{"sf1_id":1060821,"sf2_id":null,"title":"My Gun Is Cute","author":"sgtklark","words":6326,"posted_at":"2016-08-11T21:45:00.000Z","tags":["Female","Fox","Story","police"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/1060821-my-gun-is-cute","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/view/1060821","image_url":"https://www.sofurryfiles.com/std/thumb?page=1060821\u0026ext=.jpg","description":"","content":"I didn't write this story, but I heavily edited it to be furry and fit in my furry universe.  It was orginally in the National Lampoon magazine way back in the mid-1970s.I'd like to thank https://thtiger.sofurry.com/ for helping me edit and proof-read the story.My Gun Is\nCute\nGermaine\nSpillane\n(Henry\nBeard)\nIt was a\nlittle before five when I put the last hemstitch in my case and de­livered a\nset of eight-by-ten glossies to Ms. Sandra Maxfly in her apart­ment on West\nEighty-third. Everyone thinks the life of a private eyelash is all glamour and\nexcitement and hand­some bulls, but take it from me, it isn't. Sometimes it's\ndressing up in a goddamn rabbit suit with a Minox in your cottontail and\nletting a bunch of corn muffins from Muncie with pricks the size of thumbtacks\nplay touch-the-tit so you can catch a couple of snaps of some Chester who\nthinks that down there in the Batteries Not Included type on the marriage\nlicense it says it's okay for him to go looking for nookie jars to stick his\nhand in while the little lady rhumbas with the Hoo­ver and makes the Rice-A-Roni.\nWhen I left,\nI had ten crisp hun­dred-dollar bills in my purse, which I figured would keep\nme in Pink Ladies and Sardo long enough to get the bad taste out of my mouth\nand the paw prints off my skin.\nIn the\nelevator, some mug who was carrying a couple of inches of bourbon under his\nbelt to keep his other couple of inches company gave me a few wolf whistles to\nshow me he knew some­thing else he could do by putting his lips together and\nblowing.\nHe looked at\nhis watch. It was up­side down. \"Hey, honey, ish eleven thirty,\" he slurred.\n\"How 'bout a nightcap?\"\nHe wasn't\nfeeling any pain. I thought about that, and it just didn't seem fair. I made a\nquick movement, and he crumpled up in the comer, groaning. \"What the--\" he\ncroaked.\nI grinned.\n\"Sorry, Jack, I thought you said kneecap.\"\nI got into\nmy heap and headed downtown. It was rush hour, and the traffic was\nbumper-to-bumper, like dogs sniffing each other's' tail holes. I cut back and\nforth and nosed into the park at Seventy-second. By the time I got to the\noffice I'd been called more names than steak houses have for a piece of dead\ncow, but I figure men have to be allowed that. After all, they haven't got much\nleft since they stopped slinging brontosaurus cutlets through the cave mouth\nand turned in their spears for Bic pens. It's either let them wedge their\npaunches behind a steering wheel and play Hercules Un­chained for two hours\nevery day or have them come home at night with a loaf of bread, crying, \"Look\nwhat I won!\"\nIt was a\nquarter to six when I finally walked into the office, and Wil­bur, my office\nboy, was halfway out the door on his way home. When I got a guy to hold down\nthe office, I figured I might as well get a Gorgeous George as a Mr. Potato Head,\nand I sure got my hands on a nice piece of beefcake when I turned up Wilbur. He's big and he's handsome and he's hung like a horse. Which\nis only logical since he is a horse. He's also\nsmart, something the good-looking ones usually aren't.\n\"Well,\nspeak of the she-devil. I've been calling all over town for you. I thought\nmaybe you'd gone to one of those clinics in Sweden for an esti­mate.\"\nI pulled\nmost of Sandra Maxfly's thou out of my purse and tossed it on his desk. \"Here,\nkiddo, pay the bills, buy yourself some of those tiny jockey shorts that show\noff your junk, and file the rest under M for\nMazuma. Now what's the fuss?\"\nHe took the\nC-note salad and locked it up. \"Detective Skyler's been calling since around\nnoon. They fished some fluff out of the river. She didn't say why, but she\nthinks you might be inter­ested.\"\nI went into\nmy office and got a frosty can of Heublein's premixed Banana Daiquiri out of\nthe little re­frigerator Wilbur fixed up to look like a safe so the clients\nwouldn't get the wrong idea. I opened up the can and let the sweet liquor slide\ndown my craw. Then I picked up the Princess phone and spun out sky's number.\n\"Meg here, Sky,\"\nI said when she came on the line. \"What's in the oven?\"\nSkyler\nsounded preoccupied. \"How soon can you get downtown, Meg?\"\nI looked at\nthe battered Lady Speidel I've been wearing ever since it stopped a slug once\nwhen I was scratching somewhere where a bullet could do a lot of damage. It\nkeeps lousy time, but I figure most of mine is borrowed anyway, so I can't com­plain.\n\"Six thirty,\" I said.\n\"See you\nthen.\" She hung up. Wil­bur poked his nose through the door. \"Need me for\nanything, Meg?\"\n\"Nix,\" I\nsaid. \"Am-scray.\"\n\"Take care\nof yourself, Meg,\" he said softly. He had that look in his big, brown eyes that\nsaid he wouldn't mind seeing me on my back in the altogether, but not on a slab\ndown­town. You can never tell with guys: one minute they're as hard as nails\nand the next they go all mushy like Joey Bishop.\n\"Okay, kid.\"\nI chuckled. \"I'll hire a cub scout to help me cross streets. Now blow.\" He\nflashed a big smile and took off. After he left, I took a few more glossies out\nof my purse and addressed them. A couple of hairy-handed rubes I couldn't feed\nan elbow sandwich to without spoiling my cover were going to be in for a\nsurprise when the lady of the house opened up the mailbox and found a nice\neight-by-ten of hubby on the make in the Big Apple on the Mississippi in there\nwith the Burpee seed catalogues. Like I said, this job isn't all glamour, but\nthere are bonuses.\nI left the\nenvelopes on Wilbur's desk for him to mail in the morning and took a cab over\nto the sterile concrete building where Detective Skyler and Cedar Rabbit's\nfinest worked. She's an investigator in Femicide, and all policewoman, but she\ndoesn't look like she should be tearing up elevated trains in some Jap horror\nmovie or hitting Joan Crawford across the kisser with a ring of keys in Women's\nPrison.  She was a lean Mexican shepherd\nwith her raven hair perpetually tied back in a single braid that almost reached\nto her shapely ass.\nSkyler was a\ndedicated rug-muncher, but she liked to think that no one knew.  It couldn't have been any more obvious if she\nwore biker boots and a plaid lumberjack shirt with a neon sign on her head\nflashing \"Dyke\", but I respected her need for privacy.\nYou don't\nget too many cops passing the time of day in Kaffeeklatsches with private\nclits, but Sky wasn't like a lot of gumpumps who never got over mak­ing it past\nmetermaid and wore their badges as if they were a brass rag. She had brains\nenough to know I could operate around the edges of the law where the pinking is\nkind of ragged, and I knew without her on my side I had about as much chance of\ngetting anywhere with the CRPD as a good-looking rape victim who hasn't got a\njudge for a witness.\nAs I came\ninto Sky's cubicle, she looked at the clock. \"Why Meg, honey, you're five\nminutes late.\" \n\"You can\nspend your whole life waiting for a woman,\" I said. She laughed. I took out a\ndeck of Virginia Slims and fired a cig, then tossed the deck across to Sky.  She frowned and pointed her nose to the NO\nSMOKING sign on the wall.  I just sneered\nand took a long drag on my smoke.  I\nsaid, \"Wilbur tells me you found a stiff in the drink and I might be\ninterested. Say, what's cook­ing? You look like you just douched with Mace. She\nsomeone we know?\" Skyer ran her fingers through her hair and shook her head. \"I\ndon't think so--not that you'd recognize your own sister after two months in the\nBig Muddy. It wasn't a pretty sight: raw, red, flaky skin, like living in\ndishwater for ten years. We'd never have found her, except some sand hogs\ndredging near the docks brought her up in a clamshell. She was wearing a chain\njumper and a pair of concrete high heels. The lab boys figure she was around\ntwenty-five, but they're just guessing. Bunny. \nBlond. No identification. And no more fingerprints than you'd get off a\ndish of yogurt.\" Skyler shud­dered. \"A bad way for a girl to go.\" \n\"Where do I\ncome in?\"\nSkyler\nreached into her drawer and picked out a little scrap of wa­terlogged\nappointment-book paper. Scrawled on it in faint ballpoint was \"Margaret Hammer\"\nand the phone number of my office.\n\"I don't\nget, Sky. I know in cer­tain circles I'm worse than a pound of fudge to a\nweight-watcher, but I don't figure a sister getting chilled just for inking my\ntag in her hush book.\" \n\"Me neither,\nbut I wish it were that simple. Here's another wrinkle. The lab boys were able\nto discover she was a drug user, and a heavy one.\" \n\"Horse?\"\nSkyler\nnodded. I thought that over. I still didn't get it Junkies end up in rivers,\nsure, but they usually get there under their own power, either because they get\nto thinking they can cross them without wasting time with bridges or they get\nso low, holding hands with Charlie the Tuna begins to look like a good time.\nAnd either way they don't invest in iron founda­tion garments and cement Hush\nPup­pies along the way.\n\"You\nfigure maybe she was dealing and got in too deep?\"\n\"Could be,\nbut the way I see it, if she was a junkie, she couldn't have been big enough to\nattract the attention of the kind of hoods who go in for the briny kiss-off.\nThey don't trust junkies, don't want 'em around. Maybe it bothers their\nconsciences.\" Her face was a mask of hate.\n\"Last thing\nI heard, they didn't kill women either,\" I said.\n\"Maybe they\ngot picketed.\" She leaned back in her swivel chair, the material of her top\nstretching across her nicely-sized melons. \"And here's another twist. To have\nthe kind of habit that would show up after two months in the river, she'd have\nhad to have been using a frosting gun to take the stuff in, but the boys in the\nwhite smocks say she never used a hypo.\"\n\"This whole\nthing is beginning to give me the pip,\" I said. \"Nuts. Why couldn't she have\nwritten 'a dozen eggs and a quart of milk' or 'pick up shoes on the ninth'?\nThen I could have come across a two-inch item on page twenty-seven and clucked\nmy tongue like everybody else, then turned the page and read 'Miss Peach' and\nfor­gotten about it.\"\n\"Nobody's\nmaking you take the case, and as far as I know, nobody's paying,\" Sky snorted.\n\"Just try to\nkeep me out of it,\" I snorted back. \"And anyway, there's always pin money in a\nmurder. What else have you got?\"\n\"Just this.\"\nShe tossed a water-soaked matchbook on the blotter. It was from the Club\nAristo, a sexist gyp joint down in the tenderloin.\n\"What do you\nknow about the place?\" I asked. \n\"It's run by\na cheap hood named 'Clams' Casino. Gangland gossip says he's in the mob, but we\nhaven't got anything on him. Not that it means he's in line for the Good House­keeping\nseal of approval.\"\n\"And you\nfigure people might talk to me who don't make it a practice to talk to cops?\"\n\"Something\nlike that,\" Skyler said. \"I thought I owed you a shot at it.\" I was probably\ngetting ready to ruin my figure by picking up a pound of lead, and no one was\nhanding out soap coupons, and for all I knew the sister on the slab was some\ncheap twat who got what she deserved, but my intuition said no. Bats! It was\ndizzy. But I could see the faces of those goons as they dropped her off into\nthe water, and that made me mad, and when I get mad, my nose gets shiny, and\nthat makes me mad­der. She'd been in trouble, and she'd been about to turn to\nme for help. I was going to nail those goons, and I was going to be giggling\nwhen I did it. I picked up the matchbook and put it in my purse and told Sky\nI'd be in touch if I got anywhere.\n\"Take it\neasy,\" she said as I was leaving. \"If anything happened to you on this one, I'd\nnever forgive myself.\"\nI grinned.\n\"Don't worry, Sky, I don't plan on getting killed because I haven't got a\nthing to wear to my funeral. Anyway, didn't you know you can't kill a girl\nunless she wants it?\"\n*  \n*   *\nIt was\nstarting to rain when I got outside, so I hopped a cab uptown. I was headed for\nthe Club Aristo, but I stopped off on the way at Jenny's for an avocado salad\nand a Gablinger's. Jenny told me Wilbur had been call­ing for me, but I knew\nthat. By the time I left, I also knew that Kim Kardashian and Kanye\nWest were headed for the splits and\nthe reason  Jennifer Aniston looked so\nyoung was she drank goat urine and spent enough time in mudpacks to qualify for\nSoil Bank allowances.\nThe rain had\nstopped by the time I left. The Club Aristo was five blocks east and a couple\nnorth, but I walked the other way. I wanted to play sec­ond jaw in a concerto\nfor two mouths with a two-bit punkette I knew named Connie Baker.\nShe came from one of those towns that supplies Cedar Rabbits with half its\nsorghum and all its hook­ers. Way back she was an airline stewardess, and for a\nwhile a Kelly Girl, until they found out that as far as taking dictation went,\nshe made more money by stopping at the first syllable. After that she peddled\nreef­ers, and the last thing I heard she had a nice little racket going where\nshe matched up lonely society matrons with a string of nice-looking mouse boys\nby posing as a society reporter and bring­ing along a \"photographer\" for 50\npercent of whatever he got. She was a sweetie.\nShe used to\nhang out in a seedy bar on the waterfront, and that's where I found her,\nnursing a Grasshopper in a back booth. She was wearing false lashes the size of\nJapanese fans, and when I came in, her eyes opened so fast the turbulence must\nhave cap­sized every fly in the place. I guess she must have figured it was\ntime to powder her nose, and maybe take one too while she was at it, because\nshe was halfway out of the booth by the time I got a handful of something she\ndidn't fed like leaving behind and squeezed. She sat down in a hurry.\n\"Hello,\nConnie,\" I said. \"Long time no see. How's the girl?\"\n\"What do you\nwant with me, you goddamn flatheel?\" she spat.\n\"Well, I'm\nnot looking for any studs or Mary Jane, or any of your other goodies,\" I trilled.\n\"I just saw my old pal Connie Baker in a bar and I say to myself, why not drop\nin and catch up on a little blab. By the way, what are you selling these days,\nConnie? You seemed awful anxious not to make my acquaintance.\"\n\"I sit here\nminding my p's and q's, and some private dike comes barging in like Lizzie\nBorden looking for something to dice, so naturally I get an urge to freshen up.\nBesides, I'm clean. Hammer.\"\n\"Sure you\nare, Connie,\" I cooed, grabbing a handbag big enough to hold Baby Jane Holzer's\ntrousseau off the seat next to her. \"I know you're really working undercover\nfor Avon. Mind if I spelunk?\" I added, giving the purse a quick riffle. She\nsnatched at it but got her wrist caught in my hand. \"My, my, a new kind of tampax,\"\nI said, holding up a handful of marijuana joints just far enough so she could\nsee them. \"And just the cunningest little lead dispenser,\" I added, showing her\nthe handle of a little nickel-plated 380 automatic. \"What will they think of\nnext?\"\n\"Why don't\nyou lay off?\"\n\"And my\ngoodness,\" I went on, \"one, two, three cans of Esoterex feminine hygiene spray.\nNew brand? What's the matter, Connie, do the squirrels throw up when you go\nwalk­ing in the park?\"\nShe suddenly\nturned very pale and put a hand on the bag. When she saw I was going to let her\nhave it back, she snatched it away.\n\"You don't\nlook so good, Connie.\" She didn't, either. Her nose was twitching and she was\nas nervous as a nun who's three weeks late. I got hold of one of her arms and\nrolled up her sleeve, then did the same with the other.\n\"No tracks.\nFunny, you look like a junkie.\"\nHer eyes\nflashed. \"Just what do you want, anyway?\"\n\"I want to\nknow all about Clams Casino. Runs a place called the Club Aristo.\"\n\"Never heard\nof him.\" They're right. Women are lousy liars. Her lips fluttered like those\nlittle streamers they tie on fans to let you know they're running.\n\"Either you\ntell Meg all about it, sister, or you, me, and that drugstore in your purse are\ngoing downtown and play go fish with the cops for a few hours, and then you're\ngoing to go off and play solitaire for five years.\"\nShe looked\nscared. \"Look, Ham­mer, don't you know that busybodies end up just plain\nbodies?\" She looked anxiously around the room. No one seemed to be interested\nin us.\n\"Well,\" I\nsaid, \"if you don't talk, I'll kind of let it be known that you did,\nsweetheart, and then...\" I picked up one of her hands and held it tight and\nturned it palm up. \"And then,\" I continued, running my finger along one of\nthe creases, \"you'll meet a couple of short, greasy strangers and they'll\ntake you to this seafood place. The surprise is, you're the seafood.\"\nShe didn't\nlook at me, but she talked, very fast and very quiet. \"Dope. Horse.\nSometimes he uses the showgirls as pushers, but otherwise the club's just a\nfront. Honest, that's all I know!\" I didn't think she was lying, but it didn't\nlook like she'd know herself one way or the other anymore.\n\"Okay, play\nit your way,\" I said in a loud voice. \"But I'll remember.\" Then I left\nlooking like I hadn't got anything. If anyone was watching, it wasn't going to\ngive Connie much of a shot at reaching menopause if I left looking happy.\nI shoved a\nbutt in my mouth, lit it up, and headed for the Club Aristo. I did it on foot\nto give myself time to try to figure it all out, but if, as a lot of people\nthink, my brains are in my feet, the stimulation didn't help much. I was\nbeginning to wonder if I should have pressed Connie for more, but I figured I\nwas lucky to get what I did.\nThe Club\nAristo was on Forty-eighth, between Seventh and what used to be Sixth until\nthey changed the name to Cedar Rabbits Blvd. All it did was make it easy for\nthe cabdrivers to tell if you were from out of town so they could fleece you.\nThe front\nwindow was pasted full of signs that said Topless and a bunch of faces that\nlooked like Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp but weren't, popping out of the left-hand\ncomers of pub­licity photos. Inside, a tone-deaf band called Tito Guernica and\nLos Terribles were making a good case for having their visas revoked, and a\ncouple of dancers who weren't quite topless did some lurching that even a Japanese\nsoldier who spent twenty-five years in a cave could have watched for a month\nwithout getting a hard-on. As soon as I walked in, a nasty-looking greaser in a\ncheap tux slid over to me like a piece of zucchini in a pan full of Mazola.\n\"I am\nsorree, Senorita,\" he hisssed, \"but e'est impossible for zee unes­corted ladies\nto enter zee club.\"\nI wanted to feed\nhim some finger canapes. \"Take it easy, buster,\" I said. \"I'm here on\nbusiness. I want to see Mr. Casino. About a job.\"\nHe looked me\nover. \"Okay, kid, I'll tell Mr. Casino you're here, but don't count on him\nseeing you on account of he's a busy man. What's the name?\" He'd forgotten all\nhis Berlitz.\n\"Hammond.\nMary Hammond.\"\n\"Stay here.\"\nWhile he was gone I fished out some chewing gum. Men believe all women are\nstupid, but with a mouthful of Doublemint, Madame Curie could have been mistaken\nfor Paris Hilton.\nWhen\ngreaseball came back, he took me into a corridor that led past the hatcheck and\nthe rest rooms to an office with a big sign that said Pri­vate, so when the\ncustomers got sloshed they wouldn't come in by accident and pee in the\nashtrays.\nHe knocked,\nand a voice said, \"Okay,\" and we went into an over­heated little office done up\nin the motel style goons think is class. The boun­cer went over and stood\nbehind the boss, who got his name probably be­cause his face looked like\nsomething you usually get six of, only smaller, when you order cherrystones.\n\"Vinnie says\nyou're looking for a job, Miss Hammond,\" Casino said softly. \"Is that so?\"\n\"Yeah,\nthat's right, Mr. Casino,\" I said, munching on every word.\n\"Sit down,\"\nhe said, pointing to a chair. I did. I was about to go into some heavy chewing\nwhen I saw a piece of paper on the corner of his desk that caught my eye. It said\nEsoterex on the top. That was all I could read upside down, but it was enough\nto make me wonder about the coin­cidence and want to have a closer look. There\ndidn't seem to be any way that was going to happen.\n\"Out of\nwork?\"\n\"Yeah, you\nsaid it. Nobody wants a secretary who can only type forty words per.\" I\nhad a brain wave. I picked my purse off the floor and put it on my lap. Then I\npulled out a cigarette, stuck it in my mouth, and palmed the wad of gum. While\nI made like I was rummaging for matches, I stuck the gum on the bottom of the\npurse. Casino picked up a lighter off his desk, and I leaned forward far enough\nto give both of them some­thing to look at, put the purse down on top of the\npiece of paper, and leaned on it.\n\"Had any\nexperience?\" Casino asked.\n\"No, but I\ncan learn.\"\nHe looked at\nme closely. \"Haven't I seen you somewhere before?\"\n\"Gee, I\ndon't think so. Maybe you got me confused with someone fa­mous. People tell me\nI look like Paris Hilton.\"\n\"Yeah,\nmaybe.\" He didn't sound convinced. \"Okay,\" he said after about a minute. \"Give\nme a call in a week.\nMaybe I'll have something for\nyou.\"\nI got up and\nslowly picked up my purse. The paper was gone. \"Gosh, thanks, Mr. Casino. I\nsure could use it.\" Vinnie came out from behind his chair and we went out. When\nwe got into the corridor, he pointed to a door marked Emergency Exit. \"No\noffense, baby, but do you mind going out the side? Wouldn't want any vice-squad\nboys to think we was the wrong kind of place, would we?\" Eleanor Roose­velt\ncould have held UNICEF meet­ings there and the place still would have smelled,\nbut I didn't do any ar­guing. It looked like it might be a setup, but I figured\nI'd be a jerk to put up a fuss and have Casino get wise to me.\nWhich didn't\nmake me feel any less like a jerk when Vinnie's blackjane hit my head halfway\ndown the alley.\nWhen I woke\nup, I was sitting in an alley, which I was willing to bet wasn't the same one,\nwith a pint of cheap bourbon drying out on my dress and some sticky blood from\na bruise on the back of my head ruining my hairdo. My watch said one thirty,\nwhich meant I'd been out for about four hours, but it didn't surprise me that\nno one had called the cops, since anyone besides a hotshot shama still stupid\nenough to go into dark alleys in New York would be happy to be­lieve the boozy\nsmell and leave the drunken floozy alone.\nMy\nboulder-holster was empty, and someone had been through my purse, but I was in\nluck. The little piece of paper was still stuck to the bottom.\nAfter a\ncouple of tries I managed to stay standing up and staggered out to the street.\nIt was Fifty-second. It didn't much matter. I wasn't going to be able to pin\nanything on Casino anyway; all Vinnie would have to say is he showed me out the\nback and I must have gotten mugged and isn't it awful the way decent people\ncan't walk the streets anymore? I wondered how Casino recognized me or flashed\nVinnie the high sign, but that didn't matter either. They know who I was.\nIt was late,\nand I was feeling like I had the curse a million times over, but there wasn't\nany time to lose. When I got to where it was light enough to read, I looked at\nthe paper. It was an invoice, and besides saying Esoterex and giving an address\nin SoHo, it had a\nwhole bunch of num­bers and letters, which might be lot numbers and might be a\ncode but weren't going to get anybody indicted.\nI flagged\ndown a cab and went across town to an all-night luncheon­ette across the street\nfrom where I parked my car. After ten minutes in the can and a couple of cups\nof Sanka, I began to feel almost like a fox again. I knew I was feeling better\nbecause now I was sure Casino had had that girl filled, and I was thinking\nabout how, if I had anything to do with it, he was going to be wearing a truss\nin the hot seat.\nWhen I got\nback to my heap, I slipped my spare Singer .38 out of the compartment under the\ndash, checked the action, and stuck it in my holster. Then I rearranged my hair\nto cover the lump, swung the rear-view mirror back, and headed downtown.\nI found the\naddress on the invoice without much trouble. It was a grimy loft building on\nSpring Street, the east-west drag that runs through the middle of an old\nindustrial area.\nI parked on\na comer and walked back. There weren't any lights on in­side and there wasn't\nanybody in sight on the street. The only sounds were a rhythmical clanking from\na job printer on the comer and the distant rumble of heavy trucks highballing\ndown the elevated interstate. One of the windows on the second floor was filled\nwith a sign that said Esoterex Products. The downstairs door was locked, but it\nhad the kind of lock women carry keys to around in their hair.\nI climbed up a set of wooden stairs to the second floor. The entrance to\nEsoterex was through a heavy sliding fire door, and it had a grown-up lock.\nAfter ten minutes of fiddling I gave up and went back downstairs and broke into\nthe world headquarters of the Superior Envelope Co. in five sec­onds flat. I\ngot out my penlight and made my way through rolls of uncut Manila paper to the\nback. My luck was still good. The freight elevator was stopped on their floor.\nThe power was off, but it was half-full of boxes. I climbed through the hatch\non top. It took me fifteen minutes of playing Jane on the counterweight ropes\nto get to the second floor, and another five teetering on the second-floor\nledge prying open the doors with a hairbrush handle, but I made it in one\npiece.\nThe floor\nwas stacked with card­board crates halfway to the ceiling. I opened up two or\nthree. They were filled with cans of feminine hygiene spray. I tried enough of\nthem to find out it came in strawberry, mint, and orange. Maybe they had\ntuna-fish salad, too, but I didn't find it. The funny part was that they were\nall labeled Pristeen, not Esoterex.\nI was trying\nto figure out what kind of combination dodge and dago per­version Casino was\npulling when I knocked over an open box and sent a half dozen cans of the stuff\nrolling around the floor. It probably wasn't all that loud, but the way my\nnerves were, it sounded like Ruby Keeler falling into the orchestra pit I\ncrouched behind a pile of boxes and gave my Arid Extra-Dry the acid test. I had\njust about summoned up enough nookie to start my waltz of the club­footed\nsleuthess again when I saw some light, and the front of a big floor-mounted\nair-conditioning unit against the wall opened and someone stepped out with a\nsix-shot dildo in his hand. He looked around for a mo­ment, and then a voice\nfrom inside said, \"Goddamn it, Tony, get back in here. We got work to do.\" The\nvoice sounded familiar.\n\"I tell\nya, I heard something.\" \n\"You're\ngoing soft in the head. Now get back in here and close that goddamn door before\nsomeone sees the light.\" It was Vinnie.\nThe one\ncalled Tony grunted and went back through the air conditioner, and the front\nclosed with a dull clang. I looked over to the row of windows that ran along\nthe streetside wall. I seemed to remember there being five of them outside, but\nthere were only four, and none of them was covered with a sign. That left the\nloft shy a space about five feet by a hundred.\nI thought\nsome more, and then I slipped off my shoes and went over to the air conditioner.\nThe floor didn't do any creaking, but if my heart be­longed to Daddy, he'd have\nneeded a transplant. I pulled out my tickler and rapped with the butt on the\nmetal, and then I flattened as much as I could against the wall.\nTony came\nrunning. The door opened. I let him get halfway out, and then I gave him an\niron kiss on the top of the head. He went down faster than anyone's sister in\nTijuana.\nI ran into\nthe secret room. Vinnie was at one end, reaching in his coat.\nI waved my\nrosalyn at him. \"Easy does it, Vinnie,\" I said. \"This isn't a Fallopian\ntube.\"\nHe froze. I\nwent over and gave him a free rubdown. I came up with a .45 and a shiv.\nHe flashed\nme an ugly smile. \"What's it with you, baby? You mak­ing up for not having one\nbetween the legs by carrying a gat around in your paw?\"\nI smiled\nback. \"Tell you what I'll do, Vinnie. I'll give you a hole down there,\" I said,\naiming below his belt, \"and then we'll be even.\"\nAfter that he shut up. I looked around the\nroom. It ran the length of the building, a little too wide to touch both walls\nwith your hands at the same time, but only just. Down one side was a long\nnarrow sideboard, like an assembly line, covered with tools and cans of hygiene\nspray, some of them opened up, and a whole lot of Esoterex labels, and glue,\nand a big box full of white powder. I tasted some of it. A new flavor. Heroin.\n\"So that's the angle. A new way\nto peddle horse. And I'm betting it's for girls only,\" I added grimly. \"Who's\nbehind this? Clams Casino? Start talking, Vinnie.\"\n\"Why don't\nyou ask him yourself?\" said a voice from behind me.\nI spun\naround. Casino was there with two goons, and they all had bang-bangs.\n\"Well, well,\nif it isn't our favorite private cunt,\" said Casino.  \"You've got a bad case of gunorrhea there,\nsweet­heart. It could be fatal.\" The odds were lousy. I let Vinnie take my gun.\n\"That's\nbetter,\" said Casino, walk­ing forward. \"You know, you really turned out to be\ntrouble with tits. I guess Vinnie was right. We should have taken you for a\nboat ride as soon as I spotted you.\"\n\"Like you\ndid a certain other chick that gave you trouble?\"\nCasino\ngrinned. I wondered what his face would look like with a fork in it. \"That was\ntoo bad. She was a good pusher. Too bad she had to find out what it was she was\npushing and got cold tootsies.\"\n\"Maybe she\nthreatened to go to the fuzzies, is that it?\"\n\"Maybe,\"\nsaid Casino. \"And maybe I've got something too sweet to lose because some dame\ngets too nosy. You see, I got a whole racket to myself. You can't interest the\ngirlies in stack­ing needles in their arms: it makes them toss their cookies.\nBut a doc who used to make a lot of beans help­ing girls with a sudden weight\nprob­lem when it was illegal figured out if a guy can snort it, broads could\ntake it in intrauterine doses, the tissues are sensitive enough. And all you've\ngot to do to get them on it is put a little in some of the stuff they spray\ndown there. Later on, they move up to a special tickler, so they can get all\ntheir kicks at once, but by then you've got 'em. And the beauty is, no marks,\nand my, ah, sales staff don't even know what they're selling. They think it's\nan aphrodisiac.\"\nSo that was\nit. I'd been a Grade-A scatterbrain not to see it. I thought of all those\nsisters with monkeys on their backs bigger than anything Fay Wray ever saw, and\nI wanted to hand out lead all around.\nI slipped my\npurse off my shoulder real easy and put it on a chair. \"Mind if I powder my\nnose?\" I said sweetly. That got laughs all around. Dizzy broad, what'll she do\nnext?\n\"Go ahead,\nsweetheart,\" said Clams, chuckling. \"We wouldn't want them to pass you by down\nin the River Room.\" That got some more laughs. \"But don't do anything nutty, or\nyou'll be having your period a little early this month.\"\nI bent over\nand reached into the purse and brought out my compact, very slowly. It was peep-show time again, and Clams moved closer, lick­ing\nhis lips. I straightened up and opened the compact and took out the puff. Then\nI took a deep breath.\nClams put a hand on my waist and said, \"Say, boys, what do you say we--\" I\nblew the whole compact lull of powder in his face, and while his hands were\ninvoluntarily moving toward his eyes, I grabbed his gun and headed for the\nfloor. Vinnie and the goons waited a split second before firing because Clams\nwas still in the way. I shot Vinnie in the head, then rolled over and put two\nslugs into the nearest goon. I got the third one in the arm and he dropped his\ngun. It was a bad shot, since I was aiming somewhere else, but I was giggling\ntoo hard to shoot straight.\nThe guy I had clobbered came in so I shot him in the foot, just for\nlaughs. Then I told them all to line up against the wall.\n\"Okay,\" I said, \"anyone who moves learns position .38. In case you don't\nknow what it is, I put a couple of slugs in you, then you lie facedown on the\nfloor and bleed to death.\" No­body did any moving.\nI picked up Vinnie's gun and went over to where there was a telephone on\na little desk. \"Now,\" I said, \"every­one take out your peckers and hold them\ntight.\" I had to put a couple of slugs into the wall to get my point\nacross, but they came around. None of them had anything the Smithson­ian would\nbe interested in.\n\"Okay,\" I said, \"Meg is going to call the janes. If anyone takes a hand\noff his joint, I'm going to shoot it off.\" Clams managed to turn white, even\nunder all the face powder.\nIt took fifteen minutes for Cedar Rabbit's finest to get there, and Skyler\nshowed up five minutes later. I gave them the high points and made a date with Sky\nto run through it all downtown the next day. She also told me there'd be about\na 5G reward for the dope haul, and that made me feel better about my dress.\nIt was 4:15 when I got back into my car and headed uptown to the cave in\none of the cliffs I call home. The city was asleep. I thought, I do the policework,\nclean up the city, dust some punks, put a couple of grease-balls in the clink,\ncook a big-shot's goose, and they sleep through it all. Don't get me wrong.\nSometimes I just get fed up.\nHell. It was that time of the month again. \nDon't\nmiss Meg Hammer in these other Germaine Spillane thrillers: \"Knit One, Kill\nTwo\"; \"Add Lead and Serve\"; \"Me, Broad\"; \"Blood Pudding\"; and\n\"Gunnilingus.\""}