"Hah, hah, hah," said Gus. "A cop. I knew that sucker for five years. He used to own a string of gas stations. His old lady divorced him though and now he's down to three. Always has plenty of bread on him, though."

"Don't you have any bread, Lance?" asked Fluffy suddenly.

"Just seventy-five bucks," said Gus. "That enough?"

"Well," Fluffy smiled. "We expect to show you a good time after this joint closes and naturally, all good things are expensive."

"What kind of dresses you like, Fluffy?" asked Gus expansively. "I carry samples in my car and I want to see you dolls in some fine goods."

"Really?" said Poppy with a huge grin. "Do you have any size fourteens?"

"I got 'em baby," said Gus.

"You got a twenty-two and a half?" asked Fluffy. "This old green rag is falling apart."

"I got 'em Fluffy," said Gus and now he was annoyed because he had absolutely no feeling in his lower jaw, mouth and tongue.

"Listen, Lance," said Poppy, pulling her chair next to his. "We usually don't sleep with n.o.body for less than a hundred a night each. But maybe for those dresses, I could let you have it for oh, fifty bucks, and maybe we could talk Fluffy into a twenty-five dollar ride. What do you say, Fluff? He's a d.a.m.ned nice guy."

"He's a cute little s.h.i.t," said Fluffy. "I'll do it."

"Okay, dolls," said Gus, holding up three fingers to the waitress, even though he sensed Anderson was glaring at him through the smoky darkness.

"Why don't we get started now?" asked Poppy. "It's almost one o'clock."

"Not yet," said Gus. "I hear they swing after hours in this joint. What say we try to get in upstairs after two? After a few drinks and a little fun, we can head for the motel."

"George charges a lot for drinks upstairs," said Poppy. "You only got seventy-five bucks and we need it worse than George."

"Listen," Gus muttered, pitying for a moment a drowning fly who thrashed in a ringed puddle on the cluttered table. "I got a plan. Let's invite that guy I know over here and we'll take him with us upstairs to George's place after the bar closes. And we'll all drink off his money. He's loaded. And then after we drink for a while the three of us'll ditch him and head for the pad. I hate to go to bed yet, I'm having too much fun."

"You don't know what fun is, you cute little s.h.i.t," said Fluffy, squeezing Gus's thigh with a pudgy pink hand and lurching forward heavily into Gus as she tried to kiss him on the cheek with a mouth that looked like a deflated tire tube.

"Cut that out, Fluff," said Poppy. "Crissake, you get thrown in jail for drunk and what're we going to do?"

"She isn't drunk," said Gus drunkenly, as his elbow slipped off the table from the weight of Fluffy's heavy body.

"We better get out of here and head for the motel right now," said Poppy. "You two are going to f.u.c.k up the whole deal if you get busted like a couple common winos."

"Just a minute," said Gus, waving a hand toward where he thought Anderson would be.

"We don't want that guy," said Poppy.

"Shut up, Poppy," said Gus.

"Shut up, Poppy," said Fluffy. "The more, the f.u.c.kin' merrier."

"This is the last time I take you with me, Fluffy," said Poppy, taking a big swallow of the c.o.c.ktail.

"You wanted me?" asked Anderson, and Gus looked up at the red-eyed sergeant standing over him.

"Sure, sure," mumbled Gus. "Sit down . . . Chauncey. Girls, this is Chauncey Dunghill, my old friend. Chauncey, meet Fluffy and Poppy, my new friends." Gus held his whiskey up in a toast to the three of them and swallowed a gulp he could hardly taste.

"Pleased to meet you," said Anderson stiffly and Gus squinted at the sergeant and remembered that Bonelli had told him that Anderson could not operate bars because he got high on two drinks being a teetotaler except when duty called. Gus smiled and leaned over the table seeing the peculiar angle of Anderson's eyes.

"Ol' Chaunce has to catch up with us," said Gus, "if he wants to come with us to George's private bar for a few belts after two."

"s.h.i.t," said Poppy.

"Private bar?" said Anderson with a crafty look at Gus, toying with his spa.r.s.e moustache.

"Sure, these girls are taking us upstairs. They know this guy George and he's got a swinging after-hours joint and you can come as long as you buy all the drinks, right, girls?"

"Tha's right," said Fluffy and kissed Gus on the cheek with a jarring collision and Gus winced in spite of the drink in him and wondered about the diseases prost.i.tutes' mouths must carry. He furtively spilled a little whiskey on his hand and dabbed it on the spot to kill the germs.

"You buying drinks, Chauncey?" asked Fluffy with a challenge in her voice as she looked at Anderson like a boxer eyeing an opponent.

"Four drinks," said Anderson to the waitress.

"Two for you," said Gus.

"What?"

"You got to catch up."

"Well?" said the bored waitress, hesitating.

"You catch up or we don't take you upstairs," said Gus.

"Bring me two daiquiris," said Anderson and glared at Gus who giggled all through the joke about the Jew and the blue-eyed camel which Fluffy repeated for Anderson.

"Chug-a-lug the drink," Gus commanded to Anderson when the daiquiris arrived.

"I'll drink as I please," said Anderson.

"Chug-a-lug, mudder-fug," commanded Fluffy, and the purple pouches under her eyes bulged ominously. Gus cheered as Anderson put the first drink away and smiled weakly at Poppy who was now smoking and nursing her drink.

Gus leered in earnest at her bulging b.r.e.a.s.t.s and told Fluffy a joke about a one-t.i.tted stripper who couldn't twirl a ta.s.sle, but he forgot how it ended and he stopped in the middle. Fluffy whooped and snorted and said it was the funniest joke she ever heard.

When Anderson finished his second drink, he signaled for five more and now grinned gaily at Poppy, asking her if she had ever been a dancer because she had wonderful legs.

"Chug-a-lug," said Anderson when the drinks arrived.

"Mudder-fug," said Fluffy, and exploded in cackles, b.u.mping heads painfully with Gus.

"This is all right," said Anderson, after his gla.s.s was drained, and he picked up his next. "I'm catching up, Poppy."

"Something's goin' to happen," Poppy whined. "You can't get drunk in this business, Fluffy."

"I'm not drunk. Lance's drunk," said Fluffy. "Chauncey's drunk too."

"You're a beautiful girl and I really mean it, Poppy," said Anderson, and Gus roared, "Oooooh, stop it, Chauncey, you're killing me," and then Gus giggled in a prolonged burst of hilarity which threatened to suffocate him. When he recovered he saw that everyone on that side of the bar was laughing at him and that made him laugh harder and he only stopped when Fluffy grabbed him in a bulging embrace, called him a cute little s.h.i.t, and kissed him on the open mouth. She probably went around the world tonight, he thought, cringing in horror. He took a hurried drink, swishing it around in his mouth and held up his hand for another.

"You had enough to drink," said Anderson with a surly slurred voice.

"Speak for yourself, Chauncey " said Gus trying not to think of how prost.i.tutes used their mouths, as he became nauseous.

"We all had enough to drink," said Poppy. "I know something's going to go wrong."

"You're really a lovely girl, Poppy," said Anderson as he spilled half his drink on her gold purse.

"Bunch of f.u.c.kin' drunks," said Poppy.

"I'm sorry, Poppy," said Anderson. "Really I am."

Anderson finished his drink and ordered another round even though Poppy had not touched her last one, and finally Anderson drank his and Poppy's two manhattans when Fluffy dared him to. Gus had a headache and still felt nauseous as he remembered hearing a wh.o.r.e in the wagon saying she once gave twenty-two head jobs in one night, and he looked at Fluffy's mouth which had actually touched the inside of his. He sloshed more of the drink around in his mouth and pushed Fluffy away each time she leaned over and squeezed his thigh and now he found he was becoming angry at everything while only moments ago he was happy. He glared at Anderson's spa.r.s.e moustache and thought what a miserable son of a b.i.t.c.h he was.

"I'm not feeling too good, Poppy," said Anderson who had been patting her hand and telling her that business was bad and he only made fifty thousand last year as she looked as though she didn't believe him.

"Let's all get out of here," said Poppy. "Can you still walk, Fluffy?"

"I can dance," growled Fluffy, whose head seemed to be sinking lower into the ma.s.s of her body.

"I'm getting sick," said Anderson.

"Kiss the son of a b.i.t.c.h," whispered Gus suddenly into Fluffy's ear.

"What?" asked Fluffy, swiping at an indomitable drop of moisture which clung to the ball of her nose.

"Grab that b.a.s.t.a.r.d like you did me around the arms and give him a big sloppy kiss and make sure you stick your old tongue right in there."

"But I don't even like the s.h.i.thead," Fluffy whispered.

"I'll give you an extra five bucks later," whispered Gus.

"Okay," said Fluffy, leaning over the table and knocking an empty gla.s.s on the floor as she pinned the arms of the surprised Anderson and ground her mouth against his until he could manage the leverage to plop her back in the chair.

"Why did you do that?" Anderson gasped.

"'Cause I love you, you s.h.i.thead," said Fluffy and when the waitress pa.s.sed with a tray of beers for the adjoining table, Fluffy grabbed a beer from the tray and stuck her chin in the foam and said, "Look at me, I'm a billy goat." Anderson paid for the beer and tipped the angry waitress two dollars.

"Come on, Fluffy," said Poppy after the waitress left, "let's go to the restroom and wash your G.o.dd.a.m.n face and then we're getting Lance and going to the motel right now. Understand, Lance?"

"Sure, sure, Poppy, whatever you say," said Gus, grinning at the outraged Anderson and feeling happy again.

When they were gone Anderson lurched forward, almost fell to the floor and looked painfully at Gus. "Plebesly, we're too G.o.d-d.a.m.n drunk to do our job. Do you realize that?"

"We're not drunk, Sergeant. You're drunk," said Gus.

"I'm getting sick, Plebesly," pleaded Anderson.

"Know what Fluffy told me, Sergeant?" said Gus. "She told me she worked in a wh.o.r.ehouse all day and blew twenty-two guys."

"She did?" said Anderson, holding his hand to his mouth.

"She said she gives around the world or straight French 'cause it's too much trouble to screw and she'll go right up the old p.o.o.p chute if a guy wants it."

"Don't tell me that, Plebesly," said Anderson. "I'm sick, Plebesly."

"I'm sorry she kissed you, Sergeant," said Gus, "I'm sorry 'cause those spermatozoas are probably swarming down your friggin' throat right this minute and swishing their tails against your friggin' tonsils."

Anderson cursed and stumbled sideways, heading for the exit. His handcuffs fell out and clashed to the floor. Gus stooped carefully, retrieved the handcuffs and weaved his way through the tables after Anderson. Even on the sidewalk outside Gus could hear Poppy's curse when she found the table empty. Then Gus crossed the street, carefully following the wavy white line to the opposite curb. It seemed like a mile to the darkened parking lot where he found Anderson vomiting beside his car and Bonelli looking at Gus with affection.

"What happened in there?" asked Bonelli.

"We drank with two wh.o.r.es."

"Didn't they hit on you? Didn't you get an offer?"

"Yes, but there's too much between us now. I couldn't bear to arrest them."

"You drank Anderson under the table, kid," Bonelli grinned.

"Under the friggin' table. I really did, Sal," Gus squeaked.

"How do you feel?"

"I'm getting sick."

"Come on," said Bonelli, throwing a big hairy arm around Gus's shoulder and patting him on the cheek. "Let's go get you some coffee, son."

15.

CONCEPTION.

THE TRANSFER TO Seventy-seventh Street station had been a demoralizing blow. Now, after his fourth week in the division Roy could still not believe they would do this to him. He knew that most of his academy cla.s.s had been transferred to three divisions but he hoped he might escape the third one. After all, he was well liked in Central Division and he had already worked Newton Street and didn't dream they would make him work another black division. But then again, he should have expected it. Everything the Department did was senseless and illogical and none of the command officers cared in the least about intangibles like morale as long as they were efficient, icily efficient, and as long as the public knew and appreciated their efficiency. But Christ, Roy thought, Seventy-seventh Division! Fifty-ninth Place and Avalon, Slauson and Broadway, Ninety-second and Beach, One Hundred and Third, all of Watts for that matter! It was Newton Street magnified ten times, it was violence and crime, and every night he was wading through blood. Seventy-seventh Street station had been a demoralizing blow. Now, after his fourth week in the division Roy could still not believe they would do this to him. He knew that most of his academy cla.s.s had been transferred to three divisions but he hoped he might escape the third one. After all, he was well liked in Central Division and he had already worked Newton Street and didn't dream they would make him work another black division. But then again, he should have expected it. Everything the Department did was senseless and illogical and none of the command officers cared in the least about intangibles like morale as long as they were efficient, icily efficient, and as long as the public knew and appreciated their efficiency. But Christ, Roy thought, Seventy-seventh Division! Fifty-ninth Place and Avalon, Slauson and Broadway, Ninety-second and Beach, One Hundred and Third, all of Watts for that matter! It was Newton Street magnified ten times, it was violence and crime, and every night he was wading through blood.

The stores, the offices, even the churches looked like fortresses with bars and grates and chains protecting doors and windows and he had even seen private uniformed guards in churches during services. It was impossible.

"Let's go to work," said Lieutenant Feeney to the night watch officers. Feeney was a laconic twenty-year man with a melancholy face who seemed to Roy a decent watch commander, but he had to be because in this h.e.l.lish division a rigid disciplinarian would drive the men to mutiny.

Roy put on his cap, jammed the flashlight in the sap pocket and picked up his books. He hadn't heard a single thing that was said at roll call. He was getting worse about that lately. Someday he'd miss something important. They must occasionally say something important, he thought.