The Mike Hammer Collection - Mickey Spillane [109]
“I’ll speak to her. She around?”
“There’s a summer house on the south side where she practices. She practically lives there.”
She was standing in front of me now, concern deep inside those wild blue eyes. I said, “I’ll see what I can do.”
Geraldine smiled, reached up slowly, and put her arms around my neck. With the same deliberate slowness she pulled herself on her toes, wet her lips with her tongue, and brought my mouth down to hers. It was a soft teasing, tasting kiss, as if she were sampling the juice from a plum before buying the lot. Her mouth was a warm cavern filled with life and promise, then just as slowly she drew away, smiling.
“Thank you,” she said.
I grinned at her. “Thank you.”
“I could hate you easier than I could like you.”
“Which is worse?”
“That you’ll have to find out for yourself.”
“Maybe I will, baby.”
At first I didn’t think she was there, then I heard the sounds of a cabinet opening and I knocked on the door. Her smile was like the sun breaking open a cloud and she reached for my hand. “Hello, Mike. Gee I’m glad to see you.” She looked past me. “Isn’t Velda with you?”
“Not this time. Can I come in?”
She made a face at me and stepped aside, then closed the door.
It was a funny little place, apparently done over to her specifications. One wall was all mirror with a dancer’s practice bar against it. Opposite was a record player with a shelf of LP’s, a shoe rack with all the implements of the trade, a standup microphone attached to a record player, a spinet piano covered with lead sheets of popular music and Broadway hits, with a few stuffed animals keeping them in place.
The rest of the room was a girl-style den with a studio couch, dresser, cabinets, and a small conference table. Cardboard boxes, books, and a few old-fashioned paper files covered the table and it was these she was going through when I found her.
“What’re you up to, Sue?”
“Going through my mother’s things.”
“She’s a long time dead. Face it.”
“I know. Would you like to see what she looked like?”
“Sure.”
There were a few clippings from the trade papers of the time and some framed nightclub shots taken by the usual club photographers and they all showed a well-built blonde with a slightly vacuous expression. Whether it was intended or built-in I couldn’t tell, but she almost typified the beautiful but dumb showgirl. There were four photos, all taken in night spots long since gone. In two of them she was with a party of six. In the other two there were four people, and in those she was with the same man, a lanky darkhaired guy with deep-set eyes who almost seemed like a hell-fire preacher touring the sin spots for material for a sermon.
“She was pretty,” I said.
“She was beautiful,” Sue said softly. “I can still remember her face.”
“These were taken before you were born.” I pointed to the dates on the back of the photos.
“I know. But I can remember her. I remember her talking to me. I remember her talking about him.”
“Come on, kid.”
Her hair swirled as she made a small negative gesture. “I mean it. She hated him.”
“Sue . . . they were married.”
“I don’t care.”
I looked at her sharply. “Want me to be blunt?”
She shrugged and bit into her lip.
“Your mother was an alcoholic. Sim tried everything to dry her out. Alcoholics hate that. If she hated him it was because he wanted to help. Get it out of your mind that he killed her.”
“She told me the snake killed her.”
“Drunks see snakes and elephants and everything else. Don’t go getting wrapped up in an obsession.”
“She told me to look for a letter. Someday I’ll find it.”
“You were three years old. How could you remember those things?”
“I just do.”
“Okay, you look for it then. Meanwhile, I want you to do something for me.”
“What?”
“Don’t cause trouble. You stay out of his hair until we clear this thing up. Promise me?”
“Maybe.” She was smiling at me.
“What do you want?”
“Kiss me.”
I grunted. “I just got done kissing Geraldine King.”
“You’re nasty,