Sheba, page 4
She left the office and walked out into the showroom. Gregg was sitting in an easy chair reading a man’s magazine. Gregg read a lot of men’s magazines. He kept them under a pile of sales material and he said they were more interesting than the company’s propaganda about power brakes, power steering and all-metal construction.
“Get your check?” he asked.
She showed it to him.
“I hope you’re not mad,” she said.
He flipped the pages of the magazine to take a quick look at the pictures of a couple of girls without bras and then put the magazine aside.
“Mad? Why should I be mad? I didn’t get the full commission but you put thirty-six bucks in my pocket. Is that something to get sore about?”
He was a good sport, she thought, a very good sport. The Dixon sale should have been his but he was taking it in stride.
“I thought you might be,” she said.
Gregg laughed. “Well, now that you mention it, I am mad at you. I’m burning like a forest fire.”
“Oh?”
“But you could take me up on that invitation to dinner and I’d be all right.”
She laughed. “Crazy!”
He crossed his legs and sighed as he looked at the girl on the cover of the magazine. She wasn’t as naked as the others but she didn’t have much on and she had a good shape.
“How many times does a guy have to ask you, for Pete’s sake?”
She didn’t know what to say. The challenge which she felt rose within her, but it was more than that. Now that she had a chance to sell for Wise Motors she had to learn from Gregg, learn everything that he did. If she sold only one car a week — why, just one car a week and it would be out of this world. She would be able to buy new clothes, help her mother, do a dozen different things. The loan with Mr. Loven would soon be repaid and her worries would all be in the past.
“You might ask me again,” she suggested.
“All right, I’ll have a whirl at taking you up on that. Have dinner with me tonight. We’ll celebrate your victory and go to the Embers Club.”
The Embers Club was a hot shot place at the edge of town. The prices were high, the drinks no larger than they should be, and anybody who was anybody at all in Mayville went there as often as they could afford it.
“I’ll have to meet you there,” Sheba said.
“That’s a new twist.”
“Well, I have a call I want to make.” Then, “Do you think Mr. Wise would let me use one of the demonstrators?”
“If it’s business.”
“It’s business.”
Gregg reached into his pocket and withdrew a set of keys.
“Take the four-door,” he said. “It’s clean and it’s got every gadget on it. And,” he smiled, “good luck.”
“Thank you.”
“What about seven at the club?”
She ought to see Fred, ought to keep her date with him, but this was more important and Fred would have to wait. If he took her out to eat he would take her to the diner and she was sick of the diner. The food there was greasy and once in a while she would see a roach run up and down the wall.
“I think I can be there by seven,” she said.
“If you aren’t, I’ll wait.”
“You do that.”
Sheba left at five and drove the big red Blazer uptown. The car handled beautifully and she loved the smell of its newness. Someday she would own a car like this one — or bigger. She would have everything she had ever wanted, everything she had ever dreamed of having.
Part Two
4
MIKE Gordon was a young man, probably in his early thirties, and his novelty store on West Main Street was neat and clean. He had inherited the store from his father and he specialized in selling junk items to the younger set. It was also said that he sold dirty books from under the counter but no one, not even the police, had ever been able to prove this.
“Help you, miss?”
A couple of boys were back near the magazine rack, looking at the pictures of some half-naked girl and snickering.
“I’m from Wise Motors, Mr. Gordon.”
“Oh, yes.”
“I think you were talking with Mr. Walton about a new car?”
Mike Gordon nodded. “The small car, the one without all the gimmicks on it. I thought it would be a nice present for my wife’s birthday.”
The boys came up and paid fifty cents for the magazine. They left, arguing about who would look at the pictures first.
“What happened?”
“Well, I had a wreck and the car I have isn’t worth anything except for junk. I had insurance on it, not collision — just protects the other fellow, you know — and the man from Florida who hit me didn’t have any. He’ll get another car from my insurance company but I’ll have to sue to get anything.”
“So you couldn’t get the new car?”
“No. I’ve got some life insurance but when I married I took a loan on the business and the insurance policies are assigned to the bank. They said they would take the loan on the car all right, but I have to come up with about eleven hundred in cold cash.”
“You’ll probably get something from the accident someday?”
“Someday,” Mike Gordon replied. “I have a lawyer who’s working on it and he said the man who hit me is well off and can pay. But it’ll take time.”
This Gordon was friendly. Maybe he was married and maybe he loved his wife but that didn’t stop him from looking her over pretty thoroughly.
“We might be able to arrange it so you can get the car,” Sheba told him, giving him a smile which she hoped was bright and pure. “I’d have to ask you a few questions about yourself. I hope you don’t mind?”
“Hell, I don’t mind. I don’t need the car so much for myself but my wife does. We live in the country and she’s stuck out there the way things are now. I ride in with a neighbor mornings and take a cab back at night so it doesn’t bother me very much. But it’s rough on her. She’s in some church club and she has to miss meetings. So I don’t mind if you ask me any questions. I tried to work it out, but cash is a little short and I couldn’t come up with anything.”
“You own your own house?”
“Not own it, but I’m buying it. I thought of borrowing on that but appraised valuations have gone down in the last couple of years and there wasn’t enough margin. They charged me twenty-five bucks for another appraisal, sent some local goons out there and told me I was lucky to have a GI mortgage at all. So I had to drop it.”
“But you’ve got furniture?”
“We’ve got furniture, sure.”
“Is it paid for?”
“Every nickel.”
He was tough, not like the Dixons, and he was smart. Somehow she would have to break him down.
“You’d like to have that new car, wouldn’t you?”
“Naturally, but I told you how things are.”
“Have you heard of the Old Reliable Finance Company?”
He laughed at her. “That gyp outfit?”
Strangely enough, she began to feel more sure of herself.
“They aren’t gyps,” she said, taking a deep breath. His eyes followed the movement of her body under the dress.
“Not much they aren’t. You take a loan with them and you wind up paying twenty or twenty-five percent interest. They’ve got all kinds of crazy charges they can catch you with.”
She didn’t know whether she was right or wrong but she was determined to make this sale. She knew cars that were almost total wrecks and Gregg still had often allowed three or four hundred dollars on a trade-in.
“Your car isn’t worth anything,” she said.
“Ten dollars for junk. It would have been more but the block is cracked.”
“What if you went to the Old Reliable and borrowed the money on your furniture? And what if I allowed you two hundred and fifty dollars on your car? Wouldn’t that make up for some of the difference in interest?”
“It would.”
“And you would have your new car.”
He thought about it, still looking at the front of her dress. She wasn’t sure whether he was thinking about the car or what he saw. She could have adjusted the dress, but if she could push him over the side with just a little peek, what could be the harm in that? Sex was used to sell everything from washing machines to paint, and a new car was no exception.
“I’d have the car,” he agreed. “Why didn’t that Walton fellow suggest the same thing?”
“I don’t know.”
“We both went over it several times, and now you walk in here and make it sound so easy. You’re a mighty good saleswoman.”
She gave him her best smile. “Thank you, Mr. Gordon.”
“You can call me Mike.”
This time she really laid the smile on, burned it into him. “Mike.”
“Who do I see down at this Old Reliable?”
“A Mr. Loven.”
“Okay. I’ll give it a spin in the morning.”
“Just tell him I sent you.”
“I’ll be glad to do that.”
Four girls came in, dressed in tight jeans, and they sprawled over the counter, snapping gum.
“Stop at the garage afterward,” she said, starting for the door. “And ask for me.”
His glance moved over her slowly.
“I’ll ask for you,” he said.
Outside, she got into the car and began driving north toward the edge of town. Perhaps she had handled Mike Gordon properly and perhaps she hadn’t, but she had made the plunge. She would sell cars by the ton. She would sell so many cars that she would have Mr. Wise screaming at the company for more and more. And she would make a bundle, a neat bundle. What could be better than that? Mr. Wise would make money, Gregg would make money and she would make money. Everybody would be happy.
Gregg was waiting for her outside of the club, sitting in one of the fancy green chairs on the patio. He wore a blue suit that filled out his shoulders and when he stood up he looked as big as a giant.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hi, yourself. Been waiting long?”
He grinned. “Any wait for you is long. But I kept telling myself, six months you’ve been trying to date this doll and another hour won’t matter very much.”
“You’re nuts.”
The Embers Club was just off the highway and cars moved along the road, a steady stream. A group of four, two men and two women, passed them and entered the club. The men wore business suits and the women looked sleek in expensive dresses, smelled even more expensive with their imported perfumes.
“I feel out of place,” she said.
“Why?”
“This club. The way I’m dressed.”
He took her by the arm.
“Forget it,” he said. “Half of those women wouldn’t look as good in hundred-dollar gowns as you do in what you have on.” He led her toward the entrance. “It’s the woman inside that counts, not the trimmings.”
He’s nice, she thought; nicer than Fred. She hadn’t told him a thing about herself, not a thing, and yet he understood.
The club had a big dining room but it was only partially filled. They took a table near one of the windows, overlooking a small pond with a couple of swans in it, and a waiter came over to them.
“Drink?” the waiter asked.
Gregg looked at Sheba.
“Not me,” she said.
“Oh, come on, a drink will do you good. Besides, this is some sort of a celebration. What about a stinger?”
She had never heard of a stinger. Her father drank his whiskey straight and Luke tried to do the same thing.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Oh, go on, have one. It’s a great drink,” he insisted. “You’ll enjoy it.”
He continued to watch her, smiling just a little and waiting. There was nothing wrong with having a drink. A lot of people drank and didn’t get drunk. And this day was an event in her life, a big event that promised much for the future. She could think about her problems now and laugh some and not be so serious. The check was security and her job was security. A girl would never find more no matter how hard she looked.
“Well, all right,” she said, finally. “Just one.”
They ordered steaks and the waiter told them it would be almost half an hour before they would be served. When the drinks arrived she tasted the stinger and found it smooth and pleasing. It didn’t taste like the liquor she was used to at all. It was almost like a cold drink that she would get in some soda fountain.
“Luck to you,” Gregg said, touching his glass to hers. “A lot of luck.”
“Luck.”
“I had a talk with Mr. Wise after you left and I think you might do pretty well selling cars.”
“I’m going to try.”
“Just remember one thing — a car is never sold until it’s out of the garage and the license plates are on it.”
She accepted a cigarette and filled her lungs with the smoke. Gregg continued to look at her the way all men looked at her, but she felt no fear at that. He was male, she was female, and what did she expect?
“I saw Mike Gordon,” Sheba said.
Gregg frowned. “Mike Gordon?”
“You tried to sell him a car.”
Gregg finished his drink and waved for another.
“Yeah, I know now. Has a little store on West Main Street.”
“That’s right. Gregg, what would Mr. Wise say if I allowed this Gordon something on his old car?”
“Nothing,” Gregg said. “You could go up to three hundred bucks and be safe. I was going to do that but he couldn’t get his hands on any money so there wasn’t any point.”
She felt relieved — and she felt something else, too. Gregg hadn’t worked it right with Mike Gordon, hadn’t worked it right at all. He had told Gordon that he could buy but he hadn’t shown him how. There was a difference, a vast difference. She had used the allowance to offset the increase in interest and Gordon had gone for it hard.
“I sold him a car,” she said.
“No kidding?”
“I didn’t go up to three hundred on the allowance and I sold him a car.”
“More power to you.”
The drinks arrived and she was drinking the second stinger before she realized it.
“I don’t mean to steal your prospects, Gregg.”
“That’s all right.”
“But it isn’t all right. The Dixons were prospects of yours and so was Mike Gordon. I won’t do it again. I’ll find my own.”
“You won’t have any trouble.”
“Won’t I?”
“Not with your looks. The men will come to you like bees chasing a flower. All you have to do is put on a tantalizing smile and a tight dress and let nature take its course.”
“I hope it’s that easy.”
“It won’t be with the women. Women, most of them, resent a girl who is prettier than they are.”
“They do?”
“But don’t let it alarm you. You take care of the men and I’ll take care of the women. Hell, we can work as a team. I don’t know of any place that it’s been done before, but it should work. We ought to upset them like apple carts on the thruway.”
The steaks were tender and good and while they were eating they had another drink. She was fairly sure that she didn’t feel the drinks but everything was fine, fine, and she laughed at many of the things he said.
“You’re a scream,” she said once.
“Not me. It’s the business. You get all kinds. They want to think they’re getting a bargain and taking you over, so you have to make them feel that way. Everybody has a corner in his heart that is pure larceny; when he goes to buy a car it’s all larceny. They want to steal from you so they can laugh about it later and tell their friends. Nobody buys a car unless they get a bargain. Nobody.”
They didn’t have any dessert or coffee but they did have two more stingers. The place was filling up and she thought it was a lot warmer in the dining room than it had been when they arrived. She bit against her upper lip and it felt almost numb.
“How did you swing those two deals?” Gregg wanted to know.
There was no use hiding it from him. She hadn’t done anything wrong. She had only helped people who needed help.
“From the Old Reliable Finance Company,” she said.
“A guy by the name of Loven?”
“Yes, Mr. Loven.”
“So he sucked you in?” Gregg said.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean the people will have two payments to make each month.”
“I know that, but they can both afford it. What’s wrong with it if Old Reliable is the only place they can go?”
“Nothing wrong with it,” he said. “Except one little thing.”
“What’s that?”
“If you’re getting a cut.”
“What makes you think — ”
“Now don’t get steamed up over it. Loven would offer a deal like that but I didn’t think you’d take it. You’d be crazy if you did. That’s loading, and Mr. Wise would be down your throat faster than one of these stingers.”
She didn’t know what to say or how to defend herself, and she was glad when he started talking about how they could work together as a team. Mr. Loven had placed her in a position which was defenseless and she would have to do something to get out of it. Just what she would do she didn’t know but soon she would have to come up with an answer.
Gregg paid the bill, which chewed up a twenty dollar bill, and they left the club.
Outside it was dark, and the parking lot was deserted. As they walked toward their cars he put his arm around her waist, pulling her in tightly against him, and she didn’t object. There was no reason why she should. Gregg was a nice boy, awfully nice, and the things they said about him weren’t true. He didn’t run around with Mrs. Wise and when he took a girl out he behaved like a gentleman.
“There’s my car,” she said.
He took her over to the car and opened the door for her. She got in, her head spinning, wondering if she could drive back to town.
“Those stingers really stung you,” he said.
