Too Black for Heaven

E
VERYTHING ABOUT
the girl spelled class. The huge cream-colored convertible she had just parked at the curb, the clothes she wore, her walk, the fine beauty of her face. That face was now clouded by the awful secret that had been unveiled to her a few nights before. She stopped at the corner of Rush Street as if to orient herself. A man, slightly high, fitted his hand to her elbow and breathed whiskey fumes in her face. “You’re cute. How about it, baby?”

Dona Santos shook his hand off her arm and walked on.

Spring was foreign to this section of the city. Here the seasons didn’t matter. There were no trees, no grass, no birds. There was only asphalt and concrete and stone.

North Clark Street, between the river and Chicago Avenue hadn’t changed since Estrella had sung at the Heigh-Ho Club. Local and out-of-town business men still prowled the neon-lighted sidewalks in search of whiskey and willing girls younger than their wives who would help, if only for one night and at a price, to preserve the ephemeral illusion of youth.

The street was cheap. It was lush. It was fun. It was basic, elemental man at play before he’d become hemmed in by custom and convention.

There was a lighted pawnshop in the next block. Dona looked at the sign over the door. It read
North Star Loan Company
. Even Bernie’s was the same. His display window was an organized jumble of musical instruments and shotguns and pistols and electric irons and pressure cookers and watches and diamond rings.

A bell tinkled as she opened the door. She could smell camphor and leather and gun oil. There was a white-haired man with a deeply-lined face in back of one of the counters. As the bell tinkled, he looked up from the Racing Form he was studying. “Yes? What can I do for you, Miss?” Then he recognized Dona and came out from behind the counter. “Dona Santos! This is a surprise.”

“Hello, Bernie,” Dona smiled.

Her conscious memory began with Bernie Swartz. He’d been the big man of her childhood. Bernie Swartz, who knew everything and everyone from the patrolman on the beat to the captain in command of the East Chicago Avenue Station to the newest B-girl skirting the dangerously thin edge of the world’s most unprofitable profession. He was gentle and kind and good.

She liked this man. She had reason. She’d been only nine years old when she and Estrella had come to Chicago, and Bernie had been a good friend to both of them. The Heigh-Ho Club, where Estrella had worked the longest, was a few doors up the street. While Estrella had worked out and rehearsed new songs and routines, she had skipped rope and played hop-scotch on the sidewalk in front of the pawnshop under Bernie’s watchful eyes. In summer he’d bought her popsicles and ice cream and, whenever he’d thought she looked peaked, a meal. In winter, after school, when it was too cold to play outside, he had insisted that she wait for Estrella in the living quarters behind the shop, doing her home work, reading the books he bought her, listening to his radio, watching the miracle of television.

“Why?” Estrella had asked him a dozen times.

Bernie’s shrugged answer was always the same. “Now, look, Estrella. You know your way around. You can take care of yourself. But you know as well as I do this street is no place for a kid. She’ll grow up fast enough. Please me in this. She’s no bother.”

For the three years they’d been on the street, Bernie had kept a fatherly eye on her. He’d been the only father she’d ever known.

Then things had become better for Estrella. The years of singing in smoky bars and cheap night clubs had paid off and Estrella had pyramided her dark beauty and throaty voice into a quarter-hour sustaining television show. An official of Decca had heard her and recorded her vocal of
Love Me Now
. Every disk jockey in the country had liked it and plugged it, and Estrella had become Estrella Santos over-night. They had moved to an apartment on Lake Shore Drive and there’d been a maid to take care of her and money had ceased to be a problem.

Dona patted the old pawnbroker’s arm. “It’s nice to see you, Bernie.”

She meant it. She wished she’d kept in closer contact with him. The last time she’d seen Bernie was when she had graduated from St. Patrick’s and Bernie had come to her graduation and given her a wristwatch set with diamond chips.

“How long has it been?” Bernie asked.

“Over three years,” Dona said.

Bernie rubbed at the mole on his cheek. “That’s right. You were fourteen when you graduated from St. Patrick’s. That makes you seventeen.”

“Eighteen next month,” Dona said.

Bernie patted her arm. “Of course. Such a grownup young lady now. And engaged to be married in June. I saw your picture in the
Tribune
last month when Estrella announced your engagement. And believe me, Dona. You couldn’t be getting a better man.”

“You know Charles?”

“Do I know Lieutenant Mercer? A good man and an honest cop.” Bernie shrugged. “Anyway, as honest as cops go. A little here, a little there. With the set-up as it is in this town, who can blame a man for making a dollar if no one gets burned?”

Dona forced herself to laugh. She wished Bernie hadn’t brought Charles into the conversation. She still had to tell Charles. She intended to tell him tonight. Or maybe she wouldn’t tell him, anyway not the truth. It might be better that way, for him, for her, for Estrella. She could just say she’d thought it over and wanted to break their engagement because she didn’t love him enough to marry him.

“And how’s Estrella?” Bernie asked.

Dona answered mechanically. “Fine. She’s flying out to Hollywood in the morning. M.G.M. wants to talk to her about making a picture.”

Bernie interrupted her. “What am I doing, keeping you standing in the middle of the shop like a biddy waiting to pawn her wedding ring so she can buy a fifth of gin!” He opened the swinging gate in the counter. “Come in back. I’ll close up the shop and make a drink and we’ll have a nice long talk.”

Dona drew off her gloves. “I’d like to, Bernie. But I haven’t time.” She glanced at her watch. “I promised to meet Charles at the Bureau at nine and it’s almost eight-thirty now.”

Bernie closed the gate reluctantly and leaned on the counter facing her. “Youth before age. Lovers before an old friend. That’s the way the world goes. But what kind of hours are these? What shift is Mercer working?”

“The eight-to-four,” Dona said. “We were going to have dinner together but there was a shooting or stabbing on the South Side and we had to make it supper instead. Charles said, though, he was certain he’d be through by nine and asked me to pick him up.”

Bernie said, “So what can I do for you, Dona?”

Dona told him, “I want to buy a gun. I want something that works every time and is small enough to carry in my purse.”

Bernie shook his head. “This I can’t do for you. Anything else in the shop you can have. But for this you have to have a permit. I mean, to buy and carry a gun.”

“I know,” Dona said. She took the permits from her purse and laid them on the counter. “Charles got them for me yesterday.”

Bernie picked at the mole on his cheek as he studied the permits. “And why should you want a gun?”

Dona mulled over the excuse she’d conceived. It was as good a reason as any. Charles had accepted it. There was no reason why Bernie shouldn’t. She said, “Estrella is apt to be gone several months. The maid doesn’t live in. I’ll be alone in the apartment. And I think I’ll feel safer if I have some means of protecting myself.”

Bernie pressed the heels of his hands to his forehead. “So who’s going to hurt you on Lake Shore Drive? A prowler should climb fourteen stories to get into a penthouse?” He moved up the counter to the gun case. “But a sale is a sale. On one condition.”

“What?”

“You get Lieutenant Mercer to teach you how to use it.”

“I promise.”

Bernie studied the guns in the case and picked out a four-inch barrel, .32 caliber double-action revolver. Pointing the gun at the floor he tried the trigger pull. It was sufficiently stiff to prevent any possibility of discharging accidentally. He laid the revolver on a pad on the counter. “In like-new condition. Original cost around sixty-four dollars.” He looked at the code number on the ticket. “To you, with no profit to me, well, maybe a few dollars, thirty-six dollars and fifty cents.”

Dona took two twenty-dollar bills from her purse and laid them beside the revolver. “Thank you, Bernie. Now would you please load it for me?”

“This I don’t like,” Bernie said. He reached on the shelf behind him for a box of shells and broke and loaded the revolver. “I’d rather not make the sale. Girls and revolvers, even pretty girls like you, don’t mix. Better you should buy a police whistle or just yell as loud as you can. You’re certain nothing is wrong? Tell me, Dona.”

Dona forced herself to smile. “I’m positive.”

“You’re not lying to Bernie?”

“Of course not.”

Bernie folded one of the permits and returned the other to Dona. “This you keep in your purse whenever you’re carrying the gun. If you have to use it, shoot it in good health. But if I were you, as soon as I got home, I’d put it in a drawer and forget it.”

Dona put the revolver and her change in her purse. “Thank you, Bernie. You’ve never let me down.”

His smile was enigmatic. “There could be a reason.” He patted her arm. “Now you run along and meet your lieutenant. Say hello to him from Bernie. And next time when you come, have an hour you can spend with an old man.”

“I’ll do that,” Dona promised. As she fitted her gloves to her fingers the weight of the gun in the bag dangling from her forearm felt good.

When she was outside, Dona turned and looked through the window of the pawnshop. Bernie was standing where she’d left him, staring through the pledge-lined wall of his shop at something far out and beyond it.

On the corner of Ohio Street, the drunk she’d encountered before was still trying to pick up a girl. His face brightened when he saw her.

“Oh, there you are. C’mon. Be a good sport, baby. C’mon. Let’s go up to your room.”

Dona swung her handbag as hard as she could. Weighted with the revolver, it thudded against the man’s face with sufficient force to make his mouth bleed.

“Get out of my way,” she breathed. “Get out of my way or I’ll kill you.”

Chapter Two

S
HE WALKED
back to where her engagement present from Estrella was parked. The creamy Cadillac was too long. The red leather upholstery looked garish. There was too much chrome. But when Estrella had given it to her, before she had learned the truth, Dona had thought it was beautiful.

She pulled away from the curb too fast. A couple was crossing on the amber light and, as she turned south toward the Loop, she had to brake sharply to keep from running them down.

The girl screamed and jumped back. The man glared at her. “You damn fool,” he yelled, “watch where you’re going.”

Dona merely looked at him and drove on.

On the far side of the river, across Lake Street, there was a parking spot at the curb not far from the marquee of the Sherman Hotel. Dona decided she needed a drink before she met Charles and maneuvered the Cadillac into the space.

She walked quickly through the hotel lobby, ignoring appreciative stares, and sat at one of the tables against the low wall separating the bar from the dining room. She drank a dry martini slowly and ordered a second, acutely conscious that she was stalling. She didn’t want to meet Charles.

The two martinis had little effect. She still felt depressed and confused as she drove south on State Street to the Detective Division and parked in a no-parking zone. A detective about to join his partner in an official car said, “I’m sorry, Miss. You can’t park there.” Then he recognized Dona and grinned. “Oh, it’s you, Miss Santos.”

Dona asked the detective if he knew whether Lieutenant Mercer was still upstairs. The detective’s partner answered for him. “Yes, he is, Miss Santos. He’s in one of the interrogation rooms. But I think Chuck’s about through.”

“Thank you,” Dona smiled.

The interrogation room in use was next to Charles’ office. Through the partly opened door she could hear his voice, but couldn’t make out the words.

Then there was a scrape of chair legs on wood and an officer escorted a girl through the doorway. She was young and frightened but in complete control of herself.

“This way, Miss Mason,” the detective said.

Charles and two other men followed them through the doorway. The detectives went through the office to the hall. Mercer laid the clipboard he was holding on his desk. He’d loosened the knot in his tie. His hair was rumpled. He looked tired. He walked around the desk and kissed Dona.

“Sorry to mess up our date, honey, but I had to wrap that up.”

“That’s all right,” Dona said.

In front of Police Headquarters he helped her into her car and walked around it to the wheel. “I almost wish Estrella hadn’t given you this boat. I feel like a kept man every time I drive it. Where do you want to eat, honey?”

Dona’s voice was small. “If you don’t mind, let’s go to the apartment. I know we have some steaks and we can open some cans of something.”

Charles kissed the tip of her nose. “My God. She cooks, too.”

Estrella’s apartment was on the fourteenth floor, over-looking the lake. Here there were grass and trees and twittering birds. The doorman touched his cap as Charles braked the Cadillac in front of the canvas marquee. “Miss Santos. Lieutenant Mercer.”

“Is mother in?” Dona asked him.

The doorman opened the door for her. “No, she isn’t, Miss Santos. She left for the club about fifteen minutes ago.”

“You certain,” Mercer asked, “you don’t want to eat at the club? I just got paid.”

Dona shook her head. “No, please. Let’s go upstairs.”

In the apartment, Dona went directly to the bedroom to change from her suit into a simple, white dress. From the tall windows she could see the neon sign of the swank club where Estrella was singing.

Estrella had come a long way from the smoky bars of St. Louis and Memphis and the Heigh-Ho Club. Now M.G.M. wanted her to make a picture. Her trunks stood packed in the center of the floor. Her jewel-case lay open on the dresser. The bag she would take on the plane was on the bed. Dona hoped the picture would be a huge success, because once Estrella got on the plane in the morning, Dona never wanted to see her mother again.

When she returned to the living room, Charles was holding her cordé bag. “From the weight of this, you must have bought that gun.”

Dona nodded. “From Bernie.”

Mercer opened the bag and took out the revolver. “Not bad. What did he charge you for it?”

“Thirty-six dollars and fifty cents.”

Mercer swung out the cylinder and snapped it shut. “Fair enough. Ill show you how it works, but you be careful how you use it.”

“I will,” Dona promised.

She sat on one of the couches. “How about fixing us a drink before I get supper?”

“Whatever you say,” Charles said. He crossed the living room to her side. “Something wrong, Dona?”

“What makes you think anything’s wrong?”

“The way you act.”

“How do I act?”

“Like something’s wrong.”

Dona watched him as she mixed the drinks. She couldn’t tell him the truth. She couldn’t involve him in this. She didn’t want him to feel sorry for her. She didn’t want him to feel obligated to marry her.

He handed her her drink and sat beside her. “Look, honey. Come clean. This is the law talking, remember? Something is troubling you.”

Dona sipped her drink. “What could be troubling me?”

“That’s what I’m trying to find out. Do you want to go to the coast with Estrella? If so, we can postpone the wedding. I can wait a few more months.”

Dona licked a bead of Scotch and soda from her lip. “No. It isn’t that. It’s just that I’ve been thinking.”

“About what?”

“Us.”

“What about us?”

“I don’t think we should get married.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No, Charles. I mean it.”

“But why shouldn’t we get married?”

“I don’t know if I love you enough. After all, I’m only eighteen. I’ve been thinking it over for the last two days and I don’t know if I’m being smart in tying myself down to one man.”

“But, honey — ”

Dona met his eyes. “Please, Charles. So you’ve had me a few times. A lot of girls stay with men they don’t marry.”

“Stop talking like a little tramp.”

“I’ll talk any way I please.”

Charles set his untouched drink on the coffee table. “Hey. Now wait. I don’t get this. I thought everything was set for June 5th.”

“So did I. But I’ve been thinking.”

“So you said.”

“And I don’t think I want to get married, anyway not to you.”

“Why not? I mean outside of not wanting to tie yourself down to one man. Suppose you be a little more specific.”

Dona looked at him over the rim of her glass. “Well, after all, you’re only a lieutenant of detectives.”

“Only?”

“You don’t make very much money.” Dona gestured with her free hand. “You couldn’t give me anything like this.”

“That’s understood. But I didn’t think it mattered. I’ve saved enough to make a substantial down payment on a house and to furnish it.”

“A bungalow in a development, filled with cheap furniture. A baby every year and us having to watch every penny we spend.”

Charles seemed to grow in size. His shoulders strained the seams of his coat. His shirt collar was too tight. His natural color deepened. The laugh lines left the corners of his eyes. “You seemed to find it attractive enough when I proposed.”

“That was then.”

Charles reached for his glass, then set it back, untouched. “Well, this is rather sudden, but if that’s the way you feel — ”

“It’s the way I feel,” Dona said. She didn’t want to go through this again. She wanted the break to be complete. She wanted Charles to despise her. “But just because I don’t want to marry you is no reason we can’t be sweethearts.” She toyed with his hand for a minute in unmistakable invitation.

“Cold turkey. Just like that.”

“Don’t you want me?”

“No.”

“Not even one last time?”

Charles stood up. “Thanks, but no. Not under the circumstances. I thought we were in love. I know I’m in love with you. I wanted a home and kids. But if a roll in the hay is all you’re interested in, I’ll be damned if I’ll play stud to a spoiled rich brat.” He picked his hat from the chair. “I suppose I had this coming, reaching up out of my class, thinking the daughter of a three-thousand-dollar-a-week entertainer would be content to marry a cop.”

The door closed and he was gone. Dona sat very still for a long time, torn between grief, revulsion and desire. She’d done what she had to do.

She straightened her disordered skirt with a swift brush of her hand and drank the drink Charles had mixed and then made another. Perhaps if she got drunk she could cry.

She was still sitting on the couch when Estrella came home. As Estrella dropped her mink cape on the chair, she asked the obvious. “Still up, baby?”

Dona studied her mother through a shimmering scrim woven of Scotch and soda. It was almost as if she was seeing her for the first time. The soft throaty voice irritated her. Her sequinned gown was cut too low. Her perfume was too obvious.

Estrella glanced at the bottle on the coffee table, as she sat down beside her. “What’s the idea, baby? You gone dipso on me? This bottle stuff is strictly for the chumps.”

Dona forced herself to speak calmly. “I know what I’m doing.”

Estrella lighted a cigarette. “I wonder. How was your date with Charles?”

“He only stayed a few minutes.”

“How come.”

“I broke our engagement.”

“Oh,” Estrella said softly. “I see. I’m sorry, baby.”

“It’s a little late to be sorry, isn’t it?”

“I suppose it is. What did you tell Charles?”

“What could I tell him? The truth?”