Venomous Lady...

Chapter Two Hot Eyes of Hate

Room 414 was at the end of the corridor. His footsteps made no sound on the thick corridor rug. His mouth felt tight and dry.

He lifted his hand, took a deep breath and knocked on the dark door. It was two minutes after three. A familiar, throaty voice said, “Come in, Peter darling.”

His hand was cold and wet on the knob. He opened the door. It opened into a small sitting room. Beyond was the bedroom. Lynda Stanley stood at the window, looking down into the court. She wore a house coat of pale blue taffeta. She was much thinner than she had been in Calcutta.

She turned away from the window. For a moment she was silhouetted against the light and he couldn’t see her face. She walked toward him, hands outstretched.

“How nice to see you, Peter,” she said softly.

“Nice to see you, Lynda,” he mumbled.

She took his hands and turned so that the light struck her face. An ugly puckered scar started by the lobe of her left ear and slashed down across her cheek. It disappeared and then reappeared low on her throat, disappearing into the top of the house dress.

She knew he was looking at it. He licked dry lips.

“Pretty, isn’t it, Peter?”

Her voice was still soft. He looked into her dark eyes. They were like dull chips of black marble. Lifeless, dead, ugly and completely mad. He felt the skin on the back of his neck prickle.

“What... what happened to you?” he asked.

“Oh, it was a present from you, Peter. A lovely present from my lovely little man, my brave and righteous little man.”

“I don’t underst—”

She let go of his hands and traced the angry, puffy scar with one finger.

“See, Peter. It was a girl named Wanda something or other. She was in there because she had killed her two children. Poor thing, she had wanted to go away with a pleasant truck driver and the children were in the way. Horrid place, that prison. She worked beside me in the laundry. See my hands, Peter. A three-year sentence. I served two and a half years in the laundry. Do you think the swollen knuckles will ever go down? Red and cracked, aren’t they?”

“Look, I—”

“Don’t you want to hear about it, Peter? Wanda thought I was trying to steal her boy-friend guard... She took a pair of scissors from the tailor shop and walked up to me and slashed me. She had the general idea of removing an eye, but I ducked.”

Her cheeks were faintly hollow and the new thinness of her face made her dark, dead eyes look unnaturally enormous.

She stepped closer to him, her lips parted and said, “But I’m still attractive to you, aren’t I, Peter?”

He saw the bottle on the table by the window. He smelled the rye on her breath. With a quick stride, he reached the bottle, twisted the top off, tilted it up to his lips, swallowed deeply and nearly gagged on the tepid whiskey.

He sat down on the small couch. “Lynda, I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I... what do you want?”

“Why, I wanted to see you, Peter!”

“But what can I—”

“I wanted to thank you for the favor you did me. You had to save the world from such a nasty, unpleasant woman, didn’t you?”

She sat beside him, half facing him. She giggled. “I should be on the other side of you, darling. Then the scar wouldn’t show so much.”

Peter had never felt so terrible in his life. He didn’t know what to say.

She leaned her cheek against his shoulder and smiled up at him. The dark eyes were full of hate, and as dead as two lumps of coal. But she smiled. The scar was lurid and the closeness of it made his stomach turn over.

“Remember how you told me you loved me, Peter?” she asked softly. “You still love me, don’t you, Peter? Take me in those strong arms of yours. You can draw the shades and the scar won’t show.”

“You’ve had your fun,” a new voice said. A male voice. Peter spun around quickly and saw a man leaning against the door frame. He must have been standing in the bedroom listening to the conversation.

He was anything but impressive — a smallish man with an oval gray face, sparse brown hair, faded blue eyes, a nose like a damp cruet. His voice was thin and tired. The brightest spot of color in his face was an oversized underlip which sagged away from small pointed teeth. The lip was purplish red, mottled and swollen. He wore an oxford gray suit which looked much too thick and warm for the day, but he didn’t appear to be sweating. His skin looked dry and dusty.

He licked a good third of a cigarette and put it carefully in the middle of his mouth. He lit it and left it there. It flapped as he said, “You’ve had your fun, Lynda. Let’s get down to business.”

Lynda crossed the room and sat on a chair facing Peter.

“Who are you?” Peter asked.

“Call me Miss Stanley’s manager, Hume.”

“What kind of business have you got with me?” Peter demanded.

The man began to count on tiny white fingers. “One is the house on South Walker Street. Number 809. When your father died two years ago, he left it to you. It’ll bring fifteen thousand cash money on the open market, more if we had time to play around. Two is the farm on the Mill Road. Two hundred and forty acres. Twenty-five thousand quick money. Three is the big four-hundred-acre place ten miles north of town. The one your grandpappy started. It’s worth forty thousand in a quick sale if its worth a dime. Four is a small mortgage on your office furniture and fixtures. Your credit is good. Throw in your car and you can get a thousand.

“Five is your prospective father-in-law. He has large bills tucked away. He’ll make a loan of five thousand without any questions. Give him a mysterious line about a wonderful opportunity you can’t discuss yet. The whole amount comes to the grand total of eighty-six thousand bucks. We’ll give you exactly one week to get it all together, and we want it in cash. Small used bills, nothing bigger than a fifty. You may have to drive up to Des Moines to secure some of it.”

Peter sat very still. He looked at his knuckles. He fingered the smooth place on his finger where the sapphire ring had worn the hair from it.

He said, “And why should I pay you eighty-six thousand dollars?”

“Compensation for Lynda’s injuries. Time spent in the can. For shooting off at the month.”

“I won’t pay you a dime,” Peter said.

The man laughed. “Look, brother. You don’t know what a break you’re getting. Lynda over there is real sore at you. You know what she wanted to do? She wanted me to hire some punk to come down here and fill you with hot lead. She wanted me to spend good syndicate money to maybe have you snatched and have you taken apart slow with a dull knife. But I don’t go for that kind of thing. I play it fair and square. We get the eighty-six thousand and we leave you alone.”

Peter shook his head. This couldn’t be happening in the clean little Iowa city of Sayreton, population 14,000. He said, “You’re wasting your time. I don’t scare easily.”

The man laughed again and said, “You know, she even asked me if we could cross you up and take the dough and then spray a little acid across the face of that pale babe of yours. But I told her, I said, ‘Lynda, when Archy Krakow makes a bargain with a guy, he don’t cross him up before it’s over.’ You got to understand, guy, that Lynda is real mad at you.

“Now you take the syndicate. Hell, they’re not mad. We spent good money getting Lynda planted in that overseas slot so she could handle shipments for us. You ratting on her was just one of the breaks of the game. We don’t hold a grudge. But Lynda’s different. She takes it personal.”

Peter looked over at Lynda and then looked quickly away. An avid desire for his death was plain in her eyes. But it was the thought of what might happen to Annaly that really got him.

“Suppose I don’t want to pay,” Peter said.

“Guy, I hope you’re just asking out of curiosity,” Krakow said. “Just as a teaser, I might have Lynda go to your house, tear her dress and scratch herself up a little and then phone the cops. This is a small town, Pete. People don’t go for that sort of stuff.”

“This is extortion. There are laws against it.”

Krakow licked another cigarette. “Call the cops, guy. Lynda is an old overseas pal of yours. No harm in looking you up, is there? You just want to give her a little present, guy. Eighty-six thousand bucks. Let her pick out her own present.”

“It’s only money,” Lynda said hoarsely. “It’s not enough. I hope he doesn’t pay. I hope he tries to get wise.”

“Shut up,” Krakow said gently.

Lynda stood up and her mouth was a thin, tight line. She walked over to Peter, looked down at him and said, “I told myself every night for nearly three years, Peter, that one day I’d watch you roll on the floor and scream. I might still do that, you know. I might do something worse.”

She went into the bedroom, pushing by Krakow, slamming the door behind her.

Krakow smiled sleepily. “You got her real mad, guy. And she was a snowbird once before the syndicate had her cured.” He tapped his forehead. “Gotta watch those snowbirds. They get the cure, but they aren’t always okay up here. Get me?”

Peter stared at his clenched fists.

Krakow said, “Don’t take it so hard, guy. It’s only money. I’ll keep her from marking up your bride. But don’t go to the cops, or I’ll turn her loose. She doesn’t give a damn if she burns for murder. She’s pretty sore about losing her looks. You know how woman are.”

Peter rose. “I’ll have to think about it.”

Krakow sighed. “You got no thinking to do, guy. You got to spend your time raising money. Run along, now. We’ll be in touch. You want to get hold of me, I’m in 413, right across the hall.”

Peter walked numbly out into the corridor. The door slammed behind him. He went down in the elevator and walked out and got behind the wheel of his car. If they had not known everything about him, he would have had more confidence. He knew the valuations Krakow had placed on his property were accurate to the last dollar.

He sat stupidly behind the wheel of the car, his sweating hands on the steering wheel. The whole scene made him think of tense movies he had seen. Murder and death. Then you walk out of the darkness of the movie and there you are in the bright afternoon sunshine, blinking at the everyday street scenes, grinning a little because the movie had somehow made you think that you were going to walk out into a damp and foggy night where a dark figure waited for you in an alcove.

But this was three-forty in the afternoon in Sayreton and what went on up in Room 414 wasn’t a movie. He thought of Annaly and shivered.

He put the key in the ignition, started the motor and drove out into traffic without looking. Tires screamed on the asphalt and- somebody yelled at him. He shook his head to clear it and tried to concentrate on his driving.

Minutes later he put the car in the lot, rode up in the elevator and walked into his office. Robina stopped typing and looked up at him. She stared at him for a moment, then pushed her chair back and hurried to him.

“Peter!” she said. “You’re ill!”

He smiled feebly and shook his head. “I’m not sick. Just — upset.”

He went on into his own office, leaving the door open. She came in and closed the door. She had a paper cup and a pint bottle.

She poured a stiff jolt and handed it to him. His hand shook as he lifted it to his lips. The liquor had a wet cardboard Taste from the paper cup. It burned his throat.

She sat beside the desk and looked anxiously at him. “What happened?”

“She had a friend with her. They want a little money. She was in prison for two and a half years. She was hurt. Bad scar.”

“I didn’t like the way you said ‘a little money’.”

“All I can borrow, plus all I have.”

“Shall I get Chief Daniels on the phone?” She reached for the phone on his desk.

He caught her wrist. “No!”

“Why not?” she asked, puzzled.

“Robby, she’s mad. Absolutely insane. Some syndicate or other put her in that overseas spot to handle shipments to this country. Right now they’re using her madness to get money out of me.

“But she isn’t interested in money. She wants me dead. If I don’t play ball, they’ll just turn her loose on me. She’s of no use to them at anything else in her current condition. It’s as though you were in a yard and a man had a vicious dog on a chain, and he told you to throw him your purse or the dog might get away from him. What would you do?”

Robina leaned back in the chair and bit her lips. “How about getting police protection and telling them to go to hell?”

In a low voice Peter said, “They know about Annaly. They said something about acid. She’d like to throw acid on Annaly. She hates every woman that isn’t scarred like she is.” He shook his head hopelessly. “You didn’t see her, Robby. You didn’t see the way her eyes look. Bead. Like the coal on top of a furnace fire after it’s been banked. There’s fire underneath, but you can’t see it. Yet you know it can blaze up!”

“Hey,” she said. “Take it easy!”

He cupped his palms over his eyes, his short fingernails digging deeply into his hairline.

“Peter, you must have turned her in to federal officers.”

He nodded.

“Then maybe they can give you protection.”

For a moment he felt a surge of hope. Then it faded. “What have they got on her to warrant picking her up? I couldn’t take a chance. In ten minutes of freedom she could ruin Annaly’s life. I’ll have to pay.”

Robina set her jaw. “I’d fight! I wouldn’t let them get away with it.”

“I made a mistake and I’ve got to pay for it.”

“Nuts! This baby was a grown-up girl. She was having her fun. Don’t go all soft and sorry on me, my lad.”

“I’ve got to pay them,” he said.

He took out his cigarettes. She took one and he lit hers and his own. His hand was a bit steadier.

She slouched so that her rusty hair was against the top edge of the back of the chair. She looked up at the plaster ceiling while she slitted her eyes and blew a fat, slow smoke ring.

After a moment she said, “Peter, why don’t you tell Annaly the whole situation? Tell her what danger she’s in. Send her away. Send her up to Des Moines and have her register under some other name. Or drive her up yourself. Daniels will give you a permit to carry a gun. Come on back here and tell them all to go to hell.”

He thought it over. It seemed all right except for one detail. There was no point in explaining that detail to Robina. He sighed. “I’ll try it, Robby.”

She stood up and grinned at him. “Now you’re my boy. Run along and I’ll brush off the clients that are swarming in the outer office, I hope.”