Chapter 3
Grace was all smiles when I got into the car, and she chatted about one thing and another as we drove through the downtown traffic. When we bounced across the railroad tracks, she made an abrupt right turn onto a narrow side street. She drove one block and made another right turn. The street was narrow, and the sidewalks -lined with huge shade trees.
"I'll show you the red light district first. Then if you want to, you can back down," she said. She slowed up and pointed towards a two-story, white frame house. "That's my place there."
It had a wide porch across the front and one side, and I saw a girl sitting at one of the windows. It was the second house from the corner and a large neon sign on the porch read GRACE. The sign was about a foot high and two feet long. I counted similar signs on ten different houses: BLANCHE, IDA'S, MILDRED'S, and so on. One house had a sign that just said GIRLS. On other houses, there were crude signs on the front porch or screen door that read: PRIVATE, or THIS IS A PRIVATE HOME. I noticed that Grace had a small neon sign above the door: WELCOME.
Girls lounged in the windows, reading, smoking, or just staring at the street. Many of them were scantily dressed, and peering in the windows, I could see other women sitting in the parlors.
"I guess this is the largest red light district in the state," Grace said. "The houses stay open 24 hours a day, the girls work in shifts, and each joint keeps from one to nine girls."
"How many do you keep?"
"Five, six with you, but I imagine a couple of my girls will be leaving before long," Grace answered. "Most of them don't stay too long."
We drove to the end of the block and turned around. Grace drove even slower. I thought she was going to stop, but she sped up when she passed her place. I felt a tinge of fear and disappointment; maybe she was going to send me home.
"Well, Honey, what about it?" she asked. "You still want to hustle for me?"
"You know I have to. John won't give me any peace until I do."
"You could leave him."
"No, I'd rather hustle," I shook my head. "I love him too much to ever leave him."
"What are you going to do when John brings home a sister--law?" Grace smiled at me. The thought made me angry.
"I'm an only child and so is John. There will be no sister--laws," I answered firmly.
"I said that once, but when my old man brought home another chippy, I was almost glad," Grace said. "You change your mind about a lot of things after you've been on the turf a few years."
She was silent for a few blocks and we were still headed towards the main part of town. Every so often she'd look at me, as if she was still trying to decide.
"O.K. I guess. If you want to hustle for me, I'll let you. You know what it's all about so you can't say you haven't been warned," she said.
"I'll treat you O.K. if you behave yourself and if the customers like you," Grace continued. "I try to treat my girls the way I wanted to be treated when I was a chippy. But keep yourself clean and be nice to the men. I won't keep a girl with a lazy bottom. Just remember that the men who come to my joint work hard for their money and when they spend it on you, do your best to show them a good time."
I promised her I would. She parked in front of a large downtown hotel.
"Let's go see a friend," she suggested. "By the way, how are you fixed for money?"
"I haven't even got enough for a pack of cigarettes," I answered.
"I figured that. Well, you can ride the bed springs for fun for the next couple of weeks," Grace laughed. "It costs money to be a prostitute in this town."
We took the elevator to the third floor and Grace knocked at one of the rooms. A bald-headed man of about forty aaswered. He was short, with a large belly, and a red face. He had a frustrated look on his face like a fat man who had just broken a shoe lace on a crowded subway.
"Hi, Bill," Grace said breezily.
She swept on past him and sat down on the sofa. I glanced around. It was a luxurious four or five room suite. Grace smiled at him, yet I could see the scorn and disgust in her eyes when she looked at him.
"Wanda wants to join the union," she said.
Carelessly, she flicked her ashes onto the plush rug. Bill licked his lips nervously and squinted at me.
"She looks awful young," Bill's glance went from me to Grace. "Is she from here? Are you sure she's all right?"
"She was born a whore and she knows the ropes," Grace answered. "That's all you need to know about her."
Bill grunted. He went over to the desk and started writing. The scratching of his pen raked the room. He handed me a receipt for a thousand dollars.
"You sure she's O.K.?" he squinted at Grace again. "She looks awful young."
"Bill, men like them young," she said. "If they wanted them old, do you think I'd be a Madame?"
With a disgusted motion, she threw her cigarette into the ash tray. She dug into her purse and gave him ten one hundred dollar bills.
"See you next month," Bill said to me.
Bill was still holding the money when Grace walked out. She didn't say a word until we got into her car.
"Hang on to that receipt. You have to have it to hustle," she said. "Bill might come around and say that you didn't pay him."
"Who is he, anyway?"
"Just a fall guy and he knows it," Grace answered. "He collects the take from the houses. If anything ever goes wrong, Bill takes the rap. He'll be called a vice lord, but all he does is keep books for the right guys."
"Who are the right guys?"
"I've always thought it wasn't any of my business," Grace answered, with a shrug. "It doesn't matter anyway."
"Here's where we pay out more money," Grace said when we stopped in front of the city hall.
"Oh, Hell! Don't I make anything for myself?"
We went down to the basement and into the City Health office. A man was sitting with his feet propped up on the desk next to a bottle of whiskey. He stared at us with bloodshot eyes and almost fell over when he tried to stand up.
"What can I do for you ladies?"
"Wanda wants a health card." Grace gave him a note from my doctor. Yesterday, John made me go to the doctor to be examined for any venereal disease. He hardly looked at the slip.
"Er-health card," he looked at me and gave a silly little laugh. He wrote my name on a card.
Grace gave him twenty-five dollars and I took the card. It said that I was free from all forms of communicable diseases and I could handle food and be an entertainer. So that's what I was, an entertainer.
Our next stop was the police station. Grace breezed through the front door like she had just made the last payment on the building. We went into the office marked VICE SQUAD. Two detectives were sitting at a card table playing rummy and there was a uniformed cop sitting behind the desk.
"Got a new customer for you, Sam," Grace said. The cop looked at me and coughed.
"What in hell are you doing, Grace, robbing the cradle?" he asked. "Send her back to high school. How old is she?"
"She's eighteen marked up to twenty-two," Grace answered. "But don't worry, this little gal has had plenty of experience."
"They all have. One of these days I'm going to have a Madame bring a girl in here who never has hustled before. That'll be the day," Sam said, shaking his head. "We'll have to check this one out, Grace, so you'll have to put her on ice for few days." Sam turned to me, "AU right, Sister, your name and the towns where you've hustled and have a record."
"Wanda Lane, Mrs." I said.
"What's your husband's name?" one of the detectives asked.
"John-John Lane," I turned to face him. "We've been married almost a year."
"She's hustled before, you can bet on that," the detective grunted and picked up his cards as if he had lost interest in me.
The cop shrugged his shoulders. He wrote down my name, examined my health card and receipt from Bill. I was fingerprinted, mugged, and my police record started. It listed my occupation as PROSTITUTE.
"That'll be a hundred dollar fine for disorderly conduct," Sam explained. "You're to appear in police court each Monday and plead guilty to that charge. If you're too busy, your husband can bring the fine in for you. Let us know when you change addresses or decide to leave town. Behave yourself, ' and we'll let you alone."
"Well, Wanda, you're in business now," Grace laughed when we left the station. "Welcome to the whorehouses."
"Thank the Lord," I said, glad the ordeal was over. "Say, how come the cops knew so much about John?"
"He's done time for White Slavery. Honey, you're not the first girl he's put on the turf." Grace gave me an odd glance out of the corner of her eyes. "You probably won't be the last."
I didn't say anything, but I felt like it. I didn't like the way she kept throwing it up to me about John having had other chippies. Sure, I knew that he had dealt with other J prostitutes, and had lived off of their earnings, but it was different with me. I had his name on a marriage license and somehow, that made it different. I was only going to hustle for a few weeks, then quit.
Grace put her car into the garage behind the house and I we went in through the back door. It led into the kitchen. Originally, there had been about five rooms downstairs, but ii some of the walls had been knocked out, and a row of cubbyhole bedrooms had been built out of plasterboard. So now there were six bedrooms, a kitchen, and a living room that I faced the front, or as we called it, "The Parlor." When Grace took me into my bedroom, I noticed three girls lounging in the parlor.
My room was long and just a little wider than the double bed that stood in the corner. A white metal table stood beside the bed, and there was a straight-back wooden chair, a dressing table, and a chest of drawers. The only light I had was a small bed lamp. There were no windows. Along the wall, there was a built-in toilet and a clothes closet. I peeked into the closet and then I knew why John had put me in Grace's.
Grace sat on the edge of the bed and watched me put my things away.
"Ten bucks a trick, and I get five. Seven-fifty for a half-and-half, and fifteen for a French date. Whatever you knock down extra is yours, you just pay me five for each trick you hustle," Grace said. "And don't go feeling sorry for anybody; you can't afford to in this business. If a guy tries to bargain or doesn't have enough money, tell him you don't cut prices. If I catch you, I'll let you go.
"One more thing, Honey, don't waste the towels. They cost a buck apiece," she added.
"About how much will I earn?" I asked.
"Oh, $200 to $250 a night, easily. It depends on how eager you are to coin money," Grace said. "My girls have been turning forty to forty-five tricks a night. Tonight will be a pretty slow night, though."
"I'm pretty anxious to earn it," I said reflectively. "It costs a lot to keep that man of mine. You know what I mean?"
"I think I do. I've got the same problem," Grace laughed. "Anything else you want to know?"
"How much do I owe you?"
"Oh, about twelve hundred dollars. Don't worry about it, we'll work it out. Why?"
"Well, could I borrow a quarter for a pack of cigarettes?"
"Good Lord," Grace burst out laughing and slapped her leg.