Chapter 4 - Pete Grappler P.I.

The truth starts to come out about Cyrus Longbottom.

Chapter Four

 

I woke at 2.30 pm… slept like a baby for three hours or so, and a whole lot better than eight hours passed out in my office chair, to the smell of food cooking.  I’d forgotten breakfast in all the rush.

 

The door whispered open and Cynthia and the most gorgeous a*s in the world backed in with a tray full of the best bacon, eggs,  tomato on the side, light toast, and the best smelling coffee this side of Havana.  I started to get out of bed, but she shook her head and just signaled me to stay put, then brought the tray and sat down on the edge, right next to me.  Close enough so I could smell all that wonderful food, and something much better, too!

 

“You make this yourself, or call room service?”

 

“Made it myself, silly!  I’m a hillbilly’s daughter, remember.  I know how to cook and make a man happy!”

 

That she did ... that she did, and we went quiet for about five minutes while we ate up every bit of that scrumptious food.  I could really get used to this, I thought, but at the back of my mind was a little red flag telling me that it could never last.

 

As she sat there, her robe slipped just a little from her shoulder, and I saw what Harry had been talking about night before last, a set of marks and bruises, that, now that I looked, matched the ones on her arms. I reached over and gently touched one with my finger, and Cynthia flinched and grabbed the robe back up.

 

“Don’t do that”, she said, and started to move away a bit, far enough so I couldn’t touch her again.  I did get out of that bed then, and walked around and sat down next to her, real close.  She was looking down at her feet and sulky like a lost little girl who’d been bullied at school, so I took her face in my hands and gently turned it towards me.

 

“Honey”, I said, “trust me, it’s OK!  I’ve got to know all about you and all the things like this.  I feel like I’ve got an investment in you now, but I’m scared, too, scared that you’ll just blow away on the wind again like you were never here, and I’ll never see or touch you again.  And …  somebody told me about these marks and stuff.  I wanna know, baby!  Really!”

 

She looked at me for a long, long minute, then folded gently into my arms again.  I held her tight, and she said it all.. said it so calm that you’d think she was just reading a book or something….

 

“Cyrus beats me”, she said in this eerie calm voice like a little girl, “not sort of around the house or anything, not arguing and stuff, it’s different, and not just like that.  Most of the time he just leaves me alone, but sometimes he has … friends .. over, and he .. wants to put on a show for them.”

 

My mind was racing. 

 

What the hell kind of show would a man want to put on with his wife for ‘friends’ that would even want a show?

 

“It’s OK, baby.  Take your time.  I’m here!”

 

She went quiet for a while, so quiet that I thought she’d given up on telling me the story, but then her little girl’s voice started again,

 

“He makes me have sex in front of them all, all of them naked.  No, no … none of them ever touches me but him.  They just stand around and.. look, you know.  And it’s not just that, just ordinary sex.  He .. takes me like a boy, you know, from behind .. and his ‘friends’ all stand around doing that hand thing for themselves and each other, you know.  While he’s doing it he hits me with a belt, not enough to cut, but enough to hurt, you know, and leave these marks.”

 

I held her tight, gentle but tight, and she clung into me like a lost child, and my mind was in a turmoil.  What sort of man was this?  Pillar of the community, yeah.  Heard about those before….

 

She went on,

 

“I’m a hillbilly girl, you know, not exactly innocent.  I mean, I wasn’t sort of pure or anything when I met him, and he wasn’t like that at first.  Not until we were married, and I thought I could live in a big house and have a few things for a change.  But he changed after we were hitched, started going out all the time, to places like that Belle’s a lot, with his ‘friends’.  I haven’t had a real man until you, Pete, I swear, not since… before Cyrus.”

 

Yeah, I knew that Belle’s catered for all sorts of clientele .. I was getting used to that word a little … and that some of her clientele liked the boys a little too much more than the girls.  Me?  I’ll stick with the straight stuff, pure as bourbon, any day.

 

Cynthia pulled back, and I thought for a moment we’d lost that moment, that maybe she thought I was hating her for being such a w***e or whatever.  I guess she could see that I didn’t. If anything I was more hooked than ever, not for the chance of doing that Cyrus crap, but just because I felt better knowing why she needed a real man like me instead.  Guess that makes a man ten feet tall, right there.

 

She started talking again,

 

“You don’t know how it is, Pete, growing up with nothing and never seeing anything much of your very own.”

 

I turned her gently towards me, and looked into her beautiful eyes again,

 

“Do I look like a man who’s had it all handed to him any time in the last five hundred years?”

 

She looked right back, then moved over and took me in her arms in her turn,

 

“I’m sorry, Pete.  I didn’t mean it like that.  No, you don’t.  I was just sayin’, you know.”

 

“I know, Baby!”

 

She pulled away again and clenched her hands,

 

“I don’t want it any more!  I don’t want the big house and the money and the cars.  I thought I did, but I know I don’t now.  I just want what every girl wants, a good man, a home and family, and a good life that I can be proud of.  Not this stinking mess that I’ve got myself into.  I need to get out, oh, god, I need to get out of this!”

 

The tears started again and  I reached over gently, and took her in my arms again, and slipped her robe down and tossed it on the floor.  Slowly and gently, I kissed every one of those marks on her back and arms, then lay her down gently, and kissed her all over, in all the good spots, reveling in the moist warm, woman smell and taste of her.

 

I felt her relax and let go… and we lay side by side for a while, just touching and stroking gently.  She ran her fingers over the scar on my face and the one on my chest courtesy of Kaiser Bill, and maybe the few smaller scars courtesy of other kingpins along the way to this spot right here and I knew then and there that I would never want to get away.  And I never did let go of her again, not for one moment ever since.

 

*     *     *

 

Four pm.  I’d forgotten about Sam and the mortuary, and I was still a man with responsibilities.  Cynthia was lying asleep like a baby, so I  tip-toed out of the room and found the phone.

 

“St James, Mortuary not the Infirmary, you reap ‘em, we keep ‘em!  You kill 'em, we chill 'em!”, said the clerk who picked up the phone.

 

Smartass.

 

“I’m checking on Sam Spade, Negro guy that was brought in last night.  Any chance he’s been cleared to leave yet?”

 

I could almost see the smirk on his face as he thought of Sam walking outta that joint with his white robe wrapped around him, like nothing had happened.

 

“Hold on, I’ll check.  Yeah, Mr Spade is ready to leave any time soon, soon as someone signs for him and organizes transport.  Coroner says he’s a dead cert case of murder, and no reason to hold him any more, so he’s all yours any time before five.  We close then and we don’t like to hold on to our clients for long, so you’d better hurry.”

 

 “I’ll be there.”  I guess Sam had his bags packed ready.

 

I tip-toed back into the room, and headed for the shower. Cynthia was awake,

 

“You leaving me, handsome?”

 

I went over to the bed and sat down again, just for a minute, to let her in on what I was doing.

 

“Nah.  Never, Babe.  I haveta go see about Sam, and organize Spragues Funeral Parlour to take care of the details.   After that I got a little business around with a few people. I wantcha to stay here, and not go out, and I’ll bring us back some dinner.  I’ll need your keys to get in and out, is that OK?”

 

“Sure, Pete”, she said, “they’re right there on the table.”

 

“I won’t take your car.  Too obvious.  I’ll take a cab.  By the way, where is MR Longbottom right now?”

 

I’d forgotten about that boy lovin’ gutter snake’s whereabouts in all the excitement, and now I had an angle on him I wanted to know as much about him as possible.

 

“He’s away until Thursday.  He’s on some sort of business trip, something to do with politics and stuff.  I dunno much about that stuff, you know.” 

 

This was Tuesday, so I figured Cynthia and I had a coupla days rest, and a bit of time together until we needed to settle something about what and where we were going to be.  I stroked her gorgeous cheek.

 

“Yeah, Doll, better not to know too much about that sort of political crap.  Them guys are all crooks.  Listen, I gotta shower and get going.  You stay here, promise me, and I’ll be back soon as I finish.”

 

“I promise.  I don’t want to go anywhere without you again, Pete.  Never!”

 

I kissed her again and nearly ran to the shower, and another dose of that hot downpour, but only for a coupla minutes.

 

When I came out again Cynthia had laid some clothes out for me, and then gone back to sleep.  As I dressed I couldn’t take my eyes off her.  She looked so like an angel lying back on that pillow with her eyes closed, yeah, she definitely belonged in Heaven and not with Mr Longbottom.

 

I tip-toed out and headed down the elevator again and out through the door.  I arrived at the Mortuary at 4.35, and anted up the cost for Sam to come along with me, and they handed me a paper bag with his life in it. 

 

That was it at the end for Sam, a paper sack with a few bits and pieces in it, small enough to go into my pocket until later when I felt I could take it.

 

Four hundred big ones cut a hole big enough for an airship in that fourteen hundred.  Accommodation sure didn’t come cheap at St James, but they did throw in a burial suit as part of the package.  I borrowed their phone and rang Spragues. 

 

They were there at 4.59, so I slipped the attendant another dime note to keep the doors open until we got Sam on board, and handed Spragues another seven fifty for the funeral.

 

I didn’t want Sam to spend another night with all those lowlife they brought in outta the river or full of holes from the speakeasies and the streets around them, so I was happy to part with the cash.  After cab fare I still had a clean two twenty stake in my pocket, so I was good for a cab ride or two around town.  Mr Longbottom wasn’t alone, I had friends of my own to see…..

 

*     *     *