Private Dick

The City sweated like a fat man on a treadmill. It had been sultry hell for the last three weeks, and the Citizens went home after work to their peeling-wallpaper home sweet homes, got as close to naked as their shame allowed and slouched next to their refrigerators, the electric drone of fans a waste of wattage. Nightfall made no difference; the pillow had no cool side after a while, and if you were lucky enough to sleep you dreamed of a dry heat.

People go a little crazy in this kind of steambath season. Husbands want wives to shut the hell up, because that's humid air coming outta her wordhole, and dammit I work hard all day, and I swear to God you just don't listen...

And wives−or teenage daughters−who've had enough decide to pack up and leave. Or maybe they're too stifled by the heat, brains too full of steam, to decide anything, and just pick up a pistol and make some changes around this place.

That's generally where I come in. Not the part with the pistols−given a choice I leave that to the cops−but the people who've had enough, the leaving, the disappearing; if my phone rings it's generally somebody wondering where. And sometimes they don't physically disappear, but they're sure as Hell partly gone even if they're there, and my client wants to know with whom. They're usually not happy to find out.

See, I'm a private investigator. Ten p.m., a Thursday, I was still in my office. It's marginally cooler than my apartment. I sat alone with a bottle and a pack of Luckys, drinking rye neat and figuring out which bills not to pay while I cleaned my revolver. Both windows were up, for all the good it did. The blinds were inert; no breeze, even a warm one, off the harbor for weeks. The neon sign outside the window behind me, loudly advising everyone to EAT, whined like a locust with each flash, and it hadn't failed to flash, all night long, in the six years I'd had this office space.

I'd called it a day, shooed my secretary Maggie home and saw no need to keep up appearances; I was stripped down to trousers, undershirt, shoulder holster, and a very worn pair of shoes.

I heard a knock at the outer office door. A client? Now? I'd finished cleaning my roscoe. I set it down on the desk, put my fedora on and opened my office door to investigate. That's what I do.

The lights were off in the outer office, but on in the corridor outside. Silhouetted through the frosted glass of the hallway door--with my name in gold letters, no less−was a very curvy shadow. Lanky. I unlatched the door and opened up.

"You're the private investigator?" A voice like bourbon and honey, in a smudged glass. An eyebrow with a skeptical arch. Big grey eyes, heavy-lidded, drowsy. Button nose, lips built to pout, diamonds on her earlobes, dressed to the nines—hell, the tens—and a body that would make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window.

Classy dame. I took my cigarette out of my mouth to speak to her. "Do come in," I said, and pulled my suspenders back up into place. "Pardon my informality. It is after hours."

"Yes, I know. That is, I apologize for the lateness of the hour. And never mind about your appearance. The shirt is adequate. It suits you. Very Stanley Kowalski."

"Don't know him. Do I understand you require my services, Miss...?"

"Faversham." she said. "Gloria Faversham."

She was lying. One too many flutters of those thick eyelashes maybe, or a skewed dimple. I don't know, but something was a tell. Well, I didn't mind listening to lies for a while. Not from that mouth.

"Step into my office, Miss Faversham. Please." I gestured, palm up, to my door.

"Thank you," she purred, and her high heels clicked across my floor as she preceded me into the office. I took in the ankles and calves that moved those stiletto heels along and I whistled, strictly to myself. The dark seams of her silk stockings disappeared mid-calf into a tight tweed skirt with an 9-inch slit up the back, and I tried to trace the path of those long gams under the wool. Not easy; I was distracted by the hypnotic figure-8s her backside made, with a little jiggle at the end of each swing. A snug little matching jacket hugged where her hips sloped up to a narrow waist, then the flare of her ribs, all of it topped by a mink stole and a little pillbox hat. In this weather?

Then I noticed—I'm supposed to notice things—she didn't sweat. Not a drop, not a sheen, not even a glow. She was cool, all right, but was she a customer?

I said "Would you care to sit down?" as I yanked an ashtray off the client chair, but she didn't. Care to sit down. So I did, behind my desk. I lit another cigarette as she clicked about my office, first lowering the blinds, then inspecting whatever was hung on my wall. I never look at it myself. Maybe she was looking for a framed Detective's License, or pictures of the mayor shaking my mitt as we grinned at the photogs. She didn't find either one, so she gave it up and snaked the stole off from around her shoulders. She hooked it onto my hatrack and then sat. She unpinned her hat, took it off and perched it on a stack of unpaid bills.

"Oh, I beg your pardon," I said, "Would you care for a cigarette?" and I offered the crumpled pack.

"Thank you, no, I have my own," she said, and unclasped her pearl-encrusted purse to fish out a silver cigarette case. I snatched up the desk lighter, snapped it alight and held it out for her. She took my wrist in her hand and leaned over my desk, cigarette between those lips, for a light.

Her eyes were closed against the heat of the flame, and really, I had no place else to look but down the neckline of her silk blouse. She'd made a concession to the humidity and unbuttoned the top three buttons. The brazen orange flashing of the EAT sign lit up the deep divide of her full breasts, once, twice, and lit the inside surface of the underside of her brassiere. It was pink. I told you I notice things.

She took a drag on the cigarette and opened her eyes. I had shifted my gaze in time, I think, but she still looked at me like a museum exhibit. "How may I help you, Miss, uh, Faversham?"

"Is that rye?" she said, not really a question. I poured three fingers into a coffee cup and slid it across the desk.

She launched into whatever line of bunk she'd cooked up. It doesn't matter what hooey she was spouting, it won't move the plot along, but I listened. Just listened. No I sees, no Uh-huhs, no Go ons. I just watched her eyes.

And her lips. I thought about kissing them. I thought about taking her face in hand and kissing that mouth for a long, long time. I thought about sliding my meathooks down past her ample cleavage and around to her pert bottom and lifting her up and in. I thought about how she'd look wearing just the mink stole and a garter belt. I thought about how it was a good thing she couldn't see, through my desk, little Roscoe stiffening like a day-old corpse.

And then I noticed something, again. A bead of sweat at her temple. Maybe she wasn't used to lying, or maybe she was unnerved by my steely gaze. Neither possibility seemed likely. And after all, it wasn't getting any cooler. In fact, the humidity felt like an uninvited houseguest.

"...and that's why I sought you out," she was saying."Will you take the job?"Again, not really a question. I looked thoughtful at her. She uncrossed her legs, stood, and began inspecting the room again. She went to the far window, the one without a neon sign, parted two slats of the blind and tried to look out, but it was too dark outside. The lights in the room reflected in the wobbly glass only showed her her own eyes between the slats.

I tilted my chair back and explained my rates; gave her the usual disclaimer. While I talked she unbelted her suit-jacket, pulled a handkerchief from a pocket inside, dabbed at her temple, then at the hollow at the base of her throat. She took the jacket off and draped it over the back of her chair. She drained the last of the mug of rye and set it down on my desk, then set herself down next to it, perched on the desk's edge. I could smell her perfume. Expensive. Made me think expensive thoughts.

"That all sounds quite satisfact'ry," she said, then stubbed out her cigarette and looked at me without saying any more. Just looked at me.

The blinds rattled. A hot breeze blew through the room; stirred her hair. It all settled back into place.

I refilled her drink. I noticed her lipstick burnt onto the cup's rim as I poured, and I noticed that the hair on my arm and the back of my hand was...not standing, exactly, but...electric. My pistol sat next to the phone and smelled of cordite, but through that I could whiff ozone. She reached down for the cup. The air was still oppressive, but somehow empty, waiting, waiting for something to rush in, crowd in, like a saloon on payday at quitting time.

She brought the cup to her lips. Another hot breeze, stiffer this time, lifted the blinds and riffled through my paperwork. Her lips parted as I heard distant thunder. She sipped the drink and brought the cup away; a drop rolled down her lip and she caught it, quick, with her tongue.

All the while her eyes held mine. She brought the handkerchief up to her collar bone, dabbed at a bead of perspiration, but it escaped and ran down into her cleavage. She followed it down with the handkerchief. The fourth button of her blouse came undone. I just happened to notice.

All at once the windows turned electric white and the room lit up in stuttering flashes, the slats of the blinds casting sharp horizontal shadows: on the walls, across her face. Maybe it was a trick of the lightning, but I saw something in her eyes. I'm pretty sure it was in mine too. Her tongue ran along her blood-red lower lip again. Thunder followed the flashes, and made the windows thrum. I could hear the distant dry-leaf crackle of oncoming rain.

The next staccato lightning bursts turned the room into an old-time nickelodeon peepshow, in high-contrast black & white: my arm sweeping across the desk, the flying phone, the fluttering papers a jerky, stop-motion cartoon. Another flash, blinding, lit up my arm shooting behind her, the other hand pulling aside the front of her blouse and pawing her breast. She exhaled sharply and her mouth sought mine. I planted a sweaty kiss on her full, soft lips as she wrapped her arms around my neck. I lowered her down across the desk and planted my knee between her thighs.

Now it was like a fever-dream, our movements beyond control, panting and angry; thunder like surf, lightning like gunfire, boom and flash ever closer together as we tore at each others' clothes, animals in the heat. Her hand worked between my legs; I tugged her dress up over her waist and unhooked her garter belt, furious, to clutch at her panties. She dug her nails into the back of my head and pulled me down to her heaving cleavage. I found the skirt's zipper at her hip and pulled it down; unhooked her bra; peeled her. She lay back on the desk, knees spread, her back on the ink-blotter, her head off the desk's edge. I stood then, eyeing her naked body up and down as I undid my trousers and let them drop. She lifted her head and eyed me back. Thunder and lightning, loud and dazzling, pounded and roared again and again, hard and fast.

I grabbed her thighs and clasped them to my hips. I'd left her silk stockings on, and I liked how it felt. She arched her back and moved herself toward me. I ran my hands down her sweat-slick body, from throat to breasts and over her taut stomach down to her coiffed muff. I fingered her, slipping a calloused trigger-finger in and out of her moist sex.

I was harder than Chinese algebra. She looked at me, wolfish, under thick lashes of eyes half-closed, and breathed, "Mmm, private dick." I took a buttock in each hand, pulled her to me, poised the business end of my rod at the cleft, then rammed it home.

The thunder came right on top of the lightning this time, and the first drops of rain splatted onto the window, sizzling. The splats came faster and faster until it was a crazy million-man tap-dance, and the sheets of water running down the windows, between the black horizontal slashes of the blinds, cast flashing-neon shadows onto the walls like melting glass.

I slammed my prick into her with each flash of the neon sign, EAT EAT EAT, and she was grunting and chanting Fuck me Fuck Me FUCK ME, more and more insistent, stiletto heels pointing at the ceiling and her big tits recoiling at each thrust. These high-class snooty imperturbable dames can be wildcats once you get `em going. This one was a screamer.

Everything turned bright white gold for a split second as lightning ripped through and exploded that fucking neon sign, sending showers of sparks and orange shards to the rain-slicked street below.

I flipped her over and took her like a dog. She had less contact with the desk now, just palms and kneecaps, and she clutched at the edges of the desk to push herself back onto me. I watched my purple shaft disappear over and over, like a railbird's paycheck, into her puffy pink mound, and listened to her Oh Gods. She cooed like a dove, grunted like a pig and squealed like a stool-pigeon, and at last came screaming my name.

Something popped. All at once a flat crack and a clatter of crockery. I thought I'd broken something.

It wasn't me. My desk-sweeping move must've missed my gun. In her blind groping she'd grabbed it and pulled the trigger. It went off and threw a slug into my office bathroom, shattering the toilet tank.

I gotta admit, I was surprised. I was about to blow my wad into her when it happened, and she jumped at the sound and it pulled her off my bone. She felt bad about ruining my washroom facilities. I told her I'd put it on her bill.

She was on her knees sucking my cock in partial compensation when the coppers arrived. I was again about to spew when I heard the beefy fist pounding on my office door. I put a finger to my lips, but she was in no position to talk. When a beefy voice yelled "Open up! Police!" her eyes went wide. Don't want to talk to the law, Miss Faversham? I thought to myself as I grabbed both sides of her face and pumped my load in her mouth. Then I lit a cigarette while the pounding continued. I put my pants on and strolled to the outer office to open the door.

It was Lt. Kowalski from Homicide. He had Sgt. O'Malley with him, and they stood in the hallway like piled cordwood. Their rain slickers dripped on the ugly hall rug.

"Whassamatta here, gumshoe?" Kowalski barked. "The accountant next door says he heard shots. What gives?"

I exhaled smoke in the general direction of his face. "Say, flatfoot, do you Homocide ghouls come out every time some Nervous Nelly hears thunder and gets his knickers in a bunch?"

"Don't crack wise, peeper, this is a friendly visit. We just happened to be nearby when the call went out. Mind if we come in?"

"Actually, Kowalski, I do," I said, and thumped a hand up on the jamb to stop O'Malley's move through the doorway. "Sorry. I'm sorta busy right now, so if you gentlemen'll excuse me--"

"What about the gunfire?"

"Gunfire? I didn't hear anything."

"The guy next door said--"

"Everything's fine here, Kowalski. I appreciate the visit, though. Come by for a drink some time. Some other time."

"Who's the client?" O'Malley chimed in. "Some dame, knowing you."

"Don't you boys have a greengrocer somewhere to shake down? What the hell is this? You got a beef, take me downtown. If not, beat it."

"Take it easy, now--"

"To hell with that! I don't like this at all. You apes got no business here; I do. Scram!"

"Awright, awright, we're goin'. Don't get antsy," said Kowalski, and they turned to go, but turned back. "Oh, by the way... Rabinowitz? That pawnbroker that went missing you asked us for the dope on?"

"Yeah?"

"He turned up."

"Where?"

"The river. Tied to a chunk of asphalt. Let's go, O'Malley."

I watched them get in the elevator and heard the cage hum and rattle down the shaft, then went back inside. I picked up the phone on Maggie's desk and made a call. Then I went through into my office.

The mouth of the bottle clinkety-clinked against the rim of the cup as she poured herself another snort. She was rattled. She'd put her skirt and bra back on, and the hat, but hadn't yet buttoned the blouse. When she saw me she put the cup down and ran to my arms. She nuzzled my neck and clutched at my back. Coyly, she put her face up to be kissed and slid a hand toward my groin. "Protect me," she murmured, and pressed her tits against my chest.

I caught her hands.

"I won't be a sap for you, sweetheart. You killed Rabinowitz. Maybe a ruckus over some shiny dingus you hocked. You wanted me to put my nose into it and you'd find some way to dirty it up. Get the bulls on my tail to throw them off yours...your pretty little tail. Or some other chump, some tough mug who'd send me over. It doesn't matter now because you're taking the fall. But I want to know: Why'd you knock the old man off?"

"I don't know what you're--"

"There's no time for that now! I've already called downtown, and Kowalski and his midget will be back here in eleven minutes, so try telling the truth for a change."

She looked wounded. I slapped her. "TALK!"

"He's my father!" she blurted, her hand to her cheek. "The son of a bitch was my father! He-- he did--" She started to sob.

Hell... Once in a great while in this business you hear a story that makes you forget what louses people are. This wasn't one of those times. Rabinowitz, it seems, wasn't a model daddy. She told me about a surprise on the night of her thirteenth birthday. She told me about her mother packing her up one night and, both of them crying, sneaking her out, away. She told me about when he found them, and how Mama never left the hospital.

I boasted earlier—you remember—about how I could spot a liar every time. This wasn't one of those times. As she wrapped up her history, I stared out the window. The rain was still sliding in sheets down the glass. I put my hand on the pane. It had cooled some.

I swiveled to find myself staring down the barrel of my own revolver. Barrels always look so much bigger from this perspective. Funny how they sharpen your focus. My focus was sharp enough to cut glass.

"Now, now, angel, that won't do," I said. "Give it back."

"You're all bastards!" she snarled. She was done sobbing. "Every damned one of you."

"So what are you going to do, Gloria? Shoot us all, one by one, starting with the guy who can help you?"

"Shut up! SHUT UP!" The gun made ominous clicks—the safety was off and it was cocked. I dragged my focus off the barrel and into her eyes. They weren't grey. They were green. Like an old bruise.

I just listened. Talking at her would only make it worse. Just listened. No I sees, no Uh-huhs, no Go ons. I just watched her eyes. For what felt like a week.

And she watched mine. Maybe she saw something inside them that she understood. Anyway, the hard glint in her eyes, like rain down a window, slid away. The gun barrel wavered. I took it away from her as her hand went limp on the grip. She leaned her cheek on my chest and put her arms around me. I let her tears soak my shirt front. Then she turned her face up to mine. Her lower lip trembled.

I checked my watch. We only had enough time for her to button her blouse before the boys returned.

Well, Kowalski and O'Malley weren't happy about having to come back, and said so, but I poured them drinks and let them look around this time, and introduced them to my new operative, Miss Faversham. They managed to keep from openly drooling. We fed them a pretty good line; in a good cause she had a talent for creative mendacity. Eventually the boys went away, besotted but grousing.