m hard.

It feels...

I feel.

like I have a volcano between my legs... shivering

ready to explode,

with hot lava.

She’s got the negligee down.

My tits are free.

They’re so hard and pointing up at her. And now she’s

taking my hand...

putting my fingers in her mouth,

sucking them

She’s leaning over.. . her tits.

are rubbing mine.

God.

Oh, God, Freddie,

she’s taking my fingers, putting them on our tits

making me squeeze them,

together,

and putting my other hand,

moving it down,

down,

Freddie. . . I’m touching it. All warm and wet,

swollen,

swelling up.

Oh, yeah, she’s doing me

with her hand on mine.

I can’t tell who’s doing...

doing what to who.

She’s zipping the jumpsuit down

It’s taking her forever.

Urn... okay.. .I can see it,

I can see the top

of her cunt.

She’s slipping out of it, taking It off. Jesus.

She’s moving up on me.

Her cunt,..

Oh, God, Freddie, her cunt is just... just kind of brushing my tits.

And it’s so soft.

sooo soft,

like feathers, Freddie,

and my tit is wet from her.

I want to come, Freddie...

FREDDIE: Not y-y-yet, no!

TIFFANY: She’s sitting down on it.

My nipple is...

God, it’s inside her.

She’s moving,

back and forth

and my

fit

is fucking her, Freddie...

Oh, yeah,

oh yeah,

I’m so hard, Freddie,

my cut is standing up . . . like your cock.

Are you hard, Freddie, good and hard?

FREDDIE: Y-y-yes...

TIFFANY: She’s rolling over on her side.

Taking my hand,

putting my fingers inside me,

moving them...

in and out...

in

and out...

and she has my other hand

on her cunt.

I’m stroking her

and she’s moving

back and forth

faster

faster

and I’m moving my hand in and out of me

with her.

She’s rubbing me

she’s right on it and rubbing...

everybody’s together, moving together. Jesus, Freddie, she’s getting off,

she’s moving real fast and

her mouth,

her mouth is wide open.

She’s

going

to come, and so...

so...

so...

Freddie, I can’t wait. Don’t make me wait.

She’s coming, Freddie.

She’s coming.

FREDDIE!: Oh yeah,

oh yeah,

oh yeah...

TIFFANY: Here it comes, Freddie,

here it comes, Freddie.

Ohhh, Freddie,

obhh, Freddie.

Ohhh,

ohhh,

Freddie...

Freddie...

Freddie . . . Freddie, Freddie, Freddie, Freddie...

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, Oh, Oh, Oh.. . AHHHH Freddie cried out with her, a pinched, tight squeal,

caught in the constrictions of his throat, and ending in a whimpering sigh.

Pause.

The tape was quiet except for the sounds of their laboured breathing and an occasional sigh.

TIFFANY: Jesus, that was good.

It was really good. How about you Freddie? How was it for you?

Pause.

TIFFANY: Freddie?

More heavy breathing.

FREDDIE: (Groans) Oh, God.

TIFFANY: Tell me about it, Freddie. I could get off again, you know that, if you just tell me how it was.

Still no answer.

TIFFANY: Freddie?

FREDDIE: Uhhh...

TIFFANY: You know what I’d like? I’d like you to be here right now. Deep inside me. Make me feel like a woman again. Can you do that?

Can you get me off, Freddie?

FREDDIE: I w-w-want to t-t-try.

TIFFANY: Great. Because it’s building again, Freddie. All for you.

Friscoe switched the tape recorder off. ‘Well, enough of that,’ he said, ‘the rest is X-rated.’

Sharky sat in stony silence, staring at the machine. He was repulsed, yet strangely turned on by the intensity of the woman’s performance and by the eroticism of the phone conversation. He was embarrassed, but he shielded his feelings.

‘If that Freddie has any problems, that’s pretty good therapy,’ Arch Livingston said. ‘Look at Sharky, he’s struck speechless. Bet you never heard anything like that before, did you, speedy?’

Sharky shook his head.

Friscoe was laughing. ‘Little dirty tricks there, Sharky,’ he said. ‘That one there, that’s an odd-ball situation. Tell you the truth, I’d like to get a look at old Freaky Freddie. He’s the kind, sounds like he gives freaks a bad name. It’s what we call an ear job, A hunnerd-and-a-half ear job. Normally, see, what happens this Neil — he’s the pimp, okay? — he lines up the johns, makes the deal, then calls the girl. It’s strictly a one-way street, from the john to old pimpo deluxo to the hooker. She never calls Neil or the John. I don’t even think she knows his phone number. And neither do we yet. Anyway, it’s a very cautious set-up. Probably the neatest phone-and-fuck operation I’ve ever run into.’

Friscoe ran the tape forward; its garbled squeal filled the room. He stopped several times, seeking a particular take.

‘How, uh, did you get on to this?’ Sharky said finally.

Livingston smiled. ‘Believe it or not, a snitch.’

‘One of the johns?’

Friscoe shook his head. ‘Naw, don’t I wish? You think any of these bimbos gonna say anything, put their balls in the wringer? Shit, no. It was this old campaigner we call Mabel the Monster, been street trickin’ must be ten years now. Her heels are so round she has to hang on to the lamppost keep from fallin’ over backwards. What happened, back there late in November we bad some kind of religious convention in town. Shit, on Saturday night we had about a thousand Jesus freaks runnin’ all over town screamin’ and hollerin’ like a grizzly bear with his nuts caught in the door jamb. So, about seven o’clock the goddamn switchboard lights up like it’s the Fourth of fuckin’ July and then The Bat calls in, and the chief, and finally the commissioner himself. It seems the whole Peachtree hooker line turned out in force. Musta been, we counted thirty-two pros working the two blocks between the Regal Hotel and the Towers. So we go over, drop the hammer on about twenty of ‘em, and poor old Mabel turns up in the line-up. Usually, see, she’s quiet as a lamb. She’s been nailed so much she oughta be payin’ rent down at the pound. Only this night, Jesus, we had a fuckin’ maniac on our hands. So Papa there, he takes her in the backroorn, waltzes her around a bit, and turns out she’s pissed, see? She says we’re pickin’ on the low-renters and turning a deaf eye on the high-rolling ladies. For a while Papa can’t get anything specific outa her and then he oflèrs to let her walk, she gives him something we can hang our hat on, and she comes up with a name and address. Bingo, we got Tiffany.

‘We figure, the last three weeks or so, we got — how many, Arch? — ninety-one phone calls on tape, eighty per cent is jobs. She’s turnin’ four tricks a week at five and six bills a pop and you gotta figure it’s at least a hundred g’s a year, tax free. Still, still misdemeanour, but, you know, big misdemeanour. Worth workin’ on. Then three days ago, we turn up this take I’m gettin’ ready to play for you. Now it’s a new ball-game because we got what looks like a shakedown. A fat one. And that’s a felony extortion, baby,’ Friscoe smiled and licked his lips.

‘Also,’ Livingston said, ‘we got a joker popping up in the deck.’

‘We’ll come to that in a minute,’ Friscoe said.

‘Wouldn’t the IRS love to get a piece of this action?’ Sharky said.

Livingston cringed. ‘Wouldn’t they though? And fuck it up for everybody else, as usual.’

‘All those assholes are interested ia is their own chunk of the kiwash,’ Friscoe said. ‘They don’t give a diddly shit about anybody or anything but their own shit-ass little backyard. They’re as much help as a broken leg.’

‘Maybe we could lean on Tiffany, get to Neil. He knows everything that’s happening,’ Sharky said.

‘You’re jumping the gun,’ said Friscoe. ‘Just listen to this here take. There’s a lot happening. We move too soon now and we could blow the whole machine right down the fuckin’ toilet, believe me. Just hook an ear on this.’

He turned on the recorder.

LIVINGSTON: This is tape PC-74, tape recording of a telephone conversation between the subject, Tiffany Paris, Suite 4-A, the Courtyard Apartments, 3381 Peachtree Street, Northwest, December 15, 1975, three-thirty-two P.M., and a male caller identified as Neil, n.l.n.

Click.

TIFFANY: Hello?

NEIL: It’s me.

TIFFANY: Oh, thank God, T was afraid it was —

NEIL: Hey, calm down, calm down.

TIFFANY: He came by here, no call, no nothing, just showed up at the door. Anybody could have been here. My mother —

NEIL: I said calm down. It’s taken care of. It won’t happen again.

TIFFANY: But it never happened before. . . it was like that. . . terrible little man following me that ti —

NEIL: Bag it, Tif.

Friscoe turned the machine off for a moment. ‘That bit there. We think what happened, some john probably took it on himself to bypass Neil, call in person. Blew her mind, see.’

‘What’s that about somebody tailing her? Was that one of your people?’ Sharky asked.

‘No. We haven’t figured that one out yet. Anyway, moving along here we get to the meat.’ He switched the machine back on.

NEIL: Listen to me. I talked to him, eye-to-eye, read him the facts of life. It won’t happen again, believe me.

TIFFANY: It really upset me. The man that was following me that time, the one in the leather jacket, I know he was a cop and —

NEIL: He was not a cop. He was some shit-ass little conman looking for a buck. Besides, he vanished, right? When’s the last time you saw him?

TIFFANY: He was following Domino, too, Neil. She told me —

NEIL: Shit!

TIFFANY: I still think Norman sent him. He was so angry and he made those threats.

NEIL: Norman did not send him. And Domino’s forgotten about it. Norman’s back in Texas, playing with his oil fields. Drop it. Now, I mean it.

‘Here we go,’ Friscoe said, ‘now listen close.’

TIFFANY: He told me, he was going to do something to my face. You try forgetting something like that.

NEIL: Tiffany, the son of a bitch was a pussycat. Those fat shmucks have to show the hair on their chest, make a little noise. You know, they think they got balls as big as the Ritz. One look at the stills and he coughed up his fifty grand and rolled over like a pet dog and that was that. The other guy, maybe he wanted a free piece, who knows?

TIFFANY: Domino told me she thought he was following her too —

NEIL: Domino forgot it, goddamnit! She’s cool and you better. . . Jesus. That was back in October. You gonna carry that around the rest of your life?

‘Who’s Domino?’ Sharky asked.

‘She’s the joker Livingston was talkin’ about,’ Friscoe said. ‘All along we figured it was this Neil and Tiffany, period. Now we know he’s got another one in his stable. Listen . .

TIFFANY: Anyway, I think it’s too soon to try it again.

NEIL: You let me decide that.

TIFFANY: Can’t Domino do this one?

NEIL: Keep Domino out of this. What Domino and I do is none of your business. She ever bang your ear about what’s happening with her? Hell, no, she doesn’t.

TIFFANY: How come I get the dirty deals?

NEIL: (Pauses) Let me ask you, since when is twenty- five g’s a dirty deal? It’s passed. And this time we’re going for bigger stuff, maybe a hundred big ones, Tif. You want to sneeze off your half of a hundred grand?

Silence.

NEIL: Now are you set up for tonight? I don’t want you getting ants in your pants around Domino, got that straight? These two tonight, they’re worth a bloody fortune. Diamond merchants from Amsterdam. They’re throwing out fifteen hundred for the night. I don’t want you doing a sad-ass on me. They may be back and that’s big money for everybody.

TIFFANY: I’ll be fine.

NEIL: Good. They’ll pick you two up about eight-thirty in a limousine. Have a good time.

TIFFANY: Thanks.

NEIL: Later.

Friscoe switched the recorder off.

‘Okay, there it is,’ he said. ‘The way we put it together, this Neil and the Tiffany broad took some Texas oil millionaire named Norman for fifty grand. They had pictures, who the hell knows what else? But they stuck it to him and now it sounds like they’re getting ready for another round, only this time they’re sniffin’ after a hundred g’s. Christ, that’s just plain greedy.’

‘You got any idea who?’ Sharky asked.

‘Not the foggiest. But whoever it is, the way I see it, we let it start to come together, then we step in and maybe we can bust the whole lot.’

‘Who’s this Domino?’ Sharky asked.

‘Another lady in the stable. All the while we figure It for a twosome, now all of a sudden up pops the devil and we got another one in the act.’

‘You think maybe she’s got a scant working too?’ Sharky said.

‘Why not? It seems to be the season for it.’

‘Then let’s go after her too,’ Sharky said. ‘Do we have a line on her.’

‘Yeah. Livingston and Papa dutched them the night they went out with the boys from Holland,’ said Friscoe, ‘then followed Domino home.’

‘We should all live that good,’ Livingston said. ‘A Caddy limo the size of a 747 picks them up. They hit Nikolai’s Roof for dinner, dancing afterwards at Krazz. The bill for the four of them must have been five hundred bucks.’

Sharky whistled. ‘Maybe we’re in the wrong business,’ he said and grinned. ‘I wonder if she’d give me about ten dollars’ worth?’

‘Yeah,’ Papa said, ‘for ten bucks she’ll goose ya.’

‘On your pay you can’t even afford to smell it,’ said Friscoe.

‘Maybe she’ll take a dollar down and a dollar a week,’ Sharky joked.

‘Look,’ Friscoe said, ‘I agree we need to go after the

Domino broad too. I already got the office from Alvers.

After I played that performance between Tiffany and

Freaky Freddie, he was ready to give me permission to bug

her church pew.’

Sharky’s mind was humming. He had survived on the street for eighteen months with instinct and little else. Now every nerve ending was telling him that this Domino would provide a key, although he was not sure why. Perhaps because it had taken almost four weeks for her name to pop up. It seemed to him she was being well shielded and there had to be a reason.

‘What we need,’ he said half to himself, ‘is a first-class wireman. Somebody who can do it right. The apartment. The phone. The whole shooting match.’

‘Yeah, well, that’s tough shit,’ said Friscoe. ‘All we got is what’s down here in the dump. One lousy tape recorder and maybe a little help from the phone company to tap into her phone.’

‘I want the whole place,’ Sharky said.

‘Good luck,’ Livingston said.

‘I got just the guy for the job,’ Sharky went on. ‘He’ll love it. It’ll be a challenge.’

‘Who is this genius?’ Friscoe asked.

‘The Nosh,’ Sharky said.

‘Who the fuck is The Nosh?’

‘Larry Abrams. He’s got everything we need. Voice- activated recorders. Mikes the size of your fingernail. FM pre-amps for the pick-up. Let me tell you, The Nosh could plant a bug in a hummingbird’s ass.’

‘So where do we find this wonder boy?’ Friscoe asked.

‘Right here in the House. He’s in OC.’

Friscoe rolled his eyes. He shook his head. ‘Forget it,’ he said forlornly, ‘Organized Crime is D’Agastino’s outfit. That cheap guinea wouldn’t loan us the dog shit on his shoes.’

‘The hell with D’Agastino,’ Sharky said. ‘The Nosh and I go back long before either of us was on the force. I can sneak him out long enough to get it done.’

Friscoe thought about it for a few moments, then shrugged. ‘Look, it’s your machine, see. We all figure, maybe you can bring something into it we can’t. We’ve all been.. . you just get jaded after a while. You ‘wanna do some dog- robbing here in the House it’s okay with me. If the shit hits the fan, well.. . we’ll all duck.’

Sharky was thinking about The Nosh. Little Larry, fiddling around in the workshop in his garage, inventing gadgets that only he would ever use. He chuckled thinking about it.

‘I tell you what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna be all over this Domino. Before we’re through we’ll know what she’s thinking. Because The Nosh and I, we’re going to put more wire in her place than an AT and T substation.’