Laffy Daffy
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OK, so here’s my latest creation. As I’m pretty sure I wrote with my last story, this is part one of many, and truth be told, as I wrote it, I realized that the entire part one was way too long, so this is really only half. The other half will be posted on this same thread, sometime soon. Onto the warnings.
1. This is not a true tickling story. It is a story in which one of the main characters happens to have a tickle fetish. She’s not shy about it, and therefore the story contains many tickling moments. It’s much more a historically themed action story than a tickling story. There will be a number of chapters that feature a lot of tickling as the story goes on, but in part one, tickling definitely takes a backseat to the introduction of the characters and storyline.
2. The tickling in said story will feature mostly female ticklers, and a mix of male and female ticklees. If the thought of any of that bothers you as a reader, feel free to click the back button.
3. I tried to be mostly historically accurate, but I’m sure there will be some mistakes. I’m not terribly concerned with them, so try to ignore any you come across.
4. The characters in this story are fiction. 100% I do not own, nor am I aware of, any declassified FBI documents or materials pertaining to this subject. Any references to real people (Dillinger, Nelson, etc) are fictional in nature, no matter how historically convenient they seem to be.
5. Less of a warning, more of a encouragement…. Read on, enjoy, and I always appreciate feedback!
In the early 1930’s, economic hardship coupled with the complete lack of a nationalized police force allowed several of America’s most famous criminals to rise to national fame all during the same 2-3 year period. John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde, Baby-Face Nelson, and Pretty Boy Floyd dominated the headlines of papers everywhere and also the subject lines of memos fired from J Edgar Hoover’s central office to his various field agents. See, in the early part of the decade, Hoover’s FBI (at the time, known only as the Bureau of Investigation or BI) was woefully ill prepared for the crime wave about crash across the United States. Agents lacked jurisdiction on all but the most specific types of cases, and weren’t even permitted to carry guns until the aftermath of the Kansas City Massacre.
The outlaws mentioned above happen to have more in common than just their occupation: their egos. John Dillinger loved seeing his name in print. Clyde Barrow was a dangerous mix of crazy and fearless. Baby Face Nelson thought he was just plain better than his many pursuers. (It could be argued that Pretty Boy Floyd was a loyal friend who was the victim of circumstance… or an escape artist who got what was coming his way. In either case, that’s not what we’re here for.) And another interesting fact about all those mentioned above? Every last one died an early death, brought on by bullets fired from the guns of law enforcement.
Therein lies the difference between great outlaws and great thieves. Dillinger and the Barrows both considered themselves robbers (although history tells us that Clyde Barrow would’ve had a hard time robbing a piggy bank at a lemonade stand), but both were loud, open, and borderline arrogant about their crimes. Dillinger set the bar for charismatic criminals; he was unfailingly polite, quick to crack a smile, and played up his “small town farm boy” persona to no end. These are examples of great outlaws. I’d like to tell you about a great thief. So great in fact, that you’ve probably never even heard of him, or his entire gang. Known as the Scarecrow gang to their associates, and as the Feathers gang in speculative, declassified FBI documents, Russell Malloy and his men (and women) are among Hoover’s greatest unsolved mysteries.
Chapter 1 “The Gang”
To truly understand the Scarecrow/Feathers gang, one must first understand its two most influential members: Russell ‘Scarecrow’ Malloy and Andrea ‘Feathers’ Cahill.
Malloy was the son of an Irish carpenter and an Italian princess. Donna Giovese was the son of the second most influential man in all of Newark, NJ and despite his daughter’s decision to marry a poor Irish carpenter, her father took good care of both his daughter and his grandchildren. In a time when most of his friends were wondering if they’d eat dinner each night Russell, or Rusty as they knew him, never worried about going hungry. In 1927, at the age of 19, as most of his friends joined the service or picked up a trade, Malloy hit the road, deciding to see what the rest of the country held in store for him. He had a little money saved up, and he saw the world… his world anyway. Everywhere he went he got thrown out of the same kinds of bars, played poker with the same kind of guys, and learned the same kind of tricks he did in Newark.
He got his nickname in 1929 when he found himself short on cash and no longer welcome in the lodge he had been staying at (there was an issue involving the owner’s daughter, six candles, and a turkey feather) in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. To fund his trip out of town he stole 138 dollars, 11 ears of corn, 4 apples, 8 sets of gold flatware, 2 gold watches, and a service revolver from a family having a dinner party. The family was that of Mayor John D. Hayfelt. The dinner party was for the mayor’s son, who had recently returned from a two year tour abroad in the Navy. There were 8 police officers present, the mayor’s entire staff, two judges and a sheriff from two town’s over in attendance. None of Malloy’s associates ever knew him at this stage of his life, and he rarely talked about his early crimes, so it’s impossible to say if he knew just how risky this particular job was. Lord knows he knew it as he fled across that Iowa cornfield, with 11 angry men chasing him, ready to hang the young man from the nearest tree. Thing is, he beat them to the job, hanging his loot from a tall cornstalk and swapped places with one of the dinner party host’s prize winning scarecrows, letting his would be captors pass right beneath him before retrieving his score and heading back in the other direction, towards the house. He slipped past the confused and agitated guests and stole the police chief’s brand new Ford from in front of the house. They found the car two days later, at a farm 80 miles north of Cedar Rapids, with another farmer and his wife. They said a man had drove up in it, offered to share fresh corn and apples in exchange for a hot meal and a bed, and the next day had left them the car, saying he had no need for it anymore. Officers who questioned the couple said the only suspicious remark he made came when the farmer’s wife asked his occupation, and with a ghost of a grin he replied, “I’m a human scarecrow.”
If Malloy was doomed to follow in his grandfather’s foot steps one way or the other, Andrea Cahill did everything in her power to ensure she would not follow her own family’s path. The fifth of seven children of a dairy farmer in Lancaster, Ohio, Andrea worked on her father’s farm every morning from her fourth birthday until her eighteenth. She could operate farm equipment, knew how to milk a cow, and how to shoot and skin a deer. Try as he might, Andrea’s father could never produce a task that her talented hands couldn’t quickly adapt to. And her talents certainly weren’t limited to animals and machinery. Many a pulled muscle and stiff neck were rubbed out by Andrea in her years on the Cahill farm. It was good honest work, and Andrea never resented her parents for it, but she couldn’t imagine living her life trapped like they were.
On her eighteenth birthday she told her parents she needed to get off the farm. To her surprise they accepted her decision and offered to send her to her aunt’s just outside of Columbus. Her aunt was a touch healer, she had learned massage techniques from her own mother, and after giving herself to the Lord, became an aid to ailing members of her parish. Although the experience was invaluable for Andrea, the religious atmosphere was suffocating, and she left her aunt’s to try her luck as a masseuse. The problem was that in her area, the only place to get a massage was ‘The Gentlemen’s Touch,” a brothel using a massage parlor as a front. Most of the girls there doubled as whores, and Andrea refused to make that career choice. The farm was bad, but she would go back before she would sell herself.
At first the job went quite well. Andrea’s massages quickly grew in popularity, and her cute and spunky personality combined with her “no touch” rule made her one of the few unfulfilled fantasies for many of the house’s clients, a fact that did not go unnoticed by the madam of the house, Eve Ross. As Andrea’s popularity rose, her reputation with the working girls of the brothel plummeted. It wasn’t long before the girls were looking for a chance to punish the young masseuse. And just as they got their opportunity, Andrea’s life changed forever.
Before we get to the couples’ first meeting, there’s one more thing that’s relevant to both Andrea’s story and the rest of the gang’s story from here: Andrea was a tickler. She had grown up around it; with six very ticklish siblings around to both tickle and be tickled by, rarely did a day go by that one of the Cahill kids wasn’t caught laughing their heads off. As child number five, she should’ve been a target more than instigator, but Andrea’s talented hands more than made up for her many sensitive spots. She was never totally comfortable being tickled by her family (tickling them was just fine, especially her older siblings), but after her first boyfriend at age 15, she saw tickling in an entirely new light. She grew to love being tickled, and found the easiest way to make this happen was to tickle someone else first.
The truth is she was that way for the rest of her life, and it certainly didn’t change while working in The Gentlemen’s Touch. She often clowned around with the other masseuses and the whores, tickling them silly and getting pinned and tickled in return. Her tickle fetish, while only one piece of her personality, would come to define some of the gang’s more daring actions in the following years.
They almost met on March 3, 1933. Malloy was in town scouting a local job with his partner Nelson Motts, also known as Chuckles. Chuckles nickname was ironic, a poke at the fact that he never cracked a smile on a job, scared he would reveal a missing right canine tooth. He’d lost the tooth on his second tour behind bars, in a fistfight with an Irishman, and it was one of the ‘identifying features’ in his file. The two had been working together for 3 years at that point, mostly pulling low key jobs in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland. They had yet to get caught, but the heat on the East coast was enough that Malloy’s grandfather pointed the young man west in hopes he would take the cops with him. A friend in Pittsburgh had planned a job near Columbus and picked Chuckles and Scarecrow to execute the job. The problem was, Chuckles had fallen from a fence earlier in the week while planning an escape route. His ankle was bruised and sore, and limping men rarely pulled off clean bank jobs. So after hearing a rumor of a girl with magic hands at a local brothel, Malloy took Chuckles for a massage. He originally planned on getting one himself as well, in which case he certainly would’ve requested Andrea, but on the way in he spotted two local patrolmen, and blew off his massage to monitor the officers.
Instead, they met two days later, the day before their job. Chuckles had been singing Andrea’s praises ever since he rolled off the table, and now was demanding Malloy go see the girl with the magic hands.
“I’m telling you ‘Crow,’ it will be the best half hour of your life. You will feel young and alive in areas that have never felt alive in your life. I could just run in there and lift all the money myself and run right out and no one would catch me.”
They were driving through town for the umpteenth time that week, just watching everyone and everything, trying to make it so that there would be no surprises the next day. Chuckles was driving, and Malloy slumped in his seat, grinning and shuffling a deck of cards.
“I’m not going for a rub and tug in a brothel the day before we try to rob a bank. That’s pressing our luck, even for me.”
Chuckles slammed his hand on the wheel in disgust. “She’s not a whore! They asked if I wanted to be finished off, because if I did I’d need a different girl at the end, cause she doesn’t do that.” His straightened up, taking a pose of dignity. “She’s a lady.”
“A lady in a whorehouse; how very poetic.” The cards flew back and forth between his fingers, but his eyes never left the sidewalks. Malloy had complete confidence in his and Chuckles’ abilities; his theory was that it was the random nature of everyday life that was most likely to affect their plans.
“Well I’m driving, and I say we’re calling it a half hour early and going over there.”
Malloy sighed. “I can’t wait to tell our lawyer this story when he asks where we went wrong.”
Chuckles wouldn’t relent, and in a little over half an hour, they were standing in an office with Eve Ross. She was sitting, getting a pedicure from one of her girls. It was a dimly lit basement, decorated in red satin and black silk. Malloy leaned in the doorway of Ross’s office, a half smile on his face as Chuckles demanded to see Andrea.
“Miss Andrea is actually busy for the rest of the evening. She’s…” the older woman’s lips curled in a contemptuous sneer, “…occupied. Perhaps another of our girls can help you out, Mr…?”
“Jones.” Malloy spoke from the door before Chuckles could. “He’s Mr. Jones, I’m Mr. Tate. And since Mr. Jones has Mrs. Jones waiting at home, I think he’ll be declining your offer, kind though it was.”
Ms. Ross smiled, and Malloy felt a shiver dance down his spine. This was the type of woman who, even when she was being sincere, seemed more likely to pick your pocket than do you a favor. “I actually pulled something down in here,” he motioned to his lower back, “and was hoping this Andrea that Mr. Jones speaks so highly of could help me out.”
The girl at Ross’s feet suddenly piped up. “There’s plenty o’ girls who’d be happy to help you out, sailor, a lot more than little miss priss Andrea would.”
“Sounds like she wasn’t exactly loved by the folks around here huh?” Malloy moved further into the room, lighting a cigarette and offering it to Ross. After accepting his offer, she favored him with a sly smile and settled back in her chair, enjoying the pedicure.
“Yes, Miss Andrea had a tendency to get under the skin of the girls, but that’s all changed after today.”
Malloy stepped in front of Chuckles, seating himself on Ross’s desk. He had an unlit cigarette in his mouth and leaned in with a big smile on his face, wrapping his arm around Eve while watching the blonde painting her toes a dark maroon. Ross had very nice feet for an older gal, thin with long toes and high arches. “And what, pray tell, changed things so dramatically?”
Eve took a drag and then stared very hard at Malloy, as if trying to see his intentions though his brow. Then she loosened up and shrugged, as if her secret wasn’t such a big deal after all.
“We sent her up with some guys who were into breaking the new gals in. They know she isn’t going to go for it, and they’re going to make her.”
Malloy froze, and even Chuckles coughed a little and shifted in his seat. Ross smiled. “At The Gentlemen’s Touch, we make sure even the most… dangerous fantasies can be carried out. So long as our clientele is in good standing with the house. The men upstairs are two very loyal customers.”
Ross suddenly pulled her feet back from her pedicurist and ran a hand up Malloy’s thigh. “Of course, attractive gentlemen such as yourselves could receive the finest treatment as well.” Her hazel eyes flashed as they locked in on Malloy. “I’ve been in this business for thirty years. I can make you feel things you’ll never find words to describe.” She licked her lips seductively, but Malloy was already sliding off the desk.
“Thank you ma’am, but I think we’ll be back another time. Mr. Jones?” Chuckles was already at the door, and neither man turned back to receive the hurt glare from Miss Ross. They weren’t necessarily being rude, truth be told they were far from done with the brothel or its Madame.
They didn’t speak again until they were at the car, parked in an alley two blocks south of The Gentlemen’s Touch. Malloy was rummaging through the back seat. It was Chuckles who broke the silence.
“We’re going back in, aren’t we?”
Malloy was still half in the car, but his response came clear as day. “Oh, you better believe we are.”
Chuckles shook his head, but tossed the coat and jacket he was wearing into the front seat, replacing them with the standard black coat and hat for their work tomorrow. “Isn’t this going to be bad for the job?”
Malloy surfaced from the car. “Maybe. In theory it could actually help us.” He slapped a full drum of ammunition into Tia, his trusty Thompson machine gun. Tia had been at his side for his last six robberies, and Columbus was supposed to be lucky number seven. Apparently seven had come a few days early.
“Oh? Want to run that one by me?” Chuckles had produced a Winchester 1880 single shot rifle, a throwback to his days as an army sharpshooter. He had been out of the service for years now, but he was still a freakishly good shot, an asset Malloy never forgot to tap. He stuffed his other fun, a .38, into the waistband of his slacks and smoothed his long coat over the bulge.
“Well, if we go in a shoot a bunch of whores, naturally there will be some blowback. While the men in badges are trying to sort this baby out, we’ll be cleaning out their bank and be out of town long before they have any idea what we did.” Malloy pulled his own hat low, and shrugged on a coat to conceal his weapon for the short walk back.
Two witnesses who were apparently eating lunch across the street later claimed that two men had walked quickly up to the building, surveyed the sidewalk in either direction, and then calmly strode inside. The same witnesses reported the same two men left less than ten minutes later with a girl. Both recalled odd noises, but couldn’t say for sure what it had been. They were shocked to learn what had taken place inside.
Eve Ross’s pedicure was just finishing up, and she shivered with delight as her feet were dried with a fluffy towel. She enjoyed the light tickle, although it reminded her of just last week when that little tramp Andrea had found her reaching for a lost pencil under her desk and played a prank on her. She had just clasped it in her fingers when she felt someone plop down on her bum, pinning her lower half to the floor. And just as she drew breath to yell, she felt fingers scribble their way down the backs of her legs until they reached the very sensitive bottoms of her feet. All the air prepared for her yelling went rushing out in a deep bout of belly laughter, and she hit her head on the bottom of the desk as she thrashed. Her bare feet had always been dreadfully ticklish, although no one had taken advantage of the fact in years. Andrea kept at it for a few minutes, then let the embarrassed Ross out from under her own furniture.
“Come to think of it,” Ross thought to herself as she giggled through the foot drying, “it was really that tickle attack that tipped the scales when it came to deciding Andrea’s fate within the business.”
It was as Ross was reflecting on her own behavior that the two men she knew as Tate and Jones, strolled back through her door. The naughty smile reappeared on her face, then promptly froze there as Chuckles leveled his gun at them. The four of them all just stood still for a moment, Ross’s delicate hands still wrapped in the soft, tickly towel. Malloy, true to his nature, made the first move.
“What room are they in?”
Ross started to ask who, but her lips had barely formed the ‘w’ when he let out a flurry of shots into the concrete wall behind her head, breaking the will of the girl at Ross’s feet, who dove under the desk with a scream. Ross took a deep breath, steadying herself, and then fixed the two bank robbers with a withering glare.
“The slut is in room 12. I’m sure the deed is already done, in case you’re wondering.” Malloy leveled the gun at her, but instead mumbled something to Chuckles and backed out of the room. He ran down the hall, and Chuckles was left alone with Ross and her cowering companion. Ross regarded him with open disdain.
“The things we could’ve done for you. No real man would turn a woman like me down.”
Chuckles stared back, stone faced, already wishing the Scarecrow was back at his side.
Meanwhile, in room 12, the deed was far from done, and Andrea Cahill believed she was fighting for her life. She had taken a couple of stiff punches, but had rolled through a tackle attempt from one of her pursuers, and briefly held the other at bay with a lamp before being bear hugged from behind and slammed onto the bed. The air went out of her lungs in a great whoosh, and she struggled to keep her wrists from being tied to the bed.
All of this happened in a span of maybe two minutes, and despite the cold, rational steps her mind was taking, Andrea was screaming and crying, praying for some sort of divine intervention. Unfortunately, she was already pinned and facing the wall when her prayers were answered.
Both of her attackers, however, did turn when the knob blew off the door, and watched in horror as the door swung open to reveal a handsome, grinning man holding a tommy gun. The one of top of Andrea stood up abruptly, and that was all the chance the Scarecrow would need, as he emptied the rest of his ammo into the two men, nearly slicing them in half in the close quarters. For a full minute after the shots, Andrea remained on the bed, terrified to move. When she finally risked a peek behind her, Russell Malloy was leaning on the door frame, lighting a cigarette. She rolled over, gingerly pulling her torn dress around herself as best she could, and then he spoke for the first time.
“I think it might be time for a change in profession, wouldn’t you say, Miss?”
And although it wasn’t her custom to blindly trust in the opinions of strangers, standing there clearing dust spewed from bullet ridden walls, Andrea decided it was in fact time to make a career move.
1. This is not a true tickling story. It is a story in which one of the main characters happens to have a tickle fetish. She’s not shy about it, and therefore the story contains many tickling moments. It’s much more a historically themed action story than a tickling story. There will be a number of chapters that feature a lot of tickling as the story goes on, but in part one, tickling definitely takes a backseat to the introduction of the characters and storyline.
2. The tickling in said story will feature mostly female ticklers, and a mix of male and female ticklees. If the thought of any of that bothers you as a reader, feel free to click the back button.
3. I tried to be mostly historically accurate, but I’m sure there will be some mistakes. I’m not terribly concerned with them, so try to ignore any you come across.
4. The characters in this story are fiction. 100% I do not own, nor am I aware of, any declassified FBI documents or materials pertaining to this subject. Any references to real people (Dillinger, Nelson, etc) are fictional in nature, no matter how historically convenient they seem to be.
5. Less of a warning, more of a encouragement…. Read on, enjoy, and I always appreciate feedback!
In the early 1930’s, economic hardship coupled with the complete lack of a nationalized police force allowed several of America’s most famous criminals to rise to national fame all during the same 2-3 year period. John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde, Baby-Face Nelson, and Pretty Boy Floyd dominated the headlines of papers everywhere and also the subject lines of memos fired from J Edgar Hoover’s central office to his various field agents. See, in the early part of the decade, Hoover’s FBI (at the time, known only as the Bureau of Investigation or BI) was woefully ill prepared for the crime wave about crash across the United States. Agents lacked jurisdiction on all but the most specific types of cases, and weren’t even permitted to carry guns until the aftermath of the Kansas City Massacre.
The outlaws mentioned above happen to have more in common than just their occupation: their egos. John Dillinger loved seeing his name in print. Clyde Barrow was a dangerous mix of crazy and fearless. Baby Face Nelson thought he was just plain better than his many pursuers. (It could be argued that Pretty Boy Floyd was a loyal friend who was the victim of circumstance… or an escape artist who got what was coming his way. In either case, that’s not what we’re here for.) And another interesting fact about all those mentioned above? Every last one died an early death, brought on by bullets fired from the guns of law enforcement.
Therein lies the difference between great outlaws and great thieves. Dillinger and the Barrows both considered themselves robbers (although history tells us that Clyde Barrow would’ve had a hard time robbing a piggy bank at a lemonade stand), but both were loud, open, and borderline arrogant about their crimes. Dillinger set the bar for charismatic criminals; he was unfailingly polite, quick to crack a smile, and played up his “small town farm boy” persona to no end. These are examples of great outlaws. I’d like to tell you about a great thief. So great in fact, that you’ve probably never even heard of him, or his entire gang. Known as the Scarecrow gang to their associates, and as the Feathers gang in speculative, declassified FBI documents, Russell Malloy and his men (and women) are among Hoover’s greatest unsolved mysteries.
Chapter 1 “The Gang”
To truly understand the Scarecrow/Feathers gang, one must first understand its two most influential members: Russell ‘Scarecrow’ Malloy and Andrea ‘Feathers’ Cahill.
Malloy was the son of an Irish carpenter and an Italian princess. Donna Giovese was the son of the second most influential man in all of Newark, NJ and despite his daughter’s decision to marry a poor Irish carpenter, her father took good care of both his daughter and his grandchildren. In a time when most of his friends were wondering if they’d eat dinner each night Russell, or Rusty as they knew him, never worried about going hungry. In 1927, at the age of 19, as most of his friends joined the service or picked up a trade, Malloy hit the road, deciding to see what the rest of the country held in store for him. He had a little money saved up, and he saw the world… his world anyway. Everywhere he went he got thrown out of the same kinds of bars, played poker with the same kind of guys, and learned the same kind of tricks he did in Newark.
He got his nickname in 1929 when he found himself short on cash and no longer welcome in the lodge he had been staying at (there was an issue involving the owner’s daughter, six candles, and a turkey feather) in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. To fund his trip out of town he stole 138 dollars, 11 ears of corn, 4 apples, 8 sets of gold flatware, 2 gold watches, and a service revolver from a family having a dinner party. The family was that of Mayor John D. Hayfelt. The dinner party was for the mayor’s son, who had recently returned from a two year tour abroad in the Navy. There were 8 police officers present, the mayor’s entire staff, two judges and a sheriff from two town’s over in attendance. None of Malloy’s associates ever knew him at this stage of his life, and he rarely talked about his early crimes, so it’s impossible to say if he knew just how risky this particular job was. Lord knows he knew it as he fled across that Iowa cornfield, with 11 angry men chasing him, ready to hang the young man from the nearest tree. Thing is, he beat them to the job, hanging his loot from a tall cornstalk and swapped places with one of the dinner party host’s prize winning scarecrows, letting his would be captors pass right beneath him before retrieving his score and heading back in the other direction, towards the house. He slipped past the confused and agitated guests and stole the police chief’s brand new Ford from in front of the house. They found the car two days later, at a farm 80 miles north of Cedar Rapids, with another farmer and his wife. They said a man had drove up in it, offered to share fresh corn and apples in exchange for a hot meal and a bed, and the next day had left them the car, saying he had no need for it anymore. Officers who questioned the couple said the only suspicious remark he made came when the farmer’s wife asked his occupation, and with a ghost of a grin he replied, “I’m a human scarecrow.”
If Malloy was doomed to follow in his grandfather’s foot steps one way or the other, Andrea Cahill did everything in her power to ensure she would not follow her own family’s path. The fifth of seven children of a dairy farmer in Lancaster, Ohio, Andrea worked on her father’s farm every morning from her fourth birthday until her eighteenth. She could operate farm equipment, knew how to milk a cow, and how to shoot and skin a deer. Try as he might, Andrea’s father could never produce a task that her talented hands couldn’t quickly adapt to. And her talents certainly weren’t limited to animals and machinery. Many a pulled muscle and stiff neck were rubbed out by Andrea in her years on the Cahill farm. It was good honest work, and Andrea never resented her parents for it, but she couldn’t imagine living her life trapped like they were.
On her eighteenth birthday she told her parents she needed to get off the farm. To her surprise they accepted her decision and offered to send her to her aunt’s just outside of Columbus. Her aunt was a touch healer, she had learned massage techniques from her own mother, and after giving herself to the Lord, became an aid to ailing members of her parish. Although the experience was invaluable for Andrea, the religious atmosphere was suffocating, and she left her aunt’s to try her luck as a masseuse. The problem was that in her area, the only place to get a massage was ‘The Gentlemen’s Touch,” a brothel using a massage parlor as a front. Most of the girls there doubled as whores, and Andrea refused to make that career choice. The farm was bad, but she would go back before she would sell herself.
At first the job went quite well. Andrea’s massages quickly grew in popularity, and her cute and spunky personality combined with her “no touch” rule made her one of the few unfulfilled fantasies for many of the house’s clients, a fact that did not go unnoticed by the madam of the house, Eve Ross. As Andrea’s popularity rose, her reputation with the working girls of the brothel plummeted. It wasn’t long before the girls were looking for a chance to punish the young masseuse. And just as they got their opportunity, Andrea’s life changed forever.
Before we get to the couples’ first meeting, there’s one more thing that’s relevant to both Andrea’s story and the rest of the gang’s story from here: Andrea was a tickler. She had grown up around it; with six very ticklish siblings around to both tickle and be tickled by, rarely did a day go by that one of the Cahill kids wasn’t caught laughing their heads off. As child number five, she should’ve been a target more than instigator, but Andrea’s talented hands more than made up for her many sensitive spots. She was never totally comfortable being tickled by her family (tickling them was just fine, especially her older siblings), but after her first boyfriend at age 15, she saw tickling in an entirely new light. She grew to love being tickled, and found the easiest way to make this happen was to tickle someone else first.
The truth is she was that way for the rest of her life, and it certainly didn’t change while working in The Gentlemen’s Touch. She often clowned around with the other masseuses and the whores, tickling them silly and getting pinned and tickled in return. Her tickle fetish, while only one piece of her personality, would come to define some of the gang’s more daring actions in the following years.
They almost met on March 3, 1933. Malloy was in town scouting a local job with his partner Nelson Motts, also known as Chuckles. Chuckles nickname was ironic, a poke at the fact that he never cracked a smile on a job, scared he would reveal a missing right canine tooth. He’d lost the tooth on his second tour behind bars, in a fistfight with an Irishman, and it was one of the ‘identifying features’ in his file. The two had been working together for 3 years at that point, mostly pulling low key jobs in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland. They had yet to get caught, but the heat on the East coast was enough that Malloy’s grandfather pointed the young man west in hopes he would take the cops with him. A friend in Pittsburgh had planned a job near Columbus and picked Chuckles and Scarecrow to execute the job. The problem was, Chuckles had fallen from a fence earlier in the week while planning an escape route. His ankle was bruised and sore, and limping men rarely pulled off clean bank jobs. So after hearing a rumor of a girl with magic hands at a local brothel, Malloy took Chuckles for a massage. He originally planned on getting one himself as well, in which case he certainly would’ve requested Andrea, but on the way in he spotted two local patrolmen, and blew off his massage to monitor the officers.
Instead, they met two days later, the day before their job. Chuckles had been singing Andrea’s praises ever since he rolled off the table, and now was demanding Malloy go see the girl with the magic hands.
“I’m telling you ‘Crow,’ it will be the best half hour of your life. You will feel young and alive in areas that have never felt alive in your life. I could just run in there and lift all the money myself and run right out and no one would catch me.”
They were driving through town for the umpteenth time that week, just watching everyone and everything, trying to make it so that there would be no surprises the next day. Chuckles was driving, and Malloy slumped in his seat, grinning and shuffling a deck of cards.
“I’m not going for a rub and tug in a brothel the day before we try to rob a bank. That’s pressing our luck, even for me.”
Chuckles slammed his hand on the wheel in disgust. “She’s not a whore! They asked if I wanted to be finished off, because if I did I’d need a different girl at the end, cause she doesn’t do that.” His straightened up, taking a pose of dignity. “She’s a lady.”
“A lady in a whorehouse; how very poetic.” The cards flew back and forth between his fingers, but his eyes never left the sidewalks. Malloy had complete confidence in his and Chuckles’ abilities; his theory was that it was the random nature of everyday life that was most likely to affect their plans.
“Well I’m driving, and I say we’re calling it a half hour early and going over there.”
Malloy sighed. “I can’t wait to tell our lawyer this story when he asks where we went wrong.”
Chuckles wouldn’t relent, and in a little over half an hour, they were standing in an office with Eve Ross. She was sitting, getting a pedicure from one of her girls. It was a dimly lit basement, decorated in red satin and black silk. Malloy leaned in the doorway of Ross’s office, a half smile on his face as Chuckles demanded to see Andrea.
“Miss Andrea is actually busy for the rest of the evening. She’s…” the older woman’s lips curled in a contemptuous sneer, “…occupied. Perhaps another of our girls can help you out, Mr…?”
“Jones.” Malloy spoke from the door before Chuckles could. “He’s Mr. Jones, I’m Mr. Tate. And since Mr. Jones has Mrs. Jones waiting at home, I think he’ll be declining your offer, kind though it was.”
Ms. Ross smiled, and Malloy felt a shiver dance down his spine. This was the type of woman who, even when she was being sincere, seemed more likely to pick your pocket than do you a favor. “I actually pulled something down in here,” he motioned to his lower back, “and was hoping this Andrea that Mr. Jones speaks so highly of could help me out.”
The girl at Ross’s feet suddenly piped up. “There’s plenty o’ girls who’d be happy to help you out, sailor, a lot more than little miss priss Andrea would.”
“Sounds like she wasn’t exactly loved by the folks around here huh?” Malloy moved further into the room, lighting a cigarette and offering it to Ross. After accepting his offer, she favored him with a sly smile and settled back in her chair, enjoying the pedicure.
“Yes, Miss Andrea had a tendency to get under the skin of the girls, but that’s all changed after today.”
Malloy stepped in front of Chuckles, seating himself on Ross’s desk. He had an unlit cigarette in his mouth and leaned in with a big smile on his face, wrapping his arm around Eve while watching the blonde painting her toes a dark maroon. Ross had very nice feet for an older gal, thin with long toes and high arches. “And what, pray tell, changed things so dramatically?”
Eve took a drag and then stared very hard at Malloy, as if trying to see his intentions though his brow. Then she loosened up and shrugged, as if her secret wasn’t such a big deal after all.
“We sent her up with some guys who were into breaking the new gals in. They know she isn’t going to go for it, and they’re going to make her.”
Malloy froze, and even Chuckles coughed a little and shifted in his seat. Ross smiled. “At The Gentlemen’s Touch, we make sure even the most… dangerous fantasies can be carried out. So long as our clientele is in good standing with the house. The men upstairs are two very loyal customers.”
Ross suddenly pulled her feet back from her pedicurist and ran a hand up Malloy’s thigh. “Of course, attractive gentlemen such as yourselves could receive the finest treatment as well.” Her hazel eyes flashed as they locked in on Malloy. “I’ve been in this business for thirty years. I can make you feel things you’ll never find words to describe.” She licked her lips seductively, but Malloy was already sliding off the desk.
“Thank you ma’am, but I think we’ll be back another time. Mr. Jones?” Chuckles was already at the door, and neither man turned back to receive the hurt glare from Miss Ross. They weren’t necessarily being rude, truth be told they were far from done with the brothel or its Madame.
They didn’t speak again until they were at the car, parked in an alley two blocks south of The Gentlemen’s Touch. Malloy was rummaging through the back seat. It was Chuckles who broke the silence.
“We’re going back in, aren’t we?”
Malloy was still half in the car, but his response came clear as day. “Oh, you better believe we are.”
Chuckles shook his head, but tossed the coat and jacket he was wearing into the front seat, replacing them with the standard black coat and hat for their work tomorrow. “Isn’t this going to be bad for the job?”
Malloy surfaced from the car. “Maybe. In theory it could actually help us.” He slapped a full drum of ammunition into Tia, his trusty Thompson machine gun. Tia had been at his side for his last six robberies, and Columbus was supposed to be lucky number seven. Apparently seven had come a few days early.
“Oh? Want to run that one by me?” Chuckles had produced a Winchester 1880 single shot rifle, a throwback to his days as an army sharpshooter. He had been out of the service for years now, but he was still a freakishly good shot, an asset Malloy never forgot to tap. He stuffed his other fun, a .38, into the waistband of his slacks and smoothed his long coat over the bulge.
“Well, if we go in a shoot a bunch of whores, naturally there will be some blowback. While the men in badges are trying to sort this baby out, we’ll be cleaning out their bank and be out of town long before they have any idea what we did.” Malloy pulled his own hat low, and shrugged on a coat to conceal his weapon for the short walk back.
Two witnesses who were apparently eating lunch across the street later claimed that two men had walked quickly up to the building, surveyed the sidewalk in either direction, and then calmly strode inside. The same witnesses reported the same two men left less than ten minutes later with a girl. Both recalled odd noises, but couldn’t say for sure what it had been. They were shocked to learn what had taken place inside.
Eve Ross’s pedicure was just finishing up, and she shivered with delight as her feet were dried with a fluffy towel. She enjoyed the light tickle, although it reminded her of just last week when that little tramp Andrea had found her reaching for a lost pencil under her desk and played a prank on her. She had just clasped it in her fingers when she felt someone plop down on her bum, pinning her lower half to the floor. And just as she drew breath to yell, she felt fingers scribble their way down the backs of her legs until they reached the very sensitive bottoms of her feet. All the air prepared for her yelling went rushing out in a deep bout of belly laughter, and she hit her head on the bottom of the desk as she thrashed. Her bare feet had always been dreadfully ticklish, although no one had taken advantage of the fact in years. Andrea kept at it for a few minutes, then let the embarrassed Ross out from under her own furniture.
“Come to think of it,” Ross thought to herself as she giggled through the foot drying, “it was really that tickle attack that tipped the scales when it came to deciding Andrea’s fate within the business.”
It was as Ross was reflecting on her own behavior that the two men she knew as Tate and Jones, strolled back through her door. The naughty smile reappeared on her face, then promptly froze there as Chuckles leveled his gun at them. The four of them all just stood still for a moment, Ross’s delicate hands still wrapped in the soft, tickly towel. Malloy, true to his nature, made the first move.
“What room are they in?”
Ross started to ask who, but her lips had barely formed the ‘w’ when he let out a flurry of shots into the concrete wall behind her head, breaking the will of the girl at Ross’s feet, who dove under the desk with a scream. Ross took a deep breath, steadying herself, and then fixed the two bank robbers with a withering glare.
“The slut is in room 12. I’m sure the deed is already done, in case you’re wondering.” Malloy leveled the gun at her, but instead mumbled something to Chuckles and backed out of the room. He ran down the hall, and Chuckles was left alone with Ross and her cowering companion. Ross regarded him with open disdain.
“The things we could’ve done for you. No real man would turn a woman like me down.”
Chuckles stared back, stone faced, already wishing the Scarecrow was back at his side.
Meanwhile, in room 12, the deed was far from done, and Andrea Cahill believed she was fighting for her life. She had taken a couple of stiff punches, but had rolled through a tackle attempt from one of her pursuers, and briefly held the other at bay with a lamp before being bear hugged from behind and slammed onto the bed. The air went out of her lungs in a great whoosh, and she struggled to keep her wrists from being tied to the bed.
All of this happened in a span of maybe two minutes, and despite the cold, rational steps her mind was taking, Andrea was screaming and crying, praying for some sort of divine intervention. Unfortunately, she was already pinned and facing the wall when her prayers were answered.
Both of her attackers, however, did turn when the knob blew off the door, and watched in horror as the door swung open to reveal a handsome, grinning man holding a tommy gun. The one of top of Andrea stood up abruptly, and that was all the chance the Scarecrow would need, as he emptied the rest of his ammo into the two men, nearly slicing them in half in the close quarters. For a full minute after the shots, Andrea remained on the bed, terrified to move. When she finally risked a peek behind her, Russell Malloy was leaning on the door frame, lighting a cigarette. She rolled over, gingerly pulling her torn dress around herself as best she could, and then he spoke for the first time.
“I think it might be time for a change in profession, wouldn’t you say, Miss?”
And although it wasn’t her custom to blindly trust in the opinions of strangers, standing there clearing dust spewed from bullet ridden walls, Andrea decided it was in fact time to make a career move.
