“Damn the publicity,” she said in a soft voice. “Did he have a run-in with Woody?”
Curly stared. “Woody? Why—”
There was a light step behind them, and they turned. A woman was standing in the armory doorway, smiling inscrutably at them.
No buckskins here. All silks and furs and scents. This beautiful creature with the lynx eyes, the incredible enamel complexion, the subtle curves of thigh and breasts, was Mara Gay. Darling of Hollywood, star of innumerable successful sex-pictures, three times divorced... the envy of a million shop-girls and the sweet painful dream of a million men.
Mara Gay ruled a kingdom which had no geographical boundaries and whose subjects were abject slaves. She was the incarnation in painted-rose flesh of a forbidden dream. And yet, at this close range, there was something cheap about her. Or was it the result of the usual disillusionment of adjusted focus?... She was in the East, resting between pictures. An impossible, insatiable woman with the appetites of a nature-myth and the lure of Cabellian Anaitis. Just now she was obsessed with a hunger for the society of overwhelmingly masculine men. Behind her loomed three of them, faultlessly dressed, carefully shaved; one of them held a yelping Pomeranian in his arms.
There was a little silence as Mara Gay drifted over the stone floor and meltingly looked at Curly, at his big frame, his flat hips, his broad shoulders, his curly hair and dusty clothes. Kit’s small chin hardened; she lost her smile and took a little, cautious, noiseless, backward step.
“Uh — hello, Mara,” said Curly with a feeble grin. “Uh — Kit, ya know Mara? Mara Gay? Hangs out in Hollywood, too. Haw, haw!”
The lynx eyes met the gray-blue expressionlessly. “Yes, I know Miss Gay,” said Kit steadily. “We’ve bumped into each other in Hollywood on several occasions. But I didn’t know you knew Miss Gay, Curly. So I’ll be going.”
And she calmly left the armory.
There was an uncomfortable interlude. The three large men in faultless clothes behind the actress stood quite still, blinking. The Pomeranian, his civilized nostrils scandalized by the vulgar odors drifting up from the stables, yelped and yelped.
“Cat,” said Mara Gay. “High-hatting me! She and her small-time horse operas.” She tossed her extraordinary head and smiled bewitchingly at Curly. “Curly, my love, you’re beautiful! Where did you get that mop of hair?”
Curly scowled. His eyes were still on the door through which Kit Horne had vanished. Then Mara’s words took meaning in his brain. “For the love of Pete, Mara,” he grumbled, “can that kind o’ mush, will ya?” His hair was the bane of his life; it lay in cunning ringlets which he had vainly attempted for years to straighten.
The actress rubbed herself gently against his arm. Her eyes went innocently wide. “This is so thrilling! All these awful revolvers and things... Can you shoot ’em, Curly darling?”
He brightened and moved away from her with alacrity. “Can I shoot ’em! Gal, yo’re talkin’ to Dead-eye Dick himself!” Reloading quickly, he flipped his revolver and once more manipulated the catapult. Balls popped into nothingness. The actress squealed with delight, moving closer.
Outside, Kit Horne paused and her eyes were very coldly blue. She heard the pops! the tinkle of breaking glass, Mara Gay’s little squeals of admiration. She bit her lip and dashed off, striding along blindly.
The actress in the armory was saying: “Now, Curly, don’t be so bashful...” Something predacious came into her lynx eyes; she turned sharply and said to the three men behind her: “Wait outside for me.” They went obediently. She turned back to Curly and smiled a smile famous over the length and breadth of a romantic land, whispering: “Kiss me, Curly dear, oh, kiss me...”
Curly took a backward step, very noiseless and cautious, like Kit’s, and he lost his grin as his eyes narrowed. She stood very still. “Look here, Mara, aren’t you forgettin’ yourself? I don’t aim to rustle other men’s wives.”
She stepped close to him; she was very close to him now, and her scent filled his nostrils. “You mean Julian?” she said softly. “Oh, we’ve a perfect understanding, Curly. Modern marriage! Curly, don’t look so mad. There are five million men who’d leave their happy homes to have me look at them this way—”
“Well, I ain’t one of ’em,” said Curly coldly. “Where’s yore husband now?”
“Oh, upstairs somewhere with Tony Mars. Curly, please...”
If the Colosseum was the Colossus of sport arenas, its creator Tony Mars was the Colossus of sport promoters. Like Buck Horne, Mars was a living legend; but a legend of quite a different sort. He was the man who had put prize-fighting in the million-dollar class. He was the man who had scrubbed wrestling until it shone — not for ethical reasons but purely as a matter of big business — restoring it to favor with the sportsmen who financed him and the sportsmen who patronized him. He was the man who had punished the Boxing Commission by taking the largest heavyweight prizefight attraction in fistic history out of New York State and staging it in Pennsylvania. He was the man who had popularized ice-hockey, indoor tennis matches, and six-day bicycle races. The Colosseum was the culmination of his life’s dream, which had been to build the largest sports arena in the world.
His office was at the peak of that vast structure, and it was made accessible by four elevators — an opportunity for approach not neglected by the hordes of parasites for whom Broadway is peculiarly notorious. And there he sat, far in the reaches of his citadel — Tony Mars; old, wily, swarthy, hook-nosed, a New Yorker born and a New Yorker bred. He was a “sport,” in the most completely praiseworthy sense of the word. He was reputed the easiest man on Broadway for a “touch” and the hardest to put something over on. His derby rested on the bridge of his long nose, his unshined shoes scratched the veneer of his fabled walnut desk, and his two-dollar cigar smouldered between his brown jaws. He regarded his visitor thoughtfully.
The visitor was not unknown to these precincts. Suavely attired, boutonniéred, Julian Hunter was the husband of Mara Gay, but he was not historic for this feat alone; he owned a dozen night-clubs, he was the original playboy of the Main Stem, he was a sportsman with a string of polo ponies and a racing yacht, and above all he was a millionaire. Society opened its doors to him, for he came from society originally. But even society recognized him as something apart from the blue-ribboned herd. He had the pouchy eyes and pink cheeks of the well-massaged but always fatigued man-about-town; but there the resemblance stopped. It was only in the lower — or higher? — strata of the social structure that men acquired the peculiarity which was Julian Hunter’s own: the expressionless face of a wooden Indian. It was the face of the inveterate gambler. In this, at least, he and the man behind the desk were blood-brothers.
Tony Mars said in a throaty bass: “I’ll give it to you straight, Hunter, and you listen to me. As far as Buck is concerned—” He stopped abruptly. His feet crashed to the Chinese rug on the floor. His mouth curved in a disarming smile.
Julian Hunter turned lazily.
A man stood in the doorway — a man all chest and arms and legs. He was a tall man, a very tall man, a very young tall man. Set like strips of fur above his high-cheeked face were blue-black brows; his closely shaved cheeks were blue-black, as were his small bright eyes. This giant smiled, and showed white teeth.
“Come in, Tommy, come in!” said Tony Mars heartily. “Alone? Where’s that nickel-nursing manager of yours?”