Body For Sale Read online

  “YOU MADE ME KILL MY HUSBAND!”

  Helen Mathews screamed in revulsion.

  • “Wait a minute,” I said. “You made me kill him. I wanted you to get a divorce, remember?”

  • But she wasn’t listening. “You cheap, conniving gigolo!”

  • “Hold the name-calling,” I snapped. “If I’m a gigolo, you’re a whore.”

  • “I’ll make you pay,” she spat at me. “I’ll see you burn in the electric chair.”

  • “We’ll hold hands there if you try it.”

  • Helen Mathews gave me a vindictive smile. “Do you think I care? I hope we both roast in hell!”

  BODY

  FOR

  SALE

  RICHARD DEMING

  a division of F+W Media, Inc.

  FOR BABS

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  Anything But Saintly

  Also Available

  Copyright

  1

  WHEN I ARRIVED BACK IN RAINE CITY, I DIDN’T GO STRAIGHT to the office. I stopped by Tony Vincinti’s Bar and Grill first. When you know you’re going to be fired anyway, what’s the point in being careful not to breathe liquor in the boss’s face?

  At two in the afternoon the place was deserted except for fat Tony. He flashed me his white-toothed Sicilian grin and ran a rag over the already spotless section of the bar in front of me.

  “You’ve been gone a while, amico,” he said.

  “Just three weeks,” I said. I pulled my order book from my pocket and started to flip pages. “Seven fifty, five, three fifty and two. I netted four orders for good old Schyler Tools, Tony. Eighteen-hundred-dollars’ worth of business.”

  Tony’s grin widened. “That sounds good, Tom.”

  “It sounds lousy,” I told him. “The commission is ten per cent. It works out to sixty dollars a week.”

  The tavern proprietor’s grin disappeared. “Well, you get expenses too, don’t you?” he said philosophically.

  “Yeah. Which cuts Schyler’s profit on my last three weeks’ work to nothing. Make me a double Gibson.”

  Tony looked worried. “You reported in yet, amico?”

  “What the hell do you care?”

  His dark face flushed. “I thought we was compari.”

  His flush made me a little ashamed of myself. “We are,” I said. “No, I haven’t reported in yet. Make me a double Gibson.”

  “You come in here once before with that look on your face,” Tony said. “In uniform that time. Remember what happened?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I had six double Gibsons and got knocked off the force for being drunk on duty. It wasn’t your fault.”

  “I served them, didn’t I? I always felt bad about that.”

  “Rest easy,” I said. “I make my own jams. I’m a slob.”

  “You’re my compare,” he protested. “You can’t talk that way about a friend of mine.”

  I gave him a patient grin. “You going to build me a double Gibson, or do I have to go to some clean bar?”

  He pretended he was offended. Slapping ice into a mixing glass, he poured quite a bit of gin before adding a mere dash of vermouth.

  “This time it doesn’t matter,” I told him. “Drunk or sober, I get canned the minute I turn in this order book.”

  He stirred the mixture. “Why? You been working, ain’t you? You even been on the wagon since you started with Schyler.”

  “I’ve been working my head off, Tony. That’s what makes it a boot in the pants. I never blamed anybody for my own mistakes, did I?”

  Pouring the drink into a five-ounce stemmed glass, he dropped in a pearl onion and set it before me. I gave him a five-dollar bill. He rang up a dollar twenty and set the change on the bar.

  “I never heard you cry about anything,” he said.

  I took a sip of the drink. “Up to now I never had anything to cry about. I never held it against the lieutenant who caught me drunk on duty. Hell, he was just doing his job. It wasn’t his fault I let a dame throw me for a loop. And I never blamed anybody but myself for the other two jobs I lost.”

  Tony said, “That private-eye job wasn’t so much anyway, was it?”

  “That’s beside the point. Know why I got canned?”

  He shook his head.

  “I got caught trying to shake down a client.”

  Tony looked embarrassed.

  “Know why I lost my hack-driving job?”

  He shook his head again.

  “An inspector caught me gimmicking my meter. I told you I was a slob.” I drained my glass and shoved it toward him. “Same way.”

  Tony said, “Don’t a lot of them do that? You was just unlucky to get caught.”

  “I was an angle-shooter,” I said. “Up to six months ago I’d been an angle-shooter all my life. I woke up when I suddenly realized all it ever got me was trouble. So in six months on the road for Schyler Tools I haven’t even padded my expense account. And I’ve worked night and day. Only I can’t seem to sell tools.” I pointed to my empty glass. “I said the same way.”

  A little reluctantly he started to mix another drink. “That ought to count for something, Tom. Why don’t you check in and talk to the boss instead of going off half-cocked?”

  I let out a bitter chuckle. “I plan to talk to the boss. I’m primed to tell him good.”

  “You will be primed if you keep downing this priming fluid,” Tony muttered. He set the second drink before me and rang up another dollar twenty. “Ain’t it kind of childish to tell off the boss when you get canned?”

  “Not this boss,” I said. “You know who the president of Schyler Tools is?”

  Tony shook his head.

  “George Mathews. He’s president because he married old Lyman Schyler’s daughter just after the old man died. She inherited controlling interest. Without her vote Mathews couldn’t get a job as a stock boy. He spends about three hours a day at the office. The rest of the time he’s golfing, boating and discreetly chasing females. Discreetly, because his wife would kick him out on his can if she ever caught him. That’s the kind of incompetent that’s going to fire me.”

  Tony frowned. “That’s not just sour grapes? How’s the place keep going with a guy like that in charge?”

  “He’s only nominally in charge. The real brains of the company is the force of assistants Lyman Schyler built up before he died. It goes on functioning just as automatically under a figurehead boss as it did under the old man. This isn’t just sour grapes. My opinion of George Mathews is the same one held throughout the plant.”

  “He’s nobody you can reason with then, huh?”

  “He wouldn’t know what I was talking about. He’ll just can me and then rush off to play golf. At least I’m going to have the pleasure of telling him he doesn’t know his head from a cobblestone.”

  I finished my second drink and Tony mixed a third without my ordering it. “On me this time,” he said.

  I had one more after that. I was pretty well primed by the time I reached the office. Not drunk, just courageous enough to spit in a tiger’s eye.

  The little blond who served as George Mathews’ receptionist gave me a nice smile and trilled, “Good afternoon, Mr. Cavanaugh.”

&nb
sp; The smile turned to a look of alarm when, without even answering, I pushed through the swinging gate and headed for Mathews’ private office.

  “You can’t go in there!” she squealed, rushing after me. “Mr. Mathews is in conference.”

  I stepped inside and shut the door just before she got to it. She must have been afraid to violate her boss’s privacy further because she didn’t try to follow me. A quick glance about the office showed me that no one was there. This made me feel a little foolish until I remembered the small siesta room connecting to the office. The door to it was closed.

  Quietly I crossed over to it. It was unlocked too. I pushed the door open and went in.

  This room was a mere cubbyhole, no more than ten by seven feet square. There was a bar across one end with four stools before it and the door to Mathews’ private washroom alongside. The only other furnishings were two leather-upholstered chairs and a leather-covered sofa, plus a couple of ash stands.

  A couple of people, stark naked, were horizontal on the sofa.

  My unannounced entrance brought on a flurry of activity. With a flash of white legs a shapely brunette bounced up from the sofa, swept a dress and a couple of pieces of lingerie from one of the chairs and darted into the washroom so rapidly I didn’t even glimpse her face.

  But I didn’t have to. I recognized the small pink birthmark on the left cheek of her round little bottom. George Mathews wasn’t the only man at Schyler Tools who was intimately acquainted with file clerk Gertie Drake. But he probably did have the distinction of being the first to get intimately acquainted on company time.

  Mathews’ look of consternation changed to a threatening frown when he saw who had interrupted his conference. But he delayed saying anything until he had grabbed his own clothing from the other chair and jerked it on as fast as he could. He didn’t sacrifice thoroughness to speed, though. He knotted his tie in the mirror behind the bar and even carefully adjusted his tie clip.

  Then he asked in a cold voice, “What do you mean bursting in here unannounced?”

  I had intended blistering his ears with my personal opinion of him, but the situation changed my mind. Giving him a chummy smile, I took one of the chairs and lit a cigarette. Mathews glared at me.

  “I don’t seem to be much good on the road,” I said. “I think I’d like district sales manager better.”

  Striding toward me, he looked down at me with clenched fists. I wasn’t very impressed. At thirty-two George Mathews was lean and hard and well muscled, but at thirty I was leaner and harder and better muscled. And I outweighed his one seventy-five by twenty pounds.

  “Of all the unmitigated—” Mathews started to say.

  “Would you rather have me discuss the promotion with Mrs. Mathews?” I interrupted.

  He opened his mouth and closed it again. After staring at me wordlessly for a few moments, he managed in a slightly high voice, “Are you trying to blackmail me?”

  I gave him a pleasant nod.

  He stared a while more, unclenched his fists and rubbed the back of his neck. His gaze strayed to the closed washroom door.

  “I’ll make as good a district sales manager as you do a company president,” I said reasonably.

  Looking back at me, he sniffed. “You’ve been drinking.”

  “A little,” I admitted. “We all have our minor indulgences.”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “You’re an adulterer,” I countered amiably.

  His fists clenched again, then unclenched. Instead of staying angry, he decided to make me a fellow conspirator.

  Summoning a rueful smile, he said, “What the hell, Tom. We don’t have to insult each other. You’d get a little sore if I barged in on you at a time like this. And don’t tell me you’ve never had a time like this.”

  “I won’t. But I’m single.”

  He dismissed this hair-splitting with an airy wave. “According to Kinsey, fifty per cent of all married men cheat a little.”

  “How many of them have wives who could pitch them out in the street without a nickel?”

  He flushed. “You want to be nasty about this?”

  “No,” I said. “I just want to be district sales manager.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said testily. “There’s no opening.”

  “Ed Harmony retires in two weeks.”

  “You know very well Harry Graves is scheduled for that spot. Moving you over his head would create an office scandal.”

  I knew I was in by the way he was arguing instead of just telling me to go to hell.

  “Then create one,” I said. “I don’t feel like going on the road any more, so I’ll take a two-week leave until the job opens. With pay, of course.”

  For a long time he examined me coldly, the false camaraderie gone from his eyes. Then he said in a curt tone, “All right, Cavanaugh. I’ll arrange it. Now get the hell out of my office.”

  2

  WHEN I OPENED THE DOOR FROM MATHEWS’ MAIN OFFICE, a woman was speaking to the blond receptionist. She was a slim, poised woman of about my age with a delicately sculptured face framed by loose golden hair. She wore a white, severely cut street dress, white gloves and a pert little white hat.

  I had never met the company president’s wife, but I had a hunch that the woman was Helen Mathews. I was a little surprised at her beauty because it was general gossip throughout the plant that Mathews had married her only for her money. And his discreet tomcatting had made me assume that she couldn’t be very attractive or he wouldn’t be so prone to stray. But I instantly tabbed this woman as Mrs. Mathews by a process of elimination. Her aura of wealth and breeding seemed to rule out that she was someone applying for a job or a buyer for a company using our products. And from what I had heard of the type of women Mathews chased, she had too much class to be one of his mistresses.

  Both women glanced up when I opened the door. Trying to look as though I had forgotten something in the office, I turned around and pulled it shut behind me again.

  Gertie Drake, now fully clothed, was just emerging from the washroom when I re-entered the siesta room. She and Mathews both gave me outraged looks.

  “Is your wife a redhead?” I asked Mathews.

  His outraged expression evaporated. “Golden-haired. Why?”

  “She’s outside talking to your receptionist.”

  Both Gertie and Mathews looked upset. Gertie started to back toward the washroom door.

  “Relax,” I said. “If Gertie walks out with me, it’ll just look as though she was taking notes at a conference between us.”

  Taking Gertie’s elbow, I steered her into the office. Mathews nervously trailed after us. A steno pad lay on the desk. I picked it and a pencil up and thrust them into Gertie’s hands.

  “Try to look like a stenographer,” I said.

  She gave me a confused look. “I don’t know shorthand. I’m just a file clerk.”

  When Mathews and I both looked at her, she blushed at the idiocy of her remark. Straightening her back, she marched to the door and waited for me to hold it open for her. Mathews hurriedly seated himself behind his desk.

  As I pulled open the door, I said over my shoulder, “I’ll have two copies of the transcript made, Mr. Mathews, so we can each have one.”

  He merely nodded, but his face showed appreciation for the act I was putting on.

  When he went past the reception desk, the little blond said, “I guess Mr. Mathews is free now, Mrs. Mathews. Go right on in.”

  Gertie halted at the gate in the wooden railing that separated the reception desk from the rest of the office. As the door closed behind the golden-haired Mrs. Mathews, Gertie turned and thrust the notebook and pencil at me. Then she pushed through the gate and marched off with her nose in the air.

  Walking over to the reception desk, I laid the notebook and pencil down and gave the blond a chummy smile. I got a frigid look in return.

  The receptionist’s attitude intrigued me. Certainly she knew, or at least stron
gly suspected, what had been going on in Mathews’ office. And it was hardly likely that she approved of such behavior during working hours. Yet she guarded his portal like a miniature Horatio at the bridge. I wondered what she thought such loyalty was going to get her. Obviously she had no designs on the boss himself, for no woman, no matter how loyal, would aid a rival.

  It occurred to me that possibly Mathews had made some unwanted advances and that she welcomed his transferring his attentions to Gertie Drake.

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  “Miss Simmons,” she said coldly.

  “No first name?”

  After examining me for a moment, she said, “Miss Esther Simmons, Mr. Cavanaugh.”

  “Most people call me Tom.”

  In the same cold tone she said, “I don’t believe in familiarity between workers in a business office, Mr. Cavanaugh.”

  “Brrr,” I said. “I just got a promotion and was looking for someone to help me celebrate. But I guess I’ll have to eat dinner alone.”

  She looked a little startled. “Are you asking me out to dinner?”

  “I meant to before the chill set in. You used to greet me with a big smile.”

  “I used to think you were nice. You never barged past me like that before.” Her tone was still cool, but it had thawed considerably.

  “Mathews was glad to see me,” I told her. “We’re bosom pals. It won’t get you in any trouble.”

  She thawed a little more. “You can hardly blame me for being mad, Mr. Cavanaugh.”

  “Tom,” I said.

  “All right, Tom.” Then she sniffed. “Have you been drinking?”

  “Naturally. I’ve already started to celebrate my promotion.”

  Apparently she assumed that the drink had come from her boss’s private bar, and this evidence that I was on such good terms with him completed the thaw. “What promotion?” she asked with friendly interest.

  “The one I mentioned a minute ago.”

  “I mean, what are you being promoted to?”

  “Mr. Mathews wants to make the announcement himself,” I told her. “I’m not at liberty to say. Are you going to help me celebrate?”