Chapter 7
Alice Carrol was stoned ... and still working at it, attempting to drown her anguish. She'd left home some time before-how long she couldn't recall. Now she was sitting at the bar in a cheap tavern, living on Scotch and soda, rocking a little in the blast of sound from the coin phonograph. A couple was on the floor, twisting vigorously in the jungle compulsion. The joint was stale with smoke; indifferently swept. It was a favorite pickup spot for off duty servicemen in the area.
Alice had often wondered what made a woman become a prostitute. The idea was highly repugnant to her-the thought of faceless men pawing and handling her, kissing her breasts, thrusting themselves upon her with sweaty, odorous bodies only demanding sensation and not giving it, repelled her. It made sex cheap, dirty and animal. For Alice, sex was tenderness and love and giving.
With an effort, she fought down the impulse to throw her half-empty drink at the pair dancing. The girl was obviously a professional with the revealing dress, the bad skin from excessive makeup and the hard eyes which went with making a living this hard way. How could people let such things happen, she wondered, angry but restraining her urge to do something violent. She recognized this was not the time nor the place. The thing that was causing her distress was not here.
The bar tilted and Alice felt a small tinge of nausea. Quickly, she lifted her glass and soothed the feeling away with a swallow of the drink. She realized it was much too late for her to be wandering about, alone, but the feeling that nothing mattered, now, pushed the small concern aside. The bereft sensation persisted-nothing mattered, but she still loved John Carrol-and she felt like the knowledge was slowly cutting her heart out. She felt, right at this moment, she'd give anything to restore her life to what it had been....
"Can I buy you a drink, miss?" a soft voice asked pleasantly, close to her side.
Alice turned, unsteadily, to focus on the man with the young face, seated next to her. He was a nice-looking male, something over voting age, she'd guess, with features almost delicate. His face was dominated by deep-set eyes; his lips were full-almost feminine in their fullness-yet not detracting from the masculine character of his look. Despite herself, her eyes dropped quickly from his face to trace a quick glance at his body. She realized that there was a basic, urgent appeal about him for her and was surprised to feel it.
How easy it would be ... all she had to do was say 'yes' ... and the drink would be the prelude to a series of actions which would find her naked body linked with his on some strange bed. Afterward they'd depart on ways strange to each other ... still strangers and strangers to remain. Alice recognized it was easy, if that's what you wanted.
She was conscious of a quickly rising aversion to the direction her thoughts were travelling, trying to squelch the pictures they brought, as fast as they formed.
"Thank you, no," Alice replied, trying to make her refusal firm but failing to keep the undertone of snappishness under control.
"So-no. Don't make a beef of it, lady," the man said, moving down the bar to another stool as though she had something contagious.
Maybe that was part of it, she thought. Perhaps her life had become a contagion and through no fault of her own. What had happened? What had turned John Carrol against her? Why had he stepped out on her-sought the pleasure of other women-why had he stepped out on her? Wasn't she good enough in bed to keep a husband?"
The thoughts chased themselves in an endless cycle through her mind and she signalled the barman for a refill as she drained her glass, hoping she could keep her anger so soaked in alcohol that it couldn't flare into open flame. There was no other idea she could arrive at which seemed to offer any relief for the continuing anguish coursing through her-nothing but violence.
A shudder racked her as the picture of John in another woman's arms flashed into her mind in sharp detail. The bitterness and the pain it triggered-then and now-made her grit her teeth and clench her hands in violent reaction. Murder was in her mind and it wouldn't take too much fanning to make the spark leap to flame. She didn't realize it, but the spark was smoldering deep in her mind....
As he held Norma in his arms, John felt wonderful. The music was good and the evening was turning out excellently. Norma felt good to hold. The Martinis had helped heighten his awareness of pleasure but John knew it was Norma's light, graceful body close to his which made him bubble inwardly. Dinner had been delicious and the feeling of intimacy with Norma had grown through the meal. Here-and in this atmosphere-Norma was a totally new woman to him. It was puzzling. Certainly she was no stranger, but it seemed to John as though this was a Norma he hadn't known for five years; hadn't worked with almost every day over those years. It was puzzling, but John was enjoying it.
"Enjoying yourself?" he asked. His pulses leaped as she moved silently closer to him in answer.
The push of her tight breasts against his chest was sending thrills of sensual excitement through him. John had held few women in his life; had been completely satisfied with the love and the nearness of his wife for so long....
But this-this was something new and something different.
Perhaps this was something which he'd wanted for a long time and had been afraid to acknowledge or experience. The realization struck him that he might have desired Norma for years-and not admitted the fact to himself. He tried to analyze his feelings for her. It was difficult because the past few days had shaken up so many things he couldn't sort them out. He knew one thing, though-any affair with Norma was for keeps and the knowledge chilled his elation a little. He didn't know if he wanted a permanent involvement with anyone....
The beat of the music went to Latin and Norma's hips moved against him, subtly suggestive. Excitement again surged through John at the touch and, suddenly, the only thing he wanted to do was to take Norma to bed-hungering for the sensations their bodies could give.
The dim lights in the room heightened the unreality of the scene and John's sense of being someone else. As the music ended, Norma smiled up at him and the inner heat in John swelled and pulsed.
"It has been a wonderful evening," John told her as they returned to their table. He nodded when the waitress asked if they wanted another round of drinks and, as she moved away, the two of them sat, gazing into each other's eyes, like two school-kids in the grip of an overpowering infatuation. Norma broke the silence to say:
"I think it's getting a little late, John."
He started to glance at his watch and then realized that Norma's words didn't necessarily reflect her anxiety over the hour. It was late-and getting later-in their relationship, and every moment which passed was a moment lost from the embrace of each other's arms. John took a reading on Norma's eyes and verified the thought.
"Well, shall we finish our drinks and go-home?" he asked.
Norma smiled, enigmatically. "If I didn't know you better, I'd say you were suggesting something, John Carrol."
He nodded. "You caught me in the act," he assented.
"In the face of such full and free confession," she smiled, "I can think of only one come-back. As they say in the fiction paperbacks: 'your place or mine?' Mr. Carrol."
"Considering everything," he said, smiling as he got to his feet, "I should say, your place...!"
It was the first time Alice Carrol had been in the Jay Cee Club at night for three years. She had never, really, liked the place and, in her present mood and condition, she liked it even less. The headwaiter did not remember her, and that didn't help. He blocked her way as she started in to the club room.
"Yes, madam, what may I do for you?" he asked, his words a thinly-veiled aversion to seating an unescorted woman.
"I'm Mrs. John Carrol and I would like a table where I can shee-see the slitage." She struggled to make her speech behave but it was not notably successful. The head-waiter did a double take at the garble and hesitated in indecision.
"Is Mr. Carrol in?" she demanded.
"No, Mrs. Carrol, I'm sorry, but he is not."
"Well, tell Jim I'm here!" she ordered. Jim was the head barman and he'd been with John since the club opened. The head-waiter grinned.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Carrol," he apologized. "It's been so long, I'm afraid I didn't recognize you."
"'Sail right. When does that new shing-singer go on?" The booze she'd drunk was rocking her to her heels. When she was seated, she ordered another drink, sitting and waiting for Terry Anson to come on. The head-waiter had said it wouldn't be long. As she sat, waiting for her drink, the scene in the office snapped back into focus in her mind. She got angry again and, pushing back her chair, stood up, almost knocking the waitress' tray out of her hands. Grabbing the drink, she started backstage, having decided to face Terry Anson immediately.
"Bill th' man'gment, honey," she tossed back at the waitress as she left. A guard, posted to keep customers from wandering backstage, stood by the door, but recognized John's wife and nodded as she entered. "Where 'sh-Miss Anson?" she asked.
"She's in Room C, Mrs. Carrol,' he answered. Alice found the door, steadying herself with a hand before she lifted it to knock. Then, changing her mind, she pushed into the room, the door slamming shut, loudly, behind her.
Terry was sitting before one of the makeup tables as Alice barged in, Terry seeing her reflection in the mirror.
Startled, the singer stood and turned to face the intruder. She was wearing a stage dress-a tight-fitting blue evening gown which lifted her already high breasts to emphasize the cleavage between the full, firm globes. Her red hair cascaded, loose and shining, to her shoulders and her appearance was a masterpiece of nature and makeup, working in harmony. Alice recognized that the creamy skin, alluring body and beautiful hair combined to make a package of irresistible feminine charm and was probably excellent for business.
The realization intensified Alice's anger and she fought down the temptation to throw the drink at the poised, beautiful woman before her.
"Who th-the hell you think you are?" she demanded, angrily. Her ire was building but Alice still held on to her control.
Terry's face reflected surprise. "I know who I am," she answered tartly. "Who are you and what do you want in my dressing room?"
Alice almost strangled on her fury. "You know what I'm talkin' 'bout. I'm talkin' 'bout you an' my husban', tha's wha-what I'm talkin'...!" Alice was interrupted by a hiccup and her rage got the upper hand. "I c'd kill you f'r that!" she shouted, her arm flying out to splash the drink on Terry's chin and over the front of her beautiful gown. For an instant there was an ominous silence. The fire leaped in the redhead's eyes and she tensed angrily, then her breath released in a long aspiration.
"Wha' right you got af-t' go after a married man?" Alice demanded, grittily. She opened her lips to continue but shock silenced her.
"Why God-damn your eyes, I'll pinch your drunken head off and throw it in your stupid face!" The rage and detestation in the singer's voice hit her with almost the impact of a blow. "Listen to me, you rumpot-and hear me well. No woman goes after a man who's really married-not if she's in her right mind. She's just wasting her time to try. But it takes two people to be married-d'you know that? Not one-two. And the story's all over this club about you ducking into riding academies for canters with that big, tall blonde man. You're not married-you're playing mattress back on the motel circuit, Bo-Peep...." Alice flung herself at her tormentor in a frenzy of rage and pain.
She was never exactly clear as to what happened next. She remembered clutching the thick fall of red hair in her fingers and starting to pull. At that instant a jarring shock at the apex of her spread thighs paralyzed her with screaming pain. She staggered back, retching, her buttocks striking the edge of the makeup table, bouncing her forward again, against Terry. In desperation, rage and pain she wrapped her fingers around the singer's throat, squeezing with all her frenzied strength. She felt the other woman move and hastened to lift a thigh, instinctively, to cover the agony of her pelvis.
But, just as quickly as it had come before, a hard object smashed into her body, just below the meeting of her ribs and another paralyzing envelopment of pain made every muscle go slack. The room blacked out as she fell backward, her head bouncing against the un-carpeted floor.
The next thing of which she was conscious was strangling and choking while someone was slapping her face, vigorously, back and forth. She opened her mouth to scream, choked and the slapping stopped. When she could breath and focus her eyes, she looked up at the form of Terry Anson, standing over her, murder in her face and rage in her eyes. Stepping close to Alice's prone body, the sharp toe of the redhead's pump drove into Alice's hip in another shock of pain which made her scrabble away and try to spring to her feet. Failing, she pulled herself slowly and unsteadily to a standing position by using a chair. Terry slowly followed, moving on her like a cat covering a mouse with which it's toying.
Watching the drunken woman's eyes, Terry's glittering orbs read sentience returning as she unzippered her whisky-splashed gown and stepped out of it.
"Listen, you drunken slut, you stay out of my way. Don't come slooming in here with your gut full of alcohol and your head full of imaginary wrongs! You're wrong-I can tell, just by looking at you, you're as wrong as a No. 7 ticket in a six-horse race. You better read me, good, or you'll get hurt, bad! I learned my way around, fighting boys-and I'll beat your stupid fanny to a froth if you ever so much as speak to me again! You hear me?" A stinging palm rocked Alice's head on her weaving shoulders. "Now get your easy ass out of here or you won't have anything left to pass around to your boy friends. And don't go running to your husband with this or I'll turn both of you inside out with an assault and battery suit that'll tie this joint up like a Christmas Present-and spread your fun and games over the front page of every newspaper in the state! Beat it, bum!"
Hate, rage and shame fought for a place on Alice's shocked features. Her anger was throttling her and, if she'd had a weapon, she'd have murdered Terry Anson or died trying. Slowly she looked toward the door, fighting down the urge to vomit, staggering under the force of her emotions and the load of drink she'd taken on. Hair bedraggled by the water Terry'd thrown on her to revive her; face mottled red and her consciousness scarred irrevocably by the humiliation she'd brought down on herself, she backed to the door as someone knocked and yelled to ask what was going on in there. Alice found the knob and opened the door to stagger out and through the crowd of performers who looked at her in mingled curiosity and contempt. Hate for Terry Anson was all that kept her from dissolving into thin air as she staggered past people whose aversion to her was an aura she could almost see.
"You alright, Terry?" the guard asked anxiously. "You'll be on in a couple of minutes."
"Ask Jean if she can stall 'til I get into another dress," Terry snapped. "I'm alright-just had a little misunderstanding with a tourist, passing through...."
Alice cringed at the contemptuous words as she careened toward the back door into the parking lot....