Death Trap by John D. MacDonald Page B

Paulson, she was an okay kid. Never no trouble with her. And you know something? Lots of times that Landy came here. Once he parked right where you are right now, right in that beat-up Ford, and he had the other Paulson girl with him, the old maidy-acting one. I served them myself plenty of times. Always she didn’t want nothing on her burger. Just plain. Her sister used to like them all the way. That was the car he used when he killed Jane Ann. He killed her because he wasn’t getting any from the sister. It drove him off his head. The sister is a teaser. I think any girl does that is lower than dirt. I always say if you let a guy get all hot you got a kind of obligation to play along, don’t you figure it that way?”
    “Thanks a lot. When I’m ready for another beer—”
    “Don’t bother with the squawk box, mister. Just blink your lights and I’ll bring the refill.” She made change and I gave her a quarter extra and she thanked me and went away.
    I got out and walked around to the other side of the building. There were about a dozen cars of noisy kids there. The noise had apparently driven the other trade away from their area. Their closely parked cars formed an island. Constant carhopping was going on. One young girl was doing a clumsily suggestive dance to the strains of rock and roll. She was barefooted and she danced on the roof of a sedan. A group of four boys clapped hands in time to the music. The rest of them were ignoring the girl.
    I picked out the Quarto car and walked over to it. The top was down. There seemed to be ten kids in it.
    “Ginny Garson here?”
    “The man wants Garson.” “Where’s short, dark, and repulsive?” “Hey, Rook! Where’d your beast go? There’s a suntan job wants a hack at the young stuff.” “Hey, she’s over with Smith, playing pooty-tat.” “Mister Suntan, you see the showboat? The gray Cord with what Smith says is nine hand-rubbed coats of lacquer. Three over. Go look in the back seat. But knock first.” “Knock and roll, Mister S.T.” “Ole Smith’ll come up with the hinkups if you interrupt his stuff. She’s on loan-out from Rook. Hey, Rook?” “That merchandise is guaranteed. Never wears out. Don’t you people ever finish a brew? I need a frail with a pail.” I realized they were all half drunk. Long, golden girl-legs hung out in the chill October night. A half seen hand cupped a breast. They were half drunk and playful in the way that half grown lions can be playful. Rub them just a little bit the wrong way and they would have to find out if you had any chicken glands. They would cheerfully and efficiently cut you a little, or open the side of your face with a sharpened edge of a belt buckle. Or crush your groin with mail-order air force boots. While their women squealed because it was exciting. They were capable of forming a line-up on one of their own girls, or, with the callousness of the hen yard, pecking a weakened contemporary to death. They were revolt. They sheared off power poles and were found thirty feet from a tanned right arm with a homemade tattoo on the biceps. They died in flaming skids. There was nothing chicken about them. They had been informed about the world. They saw in the papers that everybody grabbed all they could. And there were slander-sheet magazines to tell them the inside dope on how their crooner heroes bounced from bed to bed. They knew the draft would catch them, that both parents and teachers had given up any last weak hope of discipline. Work was for the cubes—the quintessence of a square. The women were easy. There were always angles. They had it made.
    And I could see how Nancy felt apart from this main stream, these social and emotional folkways of her contemporaries. Jane Ann had been a part of the group. Maybe she had been forced into it.
    The Cord gleamed in the night. It was parked heading away from the lights, so the back seat was in darkness. I rapped on the roof of the car and asked for Ginny