Chapter 9
LUIS SCALICI:
"I was in the can for a year. One whole lousy year. (I didn't know then that I would spend sixteen more.) It was a rough time for an ambitious guy. I was afraid the mob would forget about me and I'd have to start all over when I got out.
My cellmate was a guy named Belcher Gein. They called him Belcher, his real name was Horace-I saw it on his tag. But anyway, he taught me a few things. Belcher was a strong-arm guy.
"I done that 'cause I wasn't smart enough t'con," he said to me a thousand times. "Lissen, armed robbery is for the birds. You tell 'em I said so."
Belcher wanted to be a con man. It was a laugh. He was built like a tractor. His body was his constant sorrow.
"I coulda been a whiz if I was skinny," he moaned.
But he taught me about banks and guns and about how cops think, and a lot of good stuff. I liked Belcher. Except for one thing. He was a little stir-crazy and would get moody and touchy now and then. You had to use kid gloves with him then. He could flare up and wipe the cell with me if I wasn't real diplomatic. Even the screws were careful with him.
He had one other stir-gotten vice. All the old residents, and some of the new, acquire it. He was one of the brown boys. Come lights out, he wanted to bugger. I had to put up with that for the year.
"Relax an' enjoy it," he would tell me. There wasn't anything else I could do. He outweighed me two hundred pounds, at least. He greased it and took his time.
It was easy to tell, from the comments, that other guys were practising the same diversion. There was one bird, down the block, who would yell: "I got it up, I got it up-"
Other boys always yelled back, with suggestions, some asking for appointments, some timing him.
The bastile was in a bad way just then, overcrowded and having problems with the screws. Belcher and I were in one of the tiny cells, meant for one guy. There were no prisoner uprising while I was there, but soon after they had a prisoner strike. I wasn't surprised.
The food was terrible. The yard was over crowded too, and a lot of guys got hurt. Old scores were settled in the yard-guys would group around and two gees would work over a creep and leave him laying there. If he got dead nobody knew a thing about it.
Some guys made dough or cigarettes, by selling mouth in the yard. The screws knew it, but they didn't try to interfere. Like I say, they were having problems with the State, and didn't take risks. A group of gay guys would stand around and if you wanted a blow they'd do it right there in the yard.
I saw some awful fights when a new guy came into the can. If he was a young, good-looking kid, the old wolves would really go after him. I was lucky in a sense being with Belcher. Nobody bothered me. They didn't fool with him.
Kipper met me when I got out.
He looked exactly the same, and I was sure glad to see him. We went right to the train and back to town. It was good to throw away the duds they gave me and get into some clothes again. I couldn't get enough of the town.
Kip had to laugh the way I wanted to ride around and look at things. But I was only twenty-one. A year was forever. The town had changed too, even in that time.
Kip knew what I wanted. He called for a girl and gave me his apartment. She was a hooker named Betta, and she looked very good to me. I guess I made a pig of myself, but she seemed to have a good time. I kept her for a day and a half.
She was one of Lilli's girls and they were the best.
Then the Big Gee sent for me and I was nervous as a hillbilly in a tux. But I got a nice surprise. The Big Guy was pleasant as hell. He was about my size, smooth as ice and gray-haired. Pleasant but ice underneath. He knew all about me. That I had been given a bum rap even.
"You were a victim of circumstances," he said. "It shouldn't have happened, but it did. We got you out in a year, though. Now we want to see that you stay out."
I got a nice bonus too. I thught I'd get my old job back, but I did other things instead. I was sent to work with Kipper and a guy named Yoine. I was glad they didn't split up me and Kip.
Yoine was a little guy, gray straggly hair and glasses. He looked like a bum. No matter how expensive his suits were, they draped on him like he got them out of a can in the alley. Yoine was an expert on legal larceny. He figured out grifts that were big on the payoff and almost legal.
I spent a year with him, then I went back to working on the tenderloin. Yoine didn't mess with the dames much, most of his business was financial, so I'll skip it. He was a very smart apple and highly respected in mob circles. What he could do with a set of books was pure art, they told me. He was one of the guys who started the Swiss switch-putting dough in Swiss banks with numbered accounts instead of names.
Unfortunately, Yoine liked young girls. I heard later that he had been gunned to death in a brownstone somewhere while calling on a young broad who happened to be the sole property of another hood who didn't recognize Yoine in his birthday suit. The mob took vengeance on the hood. Yoine had been more valuable. They gave him a swell funeral.
One night I met Stephanie Warwick in a nite club. She looked exactly the same too, and it made little shivers go up and down my spine when I saw her. She was with a party, and I had a blonde. The blonde looked like a crumpled gum wrapper beside Stephanie. And she was a hellova slick blonde.
Stephanie saw me too. She didn't make a sign. When she passed my table she slipped and I gave her a hand. When she went on, I had a note which I put in my pocket and read later. It said: 'Call me."
She was all giggly on the phone the next day. "Darling, I'm crazy to see you!"
We made a date for that afternoon at a club, and I was waiting for her. She showed up in a long coat that hid everything but her nose. I had a drink waiting. She sipped it and ogled me.
"How was it in jail?"
It must have been in the papers, but I didn't expect her to know. I told her it had been lousy. She giggled.
"Did you miss me?"
"Of course."
"Then let's get out of here."
We went in my car which was a Packard and not bad. She wasn't used to sitting in the front seat, but somebody had to drive. I headed out of town fast. She insisted on it.
"I want fresh air." She curled up and put her head on my shoulder. "Tell me who you've shot lately, darling."
I made up a story for her and dragged it out as long and grisly as I could. She loved to hear about blood. Then I turned off the road and found a spot under some trees.
She didn't have a damn thing on under the coat. Naked. A suit of satin skin. She giggled when she opened it to show me. She wriggled over the back and pulled me into the back seat with her. I had forgotten how crazy wild and exciting she was. She had been wound up at birth and would never completely unwind.
"Men wear so many clothes," she protested, as I did my best to shed them. She was all over me with hands and mouth. She knew how to erect my nerve-endings and keep them in a frothy state of delirium till nothing could stop the dam bursting.
She smothered me in titties and went berserk when I blowed madly up her gash. She screamed naughty things in my ear in French, Italian and even a little German. I had to guess what they were, but every now and then I recognized the word for 'fuck.' In French. She was becoming an international broad.
When she let me up for a coffin nail, she told me her husband was in England but was flying home in another day or so. She also had a boyfriend.
"He's young, darling, you know I need youth. Lots of it-"
"Baby, all you need is a prong."
She giggled. "Don't be vulgar. Anyone would think you know what you're talking about. Anyway, his name is Brent and he's a darling. Loaded with trashy boats, but a darling." She twined herself about my neck like a pink necklace and stuck one tit in my eye. "I don't think I love him though. I need a man for love-"
"What about your husbnad?"
"What about him, dear? He's an old fogie and I hate him." She made a face. "He smells. Darling, he smells."
"So do you."
"You're so sweet." She kissed me passionately. "Let's fuck again, darling."
She sat on it and bounced. The blonde had taken a lot out of me the riight before, so I did my best for her, but I think she was disappointed. But she didn't say so. I managed to make her scream with surging spasms, and she literally wore herself out. She was crazily impulsive in her never-ending search for gratification. I couldn't help remember the first night I had met her, and got a piece of her in the back seat of a car in an alley.
She was probably worth millions. And she foiled around with common hoods in a dingy corner just for the thrill of it.
I called on Veda, my sister, too, soon after I got out of the stone John. It took me a day to find her, and then I was sort of sorry. She looked terribly thin and worn.
She had none of the old fire and sparkle. Her skin was gray and her hair was like dull straw. The dope was making her nothing more than a skeleton. I hoped my feelings didn't show on my face.
She cried to see me. She hugged me and petted me. Naturally she knew I had been in the pen, I had written to her. I tried to get her to go to a hospital.
"You can kick the habit-"
"I'm scared," she said, looking at me with her sad eyes. "I'm scared to try."
"They'll taper you off," I told her, "it'll be tough, but they'll do it over a period of time." I wanted to get her into a hospital, talk her into it somehow. I knew they couldn't taper her off, but maybe she didn't.
She wouldn't go.
I made sure that she got her junk, so she didn't have to hustle for it. But I hated the slimy bastards who pushed the stuff. Because of Veda.
I saw Rosina too. She looked slightly older, but just as plump and settled. She was hustling out of a hotel and seemed to be doing fine. She didn't have the habit; she had a pimp, but few problems. Nothing bothered Rosina much. She even saw mom now and then.
But I kept after Veda, and finally she agreed to go to a hospital.
Old man Duunker wasn't the guy who had got her hooked, but he was just as bad. I knew he was pushing junk, grass mostly. I dropped by his store. It hadn't changed much.
"Jesus God! It's Luis!" Dunker put on a show of being glad to see me.
I let him press a cigar into my hand and give me a drink from a bottle. He didn't have a license to sell hard stuff. I was sweet to him. The old lady wasn't around, so I asked about her.
"She's upstairs," Dunker said, fluttering around to light the cigar for me. "She don't come down much no more. We're gettin' on, Luis. You know I'm not as old as I used to be." He laughed at his joke.
He was a slimy little son of a bitch. There were some young kids in the back, same as usual. Probaby some chick in the storeroom getting worked on too. I told Dunker he looked good. I lied.
He was nervous, thinking maybe the mob had sent me down to talk to him. I let him think so. If he only knew, the mob wouldn't have liked for me to monkey in junk. It could be Dunker was getting his greefo from them. I hadn't bothered to check. I was sore about Veda, and I never had liked Dunker.
We talked about nothing for a while. Dunker fussed around, always coming nervously to me. Finally he offered me a girl.
"Oh, she's a nice young one, Luis. You allis liked the girls, Luis, I remember. I give her free, for old time's sake, huh? You like that?"
"Sure," I said. Maybe I could learn something from the broad.
He fluttered away and came back in a bit with a girl. "This is Rita," he said. "Rita, you treat Luis real nice, hear? He's a big man now. Very big."
She nodded. She was nice. Young and round. She had smart eyes, but her face was young and smooth, framed by black hair tied in a pony tail. Her shape had lots of baby fat, big tits and round hips. She let me look. "Hi, Luis."
I took her out to the car. "How much do you get?"
"This is for free," she said. "Mr. Dunker said I wasn't to charge."
"How much do you get for an hour?"
"Sometimes a couple dollars."
I went uptown and drove aimlessly for a bit without speaking, trying to make up my mind. If I made trouble for Dunker I might have to answer to the mob. The mood I was in, I could have rubbed him out and never noticed.
Finally I went to the Pickering Hotel and got us a room. I could find out what he was doing anyway. The information might come in handy. Rita thought I was going to screw her. She took off the dress in a hurry and hung it up in the closet. "What're you doing?"
"I don't want to get it all wrinkly." She came back in her bra and panties. She had a very nice shape. "Can I have a cigarette?"
I gave her one. "Is Dunker getting you Johns?"
"Yesh," she nodded and blew smoke. We sat on the crummy couch and I put my feet on the coffee table.
"How old are you?"
"Eighteen."
I looked at her and she hung her head. "All right, I'm sixteen."
"You were sixteen when?"
"Two months ago."
"Are you in school?"
"Yes. He wants me to quit."
I nodded. "Dunker says you can make more dough if you work all day, that right?"
"Yeh. I can too."
"And more for him. What does he take out?"
"We split half and half if I use his back room."
"Do you like it-the work?"
She shrugged. "It's the dough. Yeh, I like it." She smiled at me to show she did. She even waggled her tits a little and I put out my hand and bounced them.
"Bunker's a shit," I said. "You know that, don't you? Fifty; fifty's too much. Is he booting you too?"
"Yeh." She looked at the cigarette. "I don't like him, but he gets me Johns. I gotta have the dough."
"What for, home?"
"Yeh."
I took her bra off and admired her tits. She had a lovely pair. She was a cute mouse. I asked her: "Is he selling grass?"
She hesitated. Then she nodded. "Yeh. Somebody makes the reefers for him and he peddles them one at a time."
"A buck each?"
"Yeh. He can get you horse too, though."
"Are you smart enough to stay off it?"
She smiled and shrugged. "I guess so. Are you gonna do it now?"
She was getting to me with that keen baby fat. I jiggled the titties and she grinned. Her nipples were stiff as dimes. "What's your specialty?"
"Any old thing. I do anything you want."
I wished there had been some music and a bottle. You can't have everything. I got up and took off the duds. She removed the panties. Then she came over and grabbed the old jock.
She was an all-round broad all right. She didn't have much seductive knowledge, but her touch was right. After all most of her trade was kids and bums. You only shell out a couple bucks, you don't expect the dance of the seven veils. Nobody had taught her the fine points. Old shit Dunker had probably just told her to lay down and spread 'em. She didn't know about the mystical side of whoring.
But her suction was young and powerful, and eager. She wanted to do me good. I let her blow a couple of intricate tunes on it, then I turned her over and laid her. She did the sinuous twitch, and I know she put out more than she should. She got pretty impulsive. I made her yell and twist and frolic. I think she meant it for real.
I thumped her hard and steady and she got wilder by the minute. Not like Stephanie, but then who was like that doll-only screamers.
We gushed and fountained, and kept it up. We got sated on it and the more I jabbed her the more she seemed to like it. It was dark in the room before we came up for air.
"God, that was great," she said. "I oughta pay you."
I liked her. "Do you have to go home?"
She hesitated again. "I could get out, I guess."
"Don't you do overnight tricks?"
She shook her head. "I haven't, but I could." She swarmed over me. "I want to-"
"Me too," I said. "You're a lovely lay, baby. I wanna wake up in the morning with you on top."
She giggled.
I gave her a Jackson and took her home. Then I picked her up later and we went out to dinner. I popped her eyes, and took her to the best joint, the Cafe Royale. We had a couple martinis and she was round-eyed at the luxury of it. "Jeez, that's what I want."
"You probably won't get it screwing."
She looked at me. "Some girls do."
"Most don't. Not in this town right now. It's stacked the other way."
I let her feel my leg during dinner. She wanted to get into my pants, but no telling who might come by; I might have to stand. But I liked it.
I took her to my apartment and put her to bed. It was fun. She had a ball, bouncing naked all over the place. It wasn't as tempestuous as a session with Stephanie, but a hell of a voluptuous time. She choked me pushing her titties down my throat. And I lapped her and drove her up the wall.
In the morning I woke with her on top. She was cute as hell.
After that I took her to see Lilli de Witt. If she wanted to be a whore, she might as well do it right. Lilli ran the best bookshop in town. Lilli seemed to like her.
We had a couple words in Lilli's office. "Is she willing?"
"Maybe too much," I said. "She fucks like it's goin' out of style. But you get the rough edges off and you'll have a great little money-maker."
"Thanks, baby," Lilli said, "I think you're right."
Lilli is a great doll. I could go for her myself. Everybody says that.