Part 2

It was almost the cocktail hour now, not that Mary-Jean went for cocktails. But Jeanne-Marie? Jeanne-Marie might. Indeed, she might. So Jeanne-Marie got into a cocktail dress which fit her properly for the first time. Actually, she found, although she looked much taller than Mary-Jean, she wasn't, not really. There were subtle structural differences which made her look taller, slimmer, statuesque. And the dress fit her like a sheath.

* * * * *

She scrawled a note for Tom. Plain, honest Tom, she thought, with some sadness. _Dear Tom: Called out of town unexpectedly. I wish I could explain. I'll be back tomorrow afternoon._ She wanted to add _maybe_ but did not. _There's supper for you and Tommy in the fridge. Don't worry about me because I'll be all right. I'll be fine. That's putting it mildly--I'll be just great. See you tomorrow. Love, Mary-Jean._ Almost, she had signed Jeanne-Marie. She looked at the note, frowned, and tore it up. It would be an adequate note for Mary-Jean to write, but not Jeanne-Marie. She took a fresh sheet of paper and scrawled:

_Back tomorrow. Called away suddenly. Mary-Jean._

That was more like it: a note with the trip-hammer, cryptic mystery of a telegram. The other note made it seem as if Tom took her for granted, would fortify any such notions he had. That might have been all right with Mary-Jean, but Jeanne-Marie wouldn't stand for such a thing. Satisfied, Jeanne-Marie went downstairs.

And the front door opened.

It was Tommy, she thought with sudden alarm, seven-year-old Tommy back from school and his cub scout pack meeting. She watched him come in. Mechanically, because there was nothing else to do, she continued down the stairs.

"H'lo," Tommy said, looking at her. "My mother upstairs?"

"Why, no, no, she isn't," Jeanne-Marie said. "She went away for the day. She left a note for your father."

"Who're you?"

"Oh, just a friend. Be--be a good boy until your father gets home, Tommy. Why don't you play with your trains?"

"Who told you I have trains?"

"Oh, your mother told me." She was at the front door now. "Your mother did. Well, g'bye."

"Bye," Tommy said.

A taxi was waiting at the curb. She had known--almost--that it would be. For Jeanne-Marie did not have to seek things out. They sought her--grateful for the privilege.

The cabbie stared at her with frank admiration and she didn't mind. She didn't mind at all. You couldn't consider it fresh. It was more like--more like homage. It was her due.

The cabbie's expected question: "where to, lady?" was replaced by a polite, "Madam?"

On impulse, Jeanne-Marie named the city's most fashionable cocktail and supper club, the Black Flamingo. Then she settled back in the cushions, relaxing. Traffic was heavy and the cabbie stole several admiring glances in the rear-view mirror, but still they made incredible time, as if all the other drivers knew that Jeanne-Marie had twenty-four hours of glorious adventure ahead of her and wanted to embark on it at once.

All the traffic made way for Jeanne-Marie. Naturally it did.

* * * * *

Homage was paid Jeanne-Marie at the _Black Flamingo_ too. There she was ushered across the crowded floor and given a ringside table near the cocktail hour pianist. The sweet, seductive music he played, the dimness within the _Black Flamingo_, the almost abstract pattern of flamingos in motion on the walls, the cigarette haze, the constant humming buzz of cocktail chatter, the first cocktail--a gibson--Jeanne-Marie ordered, all combined for an effect of drowsiness, of time suspension, which Jeanne-Marie had never experienced before.

Then the conversational buzz receded, like a tide ebbing. Jeanne-Marie blinked. Most of the crowd was gone. She looked at her wrist watch and saw that two hours had passed, looked at the small round surface of her table with the _Black Flamingo_ placemat and saw three cocktail glasses, all empty. Soon, Jeanne-Marie realized with a growing sense of disappointment, the before-theater crowd would bring the tide flowing back to the _Black Flamingo_ again. But her disappointment stemmed from the fact that nothing had happened to her and it was now almost seven o'clock. Oh, she had been stared at, admired, ogled even--but what beautiful girl wouldn't be? It was not that Jeanne-Marie had taken her twenty-four hours of beauty for granted. Rather, it was not beauty--certainly not beauty alone--she had wished for. And it wasn't sex-appeal, either, she told herself. Jeanne-Marie loved her husband and had experienced no lewd, day-dreaming fantasies about a secret lover who would sweep her off her proverbial feet. But Jeanne-Marie had waited, with a mixture of patience and passion, all her life--for something to happen. Something out of the ordinary. Something thrilling, as far removed from the pattern of her humdrum day-to-day existence as--as the spiral nebula in Andromeda.

But, Jeanne-Marie told herself, I don't seem to attract adventure--not even when I'm beautiful. Would she then have to spend all the rest of her life waiting, waiting for that sudden knocking at the door, for the face of the unknown to make itself thrillingly known?

She sighed and ordered another drink. She sipped it slowly, and sipped it, she knew, as if she spent much time sipping cocktails. Naturally, Mary-Jean's consumption of cocktails had been limited--generally to one a year, and that on the day of her wedding anniversary. But an ability to drink cocktails in a sophisticated manner seemed to go with the new body--with Jeanne-Marie.

* * * * *

When Jeanne-Marie was staring in moody silence at the little pickled pearl onion in the bottom of the now-empty cocktail glass, she was aware that someone had sat down beside her. A thrill of surprise and delight went through her body, making her shiver. This was the unexpected, she told herself. She knew it would be a man without looking. Knew it would be a good-looking fellow with the stamp of the man-of-the-world on his features. He could be nothing else.

And so it was.

Then Jeanne-Marie turned around slowly, not knowing if she should smile. When she faced the man now seated at her table, she gave him a cool quizzical look. He was a big man somewhere in his mid-thirties, with a craggy but handsome face and very wide shoulders. He was dressed, Jeanne-Marie decided, in quite good taste but expensively.

He muttered, "Didn't expect you to be so pretty."

Cocktail patter, thought Jeanne-Marie. "That's a very funny way to put a compliment."

The man said, still in hardly more than a whisper, "Fellows looking around. Three or four of them. Act like you know me. A thousand dollars. You're my wife or something like that."

He had already arranged the cocktail glasses on the table so that it looked as if both of them had been drinking. He said, "Well?"

"What did you mean about not expecting--?"

"You. Back of your head was all I saw. A girl, I thought. Obscurity of a couple when they're looking for a single man. But you. You stand out like Niagara Falls in the middle of the Sahara. See what I mean?"

"Thank you," Jeanne-Marie said. "Who is looking for you?"

"Remember what I said. Start looking like we mean something to each other."

* * * * *

And, before Jeanne-Marie could offer a protest, the man slid his chair around the small table, clutched at Jeanne-Marie's hand with one of his hands and put his other arm around her shoulder. He smiled at her, his face inches from hers, holding a cocktail glass up as if making a toast. He seemed to be relaxed and having fun, but this close Jeanne-Marie could tell his face was set tensely, rigidly, in an easy cocktail smile. When she saw the tension leave, she knew that whoever it was who sought him was gone--at least for now.

"All right," she said coolly. "I've shielded you. Now get out of here."

"I said a thousand dollars, but you haven't earned it yet."

Jeanne-Marie gave him the kind of scathing look which went very well with her new face but which, on Mary-Jean's face, would have been ludicrous. "Do I look as if I need a thousand dollars?" she asked.

"No, but--"

"So if you'll just find yourself another table."

Actually, Jeanne-Marie did not mean those words. Her new face and body were designed to attract adventure. Were they, then, bait for this man? She decided that they were, but the conversation had taken a natural course which she instantly regretted.

"But I can't do that," the man said. "Maybe they caught a glimpse of me here. Not enough to recognize me, but enough to know I belong with the gorgeous dame at such-and-such a table. See what I mean?"

* * * * *

"Who are you?"

He smiled, still holding her hand. He squeezed it. "Call me Lucky. But I don't know about tonight--lucky or not, I mean."

"Are they the police?"

"Yeah. They're the police."

"You did something?"

"What do you think they're doing, practicing?"

"I--I'm sorry. What did you do?"

"Let's drop it. You wouldn't want to know."

"Oh, but I would."

"You'd make me beat it. Or you'd call them."

"I will--if you don't tell me."

He smiled. "I guess you kind of got me."

"What did you do?"

"It was a meeting. Call it a board of directors meeting and you'd be close. We--"

"Board of directors of what?" The questions came quickly, unbidden almost, to Jeanne-Marie's lips. She felt suddenly very quick-minded and very capable.

"Well, call it a syndicate."

"The national syndicate of crime? Is that what you mean? Are you one of the directors?"

He nodded slowly and said admiringly, "Baby, you're not only beautiful, you've got a mind like a trip-hammer."

"Go on."

"There was the last thing such a board of directors would ever want. A fight."

"Someone was hurt?"

"Killed."

"Oh, I see." But she did not see. The words came automatically. What did Jeanne-Marie--or Mary-Jean--know of murder?

"I was fingered," Lucky said.

"You did it?"

"I say I didn't do it. Who do you believe?"

"I don't believe anyone," Jeanne-Marie said, the words coming quickly to her, apparently plucked from air. "I never believe anyone. What's the difference?"

"Plenty of difference. Because I'm getting out of here. But I'll never get out alone. They're looking for a single man. I can get out with you, I think."

Just then, before Jeanne-Marie could answer, he leaned forward quickly and kissed her. Jeanne-Marie stiffened and then relaxed for a moment, then stiffened again. She pushed him away gently, saying curtly, "Don't try that again."

"I can't figure you out," he said. "One minute you talk like a woman who's been around, the next like some dilly of a housewife from suburbia. What do you think I kissed you for? Just because you're beautiful? Hell, I've seen beautiful girls before. Plenty of them, and some as beautiful as you. Well, almost, anyway," he added, and they both smiled. "I kissed you because one of the cops drifted through. Listen, baby. Will you be my passport out of here?"

"Why should I be?" Jeanne-Marie asked him coolly.

"Because I'm asking you. Because maybe fate meant we should meet like this tonight--"

"Oh, now, really," Jeanne-Marie said. "You don't mean that and you know you don't. One sure way _not_ to get me to do anything for you is to throw me a line like that."

Lucky shrugged. "O.K., baby. If you were in my place, what would you do?"

"Umm-mm. I see what you mean. But I wouldn't throw you such an obvious line if I threw you a line at all."

"Can I force you to come with me?"

"I don't know. Can you?"

"O.K.," Lucky smiled. "Let's try it. I've got a gun in my pocket, baby."

She grinned back at him. "That's nice."

"Maybe I'm pointing it at you under the table. Well, it's possible, isn't it?"

"It's possible."

"How'm I doing?"

"Pretty good--if I thought you had a gun. Anyway, I like it much better than the line."

"Good. If you don't get up and walk with me, quietly, walk right out of here with me--I'll use the gun. I'm desperate. Do you believe me?"

* * * * *

"No," Jeanne-Marie said promptly. For all his hard, capable good looks, Lucky seemed crestfallen. "But," Jeanne-Marie added slowly, "I'll go with you. As far as the street and no further."

Lucky squeezed her hand and signaled for the waiter. "I'll pay the check," he said.

"You're darned right you will," she said, and they both laughed.

Two hours in my new body, Jeanne-Marie thought, and I'm helping a murderer to elude the police. A murderer? Well, he says he's not. His word is the only word I have so I guess I can go through with it with something like a clean conscience. Clean conscience or not, she knew she'd act as Lucky's passport out to the street. Because Lucky, she could somehow sense, was the adventure that the new Jeanne-Marie, the peddler's Jeanne-Marie, had summoned.

The bill paid, they got up from the table. Lucky slipped his arm through hers and, their flanks together, they walked toward the exit. The pianist was playing a rhythmic rendition of the September Song. The pre-theater crowds were out now, Jeanne-Marie knew, filling the _Black Flamingo_ and the other cocktail places, and the street as well. Once on the street, Lucky could probably make good his escape.

They went by the hat-check booth now, and out across a carpeted hallway, to a French door which led, up a little flight of stairs, to the street. A doorman swung the French doors out.

"Stop!" someone cried behind them.

Acting on instinct, the doorman slammed the French doors. Lucky whirled and swung his right fist brutally at a man running up behind them. Jeanne-Marie screamed as the man fell heavily. Then, incredibly, Lucky did have a gun in his hand. He pointed it at the doorman and said something and magically the doors swung open. Still holding Jeanne-Marie's arm and all but dragging her, Lucky sprinted up the short flight of stairs to the street. Footsteps pounded up after them as Lucky waved down a cab.

* * * * *

Jeanne-Marie tried to pull herself away from him, but his fingers dug into her upper arm painfully. "I'm not playing now," he said, his voice brutal. "Maybe it was a more subtle line than you thought, baby, but I'm not playing now. You're still my passport and you're going on being my passport till I tell you different."

He threw open the rear door of the cab and heaved Jeanne-Marie inside. She fell against the leather upholstery and heard the driver say:

"Hey, what the hell is this?"

Voices shouted outside the cab. Feet pounded across the sidewalk. "I don't want no part of this!" the driver shouted. It was almost a wail.

Lucky waved the gun and said in a quiet voice which still must have thundered in the driver's ear. "Start driving and start driving fast."

A moment later the cab leaped away from the curb.

As they joined the heavy stream of pleasure-bound traffic, Jeanne-Marie felt an instant of intense panic. Lucky had admitted it: Lucky's smooth line inside the _Black Flamingo_, his suave man-of-the-world attitude had been the real decoy. And Jeanne-Marie had fallen for it. But smooth line and man-of-the-world attitude, she knew now, hid a desperate fugitive who would stop at nothing.

Lucky wasn't watching her now. His eyes were glued to the rear window of the cab, watching the traffic behind them; looking for signs of pursuit.

"How about a break, Mac?" the driver asked. "I could let you off at a bus stop or a subway or something. I could--"

"You could keep on driving out to the expressway and keep going north on the expressway until I tell you different."

But at that moment the cab braked slowly to a stop for a red light. On the far side of the street, on the curb, Jeanne-Marie spied a policeman. Watching the cab-driver's face, she knew he had seen the uniformed patrolman too. A muscle throbbed in his jaw and Jeanne-Marie knew suddenly he was going to try something.

A word, she thought. One word between them could mean so much. Because if she could help him, if she could occupy Lucky's attention at the precise moment the cab driver tried to signal the policeman....

* * * * *

But Lucky must have seen it too. He leaned forward and slashed the automatic across the driver's neck, barrel-first, the sights raking the flesh and leaving a twin track of blood. The driver shook his head from side to side, like a fighter who has taken too much punishment. He opened his mouth to yell but Lucky's arm went around his throat.

"Don't," Lucky said. "I've killed a man already tonight. I can kill you too and it wouldn't make any difference. Just drive."

There, thought Jeanne-Marie, it was out now. He had killed a man. He admitted it. All sham, all pretense was gone. The charming man of the world was now completely gone, replaced by the ruthless killer.

The light changed to green--had been green for some time now. Horns blared behind them. The driver shifted gears and they began to drive again.

Still standing on the corner, the policeman had seen nothing.

* * * * *

Three hours later, they were still driving. The city was behind them now. They had sped through the darkness and obscurity of the northern suburbs as night fell and now were in a rural area. The expressway rimming the city had become the state parkway going north, and some twenty minutes ago they had left the parkway behind them, traveling a two-lane black-top road.

"Next left," Lucky told the frightened driver, and moments later the cab braked and turned up a dirt road hardly more than a trail.

"Friend of mine used to own this place," Lucky explained as they stopped before a small log cabin. Actually log, Jeanne-Marie thought, only ninety-some miles from the city. It was totally unexpected. "Used to use it for a hunting lodge."

He opened the door and held it that way for Jeanne-Marie, who climbed out of the cab. Then Lucky leaned in across the driver and removed the ignition key from the dash, pocketing it. "You get out of there, too," he said.

"I thought I'd just be going now, mister."

"That's very funny."

"I thought--"

"I said, get out."

"Look mister, the wife will start to worry. If the wife worries, she calls the company. The company makes a check and realizes I haven't called in. We got a two-way radio hook-up and you're supposed to call in on all fares. If the company sees I haven't called in, they start looking. Then where would you be?"

"Right here," Lucky said. "With you. And they'll never find you here. Any other questions? No? Then get out. That's right. Go inside the cabin. You ought to find some canned goods in there, and some sterno. Whip up supper for us, will you?"

Grumbling, the driver went up the split-log railed porch and into the cabin.

"It isn't locked?" Jeanne-Marie said.

"No lock on it. Nice here, isn't it?"

"Who cares if it's nice or not? You're a fugitive, you're running away, I'm a hostage. That's all that matters."

"Is it? You know, baby, there's something nice about being desperate. Something real fine. I don't even know your name. You don't know mine. Except Lucky. And you know something? I'm not even going to ask you your name. I can suddenly start admiring things, too. Like the scenery."

"You're talking in circles."

"No, I'm not. When you're a fugitive, with utterly nothing to lose, and when you happen to have as a hostage the most beautiful girl you've ever seen, and if your capture puts a permanent end to seeing any kind of girl--let alone such a beautiful one--now do you see?"

Instead of answering him, Jeanne-Marie walked quickly up the hill from where the cab was parked to the cabin. The driver wouldn't be much help--but his presence alone might stop Lucky....

But Lucky caught her before she had covered half the distance to the cabin. "Figure I'm a dying man and well, like it's the wish of a dying man to--to--listen, baby. You're very beautiful."

He held both her arms now, pinning them to her side. She struggled fiercely against him, but he was very strong. She managed to tilt her head back--and screamed.

Lucky let her go at once, and slapped her face very hard with his open hand. She staggered back and tripped over something and fell heavily. The cab driver appeared on the porch, but Lucky motioned him back inside.

"There's no one else around," he said, "as far as I know. But don't you ever try that again. Don't you see I have nothing to lose? Aren't you convinced by now. I could try to make love to you because I have nothing to lose--but I could also kill you for the same reason. Be sensible, will you? Which would you rather I did?"

Jeanne-Marie stood up. For a moment her feet felt as if they might buckle under her, but presently her strength returned. "Neither," she said, walking toward the cabin again. "And if you try that any more, I'm going to start hollering again. If you want to kill me, go ahead and kill me."

In spite of her best efforts to control it, her voice caught on the last words. Lucky laughed softly but harshly, and followed her into the cabin.

She ate without knowing what the food was. Her mind was a blank slate now. Impressions came and made tracks on it like chalk on a blackboard, but they were immediately erased. She couldn't concentrate at all. It was a state not far from hysteria, she knew. Lucky meant everything he said.... Lucky, yes--Lucky.... It was so hard to concentrate. Lucky might try to kill her or might try to make love to her or might try....

"... clean up and make it snappy," Lucky told the driver.

"What's your hurry? Going someplace?"

"When I'm in the mood for wisecracks, I'll crack them. Just clean up in a hurry, that's all."

The driver did so, while Lucky sat smoking a cigarette. The cabin's single all-purpose room was lit by a kerosene lamp hanging from the ceiling on a big hook and casting uneven shadows as the wind came through the open windows and stirred it. Jeanne-Marie felt herself dropping off to sleep and had time to register amazement. She should have been horrified, afraid for her life, beyond the point where sleep was possible. Mary-Jean surely would have been.

Yes, she thought dreamily, Mary-Jean would have been. Which was one lesson she learned from Jeanne-Marie at least. Useless fretting had always been part of Mary-Jean's make-up. But then, it was not owned exclusively by Mary-Jean: useless fretting probably took more energy from more housewives....

She awoke with a start. She felt instantly refreshed. Somehow, she had known she would. In that way, the beautiful Jeanne-Marie had a certain animal-like quality about her. Sleep--and a quickening of the self. She felt alert and capable, almost as if she had been dosed with benzedrine.