Strip Tease (24 page)

“OK,” said Orly. “Here’s what you do. Go see those fucking Lings. Find out how much they want for the girl’s python.”

“Bubba is the name.”

“Whatever. Offer five hundred.”

Shad said the Lings likely would tell him to fuck off and die. “They hate your guts,” he told Orly.

“No, this is business. Now hurry it up.”

Shad put the book by Camus behind the bar, under the popcorn platters. Then he drove up to the Flesh Farm, where the Ling brothers kept him waiting an hour—a nervy move. Shad passed the time drinking Virgin Marys and surveying the dance talent in case Orly demanded a scouting report. Shad’s ominous bald presence quickly thinned the audience and further irritated the Lings. Shad finally got his meeting, but the brothers reacted to the python proposition more biliously than anticipated.

He returned to find the Tickled Pink in an uproar. Erin seemed to be in the thick of it. Paramedics were fitting a neck brace on a pale and dazed young man. The victim was encircled by a dozen equally wan companions with corn kernels stuck in their hair. From a distance it looked as if they’d been bombed by sparrows. The men shouted high-pitched questions at the paramedics, over the jackhammer music. As a protective measure, Urbana Sprawl had stationed her insurmountable breasts between Erin and Orly, who was red-faced and raving.

“Damn,” said Shad, and waded into the chaos.

Later, in the office, Orly blustered about liability and lawsuits and his liquor license.

“You aren’t listening,” Erin said. “The man touched me.”

Urbana Sprawl, showered and fully dressed, spoke out in support of her friend: “I saw the whole thing, Mr. Orly. He got what he deserved.”

Orly snorted. “A sprained neck. Is that what he deserved? A trip to the hospital, for copping a feel!”

“He touched me,” Erin said, “between my legs.”

“Aw, he was drunk.”

Erin turned to Urbana. “This is why I hate table dances.”

Orly said, “You could’ve crippled the guy, kickin’ him in the head like that.”

“And what’s she supposed to do?” Urbana said. “Give him a nice friendly finger fuck?”

Orly flinched, turning his head. “Christ, that’s enough. No more a that talk.”

“So it’s OK for Shad to beat a customer’s ass, but not us. Is that the deal?”

“I said, that’s enough.”

“Urbana’s right,” Erin said. “It’s not fair.”

“Screw fair,” said Orly, puffing his cheeks. “Shad’s job is keeping the peace. Your job is to dance. That’s the bottom line.”

Standing by the office door, Shad reluctantly abandoned his silence. “I got sent up the street,” he said. “Otherwise it wouldn’t have happened.”

Orly gave a corrosive laugh. “Wonderful. Now it’s all my fault. Well, fuck the whole bunch a you.”

Urbana was livid. She leaned her double-wide bosom across his desk and shook a Day-Glo fingernail in his face. “Nobody touches me ‘less I wanna be touched, especially down there. I don’t care who it is or how shitfaced they are or how much money they got, I won’t stand for it. That little shit’s lucky to get out with a sprained neck, because if it was me, I’d rip his damn balls off with my bare hands, just like this—”

Orly gaped as Urbana simulated her technique, snatching imaginary testicles off an imaginary oaf.

“—and don’t think I can’t!”

Then she was gone. Nobody moved for several moments.

Orly said: “That girl gives big tits a bad name.”

Erin stood up. “Well, I’m through for the night.”

“Now wait a second—”

“No. I’m going to visit my daughter.”

After Erin left, Shad came to her defense. He told Orly that Erin had many good reasons to be jumpy—the custody case, the burglary of the apartment, and now a congressman in hot pursuit. “It’s a bad time for her right now. That’s how come she blew up tonight.”

Orly wiped his neck with a soiled handkerchief. “You and me are the only ones in this joint that don’t get PMS, and sometimes I’m not too sure about you.”

“It’s the music,” Shad said. “It makes my head hurt.”

“Talk to Kevin.”

“Kevin says talk to you.”

Orly said, “I don’t know rap from reggae. You know my secret? I don’t even listen.” He twisted an invisible knob at his right earlobe. “Just turn it off. I don’t hear a damn thing.” He asked how it went with the Lings.

“Lousy,” Shad said.

“They don’t have the girl’s snake?”

“Yeah, they got it. They just won’t ransom it.”

Orly raised his palms. “Why the fuck not? Business is business.”

“Mainly because they hate your guts.”

“Because of me hiring Lorelei?”

“Because of everything,” Shad replied.

“So the answer is no. It took you two damn hours to get a simple N-O from those jerkoff Japs. Meanwhile I got a crazed stripper doing a Chuck Norris routine on my customers—”

“The answer wasn’t only no,” Shad said. “It was this, too.” He placed an oblong package on Orly’s desk. “The Ling brothers wanted you to have it.”

Orly eyed the crude parcel, wrapped in Flesh Farm cocktail napkins and bound with masking tape. “What the hell is it?” he asked Shad.

“About twelve inches of dead Bubba.”

Orly yelped and pushed away from the desk, away from the unopened package. “Did I tell you they were animals! Did I! Jesus, what else did they say, those goddamn Lings?”

“They said there’s plenty more where that came from.”

The attractive young couple spread out towels from their suite at the Breakers Hotel, and lay side by side in the bleached sand. They took turns smearing number 29 sunblock all over each other: Perry spelled out “I Luv You!!!” on his wife’s tummy. Willa drew an oily heart on the small of her husband’s prodigiously freckled back.

A strong breeze put a salty tang in the air, and made the waves bite raggedly against the shore. The Crispins planned a brief swim later, when they were sweaty. They wore matching black Ray-Bans and pink terrycloth tennis visors. They smiled and whispered and touched each other frequently, as is the habit of newlyweds. Willa and Perry were from large, wealthy families in Connecticut, so the wedding had been suitably extravagant. Palm Beach was the first leg of a four-week honeymoon that would take them to Freeport, St. Bart’s and finally Cozumel. The sun was high and bright, and the Crispins glistened on their towels. They were unabashedly romantic, totally relaxed and not at all apprehensive about their future together. Substantial trust funds awaited both of them.

By noon, Willa’s adorable nose had turned pink. Perry noted it with alarm; his father was a limited partner in four dermatology clinics, and skin cancer had been a recurrent topic at family gatherings. From an early age, Perry showed an eagle eye for discolored moles and suspicious lesions. He told his bride that it was time to get out of the U.V. rays.

“I came to get a tan,” she protested.

“Darling, we’ve got four whole weeks.”

As they crossed the beach toward the hotel, the Crispins were followed by a slender blond man in dirty jeans and cowboy boots. Perry and Willa didn’t notice the stranger—they were engrossed in discussing the poor quality of the sunblock ointment, and the possibility of trying zinc oxide instead, at least on their noses.

The man behind them said, “Scuze me, folks.”

Perry and Willa turned. The man wasn’t dressed for Palm Beach. His blue eyes were bloodshot and jumpy. His hair was matted on one side, as if slept on.

“You got a car?” he said.

Willa looked frightened. Perry sized up the stranger and took a small step forward. The man displayed a rusty steak knife and said, “Don’t make me ask twice.”

The Crispins led Darrell Grant to their rental car, a candy-apple Thunderbird. Darrell Grant said he approved. He took the keys from Perry and ordered the couple to hop in the backseat.

“Why?” Willa asked.

“Till we get across the bridge,” Darrell said.

The Intracoastal Waterway separated the town of Palm Beach from West Palm Beach. Two more disparate worlds would be hard to find; West Palm was for normal humans, Palm Beach for the eccentric rich. The cops on the island were notorious rousters of unwanted visitors—blacks, Hispanics, and anyone not wearing Polo. If you worked in one of the mansions, fine. Otherwise, get your ass over the bridge. Darrell Grant figured he might need the Crispins to talk him out of a Palm Beach traffic stop.

“You got a purse?” he asked Willa.

The newlyweds squeezed each other’s hands. Perry was relieved to see that Willa had left her two-carat diamond wedding band in the hotel room. He hoped she’d done the same with the traveler’s checks.

“Halloo?” Darrell Grant said.

“Yes, I’ve got my purse.”

“Thatta girl.”

“All I carry is forty dollars.”

Darrell snorted. “How about you, sport?”

“Credit cards is all I’ve got,” Perry said.

“Figures.” Darrell barreled through a red light on Worth Avenue. He liked the way the T-bird handled. “All right, honey, gimme the cash. And your medicines, too.”

Willa looked confounded. Her husband motioned gravely at her purse. She took out two twenties and nervously extended them over the headrest, as if feeding a bear at the zoo.

“I don’t have any pills,” she told Darrell Grant. “Except my birth control.”

“That’ll do fine.” He grabbed the money with his steering hand. The other hand held the steak knife, running the stained blade through the stubble on his jawline.

From the backseat, Willa said: “I’m sorry but you can’t take my pills.”

“Oh yeah?” Darrell was heartily amused.

“You’ll get sick,” said Willa. “They’re not made for men.”

“Sick?”

“They’re made of hormones!”

“No shit,” Darrell Grant said. “So, like, I might grow knockers. Is that what you mean? Or maybe even a love muffin.”

“No, I didn’t—”

“Be a good girl and hand over the fucking pills.” Darrell’s arm came down and speared the rusty knife into the white upholstery. He ripped a long sibilant gash in the stiff vinyl.

Perry Crispin said: “Willa, give the man what he wants.”

“No.”

“My God,” said her husband. “Don’t be foolish.”

“Fine, Perry. And what’re we supposed to do for the next four weeks—hold hands?” Willa protected the purse with both arms. “Our pharmacy is in Westport, remember?”

Perry Crispin said: “I’m not believing this.”

“What—you want me to get pregnant?”

In the front seat, Darrell Grant was humming the theme from The Sound of Music, which was his sister Rita’s favorite movie of all time. Or maybe that was Mary Poppins, he always got the two mixed up. “Which is the one with Dick Van Dyke?” he asked. “Did I get it right?”

The Crispins had no clue what he was talking about. A dope fiend, jabbering. Willa leaned forward to plead her case. “Please, don’t take the birth-control pills. It’s our honeymoon.”

Ahead was one of the drawbridges leading to West Palm. Finally, thought Darrell, I can dump these brainless puppies. He goosed the accelerator.

“My sister’s a nurse,” Willa was saying. “These pills are very strong. They will make you sick.”

Ahead, the crossing gates swung down and a tinny bell rang. The bridge began to rise. Darrell Grant cursed vehemently and hit the brakes.

Perry Crispin’s feeble voice: “It’s just a sailboat going through. It shouldn’t take long.”

Darrell Grant whirled in the driver’s seat. He thrust a calloused palm at Willa and said: “The pills.”

She shook her head adamantly. Her husband was dumbstruck.

Darrell said, “Listen, you silly cunt. I ain’t gonna eat the damn things, I’m gonna sell ‘em. You understand? I’m gonna go across this bridge and scam me some stoners who don’t know birth control from LSD. Get it?”

Tears appeared in Willa’s eyes. She blinked downheartedly at her husband. “Perry, he called me a cunt.”

Perry Crispin felt horrible. He felt he should attack the crazed dope fiend in defense of his wife’s honor. On the other hand, he was crippled with terror. He expected his bladder to fail at any second.

“Don’t you worry,” he told Willa. “We’ll get more pills.”

“How? My prescription is in Westport.” Despair fogged her voice.

“FedEx, darling. Now do as the man says.”

The drawbridge began to go down, one side at a time. Darrell Grant announced that he would count to five, then hack out Willa’s heart and make Perry eat it on a hoagie for lunch. Willa immediately opened the purse and gave the madman her pills. Darrell drove across the bridge and parked at a Mini-Mart. He took Perry Crispin’s Ray-Bans and also the hot pink tennis visor. Then he told the couple to get their sorry butts out of the car.

The pavement scorched the soles of the Crispins’ bare feet, and they hopped like palsied flamingos to a triangular patch of shade. Darrell Grant adjusted the side minor of the Thunderbird so he could admire the fit of his new sunglasses. The Crispins watched morosely, waiting for the criminal to drive away. Willa remained very angry. “Thank you very much,” she called out acidly, “for ruining our honeymoon.”

Darrell Grant scowled and revved the engine. “You people ever heard of rubbers? It’s a new thing, sport. Fits right on your dick.”

“Perry won’t use them.” Willa’s tone was reproachful. Perry Crispin turned away.

“Figures,” Darrell said. He waved tootle-oo with the steak knife before speeding off.

It took two hours to find a junkie bent enough to buy birth-control pills and believe they were Belgian Dilaudids. Darrell only got thirty bucks from the scam but, added to Willa Crispin’s forty, it was enough to gas up the T-bird and score some reds. He had a good buzz on by the time he made the interstate, which carried him south in blazing pursuit of his precious little girl and her worthless mother.

The Rojos were in Santo Domingo, so Malcolm Moldowsky was given use of the yacht. Erb Crandall dropped off the congressman at nine sharp, and went directly to a dockside bar to drink alone. He had already delivered the bad news about the lawyer’s safe-deposit box. Moldy had taken the homicide detective’s card delicately, like a butterfly, between two fingers.

“This changes things,” he’d said, turning the card back and forth, as if marveling at a hologram. “I guess it’s time for Plan B.”

Erb Crandall didn’t ask for an explanation. The time had come to forsake party loyalty and begin thinking of one’s own situation, and of covering one’s own ass. Crandall was grateful that Moldy didn’t ask him to stay for the meeting on the yacht.

When David Dilbeck stepped into the master stateroom, the first thing he saw was The Photograph from the Eager Beaver. Moldowsky had tacked it on the wall, over the wet bar.

“A reminder,” he said, pouring Dilbeck a drink.

The congressman’s eyes riveted on Erin’s face. “Isn’t she something,” he said, breathlessly.

Moldy said, “Don’t look at her, David. Look at yourself.”

“It was a bad night.”

“You don’t say.” He shoved a tumbler into Dilbeck’s gut. “Sit down and have a drink.”

The congressman obeyed. “Ginger ale? That’s precious, Malcolm.”

Moldowsky climbed into a canvas director’s chair. He wore rubber-soled deck shoes, pressed white slacks and a navy pullover. It was one of the few times Dilbeck had seen him in casual clothes.

“I want you sober,” Moldy began. “I want you to remember every goddamn word I say. Whatever arrangement you and this girl reach, that’s fine. But you’re to talk to her, David. There are certain things we need to know.”

“Good Lord, she’s not a spy. She’s only a stripper—”

“Bring her here tomorrow night,” Moldowsky said. “It’ll be safe.”

“Safe from what?”

“From blackmailers, David.” Moldy pointed up at the photograph. Again Dilbeck’s gaze settled on Erin, shielding herself from the bottle attack.

“What if she doesn’t like me?” Dilbeck asked.

Moldowsky cracked an ice cube in his molars. “She’ll love you, trust me. Two thousand dollars buys serious love.”

“And what do I get for that?”

“Two hours of dancing.”

“That’s all?”

“It’s a start.”

David Dilbeck sipped at the ginger ale, which tasted flat. “I want sexy music, champagne, candles, the whole nine yards—”

Moldy said it was all arranged. He went through a series of questions that Dilbeck was to ask the nude dancer. Dilbeck said no way, it would spoil the mood.

“Come on,” said Moldowsky. “You’re the slickest sonofa-bitch I ever saw. Go easy. Be cool.”

The congressman was reluctant. “Malcolm, I do not wish to scare her off. This may be my only shot”

Once more his eyes wandered to the grainy photograph on the wall. “Fantastic,” he whispered, to no one.

Moldy shot to his feet and tore the picture down. He charged up to David Dilbeck’s chair and confronted him, nose to chin. “You will do this,” he growled at the congressman. “There are things we need to know. It’s essential, David”—spraying the word essential—”considering what’s happened the last month.”

Moldowsky’s breath smelted like bourbon and peppermint mouthwash. The mixture clashed fiercely with his cologne. Dilbeck turned away and huffed for fresh air. The yacht rocked gently on the wake of a passing speedboat.

“You will do this,” Moldy repeated in the congressman’s ear.

“But I don’t understand—”

Moldowsky whirled away. He snatched his glass of bourbon off the bar and took a slug. He noticed a small rectangular outline in the fabric of his pocket—the homicide detective’s card, taken from the lawyer’s safe-deposit box. Moldy said, “People are trying to harm you, David. We need to be sure she’s not one of them.”

Dilbeck shook his head. “You’re completely paranoid.”

“Humor me.”

“But she’s just a stripper.”

Malcolm Moldowsky grabbed Dilbeck’s shirt. “Fannie Fox,” he said, “was ‘just a stripper.’ Donna Rice was just a model-slash-actress. Elizabeth Ray was just a secretary who couldn’t type. Gennifer Flowers was just a country singer. Don’t you get it? Ask Chuck Robb. Or that horny idiot Hart. Teddy Kennedy, for pity’s sake. They’ll all tell you the same: in politics, stealing is trouble but pussy is lethal.”

Moldy released his grip. Exhausted, he wilted on a bar stool. “Those who ignore history,” he said, “are doomed to get their nuts cut.”