Blue Belle - Andrew Vachss [24]
The speakers spit out the music, sliding from the voodoo drums into words. Words I'd never heard before. A man's voice, gospel–tinted blues now. Warning. Blood moon rising. Slide guitar climbing on top of the drums, picking high notes, bending them against the black fabric of the bass. The words came through at the bottom of my brain; my eyes were locked on Belle.
The swamp gets mean at night.
Bloody shadows eat the light,
Things that snarl,
Things that bite,
Things no man can fight.
The music stayed dense, but the tempo picked up. Belle cocked her head, listening. She unsnapped the bra, carefully hung it on the bedpost. Her huge breasts didn't sag an inch. She raised her hands high above her head, touching them together, standing on her toes. She made a complete turn that way, a tiny smile on her face. Not a muscle twitched in the smooth skin. Her body was as seamless as an air–brushed photograph. Her shoes were gone. She stalked the little room again, listening to the throbbing music, rolling her head on the column of her neck, working out the kinks. A nurse, tired from a hard day's work? A waitress, finished with her shift?
The camera ran the length of her body. Only the white panties on her hips, a thin gold chain around her neck, a gold cross resting between her breasts. Some kind of blue mark on the front of one thigh. Even with the camera zooming in, I couldn't make it out.
She rolled the panties over her hips, down past her butt. It took a long time, but not because she was teasing the audience—the panties had a long way to travel. Belle picked them off the floor, fluffed them out, went over to the bed, and hung them on the bedpost. On top of the white bra.
The music drove harder.
Belle dropped to her knees in front of the low bed. She clasped her hands. A little girl praying. The camera moved from her broad shoulders, past her tiny waist, down to the giant globes of her butt. The seamless skin was sweaty in the burning spotlight.
The words pushed back the music.
Yes, boy, you better beware,
You better walk with care.
You can carry a cross,
You can carry a gun,
But when you hear the call, you better run.
There's worse things than gators out there.
Worse things than gators out there.
Belle's whole body was shaking now. Trembling as the spotlight blended from white to blood–red and back to white. She got to her feet and turned to face the crowd. She pulled back the covers, slid into the bed. She fluffed the pillow, pulled the covers to her shoulders, lying on her side. The mound of her hip was as high as her shoulders. The music faded down. The lights dimmed.
The music wouldn't let her sleep. Her body thrashed under the covers. Drums working her hips, guitar plucking her soft breasts. A blue spot burned down on her face buried in the pillow, turning her taffy–honey hair a ghostly white. The spot turned a softer blue, widening to cover the whole bed. The warning voice came back, soft, demanding. Telling the truth, the way the blues always does.
There's worse things than gators out there, boy.
Much worse things than gators out there.
Belle threw back the covers, the music pulling her from the bed. She looked out into the night, shook herself. She reached for her robe, put one arm into a sleeve. Then she dropped the robe to the floor.
The blue spot played over her body as she walked into the darkness.
27
WHEN THE lights came up, I saw I had two more drinks in front of me. I hadn't touched them. The pile of ten–spots in front of me was lighter.
I went back to my spot at the end of the bar, no closer to talking with Belle than I'd been. Laura came over to me, her little tray loaded with another gin–and–tonic in separate glasses. She leaned over the bar.
"You like that act better?"
I felt a hand on my shoulder. "He sure does," said a little girl's voice.
I didn't turn around. I knew who it was.
"Is this yours?" Laura asked Belle.