Woman Aroused | Page 8

about. It's a mess I got into with both
feet. I'll get straightened out, but I'll be damned if she'll get the money."
I put the envelope on the table, carefully. "Hank, why don't you put it in
a safe deposit vault or..."
"Can't, she'd get it. You don't know what a nose she has for money.
You keep it, please."
"But Hank I have a hard time making my salary last the week. You
know me and money, why I..."
"Damn it, George, do me this favor!" he said loudly, getting up,
walking around the room. "I'm in a mess that's my own making. I'm in
a rough jam, and all I'm asking is that you hold this."
I didn't want to take the money, I knew myself too well, yet I had that
old guilty feeling when I looked at Hank's uniform. I still had a
slacker-complex even though the war had become almost a joke by this
time, and being a vet was a handicap. I said, "Okay. I'll give you a
receipt and..."

"No receipt. She'd find that."
"Look Hank, please don't give me seven grand and not even take a
receipt. You know the old gag--a man isn't made of stone."
"Stop talking like a kid."
I took paper and a pen from my desk, wrote:
I owe Hank Conroy seven thousand dollars ($7,000), payable on
demand, in payment for moneys loaned me, this date.
I signed my name and the date, held it out to him. "Hank, you have to
take this. Suppose I get killed falling off a bar stool? You don't have a
thing to go on, and I'd hate to see this end up going to my distant
cousins in L.A."
"Forget the receipt, be serious. I'll probably be divorced, straightened
out in a very few months and..."
"But I'm being serious, Hank. Seven grand is quite a bundle, what if
something did happen to me?"
"Nothing will. I'll take that chance.
I looked at the envelope full of folding money and felt mixed up. "Hank,
you're crazy."
He stopped pacing the room. "That's no lie, sometimes I'm damn sure I
am off my rocker. Come on, I'll take that cup of Java."
"I don't hold the money unless you take this receipt," I said. "The strain
might easily overpower me."
He suddenly grabbed the receipt out of my hand, walked over and
pressed the panel. He put the piece of paper inside, closed the panel,
and turned to me with a smile. "Feel better? No one knows about the
panel but the two of us, maybe Flo, and..."

"I forgot to ever tell Flo about it."
"Good. If anything happens to you, I'm protected."
"But suppose the house burns down? Or...?"
"For God's sake!" Hank pushed me toward the kitchen. I went back and
got the envelope. The way he left money around made me jittery.
Over coffee he told me he was going to live with his sister for a few
weeks. "Just till I get an apartment or a room. Lee and my sister, they'll
kill each other, if they haven't already. She wrote me she thinks Lee has
already swiped some of the silver, and you know my sister Marion."
"You don't mean she's actually stolen the silverware?"
"Probably has--I had to send Lee over a week or so ahead of my plane
and... George, try to understand this, I've married a devil. A backward
girl who's gone through... Hell, don't get me started on Lee. She isn't
guilty. I am. We all are."
"What?"
"I don't want to talk about it, Georgie. Look, it's as bad as this: all the
way over I was hoping my plane would have an accident and I'd be
killed."
"You're the cautious type Hank, how...?"
"Forget it, it's my party," Hank said. He began asking about fellows
we'd known in the old days--and whom I hadn't seen in years. When we
first moved downtown, Hank had lived in the brownstone across the
street; the only kid on the block I had as a friend. He was real social
register stuff, not that he ever let that get him down, or hinder our
friendship.
We talked for a while longer, then he said, "Have to go and see my
ever-loving wife, wired her I was coming in this morning. Thanks for
holding the money."

"I'll call you at your sister's. I might be able to line up a job or..."
"No. Don't ever call me," he said curtly. "I don't want Lee to even know
about you. I'll get in touch with you at your office from time to time."
"If that's the way you want," I said, thinking it strange Hank didn't want
me to see his wife, at least take them out.