Xaviera Hollander - The Happy Hooker - My Own Story

My name was written on the envelope in very scribbly, more or less childish, uncontrolled handwriting, and with a pencil, not a pen. I opened the envelope as I walked in and took my coat off. And all of a sudden an intuitive feeling told me that this little envelope contained dangerous news for me.

Only one thing came out of the envelope – a Polaroid picture, which shocked me tremendously. Someone had put the pictures, which Mac the so-called cop, who I later learned was a phony, stole from my old apartment, into a group and took this Polaroid shot of them. There I was in one photo sucking a huge cock, and in the others, playing with myself. There was no letter with the pictures.

I was badly scared and immediately ran out of the apartment and took the elevator down to the lobby. I went up to the doorman on duty and said to him, “Listen, I’m in trouble.” I trusted this doorman. He was a kind of fatherly type, a father image to me.

He knew I was hooking, of course, but I was paying him off. I didn’t show him the picture or tell him exactly what had happened. I just said that some person came up to my apartment and put an envelope under the door which shouldn’t have been put there.

“Did you see anyone going up unannounced?” I asked.

The doorman scratched his head and finally said, “Let me think. Yes, now that you ask me, I remember seeing a young guy this afternoon. I thought he must be drunk or doped up. I don’t know what those kids take nowadays, but he couldn’t walk straight. He needed a shave, his clothes were dirty and ragged.” The doorman frowned to himself. “He, was a young punk with long stringy blond hair hanging in his face, and he said he had something to deliver to you.”

The doorman grinned now. “He mispronounced your name something awful, so I told him I’d take the message to you. But he said he wanted to deliver it himself, and he would just push it under your door. So finally I let him go up.”

I couldn’t think of anyone who answered the description, but I thanked the doorman, gave him five dollars, and went back to my apartment. I knew this was no joke, and as though to confirm this thought, the telephone rang. The voice on the other end was heavy with that low-class New York accent. It said, “Miss Xaviera?”

I knew the call was to do with the pictures. “Yes,” I whispered.

“So, Miss Xaviera, I hope you found your little letter.”

“Yes,” I said, trying to stop my voice from quivering.

“Miss Xaviera, we want you to think our proposition over seriously, and we want an answer by Wednesday. In fact, we are going to call you tomorrow night at seven.” This was already Monday. “We want you to have five thousand dollars ready for us, or else…”

Upon which I said, “What do you mean? Five thousand dollars for this little picture?”

With a sneering voice the man said, “Yeah. We know you don’t have your immigration papers. We can get your sexy little ass kicked out of the country in forty-eight hours by proving to the Immigration Department that you are posing for pornographic pictures.” He had a mean laugh.

“We can give the pictures to the people where you work, and you’ll be fired and be in big trouble with immigration. Think about it. We’ll be back to you tomorrow at seven in the evening.”

The man hung up, and in my life I never remember being so upset. I had been on my own for less than a year since Carl Cordon left. Apart from Sonia, I didn’t have any real friends because of the wild life I had been leading. I knew some lawyers and influential men who were customers, but all of a sudden I was faced with the problem of raising $5,000. I looked through my address book wondering whom I could call.

For about four months I had been “dating” a lawyer named Martin Joffrey, a very sweet, very uptight Jewish boy, whom I had met just after Carl went away. He knew what I had suffered and that I was basically a very sensitive person. Martin had seen me going the way down, as he put it, ever since I was introduced to Pearl. He hated to see this happen to a nice Jewish girl from Holland. But Martin and I had a tender, almost loving relationship. I really cared for him and knew I could call him anytime for advice.

So the first person I called was Martin and he really didn’t know what to say. The one thing he did say was, “Don’t pay them. Once you pay a blackmailer, he’s on your payroll for life.” This answer didn’t help me, and I called other people I knew, but nobody could help me.

Finally I started asking if I could borrow $5,000. “I’ll work it off, even if it means I have to leave my job and screw it off,” I begged.

Some of the men I had been dating were really rich, but now, very early in the game, it was driven home to me that a man who goes to a prostitute doesn’t want to be bothered with her private problems unless he really gets involved with her.

So I was on the phone all night, and no help was coming.

The next morning I was in almost a state of nervous collapse when I found in my pocketbook, just before leaving for the office, the piece of paper on which Murray the Mover had written his name and phone number.

I remembered how he had know instinctively I was working as a prostitute even though I had a daytime job. Murray, being a mover, wasn’t exactly a sweet pussycat, and I thought this is precisely the time to call a rough boy instead of all those nice, sophisticated jet-set people who are full of words without any action. So I called Murray just before leaving for work and explained what had happened. He said if this blackmailer was going to call me tonight at seven, he would be at my apartment at six-thirty. Murray told me not to have any dates and not to plan on going anywhere until this thing was settled. “I just want you to be with me, and that means that I will be with you, and you will do what I tell you – that’s all.”

This was an order, and right after five o’clock I went home. I had made a date for nine that night with a lawyer from Canada to go to dinner, and I had no way to reach him. He was recommended to me by my stockbroker, and when I called Wall Street, my broker didn’t know how to find the lawyer. I just had no way to cancel this nine o’clock date.

I was home before six and canceled every person I was supposed to see before nine that night, and I was so nervous I barked at the men who called me on the phone. “Leave me alone; don’t bother me for the rest of the night.”

At six-thirty sharp, Murray rang the doorbell. I had not seen him since he moved me in three weeks before. He is a very tough-looking man and has a dark, pockmarked face and bushy black hair.

Murray seemed nervous himself when he came in. He looked around my studio apartment, first into the bathroom, where I had a phone so I could call people while I was in the tub. He said this was good, and as he looked around, he was talking.

“Xaviera, I want you to do exactly what I tell you. If anything happens tonight, we will be together. Just don’t be afraid. I know what I’m doing.”

Murray told me not to be frightened, but I was frightened and trying to keep from shaking. I was not really intending to do anyone – even Mac, who stole the pictures – any harm. All I wanted was to have a man with me when I met the people who were blackmailing me, somebody powerful who would maybe smack them on the nose a little and say, “Listen, give the pictures back to the girl and stop the bullshit!”.

“Okay,” Murray said, “now remember, usually blackmailers are not there to hurt you, they just want money, that’s all. When they call at seven, you answer in the bathroom and I’ll pick up in the living room. We’ll pretend that I’m your uncle. The only living relative you have in this country. I’m representing you, see? I have a car, and if they want to meet us we’ll meet them.”