The Strange Story of Linda Lee (30 page)

Endeavouring not to show her disappointment, she thanked him, smiled and left his office.

Out in the street she felt greatly perturbed at this new obstacle which had suddenly arisen as a requisite to her securing employment. As, she now recalled, had been the case in Canada, to be able to produce a passport was essential to getting a work permit. She could only hope that all agents were not so particular about regulations. The second address she had taken down was some way off and when she reached it she found half a dozen people sitting in the waiting-room. Two were men talking together, one very tall and thin, the other very short and fat, so she put them down as a pair of comedians. All four of the women had good figures. In the daylight the three older ones looked slightly blowsy under their make-up. The fourth was a young Negress with a pert little face, but thin, unattractive legs.

Linda had to wait half an hour before her turn came to be shown into the manager’s office. He was a small, round-shouldered Jew, wearing heavily-rimmed spectacles, and had an abrupt manner.

Their opening dialogue was very similar to that which had taken place in the first agent’s office. He then said to her:

‘Pull up your skirt.’

She lifted it several inches.

‘Higher,’ he said.

Again she obeyed. Getting up from his desk, he came round to her, pinched one of her thighs, then laid a hand on one of her breasts to squeeze it.

Stepping swiftly back, she snapped, ‘Stop that! Keep your hands to yourself.’

He grinned, showing a gold tooth. ‘Vot you think I’m up to, eh? This is pusiness. I don’t lay dames in my office. All I vant is to be certain you ain’t padded. I bin had that way before. No, you’ll do. But you ain’t American, that’s for sure. Where’s your work permit?’

Again she had to admit that she had not got one.

His dark eyes behind the spectacles suddenly filled with anger, and he snapped, ‘Vot the hell you vaste my time for then? Get the hell outa here.’

This second defeat sent her spirits down to zero. Out in the street again, she wondered if it was worth while to go to the third agent whose address she had taken. But it was not far off, so she rallied her courage to try once more, in the hope that the old saying, ‘third time lucky’ might work and that the agent would be willing to risk placing her without a permit.

The waiting-room was more crowded than at the agent’s she had just left. Of the dozen people in it eight were women, ranging from old-stagers to pretty, youngish girls. Three of the four men were middle-aged, the fourth looked to be only about thirty. He was tall, slim, olive-complexioned, well dressed in a rather flashy way and had a black, hairline moustache. Linda put him down as an Italian.

Having given her name to a long-haired youth who was addressing envelopes at a small table, Linda sat
down to wait her turn. Every five minutes or so, from a glass-panelled door marked ‘Private’, people emerged, looking smugly pleased or slightly peeved, and the young man showed others in to be interviewed.

After a while the youngish Italian-looking man came over to Linda, politely tipped the soft hat he was wearing at a rakish angle, and said, ‘Hiya, sister. You’re new here, ain’t you?’

She gave him a brief smile. ‘Yes, but how did you guess that? Do I look so unlike the others?’

‘You sure do; but it wasn’t that. My name is Marco Mancini, and I’m a journalist. I hang round this joint quite a bit to pick up paras about theatrical folk, so I know most of the regulars by sight, and I’ve never seen you before. Mind if I sit down?’

His manner was pleasant and Linda liked his smile, which displayed even, gleaming-white teeth, so she said, ‘By all means do. As I’m new at this sort of thing, perhaps you may be able to give me some useful advice?’

‘Sure, I’d be happy to if I can.’ As he took the chair next to her, he went on: ‘What’s your line?’

Linda repeated her story that she had been a model, but was fed-up with changing her clothes twenty times a day and that she had no stage training, but hoped that her face and figure might get her a job in a chorus.

His teeth flashed again. ‘You’ve got what it takes, baby. And if I was you I’d ask plenty. That face and them legs of yours will land you a contract in any city any day.’

‘You’re wrong about that. I’ve been turned down by two agents this morning already.’

‘You don’t say!’ His well-marked eyebrows lifted in surprise. ‘How come?’

‘I gather that anyone who is not an American citizen
has to have a work permit. I’m not, and I don’t think I could pass as an American, unless I could produce evidence that I had been naturalised.’

‘You certainly could not. The moment you opened your mouth I said to myself, “Marco, this babe is English, or else she was reared there and brought over by some lucky guy.” ’

‘You’re right,’ Linda conceded, then elaborated on the supposition he had formed. ‘But the guy wasn’t all that lucky. I had known him in England and came over to marry him. I’d no idea that he was mixed up in a gambling syndicate, but he was. He met me when I arrived in New York, flew me here and took me to his apartment. He told me then that his money came from graft and that he was having trouble with his past associates. Two days later, when I returned from shopping I found him gone. He’d left a note for me saying that he had had to clear out because his life was in danger. He left no address, but I was scared stiff that the men who were after him might think he had, turn up at any moment and take me to pieces in the hope of getting it out of me. So I packed as quickly as I could and moved to an hotel. We were to have been married, at least that’s what he’d said; but perhaps he never meant it. As it is, I’ve been left high and dry.’

Marco shook his head. ‘You poor kid. But why didn’t you go back to England?’

‘I hadn’t enough money for the fare. And I know no-one in England whom I could ask to lend me that much. You see, my parents aren’t at all well-off, and I left home when I was seventeen. Either to get back or go on living here I’ve simply got to get a job, but the trouble is that I haven’t a work permit.’

‘You could get one at City Hall.’

‘No. They wouldn’t give me one unless I produced my passport, and I haven’t got one. It was in my friend’s safe. I didn’t know the combination, so had to leave it there.’

‘You’re in a jam, baby; you’re in a jam.’ Marco jerked his head in the direction of the door marked ‘Private’. ‘Old man Jutson in there won’t give you a job without you got a permit. That’s for sure. If he did, and it came out, he’d be liable to lose his licence as an agent. He’ll not risk that, so you’re just wasting your time sitting here.’

Linda sighed. ‘In that case I’d better go back to my hotel. Perhaps I could get a job as a shop assistant, but I’d hate to have to do that. Is there nothing you can suggest?’

Again Marco shook his head. ‘Seeing you’re a foreigner, you couldn’t even get work in a store without a permit. Still, for those who know the ropes, anything is possible. Have you no friends in Chicago?’

‘No, I don’t know a soul.’

‘I’m well-off in that respect. A Press man has to be. I’d like to help, and I just might be able to pull a few strings. How about coming round the corner and having a cup of coffee while we talk it over?’

Linda accepted at once. ‘That’s very kind of you. I’d be most grateful for anything you can do.’

Ten minutes later they were seated opposite each other at a table in a pâtisserie. As soon as they had been served, the handsome Marco wasted no time in beating about the bush. In a low voice he said:

‘Now listen, baby. If you’ve no friends and not much money, you’re up against the wall. But I can put you in the clear if you’re prepared to play along. As I’ve said, I’ve plenty of friends and some of them can do pretty
well what they like in this little old city, law or no law. I can get you a passport so you can get a work permit, and a well-paid job into the bargain. But you’ve got to treat me right. I’ve taken a real fancy to you. We could have fun together. You’ve got sex written all over you, and I’ll bet you’re a damn’ good lay. I’ll trade you a passport against you coming to bed with me cheerful and willing.’

From the way he had been looking at her Linda was not very surprised at his making this proposition, but she did not reply at once. With her eyes cast down she forced herself to consider his offer dispassionately.

She had got to know Big Bear quite well, and had come to like him a lot before she had accepted his invitation to go with him to Victoria Island. Colin’s gallantry and generosity had touched her so deeply that she had felt a spontaneous urge to repay him in the only way she could. Both of them had also been of the world that she had entered on becoming Rowley’s mistress.

But this was different. There was nothing repulsive about Marco physically. In fact, he was good-looking, although he was not of a type that attracted her, and he was certainly not of the class to which Rowley had raised her. His clothes were flashy, his manner slick. She felt sure that he would never have been accepted into what was termed ‘polite society’. It was quite possible that he had been brought up in a better home than she had; but she had acquired new standards and, absurdly snobbish as it might seem, she knew instinctively that for a long time past it would never have entered her head to have an affair with a man of his kind.

Therefore, to do as he suggested would be to lower herself in her own eyes. To trade the use of her body for a passport would be selling herself. It would be exactly
the same as going to bed with a man for money. To be honest with herself, she would become a whore.

On the other hand, what if she refused? Her hotel bill at Buffalo, bus trip to Chicago, the things she had bought since, and her expenses during the past few days had reduced her resources to a bare hundred dollars—only just over forty pounds. That would not keep her for long in America, and it was all she had in the world.

Having no passport, she could not get a work permit. Without one it seemed there was no way in which she could earn money. And money she must have, otherwise within a month or less she would find herself destitute. The alternatives then would be starvation or the streets.

At the thought she gave an inward shudder. But she was still loath to take the flashy Italian as a lover, and racked her brains for other means of escape. She still had two thousand dollars in the bank in Vancouver, but could not draw upon it because her cheque book had been in the night case she had abandoned to fight her way through the crowd at the exit to Toronto Station. And she dared not write for another, because she would have to give an address to which to send it, and the bank would pass it on to the Canadian police.

Both Big Bear and Colin were rich men, and she felt sure that the bonds she had forged with them would have induced either to answer an appeal from her for help. But again she would have to give an address for a reply, and that would entail a certain risk. If Colin’s call from Niagara to the Hilton at Buffalo had been traced by the Canadian police, they would have alerted their opposite numbers in the States that she had probably got across the frontier, so she would be on their list of wanted persons. Should either of her letters
go astray or fall into wrong hands, they would pounce within a matter of hours. Her beloved Eric remained the only possibility. Even though he might wish to have no more to do with her, for old times’ sake he would send her enough money to fly down to Mexico, or somewhere in the Caribbean where work permits were not required. But she had no idea where he had gone, and a letter to him care of the Foreign Office would probably not reach him for weeks.

She had remained silent, staring down at her plate for a good two minutes. Her cigarette, unheeded, had burnt down almost to her fingers. As she quickly stubbed it out, Marco spoke:

‘Come on, baby. Make up your mind. You give me a good time and I’ll see you right. Otherwise you’ll soon find yourself pawning that fine mink coat.’

The idea had not occurred to her. It was a way out. She could get enough for it to fly from the States to some other country. But no; she could not. She had no passport and no means of getting one. Fate had played her one scurvy trick after another. But at least she was still free and, having covered her trail from Buffalo, now stood a good chance of remaining so. By selling her coat she could keep herself decently for quite a while, but not indefinitely. A chance was being offered her of starting a new life with little to worry about. The first agent she had seen that morning had said he would have no difficulty in getting her a well-paid job if she had a work permit. Marco could provide her with the means of getting one. Such a chance might not occur again. She simply could not afford not to take it.

Putting the best face on this unattractive situation, she smiled when she at last looked up. ‘I’m not accustomed to going to bed with men I’ve only just met;
that’s why I’ve taken a little time to think it over. But I like you, Marco.’

He laughed. ‘Any mutt could see you weren’t an easy push-over. That’s what got me. Else I wouldn’t have propositioned you with that bit of pasteboard. The boys who can get them don’t part with them for peanuts; so it’s going to cost me plenty. But I’m no meanie. We’ll eat tonight at the Lido, a real good Italian restaurant on East Monroe. And afterwards I’ll just not be able to wait to sample the goods.’

The smile left Linda’s lips and she sat back. ‘No, Marco. It’s not going to be like that. I like you enough to promise you a good time if you play the game by me. But I’ll not so much as kick a shoe off until you’ve given me that passport.’

‘Oh, come on, baby,’ he sought to cajole her. ‘You sure can trust me. I wouldn’t do you down. But I can’t get what you want just in an afternoon. Fakin’ a passport takes a bit of time. Earliest I could hope my friend to let me have it would be some time tomorrow. Be a sport now and let’s seal our deal tonight.’

Linda shook her head. ‘No, Marco. Let’s face the facts. I’ve no particular wish to go to bed with you, although I may enjoy it when I do. So this is a business deal in which I’m acting like a tart. I’ve never done that before, so I don’t know much about it, but I’ve always understood that they don’t rely on promises. They require the money on the spot.’