The Postman Always Rings Twice - James M. Cain [3]
"Well, I've seen many a sign in my time, but never one like that. I got to hand it to you, Nick."
"By golly. By golly."
We shook hands. We were friends again.
Next day I was alone with her for a minute, and swung my fist up against her leg so hard it nearly knocked her over.
"How do you get that way?" She was snarling like a cougar. I liked her like that.
"How are you, Cora?"
"Lousy."
From then on, I began to smell her again.
One day the Greek heard there was a guy up the road undercutting him on gas. He jumped in the car to go see about it. I was in my room when he drove off, and I turned around to dive down in the kitchen. But she was already there, standing in the door.
I went over and looked at her mouth. It was the first chance I had had to see how it was. The swelling was all gone, but you could still see the tooth marks, little blue creases on both lips. I touched them with my fingers. They were soft and damp. I kissed them, but not hard. They were little soft kisses. I had never thought about them before. She stayed until the Greek came back, about an hour. We didn't do anything. We just lay on the bed. She kept rumpling my hair, and looking up at the ceiling, like she was thinking.
"You like blueberry pie?"
"I don't know. Yeah. I guess so."
"I'll make you some."
"Look out, Frank. You'll break a spring leaf."
"To hell with the spring leaf."
We were crashing into a little eucalyptus grove beside the road. The Greek had sent us down to the market to take back some T-bone steaks he said were lousy, and on the way back it had got dark. I slammed the car in there, and it bucked and bounced, but when I was in among the trees I stopped. Her arms were around me before I even cut the lights. We did plenty. After a while we just sat there. "I can't go on like this, Frank."
"Me neither."
"I can't stand it. And I've got to get drunk with you, Frank. You know what I mean? Drunk."
"I know."
"And I hate that Greek."
"Why did you marry him? You never did tell me that."
"I haven't told you anything."
"We haven't wasted any time on talk."
"I was working in a hash house. You spend two years in a Los Angeles hash house and you'll take the first guy that's got a gold watch."
"When did you leave Iowa?"
"Three years ago. I won a beauty contest. I won a high school beauty contest, in Des Moines. That's where I lived. The prize was a trip to Hollywood. I got off the Chief with fifteen guys taking my picture, and two weeks later I was in the hash house."
"Didn't you go back?"
"I wouldn't give them the satisfaction."
"Did you get in movies?"
"They gave me a test. It was all right in the face. But they talk, now. The pictures, I mean. And when I began to talk, up there on the screen, they knew me for what I was, and so did I. A cheap Des Moines trollop, that had as much chance in pictures as a monkey has. Not as much. A monkey, anyway, can make you laugh. All I did was make you sick."
"And then?"
"Then two years of guys pinching your leg and leaving nickel tips and asking how about a little party tonight. I went on some of them parties, Frank."
"And then?"
"You know what I mean about them parties?"
"I know."
"Then he came along. I took him, and so help me, I meant to stick by him. But I can't stand it any more. God, do I look like a little white bird?"
"To me, you look more like a hell cat."
"You know, don't you. That's one thing about you. I don't have to fool you all the time. And you're clean. You're not greasy. Frank, do you have any idea what that means? You're not greasy."
"I can kind of imagine."
"I don't think so. No man can know what that means to a woman. To have to be around somebody that's greasy and makes you sick at the stomach