The Man Who Loved Women to Death (22 page)

“Atta girl.”

“Shit, she’s not rabid, is she?”

“Only in defense of the people she cares about.”

A red light stopped me at Forty-sixth Street. The 230 Park Avenue building stood before us, ornate and gilded. In days gone by, it was the New York Central Building, as in the railroad. Now it belonged to the Helmsleys, as in Leona. Looming over it was the Pan Am building, that ghastly upended shoebox which in fact was now the Met Life building, although no one called it that, just as no one called Sixth Avenue the Avenue of the Americas or Phil Rizzuto anything but the Scooter.

“Are you stalking her, Tuttle?”

He didn’t respond. The light turned green. I nosed the Jag through the tunnel that went under 230 Park and then rose up and around Grand Central Station.

“Well, are you?” I persisted.

“I hate that word,” he answered softly. “It has such a negative connotation. I’m watching over her, okay?”

“No, it’s not okay. You’re making her crazy, and she’s in a highly fragile state. Keep it up and she’ll end up in the hospital. And you’ll end up in jail.”

“That’s exactly what you want, isn’t it?” he said, sneering at me.

“Damn it, Tuttle!” I hit the brakes, hard, stopping us cold in the middle of the street. A cab swerved around us, honking. “What I don’t want is
this!”

“What, Doof?” he asked dumbly.

“You and your miserable self-pity. You and your pointless, empty, upper-middle-class, white bullshit.”

“I’m not upper-middle-class.”

“Oh, fuck you, Tuttle.”

He gaped at me in shock. “That … that was beneath you, Doof.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve lowered my personal bar, okay?”

“You used to be a lot wittier.”

“And I used to have a lot more hair and gum tissue and spermatozoons. So what? I used to be a lot of things. We both did.”

He stuck his chin out at me. “I didn’t ask for you to show up in my life again. It was all your idea, not mine. So why don’t you just get lost, huh?”

Why indeed? For the same reason that I couldn’t let him out of my sight until 8
A.M.
Because I had too much riding on him, that’s why. Because if Tuttle Cash’s life was meaningless, then somehow, mine was, too. If he was nothing, then I was nothing. If he was a murderer of innocent women, then, well, I didn’t want to think about what that made me. Later. When there was time to reflect. For now, I couldn’t get lost. That much I knew.

I resumed driving. “Which health club do you belong to, anyway?”

“Manhattan Fitness Center. They’ve got a branch right around the corner from the restaurant.”

“They have one on East Thirty-ninth, too, don’t they?”

“I believe so. Why?”

“I’m thinking about getting back in shape.”

“Doof, you never were in shape.”

“Tuttle, please. Leave me one of the few illusions I have left.”

Ten’s, formerly known as Stringfellows, was squeezed into a soft spot on East Twenty-first Street in between the Oriental rug district and Gramercy Park. There were double doors of smoked glass and lots of shiny chrome out front. Also a doorman in a tux. Cabs were lined up there, waiting for the big tippers to come staggering out after their night on the town. I parked down the block and in we went. There was a cover charge of fifteen dollars each, and they made us check our coats. The girl who took them didn’t seem to notice the extra weight in Tuttle’s. Or maybe she just checked a lot of coats with guns in them. She smiled at Tuttle. She knew Tuttle. Everyone knew Tuttle.

Inside there was more shiny chrome and lots of mirrors and strobe lights and women, women everywhere—women in G-strings, spiked heels and nothing else. Unless you count all the silicone they were wearing. Their breasts were so inflated it was a wonder the poor girls didn’t just lift right up off the rug and float to the ceiling. I’m talking the Goodyear Blimp
Columbia
here. Ten’s was not Times Square by any means. This was Hef the Ancient’s glossy magazine come to life, as upscale and respectable as a place full of nude women and fully clothed men can be. Huge, too. I’m talking a veritable three-ring circus of perfumed flesh and lacquered hair. Seventy-five women at least. Every type imaginable. Tall or short, blonde or brunette, black or Asian. Everything except flabby or flat-chested or old. There was a stage with a DJ, and a stripper was working it to a pounding beat, all slither and lubricious undulation. Disco was still alive here. Or at least Tom Jones was …
Or did Mr. Tom Jones rise up from the dead while I was inside? Because that man is back. And sounding as shitty as ever.…
There were four different bars where eight-dollar beers and assorted light snacks could be had. And then there was the sea of tables, most of them taken. Here, for twenty bucks, lap dancers waved their hooters and their butts in the faces of businessmen in dark suits. Some merely sat and talked with the women, which was fine. You could talk to them. You could look at them. You could do everything but touch them: the ultimate in safe sex. It was all very posh and clean and friendly. And yet it was all very grim and cheerless, too. Maybe it was the stony boredom in the women’s eyes. Or the bouncers wearing tuxes and earplugs who were stationed every six feet, big as houses. Or the surveillance cameras up above, watching, watching.

Lulu took one look around and asked me if she could spend the rest of the evening in the car. I said no. We took a table. We tried to order a drink. We couldn’t find a waitress.

Luz Santana turned out to be tawny and long-limbed and no more than twenty-three. She came with the preferred equipment package—the antigravity tits, fattened collagen lips, big Jersey hair dyed the color of butterscotch. Her lips and nails were bright orange, her G-string and spiked heels hot pink. Personally, I saw no resemblance to Julia Roberts whatsoever.

Luz was not in the least bit happy to see Tuttle. Passed right on by our table, flaring her nostrils at him. Not that this fazed Tuttle in the least.

He just grabbed her by the arm and said, “Join us.”

“Like, ask someone else, okay?” Luz’s voice was somewhat screechy. It was not her best feature.

“Aw, come on, baby,” he pleaded. “I want you to meet my oldest friend in the universe.”

“If he’s anything like you I don’t wanna have nothin’ to do with him, okay? And I
ain’t
your baby.”

Tuttle climbed unsteadily to his feet. “I’ve missed you, Luz,” he said, gazing deeply into her eyes. He could do this better than anyone, even drunk. Especially drunk. “I’ve missed what we had together.”

Luz looked away uneasily. She suddenly seemed extremely young and very vulnerable. “Yeah, well, I didn’t like where it was headed, okay?”

“You make it sound like the whole thing was my idea.”

“Like, the handcuffs weren’t exactly mine, okay?”

Lulu let out a low unhappy moan. Not her kind of conversation.

Tuttle looked hurt now. “What, you’re saying it was no good for you?”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying,” Luz admitted, softening. “Like, I’m standing here talking to you and it’s like my heart is beating so fucking fast. You got skills, honey. You got it going.”

“You’re the one’s got it going.” His eyes were feasting on her plump, golden-brown breasts, thighs, drumsticks. “My God, look at you.”

“No,
Tuttle! Just … no. It’s over, okay?” She started away from him.

He grabbed her by the arm again, harder this time. “No, it’s
not
okay!”

“Let go of me!” she cried, squirming in his grasp.

Instantly, a bouncer appeared.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you not to touch the ladies, sir,” he informed Tuttle politely.

“Oh, really?” Tuttle tightened his grip on Luz’s bare arm. Splotches formed beneath his fingers. “Well, I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to get out of my fucking face.”

The bouncer moved in closer. He wasn’t any taller than Tuttle, but he was a whole lot wider. And calm. Really calm. “We like for everyone to have a good time, sir. But you have to behave yourself. If you’re going to bother the lady, you’re out of here.”

Another bouncer appeared behind him now. Backup.

“Tuttle, why don’t you go get us a couple of drinks at the bar?” I suggested, playing Mr. Peacemaker.

“You get them, Doof. Me and Luz have to talk.”

I tried it again, louder this time. “Go get us some drinks, Tuttle. Or we’re leaving.”

Tuttle scowled at me. He seemed dazed and confused all of a sudden, like he’d just been thrown to the turf by an onrushing linebacker. I found myself wondering just how many tabs of Vitamin V he’d taken. “Oh, okay, Doof,” he said hollowly. “Sure. Whatever.” He released Luz, straightened his tie with exaggerated care and started across the crowded club toward one of the bars, weaving on rubbery legs. The bouncers watched him carefully.

“Thanks, Eddie,” Luz said to the first bouncer.

“Enjoy your evening, sir,” Eddie said to me. Then he and his backup headed off into the crowd.

“May I have a moment of your time, Luz?”

She tossed her head at me, rather like a palomino. “Want me to dance for you?”

“Just talk.”

She glanced longingly over her bare shoulder at the suits stacked four deep at the bar, then doubtfully down at Lulu, who was huddled between my feet. Finally, her eyes fell on the fifty in my hand, and that made her mind up, no problem.

She sat. “Are you like a friend of his?”

“We went to school together.”

“You the one goes with Merilee Nash?”

“Why, yes.”

She nodded. “Sure, he talks about you all the time. Your name’s like Yogi or Bogie or—”

“Close enough,” I said, my eyes getting used to the presence of her naked breasts across the table from me. And you do get used to them. Because you are so surrounded by them. And because it’s all so impersonal. “What does he say about me?”

“That you was a very famous writer.”

“It’s true. I was.”

“No, no,” she said apologetically. “I don’t talk so good sometimes. I wasn’t saying you aren’t one no more. Like, I’m sure you are.”

“I guess you don’t get many publishers in here.”

A waitress appeared now. When a dancer sits they show. Luz ordered a cranberry juice and soda. I ordered a Rolling Rock. At the bar, Tuttle was still in line.

At my feet, Lulu started sneezing furiously from all of the perfume in the air. She’s allergic to any number of them, especially anything musky or Calviny. I would regret this later. Her sinuses would clog up. She would sleep on my head. She would snore. Oh yes, I would regret this. I removed Grandfather’s silver cigarette case from my inside jacket pocket and offered her one of her allergy pills. They are small. They are for her own good. Usually, she will take one without a fight. Not this time. Stubborn? Unless you’ve spent time around a basset hound you don’t know the meaning of the word. I tried Plan B, the one where I pry her jaws apart, chuck the pill down her gullet and massage her throat until she swallows it. Nothing doing. She has an amazingly strong jaw. This called for Plan C—insert pill directly into right or left nostril of large black nose. Wait for her to schnarfle it back into my hand, relaxing her jaw in the process. Shoot pill down throat before she can clamp it tightly shut again.

And everyone thinks she’s the brains of the outfit.

“You okay now, honey?” Luz arched an eyebrow at me.

“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far.”

“How come you got your little dog with you anyway?”

“She likes to party.”

“I never heard of that. That’s so cute.”

“Believe me, it gets old fast.”

Our waitress returned now with our drinks. Luz reached for hers and somehow managed to grip it—her orange fingernails were at least an inch long. She took a sip. At the table next to ours, a hardworking little blonde was earnestly air-humping a middle-aged guy’s knee. She reminded me of a frisky cockapoo my parents had when I was a boy.

“What happened between you and Tuttle, Luz?”

She thought this over, running her tongue around the rim of her glass. “Like, we went out a few times, okay? And he seemed pretty nice and all, if you like older guys. Oh, hey, I’m not trying to insult you or nothing.”

“I know you’re not, Luz. That’s the sad part.”

“Huh?”

“You went out a few times …”

“Only I tol’ him to stop calling me, on account of it got weird, okay? If it was just the handcuffs, that woulda been one thing. Only he wanted to get rough, too.”

“Rough, how?”

She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. “You know, where you tie a stocking around your throat and pull it so tight you almost choke. Makes it like a more intense orgasm.”

“His or yours?”

“Huh?”

“Throat. His or yours?”

“Mine, for damned sure.” She fingered it. It was a lovely throat, creamy and unlined. “You ever know a guy who liked to do punishment to himself?”

“I guess you don’t get many writers in here either.”

The little blonde was done dancing now. She put her leg up on her customer’s chair. He put a twenty in her garter. There were a lot of twenties stuffed in her garter. Up on the stage, another stripper was at work. Same disco beat.

“I tol’ him no way, okay?” Luz went on. “Like, I ain’t about that shit. And that’s when he gave me a black eye. I had to call in sick for three nights. And now I just want he should leave me alone, only he
won’t.
He keeps coming by, bothering me. He even …” She hesitated.

“He even what, Luz?”

“I feel like I’m being followed,” she blurted out. “I mean, I
am.
Like, he’s following me, okay?”

A cold chill went through me. “Are you sure it’s Tuttle?”

“Well, yeah. Who else would it be?”

I looked around the room. It was crowded with restless men. Unhappy men. Salivating men. “Working in a place like this, I would think it could be just about anyone.”

“Oh, no. Uh-uh. I’m real careful. We all are. You never tell him your last name. You never tell him where you live. Uh-uh. No way. It’s Tuttle. I know it is.” She glanced over her bare shoulder again at the bar. He was still there, ordering now. She leaned across the table toward me, our drinks all but disappearing beneath her silicone wonders. “Look, you seem pretty okay. And he kind of listens to you. Can I be straight here?”