Taggart agreed it was an excellent idea. “The other installation won’t have the convenience of a nearby Saliaris,” he said. “I’ll secure everything according to your instructions, Mr. Correll, but what have we got to get so windy about? What’s coming loose?”
Correll hesitated, dismayed by his sudden reluctance to trust even the general. “I’m not quite sure yet,” he said. “I’ll be in touch when I have more information...”
Petey Komoto was first and foremost a businessman; everything was relative in his view, pain and pleasure, good and evil, these had varying and negotiable values depending on when and where and under what circumstances they were traded for — just as the price of dollars and francs and yen fluctuated on the boards of an arbitrage firm.
As the city came to life that morning, Petey Komoto let Selby and Wilger into his shop on Arch Street.
“Leave the closed sign in the window,” Wilger told him, “and phone your clerks and tell them not to bother to come in.”
Komoto’s eyes were bland, his complexion the color of dandelion wine. He said, “Yes, but that will cost me money—”
“Bullshit,” Wilger said. He was staring with distaste at a display of thin whips done in pastel leathers with finely ornate ivory handles. “Snap shit, Petey, or your wife will be back entertaining tourists in Tijuana.”
“I will make the calls, of course,” Komoto said. He even bowed slightly to Wilger. “But I don’t understand your resentment of me and my merchandise. I am a businessman. I didn’t create people’s urges and the needs that make them enjoy such little aids or watching group sex acts. I am the grandson of fishermen. Bento Komoto. If I sold gin and whiskey, would you blame me because my customers drink too much?”
Selby said, “Make those calls, Mr. Komoto. I’m not interested in your philosophy. You’re making me impatient.”
“That wasn’t bad,” Wilger nodded approvingly as Komoto hurried into his office. “Kind of gentlemanly shit, but you’re big enough to make it go down.”
The Hell for Leather shop sprawled through four ground-floor rooms of an ancient building that was within walking distance of Wanamaker’s famed department store and the Old Reading Terminal. The two rooms fronting the street were lined with glass shelving and counters which displayed dildoes of various sizes, along with inflated, multicolored condoms stuffed into vases like flowers. Jars and tubes of creams and jellies were heaped in pyramids on shelves, some containing alleged aphrodisiacs, others mingled with properties guaranteed to cause itching or burning or numbing sensations.
“Jesus Christ,” Wilger said, looking at life-sized rubber dolls that stood about like pink, blank-eyed spectators, fully equipped with male and female genitalia.
The rear rooms were walled with shelves of tapes, film and cassette sets. Neatly lettered signs, like something in the public library, Selby thought, were thumbtacked to the shelf edges to identify various categories: Disciplines, Fetishes, Bondage, Group Activities, Aphrodisiacs. In some cases there were subheadings — Corporal Punishment, Girls’ Schools, Gloves, Shoes and Slippers, All-Men, All-Women; Stimulants (Friction, Drugs, Alcohol, etc.).
At the end of the corridor, a half dozen screening rooms were furnished with couches and chairs. All were scruffed and dusty and in need of cleaning. In each screening room was a projector that could be operated from inside the booth, but the activating tokens had to be purchased from Komoto at the main cash register to run the machines for half-hour interludes.
“Otherwise,” Komoto had explained, “the kinks would stay all night.”
On the drive over, he had already told them as much as he knew about Earl Thomson. But Komoto’s information had only outlined the dimensions of the problem; it hadn’t solved it.
Thomson had rented a film cassette from the files titled Knots and Lashes — “very pretty porn, pirate ladies in G-strings, captured, tied to riggings, flogged” — but Earl and his friend, the army officer, hadn’t screened that film because, as Komoto explained, it was new and the seal on it hadn’t been broken.
They’d rented a private booth, paid for one activating token and looked at other footage, a film Earl had brought out of the booth with him later, a cassette with the name of a city on it... Summitt City, Komoto remembered the words stenciled on the brown plastic cover in block capitals.
Komoto returned from his office. “My clerks will take the morning off, but it will cost me a lot, you know.”
“Cheaper than Encarna’s swimming lessons,” Wilger said. He looked at Selby. “You believe this character? Or should we try some of those tickle whips on his yellow ass?”
Selby said, “I told him to name his price for that film. If he knew where it was, he’d be interested. He’s a businessman.”
Komoto smiled gratefully at Selby. “Precisely. It’s buying and selling, nothing more. Would you care for coffee while you look around? It’s a chicory blend. I obtain it cheaply from sailors up from Panama. They keep me supplied.”
“Stuff your coffee,” Wilger said. “Let’s go to work, Harry.”
Earl Thomson, according to Komoto, had asked if he could leave his cassette in the files at Hell for Leather. He’d paid for that, naturally, a storage fee. But Komoto had no idea where Thomson had put it.
“The shop was very crowded, you know that.” He glanced accusingly at Wilger. “You were parked across the street watching. You saw the people, sailors, a florists’ convention was in town, a man tried to take a live chicken into a screening booth. It was that kind of day. Very much business. I don’t know what Mr. Thomson did with it.”
He gestured at the shelves of cassettes. “I can’t help you.” He laughed showing strong, white teeth. “You would have to tear the place apart to find it.”
Wilger removed his coat and folded it neatly over a rack of kid porn magazines. “You said that, Bento, we didn’t.”
Selby said, “You start with A to N. I’ll cover the rest of it.”
“That gives me assholes to nookie. Bento, you wanna help?”
“Most certainly, sir. This is only a business matter. But please handle these items with care. Many of them are irreplaceable.”
Wilger smiled grimly. “I’m very glad to hear that, you kinky little bastard.”
A cool light spread across Summitt City’s blue lake, and the green belts glistened under sprinklers. Miniature rainbows formed brilliant arches within the crystal water cones.
When Correll was informed that directions to the screening room had been left at the north gate for Harry Selby, he drove directly to the theater.
The cameras on the buildings were motionless, their slim barrels fixed on the horizons. The shopping mall was empty and silent, but golfers were already on the course, tiny figures dotting the fairways.
The theater was a stone-colored, windowless structure landscaped with firs and spreading shrubs. Correll parked and went inside.
Wall clocks in the auditorium recorded the time in New York and a dozen world capitals. An electronic island contained projection equipment and a control panel with rheostats, speakers and microphones. Clear light streamed from panels in the acoustically treated ceiling.
A cassette of film had been inserted in the projector. Correll snapped a switch, and twin beams illuminated the large screen. Music sounded and scenes of Summitt City appeared in smooth sequences: children playing baseball, passengers getting off electric buses, homes with colorful gardens, window boxes bright with flowers. The film had been shot in clear fall sunlight, a brilliant day in October. Correll had watched it at Camp Saliaris with Jennifer, surrounded by the world delegates chosen to participate in the Ancilia Four program. On that occasion, General Taggart’s sardonic voice had counterpointed the images on the screen.