79 Park Avenue (3 page)

I turned and pointed the papers dramatically at the defendant's table. "Maryann Rood!"

Without looking back at the jury I crossed the room to my table. I sat down amid the rising murmur of voices in the courtroom behind me. I stared down at the table. My eyes were burning. I blinked them wearily.

"Good boy!" I heard them whisper.

"You sure pasted her!" Alec's voice came from the other side.

I didn't look up. I didn't want to have to see her. It seemed as if a thousand years had passed since I had got up to address the jury.

I heard the sound of the judge's gavel on his desk. Then his heavy voice: "The court will adjourn until two o'clock."

Automatically I got to my feet as he left the court. Then without speaking I made for the private entrance to the District Attorney's offices.

We ducked the reporters by going out to lunch through the Tombs. I went into the Old Mill restaurant and was given a table in the far corner. I sat down with my back to the room, facing Joel and Alec. The waitress came up to us.

"I need a drink," I said and ordered a gin over rocks, with a twist of lemon peel. "How about you fellows?"

They shook their heads and ordered their food. There was a murmur in the room behind us. I didn't have to turn around to know who had come in. I looked questioningly at Joel.

He nodded. 'They're here."

I smiled thinly. "It's a free country." Suddenly I couldn't wait for the drink. I wished the damn waitress would hurry back. "Where's my drink?" I growled irritably.

"The waitress stopped to pick up their order on the way back," Alec said quickly.

A moment later she put the drink down in front^of me. There was a peculiar expression on her face which I understood the moment I lifted my glass. There was writing on the doily under the glass.

I didn't have to look at the signature to recognize the writing. She still had the same childish scrawl.

"Welcome to the big time, Counselor," it read. "Good luck!" It was signed "Marja."

I crumpled the doily with my fingers so that the others could not see it had been written on, and sipped my drink. That was one thing I had always liked about her. She was afraid of nothing.

She wished me luck knowing full well that if I were lucky she could spend the next ten years of her life in jail. She was Uke that even when she was a kid.

I remembered once when I tried to stop her from crossing against a light into trafl&c that was moving wildly. Angrily she shook me off.

"That's the trouble with you, Mike,'* she had said. "Afraid to take chances. Even on a Httle thing like this!"

"But, Marja," I had protested, "you could get hurt, or maybe even killed."

She had looked at me, the wild light blazing in her eyes. "So what, Mike?" she said, stepping into the gutter. "It's my body, not yours."

That, in its essence, was the difference between us. That philosophy and a lot of other things. Like the way we had been brought up. She had an amazingly paradoxical capacity for both affection and cruelty.

I sipped again at my drink. The cold sweetish taste of the gin burned its way down my throat. I think my mother put her finger on it one night when I came home dejected from waiting for Marja to return from a date.

I was too big to cry, but the tears hovered beneath my eyes. Mom knew it the moment I came in the door. She moved quickly toward me. I turned away to go to my room, but her hand caught mine and held me.

"She's not for you, Mike," she said sofdy.

I didn't answer, just stared at her.

"I'm not telling you who to like, son," she added. "It's just that she's not for you. She's been brought up without love and has no understanding of it."

I had pulled my hand away and went to my room, but what she had said stayed in mind. Without love.

Now I could understand at last what Mother had meant. That in all its simplicity was the story of Marja's life. Without love.

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Book One MARJA

Chapter 1

SHE pushed open the door of the candy store and stood there a moment while her eyes adjusted to the dimness. The bright sun behind her framed her face in the shimmering gold of her hair. The violent scarlet slash that was her mouth drew back over white, even teeth in a tentative smile. She walked toward the counter.

There was no one in the store* Impatiendy she tapped a coin on the marble top.

There was an immediate answer from the rear of the shop, where Mr. Rannis had his rooms. "Just a minute, just a minute. I'm coming."

"That's aU right, Mr. Rannis," she caUed. "It's only me. I'll wait."

The old man appeared in the doorway of his rear room. His hands were still busy adjusting his clothing "Marja!" he exclaimed, a pleased tone coming into his voice. He moved stiffly behind the counter toward her. "What can I do for you*^"

She smiled at him. "Gimme five Twenty Grands."

Automatically he turned to the shelf behind him, then hesitated. He glanced back at her over his shoulder ques-tioningly.

"It's okay, Mr. Rannis," she said quickly. "I got a nickel."

He picked up an open package and shook five cigarettes out carefully and placed them on the coimter before her, his hand covering them.

She pushed a nickel toward him. He lifted his hand from the cigarettes and covered the coin. He slid it back along the counter toward himself and it dropped into the cash drawer just beneath the counter.

The white-papered cigarettes were bright against the dirty gray marble. Slowly she picked one up and stuck it in her mouth. She reached toward the open box of wooden matches on the counter.

Before she could strike a match he had one flaming in front of her. She dipped the cigarette into it and dragged deeply. She could feel the harsh, acrid smoke filter back into her lungs. She exhaled, the smoke rushing from her Ups and nostrils. "Man, that's good," she said. She looked at the old man. "I thought I'd never get out of school. I wanted that smoke all day and nobody would even give me a drag."

The old man looked at her, his lips drawing back over his partially toothless gums in a smile. "Where have you been, Marja?" he asked. "I haven't seen you all week."

She stared at him. "I been broke," she answered bluntly. "An' I owe yuh enough."

He rested his elbows on the counter and looked at her in what he thought was a winning way. "Why'd you do that, Marja?" he asked reproachfully. "I never asked you for money, did I?"

She took another puflE at the cigarette and didn't answer.

His hand reached across the counter and took her free hand and squeezed it. "You know I'm always glad to see you, Marja."

She looked down at her hand, but made no effort to withdraw it. She flashed her eyes up at him. "You're glad to see any of the girls," she said flady. "You like all of them."

"None of them like you, Marja," he said earnestly. "I'd rather see you than anybody. You were always my favorite, even when you were a Uttle baby.**

"I bet," she said skeptically.

"I mean it," he protested. "You're the only one I give credit to. I wouldn't let nobody else owe three dollars and twenty-five cents and not bother them."

She slipped her hand from his slowly, watching his eyes as she moved. She smiled slightly as she saw a film come over them. "What about Francie Keegan? She said you let her owe yuh."

He ran his tongue over suddenly dry lips. "I made her pay me, though, didn't I?" he demanded. "I never, asked you, though."

She stepped back from the counter without speaking and 1^ looked around the store questioningly. "Something seems different here."

He smiled proudly. "I had the back rooms painted."

She raised a studied eyebrow. "Oh."

"A nice light green," he added. "I'm thinking of doing the store, too, if I can get the money together."

"Don' gimme that, Mr. Rannis," she laughed. "You got more money than God."

A hurt expression came over his face. "All you kids say that. I don't know why. You see the kind of business I do."

"That's just it," she said. "I do see." She turned suddenly and leaned over the candy counter against the glass.

The old man caught his breath. The full young lines of her body were revealed against the glass. Her strong young breasts pressed against the thin white blouse. "Want some candy?" he asked.

She looked at him over the counter top, her eyes speculative. "I haven't any more money," she said carefully.

"I didn't ask you for any, did I?" he asked, quickly bending down behind the counter and opening the door. He stared up at her through the glass. "What would you like?"

Her eyes were laughing as they met his. "Anything. A Milky Way."

Without taking his eyes from her, he reached for a candy bar. His hands were trembling. The bright light from the gtreet behind her frgmied her body through the flimsy skirt. He had long ago found this vantage point of observation. It was one of the main reasons he kept the store Ughts dim. The other was the high cost of electricity.

She looked down at him, wondering how long he would stay there. It was a standing joke among the girls in the neighborhood. She knew what he was looking at. The Rannis display case worked both ways, but she didn't care. He was a homy old goat and it served him right if you could get something out of him. Especially for nothing.

In a few seconds she became bored with her little game and moved back to the other coimter. Almost immediately he got to his feet, the candy bar in his hand.

His face was flushed with the exertion of kneeling. He pushed the candy across the counter to her with one hand and grabbed hers with the other as she reached for it She let her hand remain still as he spoke.

"You're the prettiest girl in the neighborhood, Marja," he said

She sniffed disdainfully.

"I mean it, Marja," he said, squeezing her hand earnestly. He turned her hand over in his and opened it. "You got pretty hands, too, for a kid.'*

"I'm no kid," she said quickly. "I'm goin' on sixteen."

"You are?" he asked in a surprised voice. Time went so quickly in this neighborhood. They grew up in a hurry. Before you could turn around, they were married and gone.

"Sure," she said confidenUy. "In the fall."

"I bet the boys in school are all wild for you," he said.

She shrugged her shoulders noncommittally.

He looked down at her hands. "I bet they're always trying to get you in comers."

She purposely made a puzzled expression. "What do yuh mean, Mr. Rannis?" she asked innocently.

"You know what I mean," he said.

"No, I don't, Mr. Rannis," she insisted, a glimmer of laughter lurking in her eyes. "You tell me."

He withdrew his hand with the candy bar, released hers, and walked down behind the counter to the back of the store. At the end of the counter, where the display concealed him from the front of the store, he called to her. "Come back here, Marja," he said, "and I'll tell you."

Slowly she walked to the back of the store. There was a half-smile on her lips. She stepped partly behind the display stand and looked up into his face.

His face was flushed and there were beads of moisture on his upper lip. His mouth worked tensely, but no words came out

Her smile grew broader. "What, Mr. Rannis?"

His hand reached toward her. She stood very still. "Don't they ever want to touch you?" he asked in a hoarse voice.

She looked down at his hand a few inches from her and then up at his face. "Where?" she asked.

He brushed his fingertips against the front of her blouse lightly. The firm flesh sent a flame up his fingers. "Here?" he asked tensely, watching her face for signs of fear.

There were none. She jiidn't even make a move to get away from him. Instead she smiled. "Oh," she answered. "Yes, Mr. Rannis. All the time."

Her answer took him by surprise. He almost forgot that he was holding her. "You let them?"

Her eyes were still frankly fixed on his. "Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don't. It depends on how I feeL If I like it." She turned slightly, moving away from him. "My candy, Mr. Rannis," she said, holding out her hand.

Without thinking, he gave it to her. He stared at her, the memory of her breasts in his fingers still flooding his mind. "You want to see the paint job in the back room?" he asked.

She didn't answer, just looked at him as she unwrapped the bar and bit it slowly.

"If you come in the back," he said anxiously. "Maybe if you're real nice, I'll forget about the three and a quarter you owe me."

She swallowed a piece of the candy and looked at him reflectively. Then, without answering, she turned and started for the door.

"Marja!" he called after her in a pleading voice. "I'll even give you some money!"

She paused at the marble-topped counter and picked up her cigarettes and a few matches, then continued on to the door. She started to open it

"Marja!" the old man pleaded. "Ill give you anything you want!"

She stood there a moment, her hand on the door before answering. When she did speak, he realized that she had been thinking over her reply.

"No, Mr. Rannis," she said politely in her husky voice. *1 ain't ready for yuh. Not just yet."

The door closed behind her and the store seemed dull and empty without the bright, flashing gold of her hair. Wearily, as if he had been in battle, he turned and went into the back room.

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Chapter 2

THE EARLY Junc sun had baked the city streets to a soft spongelikc asphalt surface that clung maliciously to the feet and nrnde every step an effort. It bounced wildly off the flat concrete walls of the tenements and beat against the face Uke the licking flame of an open fire.

She hesitated a moment in the doorway of the store before stepping into the inferno of the street. Slowly she ate the last of the candy bar while her eyes scanned the street for signs of life.

It was almost deserted except for a few children who were playing down near the corner of Second Avenue. One lone woman came out of Hochmeyer's Pork Store carrying a shopping-bag and made her way up the blocTc. A taxi roared down the street, leaving bluish tracks in the pavement