Chapter 8
The morning of the day Whitey and the other Cobras cornered old man Danilov in the alley, Brick Fontaine woke up with a hollow head and a heavy guilt.
Rolling over on the couch, he held his temples between his hands and tried to suppress the clanguorous ringing in his ears. His mouth tasted as though he'd swallowed a jar of brass polish. But worse than these physical afflictions was Brick's suddenly clear memory of what had occurred on this same couch the night before.
He remembered all too vividly the Danilov girl's eager, tender body. A body that writhed as though possessed by devils.
God, Brick thought, crawling off the couch and stumbling down the hall to the shower. What a great social worker you are! First night on the job and you jump a teenager. What other evil deeds have you in mind? How about a couple of crimes against nature; Fontaine old kid? What's a little depravity among friends?
Brick tottered beneath the rusty shower, turned on the squeaking taps and drowned his fretting beneath a boiling spray of water.
Had it really been his fault?
Now come on, Fontaine. Don't try to excuse yourself.
But he had to admit that once the Danilov girl took off all her clothes, she was quite a trick. She'd given him one of the best times he'd ever known with a girl. Almost as good as the loving he'd shared with Elaine.
Still, he knew he'd done wrong.
No matter how he rationalized it-bitterness and frustration over losing the girl he loved, the undue influence of the bourbon he'd so foolishly drunk-guilt was inescapable. By the time he stepped from the shower cabinet, he was done with self-pity and resolved to make up for the sin of commission of last night. He also intended to forestall a sin of ommission by seeing what he could do to help the Danilov girl, really help her. She was so obviously sick that she required the care of a competent psychiatrist.
In a smaller room adjoining the office, a room full of cobwebs and musty smells, Brick discovered a pound can of faintly dank but still brewable coffee, a hot plate and a tin percolater.
Three acid-black cups later, Brick was ready to tour the settlement house.
The gym floor was in passable condition, needing only a wax job. Most of the doors had been stolen-ripped bodily-from the lockers in the dressing room. The club room blackboards were all smashed, as well as most of the rickety wooden furniture. Stepping outside-a light autumnal morning mist had some of the leprous ugliness of Hamilton Street, thank God-Brick roamed along the outer walls. The siding was badly in need of a coat of paint before winter. Well, he hadn't planned to open the doors for another week or two. Might as well start with the paint.
He located a ladder in a storeroom, brought it out to the steps and straightened the sign over the door.
Climbing down, he reflected that he had ample work ahead of him. The trustees of the estate which supported the Justus J. Peabody House were wavering about further long-term financing of the project. Needless to say, Brick had been damned lucky to pry nominal living expenses from the committee. Hiring painters was out of the question. He'd simply have to do the job himself. But maybe physical exercise would eradicate some of his lingering shame over Rita.
Brick returned to the office to pick up his coat. On the desk he noticed a piece of note paper written in a girl's light slanted hand.
Mr Fontaine, the words ran, I'm anxious to meet you although I know you won't re-open the house right away. I'll keep my eye out for your arrival and stop by to see whether there's anything I can do to help during the clean-up process.
The signature, bringing a puzzled frown to Brick's brow, was Carol A.
Carol A.?
At length he remembered. The trustees-Elaine's father Artemus Olsen, in fact-had mentioned a girl named Ambrosio, a teenager whose parents ran a delicatessen on Hamilton Street. The Ambrosio girl had volunteered her services to the previous director as an after-school secretary and bookkeeper, without salary.
As he set off down Hamilton on the first of his two errands Brick reflected that the inhabitants of Hell's Half Mile, like most people, couldn't be entirely bad or entirely hopeless if the world included a few Carol A.'s. Even the hostile, suspicious stares Brick received from passers-by could not dim this thought.
At Danilov's Produce Market, however, he ran up against his real opposition.
The balding, sloppy man Brick assumed to be Danilov himself waved his hands up and down and kept repeating, "No here, no here!" when Brick inquired for Rita after introducing himself.
The more Brick questioned Danilov, the more agitated the fattish man became, repeating, "No here, no here!" monotonously. Then he lapsed into some Middle European tongue Brick didn't understand.
Danilov's eyes flickered with suspicion. The old hog-bellied fool was playing with Brick, pretending he spoke no English, when all around the store were cardboard price placards lettered in a man's heavy hand.
"Damn-I mean, listen Danilov. I have to see your daughter. The name's Fontaine."
"No here, Goddam, no here!" Danilov shouted.
Brick was on the point of grabbing his shirt and roughing the obstinate old man a little when he suddenly realized that Danilov might be telling the truth. There was a sick, uncertain glaze to the rhuemy eyes that convinced him. Sighing, Brick turned and slammed out of the store.
Was Rita really gone? If she'd run off as a result of last night-
No, probably the old guy was simply suspicious, lying to conceal Rita's whereabouts. She'll learn I was asking for her, to find out who Fontaine is, and then she'll come to the settlement house.
She has to! I've got to help her!
Yet all his mental certainty was sheer invention. He wasn't at all sure Rita Danilov had not been irreparably hurt by his drunken behavior.
Monoghan's Hardware and Plumbing Supply proved to be another excellent symbol of the hostility Brick was going to encounter in the neighborhood. Monoghan himself, a sandpaper-voiced little man, totalled up Brick's purchases-several gallons of exterior paint, scrapers and brushes, bought with his own money-and snorted as he handed over the bill.
"Waste of valuable money! Kids around here don't need no help except help that'll land them six feet under. Bunch of wolves! I tell you, mister, one of these days we won't have any more juvenile problems on this street, because when the decent people get mad enough-"
Monoghan snickered.
"-there won't be any more juveniles."
A scowl puckered Brick's brow.
"Are you talking about that vigilance committee I heard about?"
Monoghan gazed at the ceiling. "I ain't saying what I'm talking about."
"Maintaining law and order is the job of the police."
"Is it, now? Go tell that to Captain Wadsewski, him with his fancy college ideas about treating these bastard kids with gloves on. Appears to me you're the same type.
"Who's behind your committee? That cop, Kreeg?" Monoghan's lips were thin.
"The bill, mister. Eighteen dollars ninety-two cents."
Disgusted, Brick paid without further questions and lugged the heavy paint cans back to the settlement house.
There he set to work scraping and priming the wall adjacent to the playground. He was still at it, finishing the prime coat at the north corner near the downspout, having missed lunch entirely, when he grew conscious of a young auburn-haired girl standing at the foot of the ladder, smiling.
With a start Brick realized the sun had gone down. The streetlamps were shining. He wiped his hands on a turpentine-soaked rag and jumped off the third rung.
"Hello, Mr. Fontaine." The girl was young, clean-scrubbed, had a fresh, unspoiled smile. She extended her hand. "Carol Ambrosio."
"How do you do? I saw your note."
"Welcome to Hamilton Street." She said it with what might have been a wry smile. "Sorry I couldn't be here after school but we had a Future Teachers meeting."
Brick gave a weary chuckle.
"You mean there's actually one kid on Hamilton Street who thinks about going to school past the legal quitting age?"
A frown creased Carol's pretty brow.
"Mr. Fontaine, don't sound so glum so soon. Regardless of what they say, the people down here need this place. I practically live for the hours I can spend here. When you sleep six in one room, any breath of fresh air-"
She stopped, smiled again.
"Will you have any work for me this week?" Brick shook his head.
"The painting should keep me busy at least through next Monday. Why don't you come by on Tuesday if you can? By then I ought to be ready to look over the books and any correspondence that's piled up. I plan to open shop a week from Friday."
Carol nodded, auburn curls gleaming in the dim street-lamp gleam.
"Anything you say. I'm pretty good at baking. What if I made an apple pie on Saturday? I hear you're living at the house, so you probably don't get much good food."
"A pie would be swell, Carol," returned Brick, touched. "Thanks very much."
Carol waved as she walked away.
"See you sometime Saturday, then."
After she had vanished into the shadows beyond the playground fence, Brick rapidly set about completing the prime coat. His earlier impressions of Hamilton Street were at least moderately reversed by discovering a young girl as nice as Carol Ambrosio.
Watch it, Fontaine! he thought, slapping the brush back and forth to lay on the paint. You re getting those dirty ideas again, you child-molester.
But he'd lost some of the remorse he felt earlier. What was done, was done. The only sensible course open now was to forget past errors and take a positive step. Like asking someone besides Danilov-maybe even Captain Wadsewski at the precinct-about the whereabouts of Rita.
Whistling, Brick hurried to complete the painting, perched on the ladder in the gathering dark with his back to the playground. He didn't see the half dozen shadow-shapes linger briefly beyond the fence, then fade into the dark down Hamilton, in the same direction Carol Ambrosio had taken on her way home.
Carol Ambrosio, sixteen, had a tender, white young body.
A body she was proud of.
A body she kept clean and sweet with daily bathings, in the dim hope that one day she could escape Hell's Half Mile, perhaps even earn a scholarship to City College and there meet a clean, decent boy to whom she could surrender her body for those mysterious, beautiful acts the movies and television only hinted about.
Hurrying along the dim street between Peabody House and the spangled arch of the interstate bridge in the distance, Carol thought with a guilty flush that Mr. Fontaine was a handsome man. Far handsomer than the previous directors.
A funny tingle ran down the inner surfaces of her legs as her flesh brushed while she walked. Under her thin blouse the clean, white-soft little mounds of her maturing breasts prickled.
Mustn't think such things, she chided herself, turning up her coat collar against the evening chill. It was hard not to, though, with all the filthy talk among the kids born and raised on Hell's Half Mile. Her school companions always tried to tarnish her dream of a brighter, cleaner life in another place. Perhaps in a tiny house in the suburbs, all neat and modern and sparkling, a house of the kind she'd seen in colorful magazines in the school library when she stayed late to write an extra-credit English paper.
Inside the house-one of Carol's hands stole to her cheek, ashamed of the heated flush she felt there-there would be a clean, intelligent boy with a good job who, in the darkened privacy of their bedroom, would undress her gently, tenderly, peeling away first this garment, then the next, with utter tenderness and respect, finally taking her in his arms to make a love-baby inside her body-
"Hey there, pussycat. Where you goin' so fast?"
Carol stopped, startled by the youth who had sidled out of a warehouse bay and now blocked her path along the sidewalk. She recognized the familiar silken Cobra monogram over the breast pocket in his jacket. Many times she'd seen the enblem in class, in spite of what the principal said about gang jackets worn on school premises.
The tough facing her was thin. He had long, unshorn hair that gleamed with oil. Carol felt a cold knot draw tight somewhere in her lower belly. Stuffing her hands into her coat pockets and lowering her gaze, she stepped in to the gutter to walk around him.
Cat-quick, the boy grabbed her arm.
"Not so fast! I got friends for you to meet!"
"Let go!"
"Don't let her mess around, Viper!" grated a harsh voice.
Carol twisted. A blond boy slipped from the gloom, grinning.
"Knock her block off if she acts up."
Before Carol could scream, Viper did just that.
Sprawling, Carol Ambrosio found herself far back in the warehouse bay a moment later, her skirt hiked around her thighs, her head hurting from the crack it had received as she fell. Under her skirt a patch of silky-white pantie material gleamed.
Carol's coat had fallen open. The thin blouse she wore was exposed, dangerously exposed, she thought in sudden panic. The blouse was sheer enough for her bra to be plainly visible. The double points of her sharp little breasts rose and fell stridently.
Four of five more youths appeared in the bay entrance. Carol stared at the blond boy.
"Whitey Noonan!" she gasped. "Now I remember! I saw it in the papers! You ran away from-"
Carol's lips turned icy. Words froze in her throat. She reached down in terror to pull the skirt over her kness. Whitey chuckled low, stepped down hard between her legs.
His tennis shoe rested on her painfully, the toe hurting.
"Don't hide it, sugar puss. We all want a look. We all want to take a good look at the little kitten hanging around with the jerk at Peabody."
Whitey's voice had a hard edge as he took his foot away, squatted beside Carol and ran his hand up and down the inside of her thigh. He picked at the hem of her panties as she lay immobilized with fright.
"I got nothing against you personally, honey," Whitey told her. "I mean, nothing yet."
Coarse laughter from the boys.
"This Fontaine jerk, he's been messing with my girl. I can't find her and I got a little score to settle with him. I figure me'n the others could sort of settle it with you."
Whitey ripped her panties aside. Carol tried to draw away. Instantly another boy knelt at her head and gripped her shoulders.
Whitey's hand worked at the tie of Carol's blouse.
"I think we ought to have a look first."
"My God, you wouldn't do that to me!" Carol began.
"The hell I wouldn't!" Whitey laughed.
He ripped her blouse down to her belly. Her slip hung in tatters. The two perfect-white cones of her brassiere gleaned in the dim light.
His hands were hard, twisting her breast this way and that. Carol tried feebly to escape his examination.
Whitey sat on her thighs while the second kid, the one addressed as Viper, pressed her shoulders to the hard concrete of the truck bay floor with one hand. His other slid across her mouth.
Carol tried to sink her teeth into the flesh, Viper laughed. His grip was all male strength, even making it impossible for her to move her jaws.
A random gleam from a streetlamp flashed on the spectacles of one of the boys.
"Whitey, I don't like this-!"
"Shut up!"
Mechanically Whitey worked Carol's bra strap over her shoulder.
"So you don't like it, huh? Well, J. B., that's just tough crappo, buddy."
His face a blurred white smear, the kid known as J. B. sidled forward, made a protesting gesture.
"If you want to scrag Fontaine, that's one thing. But this kid didn't do nothing-"
"She works for him, doesn't she?" Whitey spat. She helps him! Ain't that right?"
"Damn it, Whitey, I still say it's chicken to hurt her instead of going after-"
J. B. swallowed, a loud, gulping noise as Whitey left off his play with Carol's brassiere. Whitey scowled at the pale-lipped boy who was nervously fingering the bridge of his glasses.
"What did you say, J. B.? Did you say I was chicken!"
Again a noisy swallow.
"I didn't-nothin', Whitey. Forget it."
"You don't want to have her, you don't have to. But keep your crapping mouth shut!"
"I don't want to have her, Whitey," J. B. echoed in a limp tone.
"Ah, you chicken-crapper!" Whitey chuckled. "When you gonna grow up? Get your butt out to the sidewalk, then. Keep your eye peeled. If anybody comes, whistle."
"Yeah, okay, Whitey," J. B. mumbled. "But Jesus, don't hurt her too much-"
"Get going!" Whitey hissed. "Before I carve you up!"
Still protesting, J. B. shuffled to the entrance of the bay. Whitey returned his attention to Carol.
She lay under his forcing knee with her bra half stripped away, her right breast thrusting out, the wrinkled tip chilly in the night air.
This wasn't happening, Carol told herself as she saw his black figure tower over her, saw him drop the jeans and shorts to his knees and then kneel again.
Tightly, tightly, Carol clamped her legs together, pressed the knees against one another so ferociously they began to ache. Whitey's breath, stale with cigarettes, clouded around her, a sick miasma.
Again Carol attempted to bite the hand pressed to her mouth. Viper released her shoulder and delivered a blow to her ear that stunned her.
With a wrench Whitey tore her thighs apart.
"Baby, you're a little doll. I'm going to like this."
Somehow Carol knew she had to fight, knew she had to summon every last reserve of strength before it happened. Her head began to twist from side to side.
"Hold her, Viper, Goddam it!"
Whitey's body pressed her fiercely. Carol managed to sink her teeth into Viper's thumb and make him curse with pain at the very instant Whitey levered her legs open and-ohh!
Viper recoiled, stumbling backward, sucking his thumb.
Whitey's hand flew up to her throat, clamped there. All around, the gang boys crouched to watch, nightmare figures, shadowy carrion birds.
Oh, God in heaven, Oh God in heaven! He was hurling her!
Whitey's face loomed over her breast as his mouth nuzzled cruelly at the soft valley between the jutting mounds, bare now that he had pulled her bra all the way to her navel. His fingers gripped her throat so that she couldn't scream, could only twist her head a little, wishing the pain would stop.
Whitey smashed her against the concrete. Pain dimmed her eyes, pain and the increasing pressure of of his fingers as he tried to silence her, tried to still the abortive rattling in her throat.
The pain of inside her was nothing compared to the pain of his fingers on her neck.
Didn't he realize he was chocking her?
Didn't he understand in his crazed passion that she could no longer breathe?
That it was dark-?
Whitey stoop up, wiping his forehead.
"Your turn, Viper."
Moving to her side, Viper gasped.
"Whitey-"
His head swung around, eyes frantic.
"Whitey-you choked her too hard."
Whitey kicked Viper out of the way, knelt over the girl's abused body, slapping her cheeks. J. B. ran in from the bay entrance.
His eyes were big as moons behind the glasses.
Whitey's palms flicked and cracked on Carol's pale cheeks. At last he stood up, ashen. "Run, you bastards. She's dead."
His voice rose to an outraged shriek:
"Don't stand there-run!"
One after another the Cobras plunged out of the bay into the dark.
Only the emaciated figure of J. B. remained, resting his head against the unloading dock. Unable to look at the white twisted body of the teenage girl lying on the greasy concrete, ghastly and exposed in death, J. B. grew violently sick.
When the convulsion passed, he darted from the bay and glanced both ways along the street. The rest of the Cobras had vanished.
A tug's hoot sounded lonely from the river. Without daring to look behind, J. B. ran across the street, leaped a six-foot-high board fence and vanished like a frightened animal seeking its den.