'I know. I know. Sure, I could have parked you at your flat and picked you up this morning. But patience isn't in my make-up. If it had been I'd not have got halfway up to where I am now.'
She shrugged. 'Well, you've had what you wanted as far as I'm concerned. I hope it's been worth it.'
'And how!' His scowl gave place to a sudden grin. 'Sure; sure. But mighty few of the best-looking dolls have anything inside their heads. And you've got everything, honey. I'm a man who likes to get fresh angles on things, and if the angles come from someone who's got the right kind of curves as well, what more could a guy want? I want to see a lot more of you yet; so how about staying on here with me for a while?�
At that her hopes of being through with him in a few hours' time sank to zero. But she dared not show it. Although his latest idea had been couched in the form of an invitation, she knew that he would not allow her to refuse it, and that her only chance of getting away now lay in not letting him suspect that she wanted to. It meant that she would have to spend at least one more night with him, but it seemed certain that tomorrow he would have to leave the house to attend to his duties, which would then give her a good chance to escape. Summoning up a smile, she said:
'Yes, I'd love to do that. I'm sure we'll find lots to talk about.'
'Fine oh!' He gave her a resounding slap on the bottom. 'Would you like to eat up here or downstairs?'
'Let's go downstairs, and you can show me the rest of the house.'
Half an hour later he was mixing Vodka Martinis for them in a sitting-room below the big bedroom. Like the other rooms it had been furnished expensively, but without taste. In the bay window stood another big television set, a separate radio and a walnut gramophone cabinet for long-playing records. As he handed her a drink she said:
'You know, I don't even know your name!'
'Among the blessed of our Lord Satan, I'm known as "Twisting Snake",' he replied with a grin. 'But in these parts it's Colonel Henrik G. Washington of the U.S.A.A.F.; though, among themselves, my boys call me "that big bastard Wash".'
She could not help laughing and, lifting her glass, said: 'Well, I much prefer that to Twisting Snake; so here's to you Wash!'
He sunk his first cocktail at a gulp. 'That's to your blue eyes, Circe. I recall that's the name you took as a neophyte. But what'll I tell Jim and the others to call you while you're my house-guest here?'
'Mrs. Mauriac; Margot Mauriac. Tell me, why did you choose such an ugly Satanic name as Twisting Snake?'
'The original was an ancestor of mine. Maybe you've guessed that I've got Red Indian blood, and that old medicine-man was the greatest ever wizard of the Five Nations!'
Mary nodded. 'Yes, I can imagine you looking magnificent in a feathered head-dress and all the trimmings. Where did your very fair hair come from, though?'
'I'm a thorough-bred half-caste,' he told her, 'born in an Indian reservation of a squaw. My father was some kind of a crook. Leastways, he was hiding up in the forest when my Ma came on him. She was only about fifteen, but that didn't worry him any. I was the result. I guess she fell for him though, as she took food to him in secret for around a month, and insisted on calling me Henrik, which was the only name she knew him by. One day he took a runout powder on her and was never seen again. He must have been some sort of Nordic, and he'd talked to her of a big island where he'd been a fisherman before he hit the States, so maybe he was an Icelander; but that I'll never know for certain.'
'It's a big achievement for a little boy, brought up as you must have been in an Indian reservation, to have become a Colonel in the United States Air Force.'
'Yeah. It weren't easy; but I made it. I owe that mainly to my Granddaddy. He was the medicine-man of the tribe. I'll bet he beat hell out of my Ma when he knew the games she had been up to in the forest; because, of course, no brave would take her as his squaw after she'd had a child that way, and she must have been worth quite a few head of cattle to him. But he brought me up. Taught me all he knew, and by the time I was fourteen I was a better medicine-man than he was.
'Nominally all the red folks are Christians these days; but that's only lip-service to gip free blankets and baccy out of the padres. They know what's best for them and still practise the old religion on the side - totem rites, palavas at the full of the moon, and the rest. My Granddaddy could kill or cure plenty and he wanted me to follow him as Our Lord Satan's top priest in the reservation. But he was old and ailing so he had to give me the red feather of initiation much earlier than he would else have done. I earnt it though. Makes me sweat now to recall some of the ordeals I went through. All the same, I took to making magic like a heron takes to diving for the fish.'
As he paused, Mary asked: 'And did you succeed your grandfather?'
'Not me. Leastways, only for a few weeks. Taking dimes off our poor folk for curing cattle, or causing some old joker to turn up his toes a bit sooner than nature meant him to, was too narrow an alley for me to be happy playing ball in for long. One night I lit out with a travelling circus, and I never went back.'
'At sixteen I was already as big as most men ever come, and still growing. Add to that I met few people I couldn't hypnotize into doing what I wanted. I'd brought Granddaddy�s ceremonial feathers with me and I made the circus boss let me put on an act of my own. It was lassooing, bow and arrow, and throwing the tomahawk. I got a programme girl to stand in for me to shoot and throw round. Poor kid, she was so scared she near died of fright every time before we went on. She needn't have feared. Once she had her back to the target I could hold her there with my eyes, as rigid as an iron bar, and long as she didn't move she was in no danger. But she hadn't enough of what it takes to keep me for long with her under a blanket. I decided to team up with the Gipsy Lee of the outfit and move into her caravan. She was near twice my age but she had "it" all right, all right. Trouble was she had a husband. Sid was his name. So I carved a little wooden doll and scratched Sid on it. Then I talked magic talk to it all night long and took it out in the morning and buried it. Within a week Sid caught a cold and started coughing. That was before the days of penicillin. In a fortnight pneumonia had taken him, and I was in the caravan teaching his woman the quick way to forget him.'
At the mention of the doll, Mary had guessed what was coming, so she had time to glance away and repress a shudder at this confession of cold-blooded murder. Now happily launched on his life-story, the hook-nosed giant went on.
'Come the fall, the circus went into its winter quarters at Detroit. Gipsy, as was her custom, took a room for telling fortunes. She was mighty good at it. Could have done far better for herself that way all year round, but she had real gipsy blood in her and preferred a roving life. What I knew of magic put me wise to it that she was pulling in power from some source outside herself. One night I got out of her the how and why. She was an initiate of a Satanic Lodge there in the city. I made her take me along. That's how I became a Brother of the Ram.'
He poured Mary another cocktail, and resumed. 'It was by way of a guy I happened on in that Lodge that I got my first real break. He ran a big brothel. Seeing I was strong as a young bull, he asked me if I'd like to take a hand breaking in new girls. Most of those that get to the houses know what to expect; but there's some that don't, and make trouble. They have to have their heels rounded off, and it's strong men's work to do that. After I'd been at this dame busting game for a while it hit me that I was a sucker to do it for another guy when I might be doing it for myself.'
'Gipsy was making enough to keep me, but I felt it would be good to have some extra dough to throw around; and setting up as a knife-thrower in a booth wouldn't have paid the sort of dividends I had in mind. Within three months I had a string of five girls working the streets for me. From then on I never looked back. I made Gipsy cut out the fortune-telling and set her up as the Madame in a place of our own. By the time I was nineteen