Read 1953 - The Things Men Do for Free Online Page B

air. Nearby three big cars were parked: a Cadillac, a Humber and the 1939 Buick I'd seen already.
    I stood hesitating, looking up at the windows, still not sure if I should ring the bell or sneak away.
    I rang the bell.
    After a few minutes delay, the door opened.
    "Hello, Harry."
    I took a step forward, then stopped. She was in a black evening dress, cut so low I could see the tops of her breasts and the furrow between them. In the evening light her shoulders were porcelain white, and the overhead lamp in the hall lit up the brilliants around the top of her dress and sent flashes of fight from a big paste diamond clip she wore in her hair.
    She looked the most exciting and sensual woman I had ever seen, and just to look at her, sent a feeling through me so violent it scared me.
    "My! You do look handsome." Her hand reached out and took mine. "The other boys will be green with envy."
    "You look as if you've stepped straight out of a movie."
    "Do I? That's the first compliment I've been paid this evening. I put this dress on specially for your benefit. Like it?"
    "Its' terrific: a knock-out."
    "Well, come on up and meet the others."
    "Is he here?"
    "Yes. His name's Dix: Ed Dix. When the party's warmed up I'll find the opportunity for you to talk to him."
    She led me up a flight of steep stairs and into a long, low-ceiling room that was full of tobacco smoke. The curtains had been drawn, shutting out the waning evening light and small parchment-shaded lamps, set in the walls, were alight.
    "People: meet Harry Collins, my new boyfriend," Gloria said from the doorway.
    That surprised me, but there was nothing I could do about it. I let her lead me into the middle of the room.
    "Reading from left to right," she went on, speaking rapidly, "Betty, Connie, Paula and Madge. Don't let them get their claws into you, and girls, remember, he's my property."
    The girls were expensively dressed, all, over made-up: two blondes, a red head and a platinum blonde: none of them had any attractions for me. I gave each of them a stiff little bow while Gloria slid her arm through mine and watched me with a possessive air that embarrassed me.
    They all smiled. Paula, the red head, winked, while Madge, one of the blondes, rolled her eyes at me.
    A slight tug at my arm half-turned me to meet the four men.
    Three of them were in evening dress; the fourth was in a pearl-grey lounge suit, cut on the American style. He wore a hand painted tie of horses' heads on a yellow background. He was tall and massively built, about twenty-five or six, with small dark eyes that stared through me, a small over red mouth and a long, massive jaw.
    "Eddie, I want you to meet Harry Collins."
    So this was Ed Dix. I disliked him on sight.
    "Hullo; how's yourself?" he asked, moving towards me with a slow, lounging gait He spoke with a marked American accent.
    "Pretty good. Glad to meet you."
    He gave me a jeering little smile.
    "You are? That's fine. Meet the boys: Joe, Berry and Louis."
    The three men averaged about twenty-seven or eight years of age; Berry was short and thickset with a white, hard face and flaming red hair; Joe was big; nearly as powerful-looking as Dix. He had the battered, squashed face of a fighter. Louis was fair and effeminate looking. He had a pencil-lined moustache and a carnation in his button-hole.
    I didn't like the look of any of these three any mare than I liked the look of Dix, but they were obviously determined to be amiable and each shook hands with me, grinning.
    "Well, now you've met everyone, have a drink," Gloria said, leading me across the room to an elaborate bar. She slipped behind it. "What'll you have? Whisky?"
    "Thanks."
    My eyes went to her half-concealed breasts again.
    While she busied herself with an ice shaker one of the girls put on a record on the radiogram. Soon all four couples were dancing while Gloria leaned against the bar, watching them, and from time to time looking at me.
    I had time now to examine the room I was in.