Chapter 4
The luxurious black Cadillac rolled swiftly along the smooth concrete stretches of the Long Island Expressway. Joe Toder drove the big car expertly, Dr. Ralph Ramey noted. When he asked Joe where they were headed, the man replied, "Moratta's joint in Westhampton."
Mike Moratta's "joint", in exclusive Westhampton on Long Island's South Shore, turned out to be an imposing colonial-style mansion of about thirty rooms with grounds and all the trimmings to match. Dr. Ramey took in the beauty of the landscaped grounds, the modernistic pool, the tennis courts and greenhouses and decided that Mike Moratta knew how to live.
He was a big man, with an unusual and forceful personality that practically bowled Dr. Ramey over as they shook hands. Then Mike told him, rather than asked, "Let's get a drink!"
Obviously, in Moratta's world, all callers wanted a drink, so Ramey did not demur. He remained silent as they skirted the huge house and passed a gardener digging in a flower bed; the man appeared to cringe and certainly dug a little more industriously as Moratta passed.
The first exceptional note was struck as they rounded the side of the house and came into an out-of-place, tropical patio built around a pair of French doors that gave into the mansion. And if this were not too strikingly inappropriate, the girl lying on the grass in the sun certainly was.
She was completely nude. She looked like a page out of a slick men's girlie magazine except that she rolled over and made no effort to hide any part of her complete nakedness.
Her sexy allure and her beauty were undeniable. The rounded, luscious ass was beautifully tanned. Her tits were overdeveloped, but pillowy rather than grotesque.
Her sullen mouth and the defiant manner in which she consciously exposed her cunt to a complete stranger told Ramey that she had a magnificent problem; one any psychiatrist would delight in analyzing.
Moratta showed no embarrassment, only anger. "Are you at it again? Get the hell into the house and put some pants on!"
The girl scrambled to her feet and Moratta swung an open palm. It cracked against her asscheeks, arched her body obscenely forward, and with her hands on her ass by way of instinctive protection, she vanished through the French doors.
"That little cock-sucker can't get rid of her old habits," Moratta growled. "She's got to show her naked twat all over the place to be happy."
Apparently that explained everything as far as he was concerned. He dropped into a big, basket-like chair beside a wrought iron table and whacked a bell that clanged commandingly. He motioned to a chair opposite him as a butler appeared.
Ramey had turned away to sit down. When he turned back, the butler was there, giving the illusion that he'd popped up out of the red flagstone floor.
"A double bourbon," Moratta growled. "What's your pleasure?"
"A bourbon will be fine."
The butler left and Moratta turned his intense, brooding eyes on Ramey.
"Okay, chum," he said. "I got a deal."
"I'm willing to listen."
Moratta's scowl deepened-as though such a non-commital reply was tantamount to treason in the world he dominated. "From what I get, you're pretty good at handling women."
"I don't quite like it put in those terms."
The sandpaper side of Moratta's personality asserted itself. "Let's not pussyfoot. I don't and I don't like other people to. It's a waste of time. Now...."
He didn't finish because at that moment a boy came through the French doors and Moratta changed as though by magic. His eyes softened. The hardness dropped away. Adoration shown in his big, ugly face.
"Phil! What are you doing up? I told you to stay in bed and get some rest."
The boy advanced toward the table, and Ramey's reaction was quick pity. The lad looked to be ten or eleven years old. He was pale and drawn. His hesitation of movement, a slow, indecisive manner of walking, made it appear at first that he was afraid of Moratta. This illusion was dispeled when he climbed into Moratta's lap and put his thin arms around the great bull neck.
Moratta's grin was almost fatuous. "My son," he said. "Phil. Smart as a whip. A little peaked because he doesn't like the sun-stays inside all the time-in his room."
It was obvious to Ramey that the child's abnormal pattern, his fragile health, were psychosomatic. Moratta, an earthy man, would not have tolerated any chronic physical disability in his son. He would have called in the best doctors in the world. He had no doubt done this and had been told there was nothing that medicine could correct.
This train of logic, which Ramey considered to be acceptable, showed a block in Moratta's makeup. He'd no doubt been told where his son's trouble lay-in a mental disturbance. And he had not agreed. This would indicate that he did not believe in psychiatry as a remedy.
If that were true, why had he called a hypnotist? It would be interesting to find out.
"Phil, this is a guy I know. He puts people to sleep. He can make them walk around like zombies. What do you think of that?"
For a wild moment, Ramey wondered if he'd been brought to entertain the boy. He watched the lad's wan sensitive face for a reaction. There was a sudden brightness.
"You're a hypnotist?"
"That's right," Ramey said.
"Can you hypnotize animals?"
"I think not. I've never tried, but I don't believe an animal would respond."
The boy turned his eyes to his father. "He couldn't hypnotize Dee then. She's an animal."
The last word was propelled from the boy's mouth in a spurt of pure hatred.
The grin faded from Moratta's face as the boy got down from his lap and went into the house. Moratta's reaction was hard to discern from his new expression. It was a mixture of regret and hardness, Ramey decided. But there was no hostility toward either his son or Dee-whoever that was.
"The kid doesn't like Dee. They rub each other the wrong way," he said.
"Dee?"
"My secretary. The girl we bumped into naked on the way in. I think the kid's jealous maybe."
There was a weird situation here. Ramey knew that without further observation. But he knew also that it was none of his business. He was sure that his presence there had nothing to do with the child.
Moratta turned back to the business at hand. He knocked off his double bourbon in one gulp and said, "Like I told you don't pussyfoot. I want you to get to a girl and find out something for me. Can you do it?"
"I'm not pussyfooting when I say that I don't know. I couldn't answer intelligently without knowing the girl, the circumstances, the nature of the information wanted."
Moratta put his habitual scowl on his face. "I'll get to that. Right now I'm wondering if I made the wrong move. I could get a gigolo to handle the thing. The girl would be a pushover for the right guy. But I read a piece in a magazine about hypnotism once and it stayed in the back of my mind. Then I heard about you."
"Do you mind if I ask how you heard about me?"
Moratta grinned but it was different. There was cruelty and contempt in this grimace-no fatuousness. It was the reflection of a man with no more compassion in his makeup than that of a hungry tiger.
"You haven't exactly hired a press agent, have you?"
"That was why I asked."
"The hell with you. I've got my methods. I know a lot of people. I heard a lot of things. It's none of your damned business."
"I see."
Ramey accepted the uniformative answer, but it made him uneasy. In a way, it shook his sense of security. If Ramey knew all about him then perhaps his comparative freedom from harrassment and arrest had been more a matter of luck than brains.
"If you handle this job right," Moratta announced, "There's ten grand in it for you."
Up to that point, Ramey had been negative on whatever Moratta's proposition was. But ten thousand dollars! It would be his biggest individual score.
And there was something mystic here. Sight of the boy, Phil, had stirred something in Ramey, the old demand to be more than an opportunist with a talent; the urge to justify himself.
"How much time will be involved in this project?"
"How do I know? It can't take too long, though. I need the dope I'm commissioning you to get."
"Suppose you give me the details."
Moratta settled back and set his sausage-like fingers into a steeple.
"There's a guy I know. He's got something I want. A building on Fulton St. in Manhattan. The guy's name is Steve Lyman and he doesn't want to give up the building because he knows the same thing I do-and that a syndicate likes the location for a factory and if they decide to go ahead, he's got a valuable lump of real estate-or he might have sometime next year. The gamble's worth holding the place for, so he won't let me have it at a reasonable price."
Moratta leaned forward, his whole, ruthless being thrown into this particular manipulations. "He's also got a nympho wife."
"And what bearing does that have on the situation?"
"Hold your horses 'til I tell you," Moratta growled. "Lyman is in trouble. He's got a big loan pending and just lately, he talked the outfit into a year's extension. This gave him a breather. My trouble is: I can't find out who's holding his tab."
This point intrigued Ramey. Here was a man who could find out all about an obscure hypnotist-right down to the number of names he had used during his life time. But he couldn't find out who was carrying a loan for one of his competitors. He was sure this could have been explained logically. Perhaps Steve Lyman had been more astute in covering his tracks.
This was only a passing thought, however. Ramey said, "I presume Lyman's wife has the required information."
"That's right. It's up to you to get it out of her."
"Do you think you can persuade her to come to me? It would have to be done on a professional basis."
"It can be done right here-this weekend." Then Moratta really floored Ramey by saying. "Lyman is my best friend. He's coming out this weekend, as my guest."
"Are you sure hell bring his wife?"
"Sure Nina'll come because her best friend's the broad I'm fucking now. Dee Redding. You saw her when you came in. She's a nice kid. Maybe I'll marry her after I break her habit of going around with her twat naked."
"Then my job will be to get to Lyman's wife during the two days they're here?"
"Four days. They come Thursday night and'll probably leave Monday night. If you haven't connected, I can talk them into another couple of days."
"If Nina Lyman is a nymphomaniac as you say, won't her husband be keeping a pretty close eye on her?"
Moratta shrugged. "Where would his wife's pussy be safer than in the home of his best friend?"
Perhaps Ramey was past shock. At any rate, Moratta's philosophies were no longer producing the sense of incredibility that enveloped him when he saw the naked girl sprawled in the patio and the pathetic boy whose hatred for his father's way of life had warped him physically.
After seeing these things-evidences of a careless brutality-Moratta's plan of having his best friend's wife fucked while under his own roof seemed quite in keeping.
"If the opportunity is provided," Ramey said, "I might be able to do what you ask. But I must warn you, hypnotism is no exact science. Nothing is sure, every person is different. Individual makeup is the key to success or failure. I have no way of knowing how Nina Lyman would react to hypnotism."
Moratta eyed Ramey with calculation. "You won't have any trouble. You've got the looks, the build. Ten minutes alone with Nina Lyman and you'll be able to hang her pants on the wall for a souvenir."
Ramey instinctively resented that. He was far from a moralist but he did not like his talent referred to with such callous disdain.
"My own personal appearance has nothing to do with it," he said.
Moratta grinned the wolfish grin Ramey would come to know. "That's what you think. Like I said, a few minutes with you and she'll go into a trance or into bed-you pick it."
"Thank you," Ramey said without enthusiasm.
"Okay. The deal is set."
"I'll do my best."
Moratta got up without further word and hurried away leaving Ramey to stare pensively at the doorway-Until a girl filled it. The same girl he'd seen sprawled naked on the flagstone when he arrived.
She was dressed now in a wispy bra and the narrowest bikini imaginable. She had one of the most beautiful bodies Ramey had ever seen. The fact that it did not stir him greatly did not detract from its big breasted, long-legged allure. He was basically a one-woman man in his amorous inclinations, and Lee happened to be that woman.
The girl came forward, her movements so hump-conscious as to be almost ludicrous. Her sullen eyes were insolent as she asked, "What kind of a job has he got -lined up for you?"
"You're referring to Mr. Moratta?" Ramey asked politely.
"Who else?"
"We were discussing some business." He made that wary admission and waited.
"If you want an apology for finding me naked when you came in, you've got it."
"You have no reason to apologize to me."
"I thought you might be some kind of a prude."
She sneered automatically. "All men are when they see a naked woman."
"Do you resent it?"
"Any girl resents men like that."
"Then why do you insist on being the naked woman involved? Why don't you get dressed?"
She didn't flare. She merely remained as she appeared to take a greater interest in Ramey. "You lay it on the line, don't you?"
"I'm usually pretty frank."
"My name is Dee," she said. She paraded in front of him and came to a halt with her back to the high hedge that bounded the patio. She stood with her hands on her hips, her legs slightly spread, as though saying, Well, there I am-all of me. How do you like me?
"I'm happy to know you," Ramey said.
"I'll bet you are."
Ramey wondered what he was supposed to do. Moratta might have been a generous host, but he certainly wasn't a thoughtful one. He'd left Ramey sitting alone without any idea of where his room was. Perhaps, Ramey thought drily, this was Moratta's way of making him remember he wasn't really a guest.
"What do you think of Moratta?" the girl asked.
Ramey had classified her easily. A self-destructionist. Everything he had seen fit that pattern. She had a magnified sense of her own worthlessness as demonstrated by exposing herself naked. She was sullen and hostile by nature. She lived basically and drew her power from hatred of everything and everybody. And now she dared fate be attempting to show lack of fear for a man who was obviously to be feared.
Ramey suspected that Moratta beat her on occasion and that she secretly welcomed the punishment.
"Moratta?" he said. "I was quite impressed."
"Everybody is."
"He's forceful and decisive."
"You're not kidding." Dee Redding's hand went unconsciously to her ass. This told Ramey a great deal. "He's a rat on wheels," she said.
Normally, Ramey would hare steered away from such a conversation, but he was interested in the girl's motives and reactions, so he kept tossing the ball back.
"Would you like me to relay that to him?"
"I wouldn't put it past you. All men are alike. I'll bet you'd like to see me with my pants beat off."
"No, I wouldn't like that at all. Would you?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Nothing specific. I was just curious."
She frowned doubtfully. "I don't get you. You're not the kind he usually brings around."
"What kind does he usually bring around?"
"The ordinary kind would have me down trying to fuck me by now."
"Does Moratta permit his guests to attack you?"
"You'd be surprised what he permits."
"Then why do you put yourself in a position to be attacked?"
"Will you quit throwing the cuties at me? Maybe it's a new kind of approach. Huh?"
"Perhaps it is."
"I knew it! All men are alike."
Before Ramey had a chance to reply, the patio became a scene of sudden, violent action. Dee Redding was the center of that action.
First, an off, surprised look dawned on her face. Her eyes opened wide. She stood frozen for a moment as Ramey heard a rustling in the bushes behind her.
Then she flew straight up into the air as her hands went around and she clawed desperately at her rear. Her legs sprawled so she was revealed again as totally naked except for the thread-like line of the bikini that ran across her legs.
She continued to claw wildly behind her and Ramey got a weird impression of a girl pushed up into space, impaled expertly upon an invisible perpendicular. Her eyes that had previously merely opened, now bulged and came close to crossing. Her mouth opened and her tongue came out. An animal protest against pain, a wordless squall, spewed from her throat: "Gaaaaaa!!"
Then, words. "Ouch! Cut it out!"
She hit the ground again, her legs churning. They carried her automatically toward the French doors. She moved at a ridiculous hopping gait because she continued to keep her legs far apart in deference to the sudden abuse she'd taken as though she did not want the cheeks of her ass to touch each other again until she could assess the damage that had been done to her.
Ramey, totally amazed by the unexpected demonstration, turned his gaze back to the spot Dee Redding had left. He saw the wan, pinched face of Phil. There was a look of savage satisfaction on it now.
He came through the hedge like a conqueror entering a captured city. He looked at the sharp-pointed stick he carried and threw it to the ground.
"I guess I showed her!"
Ramey was, for once in his life, at a loss for words. "I guess you did," he said lamely.
"Shell remember that goosing up her asshole for a long time."
"I wouldn't be surprised. Tell, me, Phil, why do you hate her so much?"
"She's a bitch! That's why."
He came forward and sat down in the chair opposite Ramey. "What your name?"
"Ralph Ramey."
"How come you're a hypnotist?"
"It's my business. My profession."
"Is there money in going around hypnotizing people?"
"Yes, but mainly I'm interested in helping people."
"How does it help a person to hypnotize them?"
"It allows me to get into their subconscious minds and see what's troubling them. He paused only for a moment. "What's troubling you, Phil?"
"Nothing! I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with me."
"Do you love your father?"
"Sure! He's the greatest."
"But you don't know why you hate Dee?"
"She's always nosing around him. When she gets to be too much of a pest, he beats the hell out of her."
"So you think you ought to beat her too?"
"I want her to go back where she came from."
"Where did she come from?"
"The street. She's a streetwalker." His eyes glowed. "Once I got her good. I was upstairs in the garage and she came through and I dropped a pail full of water over her head. She kicked around plenty."
Ramey was appalled. Could Moratta be as stupid as he appeared to be concerning a child he professed to love? Ramey now had a very good idea of what kind of place Moratta ran. A sensualist and a materialist, he conducted himself accordingly and did not have the preception to see that the environment was turning his son into a real sick boy.
Ramey was beginning to feel very sorry for his lost, little boy and the unhappy, beautiful Dee. Dee-there was a dish he'd like to give a little free therapy to, Ramey thought. From her spun gold hair, her tip-tilted breasts enticingly nippled, her slender waist that flared into generously curved hips and asscheeks, right down to her pink-painted toenails, this gal had the sexiest body he'd ever seen. He wondered what it would be like to kiss the ruby cone of her breasts, to possess that sensuous body, to have that gorgeous cunt writhing around his prick in love's frantic ecstasy....He knew it wouldn't take long for him to straighten Dee out because it was a project he could put himself into wholeheartedly, and then some.
Ramey was willing to bet anything that Moratta had probably never once had normal screwing with Dee. Used her as a showpiece, a beautiful scapegoat for his rages, but had never really fucked her. What a waste, he was thinking as he heard Moratta yelling for him.
"Hey, Ramey, come out here and meet Mr. and Mrs. Lyman."