Chapter 17

I called Emily Ann the next morning at nine, and caught her by two minutes, she said.

"I decided to go out of town for a couple of days," she said. "Aren't you leaving, too?"

"I wanted to talk to you once more before going," I said. "I have to see you, to tell you some personal things, some important things, Emily Ann."

"Carl, I'm all packed," she said. "As I mentioned, if you'd called two minutes later, I'd be gone. What kind of personal things, Carl?"

"Not over the phone," I said. "You asked me to trust you once, remember. Well, I did, and I'm leaving. Now, won't you trust me, and at least have a drink with me?" I warned myself not to lay the lies on too thick. Emily Ann was no fool.

"Well, I don't know," she said. "Okay, just a drink. Nothing, you know, physical."

I laughed. "Giving it up for lent?"

Her voice changed. "Maybe for longer, Carl," she said. She forced a laugh. "Maybe from now on, I want to look like Socrates and be liked for my brains or something and not, well, you know. Just one drink now. How about the same place, down on the highway to the Gulf? I'll be heading out of town that way."

I said I'd meet her in half an hour, and hung up.

I got there in less than half an hour, but Emily Ann was late. So late I thought she'd decided not to come, and called her house without reaching her. I was having my third drink and worrying about what in the hell to do when she walked out onto the terrace.

Emily Ann was dressed in a sleeveless, high-neck pink linen dress, and I had forgotten the true magnificence of the gigantic breasts that shoved proudly upward against the thin pink material. The dress was short, and her slim legs were sleek in stockings. She wore the large shades, and a faint breeze from the water rustled her hair.

"Sorry I'm late," she said, as she sank down onto a chair. She perched on the edge and smiled quickly, glanced around, smiled again. She was a nervous wreck.

"I had about given you up," I said, and looked from the breasts at the child's face beneath those absurd glasses. "A Singapore Sling, I seem to remember."

She laughed. "Seem to remember, hell, Carl," she snapped. "Have you calculated how many it will take to get me drunk? It might actually surprise you."

I called the waiter and ordered her drink. As I turned back, she pulled the glasses off, and revealed a swollen, black eye.

"Christ, what happened Emily Ann?" I asked.

"Wouldn't you suspect somebody hit me in the eye?" she said. "I could he and say I walked into a door, but that would be silly and you wouldn't believe me."

"Okay, then who hit you, and why?" I asked.

She sat back in the chair, twirled the glasses by their frames, sat up, tugged her dress down at the hem. "It's not important," she said finally, and put the glasses on. "I left a couple of marks myself."

"The fights I've seen involving women were always nastier than those with men," I said.

"Oh, come on, Carl," she said. "Stop that kind of thing. I know perfectly well you said that so you could find out if I had a fight with one of the girls. Okay. I had a fight with one of the girls. I'm not going to talk about it. Now shall we go through the facade of those important and personal things you had to tell me, so you can start plying me with Singapore Slings and trying to pump me."

The waiter brought the drink. She took one quick sip, then sat back and crossed her legs and her pink dress was pulled high on her slim thighs.

"Okay, no games, Emily Ann," I said. "Just tell me. Why did you come if you knew that's what I wanted?"

"Why not come?" she countered and smiled on the corners of her lips. "I did want to see you again. Are you really leaving? You're not, are you? Carl, please, please leave. Now, right now. I'd do anything to get you out of town before, well, to get you away."

"Before what?" I asked and leaned forward. "And why are you running away, baby? Are things going to get rough, and you can't stand it? Is something supposed to happen to me?"

She picked up the tall, frosting glass in both hands and took a deep swallow through the red and white straw. "No, Carl, not to you," she said. "Nothing bad, that is. I just don't want you here. Oh, Lord, it's too late now, and you're too stubborn to take a threat."

"So you put that fat deputy up to threatening me?" I asked.

She shook her head up and down. "That I confess," she said. "He used to work for my uncle. I just wanted to get you out of town. I wouldn't have really let him arrest you, or anything like that."

"Well, I'm not going," I said, and saw that she was sipping her drink again, in short, nervous sips. I signalled the waiter.

"Well, I am," she said. "And you'll think a lot less of me after what's going to happen. I did so much want you to like me, just a little."

I ordered another, and was relieved that Emily Ann didn't protest. The sun was getting hot now, but the wind breeze stronger from the water, and the humidity was not too bad so far.

"I like you a lot," I said. "And that's no put-on. I liked you more than I wanted to, because I thought what you said and the kind of things you were involved in were pretty damn terrible. You played those absurd sex games, all right, that's your bag, baby, and you were a part to some of that torment of Jamie and I could never forgive you for that, even if you had a small part. And you helped frame an innocent man and you stood out there on the Conway's terrace giggling while he was electrocuted."

"How dare you talk to me that way," she said, and shoved her chair back. "If you think for a minute. . . "

The waiter brought the drinks and she suddenly shook her head, settled back and took a long, very unlady-like sip through the straw.

"I sound like a fool at times," she said. "I guess most of the time, really. Such a short time ago, though, I really believed everything I spouted. It made sense, our sex games, as you call them. At least to me. And I really did think we were something special. I mean, everyone had always told us we were and all, and when I studied philosophy, I seemed to find justification.. . .

I glanced at my watch. The sun was murderous, and I shifted my chair to get the shade of a palm tree.

I let Emily Ann ramble on, and she had another Singapore Sling. She was right. I was surprised at her capacity. I was also getting worried because it was nearly eleven-thirty.

Finally, I had to interrupt. "Baby, what's going to happen?" I asked, and put my hand over hers. "You're a decent girl, Emily Ann. You can't just have a fight and run away from something horrible, when you can prevent it."

"A decent girl and a philosopher," she said. "And expert at being had by men between my breasts. It's been a full life. And yes, I wouldn't want to forget the night I giggled and blushed and pampered Millie and that man died."

She was fairly drunk now, and she squeezed my hand, and I moved my chair next to hers.

"Which one hit you?" I asked, and took the shades off.

"Little Millie hit me, because of some very uncomplimentary things I said about her," she said. "She's very sorry she hit me, because Millie can't stand to be touched, to be hurt even slightly, she not only has a black eye, but a welt on the cheek and several strands of hair missing."

I glanced at my watch. Noon. I took a quick sip of my drink, and my pulse quickened. "And why did you have the fight?"

"I told you," she said. "She didn't like the things I said. Oh, you want the details. I see. The breakup of the vestal virgins. Carl, I don't approve of many things my friends do, or of what is going to happen. But they are my friends and I have a loyalty to them, and I am somewhat involved myself."

"Dammit, what's going to happen?" I asked, and brushed sweat from my forehead. I realized that I should have told Jamie where I would be so she could call me, if necessary. Then I had a sudden fear that in worrying about her father, I had forgotten possible danger to her.

"Emily Ann, what about Jamie?" I asked. "Do you girls have something planned for her, as well as her father? So help me. . . .

She pulled her hand from mine. "Don't threaten me," she said. "Carl, please don't threaten me. No. Nothing is going to happen to her. Did it ever occur to you that despite how you feel about her, that lots of people don't like her? I don't. I guess it's not much justification for what happened, but she was a pretty snooty girl to me for a long time, and she loved those sex games, after a while, Carl. She couldn't get enough, and she seemed to actually enjoy. . . . "

"I'm aware of that, baby," I said. "And I can understand your feeling about Jamie. All right, I'm not asking that you like her. But to hurt her, and her father, to humiliate them, or God knows what else you've planned, that's no good, Emily Ann. There's no justification for that."

"Okay, forget Jamie," she said. "What about her father? Is it right for a man to come into a town and get wealthy and be as arrogant and as ruthless as he was? To completely disregard ways people have been doing things here for a long time? Carl, he was so ruthless with my father, hurt him so much, with all kinds of shady, underhanded business dealings. You don't know my father. He's very gentle. He-likes to hunt and fish and he raises flowers as a hobby. He comes from another era and he's a good enough businessman, but he believes there are rules and there are some things a man doesn't do, and.. . . "

"Christ, I'm not defending Jamie's father," I said. "I know he's a son-of-a-bitch, Emily Ann. But your father is right. There are things you don't do. You don't, for example, let innocent men die in the electric chair." I caught my breath and finished my drink. I had to stop this talk and find out something. It was nearly one now.

"It's going to kill Daddy when all this mess gets out," she said. "But, Carl, we just couldn't let Jamie's daddy get away with this freeway deal. My father alone has a fortune tied up in land. This could ruin him. And that Ron Meadows. He goes out with us, begs us, whines, God knows, he's disgusting, but nothing will change his mind. He has a monomania. Peggy Sue threatened to tell the town every degrading thing he did with her, and with all the other girls."

"That's no threat," I said. "She'd be exposing herself, and he knows it."

"It's more of a threat than you think," Emily Ann said. "Her father will go bankrupt if he loses this freeway deal. No more University, no more sports cars, no trip to Europe."

"Okay, and he still wouldn't back down," I said. "So what in the hell did you decide?"

She sniffled and I was afraid she would start crying. "Don't say 'you,'" she said, nearly begging. "I was against it. And so was Kerry. But the other girls insisted. Oh, Carl, I don't believe I'm caught up in all this. At first, we just wanted to humiliate Jamie. And then her father. He would swagger around town and be so high and mighty, and then he'd go out and beg one of us to make love. I just couldn't stand him, the way he whined and offered to do anything, to revel in degradation, and then the next day be just as arrogant as before. Oh, we realized that what were just kicks might be useful somehow. And then this freeway thing came up and we found out just how much our families had invested in it, which was just about everything."

I stood up. "Emily Ann, it's a quarter after one. You can't stall any longer. I'm asking you, begging you, to tell me." I cursed myself for having spent so long with her, for not having called Jamie. Surely, though she would have found some way to keep her father from meeting Peggy Sue.

Emily Ann took a sip of her drink, hesitated, then stood up, but none too steadily.

"I told Millie last night I wished that guy had strangled her, instead of just slapping her and hitting her a little after she teased him so much," she said, and nibbled her lower lip and avoided my eyes. "That is all that happened, but Millie flew off the handle and yelled rape and couldn't back down and I went right along with it and yes, I did stand out there and giggle, but it won't happen this time, Carl. I don't care if I do have to betray them and my family finds out everything. You should have figured it out, Carl."

She stepped to me, put her hand on my cheek, her breasts mashing against my chest. Then she bolted back, and sniffled again.

"Peggy Sue is going out with Ron Meadows this afternoon, and she is going to yell rape, Carl," Emily Ann said. "Just like Millie. With feeling in town the way it is about him, well, you can imagine the reaction. If necessary, Sandy and Julie will back up Peggy Sue, and say they had trouble with him, but kept quiet."

"My God," I gasped. "I should have figured it out. Where in the hell are they going?"

"They usually go to my fishing camp, though I don't know about today, since I had that fight with Millie and all."

I pivoted, but she called me and I stopped. "Baby, I can't talk now. Thank you for telling me, but it should have been a couple of hours ago."

She jerked the glasses off, her innocent, young face distorted by the horrible black eye. "If you don't hate me too much," she called, as I turned and walked quickly toward the building. "Don't hate me too much." Her voice was breaking. "Please call me and at least talk to me and Carl, please, please be the first man I go all the way with."

I didn't answer, but sprinted into the building and looked for a phone. There was only one, where a fat woman in a flowered dress was talking and giggling.

I tapped her arm and told her I had an emergency call to make. She looked around, frowned, nodded, then talked another few seconds, laughed once and hung up. She stepped back but paused, as though by giving up the phone she had earned the right to learn of the emergency. My look sent her away quickly.

I fumbled for a dime, my heart racing, and dialed Jamie's house. The damn line was busy.

I cursed, dropped the receiver into the hook. Paused. Dialed again. Still busy. I should have known this, have known the girls would resort to this again, but what worried me now was less a rape charge against Jamie's father, which could be disputed, than what her father's reaction might be if Peggy Sue were stupid enough to tell him what she was going to do.

I tried again. Busy. I glanced at my watch. My heart raced. It was one-thirty. I was calculating whether to make a dash for Jamie's house, or to stand here and keep calling, when I heard someone behind me. I glanced over my shoulder. Emily Ann stood there.

"Busy?" she asked.

I nodded. "Look, baby, would Peggy Sue be stupid enough to get Jamie's father out and taunt him and let him know what was going to happen? God knows what his reaction would be. Not even that he might go to the chair, but that with the meeting tonight, he would surely lose the freeway route. He's such a madman about that, he might snap. Even if he didn't give a damn about the town's knowledge of his sexual quirks, or even if he felt he could beat the rape charge, he'd know right then he'd lost the freeway fight."

"My Lord, I'm sure Peggy Sue wouldn't pass up the chance to rub it in," Emily Ann said. "We hadn't even thought of that, Carl. That scares me. That man is capable of anything."

I tried again and the line was still busy.

"Give me the dime," Emily Aim said, and

I held out her hand. "You get there as fast as you can, and I'll keep trying to call."

"Thanks," I said, and put the dime in her hand, closed the fingers into a fist. I squeezed hard and she stepped against me and brushed my cheek with her lips.

She smiled at the sudden stirring between my thighs. But she quickly moved back. "You get going," she said, as she dropped the dime into the phone and started dialing. "But if you can, if you want to, sometime make love to me just one time-the way you'd make love to a real woman."

"Sure, Emily Ann, I'd like that," I said, and I was not lying, though I knew it was impossible.

I was intercepted by the rather irate waiter, had to waste a couple of minutes settling the bill, then ran out to the car. The handle was burning, and the inside of the car was like an oven. I switched on the engine and the tires spun as I lurched onto the highway. The back of the seat was so hot I had to sit up straight, but that was all right, because I was too tensed up to relax at all-tensed not only by the race against time, but by the touch of Emily Ann's breasts, and the thought of what it would be like to take her virginity. A pleasure I would have to pass up, I muttered grimly as I pumped down on the accelerator and passed a truck. Another. Two cars. I brushed sweat from my forehead.

My heart was pumping and my stomach knotted, and I pushed the car faster and had the idiotic idea that this was all for the benefit of a man and girl I disliked intensely.