Not I, Said the Vixen

  Bill S. Ballinger

  Not I, Said the Vixen

  CHAPTER ONE

  All the two-headed hounds of hell were baying at the far side of the moon where the gray, dusty craters stood as burned-out monuments to my own life. It was an endless wasteland, hopeless and without pity, and road signs pointed straight ahead to nowhere… although, I knew my way around in it because I had been living there for years. It was silent and lonely, but it was private and no real-estate brokers were interested in subdevelopments. However, I would’ve sold them several million acres without missing one small inch. I had desolation to spare… to give away… to squander… and anyone could enter for free simply by giving up hope. Which is certainly not a high price if you have already lost it.

  Occasionally, wind-devils whirled pumice sand into my throat and seeded my eyes, and from far away came the sound of monotonous, tortured music. This was my life—bounded to the north by limbo and to the south by despair. And in the infertile heartland was oblivion. And oblivion makes the best homestead of all.

  From the distance, someone said, “Let him sleep.” And someone else said, “Man, he’s real smashed.” Then an obsequious, yet stubborn, voice replied, “But someone has to sign for this.”

  I rolled over in the gravel pit, evading the sharp spines of the dwarfed cactuses, and dropped through an abyss several centuries deep. Both of my good friends—the Wandering Jew and the Flying Dutchman—had assured me that I would live forever to enjoy my misery. So I held no fear of falling. When I landed with a smart blow on my head, I opened my eyes.

  A youngish smirking man, wearing a scarlet jacket laced with gold, leaned over to grasp me by an arm. He started to haul me to my feet. It seemed an impossible distance from the floor, and I had no desire, and certainly no incentive, to make an effort to join this stranger or to tolerate his intrusion. Another—a rather portly man with sparse gray hair combed neatly over the skin of his pink skull—stood behind the lackey in livery, and joined in the effort to stand me erect.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “The manager,” the pudgy man replied.

  “There are many managers,” I pointed out. “There are even managers of managers. What exactly do you manage?”

  “This hotel,” he replied. “The Beverly Plaza.” He panted slightly from the exertion of bending over me. I had permitted my arm to go limp, and it undulated like the neck of an ostrich. He preferred to ignore it. “Please, Mr. March, stand up!”

  I glanced at the fellow in the red and gold coat. “General Braddock, I presume?” The bellboy laughed.

  “I came along to haul the case of Scotch,” he told me. “The new one,” he added.

  “Have there been others?” I asked.

  “Plenty.” He began to laugh again, loudly, until the manager looked at him and shook his head. The bellboy stopped abruptly.

  Lying on the floor, I was encircled by faces—fifteen, twenty, twenty-five of them. I don’t know. I don’t know how many faces.

  Beatrice’s, of course, wasn’t there. It never was any more.

  The women’s faces that laughed at me, I hadn’t seen before.

  The manager was saying, “Mr. March… Mr. March… there’s a reservation on this suite. You’ve had it for five days now, and you have to get out in the morning…”

  The men weren’t friends of mine either. Their faces held the curious alert expression of men waiting to make their escape—if necessary. They wore make-up, but the make-up came from the inside and oozed through their pores to film their faces with a patina of boredom and stinginess. They needed no color on their eyelids, because sharks don’t have eyelids.

  “We’ve been very tolerant, Mr. March,” the manager continued in a voice to match the Rotarian button in his lapel, “but the management insists that you settle this bill now.” He nodded to himself, for affirmation, then added, “Or at least part of it.”

  My eyes worked their way up the legs of the tables to the tops, and a small detached part of my mind began counting the large silver trays stacked with dirty dishes, uneaten food, soiled cups and glasses. There were many—too many—for me to count without being discourteous to my guests.

  Someone had written a limerick of four letter words on the wall with lipstick. Next to it, a faceless wit had drawn pictures to illustrate it—with the end of his finger dipped in cigarette ashes. It was old home week, all right. “How much do I owe you?” I struggled to ask the manager.

  He held out a number of slips of paper, all neatly itemized and clipped together. I couldn’t focus my eyes on them. “Do you want the total,” he asked, “or do you want to go over them?”

  I shook my head; the motion caused me to reel with dizziness. “You… tell… me…” I said.

  The manager glanced quickly at the listening circle of my waiting guests. “Perhaps you’d rather go into the bedroom to discuss this…”

  “No. Besides, the bedroom is probably busy.” Everyone laughed loudly at my homespun humor. Drawing heavily on their idiotic appreciation, I continued, “You have interrupted my slumber, disturbed my guests and, like the Red Death, stalked through our banquet halls. Now, what’s the tab?”

  The manager took a deep breath. “Two thousand, one hundred and sixteen dollars.” He paused, then added, “And forty-two cents.”

  “All right,” I told him. “Will you take a check?”

  “Certainly, Mr. March,” he agreed quickly.

  “Do you have a blank one?”

  Nodding, he withdrew a pad of blank checks from his inside jacket pocket, tore one loose, and handed it to me. Then he gave me a ball point pen. The bellboy leaped into action, and quickly dug up a white and gold desk from beneath several feet of debris. With some difficulty I seated myself and wrote out the check. The manager took it, and without looking at it, carefully folded it and put it in his pocket. “Thank you,” he said. “Is there anything else you’d like tonight, Mr. March?”

  “Did I hear someone say you have just delivered another case of Scotch?” The manager wagged his head in agreement. “On your way out, please hand me a bottle,” I told him.

  I sat at the desk with the bottle and opened it. A girl in a black cocktail dress came over to the desk and perched on top of it, spreading her skirt around her like a fan. “Hello,” she said.

  Looking up, I asked, “How long have you been here?”

  “Two days.” Her eyes sought mine boldly.

  “Well,” I said, “it must’ve been nice having you around.”

  She was silent for a minute. “I’ll bet you don’t know my name,” she said finally.

  “I don’t,” I told her, “and I don’t particularly want to.” Her face set sullenly. I apologized. “I don’t mean to be rude.” I knew she wouldn’t understand, but I made an effort to explain. “I’m just tired. I’m looking for someone—”

  “Anyone in particular?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Her name is Beatrice.”

  “Would I know her?”

  “Definitely not.”

  She slipped away from the desk, pouting. “I guess you’re one of those solitary drinkers,” she said accusingly.

  I glanced around at the noisy, smoky, stinking room. “Absolutely,” I agreed. I tilted the bottle. The sand disappeared from my throat as the back of a spade seemed to slam into my stomach.

  “Well, good luck,” she said.

  “You’ll find the Scotch directly behind you,” I told her. I tried to get off the desk chair, but I couldn’t. I opened one of the drawers to prop myself against it; the drawer was filled with sandwich crusts, a woman’s stocking complete with runner, and several empty bottles. I threw the bottles to the floor.

  Then I took another drink.<
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  CHAPTER TWO

  Sunset Strip winds between West Los Angeles and Beverly Hills, a street of the demimonde, the beat and the chic. Along the Strip itself, and on streets above and below it, apartment buildings, paneled in glass and trimmed with stainless steel, bear exotic names. Such a one is the Silver Sands. It is built on a steep hillside, overlooking the Strip, and precariously juggles a large heated swimming pool. The building is only four stories high, the rent is high, and the social aspirations of the tenants are high.

  At approximately two o’clock in the morning, apartment 3-A in the Silver Sands appeared darkened from the street. Inside the apartment, however, and toward the rear, soft lights burned in a sybaritic bedroom, interior hall and bath. The heavy plate-glass door to the shower was steamed over, and the moisture made it translucent. Tiny beads of hot water glowed in reds, blues and greens, while the vapor frosted the door with snow. Behind the door could be seen the moving shadow of a woman.

  The sound of the water beating against the tiled walls of the enclosure ceased abruptly and the rounded arm of Ivy Lorents reached from behind the door to pick up a deep-piled towel. Wrapping the towel around her, she stepped from the shower.

  She gave an impression of height which she did not actually possess. On her head was a shower cap—a frivolous object of transparent plastic, ornamented with large imitation pearls, golden snail shells and coral sea horses. When she removed the cap, a mass of blue-black hair tumbled to her shoulders, and she shook her head gracefully from side to side while her hair swirled free. Fresh from her bath, her face devoid of make-up, she had the freshly-scrubbed appearance of a young girl.

  But she was not a young girl, and the suppleness of her slender body could not conceal her maturity. Ivy’s brow, nose and chin were regular in shape and delicately proportioned; and her small, well-shaped head was balanced on a long pliant neck which curved gracefully into a swelling bosom. The width of her face across the cheekbones was wide, and the bones themselves high with the skin stretched tautly over them. Her eyes were elongated, slanting upward at a noticeable angle toward the outer edges of her temples, and were an unusual and brilliant color of green. She possessed a mouth which was wide and mobile—the upper lip thin, the lower full—and when she smiled it gave the beholder an impression that it concealed amusement. This appearance of innocence mixed with a curious sophistication gave an odd, yet most attractive, expression to her face.

  After drying her body, Ivy Lorents hung the towel through a gold-plated ring mounted on the wall, and inserted her feet into a pair of soft, glovelike slippers.

  She entered a dressing room which adjoined the bath. The walls were painted deep rose to exactly match the wall-to-wall carpet. A large mirror, in a gold and white rococo frame, stretched from floor to ceiling and reflected a French baroque dressing table and chaise longue standing across from it.

  From the dressing table, Ivy selected an ivory comb and drew it casually through her hair until the fine dark mass fell into gentle waves. Next she sprayed her hair with a mist of perfume, then lightly dusted her naked body with a matching scent of bath powder. Hesitating for a moment, she examined her lips in the mirror, then quickly brushed them with lipstick. Opening the door to a closet, she selected a thin silk robe, slipped into it, and knotted the band around her waist.

  She stepped from the dressing room to the interior hall. It extended the length of the apartment, and from it doors opened to the other rooms. The hall ended at two steps which dropped to the level of the large living room. This room was dark except for the faint glow of a single small lamp, and it was filled with the soft muted music of a radio.

  At the steps dropping to the living room, Ivy Lorents paused to gaze intently across the darkened room. She saw silhouetted against the large window the outline of a short, thickset figure peering out into the street below. It wore a white shirt and dark slacks, and stood with hands clasped behind the back and legs slightly straddled. The figure continued to stare into the night, oblivious to Ivy’s approach, which had been covered by the music.

  Cautiously, Ivy’s hand reached out to a small Italian chest beside her. Her face, and its expression, was concealed by a heavy shadow as she secretively opened the top drawer and quietly groped inside.

  Downstairs, in apartment 2-A directly beneath Ivy Lorents, Pauline Morrisey walked into her living room and stiffened as she heard a shot rip apart the silence of the night.

  Outdoors, across the street from the Silver Sands, Mrs. Norma Ulrich, an elderly widow on her way to a drug store, paused with her hand on the door of her parked car as the sounds of two additional shots slammed through the empty street.

  CHAPTER THREE

  I managed to get my wrist level with my eyes before I opened them. It was wasted effort, however, as my wrist watch was gone. I didn’t really care what time it was, but I did wonder what day it might be.

  Lifting first one leg, then the other, I swung them over the side of the bed which creaked in a rhythmic counterpoint to my own groaning. The room steadied from a dizzying whirl to a soft undulation as a window with a flapping, tattered green blind came into view and I focused my eyes on it. It was day, at least. Some day.

  Feeling a hard lump under my hip, I shifted slightly and pulled out an empty bottle. I tossed it to the floor to join its relatives. Turning around, I lifted a pillow from the sleazy brass bed, and examined a pillow case. On it was stitched “Hotel Tullery.” Already, I knew the Hotel Tullery would never become a popular resort.

  While I wondered how the hell I’d gotten there, the door flew open without benefit of knock, and a man resembling a cross between a toad and a mushroom stared at me with open distrust. I returned his stare, not with distaste but with astonishment at the variations that nature can contrive with the race of man. “Don’t move,” I warned him softly, “or you’ll step on a roach!”

  He started and glanced at the floor. “That’s not funny,” he said, returning his suspicious eyes in my direction. “That cab is here,” he announced, “but you’re not leaving till you pay for the room.” He added bluntly, “And no checks!”

  “How long have I been here?”

  “Three days… at three-fifty. That’s ten and a half dollars.” When I started to reach in my pocket, he interrupted me. “You spent your last five dollars two days ago. On booze.” I noted that in addition to my wrist watch, my gold cuff links and belt buckle—were missing. I decided I must have pawned everything except my appendix. The binge had been a good one while it lasted. Now, however, I had the shakes. I shook so hard that the room clerk seemed to vibrate.

  Closing my eyes in agony, I sat there for a few moments. When I again opened them, I discovered that his appearance had visibly improved. By gritting my teeth and holding my head steady, I realized that the room clerk had turned into a cab driver.

  The cabbie pushed his cap back on his head. “Mister,” he said, “you’ve got it bad. How about the hospital?” He went out of focus again, and the peeling dresser began inching across the room. I expected to see a large drawer yawn open and snap up the driver. But it didn’t. When everything went back into place, I pulled myself to my feet and stood clutching my trousers to keep them from falling to my ankles. I needed that belt buckle.

  A look of sympathy crept across the cabbie’s face, and he removed a safety pin from the underside of his lapel. “You need this, mister,” he said, handing me the pin. But I couldn’t hold it. It dropped to the floor. After a moment, the cabbie picked it up and pinned the top of my trousers to my jacket. My pants would now stay up as long as I kept my coat on—and I had no intention of removing it. At least, not very soon.

  “Do you have ten dollars and fifty cents?” I inquired.

  The taxi driver hesitated before answering. “You want to keep drinking?” he asked slowly.

  I let go of my grasp on the brass bed, then hastily grabbed it again to keep from falling. “No,” I told him, “but the room clerk out there is selling my body to a medi
cal college unless I pay him.”

  “You owe him the dough?” The cabbie grinned.

  “Every cent of it,” I assured him. “If you’ll drive me to my office, I’ll give you your money back.”

  He considered me thoughtfully. “You don’t talk like a drunk,” he observed noncommittally. “Are you an alky?”

  “Not all the time,” I assured him. “Just part-time. If I tried, I could do better than this. It’s only a hobby now—merely when I have nothing better to do.”

  He thought this over. Finally, he asked, “What’s your name?”

  “March,” I told him. “Cyrus… March.”

  His eyes lit up with interest. “Hey,” he exclaimed, “I’ve heard of you!” He coughed, and politely turned his eyes away. “A man like you… shouldn’t be going ’round… his clothes falling off… and everything…”

  I wanted to shout at him—to tell him I didn’t care whether my clothes rotted from my body. All I could think about was one more good l-o-n-g drink to quiet my nerves, to get out of this festering hotel… to go home. Instead, I swallowed the nausea in the back of my throat, and I was filled with disgust when I raised a hand to my mouth to suppress the retch. A weeks’ growth of beard furred my face. Removing my hand, I plastered on a smile. “You’re right,” my voice croaked, “this has gone far enough… at least for now. How much money have you got on you?”

  This time he answered promptly. “Over twenty bucks.”

  “I’m going to rent your cab for the rest of the day. On the way out, pay off the slug in the lobby. While I wait in the cab pick me up a half pint… just a half pint of the best you can find. No more! That’s for medicinal purposes…” The cabbie nodded. “Then take me to a Turkish bath, and while I’m in there I’ll give you a note to take out to my house. For clean clothes.”

  “Sure, Mr. March,” he agreed. “Sure.” He crossed the room to stand beside me. Almost gently, he put a short powerful arm around my shoulders. “Maybe you want to lean on me,” he said. “You could use some help.”