Harlan Ellison: Spider Kiss

Indoor, year-round ice skating rinks.

A carnival, top-heavy on grifters and nautch shows.

A dog track.

A traveling country music and revival show.

Some calculated gambling in Reno, Las Vegas, Monte Carlo, and Hot Springs, Arkansas, utilizing the services of a gentleman with only three fingers on his right hand, a need for twenty-seven thousand dollars, and a face seen on posters often tacked-up in metropolitan police stations.

Some gun-running.

Another dog track.

A talent show.

Another talent show.

A third talent show, packaged by Freeport’s own outfit.

A girl singer with connections.

An ill-starred publishing venture (no one was really very interested in reading), The Alexandre Dumas Adventure Magazine .

A Broadway musical featuring a girl singer with connections.

Some more gun-running.

And then, the organization of FREEPORT, SERVICES UNLIMITED. From which foundation emerged young talents and well-known personalities in new formats that, within the space of five years, made the name of Colonel Jack Freeport a touchstone in the trade. The name no longer elicited a querulous, “Who?” in the Brill Building.

With one-minded verve, Freeport made his way, built his fortune, grew older and surer of himself, to pour substance into a dream. The old days, in Atlanta, when the Freeport family had owned Freeport, a family name and a plantation whose fields and rooms and eyries had known light. A dream to rebuild a tiny empire of regal living on land charred by Sherman and his marauders.

Too poor, too long, living with the slightly stale smell of decaying memories. This was the driving force of Colonel Jack Freeport—no more a Colonel than his great-great-grandfather (who had been a pillaging privateer) had been.

And any means to this end was a valid, honorable means. How much more potent is the drive to regain stature than mere love, motherhood, honor, security. Of this substance are made dictators, nations, dynasties, empires, rock’n’roll singers.

Colonel Jack Freeport had a good eye.

His ears were excellent, also.

He saw what Shelly had seen in Luther Whoeveryouare. Had it been necessary to rig the talent show (a small challenge to the man who had convinced America it needed a ticket to a Freeport-produced show more than it needed shoes for baby), he would have done so without hesitation.

But the need had not arisen.

The only competition had been a snot-nosed tot with Shirley Temple dimples and a head of Breck shampoo curls. Weak competition at best, whose only strength had been fatuous mommy-love. Luther had walked off with it; the pre-rigged decision by Freeport had not been necessary.

The boy had been just this side of sensational. Aside from a fleeting nervousness which had quickly dispersed as his audience warmed, his stage presence had been sharp and commanding. He had sung his heart out, received three curtain calls, and collapsed the house by singing on one knee—oddly, in no way reminiscent of Jolson—directly into the pimply face of an adolescent and the wine-bright eyes of a matron. They squealed. They squirmed. They found themselves drenched with a sweat of desire. Luther was a sneak-away success. He won the first prize, which, it miraculously turned out, was a contract with Colonel Jack Freeport, and a trip to New York. Had the tot won, the prize would have been a lovely Westinghouse refrigerator-freezer combination and a check for five hundred dollars.

That’s show biz.

His full name was Luther Sellers. No relation to Peter. Mother dead, father off in the oil fields somewhere. He was— literally—a child of the streets, and it showed through with every word he uttered, with the way he carried himself, his conception of the world, and his interests. It was there all the time—but not when he sang.

He had a manager, which surprised Freeport and Shelly, and immediately made their eyes narrow, their minds begin to work. “Don’t worry about Asa,” Luther told them the next day. “I can handle him.”

“Have you got a contract with him?” Shelly asked.

The boy shook his head. “He heard me singin’ one time and said he’d help me. Got me a place to stay, an’ a job at the hotel.”

Freeport was in a position to be magnanimous. “Sounds like a fine man, Luther. We’ll have to do something for him.” He thought for a moment, pursed his lips and went on. “Of course, the corporation will have to have full ownership of your contract, but I’m sure we can make it worth this uh—”

“Asa Kemp.”

“—yes, uh, Asa Kemp. We can make it well worth Mr. Kemp’s time and efforts spent. I think perhaps a thousand dollars might—”

“Forget it,” Luther said, giving Shelly and Freeport the first solid indication of a somewhat darker character. “I’ll take care of old Asa.”

Freeport smiled indulgently. He exchanged a glance with Shelly that said, This infant knows nothing about business . And Shelly had a Roman candle thought-burst that said very distinctly, Freeport, we have maybe got ourselves a tiger by the short hairs .

“Well, Luther, we’ll see.” The Colonel placated him, adding, “Why don’t we call this Mr. Kemp, and have him come by for a drink?” Luther shook his head.

“We have to go there,” he said. “He won’t leave the bicycle shop during the day. He’s got a thing.”

Shelly and the Colonel exchanged their glances, and Freeport moved to get his pills from the table. “All right, Luther, why don’t we go see Mr. Kemp right now, so we can clear things up here, and be on that ten-thirty plane to New York. How does that sound?”

Luther shrugged. Shelly thought wryly that Luther was very large on shrugs. He was also beginning to notice that Luther had very, very sharp teeth.

It was a fairly safe bet that Asa Kemp was about to get twelve or fifteen inches stripped off his ass. The hard way. Shelly felt uneasy; also greedy. The grab is a helluva disease , he thought, as they descended in the elevator.

He thought about it as the rented limousine pulled up before The Brown. He thought about it all the way across town to the bicycle shop. He stopped thinking about it when he saw Asa Kemp for the first time.

Only a fink could worry about cheating such an easy mark. Asa Kemp was born to be had. He wore wire-frame glasses. And a bow tie. Clip-on.

“Luther!” His face looked like a bonito-bettor’s at hit-time. “Son, how ah you!” He didn’t really want an answer. He grabbed the boy around the shoulders and hugged him carelessly. “Ruth was askin’ after you, boy.”

Then he noticed the silk-suited accompanists, and his smile broadened, became a company grin for the folks at large. “Afternoon,” he beamed.

“Mr. Kemp,” Shelly began, and never finished.

" Luther !" the fat little woman came through the curtains at the rear of the shop. She seemed out of place here among the frames and wheels and rubber tubes strung about the walls, yet she moved between the rough wooden benches and the racked bicycle parts with the ease of familiarity. She held Luther at arm’s length and blinked at him myopically.

“Where have you been , Luther Sellers?” she chided him with false severity. “You’ve had poor Asa and me about worried to death! Do you know we didn’t even know you’d entered the Talent Show at the Fair till we saw’t in the paper this morning that you’d won. Lord, son, you mustn’t worry us like that!”

Luther stared at her coldly. Even to Shelly there was a warmth here, and though he did not do it openly, he felt like smiling at the pleasant Kemps. But Luther stared at them coldly.

“This is Colonel Freeport from New York,” Luther said briskly. “He wants he should talk to you.” He opened the door for Freeport, and stepped back.