James Chase: Lady—Here's Your Wreath

She came to a small landing and again opened a door. “Here we are, darlin’,” she said.

I stepped into the room. One of those small joints. You open the front door and step into a double bed. The room was all bed.

I wedged myself round her and got to the far end of the room. The bed divided us. I had to admit she’d taken a lot of trouble in fixing the room. It had a lot of neat little gadgets, and some of the pictures she’d got hanging on the wall even made me take a look.

I said, “You’ve got a swell apartment here, ain’t you?”

She pulled off her hat and fluffed up her blonde hair. We took a look at each other. I’ll give her this. She hadn’t the usual hard, gimme face of the streetwalker. She would have been quite a looker if her chin wasn’t so pointed. That rather hardened her face, but for the rough work she was all right. If I hadn’t been sitting with Mardi for an hour, I guess this floozie would have interested me more than somewhat.

I tossed my hat on a peg and grinned at her. She had given me one long, searching glance, summed me up, and her smile back was full of things to come.

“You like it, huh?” she said.

That’s another thing I love. When a dame says ‘huh’.

At the head of the bed, and on each side, were two doors. She said, “I won’t be a minute,” and before I could stop her she went through one of the doors.

I sat on the bed and lit a cigarette. Somewhere in this joint was my five grand, unless she’d pushed it into a safe deposit. If she’d done that I was sunk, but, knowing how these floozies like to keep their dough right by their hand, I reckoned that I wasn’t going to be disappointed.

She came in again wearing a come-hither smile.

I wish I’d started my tricks before she got going, but it was too late now.

She came over and sat on the bed. “May I have my present, darlin’?” she said.

This is where it was going to be tricky. I shook my head. “You got it all wrong, baby,” I said. “I’m charging you for this outing.”

I said she hadn’t the usual hard, gimme face of the streetwalker. Well, I was wrong. I was crazy to have thought otherwise. Away went the bright smile and the flashing eye, just like they were blotted out with a sponge. Her face suddenly became set. “What you mean?” she said, her voice suddenly taking on a harsh note. This dame was looking tough.

I flicked the ash off my cigarette. “Just that,” I said, slowly putting myself in a position so that I could get up quick if she started anything. Something told me that she was likely to start something. “Maybe we better get introduced, baby,” I went on. “I’m Nick Mason.”

Just for a second she gave herself away, but then she came back again. “You aren’t tight, darlin’?” she asked. She had pulled a pillow from the bed and was holding it against her.

I said, “Suppose we come down to earth. We might start by leaving out the darlings… they give me a pain.”

She got to her feet and walked over to the door where a wrap was hanging. She put the wrap on quickly. As she fastened the sash I could see her fingers were trembling.

“You crazy or something?” she said. “You get out of here.”

“Don’t get tough,” I said, still sitting on the bed. “This morning you came to my apartment and took five grand off me. You hand that back an’ we’ll call it quits.”

She put on a good act. Her eyes opened wide and she actually managed a laugh. “You’re crazy!” she said. “I’ve never seen you and I don’t know where you live.”

I got slowly to my feet. “Listen, baby,” I said gently, “you ain’t goin’ to get anywhere with bluff. I’ve got you where I want you, an’ I’m having that dough if I have to take this joint to pieces to get it. You ain’t goin’ to get tough, because I could twist your neck for you with one hand. Now come on an’ be pice.”

She stood hesitating, then she shrugged. “If that’s the way you feel about it,” she said, “maybe I’d better let you have it.”

I almost laughed. I let her get to the small chest of drawers and pull open one of the drawers, before I shot over the bed and smothered her. My arms went round her, pinning her arms to her side, and I jerked her away from the chest. I was glad I’d taken the precaution. I had just time to see a gun lying in the top drawer before she came at me.

I’d been in some nasty corners during my career as a journalist, and I’d been in plenty of rough houses as well, but this was the first time I’d mixed it with a woman, and I should just like to place it on record that I sincerely hope it will be the last.

I can look after myself when it comes to an all-in scrap with a man. I know most of the dodges they get up to and I know most of the answers, but when a blonde fury comes at you I was up-creek without a paddle.

I see now that I could have saved myself a hell of a lot of trouble if I’d socked her on the button and finished it there and then, but I was crazy enough to treat her light.

She came at me with her arms whirring around like the blade of a propeller and her eyes blazing. I tried to grab her arms, but got nowhere. The weight of her body struck me like a small shell, and I went over with her on top of me. The bed was in the way and I got myself wedged between the wall and the bed. A sweet position to be in with a hell-cat on top of you.

She came down on me, her hands clawing at my throat. She must have weighed around a hundred and forty pounds, and that’s no joke to have dropped on you from above.

I managed to grab her wrists, and, by exerting a lot of beef, held her. Get the picture if you can. There I was, lying flat on my back, wedged between the wall and the bed, with Blondie on top of me, her wrists held, looking as if she’d start murder any minute.

I said with a gasp, “Relax, sister, this ain’t the way for a lady to behave.”

For an answer the hell-cat butted me in the face with her head. Maybe she did have blonde curls, but her head was as hard as concrete. She must have knocked herself a bit silly, but it was nothing to what she did to my mug. I felt the blood start from my nose and I thought my front teeth were coming through my top lip.

I got as mad as a coon, and, shifting my grip on one of her wrists, I socked her as hard as I could on the jaw. If you’ve ever tried to hit anyone, lying on your back, and wedged tight, you will know how difficult it is, but I managed to get a little steam through, sufficiently hard to send her backwards.

That just gave me time to struggle into a sitting position and sock her again as she came at me. This time I gave her a good one, but I hit her on the shoulder, so although it got rid of her it didn’t stop her.

I was on my feet by the time she had got over that thump, and we stood there glaring at each other.

“Cut it out,” I said, “or you’re going to get hurt. I told you…

You just couldn’t put any sense into her head; she snatched up a hand mirror from the chest of drawers and came at me again. I cursed that bed… there just wasn’t room to get set. I swept up my arm and knocked the mirror out of her hand, and then we went over together on the bed. In a way, it was better, because I could use my extra weight. I caught one arm, but before I could get the other she gave me a punch in the face, kicked my shin with her pointed shoe, and butted my nose again.

Up to now she was getting it all her own way, and the punch she had swung over had a lot of steam behind it. It was so unexpected that I loosened my grip on her arm, and she swung clear and tried to roll to the other side of the bed. I snatched at her wrap and pulled it right off her back. As the wrap came off she lost her balance and fell on the bed again.