She began to laugh. "You're nothing but a dirty old man, Charlie. When do you bring out the French postcards?"
He laughed with her. "Why shouldn't I be? I was a dirty young man, too. But I was never stupid. You have all the equipment necessary to become a great courtesan. The body, the mind – even your nurse's training won't be wasted. True sex demands a greater intellectualism than simple animal rutting."
"Now I know it's time for you to go to bed." She laughed. "Next thing I know, you'll be suggesting I go to a school to learn all about it."
"That's an idea." He chuckled. "They're always after me to endow one college or another. Why didn't I think of it? The Standhurst College of Sex. Otherwise known as the Old Fucking School." He began to laugh heartily, then suddenly he grimaced in pain. His face whitened and beads of perspiration broke out on his forehead. He hunched over in his wheel chair.
In a moment, she was at his side, pushing up the sleeve of his robe, exposing his arm. Quickly she shot the syrette of morphine into his vein. His bony fingers gripped her arm, trying to push it away, as he stared at her with agony-laden eyes.
"For Christ's sake, Charlie," she said angrily. "Give yourself a break. Stop fighting it!" His grip relaxed for a moment and she emptied another syrette into him. She looked into his eyes and saw him fighting the comfort the drug would bring him. She took his fragile, thin hand and raised it swiftly to her lips.
He smiled as the drug began to cloud his eyes. "Poor little Jennie," he said softly. "Any other time and I’d have made you my queen!" His fingers brushed her cheek gently. "But I won't forget what we were talking about. I'm not going to let you go to waste just because I'm not going to be around to enjoy it!"
11
Three days later they were having lunch on the terrace when she saw the gray Rolls-Royce come to a stop in the driveway. A smartly dressed chauffeur opened the door and a woman stepped out. A few minutes later, the butler appeared on the terrace. "A Mrs. Schwartz to see you, Mr. Standhurst."
Standhurst smiled. "Set another place, Judson, and ask Mrs. Schwartz if she'll join us."
The butler bowed. "Yes, Mr. Standhurst."
A moment later, a woman came through the doorway. "Charlie!" she said, unmistakable pleasure in her voice. She held her hands out toward him as she walked. "How good to see you."
"Aida." Standhurst kissed her hand. "Forgive my not getting up." He looked into her face. "You're as beautiful as ever."
"You haven't changed a bit, Charlie. You can still keep a straight face and lie like hell."
Standhurst laughed. "Aida, this is Jennie Denton."
"How do you do?" Jennie said. She saw a woman, perhaps in her middle or late fifties, quietly and expensively dressed. The woman turned, her smile warm and friendly, but Jennie suddenly had the feeling that there was little about her that the woman didn't take in.
She turned back to Standhurst. "Is this the girl you spoke to me about on the phone?"
Standhurst nodded.
The woman turned back to Jennie. This time, her eyes were openly appraising. She smiled suddenly. "You may have lost your balls, Charlie," she said in a conversational tone of voice, "but you certainly haven't lost your taste."
Jennie's mouth hung open as she stared at them. Standhurst began to laugh and the butler reappeared at the doorway, carrying a chair. He held it for Mrs. Schwartz as she sat down at the table.
"A sherry flip for Mrs. Schwartz, Judson." The butler bowed and disappeared. Standhurst turned to Jennie. "I suppose you're wondering what this is all about?"
Jennie nodded, still unable to speak.
"Twenty-five years ago, Aida Schwartz ran the best cat house west of the Everleigh sisters in Chicago."
Mrs. Schwartz reached over and patted his hand. "Charlie remembers everything," she said to Jennie. "He even remembered that I never drink anything but a sherry flip." She looked down at his glass on the table. "And I suppose you still drink champagne in a tall glass over ice?"
He nodded. "Old habits, like old friends, Aida, are hard to give up."
The butler placed a drink in front of her. She raised the glass daintily to her lips and sipped. She looked at the butler and smiled. "Thank you."
"Thank you, madam."
She raised her eyebrows in good-humored surprise. "This is very good," she said. "You don't know how hard it is to get a decent cocktail, even in the most expensive restaurants. It seems that ladies drink nothing but Martinis nowadays." She shuddered politely. "Horrible. In my time, no lady would dream of even tasting anything like that."
Standhurst looked at Jennie. "Aida would never let any of her girls drink anything but sherry."
"Whisky befuddles the brain," Aida said primly. "And my girls weren't being paid for drinking."
The old man chuckled reminiscently. "They certainly weren't. Aida, do you remember before the war when I used to come down to your house for a prostate massage?"
"I do, indeed." She smiled.
He looked across the table at Jennie. "I’d developed a bit of trouble and the doctor recommended prostate massage three times a month. The first time I went to his office. After that, I made up my mind that if I had to have massage, I’d at least enjoy it. So, three evenings a week, I showed up at Aida's for my treatment."
"What he didn't tell you," Aida added, "was that the treatments got him terribly aroused. And my girls were trained never to disappoint a guest. When Charlie went back to see the doctor two weeks later and explained, the doctor was horribly upset."
Standhurst was still laughing. "The doctor said he'd bring Aida up before the authorities on charges of practicing medicine without a license."
Mrs. Schwartz reached over and patted Standhurst's hand fondly. "And do you remember Ed Barry?"
"I certainly do." He chuckled and looked at Jennie. "Ed Barry was one of those hard-shelled Southern Baptists who look down the end of their nose at everything and immediately label it sin. Well, this was election eve and Ed was running for governor on a reform ticket. I managed to get him drinking in the excitement of it all and by midnight, he was weeping drunk. So without telling him where I was taking him, we went down to Aida's. He never forgot it."
Standhurst laughed, wiping the tears from his eyes. "Poor old Ed, he never knew what hit him. He lost the election but he never seemed to mind it. On the day Aida closed down her place, after we got into the war, he was downstairs in the bar, weeping as if the world had come to an end."
"Those were the good old days," Aida said. "We'll never see them again."
"Why did you close down?" Jennie asked curiously.
"There were several reasons," Aida said seriously, turning to Jennie. "After and during the war, there was too much free competition. It seemed as if every girl was determined to give it away. And it simply became too difficult to find girls who were interested and dedicated enough in their work to measure up to the high standards I wanted to maintain. All they were interested in was being whores. Since I didn't need the money, I closed up."
"Aida's a very wealthy woman. She put all her money into real estate and apartment houses, here and in most of the big cities around the country." Standhurst looked over at her. "Just about what are you worth right now, Aida?"
She shrugged her shoulders. "About six million dollars, give or take a little," she said casually. "Thanks to you and a few good friends like you."
Standhurst grinned. "Now are you still determined to go back to the hospital?"
Jennie didn't answer.
"Well, Jennie?" he asked.
Jennie stared at him, then at Aida. They were watching her intently. She started to speak but no words came to her lips.
Mrs. Schwartz reached over suddenly and patted her hand reassuringly. "Give her a little time to think it over, Charlie," she said gently. "It's a decision a girl has to make for herself."