Chapter 7
"Clarence! What are you doing?" came an unexpected shriek behind him, and Mr. Clarence Johnson, Chairman of the Central Church Committee on the Fine Arts, straightened up quickly, banging his head against the window frame as he tried to conceal the fact that he had been looking lecherously into the Caruther's backyard. But Mrs. Johnson, a stout horse-faced woman in her early fifties, bustled angrily past him, ignoring his howls of pain as the chairman held his hurting head, and looked out the window herself, confirming her worse suspicions.
"Ah ha!" she proclaimed theatrically. "So this is what you've been up to all this time!" She picked up the binoculars she had given her husband last Christmas for bird watching and waved them menacingly in his face. "So you've been spying on that shameless hussy next door!"
"No...no, dearest, I assure you," struggled Clarence Johnson, his head still smarting from its brusque encounter with the window frame.
"There was a double breasted.. . I mean a speckled breasted blue jay on the Caruthers' garage and I was observing it.. . "
"Of course you were," the old battle-axe replied sarcastically. "The only thing with breasts I see down there is our neighbor's wife, and what a good man like Allen Caruthers sees in her I'll never know!"
Mr. Johnson, having observed the subject carefully with his binoculars knew exactly what his neighbor had seen in the young lady, particularly since Joan had recently gotten in the habit of removing the top of her bathing suit while she lounged in the mid-afternoon by the side of their pool. She must know that she could be observed from the bedroom window of the Johnson's home, and yet she did it anyway apparently not caring whether anyone saw her or not.
"Hmmmmmph! Lying half-naked around in the yard," stormed the irritated society woman indignantly. "I've got half a mind to speak to Mr. Caruthers about it. I'm sure he has no idea how his young wife behaves herself while he's away at the office. I don't forecast much of a future for that marriage, Clarence. A man must never marry beneath his class!"
"I don't see any evidence that Mrs. Caruthers misbehaves," offered the humiliated husband meekly, the pain in his head starting to disappear. "I hadn't noticed that she was not completely dressed, but then it's her own backyard and no one can see her."
"No one but you, of course!" snapped his wife sharply. "Clarence, I'll never understand you men, always ready to have the wool pulled over your eyes by any young thing with a pretty body...."
"She does have a nice build now that you mention it," Clarence agreed, stealing a glance over his shoulder at the young wife who continued to relax under the warming rays of the autumn sun, unaware of the commotion her splendid young body was causing.
"Clarence, stop looking!" snapped the wife. "A 'nice build' indeed. Cheap, I would call it, like everything else about that girl. Cheap. Cheap. Cheap!I For one thing, she's top-heavy and no respectable woman has a bosom that big! She has low-class written all over her in big letters. Even when she entertains, you can tell that Allen has done a very poor job of educating her, although you must give the poor man credit for trying."
"Well dear, I think she does very well considering her origins.. . "
"It's not quite good enough! You can tell that she was once a barmaid and God knows what else every time she entertains. She has that barmaid way of handling glasses. You can always tell a member of the lower classes when they try to be something they're not. I shudder to think of having to have her here in our house as a guest, but I suppose one does have obligations to one's neighbors."
"Yes...obligations to one's neighbors...." mumbled Clarence Johnson, putting his binoculars back in the case where he could find them tomorrow when his wife would go out to a Church meeting and Mrs. Caruthers would take her sun bath.
"Now Clarence, promise me you'll never spy on that worthless cheap thing again."
"Yes, dear," Clarence said humbly, hoping that tomorrow would be a good clear day for sun bathing.
Joan Caruthers knew perfectly well that old Mr. Johnson spent a certain amount of time each day watching her through his binoculars, but the idea failed to upset the young woman. A lot of water had passed under the bridge this summer, and she was no longer quite as shy about exposing her body as she had once been. She liked sun bathing topless, and if Mr. Johnson enjoyed looking, then they were both happy. Mischievously, she thought about coming out the next day stark naked under her bathrobe and giving the old phony a heart attack.
In the meanwhile, however, she felt happy and comfortable. The summer had not gone badly, although there were still some unresolved problems she would have to deal with in the future. Allen's business negotiations in Saint Louis were going well and he was happy, despite the fact that he had to spend so much of his time away from home in the company of the disagreeable Mr. Tompkins. But Allen's absence from the house made things much easier for her. When he was gone she did not need to invent excuses to go to Split's parties or spend an afternoon window shopping with Liza. It was nice to have a girl friend again, and the two of them enjoyed their days together. And then there were the parties . . .
She still felt guilty about the parties, even though she had already attended six of them over the summer and still had to attend two more in order to gain possession of all the incriminating photographs Lynch had taken of her on that first disastrous night. But somehow, relations between herself and the two men had softened, and she now genuinely enjoyed being with them, despite the fact that they were gently blackmailing her. Split had offered to share the proceeds from his parties with her, and she had finally accepted after three or four parties had taken place, finding the money useful for buying little things for herself which Allen might not approve of. But the big question mark still loomed in the future: What would happen when she had earned back all of her pictures? Could she possibly now go back to being the sweet little housewife in the suburbs? All summer long she had plunged herself jubilantly into the most degenerate orgies Split's inventive mind could design. It had been difficult at first, but now she clearly had to face the fact that her evenings at Jack Lynch's studio were bringing the only life and fun into an otherwise drab existence. Could she give it all up now?
These days Alien was far too tied up with his merger to pay much attention to her, but sooner or later, he would catch on to the fact that she was leading a double life. And then she would be out on the street, and her husband's lawyers would make sure that she stayed there. But there was something even deeper bothering her. Could she go on like this, a whore on the inside and a respectable lady on the outside? She had married Allen and moved away from the area around the train station with the idea of making something of her life, not wanting to finish her days like her mother, a drunken old slut who slept with anyone and everyone. She had to break free of Split and Lynch and Liza no matter how much she liked them or she would be following a trail which led nowhere but down! There were two more parties to do to win her freedom. She would do them and that would be all! Perhaps she would go shopping with Liza once in awhile just for old time's sake, but there would be no more drunken parties and gangbangs in which she pretended to be an actress from the West Coast for the benefit of some perverted, depraved man she had never seen before. It was immoral and dishonest!
Bt the phone was ringing and she collected her wits quickly, holding a towel over her breasts as she dashed into the house. It was time to stop daydreaming anyway. Allen would be home for work shortly, and he liked to find her properly dressed for dinner.
"Hello?"
"Hi, baby, this is Split."
"How are you? Are we still set for tonight?"
"Yeah, everything's ready, honey. Your hubby going outa town?"
"Right. He should be home any minute now to eat and pack. I'll drop him at the airport and come right over."
There was a moment's pause while Joan wondered why Split had bothered to call. Had something gone wrong, she would have taken the initiative to call him, and furthermore this party had been scheduled for weeks.
"Listen, baby, this is kind of a special party tonight...a lot of important people coming...Jack and I are trying to make it something sensational."
"So? What do I do, stand on my head?" she joked with him, wondering what he was working his up to.
"No, not exactly, look, I was just wondering if you'd like to get those last two pictures taken care of in one night? We've got kind of an act worked up and if you wanna participate, I'll tell Jack to give you back both of the negatives, and we'll be even."
"What do I have to do?" the young wife asked suspiciously, worrying that Allen might arrive any minute and overhear her end of this strange conversation.
"Well, it's better if I don't tell you, baby, because if it's a surprise you'll react better. Kind of a happening, if you know what I mean."
"Is it going to hurt?"
"No, love, you know we'd never hurt you."
She thought for a long minute. Split was obviously not going to come up with any more information than this, and she believed that he was sincere when he said that the "entertainment" would not hurt, but still she was doubtful. To promise to participate in something unknown sounded risky and yet. . . with those two negatives in her pocket she was free.
"Okay," she agreed reluctantly. "If this is going to be my last night, we might as well finish up with a bang."
"I hope this isn't going to be our last night," said Split seriously.
"What do you mean?" she shouted at him. "You promised! You swore up and down that if I.. . "
"Calm down, baby, calm down. Old Split keeps his promises. If you want this to be our last night, then that's the way it'll be. But there's some money to be made in this business, and I could get you a lot of work, honey, a lot of real work! Not only parties, but big money-makers. We could do some pictures of you, you know the kind I mean. If you only knew how many times guys have asked me to line up a weekend with you! They're willing to pay top dollar for someone like you, baby, and I only take ten percent."
"I know, I know, Split," she agreed wearily. "But I can't get involved in games like that and still live out here with Allen. My whole life has changed, Split, and everything's different now. I can't go back."
"Baby, I'm an organizer and not one of them skull doctors, but I can't see how a swinger like you is ever gonna be happy out there. I know what kinda people they are because I've arranged stuff for 'em, more than anyone's gonna ever admit. Don't they piss all over you? Don't they snob you and make you feel bad? I know they do 'cause that's the way those people treat a girl that didn't go to one of them proper dame's finishing schools. They don't want real broads out there, Joan, they want store-front models. That's why they all marry those skinny, flat chested dames! You don't belong out there, baby, you belong in here with us. Downtown you can be the queen. Out there you're shit, and you'll always be shit!"
"Split, here comes Allen! I'll talk to you tonight!" Hearing her husband's car pull into the alleyway, she quickly hung up.
"Who was on the phone?" inquired Allen curiously, evidently a little surprised at finding his wife standing in the hallway dressed only in the bottoms of her bikini and a towel draped around her breasts.
"Oh, one of those people who try to sell you encyclopedias," she bed quickly. "They can be so hard to get rid of and he called just as I was changing my clothes. Would you like a drink, dear? You look tired."
"Sounds good. Let me take a shower while you mix up a couple of martinis."
Joan followed his instructions, mixing up a pitcher of martinis and helping herself to one while Allen stripped in the bedroom and took his shower. Wow, that was close, she told herself, sprawled on the bed while she waited for her husband to join her. I wonder what Split's got up his sleeve for tonight that he can't tell me about.
Just thinking about what was likely to happen later that evening was a little exciting, and Joan finished her martini and started on a second one, feeling the alcohol warm her up all over. She decided the towel was a waste of effort in the privacy of her own bedroom and threw it into the corner. Maybe Allen would like a little good-by present. After all, he was going to be gone for the better part of a week . . .
Allen came out of the shower naked, perhaps expecting that his wife would be waiting for him in the living room, and started a little when he found her watching him from the bed, only wearing the inadequate bottom of her bathing suit.
"Ah! There you are," he said awkwardly, a little embarrassed at being seen naked despite the fact that they had been married for over a year.
"That's right, here I am," she said with a saucy sexy lilt to her voice and she went over and took the towel from his hands, finishing the job of drying him off. Gradually she worked her way across his flat athlete's stomach and dropped to her knees in order to deal with his legs and thighs. The young businessman was obviously a little upset by her near-nakedness and the closeness of her face to his genitals, but apparently unsure whether he liked it or not. Joan had always been a little forward where sex was concerned, he reminded himself, but as long as no one else found out about it, there was no cause for alarm.
The young man jerked slightly as he felt his wife's hands touch his testicles and he looked down sharply to see what she was doing. The pretense that she was helping him to dry off was slowly disappearing, and the girl dropped the towel on the floor and reached up with both hands to cup his softly twitching genitals between her fingers.
"Thought you might like a little something before you went away," she crooned enticingly, puckering her lips to plant a moist kiss on his slowly hardening cock. "A week is a long time for a guy to go without some love."
"Well.. . " mumbled the businessman, a little surprised by the directness of her approach and more than a little stimulated by the kiss she had just placed on his penis. Allen's cock was slowly but surely growing to its maximum length and hardness and the tip of his slender instrument brushed past her moistly parted lips as it rose, causing the girl to giggle. Taking a deep breath, she bent forward and seized his cock gently between her softly ovaled lips, her tongue dancing across the delicate glans at the end.
"Oh...good heavens!" Caruthers groaned, not quite sure that this was the kind of sexual activity which was proper between man and wife. Wasn't this the sort of thing that whores were supposed to do to you? Where had Joan learned this depraved trick, anyway? But God, it was stimulating!
"Come on, baby," Joan murmured temptingly, her words distorted by the presence of her husband's eagerly throbbing penis between her lips. Now deciding to throw herself into this bizarre act, she tightened her lips around his rapidly growing cock and began to suck on him in earnest, pulling him farther and farther into her throat as she stroked his balls lightly with her fingers. It was a disagreeable thing to think about, but not really bad to do once you got the hang of it, thought Joan, and a man is so tempting when he first steps out of the shower, all fresh and clean. She had done this same perverted act for so many other men that it struck her as unfair that Allen should miss out on all the fun. After all he was her husband and she loved him even if he wasn't quite as good as most of the men she had gotten to know at Lynch's studio . . .
"No...no, dear, we really can't do a thing like this," he was protesting, his naturally tenor voice going even higher with tension as he carefully extracted his saliva-coated cock from her lips. "Let's get on the bed and do it the normal way."
Oh you jerk, she found herself thinking, flopping back on the bed, automatically spreading her legs as he climbed clumsily on top of her. There's men in this city who would pay me two hundred dollars for what you just turned down. You may know something about business, but as far as bed is concerned, you're going bankrupt! All right, have it your way. If you like the missionary position so much, go ahead and do your stuff!
Allen did, and it did not take long. Over-excited by what had just happened to him despite his disapproval, the young businessman stabbed inside of her with his long narrow cock, moving furiously backwards and forwards without any particular skill and ejaculated weakly into her unsatisfied womb a moment or two later before Joan had had a chance to get properly warmed up.
"Gee, that was wonderful," he raved as he promptly hopped off of her disappointed body. "Was it good for you too?"
"Oh terrific," she told him dully, her mind already moving ahead to the party that evening. "If those girls down in Saint Louis only knew, they'd be waiting at the airport."
"Ha, ha, but you won't tell them, will you, uh?" he laughed, believing in his colossal innocence that he had genuinely brought her some pleasure with this brief encounter. "Well, I guess I'd better get packed. Those airplanes don't wait for anyone, not even a stud like yours truly."
"Look Split, I think you ought to tell her!" insisted Liza, tears coming to her eyes as she argued with her boss. The curvaceous brunette knew she was not the brightest girl on earth, but she prided herself on being fair to her friends, and when her friends were in conflict she suffered tremendously.
"If we tell her it'll ruin everything!" put in Jack Lynch. "Look Liza, nobody's fonder of Joan than we are, but she's a lousy actress no matter what we tell the goons who come to these parties. If we explained in advance what was going to happen, she just wouldn't be able to behave naturally. She'd sit off in a corner biting her nails and getting stinking drunk and the show would be a disaster. We've got some heavy-paying customers coming in tonight to see this thing, and we can't take a chance on it going sour on us."
"I still think it's mean," pouted Liza, unconvinced. "Joan might get mad and not come back anymore. Then what would we do?"
"Oh we managed before Joan came along and we can manage if she decides to quit," philosophized Split moodily. "Fact is, that girl needs us worse than we need her. I worry about her out there in hick-land. She belongs here with her kind of people. She's never going to be happy living with that freaky businessman. It's just not in her blood. Hell, I remember her when she was a little girl and she was full of mischief even then."
"When is Homer due to come by?" wondered Lynch, lazily getting out of his seat to pour himself another drink.
"About nine o'clock. Look, try to keep Homer and Joan apart until things get going," warned Split worriedly. "If they get talking before the performance, Homer might not be able to keep his big mouth shut. And Liza, tonight Joan is your responsibility. You have to get her ready!"
"What do you mean get her ready? She's not going to be wearing much of anything."
"I mean psychologically ready. Jack'll give you some of those Mexican cigarettes that she likes and make sure she smokes as many as you can get into her mouth. And keep the whiskey flowing too. I want her stoned out of her mind before this little exhibition begins. Remember, this isn't going to be just another party. We're moving into the big leagues now and there's people coming in from all over the state. And stay off the pot yourself, Liza. All I need is to have you spinning off into space while I'm trying to get things organized. You can do your work sober."
"Okay, boss," the girl agreed reluctantly. "I just hope that Joan is speaking to us all after the night is over."
CALLING MR. CARUTHERS! CALLING MR. CARUTHERS!
The voice on the public address system at the airport was nearly covered with static and indistinct, but Allen finally understood that they were paging him and hurried to the information booth. His plane was due to depart in a matter of minutes, and he could only think that Joan had suffered an automobile accident on the road.
"I'm Caruthers," he said breathlessly, arriving at the booth.
"Urgent phone call for you, Mr. Caruthers," responded the pretty girl behind the counter as she handed him the receiver. "It's your office."
"Caruthers here."
"Allen? This is Jameson," came the voice of his boss and the president of his company. "Thank God I got hold of you before you left. Listen that nut is coming here!"
"What nut?" replied Allen, a little confused.
"Tompkins! We just got a call from his Saint Louis office saying that he wants to conclude the negotiations up here and have a night on the town to celebrate before signing the final papers. Stay right at the airport, because he should be coming in within the hour."
"Oh Christ," groaned the young businessman. "Does that mean I've got to go bar-hopping with him all night?"
"Not unless you'd rather not be Second Vice President of this corporation," Jameson reminded him stiffly. "That's part of every executive's job, Allen. I don't care what he wants, but keep the guy happy and out of jail until tomorrow morning. Once he signs those contracts you can spit in his eye for all I care. In fact, I might spit in his other eye. But tonight, he's the king and remember that it's all on the expense account. Don't spare the horses."
Exactly one hour and five minutes later, Tompkins was safely ensconced in the airport bar, while Allen was frantically calling his office. Unfortunately, Jameson had already left for the day, and he had to content himself with speaking to the assistant director of the art division, a man Allen had never thought particularly highly of. But at the moment, he was desperately in need of advice.
"Look, Thomas, I'm in a jam," he explained to the younger man, a disagreeable artist with a reputation for being a lecher and a womanizer. "And maybe you can give me some help. Have you been following the negotiations for the Tompkins merger?"
"Sure Allen, who hasn't? Boy, if we land that big fish there's pay raises for everyone. Hear they're going to make you a big shot, too. Congratulations."
"Yeah, but save the champagne until after we get the contract signed. At the moment the big fish in question is sitting in the bar getting fuelled up for a swinging night on the town. I guess his wife doesn't let him out of her sight very often, and when she does he wants to live it up in the big city."
"Well, no problem, Allen, take him around to some of the night clubs...lemmie see, they've got a hell of a good floor show over at the Rising Sun, and if he's in the mood for something a little heavier, you can always take him around to the concert at Symphony Hall."
"Thomas, you are not following me," groaned Allen Caruthers in desperation. "This man is a sexual monster. He wants to see something he calls a 'live-show'. Is that what I'm afraid it might be?"
"A live-show? Wow, he is a dirty old man," whistled Thomas in admiration. "I guess that's something you can't find in Saint Louis."
"The question is," said Allen through gritted teeth, controlling his irritation with difficulty, "can we find one here? I've heard about such things going on in Denmark and Hong Kong, but surely the police...."
"Oh the police like 'em as well as anybody else," replied the commercial artist cheerfully. "Don't worry, I'll make some phone calls and see if I can come up with something. On a Friday night there's gotta be one around somewhere. Where can I reach you if I make contact?"
"I'll call you. Right now I'm going to take him out to dinner."
"Make sure he doesn't eat the waitress, Allen," laughed the artist. "Dig you later."