Max Collins - Chicago Lightning

Janet, it seemed, was also interested in show business; a former dentist’s assistant, she was a couple years older than Peggy. They had roomed together in New York City and came down here a few months ago, seeking sun and fame and fortune.

The afternoon was pleasant enough. Clifton sat at the wheel with Janet cuddling next to him, and Peggy and I sat in the seat behind them. She was friendly, holding my hand, putting her head on my shoulder, though we barely knew each other. We drank in the sun-drenched, invigorating gulf-stream air, as well as our bottled beers, and enjoyed the view-royal palms waving, white-capped breakers peaking, golden sands glistening with sunlight.

The runabout had been bounding along, which-with the engine noise-had limited conversation. But pretty soon fton charted us up and down Indian Creek, a tranquil, seawalled lagoon lined with palm-fringed shores and occasional well-manicured golf courses, as well as frequent private piers and landing docks studded with gleaming yachts and lavish houseboats.

“Have you found any work down here?” I asked the fresh-faced, sad-eyed girl.

She nodded. “Some cheesecake modeling Pete lined up. Swimsuits and, you know…art studies.”

Nudes.

“What are you hoping for?”

“Well, I am a good dancer, and I sing a little, too. Pete says he’s going to do a big elaborate show, soon, with a chorus line and everything.”

“And he’s going to use both you and Janet?”

She nodded.

“Any thoughts beyond that, Peggy? You’ve got nice legs, but show business is a rough career.”

Her chin crinkled as she smiled, but desperation tightened her eyes. “I’d be willing to take a Chicago booking.”

Though we weren’t gliding as quickly over the water now, the engine noise was still enough to keep my conversation with Peggy private while Pete and Janet laughed and kissed and chugged their beers.

“I’m not a booking agent, Peggy.”

She drew away just a little. “No?”

“Pete was…I don’t know what he was doing.”

She shrugged again, smirked. “Pete’s a goddamn liar, sometimes.”

“I know some people who book acts in Chicago, and would be glad to put a word in…but don’t be friendly with me on account of that.”

She studied me and her eyes didn’t seem as sad, or as old, suddenly. “What do you know? The vanishing American.”

“What?”

“A nice guy.”

And she cuddled next to me, put a hand on my leg.

Without looking at me, she asked, “Why do you think I came to Florida, Nate?”

“It’s warm and sunny.”

“Yes.”

“And…” I nodded toward either side of us, where the waterway entrances of lavish estates, trellised with bougainvillea and allamanda, seemed to beckon. “…there’s more money here than you can shake a stick at.”

She laughed. “Yes.”

By four o’clock we were at the girls’ place, in a six-apartment building on Jefferson Street, a white-trimmed-pink geometric affair among many other such streamlined structures of sunny yellow, flamingo pink and sea green, with porthole windows and racing stripes and bas relief zig-zags. The effect was at once elegant and insubstantial, like a movie set. Their one-bedroom apartment was on the second of two floors; the furnishings had an art moderne look too, though of the low-cost Sears showroom variety.

Janet fixed us drinks and we sat in the little pink and white living room area and made meaningless conversation for maybe five minutes. Then Clifton and Janet disappeared into that one bedroom, and Peggy and I necked on the couch. The lights were low, when I got her sweater and bra off her, but I noticed the needle tracks on her arms, just the same.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Nothing…. What are you on? H?”

“What do you mean?…. Not H.”

“What?”

“M.”

Morphine.

She folded her arms over her bare breasts, but it was her arms she was hiding.

“I was blue,” she said, defensively, shivering suddenly. “I needed something.”

“Where’d you get it?”

“Pete has friends.”

Pete had friends, all right. And I was one of them.

“Put your sweater on, baby.”

“Why? Do I…do I make you sick?”

And she began to cry.

So I made love to her there on the couch, sweetly, tenderly, comforting her, telling her she was beautiful, which she was. She needed the attention, and I didn’t mind giving it to her, though I was steaming at that louse Clifton.

Our clothes relatively straightened, Peggy having freshened in the bathroom, we were sitting, chatting, having Cokes on ice like kids on a date, when Clifton-in the pale yellow sportshirt and powder-blue slacks he’d gone boating in-emerged from the bedroom, arm around Janet, who was in a terrycloth robe.

“We better blow, Nate,” he told me with a grin, and nuzzled the giggling Janet’s neck. She seemed to be on something, too. “I got a nine o’clock show to do.”

It was a little after seven.

We made our goodbyes and drove the couple of blocks to his place in his white Lincoln Zephyr convertible.

“Do I take care of you,” he asked with a grin, as the shadows of the palms lining the streets rolled over us, “or do I take care of you?”

“You’re a pal,” I said.

We were slipping past more of those movie theater-like apartment houses, pastel chunks of concrete whose geometric harshness was softened by well-barbered shrubs. The three-story building on West Jefferson, in front of which Clifton drew his Lincoln, was set back a ways, a walk cutting through a golf green of a lawn to the pale yellow cube whose blue cantilevered sunshades were like eyebrows.

Clifton’s apartment was on the third floor, a two bedroom affair with pale yellow walls and a parquet floor flung with occasional oriental carpets. The furnishings were in the art moderne manner, chrome and leather and well-varnished light woods, none of it from Sears.

I sat in a pastel green easy chair whose lines were rounded; it was as comfortable as an old shoe but considerably more stylish.

“How do those unemployed showgirls afford a place like that?” I wondered aloud.

Clifton, who was making us a couple of rum and Cokes over at the wet bar, said, “Did you have a good time?”

“I like Peggy. If I lived around here, I’d try to straighten her out.”

“Oh yeah! Saint Heller. I thought you did straighten her out-on that couch.”

“Are you pimping for those girls?”

“No!” He came over with a drink in either hand. “They’re not pros.”

“But you fix them up with friends and other people you want to impress.”

He shrugged, handing me the drink. “Yeah. So what? Party girls like that are a dime a dozen.”

“Where are you getting the dope?”

That stopped him for a moment, but just a moment. “It makes ’em feel good; what’s the harm?”

“You got ’em hooked and whoring for you, Pete. You’re one classy guy.”

Clifton smirked. “I didn’t see you turning down the free lay.”

“You banging ’em both?”

“Never at the same time. What, you think I’m a pervert?”

“No. I think you’re a prick.”

He just laughed at that. “Listen, I got to take a shower. You coming down to the club tonight, or not?”

“I’ll come. But Pete-where are you getting the dope you’re giving those girls?”

“Why do you care?”

“Because I don’t think Frank Nitti would like it. He doesn’t do business with people in that racket. If he knew you were involved…”

Clifton frowned. “You going to tell him?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Maybe I don’t give a shit if you do. Maybe I got a possible new investor for my club, and Frank Nitti can kiss my ass.”