CHAPTER SEVEN

The twenty hundred-dollar bills new and crisp, made a neat little stack. Spinelli toyed with them, tapping them together, shuffling and reshuffling them. It was half an hour since they had made love. They had donned their clothing once again.

Spinelli said, "This will be four weeks' advance against your earnings. I'll expect you to buy some fine clothing—if you need help picking anything, one of my other girls will help you. You'll move across town as soon as possible, into an apartment that more nearly reflects your economic status. It probably won't often be necessary for you to receive clients in your home, but I want you to live well anyway. When you travel, you'll travel by taxi. When you eat, you'll eat only at the best places. You're not a Kansas farm-girl any more, remember. You're a sophisticated Manhattanite, and I want you to live the part twenty-four hours a day."

"It shouldn't be too hard," Laura said.

"As for your working day: I'll have to insist that you be within telephone range from three o'clock on, every day. When possible, I'll try to line up your assignments in advance. The general arrangement is that you meet the client for dinner, attend a show with him, and go to his hotel. Most of your clients will be out-of-towners, executives. You'll be eating at the best places in town, so I suggest you keep an eye on your weight. You cease to be valuable when you begin to get bloated." Spinelli smiled smoothly. "There'll be various special assignments for you—trips out of town, parties at conventions, things like that. You'll be notified well in advance when possible. Some of my clients have—ah—unusual tastes in sexual practices. In the beginning, I'll keep you away from the really oddball ones. I have specialist girls for them, anyway."

"And you'll pay me a regular salary, is that it?" Laura asked.

Spinelli nodded. "Five hundred a week, payable every Wednesday in cash. My messenger will drop the money off at your apartment, and you'll give him a receipt for it. Aside from the base salary, you may receive gifts from your clients. Anything they give you is yours—but you must report it to me, even if it's only a few dollars. Is that clear? I insist on knowing what they give you."

"Fair enough," Laura said. "How will they pay for my services?"

"I bill them. No money will change hands through you, except what they choose to give you for yourself. I refuse to let my girls be forced to act as collection agents for me. You render services: I worry about collecting the fee for them."

Laura crossed her legs. "Just as a matter of curiosity, could you tell me how much you'd collect for my night's services?"

Spinelli showed even white teeth in a flickering smile. "The answer to that is no. All you need to know is that my operations show a profit despite the basic overhead of the girl's salary. Incidentally, you'll have six days off each month. You can generally pick these yourself, but you'll have to give me a couple of days' notice. On the days when you're unable for—ah—personal reasons to give complete services, you'll be assigned to less intimate social events." Spinelli stood up and pushed the little sheaf of hundred-dollar bills toward her. "Are there any questions?"

"Yes," Laura said. "I've got a friend, a girl I'm rooming with. Is it all right if I let her share my new apartment?"

"Absolutely not."

"But—"

Spinelli's face grew stern. "I don't want any complications. None of my girls are allowed to share their apartments, even with other girls of the staff. If you think this friend of yours is interested in this sort of work, I'll be happy to interview her—but you can't go on living with her."

Laura shook her head. "She's—not very pretty," she said in a low voice. "I don't think you'd be able to use her. But—I wish I didn't have to split up with her—"

"I don't believe in making exceptions," Spinelli said coolly. "Understood?"

Laura shrugged. "Yes."

"Everything's agreed, then?"

"Agreed," Laura said in a low voice. "When do I start?"

"There's no rush. The end of the week, perhaps. I'll arrange for an apartment for you tomorrow, and you can begin furnishing it right away. My decorator will help you, and we can arrange any kind of payment scheme you like. Also, tomorrow, you'll come here to be photographed."

"Photographed?"

"Like this," Spinelli said, taking a large flat book from a desk drawer. He handed it to Laura. It was thick, printed on glossy paper. It consisted of page after page of photographs of girls, all of them nude, photographed from front and back and in several angles. Laura reddened faintly, and gave the book back to him.

"Why?" she asked.

"Expensive stores have display windows for their goods. This book is my display window. When a client insists on seeing in advance what he's paying for, I show him the book. Your pictures will be in the next edition." Spinelli laughed. "Don't worry though. The book has a highly limited circulation. Only a very exclusive few ever get to see it, and no copy can be bought at any price." He looked at his watch. "Run along, now. I'll phone you tomorrow when your apartment is rented."

Laura felt dizzy as she stepped out. It was hard to believe that she had two thousand dollars in cash in her handbag, harder to believe that in a few days of rocketlike rapidity she had taken up and abandoned a career as a streetwalker and had stumbled somehow into the glittering and money-laden life of the call-girl.

She started to look around for the subway; then, remembering what Spinelli had told her, she hailed a cab and took it to Columbus Circle. She got out and looked around for several minutes before finding Marilyn.

The slim prostitute was sitting glumly on one of the benches just inside the park, obviously having a slow afternoon. But she brightened the moment she saw Laura approach, running toward her and embracing her.

"Well?" Marilyn asked eagerly. "Tell me all about it. What happened! What did he do?"

"I made the grade," Laura said simply.

"Great!"

"He took me to lunch—fabulous place—and he explained the setup. Then he took me up to his apartment and sort of tested me out, and told me I could have the job if I wanted it. For five hundred bucks a week."

Marilyn gasped. "Five hundred—!"

"And he gave me a month's advance. I'm going to go on the most glorious shopping spree a girl ever went on, Marilyn. He's getting me an apartment, too, on the East Side, and—oh."

Marilyn looked up, anguish on her thin face, "I figured."

"I'm sorry, Marilyn," Laura said gently, and tears came to her eyes. "I asked him if you could room with me. He said Absolutely no. No roommates of any kind. That was emphatic."

Marilyn smiled wanly. "That's okay, hon. I'm not in your league, anyway. You wouldn't want me around. I'm a hundred percent for you, Laura. I think all this is wonderful." She shrugged. "What the hell, I'm not any worse off than before I met you. I'll find another roommate sooner or later."

"We'll keep in touch," Laura promised, but already she began to see that they would not. Marilyn belonged to a different world, a shabby world of $3.50 hotel rooms and five-dollar tricks. It would be inevitable that the gulf between them would widen as Laura moved into more and more exalted circles.

Laura persuaded Marilyn to quit for the day, even though she hadn't turned a single trick yet. "I'll pay you for what you'd be losing," Laura said gaily. "Let's go downtown and do some shopping—the stores are open late tonight, aren't they? And we'll have a little party, you and me, just for old time's sake."

It was not as joyous an evening as it might have been. Laura stubbornly insisted that Marilyn should get herself some new clothes, and that she would pay for them. Marilyn was unwilling, but Laura kept at it. At length, Marilyn bought a dress and a few blouses, while Laura treated herself to virtually an entire wardrobe, telling the clerks that she was moving and would notify the store of her new address so delivery could be made. The clothing bill came to $250, and Laura lightheartedly paid for it in hundred-dollar bills, to the astonishment of the clerks.

An undercurrent of gloom marred the evening, despite every attempt to keep things festive. They ate out—Laura was not very hungry, after the big lunch, and she limited herself to a few drinks and sandwiches—and then went back to the apartment and talked till very late about Laura's new future. They went to sleep in the same bed, in each other's arms, but they did not make love.

There was a call at eleven the following morning from Skalkottis, Spinelli's secretary. "Mr. Spinelli says to tell you to get your things packed right away, and he'll send the car over to pick you up. How soon can you be ready?"

"Give me an hour."

"Okay," Skalkottis rumbled. "The car will be in front of your place at noon."

With Marilyn's help, Laura packed quickly and she was ready to go by quarter to twelve. The two girls waited silently for the minutes to pass. There was not much that could easily be said.

At five to twelve a horn honked down below. Laura glanced out the window and saw Spinelli's limousine in front of the house. Spinelli himself had not come, only the chauffeur. While Marilyn bustled about, frantically getting everything together, Laura slipped into the bedroom. Quietly, she drew two hundred-dollar bills from her purse and, folding them up, put them in the medicine cabinet. She knew that Marilyn would never accept the money if it were offered—but perhaps this way she would keep it.

Marilyn and Laura brought the luggage downstairs, and the chauffeur stored it in the trunk. Laura turned to her friend before getting into the car.

"So long," she said. "I'll be in touch."

"Just live well," Marilyn said. "Have the best of everything. You deserve it, hon."

They kissed—quickly, like sisters—and then Laura entered the long black car. It purred serenely away from the curb.

Spinelli was waiting impatiently in the big apartment. Greeting Laura impersonally, he said, "I've got a place for you on 65th right off the East River Drive. Four rooms, terrace. It'll set you back $325 a month."

Laura whistled. "So much?"

"Believe me, that's cheap. Dirt cheap. You have to live in a good place if you work for me, Laura. My decorator's coming over in an hour or so, and we'll all go over there and plan things out for you. Meanwhile let's get the photography out of the way."

One room of Spinelli's sprawling apartment had been converted into a regular photo studio. The photographer, a thin, bald man with a domed head and a peculiarly glassy-eyed stare, was busily setting up lights and chalking off angles.

"All set?" Spinelli asked him crisply.

"Another few minutes, Mr. Spinelli. If the young lady will remove her clothing so all marks of garments and belts can disappear—"

Laura hesitated. Skalkottis had come into the room.

"Go ahead," Spinelli said. "Didn't you hear him?"

"In front of everybody?" she asked.

"These men have seen the female body before, Laura. Yours isn't going to be anything new to them. Come on, let's get the show moving."

Swallowing any lingering vestige of modesty, Laura began to remove her clothes. She unbuttoned her blouse and draped it over a table, removed her skirt, took off the half-slip. She sensed the tension in the room as she bared her breasts; maybe these men had seen the female body before, but they certainly took a lively interest in hers. A moment later, the panties and garter-belt joined the rest of her clothing, and she was nude.

"Over here," Spinelli ordered. "Stand under the light. Heinsohn, how does she look?"

At the photographer's gesture, Laura turned in a complete circle. The photographer said, "The garter-belt has left a mark on the upper part of her buttocks, as you see. Otherwise she is ready. We'll do the front views first, and perhaps by then the back will be ready."

Efficiently, he went about his work. He was obviously a master of the art of photographing women. He showed Laura how to hold her arms against her sides so her breasts would thrust forward even more than they already did; he asked her to suck in her belly, to stand at a slight angle, to smile with drooping lips, to look at the camera with slitted eyes. He took more than a dozen shots—downward over her shoulder to catch the steep thrust of her bosom, upwards toward the crotch, profile, breast close-ups, everything. By that time, the marks on her rear had disappeared and he was able to complete the set.

"I want the proofs at nine tomorrow morning," Spinelli said. He patted Laura's buttocks. "Back into the clothes, girl. I'll show you your apartment now."

Laura dressed quickly, and she and Spinelli drove the few blocks to her new apartment. It was in an extremely modern building, and the apartment was an attractive one, with spacious room and a nice little terrace. Spinelli soon left, pleading urgent business elsewhere, and Laura and Spinelli's decorator—a plump, dowdy little woman—conferred on the furnishings.

Evidently Spinelli had pull even in the furniture world. Later that evening, a van pulled up with a temporary bed and chest of drawers for Laura, to last her for the few weeks it would take until her permanent furniture arrived.

The next few days were hectic ones for Laura. She was busy poring over fabrics and designs, spending sums of money that would have seemed incredible to her only a week before. Spinelli told her not to worry, that he would cover the cost of the apartment and she could pay him back over as long a period of time as she chose.

The telephone was installed on the third day—a gleaming ivory one in the bedroom-to-be, and a beige wall extension in the kitchen. The apartment began to take shape as, with fantastic speed, the furnishings arrived. Laura saw little of Spinelli during those days. He dropped in from time to time to see what progress was being made, and he brought over the proofs of Laura's photos to show her. They were astonishingly intimate shots, and she blushed to see them, much to Spinelli's amusement.

One of Spinelli's other girls was detailed to fill Laura in on the ropes. She was a glamorous, somehow brittle-looking blonde in her late twenties, who gave her name as Tania. Tania, it seemed, was one of the veterans of Spinelli's staff, one who handled many of the "specialty" clients. She gave Laura a thorough coaching on what she was expected to do when with clients.

Laura listened carefully. She wanted to be a good pupil. She wanted to be worth her salary.

At the end of that week, she had her first chance.

There was a call from Spinelli at half past two that day. "I've got an assignment for you," he said simply.

Laura felt a flutter of nervousness. "When?"

"Tonight. One of the regulars came down with her monthlies a day early, damn her. I need you to pinch-hit."

"What's the setup?"

"Double date," Spinelli said. "Two purchasing agents from a midwestern department-store chain company are in town, and an air-conditioning outfit promised to send them a couple of girls, just to sweeten things up. You and Tania are the dates. They're staying at the Hudson. You meet them there at six for dinner, and the rest of the evening's up to them. Take your cues from Tania and it'll be all right."

Tania phoned a few minutes later to arrange to meet her. Tania lived on the next block; they met at the corner of 59th and First and hailed a cab to the Hudson Hotel. Laura wore one of her new dresses, an extremely decollete affair which bared her breasts practically to the nipples, while Tania's dress was a severe, high-neckline affair that pulled taut against her body and accentuated the sharp outjutting contours of her bosom.

The purchasing agents had a suite on the ninth floor. At six sharp, Tania and Laura were knocking on the door.

The man who answered was in his late forties, tall and plump and bland-looking. Before he could say anything, Tania said warmly, "Hello, there. Are you Lou Hazen?"

They stepped inside. The second man emerged—shorter, leaner, a little older. His name was Dave Hesse, and the girls introduced themselves. Deftly, Tania slipped her arm through Lou Hazen's, thereby establishing a coupling for the evening and avoiding any possible confusion about which date was which, at least at the start.

They had a gay and lengthy dinner at a nightclub, and stayed around for part of the floor show. Then Hazen suggested, none too subtly, that they return to the hotel and have a little "party."

In the two-bedroom suite, they ordered drinks and setups from room service, and until about eleven-thirty they had a party. Tania did as little drinking as possible, and Laura followed her lead. The men seemed to be having a good time. They told the filthiest jokes Laura had ever heard, and they grew increasingly uninhibited as the evening wore on; Tania sat on Hazen's lap, and he had his hand thrust up under her skirt between her legs, while Laura sprawled out on the couch with her head in Hesse's lap while he slipped his hands into her dress, and under her bra to cup the warm large breasts and play with her stiff nipples.

Still later, the couples were kissing intimately, and finally Hesse leaned over Laura drunkenly and said, "C'mon inside. We need some privacy."

Obediently, Laura went into one of the bedrooms with him, and Hesse closed the door. "Take off y'r clothes," he ordered thickly. She did so, while he undressed too. He was hairy and had the beginnings of a potbelly. He eyed her admiringly. "You got a nice paira tits, you know? Jeez, if my wife only had a pair like that. Wish I could take them back to Illinois with me."

He staggered forward toward the bed and tumbled down on top of her. "Letsh have relations," he whispered. "Isn't that what they call it, relations? They got some other words for it, too, but I like relations."

He began to laugh, as though he had said something tremendously funny, and he was still laughing as he entered her. Laura caressed him impersonally, as though he were a statue come to life, and he continued to chuckle until it was over.

Almost immediately, he was asleep.

Laura lay by his side for a long while, hearing laughter coming from the next room. Suddenly the door opened, and Hazen stood there, stark naked, his fat body pale and soft. Tania was with him too, also naked. Her nakedness had a sleek, tawny quality about it.

Tania said, "Is he asleep?"

"Like a light."

"Come on inside, then. Hazen wants us both."

What followed was complicated, and Laura had never dreamed that such acts were commonplace. Hazen sprawled out on his bed with both girls, switching from one to the other without reaching fulfillment in either, until finally he clasped Tania tight to completion. By that time, Hesse was awake and ready again. The rollicking party went on hectically until nearly five in the morning, when both Hesse and Hazen, exhausted, indicated they had had enough fun for the evening. Just before tottering off to bed, Hazen found his trousers and pulled out a bill.

"Here," he said, extending it to Laura. "You're good girls. Have some fun with this."

Laura took it and showed it to Tania as Hazen went into the bedroom. It was a hundred.

Tania grinned. "Fifty apiece. Not bad at all, even with the specialty stuff."

"Can we go home now?"

"Nothing stopping us. How do you feel?"

"A little shaky. I've never done things like that before."

"You'll get used to them," Tania chuckled. "These mid-westerners have the damndest ideas, sometimes."

Laura went into the bathroom and tidied herself up, and dressed while Tania was washing. Hazen and Hesse were sound asleep, snoring blissfully. "They'll sleep like logs now," Tania said. "Well, I hope we sold plenty of air-conditioners tonight."

"They seemed to like us," Laura said.

"You all ready?"

"Just about."

"Phone the desk and ask them to call a cab for us while I'm getting dressed," Tania said. "After a night like this I can always use plenty of sleep." She yawned. "Spinelli wants me to turn in a report on your performance tonight, by the way, Laura. And I'm going to give him a good one. You did damned well for a beginner, you know. Damned well."