1968 - An Ear to the Ground (7 page)

‘Are you a fan?’ Gilda turned and looked through her sun-goggles at him. ‘So am I. When I get home, I turn it on and that’s it until I go to bed. Goodbye.’

Baines watched her walk down the steps to the white Opel car. Then remembering he had his Coq au Vin to heat up, he shut the front door, shot the bolt and took the elevator up to his quarters.

That night Johnny and Gilda raided the house. Gilda had no trouble in climbing to the first floor. Johnny stood in the moonlight and watched her as she went up the side of the house as if she were walking up a flight of stairs. She lowered a knotted rope down to him and he came up that way, hand over hand, joining her on the balcony. She had described to him the lock on the window and Johnny had brought along the necessary tools to open it.

With the blueprint from Raysons, it took them only a few minutes to locate the controls, another minute or so to open the safe. Both wore surgical gloves. Johnny emptied the glittering gems from their cases into the small sack he had brought with him. The job lasted less than five minutes. Then they left. Johnny relocked the window from the outside, then they slid down the rope, jerked it free and were away.

The first raid of the big take was accomplished.

Three

T
o get this story in its right perspective,’ Al Barney said, ‘I now have to take you back three years. We’ll come up to date before long, but I want you to get it into your mind, we are going back three years.’

I said I understood.

Al nodded and took some beer.

‘Well, now. . . I want to tell you about Harry Lewis. . .

‘At the age of thirty-eight, Harry Lewis became the husband of one of the richest women in the world. He didn’t make any effort to marry her — she married him. The moment she set eyes on him, he was a dead duck. She wanted him as her husband, and when Lisa Cohen wanted anything, she always got it. Harry wasn’t anything special in the brain-box line nor was he particularly bright in business. But he had looks. He was one of those tall, husky, handsome guys you see on the movies — a Gregory Peck type. He had loads of personality, sex appeal and a smile that rocked the kind of girls he associated with. Make no mistake about it, Harry had a stable full of girls who dropped flat on their backs when he gave the signal. But apart from his looks, Harry was no great shakes, and he was grateful that more by luck than hard work, he had become the manager of one of Cohen’s Self-Service Stores, right here in Paradise City.’ Al paused to look at me. ‘Maybe you’ve heard of Sol Cohen?’

I said I had heard of him — who hadn’t?

‘Yeah . . . well, here was Harry walking around the store, showing his teeth to the girls who worked there, giving some of them who would stand for it a quick feel when no one was looking and earning around six thousand dollars a year. He had more or less made up his mind he wouldn’t get beyond this income bracket, and this was as far as he would go in his career. This didn’t worry him too much. . . he wasn’t the ambitious type. With six grand coming in steadily, he could amuse himself, have all the girls he wanted and pay the rent of a two-room apartment that faced the sea and that was pretty cosy over the weekends when he would sun himself on the balcony with a girl on his lap or near enough for him to reach for should the idea come into his mind.

‘I don’t ever want you to imagine Harry was dumb. No one who ever worked for Sol Cohen could be dumb, but Harry wasn’t anything special. He did his job and got by.

‘Well, one hot, sunny afternoon something happened that was to turn his life upside down and inside out. Imagine Harry wandering around the store, keeping his eyes on things, giving his favourites his sexy look, pausing to have a word with the customers, feeling like a captain on his ship when the sea is nice and calm, when a woman comes up to him.

‘I’ve seen Lisa Cohen a number of times, so let me describe her to you. She was small, dark and skinny. She had big eyes — her best feature — and her father’s nose that took up most of her face. She had a mouth and chin that showed temper and aggression. One thing you can be certain about, Lisa Cohen would never make the centre spread in Playboy. You could bet your last buck on that and not have a sleepless night. At the time she first met Harry she was twenty-nine years of age. She was wearing a pair of white slacks and a blue sweat shirt that made her look like a half-grown teenager.

‘She was in Paradise City on a month’s vacation. The Cohens’ home was in Frisco, and this was her first visit to Paradise City. She had been there two weeks with friends on her father’s yacht and the old man had asked her to take a gander at the store to see how it was being handled and to report back to him. He had a lot of faith in Lisa’s judgment and he got her to do these snap checks when she was in Florida. A couple of times, she had reported unfavourably, and the managers of the stores found themselves out on the cold, hard sidewalk.

‘Lisa had been watching Harry without him noticing her for the past ten minutes. She had been wandering around the store, noting how the merchandise was being displayed, how the girls coped, and she had been favourably impressed. She was still more impressed when she realised this tall, husky hunk of beautiful manhood was the store manager.

‘It’s no secret that Lisa had hot pants. I wouldn’t go so far as to say she was a nympho, but she was as near it as makes no difference. She could have married twenty or thirty times. With her money, and what Sol Cohen was going to leave her, men were queuing up. Lisa let a lot of them lay her. This was something she had to have, but she had made up her mind when she was going to marry she would pick her man for herself and he wasn’t marrying her just for her loot.

‘As soon as she saw Harry, she decided he was the one she was going to marry. Up to now, she had met all types of men: tall, thin, short, fat, smooth, brash, young and old, but none of them combined Harry’s looks, his huskiness and the sex appeal that leaked out of his ears.

‘So she went up to him, looking at him with her big, alive eyes and told him who she was.’

***

To say Harry was startled to find himself face to face with his boss’s daughter was to put it mildly. He was practically thrown into a panic. He wondered how long she had been in the store . . . if she had seen him squeeze the bottom of the girl working on the cosmetic counter. He wondered. . . then he pulled himself together and switched on his charming smile.

‘Welcome to the store, Miss Cohen. This is an unexpected pleasure.’

Lisa had noted the panic, which pleased her. She also liked the smile, which made her blood move more quickly.

‘I want to talk to you about the store,’ she said abruptly. ‘What time do you close?’

‘Seven o’clock,’ Harry told her. ‘Won’t you come up to the office, Miss Cohen?’

‘I’ll be outside in my car at seven,’ Lisa said. ‘We will have dinner together,’ and turning, she walked into the crowd and Harry lost sight of her.

He cursed to himself because he had a girl lined up who promised great things for this night, but he had no alternative but to call her and cancel the date. She took it badly. Harry said it was just one of those things and hung up while she was still screaming abuse.

During the afternoon, he wondered what the hell the daughter of a tycoon wanted, having dinner with him. He spent the rest of the afternoon in his office, feverishly making notes on the latest sales figures and getting out a balance sheet. He could only imagine she was going to probe his profit and loss account, and as the takings had fallen off during the month, Harry sweated. But he need not have worried. During dinner, Lisa didn’t even mention the store.

She was waiting for him in a white Aston Martin. She had changed into a simple scarlet dress which from its cut must have cost plenty. She wore no jewellery and no stockings. Her black glossy hair was immaculate and if her nose had allowed her to look attractive, she would have been attractive.

Harry got into the passenger’s seat and she shot the car off with an expertise change of gears that startled him. She said nothing until they were roaring along the beach road that led out of Paradise City, then she asked abruptly, ‘Can you eat seafood?’

‘Why, sure,’ Harry said. ‘I can eat anything.’

She concentrated on her driving, and although Harry hated to be driven, preferring always to drive himself, he didn’t feel one qualm of uneasiness although she drove at an enormous speed.

They arrived at a small restaurant that Harry knew to be murderously expensive, situated on a lonely strip of beach. He wondered if he had enough money on him to meet the check’, but again he need not have worried. When the Maître d’hôtel saw Lisa, he came forward, bowing, and led them to a secluded booth, away from the rest of the crowded restaurant and from then on, Harry had nothing to do with the arrangements.

The dinner had already been ordered: king-sized prawns, hanging from wine glasses that were filled with crushed ice, lobster in a cream and champagne sauce, followed by wild strawberries in Kirsch.

During the meal, Lisa, sitting opposite Harry, studied him and questioned him: not about the store as he had expected, but about himself. Her questions were personal and probing, and bewildered, Harry answered them. Who were his parents? What was his father’s profession? Where was he educated? What were his ambitions? (To this, Harry answered a little vaguely that he was doing all right at the store and liked the work. Then seeing Lisa’s sharp, frowning stare, he went on to say that of course it would be grand to get to head office, but he did really enjoy his work.) Was he married? What were his hobbies? (To this, Harry said golf, but if he had told the truth, he would have said sex.) The probing questions went on and on and Harry became more bewildered and even a little resentful, but he told himself you never know: she might be vetting him for a more important job. By the end of the dinner, Lisa knew almost as much about Harry as he did himself— but not quite. When she abruptly asked him about his sex life, Harry threw up a smoke screen. This was taking the probe just too far.

‘I get along. . . is this something we have to talk about?’

She studied him, then nodded.

‘No. Do you want coffee?’

‘Look, Miss Cohen,’ Harry said firmly, feeling now was the time to assert himself. ‘You are my guest. I want you to understand that. Do you want coffee?’

She moved her shoulders impatiently.

‘Don’t be a fool,’ she said with brutal curtness. ‘It goes down on Daddy’s account. I sign for everything and he pays. On what you earn, you couldn’t possibly afford to pay the check. . . do you want coffee?’

Thinking back later, Harry realised this was the crucial moment when he should have either slapped her face or tossed his only $100 bill on the table and walked out. But Harry wasn’t made of that stuff. He hesitated, then turned on his charm.

‘Why, thanks . . . I didn’t know. A coffee would be marvellous.’

From that moment, he was a dead duck.

They had coffee and brandy and they discussed the latest novels, the latest pop discs and the latest movies. All the time, he felt those big black eyes searching his face, regarding the width of his shoulders, looking intently at his hands.

Then suddenly she signalled to the Maître d’hôtel for the check. She examined it carefully, even added the figures, then she signed it. She put a ten dollar bill on the plate as a tip. As she left the restaurant, money passed between her and the Maître d’hôtel. He bowed nearly to the floor. Harry registered this and flinched. This was brash, vulgar spending and he resented it.

They walked together to the car. Harry said it was one of the best meals he had had, and he thanked her for it. Lisa said nothing. She got in the car, started the engine and when Harry was by her side, she drove the car further down the beach road towards the sand dunes.

‘I don’t know if you know it,’ Harry said awkwardly, ‘but this road is a deadend. You . . .’

‘I know,’ she said.

Because Harry wasn’t all that dumb, he got the idea that the evening wasn’t over. He suddenly realised Lisa Cohen, his boss’s daughter, had hot pants for him, and this brought him out in a cold sweat. For one thing, she wasn’t his type. She was just the kind of girl Harry never even looked at. He liked his girls to have big breasts and neat, hard bottoms. This girl had no front and no behind. She was just skinny. Apart from that, he thought of Sol Cohen. If he laid his daughter and Cohen heard about it, he would be out on his ear.

Lisa pulled up under a clump of palm trees. There was a big stretch of silver sand, looking in the moonlight like freshly laundered sheet. . . there was the sea.

She got out of the car and walked down on to the hard firm sand, and Harry, his heart thumping, feeling he wanted to shout for help, followed her. She sat down under the palm trees and he stood over her.

She looked up at him.

‘Come on,’ she said impatiently, ‘take me.’

A half an hour later, Harry came out of an exhausted doze and stared up at the big, white moon. He felt as if he had been put through a wringer. Never before in his sexual life had he ever had such an experience. Making love with Lisa was like making love to a buzz saw. It had been a shattering session and Harry had hated it. When he laid a girl, he liked to be in charge.

He liked to regulate the tempo, but he had had no chance to do anything but to submit to Lisa’s terrifying passion.

‘Give me a cigarette,’ she said. She had pulled down her dress and was lying placidly by his side. As he lit the cigarette for her, he was surprised to see in the flame of the lighter how relaxed she was now. The hardness had gone. As she looked at him, smiling, her eyes limpid and kind, in spite of the size of her nose, she looked beautiful.

Not knowing what to say, still feeling torn to pieces, Harry said nothing. He lay there until Lisa had finished her cigarette, then she crushed it out into the sand and sat up.

‘I must get back. They’ll think I’ve had an accident or something.’ She got to her feet and walked across the sand to the car. Harry followed her. It was an effort to drag one foot after the other. He had never felt so drained out.