What's in It for Me? (18 page)

“Sorry about Martha's not being here yet, fellows, but she must've been detained a little. She'll be here, though.”

“Martha?” someone asked. “You mean Martha Mills?”

I looked at the speaker. It was Joe Vitzler.

“Yeah, Joe,” I said. “When did you come in? I didn't see you—”

“I just came in a couple minutes ago.”

I picked up a bottle and a glass and walked toward him.

“Here, Joe, have a drink. All the other boys have their—”

He held up a glass in front of him.

“Thanks, Harry,” he said with a grin. “While you were out, the boys took care of me.”

“That's the spirit, Joe.”

“But was that Martha Mills you were talking about?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Remember,” Bash broke in, “I got first—”

“Yeah, I know. You got first, Bash.” I turned back to Joe Vitzler. “What were you going to say, Joe?”

He shrugged and spread his eyes wide.

“Nothing, Harry. Only I just saw her.”

Everybody looked at him.

“Where?” I asked.

“Down at Schrafft's.”

“What was she doing?”

“Eating lunch.”

I didn't want to ask the next question. But I could see Vitzler poised for the kick and the others leaning forward to see it land. If I didn't ask it, they would.

“Alone?” I asked.

“No,” he said innocently. “With an old friend of yours.”

“Which one?”

“Teddy Ast,” he said.

T
HE LIVING ROOM GREW
dark while I sat and chewed my lip and lit one cigarette after another until my throat felt like sandpaper. But I didn't get up to turn on the light. I didn't even know how I felt. Once there was a time when I could handle anything. Now a little five-dollar-a-night whore like that could take me by the nose and lead me around until I was dizzy. What the hell could she see in that little bastard Ast that could make her—?

The phone rang and I picked it off the table beside the sofa.

“Yes?”

“Y'mother on the wire,” Charlie said.

“I'm not in,” I snapped and hung up.

I arranged everything carefully. I made my plans the way I used to make them. I picked my people the way I used to pick them. Then why didn't things work out the way they used to work out? I wasn't getting any dumber. If anything, I was getting smarter. I picked up the phone again.

“Charlie.”

“Yes, Mr. Bogen?”

“You know my mother's number?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get her for me.”

“Hello?”

“Hello, Mom,” I said quickly.

“Who's this, Hershie?”

“Yeah, Ma. This is—”

“I called you a few minutes ago and the boy said you—”

“I know, Ma. I just got in and he gave me the message.”

“Oh.”

“Ma, there's a—”

“You know who I spoke to on the telephone just a few minutes ago, not even ten minutes ago? You know who?”

“Who?”

“Mrs. Ritling!”

The door opened suddenly and Martha came in.

“Listen, Ma,” I said quickly, “I'll call you back later.”

“But—!”

“I'll call you back later,” I said, and hung up.

“Where were you?” I asked in a low voice. “Why didn't you show up in the showroom like I ord—like you promised?”

“Oh, I'm sorry about that, Harry. I was coming downtown, but I ran into a friend of mine who insisted on me having a snack of lunch with her, and I just sort of lost track of the time.”

“Who was the friend?” I asked calmly.

“You wouldn't know.”

The restraint went out of my voice.

“Since when wouldn't I know Teddy Ast?”

She swung her face toward me angrily.

“What have you got, a detective service?”

“I don't need detectives. I got ears. I heard people talk.”

“When do you get the chance?” she sneered. “You're always talking yourself.”

“Never mind that wise guy stuff,” I snapped. “What about Ast?”

“Suppose it was Ast? You want to make something of it?”

I drew back my hand to smack her.

“Why, you dirty little—!”

She didn't flinch, but her eyes narrowed.

“Brother,” she said quickly and slowly, “if you ever did that, I wouldn't take out an insurance policy on your life even if the premium was to be paid in buttons.”

I dropped my hand and pulled myself together.

“Look,” I said finally. My voice was elaborately calm and analytical. “If you started two-timing me for an oil king or a movie hero I could understand it. But will you just answer me one question? What the hell do you see in that little rat-faced jerk?”

She leaned back in her chair and lit a cigarette.

“Who ever said I saw anything in him?”

“Then what the hell do you run around with him for?”

She smiled acidly.

“First, darling, because you asked me to originally.”

I bit my lip and shook my head at her.

“All right. I asked you to. But now I'm asking you not to, and you're
still
running around with him.”

She opened her eyes in surprise.

“So what are you yelling about? I'm maintaining a fifty per cent average in following your instructions. Seems to me that ought to be satisfactory. What are you kicking about?”

“Come on. Save the wise cracks for later. What else?”

Her jaw hung forward meanly.

“And secondly, I like him because he treats me like a person, for my own sake. Not like a piece of furniture that you're always trying to dress a window with to see what you can get out of me.”

“You're getting pretty God-damn sensitive all of a sudden, aren't you,” I said sarcastically.

“My patrician upbringing.”

“That's a new name for Tenth Avenue,” I sneered.

“It's still Park Avenue to where
you
come from.”

“We're not discussing my birthplace.”

“What's the matter? Don't you want the conversation to get down that low?”

“Considering what I'm talking to, it's low enough.”

“Never mind the true confessions, Harry.”

“Your sensitivity outraged again?”

“What if it is?”

“You weren't so God-damn sensitive in the days when I was buying you wrist watches and diamond bracelets.”

Her lips twisted in a sneer.

“A lot of my sudden sensitivity may be due to the fact that you've been doing damn little of that lately.”

I smacked the table and waved my hands.

“Jesus Christ alive!” I cried. “Didn't I tell you this is only a temporary lull? Didn't I tell you all my available cash went into the new business? Didn't I tell you this was only until I got back on my feet again?”

“Well, I'll tell you, Harry. I was never one for this little-woman-standing-by stuff,” she said coolly. “I don't go much for men who are getting on their feet. I like them when they're standing up on their feet already. The other girls can have them while they're getting set up. Then I step in and take them over.”

“Like you took me, eh?” I sneered.

“Why, Harry! What a thing to say! The Great Bogen! You know nobody takes you, Harry. You know you just swept me off my feet and I was just putty in your hands.”

“Look,” I said quietly, “I want you to notice something.”

“What?”

“Notice how calm I am about this. Notice how logical I am. Notice how I don't get excited or sore or anything like that.”

“I'm noticing. But what about it?”

“This whole thing,” I said sarcastically. “You're looking on it just as a business proposition, aren't you?”

She shrugged and straightened her gloves.

“Well, I can't exactly go into the business of manufacturing dresses like you can, can I?”

Seventh Avenue couldn't come within miles of the business she was cut out to run.

“In other words, it's the guy that pays the most that gets you, eh?”

She looked up at me sweetly.

“Or the guy that has the most. They don't have to pay, Harry. I can always get it if they've got it.”

I straightened up triumphantly.

“Well, then, I don't see this guy Ast buying you any diamond bracelets or wrist watches, either.”

“That's true,” she admitted; then, brightly, “but at least he makes offers.”

“Offers! What the hell land of offers can
he
make.”

“Well,” she said casually, “you'd be surprised at some of the offers he's made me.”

“Go ahead. Tell me.”

“He's offered to take me to Europe and to Hollywood and then to get me into pictures. That's what he's offered me.”

“What a laugh!
He's
going to get you in the movies! His influence makes about as much difference as a fart in a gale.”

“You don't seem to have such a hell of a lot more,” she snapped.

“Then what's the advantage of changing?”

“Just to get out of the groove,” she said with a calm shrug. “You work one vein until it's played out, and then you shift to another.”

“Don't go shifting so fast,” I said, “until you examine all the possibilities.”

“I've examined all the possibilities,” she said finally.

“So you think I'm worked out, eh?”

She smiled at me gently.

“Sometimes, Harry, you say the most accurate things.”

“Well, I'll just show you how smart I am.”

“Oh, my God,” she said, “another demonstration?”

“One more won't kill you.”

“I'm not so sure of that.'

“Well, you just listen for a minute and see if I'm not right.”

“All right. I'm listening.”

I looked at her deliberately.

“You don't care for diamond bracelets and wrist watches and that stuff. You don't care for Teddy Ast, either. In fact, if he was a Christmas tree loaded down with diamond bracelets you wouldn't give a God damn for him. Am I right?”

She shrugged unconcernedly.

“Don't ask me. This is your speech.”

“Then I'll make it. You don't care for all that. You—”

The phone rang suddenly. I picked it up.

“Yes?” I snapped.

“Mr. Bogen?”

“Yes, Charlie, yes, yes? What do you want?”

“A large fat envelope just came in for you, Mr. Bogen.”

“A what?”

“A large fat yellow envelope. It says Mr. Guber in the corner? Irving Baltuch Associates, Inc.? Real Estate? Do you want me to—?”

“Put it in my box,” I snarled. “I'll pick it up later.”

I hung up and turned back to her.

“Where was I?”

“You were just telling me the things I didn't care for,” she said with a straight face.

“That's right. Diamond bracelets and wrist watches and Teddy Ast—that's all junk. You know what you really want?”

“What?”

“You want Hollywood. You want to get out there in front of a microphone and sing like Gladys Swarthout and Jeanette MacDonald and all the rest. Am I right?”

She looked me in the eye.

“Suppose you are. What about it?”

“Just think about it. If you're playing Teddy Ast for that, you're up the wrong tree.”

“Maybe. But I'm not listening to advice.”

“All right. But you can listen to a statement.”

“Try making it.”

“I will. You play ball with me and I'll have you in Hollywood before the year is up. How does that sound?”

“It sounds fairly intelligent, but—”

“And when I say I'll have you in Hollywood, I mean as a star, not as a tourist.”

She smiled up at me cheerfully.

“Well, Harry, this little conversation seems to be making some sense finally, doesn't it?”

“You said it, kid.”

“Wait a minute,” she said. “We better shake on that deal first.”

“You don't trust anybody, do you?”

She shrugged.

I took her hand and shook it.

“It's a deal,” I said.

“Right,” she said.

Then she put her arms around me and tipped up her face and I kissed her.

“Harry, my dress.”

“The hell with the dress. I'll buy you another dress.”

“Harry.”

“Shut up.”

“Harry!”

“Shut up.”

“Har—Unhh, unhh—”

She shut up. A few moments later I stopped suddenly. She opened her eyes.

“What—?”

I looked down at her. I didn't have to look. I could feel it.

“You hate my guts, don't you?” I said quietly.

Her face twisted. She shook herself and shivered.

“You pick out the dumbest times to—Come on.”

“You hate my guts, don't you?”

“Oh, shut up and come on.”

“You—”

“Come on. Come
on!”

“All right.”

“That's—Unhh, unhh—”

But it wasn't any good. Christ, even that was lousy. There didn't seem to be anything any more.

I
UNWOUND MY LEGS
and recrossed them for the fortieth time and crushed out my fifth cigarette.

“Pardon me, Miss,” I said finally, “but you mind telling Mr. Terkel I'm still out here waiting for him?”

She looked up at me with a worried frown.

“I'm awfully sorry, Mr.—” she began, and hesitated.

“Bogen,” I said.

“I'm awfully sorry, Mr. Bogen. But when Mr. Terkel gets in in the morning he's got his desk piled high with important memoranda. And there's a list of important calls he has to make first before he can see anybody.”

“Well, my God, what does he think I am, a Broadway playboy? With an income from a tobacco fortune or something? I got my own business that I've got to attend to. I can't keep sitting here all day and—”