“What was that?”
“He stood up. There was this end table beside the chair —- just the right height. He put it down on the end table and it was immense. Honestly, Steve, you can’t imagine -”
“When I laid that thing on old Joe’s bar/ I’ll sw’ar it stretched from that to thar,” I quoted.
“Exactly! Only farther. Anyway, then he reached over and unbuttoned the front of my dress and pushed it down. He pushed my bra down, too. Then he took both his hands with the fingers sort of formed into two sets of pincers, and, using just the tips, he squeezed my nipples. He squeezed very hard, and I let out a yell. He liked that, the bastard! He said why didn’t I fight back, and he took time out to show me what he meant. He wanted me to slain my fist down on that monster of his on the end table. Well, when he pinched the tips of my breasts again, I did it, all right. I pounded it with a vengeance.”
“Ouch!” I couldn’t help empathizing.
“He kept pinching—a sort of delicate, exquisite torture—and I kept hitting it as hard as I could, over and over again. That really got to him. He went at me with his teeth then. Just nibbling the tips, but with sharp pressure so that it really hurt. I actually became afraid he’d bite them off. But I was mad, too. I guess I sort of got carried away with the situation despite myself. I began clawing him, really gouging with all five fingers.”
“You mean his—?”
“Yep! I really ripped away at it.”
“Phew! ” I shuddered. “Didn’t that cure his lust? ”
“On the contrary, if anything it got to him even more. He made me beat a tattoo on it with both hands then. I hit it as hard as I could, but still he kept insisting I hit harder. Finally, he grabbed me here”—Hortense pointed —“with all five fingers, and almost turned me inside out. I yelled and came down on it with all my might. That did it. The result was all over the wall on the other side of the room.
“You mean the two of you didn’t--?”
“Nope. He didn’t want sex. He wanted it beaten out of him. And once I’d obliged, he seemed to just lose interest in me completely. He was so brusque he was positively rude when he took me back to rejoin the others.”
“Was I there?”
“Of course you were, darling. And you were so sympathetic and tender. I’ll never forget it. You made me feel like a little girl who’d hurt herself instead of a professional whore. Of course, you did ask a lot of questions. But then y0u’re always asking questions. You are the darnedest man that way. I swear, darling, if I didn’t love you so much, I’d really be annoyed.”
“What sort of questions did I ask?”
“There you go again!”
“Please, Hortense. It’s important.”
“I don’t see why. After all, you asked them. I don’t understand why you want me to tell you what you said to me. It’s silly!”
“Please.”
“Oh, all right. Earlier you’d asked me to pump him about a couple named Cromwell, or a girl named Carrie. Now you wanted to know what I’d found out.”
“And what had you found out?”
“Nothing. Only that Von Koerner said he knew the girl. That was all.”
“That’s enough.”
“That’s what you said last night. And I still don’t know what you mean.”
“Forget it.”
“I don’t know.” Hortense was suspicious. “Who is this Carrie Cromwell anyway? You carrying a torch for her or something? You kept trying to pump Barry and Elsa about her, too.”
“Did I get anywhere?” I ignored Hortense’s jealousy.
“Only that we’re going back with them to Von Koerner’s again in a few days because maybe she’ll be there.”
I decided that was one event in which my Russian double wasn’t going to sub for me. “What else happened at Von Koerner’s?” I asked aloud.
“Nothing. You went into a huddle with that Gretchen for a minute, which I didn’t like, and then we left.”
“With Elsa and Barry?"
“No. We took a cab by ourselves to my place. Some ride!” She giggled. “You were all over me. But you kept asking all those questions between every kiss. I guess I’ll have to get used to that. Everybody has his idiosyncrasies.”
“I’ll just bet I asked questions,” I mused. “What did we do then?”
“Now don’t tell me you don’t remember that!” Hortense actually blushed—no mean feat, considering how blush-proof her career should have made her.
“Oh, sure. It was great.” I glossed over it.
“That it was. But over too soon. Why did you have to rush away that way?”
“Didn’t I say why?”
“A business appointment, you said. But in the middle of the night?”
“That’s the kind of business I’m in.”
“Well, it wasn’t very flattering. But I must admit I was on Cloud Nine, so I guess I didn’t mind too much. I didn’t mind anything after what you said to me just before you left.”
“What did I say?” I asked automatically.
“Oh, please, Steve! Ask me all the ridiculous questions you want about last night, but don’t tell me you forgot that. Oh, you couldn’t have! After you said my past didn't matter and everything. After you made me believe how wonderful it could be. And you said we’d do it day after tomorrow. Remember?”
“Do what day after tomorrow?”
“Get married!” she wailed. “You asked me to marry you and I accepted. You couldn’t forget a thing like that, Steve!”
“Get married?” I was dazed.
“You even told me to wire my mother to come for the wedding.”
“Get married?”
“Yes, darling. Oh, you’re just still half-asleep, that’s all. I’m going to make you such a good wife! But right now I’m going to run out and buy some things for the wedding. A white bridal dress and a black nightgown. How does that sound, darling?”
“Get married?”
“Call me later.” Hortense blew me a kiss and she was gone.
Get married? If I ever got my hands on that sadistic, traitorous, atrocity-committing Russian “pre-vert,” I’d— Some place in the back of my mind, a funeral organ played a Volgalike version of Lohengrin in dirge-time.
Married!!!
chapter SEVEN
“Rape?”
“Rape!” I repeated wearily.
“Now see here, Mr. Victor, this is too much!” Putnam’s voice crackled in the telephone receiver like a sputtering fuse about to explode.
“It’s not my fault.”
The cop standing beside me at the precinct desk snorted.
“It’s never your fault. First murder, then assault, then another murder after I expressly warned you how important Hajstrom was, and now this!”
“I’d been meaning to give you a ring and explain about about that Hajstrom business, but--”
“Explain! I suppose you’re going to tell me you didn’t kill him, either!”
“I didn’t.”
“Then who did? Your twin brother?”
“You’re getting warm.”
“I can see where it’s pretty handy having a double to blame for everything, Mr. Victor. I suppose this rape business is his fault, too.”
“Well, in a way it is.”
“I’ll just bet! And tell me, Mr. Victor, just who is your victim this time?”
“Well, she’s not exactly a victim. And certainly not mine. It’s Helen Quentin’s sister, Patricia.”
“That little girl!”
I looked at Patricia powdering her nose on the other side of the police station. Her sweater was torn and one of her upthrust adolescent breasts seemed about to spring free of it. What was left of her short-shorts stretched tight over her buttocks, and she smiled smugly into the mirror of the compact as she caught one of the cops eyeing her. “She’s not such a little girl,” I told Putnam.