TeeHeeLawrence
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SHE LAUGHS AT DANGER! Chapter One: "Uptown Dame in Ticklish Spot" (F>F, tootsies)
***The following lidlifter of an optimistically envisioned series is copyright 2008 by the author.
***This entry features F>F foot tickling, as well as a few frustratingly brief descriptions of more ambitious tickle doings.
***This tale is not intended for readers under 18. Both principals are over 18.
***The characters in this story are fictional, and only coincidentally resemble actual persons. (Confidentially, if the inspirations for the principals ever read this story, boy, would they sue my ass!)
Hard-boiled…soft-soled…she’s T.G. Abramowitz, Private Investigator, and…
SHE LAUGHS AT DANGER! by Tee Hee Lawrence
(as originally serialized in Spicy Shamus Stories, May-Oct., 1937)
Chapter One: "Uptown Dame in Ticklish Spot"
It had been a long, hard Thursday followin’ a sleepless night, so--tho’ my saintly Irish Ma woulda boxed my ears if she saw me—I kicked off my pinchin’ fancy new two-tone heels and I propped my palpitatin’ puppies atop my creakin’ old desk. The heels I had bought at Shmuel Goldfisch’s on Orchard Street last Tuesday; the old lecher always liked eyein’ my legs and made me a good price. The desk was already ancient when Meyer Minsky ran his bootleggin’ outta this office durin’ the Roarin’ ‘20’s. And my coolin’ toes wiggled happily in stockin’s from Saks (by way of a pushcart near Essex) as seen through the glass of Old Stonewall (“Unyielding Tradition Since 1861”) I was sippin’. Like any workin’ girl, my stockin’s had a few teeny telltale holes under heels and toes.
Twelve hours of tailin’ a nogoodnik husband had wore me out. I had a good mind to boomerang the retainer his old lady had slipped me to see what rover boy was doin’stead of looking for steady work. He made like a pinball from an East Harlem gin mill to Aqueduct Racetrack to a Greenpoint beer hall to a Jackson Heights poolroom to the fights at the Garden to a Hell’s Kitchen dive to a Russian bathhouse in the East Village. She figured he was makin’ time wit’ some floozie. She expected me to produce lipsticked cigarette butts, receipts from the Waldorf, and probably glossies of the couple couplin’ in a hansom cab in Central Park.
Instead, I had for her matchbooks from the gin joint and the dive, chalk from the pool hall, torn bits of a Racing Form with every hapless long shot checked, a crumpled fight card with every loser circled, and a threadbare towel with Russkie letterin’. Hubby may have been a soak and a loser but he sure was no sugar daddy. He never looked twice at a woman once. Carole Lombard could have fainted nude in front of him and he woulda stepped over her. The wife would never believe that he was just blowin’ it all on booze and sucker bets. She’d have me shadowin’ the jerk ‘til Gabriel made with the horn.
An’ all this sightseein’ was on the heels of an overnight nosin’round the Fulton Fish Market for another client who claimed her husband—who’d taken a powder five months ago—had been seen workin’ one of the stalls there. I flashed the pic she gave me to ev’ry oyster shucker and eel wrangler in the joint, but he never showed and no one copped to knowin’ him. By dawn, I was sick of haddock and had a headache.
I sighed and poured another couple of fingers of bourbon. Three years ago, I figured that hangin’ out my shingle as a PI would mean a life much more excitin’ that bein’ a police stenographer had been. I’d dreamed of bein’ a cop since I’d heard my mom’s brothers’ stories of cracking cases—and heads—on the Force. The fact that I was a 5’, 5”, blue-eyed, sandy-haired cutie didn’t keep me from dreamin’. My uncles cackled when I stupidly dreamed out loud, but they did help me land the job at the Tweed Courthouse. There I shadowed the Detectives, drank with ‘em, and even was engaged to one—‘til I regained my senses. They even let me join ‘em for pistol training out at the range by Pelham Bay. I could see, tho’, that they were never gonna let me be part of the action on the Force.
So, I quit, got a private investigator’s license and a gun permit wit’ the help of my skeptical but softie uncles, and set up shop here, in my Jewish pa’s old neighborhood. I figured I’d get local trade from folks leery of goin’ to the cops. My calling card made no mention of my bein’ a woman, and, in the early days, when prospective clients came through my door, they often as not turned on their heels when they realized the voice on the phone hadn’t been a secretary but the shamus herself.
Still, after lean times, I’d established a decent rep as a bonafide investigator. Once people got over my pretty puss, my dyed platinum blonde bangs, skirt, stockings, and high heels, they gave me a chance. My unks gave me some useful dirty fighting tips and a Chinese pal on Pell Street drilled me in Shaolin martial arts, so pretty, petite me more than holds her own in a donnybrook. When necessary, I tote a .38, and while I’m no Billy the Kid, I’ve given a few cocky gunsels some pretty close lead shaves. Three years later, I had to admit that most of my time has been spent shadowin’ wayward spouses and small time chiselers. It wasn’t like Sherlock Holmes or Dick Tracy, but at least I wasn’t poundin’ a typewriter no more.
Sippin’ my drink wit’ my stockin’ feet up, I was decidin’ between matzo ball soup and kasha varnishkes at Wolff’s, linguine with clam sauce at Ranieri’s, or duck with orange sauce at Wah Lung’s. This I’d follow wit’ a hot bath at the roach farm on Eldridge that my landlord rents me for an apartment. There was a soft rapping at the frosted glass panel of my front door. The tender taps told me kid-gloved hand, and the figure through the frost was that of a femme wearin’ a fur and a Fifth Avenue fez.
“C’mon in, it’s open,” I croaked, choking down a last swig of bourbon and stashing the bottle in the pickle drawer of my desk. The tall, thin redhead who entered on a cloud of Parisian perfume looked down at my reclinin’, blonde boopadoop bod’ like she wasn’t sure whether to ask when my boss was due back. She coughed genteelly, and in a velvet voice, crooned, “I’m looking for T.G. Abramowitz, the, ah, investigator for hire.” Her stylish makeup and threads didn’t hide the fact that she was little more than a kid, probably fresh out of Vassar or some other ivy-covered cathouse.
“Well, you’re in luck, sister. Teresa Golda Abramowitz, private eye, license #E2769-18 at your service. Take a seat, honey. Tell your story.”
She sat in the three-and-seven-eighths-legged chair across the desk, staring all the while at my twitchin’ toes. My right pinky toe was threatenin’ to pop out of a hole in my stockin’. She coughed again and softly said, “I was referred to you as someone with experience in the recovery of, ah, intimate documents.”
I amused myself by wiggling my plump toes and watching her green eyes wiggle with ‘em, before tummelin’, “Somebody’s shakin’ you down for real dough after getting’ dope on your hanky-panky, eh?”
“I beg your pardon?” she said, bringing a gloved hand to her throat.
Sliding my feet off the desk and slippin’em into my heels, I snorted and said, “You’re bein’ blackmailed, right? Over what? Photos? Letters? … A diary?”
Clearly impressed, she half smiled and said, “Amazing. I have indeed…mislaid a diary. And it includes some…compromising photographs. I’m prepared to make it more than worth your while if you can discreetly and expeditiously return the diary to me.”
I rocked back in my squeaky chair and crossed my stocking legs. I began energetically dangling my shoe off the toes of my left foot. Red’s eyes were drawn to my jiggling foot like iron filings to a magnet. I yawned and considered the ceiling. “You’d rather not ask the cops to help you get it back, eh? You know, they got a whole force to help you…unless, of course, you’re afraid they’ll take a peek in it?” I stilled my foot and met her eyes. She coughed again.
Bringing a scented handkerchief to her nose, she said, “Very well. For some time now, I’ve been compiling in this diary, with accompanying photographs, some…ah, libertine activities I’ve been involved in, under my nom de plume, ah, ‘Feathers.’”
Silent, I wasn’t goin’ to let her off easy. I appeared absorbed in the paint peeling off the tin ceiling
She continued, “Ah, er, Miss Abramowitz…”
“My friends save time and call me T.G.”
“Ah, hehheh, yes. Well, ah, T.G., I don’t suppose you’ve heard whispers of certain circles, consisting solely of women of some means, who congregate to let their hair down, kick off their shoes, and, in pursuit of the liberation found in good, healthy laughter, explore each other’s… TICKLISH spots. I belong to such a circle, and have hosted a number of especially…exuberant evenings.”
I tried to picture the society gal before me helpless with laughter, and was considerin’ just WHERE she might be ticklish, when it occurred to me that she had been doin’ the same while I was wigglin’ my little piggies under her nose. Tryin’ to be casual, I slid my foot back into my shoe and hid my terribly ticklish feet under my desk. It mighta been me imaginin’, but Red’s ruby lips seemed ta pout at my tootsies’ disappearance.
Sighing, she continued, “The diary contains detailed records of the circle’s activities. Unfortunately, it has fallen into the hands of an unscrupulous rival, Miss Henrietta Beinstock, who not only intends MY social ruin, but threatens the political ambitions of my father unless I part with an excess of cash and jewelry.” I didn’t let on that I had recognized her from a recent photo in the Tribune: the darlin’ daughter on the arm of her banker pop who was stumpin’ for a GOP nomination for governor. She continued, “Even if I could come up with such an usurious payment on such short notice, it would be sure to come to the attention of my father, whom I’d rather not know of my, ah, predilections. And, frankly, even if I pay her, I don’t trust her not to pass the diary along to the gutter press anyway, simply to spite me and crush my father’s hopes.”
I offered, “Just how hot is this diary?” She blushed and looked away.
I persisted. “If it’s not so hot, the scandal sheets won’t even give it a sniff.”
Red coughed and whispered, “This very evening, Mrs. Beinstock suggestively read over the phone to me the first diary entry she intended to circulate to gauge interest among the city editors. It minutely described my rolling one of my, ah, guests in a Persian rug and my coating her bare feet with fish oil so that they might be torturously licked by an Abyssinian.”
Seein’ my blue eyes pop out, she added, “Ahem! That’s a PUSSYCAT! Well, as you can imagine, the threat of having THAT activity published Monday in the New York Graphic with the accompanying photos is no laughing matter.”
“Even if Kitty lickin’ her toes was,” I cracked, and she reddened some more. I went on, “O.K. I’ll take the case for twenty-five bucks a day, plus expenses. You lay down at least fifty now as a retainer. If I produce the goods and you dodge the headlines, I’ll expect a bonus—and I don’t mean just your undyin’ gratitude.”
She coughed and reached into her jeweled purse—Tiffany’s t’ be sure. She quietly set a couple of crisp c-notes on the desk. She closed her purse with a click and purred, “I trust this will retain your services.” She leaned back in the rickety chair and crossed her legs, clad in lacy baby blue silk imported from Paris and not piled on no pushcart. She allowed her fancy shoe—a blue satin job probably handmade in Italy--to slide off her heel and dangle from her slim toes. No holes in the silk that I could see.
I picked up the bills and stepped around the desk, perching on its corner. Ticklin’ my chin with the Franklins, I drawled, “Feathers, consider me retained.”
Her nostrils flared and her foot jiggled as she snapped, “I’d prefer that you NOT refer to me by that designation.”
I smiled. “It’s the ONLY moniker you offered, though your hanky sez yer ‘Lee’.” I busied myself hikin’ up my dress and slippin’ the bills under my garter.
She softened and returned a smile, murmuring, “Forgive me for flaring up then, and for underestimating you. My name is Letitia Manning. Friends and family call me Lee. If you insist, you’re welcome to do the same.”
Crossin’ my legs and lettin’ my foot jiggle near hers, I said, “OK, Lee, but if you want results pronto, I not only need the lowdown on the Beinstock dame, but I need more on this diary. Bein’ coy now ‘bout your ticklish doin’s ain’t gonna kept the presses from rollin’ Monday.”
“Must I say more?” she asked.
I fiddled with some buttons on my dress, then folded my arms and said nothin’.
Blushing furiously from the tops of her tiny shell ears to her heart-shaped mouth, Red stared at the floor and described reducin’ a guest to her silk slip and stockings, tying her hand and foot, and directin’ four “artists” who “painted” her with horsehair brushes until she couldn’t breath for laughin’. Another time, Red composed poetry with charcoal pencils upon a visitin’ ladies’ magazine editor’s bare soles until the hilarious victim agreed to publish Red’s scribblin’s. Still another night, “Feathers” beat a professed Boston Brahmin at bridge and secured the loser’s wrists overhead to a rose trellis in the solarium. Red so teased loser under her arms that the lady lost control and confessed that she had been born Ethel MacGurk in Milwaukee in 1889. Another kootchy coup saw Red make like the daughter of Fu Manchu and feather the toes of a visiting Chinese dancer until the Honan hoofer agreed to perform gratis at one of Red’s dad’s campaign fundraisers.
I was sorely cravin’ a drink after all that kitchey-koo blow-by-blow, and Red looked like she could use one, too (tho’ she was prob’ly the fancy cocktail type). But, before I made for another snort, I had another itch t’scratch.
“I notice, Lee, that, in all the stories you told me, someone else was gettin’ the hell tickled outta her.” I allowed my swinging foot to lightly tap the shoe dangling off her toes. “Tell me: at these parties, don’t YOU ever get tickled?”
She looked away from me and yanked her foot away from mine, stammering, “N-NO! NO!” She recovered her classy calm and coolly insisted, “I’m not the least bit ticklish, so there would be no point. No, at these secret soirees, I am strictly a tickler. Why?”
“Oh, just curious,” I said, all innocent smile. Like lightning, I bent down, grasped Red’s jiggling foot and dragged it firmly into my lap. “Well, then, if you’re not ticklish….”
“WHA-AT are you doing?” she cried, struggling to pull her puppy away.
“…you won’t mind if I check somethin’.” I plucked her shoe off her toes and tossed it to the floor. I’m a two-fisted gal, and I’m not bad with a gat, either, but I’ve another talent I don’t often get to show off as a shamus.
I skittered five fingertips upon the middle of her sole. She gasped and tried to yank her foot away, but I’m a lot stronger than I look. I slid my fingers up-and-down the slippery silk upon her foot, and she began to giggle as she writhed in the chair. When I snaked my fingers under her scrunching toes and wiggled them fiendishly there, she squealed and hiccupped with laughter.
But, she REALLY lost it when I began stroking with just my forefinger through the silk upon her sole between the ball of her foot and her heel. Shuddering, she tried to hold it in, but the laughter bubbled out of her. I made like a hoary old stage villain and teased, “Kitchie-coo! Coochie-coo! Kitchie-coochie-cooooooooo-uh!”
She howled, “OHHOHONONONO!YOUHOO STAHHAHAHAHAAP!” She was laughin’ so hard I was sure she’d bounce Meyer’s bentwood chair to kindlin’, tho’ I wasn’t about to show mercy. I giggled, “Hehheh! Tickletickletickle! Hehhehheh! Coochiecoochiecoochie!” Still, after a few minutes more of playing with her petite piggies and teasing her silken insteps, I, satisfied her goofiness was legit, released her foot.
Breathless and red-faced, Red indignantly rose from the chair. “Why, you-you…!”
I darted around Minsky’s old desk and waved for peace. “Now, hold it, Lee! You expected me to swallow a lot on just your say so, but I figured I’d learn more from your say sole. You really ARE ticklish. You were holdin’ out on me. I’m used ta clients doin’ that, especially with, ah, ticklish affairs. But, if you really want that diary back before it’s headline stuff, you’ll level with me, and tell me straight what’s so hot about it.”
Still breathing hard, Red sat down and picked up her shoe. She said, “I’ve never had to consult a private investigator, so I’m inexperienced in, ah, the hands-on methods of your trade. And I’m impressed, if a little taken aback. Very well, Miss Abramowitz…T.G. There are passages—and revealing photographs—in the diary detailing not only my being tickled by my guests, but other…intimacies between us.”
She let that sink in for a tic. I coulda told her that, in my business, it wasn’t exactly news that, sometimes, both parties in affairs I’d scoped had been of the fairer sex. And such affairs were far from the weirdest stuff I’d peeped, even for a newbie PI like me.
She went on, “There. Now you know.” She got hoarse. “So, you see why I turned in particular to you and why I’m counting on you to recover my diary. If you don’t, I-I….”
I could see that the tears now fillin’ her big green eyes weren’t from my ticklin’ her. I sighed. I knew that dinner and hot bath I’d been dreamin’ about would have ta wait.
As she adjusted the silk coverin’ her ticklish toes before slowly slipping on her satin shoe, she gave me some particulars about the Beinstock dame, whose, as it happened, was holdin’ a soiree of her own—minus any ticklin’, apparently-- Saturday night at 9. By the time Red had refreshed her make-up, straightened her hat, and made her grand exit, I was already on the job, on the phone, hopin’ to call in a favor that would get me inside the Beinstock mansion.
Waitin’ for the useful party to answer, I reached into the pickle drawer for the Old Stonewall and the grimy glass. This little dimple-dappled Delancey St. detective felt that Red had STILL held out on me. My cute button nose was twitchin’. She left thinkin’ I figured I’d weedled her big secret outta her. No, she still hadn’t told me everything about the hot diary, and I wasn’t buyin’ that Beinstock was just some society shark out to bleed her.
No, the cool crisp bills ticklin’ under my garter reminded me that sometimes folks hired PI’s like me when they needed a fall gal. I needed ta remember that when I went undercover on Saturday night.
A sleepy voice answered, none too pleased ‘bout the hour. Before she could squawk, I barked, “Hey, there, Mo! T.G. here…. Yeah, I know what time it is…. ‘Member that favor you owed me?...Well, it’s collection time! Listen up….”
(Ah, here are three of the most infuriating words in popular fiction:
TO BE CONTINUED...)
***The following lidlifter of an optimistically envisioned series is copyright 2008 by the author.
***This entry features F>F foot tickling, as well as a few frustratingly brief descriptions of more ambitious tickle doings.
***This tale is not intended for readers under 18. Both principals are over 18.
***The characters in this story are fictional, and only coincidentally resemble actual persons. (Confidentially, if the inspirations for the principals ever read this story, boy, would they sue my ass!)
Hard-boiled…soft-soled…she’s T.G. Abramowitz, Private Investigator, and…
SHE LAUGHS AT DANGER! by Tee Hee Lawrence
(as originally serialized in Spicy Shamus Stories, May-Oct., 1937)
Chapter One: "Uptown Dame in Ticklish Spot"
It had been a long, hard Thursday followin’ a sleepless night, so--tho’ my saintly Irish Ma woulda boxed my ears if she saw me—I kicked off my pinchin’ fancy new two-tone heels and I propped my palpitatin’ puppies atop my creakin’ old desk. The heels I had bought at Shmuel Goldfisch’s on Orchard Street last Tuesday; the old lecher always liked eyein’ my legs and made me a good price. The desk was already ancient when Meyer Minsky ran his bootleggin’ outta this office durin’ the Roarin’ ‘20’s. And my coolin’ toes wiggled happily in stockin’s from Saks (by way of a pushcart near Essex) as seen through the glass of Old Stonewall (“Unyielding Tradition Since 1861”) I was sippin’. Like any workin’ girl, my stockin’s had a few teeny telltale holes under heels and toes.
Twelve hours of tailin’ a nogoodnik husband had wore me out. I had a good mind to boomerang the retainer his old lady had slipped me to see what rover boy was doin’stead of looking for steady work. He made like a pinball from an East Harlem gin mill to Aqueduct Racetrack to a Greenpoint beer hall to a Jackson Heights poolroom to the fights at the Garden to a Hell’s Kitchen dive to a Russian bathhouse in the East Village. She figured he was makin’ time wit’ some floozie. She expected me to produce lipsticked cigarette butts, receipts from the Waldorf, and probably glossies of the couple couplin’ in a hansom cab in Central Park.
Instead, I had for her matchbooks from the gin joint and the dive, chalk from the pool hall, torn bits of a Racing Form with every hapless long shot checked, a crumpled fight card with every loser circled, and a threadbare towel with Russkie letterin’. Hubby may have been a soak and a loser but he sure was no sugar daddy. He never looked twice at a woman once. Carole Lombard could have fainted nude in front of him and he woulda stepped over her. The wife would never believe that he was just blowin’ it all on booze and sucker bets. She’d have me shadowin’ the jerk ‘til Gabriel made with the horn.
An’ all this sightseein’ was on the heels of an overnight nosin’round the Fulton Fish Market for another client who claimed her husband—who’d taken a powder five months ago—had been seen workin’ one of the stalls there. I flashed the pic she gave me to ev’ry oyster shucker and eel wrangler in the joint, but he never showed and no one copped to knowin’ him. By dawn, I was sick of haddock and had a headache.
I sighed and poured another couple of fingers of bourbon. Three years ago, I figured that hangin’ out my shingle as a PI would mean a life much more excitin’ that bein’ a police stenographer had been. I’d dreamed of bein’ a cop since I’d heard my mom’s brothers’ stories of cracking cases—and heads—on the Force. The fact that I was a 5’, 5”, blue-eyed, sandy-haired cutie didn’t keep me from dreamin’. My uncles cackled when I stupidly dreamed out loud, but they did help me land the job at the Tweed Courthouse. There I shadowed the Detectives, drank with ‘em, and even was engaged to one—‘til I regained my senses. They even let me join ‘em for pistol training out at the range by Pelham Bay. I could see, tho’, that they were never gonna let me be part of the action on the Force.
So, I quit, got a private investigator’s license and a gun permit wit’ the help of my skeptical but softie uncles, and set up shop here, in my Jewish pa’s old neighborhood. I figured I’d get local trade from folks leery of goin’ to the cops. My calling card made no mention of my bein’ a woman, and, in the early days, when prospective clients came through my door, they often as not turned on their heels when they realized the voice on the phone hadn’t been a secretary but the shamus herself.
Still, after lean times, I’d established a decent rep as a bonafide investigator. Once people got over my pretty puss, my dyed platinum blonde bangs, skirt, stockings, and high heels, they gave me a chance. My unks gave me some useful dirty fighting tips and a Chinese pal on Pell Street drilled me in Shaolin martial arts, so pretty, petite me more than holds her own in a donnybrook. When necessary, I tote a .38, and while I’m no Billy the Kid, I’ve given a few cocky gunsels some pretty close lead shaves. Three years later, I had to admit that most of my time has been spent shadowin’ wayward spouses and small time chiselers. It wasn’t like Sherlock Holmes or Dick Tracy, but at least I wasn’t poundin’ a typewriter no more.
Sippin’ my drink wit’ my stockin’ feet up, I was decidin’ between matzo ball soup and kasha varnishkes at Wolff’s, linguine with clam sauce at Ranieri’s, or duck with orange sauce at Wah Lung’s. This I’d follow wit’ a hot bath at the roach farm on Eldridge that my landlord rents me for an apartment. There was a soft rapping at the frosted glass panel of my front door. The tender taps told me kid-gloved hand, and the figure through the frost was that of a femme wearin’ a fur and a Fifth Avenue fez.
“C’mon in, it’s open,” I croaked, choking down a last swig of bourbon and stashing the bottle in the pickle drawer of my desk. The tall, thin redhead who entered on a cloud of Parisian perfume looked down at my reclinin’, blonde boopadoop bod’ like she wasn’t sure whether to ask when my boss was due back. She coughed genteelly, and in a velvet voice, crooned, “I’m looking for T.G. Abramowitz, the, ah, investigator for hire.” Her stylish makeup and threads didn’t hide the fact that she was little more than a kid, probably fresh out of Vassar or some other ivy-covered cathouse.
“Well, you’re in luck, sister. Teresa Golda Abramowitz, private eye, license #E2769-18 at your service. Take a seat, honey. Tell your story.”
She sat in the three-and-seven-eighths-legged chair across the desk, staring all the while at my twitchin’ toes. My right pinky toe was threatenin’ to pop out of a hole in my stockin’. She coughed again and softly said, “I was referred to you as someone with experience in the recovery of, ah, intimate documents.”
I amused myself by wiggling my plump toes and watching her green eyes wiggle with ‘em, before tummelin’, “Somebody’s shakin’ you down for real dough after getting’ dope on your hanky-panky, eh?”
“I beg your pardon?” she said, bringing a gloved hand to her throat.
Sliding my feet off the desk and slippin’em into my heels, I snorted and said, “You’re bein’ blackmailed, right? Over what? Photos? Letters? … A diary?”
Clearly impressed, she half smiled and said, “Amazing. I have indeed…mislaid a diary. And it includes some…compromising photographs. I’m prepared to make it more than worth your while if you can discreetly and expeditiously return the diary to me.”
I rocked back in my squeaky chair and crossed my stocking legs. I began energetically dangling my shoe off the toes of my left foot. Red’s eyes were drawn to my jiggling foot like iron filings to a magnet. I yawned and considered the ceiling. “You’d rather not ask the cops to help you get it back, eh? You know, they got a whole force to help you…unless, of course, you’re afraid they’ll take a peek in it?” I stilled my foot and met her eyes. She coughed again.
Bringing a scented handkerchief to her nose, she said, “Very well. For some time now, I’ve been compiling in this diary, with accompanying photographs, some…ah, libertine activities I’ve been involved in, under my nom de plume, ah, ‘Feathers.’”
Silent, I wasn’t goin’ to let her off easy. I appeared absorbed in the paint peeling off the tin ceiling
She continued, “Ah, er, Miss Abramowitz…”
“My friends save time and call me T.G.”
“Ah, hehheh, yes. Well, ah, T.G., I don’t suppose you’ve heard whispers of certain circles, consisting solely of women of some means, who congregate to let their hair down, kick off their shoes, and, in pursuit of the liberation found in good, healthy laughter, explore each other’s… TICKLISH spots. I belong to such a circle, and have hosted a number of especially…exuberant evenings.”
I tried to picture the society gal before me helpless with laughter, and was considerin’ just WHERE she might be ticklish, when it occurred to me that she had been doin’ the same while I was wigglin’ my little piggies under her nose. Tryin’ to be casual, I slid my foot back into my shoe and hid my terribly ticklish feet under my desk. It mighta been me imaginin’, but Red’s ruby lips seemed ta pout at my tootsies’ disappearance.
Sighing, she continued, “The diary contains detailed records of the circle’s activities. Unfortunately, it has fallen into the hands of an unscrupulous rival, Miss Henrietta Beinstock, who not only intends MY social ruin, but threatens the political ambitions of my father unless I part with an excess of cash and jewelry.” I didn’t let on that I had recognized her from a recent photo in the Tribune: the darlin’ daughter on the arm of her banker pop who was stumpin’ for a GOP nomination for governor. She continued, “Even if I could come up with such an usurious payment on such short notice, it would be sure to come to the attention of my father, whom I’d rather not know of my, ah, predilections. And, frankly, even if I pay her, I don’t trust her not to pass the diary along to the gutter press anyway, simply to spite me and crush my father’s hopes.”
I offered, “Just how hot is this diary?” She blushed and looked away.
I persisted. “If it’s not so hot, the scandal sheets won’t even give it a sniff.”
Red coughed and whispered, “This very evening, Mrs. Beinstock suggestively read over the phone to me the first diary entry she intended to circulate to gauge interest among the city editors. It minutely described my rolling one of my, ah, guests in a Persian rug and my coating her bare feet with fish oil so that they might be torturously licked by an Abyssinian.”
Seein’ my blue eyes pop out, she added, “Ahem! That’s a PUSSYCAT! Well, as you can imagine, the threat of having THAT activity published Monday in the New York Graphic with the accompanying photos is no laughing matter.”
“Even if Kitty lickin’ her toes was,” I cracked, and she reddened some more. I went on, “O.K. I’ll take the case for twenty-five bucks a day, plus expenses. You lay down at least fifty now as a retainer. If I produce the goods and you dodge the headlines, I’ll expect a bonus—and I don’t mean just your undyin’ gratitude.”
She coughed and reached into her jeweled purse—Tiffany’s t’ be sure. She quietly set a couple of crisp c-notes on the desk. She closed her purse with a click and purred, “I trust this will retain your services.” She leaned back in the rickety chair and crossed her legs, clad in lacy baby blue silk imported from Paris and not piled on no pushcart. She allowed her fancy shoe—a blue satin job probably handmade in Italy--to slide off her heel and dangle from her slim toes. No holes in the silk that I could see.
I picked up the bills and stepped around the desk, perching on its corner. Ticklin’ my chin with the Franklins, I drawled, “Feathers, consider me retained.”
Her nostrils flared and her foot jiggled as she snapped, “I’d prefer that you NOT refer to me by that designation.”
I smiled. “It’s the ONLY moniker you offered, though your hanky sez yer ‘Lee’.” I busied myself hikin’ up my dress and slippin’ the bills under my garter.
She softened and returned a smile, murmuring, “Forgive me for flaring up then, and for underestimating you. My name is Letitia Manning. Friends and family call me Lee. If you insist, you’re welcome to do the same.”
Crossin’ my legs and lettin’ my foot jiggle near hers, I said, “OK, Lee, but if you want results pronto, I not only need the lowdown on the Beinstock dame, but I need more on this diary. Bein’ coy now ‘bout your ticklish doin’s ain’t gonna kept the presses from rollin’ Monday.”
“Must I say more?” she asked.
I fiddled with some buttons on my dress, then folded my arms and said nothin’.
Blushing furiously from the tops of her tiny shell ears to her heart-shaped mouth, Red stared at the floor and described reducin’ a guest to her silk slip and stockings, tying her hand and foot, and directin’ four “artists” who “painted” her with horsehair brushes until she couldn’t breath for laughin’. Another time, Red composed poetry with charcoal pencils upon a visitin’ ladies’ magazine editor’s bare soles until the hilarious victim agreed to publish Red’s scribblin’s. Still another night, “Feathers” beat a professed Boston Brahmin at bridge and secured the loser’s wrists overhead to a rose trellis in the solarium. Red so teased loser under her arms that the lady lost control and confessed that she had been born Ethel MacGurk in Milwaukee in 1889. Another kootchy coup saw Red make like the daughter of Fu Manchu and feather the toes of a visiting Chinese dancer until the Honan hoofer agreed to perform gratis at one of Red’s dad’s campaign fundraisers.
I was sorely cravin’ a drink after all that kitchey-koo blow-by-blow, and Red looked like she could use one, too (tho’ she was prob’ly the fancy cocktail type). But, before I made for another snort, I had another itch t’scratch.
“I notice, Lee, that, in all the stories you told me, someone else was gettin’ the hell tickled outta her.” I allowed my swinging foot to lightly tap the shoe dangling off her toes. “Tell me: at these parties, don’t YOU ever get tickled?”
She looked away from me and yanked her foot away from mine, stammering, “N-NO! NO!” She recovered her classy calm and coolly insisted, “I’m not the least bit ticklish, so there would be no point. No, at these secret soirees, I am strictly a tickler. Why?”
“Oh, just curious,” I said, all innocent smile. Like lightning, I bent down, grasped Red’s jiggling foot and dragged it firmly into my lap. “Well, then, if you’re not ticklish….”
“WHA-AT are you doing?” she cried, struggling to pull her puppy away.
“…you won’t mind if I check somethin’.” I plucked her shoe off her toes and tossed it to the floor. I’m a two-fisted gal, and I’m not bad with a gat, either, but I’ve another talent I don’t often get to show off as a shamus.
I skittered five fingertips upon the middle of her sole. She gasped and tried to yank her foot away, but I’m a lot stronger than I look. I slid my fingers up-and-down the slippery silk upon her foot, and she began to giggle as she writhed in the chair. When I snaked my fingers under her scrunching toes and wiggled them fiendishly there, she squealed and hiccupped with laughter.
But, she REALLY lost it when I began stroking with just my forefinger through the silk upon her sole between the ball of her foot and her heel. Shuddering, she tried to hold it in, but the laughter bubbled out of her. I made like a hoary old stage villain and teased, “Kitchie-coo! Coochie-coo! Kitchie-coochie-cooooooooo-uh!”
She howled, “OHHOHONONONO!YOUHOO STAHHAHAHAHAAP!” She was laughin’ so hard I was sure she’d bounce Meyer’s bentwood chair to kindlin’, tho’ I wasn’t about to show mercy. I giggled, “Hehheh! Tickletickletickle! Hehhehheh! Coochiecoochiecoochie!” Still, after a few minutes more of playing with her petite piggies and teasing her silken insteps, I, satisfied her goofiness was legit, released her foot.
Breathless and red-faced, Red indignantly rose from the chair. “Why, you-you…!”
I darted around Minsky’s old desk and waved for peace. “Now, hold it, Lee! You expected me to swallow a lot on just your say so, but I figured I’d learn more from your say sole. You really ARE ticklish. You were holdin’ out on me. I’m used ta clients doin’ that, especially with, ah, ticklish affairs. But, if you really want that diary back before it’s headline stuff, you’ll level with me, and tell me straight what’s so hot about it.”
Still breathing hard, Red sat down and picked up her shoe. She said, “I’ve never had to consult a private investigator, so I’m inexperienced in, ah, the hands-on methods of your trade. And I’m impressed, if a little taken aback. Very well, Miss Abramowitz…T.G. There are passages—and revealing photographs—in the diary detailing not only my being tickled by my guests, but other…intimacies between us.”
She let that sink in for a tic. I coulda told her that, in my business, it wasn’t exactly news that, sometimes, both parties in affairs I’d scoped had been of the fairer sex. And such affairs were far from the weirdest stuff I’d peeped, even for a newbie PI like me.
She went on, “There. Now you know.” She got hoarse. “So, you see why I turned in particular to you and why I’m counting on you to recover my diary. If you don’t, I-I….”
I could see that the tears now fillin’ her big green eyes weren’t from my ticklin’ her. I sighed. I knew that dinner and hot bath I’d been dreamin’ about would have ta wait.
As she adjusted the silk coverin’ her ticklish toes before slowly slipping on her satin shoe, she gave me some particulars about the Beinstock dame, whose, as it happened, was holdin’ a soiree of her own—minus any ticklin’, apparently-- Saturday night at 9. By the time Red had refreshed her make-up, straightened her hat, and made her grand exit, I was already on the job, on the phone, hopin’ to call in a favor that would get me inside the Beinstock mansion.
Waitin’ for the useful party to answer, I reached into the pickle drawer for the Old Stonewall and the grimy glass. This little dimple-dappled Delancey St. detective felt that Red had STILL held out on me. My cute button nose was twitchin’. She left thinkin’ I figured I’d weedled her big secret outta her. No, she still hadn’t told me everything about the hot diary, and I wasn’t buyin’ that Beinstock was just some society shark out to bleed her.
No, the cool crisp bills ticklin’ under my garter reminded me that sometimes folks hired PI’s like me when they needed a fall gal. I needed ta remember that when I went undercover on Saturday night.
A sleepy voice answered, none too pleased ‘bout the hour. Before she could squawk, I barked, “Hey, there, Mo! T.G. here…. Yeah, I know what time it is…. ‘Member that favor you owed me?...Well, it’s collection time! Listen up….”
(Ah, here are three of the most infuriating words in popular fiction:
TO BE CONTINUED...)
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