Despite the fact that he was always short of money, he could get to bed with any of the show girls working in the hotel with romantic sweet talk. If she held out, he might pull his fur coat routine.
It was slick. He would bring her to a fur shop farther down the Strip. The owner was a friend of his, but the girl didn’t know this. Cully would have the owner show the girl his stock of furs, in fact, have the guy lay all the pelts out on the floor so that he and the girl could pick out the finest. After they made the selection, the furrier would measure the girl and tell her the coat would be ready in two weeks. Then Cully would write out a check for a thousand dollars as a down payment and tell the owner to send him the bill. He’d give the girl the receipt.
That night Cully would take the girl out to dinner and after dinner he’d let her bet a few bucks on roulette, then take her to his room where, as he said, she had to come across because she had the receipt in her pocketbook. Since Cully was so madly in love with her, how could she not? Just the fur coat might not do it. Just Cully’s being in love might not do it. But put both of them together and, as Cully explained, you had an ego-greed parlay that was a winner every time.
Of course, the girl never got the fur coat. During the two-week love affair, Cully would pick a fight and they’d break up. And Cully said, not once, never, not one time, had the girl given him back the receipt for the fur coat. In every case she rushed down to the fur store and tried to collect the deposit or even the coat. But of course, the owner blandly told all of them that Cully had already picked up his deposit and canceled the order. His payoff was some of Cully’s rejects.
Cully had another trick for the soft hookers in the chorus line. He would have a drink with them a few nights in a row, listen attentively to their troubles and be enormously sympathetic. Never making a bad move or a come-on. Then maybe on the third night he would take out a hundred-dollar bill in front of them, put it in an envelope and put the envelope into the inside pocket of his jacket. Then he would say, “Listen, I don’t usually do this, but I really like you. Let’s get comfortable in my room and I’ll give you this cab fare home.”
The girl would protest a little. She wanted that C note. But she didn’t want to be thought a hooker. Cully would turn on the charm. “Listen,” he would say, “it’s gonna be late when you leave. Why should you pay cab fare home? That’s the least I can do. And I really like you. What’s the harm?” Then he would take out the envelope and give it to her, and she would slip it into her purse. He would immediately escort her to his room and screw her for hours before he let her go home. Then came, he said, the funny part. The girl, on her way down in the elevator, would rip open the envelope for her C note and find a ten-dollar bill. Because naturally, Cully had had two envelopes inside his jacket.
Very often the girl would ride the elevator back up and start hammering on Cully’s door. He would go into the bathroom and run a tub to drown out the noise, shave leisurely and wait for her to go away. Or, if she were shyer and less experienced, she would call him from the lobby phone and explain that maybe he had made a mistake, that there was only a ten-dollar bill in the envelope.
Cully loved this. He’d say, “Yeah, right. What can cab fare be, two, three dollars? But I just wanted to make sure, so I gave you ten.”
The girl would say, “I saw you put a hundred dollars in the envelope.”
Cully would get indignant. “A hundred bucks for cab fare,” he’d say. “What the hell are you, a goddamn hooker? I never paid a hooker in my life. Listen, I thought you were a nice girl. I really liked you. Now you pull this shit. Listen, don’t call me anymore.” Or sometimes, if he thought he could get away with it, he’d say, “Oh no, sweetheart. You’re mistaken.” And he’d con her for another shot. Some girls believed it was an honest mistake, or as Cully was smart enough to point out, they had to make believe that they had made a mistake not to look foolish. Some even made another date to prove they weren’t hookers, that they hadn’t gone to bed with him for the hundred dollars.
And yet this was not to save money, Cully gambled his money away. It was the feeling of power, that he could “move” a beautiful girl. He was especially challenged if a girl had a reputation for only putting out for guys she really liked.
If the girls were really straight, Cully got a little more complicated. He would try to get into their heads, pay them extravagant compliments. Complain about his own inability to get sexually aroused unless he had a real interest in or real knowledge of the girl. He would send them little presents, give them twenty-dollar bills for carfare. But still, some smart girls wouldn’t let him get his foot in the door. Then he would switch them. He would start talking about a friend of his, a wealthy man who was the best guy in the world. Who took care of girls out of friendship, they didn’t even have to come across. This friend would join them for a drink and it would really by friend of Cully’s, usually a gambler with a big dress business in New York or an auto agency in Chicago. Cully would talk the girl into going to dinner with his friend, the friend being well briefed. The girl had nothing to lose. A free dinner with a likable, wealthy man.
They would have dinner. The man would lay a couple of hundreds on her or send an expensive gift to her the next day. The man would be charming all the way, never pressing. But there were portents of fur coats, automobiles, diamond rings of many karats perceived in the future. The girl would go to bed with the rich friend. And after the rich friend moved on, the beautiful girl who could not be “moved” would fail into Cully’s lap for carfare.
Cully had no remorse. His position was that women not married were all soft hustlers, out to hook you with one gimmick or another, including true love, and that you were within your rights to hustle them back. The only time he showed a little pity was when the girls didn’t hammer on his door or call him from the lobby. He knew then that the girls were straight, humiliated that they had been tricked. Sometimes he would look them up and if they needed money for rent or to get through the month he would tell them it had been a joke and he would slip them a hundred or two.
And for Cully it was a joke. Something to tell his fellow thieves and hustlers and gamblers. They would all laugh and congratulate him on not getting robbed. These hustlers were all keenly aware of women as an enemy, true, an enemy that had fruits necessary to men, but they were indignant about paying a stickup price, which meant money, time and affection. They needed the company of women, they needed the softness of women around them. They would pay air fare in the thousands to take girls with them from Vegas to London just to have them around. But that was OK. After all, the poor kid had to pack and travel. She was earning the money. And she had to be ready at all times for a quick screw or a before-lunch blow job without preamble or the usual courtesies. No hassles. Above all, no hassles. Here was the cock. Take care of it. Never mind do you love me. Never mind let’s eat first. Never mind I want to sightsee first. Never mind a little nap, later, not now, tonight, next week, the day after Christmas. Right now. Quick service all the way down the line. Big gamblers, they wanted first class.
Cully’s wooing seemed, to me, profoundly malicious, but women like him a hell of a lot better than other men. It seemed as if they understood him, saw through all his tricks but were pleased that he went to all that trouble. Some of the girls he tricked became good friends, always ready to screw him if he felt lonely. And Jesus, once he got sick, and there was a whole regiment of floozy Nightingales passing through his hotel room, washing him, feeding him and, as they tucked him in, blowing him to make sure he was relaxed enough to get a good night’s sleep. Rarely did Cully get angry with a girl, and then he would say with a really deadly loud contempt,