“I also liked the way you took such special care of those two women.” She indicated the photos of the two mutilated corpses.
“You did?” This genuinely surprised Bush.
“Yes. Not everybody would have done that. Oh, I heard the dirty jokes some of the guys were telling about those poor women. It turned my stomach.” She indicated the turned area. Then she moved her hand up her body, accentuating the already clearly defined area of her breasts.
Bush felt sexual stirrings.
“But,” Agnes continued, “you protected them, even in death. I saw how you tended to them. Wouldn’t let anyone else handle them. Even fought for them! That’s when I really began to wonder about you, Arnie. I’ll bet you took good care of your mother, didn’t you? A woman can tell that sort of thing.”
“I didn’t know my mother,” Bush said flatly.
“Didn’t know your mother! You poor thing. And yet your heart can go out to these poor creatures who were so badly treated. So brutally murdered. All that and you didn’t even have a chance to know your own mother. You really are one in a million, Arnie Bush.” Agnes rose from the bed and moved just behind Arnold’s chair. She began to knead his shoulders.
Bush was thoroughly confused.
“They say you’re not married . . . that right?”
He nodded.
“Ever been married?”
He shook his head.
“Ever had a girl?”
He shrugged.
“Any girl’d be proud to have you for her fella, Arnie.”
He sat motionless.
She stopped kneading his shoulders. What was she doing? He could hear some sound but he couldn’t identify it.
Suddenly she stepped in front of him. She was only inches away. She had removed her dress, revealing a black lace bra and half-slip, and a lot of body. Agnes was proud of her body. She had reason to be.
“Well, Arnie?”
Bush gasped. He was immobilized. He didn’t know what to do. He was used to being in charge of things. This was one of those rare times when events seemed to be beyond his control. Obviously, the next move was up to him. But what? The evening had begun with his taking out a woman whom he reverenced as he would have the Blessed Mother. He had treated her, as far as he knew, as a gentleman should.
But there she stood, half-naked. Her dishabille was self-effected. It was a statement of some sort. The next move was up to him. The ball, as they say, was in his court. He should do something. But what?
He hit her.
Not as hard as he could, by any means. Just hard enough to topple her onto the bed.
Her eyes opened wide. She had not expected that. On the other hand, she was not displeased. This show of controlled violence excited her.
He leaped on the bed, straddling her. He grasped the bra at the point between her breasts and yanked. The clasp gave way with a small popping sound.
Everything was hers. Truth in advertising. No falsies, no padding, no artificial uplift. Her breasts were truly magnificent.
As soon as he saw her flesh, the erect nipples, the large dark aureole, he saw not Agnes Blondell but all the whores he’d grown up among. They never cared how little clothing they wore. Lolling around the parlor, frequently their breasts were exposed. No one seemed to care.
But Arnold Bush had cared.
The whores were the antithesis of the Blessed Virgin. They were “The Enemy.” But he couldn’t do anything to right their wrong. Not then—he had been just a child. But now!
“Arnie! Arnie! You’re hurting me! Stop! Arnie!”
He was fascinated by the white marks his fingers were making in her breasts. As he dug deeply into the unexpectedly firm flesh, the white marks quickly turned to red as bruises began to form.
“Arnie! Arnie!” Now she was frightened . . . terrified. This had gotten completely out of control and she didn’t know how to put a halt to it. She could not possibly combat his strength. She knew it was fruitless to scream; she remembered thinking as they entered the building that even if anyone else lived here there was no indication anyone else was home.
His hands slid up around her throat. They began to squeeze ever more tightly.
Agnes was losing consciousness. In a little while, she knew, she would be dead.
She summoned up every vestige of strength she had left and struck his nose with the flat of her hand.
It was as solid a blow as he’d ever felt. He shook his head and relaxed his grip on her throat. Slapping him seemed to him like the act of a virtuous woman. Again, he was confused. Was she actually a virtuous woman? Might she even be a virgin?
He removed his hands from her throat and sat back, still straddling her.
She choked and coughed and concentrated on not vomiting. With him atop her, she couldn’t turn over. If she were to vomit now, she feared she might be asphyxiated by her own sickness. She massaged her injured throat.
After a few moments, she was able to moan, “Get off, Arnie. Get off.”
Slowly, still confused, he dismounted.
She was grateful to be alive, and furious with him. The two emotions were not mutually exclusive. Both somehow filled her being. She glanced at her throbbing breasts. Tomorrow they would be one large painful bruise. That was the bad news. The good news was that there would be a tomorrow.
She glanced at her bra. It was beyond repair. She did not bother picking it off the floor. She slipped into her dress and buttoned it, picked up her purse, and headed for the door.
It occurred to Bush that she had no transportation. “I’ll drive . . .”
She waved him off. No possible way would she spend another moment with this madman. A street mugger would be a welcome relief compared with what she had just gone through. “Taxi,” she whispered, and pointed to his phone.
He called for a taxi, giving directions to his apartment. Hanging up the phone, he turned to her. “I . . .”
Again she waved him off, and left the apartment to await the taxi in the comparative security of that high-crime neighborhood.
As she rode home, she had to wonder how she could have been so mistaken. She was a careful woman. Or at least experience had made her careful. Never had she been so deceived. The strong, silent type—good-looking, too. Never made a pass at her—or at any other woman at work. A perfect gentleman on the date. The pictures on the wall, proving the special care he had taken with those poor mutilated women. And the holy pictures! What was it: You can never tell a book by its cover? Whoever first said that sure could have been thinking of Arnold Bush.
One thing was certain: She would tell the other girls at work, first thing in the morning, about her near-fatal encounter with Arnold Bush. In the ladies’ room she would show them her abused breasts. It was important that none of the others ever make the mistake of getting close to this maniac. She would swear the girls to secrecy. No point in telling the men.
She was grateful to have escaped tonight’s plight alive. Ordinarily not a prayerful person, now Agnes Blondell felt prayer was appropriate. Tonight—for the first time since she was a child—she would say her night prayers.
So would Arnold Bush. Except that, for Bush, prayer was a daily habit. And tonight he had a lot to talk to God about. He was confused. How could everything have become so jumbled?
His mistake—if the fault were, indeed, his—was in letting a woman into his life. He knew he never had been able to understand them. He assumed there must be good women around somewhere. There was the Blessed Virgin Mary. There were nuns. There were faithful mothers of families. But he never seemed to meet any of these good women. Why was he forever playing Adam to somebody else’s Eve?
Agnes was a case in point.
She seemed to be good. They’d had a nice time this evening. The movie was entertaining. They had plenty to eat. She seemed to completely understand his picture gallery. Everything was going so smoothly. Then she had to get fresh. She had to play the harlot.