The Carpetbaggers

I smiled. "I won it in a crap game."

He looked at me questioningly.

"Don't worry," I added quickly. "I let him win five hundred dollars afterward."

He nodded, satisfied. That, too, was one of the things Nevada taught me. Never walk away from the table after you win a man's horse without letting him win back at least one stake for tomorrow. It didn't diminish your winnings by much and at least the sucker walked away feeling he'd won something.

I reached into the rear cockpit and pulled out some chocks. I tossed one to Nevada and walked around and set mine under a wheel. Nevada did the same on the other side.

"Your pappy ain't gonna like it. You messed up production for the day."

I straightened up. "I don't guess it will matter much." I walked around the prop toward him. "How'd he hear about it so soon?"

Nevada 's lips broke into the familiar mirthless smile. "You took the girl to the hospital. They sent for her folks. She told them before she died."

"How much do they want?"

"Twenty thousand."

"You can buy 'em for five."

He didn't answer. Instead, he looked down at my feet. "Get your shoes on and come on," he said. "Your father's waiting."

He started back across the field and I looked down at my feet. The warm earth felt good against my naked toes. I wriggled them in the sand for a moment, then went back to the cockpit and pulled out a pair of Mexican huarachos. I slipped into them and started out across the field after Nevada.

I hate shoes. They don't let you breathe.

2

I KEPT RAISING SMALL CLOUDS OF SAND WITH THE huarachos as I walked toward the factory. The faint clinical smell of the sulphur they used in making gunpowder came to my nose. It was the same kind of smell that was in the hospital the night I took her there. It wasn't at all the kind of smell there was the night we made the baby.

It was cool and clean that night. And there was the smell of the ocean and the surf that came in through the open windows of the small cottage I kept out at Malibu. But in the room there was nothing but the exciting scent of the girl and her wanting.

We had gone into the bedroom and stripped with the fierce urgency in our vitals. She was quicker than I and now she was on the bed, looking up at me as I opened the dresser drawer and took out a package of rubbers.

Her voice was a whisper in the night. "Don't, Joney. Not this time."

I looked at her. The bright Pacific moon threw its light in the window. Only her face was in shadows. Somehow, what she said brought the fever up.

The bitch must have sensed it. She reached for me and kissed me. "I hate those damn things, Joney. I want to feel you inside me."

I hesitated a moment. She pulled me down on top of her. Her voice whispered in my ear. "Nothing will happen, Joney. I’ll be careful."

Then I couldn't wait any longer and her whisper changed into a sudden cry of pain. I couldn't breathe and she kept crying in my ear, "I love you, Joney. I love you, Joney."

She loved me all right. She loved me so good that five weeks later she tells me we got to get married. We were sitting in the front seat of my car this time, driving back from the football game. I looked over at her. "What for?"

She looked up at me. She wasn't frightened, not then. She was too sure of herself. Her voice was almost flippant. "The usual reason. What other reason does a fellow and a girl get married for?"

My voice turned bitter. I knew when I'd been taken. "Sometimes it's because they want to get married."

"Well, I want to get married." She moved closer to me.

I pushed her back on the seat. "Well, I don't."

She began to cry then. "But you said you loved me."

I didn't look at her. "A man says a lot of things when he's humping." I pulled the car over against the curb and parked. I turned to her. "I thought you said you'd be careful."

She was wiping at her tears with a small, ineffectual handkerchief. "I love you, Joney. I wanted to have your baby."

For the first time since she told me, I began to feel better. That was one of the troubles with being Jonas Cord, Jr. Too many girls, and their mothers, too, thought that spelled money. Big money. Ever since the war, when my father built an empire on gunpowder.

I looked down at her. "Then it's simple. Have it."

Her expression changed. She moved toward me. "You mean – you mean – we'll get married?"

The faint look of triumph in her eyes faded quickly when I shook my head. "Uh-uh. I meant have the baby if you want it that bad."

She pulled away again. Suddenly, her face was set and cold. Her voice was calm and practical. "I don't want it that bad. Not without a ring on my finger. I’ll have to get rid of it."

I grinned and offered her a cigarette. "Now you're talking, little girl."

She took the cigarette and I lit it for her. "But it's going to be expensive," she said.

"How much?" I asked.

She drew in a mouthful of smoke. "There's a doctor in Mexican Town. The girls say he's very good." She looked at me questioningly. "Two hundred?"

"O.K., you got it," I said quickly. It was a bargain. The last one cost me three fifty. I flipped my cigarette over the side of the car and started the motor. I pulled the car out into traffic and headed toward Malibu.

"Hey, where you going?" she asked.

I looked over at her. "To the beach house," I answered. "We might as well make the most of the situation."

She began to laugh and drew closer to me. She looked up into my face. "I wonder what Mother would say if she knew just how far I went to get you. She told me not to miss a trick."

I laughed. "You didn't."

She shook her head. "Poor Mother. She had the wedding all planned."

Poor Mother. Maybe if the old bitch had kept her mouth shut her daughter might have been alive today.

It was the night after that about eleven thirty, that my telephone began to ring. I had just about fogged off and I cursed, reaching for the phone.

Her voice came through in a scared whisper. "Joney, I'm bleeding."

The sleep shot out of my head like a bullet. "What's the matter?"

"I went down to Mexican Town this afternoon and now something's wrong. I haven't stopped bleeding and I'm frightened." I sat up in bed. "Where are you?"

"I checked into the Westwood Hotel this afternoon. Room nine-o-one."

"Get back into bed. I’ll be right down."

"Please hurry, Joney. Please."

The Westwood is a commercial hotel in downtown L.A. Nobody even looked twice when I went up in the elevator without announcing myself at the desk. I stopped in front of Room 901 and tried the door. It was unlocked. I went in.

I never saw so much blood in my life. It was all over the cheap carpeting on the floor, the chair in which she had sat when she called me, the white sheets on the bed.

She was lying on the bed and her face was as white as the pillow under her head. Her eyes had been closed but they flickered open when I came over. Her lips moved but no sound came out.

I bent over her. "Don't try to talk, baby. I’ll get a doctor. You're gonna be all right."

She closed her eyes and I went over to the phone. There was no use in just calling a doctor. My father wasn't going to be happy if I got our name into the papers again. I called McAllister. He was the attorney who handled the firm's business in California.

His butler called him to the phone. I tried to keep my voice calm. "I need a doctor and an ambulance quick."

In less than a moment, I understood why my father used Mac. He didn't waste any time on useless questions. Just where, when and who. No why. His voice was precise. "A doctor and an ambulance will be there in ten minutes. I advise you to leave now. There's no point in your getting any more involved than you are."

I thanked him and put down the phone. I glanced over at the bed. Her eyes were closed and she appeared to be sleeping. I started for the door and her eyes opened.