The Ranch - Chapter 18

Chapter 18 – False trail

The casino’s head honcho’s first words to me were more mundane than his air of dignity had led me to expect. “As I have heard, my dear, you have accumulated a nice little sum there.” Midas gestured towards my purse. “We always like to send our first-time customers away with smiles on their faces. What was your name again?”

“I hadn’t mentioned it, but it’s Jennifer… Jennifer Cartwright.”

“Well Miss Cartwright, the roads around here aren’t too safe for a good-looking woman to be travelling alone so late at night, especially if she is carrying. I’ll tell you what we’ll do. Here’s my IOU for your winnings. I’ll hold on to the cash until you come again. That way, we can both happy.”

I opened my mouth to protest but then thought better of it. There was something about the man’s manner that brooked no refusal. I remembered what my real agenda for visiting the place had been and assented. As it was, I came away with something more valuable than money. The germ of an idea. As I drove back all those lonely miles the notion grew wings. The more I considered it the more it took flight. It positively soared!

What if this Jocasta was not who she pretended to be but someone else entirely? She was so tall and straight… almost flat-chested… and then there was her voice. Might she actually not be female at all, rather like my client? With my background I ought to be able to tell! If I was right then could she be the elusive brother that was so hard to find, got up as a woman? It might explain a lot.

My next leap in the dark was even more adventurous. Suppose that Raymond Price had discovered all about Gloriana’s and was blackmailing the wealthy names on the list who were patrons there. Perhaps he had also tried to put the bite on the other name on the list. Auros K!

Attempting to shake-down such a hard-headed individual might have been too dangerous a game for safety! During the long drive home the germ of imagination expanded in my brain until I felt sure I was right. It remained to be seen whether my theory would stand up to the cold hard scrutiny to which my boss was sure to subject it when I told him of it the following day.

I woke bright and early and arrived in the office before Guy, an event in itself. By 10am he was still not in, and I was growing impatient. By 11am I decided I would have to test out my theory of the previous evening under my own auspices. I would start by finding out what my client knew, if anything. Twenty minutes later I was outside the Simpson residence. I rang the bell and Millie answered the door to me as before.

“Good morning, Miss Cartwright. I’m afraid my mistress isn’t down yet. If you would care to wait in the drawing room, I’ll tell her you’re here.”
I waited as bidden, wondering why my client was so behindhand with her toilette. A late night perhaps?

I wasn’t kept in suspense too long. Gloria swept in looking radiant. “You must excuse me, Jennifer, dear. I woke with a terrible headache, which is why I wasn’t up. I was so delighted when I heard you had called, I’m happy to say, that your visit has driven it entirely away. Please forgive my lack of formality. I just threw this old thing on.”

The robe she had wrapped around her was so sheer it provided the merest nod to modesty. I didn’t know quite where to look. I gulped and stammered “It… It’s perfectly fine!”

She seated herself opposite me and gazed into my eyes. “You’re going to tell me you have solved my case; I simply know it” she gushed. “Clever you!”

“Well, not quite.” I amended, trying my hardest to prevent my eyes descending from her face, “but we have made some progress.”

“But since your last visit, there’s been no-one following me at all” she exclaimed, waving her arms in triumph.

Her excitement threatened to unwrap the flimsy robe which loosely enfolded her. I would have been less concerned if I’d been certain that she was at least wearing panties below it. Hastily I strove to introduce a modicum of reality into her state of mind.

“We still have some questions that need to be addressed. It seems likely that the man who was tailing you was a blackmailer, and there might have been other victims.”

Gloria’s eyes widened in horror at this news. “How awful!! I think blackmail is despicable, don’t you?”

“I was wondering if you recognised any of these names.” I took out the list. “It might make sense of our findings if any of these men were known to you. They may have visited Gloriana’s”

I read out the first, but my client immediately denied knowing it or anything that would cast any light on the subject. “No. But I only knew our guests by their femme names” she pointed out. “Arthur would have had their full details, I guess.”

“Let’s see” I persisted.

Slowly and carefully, I went through the rest of them, giving particular emphasis to those individuals whom Guy had highlighted. To each name, however, the lady gave a decided shake of the head. As far as I could tell she wasn’t trying to deceive me. To my belief the woman honestly had not heard of any that I mentioned. Until the very last, that is.

Instinctively I had held back from including it with the others and I dropped the name as an afterthought as casually as I could. “Oh, and there’s another name, someone called Auros. I think it might be Auros Klondyke.”

The effect on Gloria was dramatic. She looked wildly about her, as does a sleep-walker who wakes to find themselves in an unknown fearful place. “How? Why is he on that list?” She buried her head in her hands.

As gently as I could I coaxed “Can you tell me about him?”

She lifted her head and reached out to me.

I took her hands and time seemed to stand still. I forbore from further questions until she looked more composed. “How did you come to know him?”

“He and his brother Midas used to run a casino. Still do, for all I know. I worked there. It was where I first met Arthur.” She smiled at the recollection. “He rescued me from all that. He helped me change into… well, what you see before you now. When we first met, I was a singer and burlesque dancer. It seemed like fun to begin with but in the end, I found it degrading.”

“It doesn’t sound so terrible.”

“You don’t understand. My billing was as ‘The Ginger Goddess’. I was a drag performer!”

She paused before making the rest of the revelation. “There’s something you should know about me. Despite how I look, I was born a male, or so my birth certificate declares, but it was always wrong. I was born a female in a man’s body.”

I remained silent and tried to look surprised. Gloria didn’t appear to notice. “As time went on, having to act out a parody of what I ought to be became unbearable. One evening I refused to go back on after the interval. They had to make an announcement that I had been taken ill. Arthur was there that night and came backstage. He overheard them threatening me, trying to insist I carry on, and he intervened. He stood up for me. He was magnificent!”

The woman turned her head away, overcome with emotion. Her shoulders heaved as she stifled a sob.

“You don’t have to tell me if it’s too upsetting” I soothed.

“No. I want to” she visibly pulled herself together. “I know I can trust you completely. Arthur and I fell in love. He took me away from there and helped me change from merely impersonating women to becoming the one I’d always been on the inside. He found a good plastic surgeon who did the work. It must have cost a fortune, but expense was no object to him. I’ve lost count of the operations and procedures I’ve had, but he swore it was worth every penny. We were so in love.”

Gloria dabbed at her eyes. “There’s something else you ought to know. The physical side of our relationship was never complete. I tried so hard to please him, but it could never be enough. He always would reassure me that I excited him like no other lover. In the end the exertions were too much for him and his heart gave out. I can never forgive myself” she sobbed.

Again, I stayed silent. I could relate to the worry of being unable to satisfy a lover. When she had recovered her composure again, I probed a little further. “Is that how he died?”

Gloria nodded. “We’d made love that night. In the morning I’d taken a shower and was getting dressed when Millie came and told me. She’d found him when she had brought in the coffee tray. Once I’d seen him lying there so cold I was too upset to deal with it. Millie had already sent for the doctor, but of course by the time he arrived it was too late. When I last saw Arthur, he looked so peaceful, like he was asleep. I’ll always remember him that way.”

I resisted the temptation to take the creature in my arms. The flimsy nature of her covering garment and the attraction that I felt told me that that way lay disaster. Instead, I held her hands very tightly for what seemed an age. It seemed to help.

I was anxious to get back to discovering what Gloria knew about the Klondyke brothers and Auros in particular, but out of sympathy I refrained from plying her with questions. It was my client who roused herself to return to the former topic.

“Enough about me. You were asking about Auros. When I first met him, I had the impression that he was different from his brash and ruthless brother; a gentleman. But make no mistake, he was just as hard underneath. Worse, if anything!”

Her words echoed those of Alexander. “With Midas you know where you stand, but his brother is the evil genius behind those rackets they’re involved in. He’s an insidious little snake.”

“Little?”

“Yes, he’s not even as tall as I am.”

Bang went my cleverly thought-out theory. “Was there a woman called Jocasta at the club, by any chance?” I asked weakly.

Gloria nodded solemnly. I tried hard not to look disappointed. The tall woman was evidently not Auros Klondyke in drag, as I had supposed. Stupid of me!

“She began as the other half of my act. She played the man, I the woman. Fred and Ginger. Pathetic really, and when I realised what sort of outfit I had got mixed up in I had to get away. She moved on… to other things. What she is or does now I haven’t a clue.”

“I can understand that.”

“It feels good to tell you all this, but it’s time I made myself decent. Come and talk to me while I dress.”

I hesitated, but as ever, Gloria brooked no refusal. She took my hand and pulled me into the hall and up the stairs. At least by following her, the question of whether she wore any panties underneath her diaphanous wrap was solved! Entering her bedroom, I was led over to sit on the bed where I perched myself uneasily. She disappeared behind an ornate screen, so that only her head and neck were visible.

“Don’t be so nervous” laughed Gloria, seeing my edginess. “I rarely bite!”

I tried to smile naturally but it was a feeble attempt.

“Now you have heard all my secrets, tell me something private about you in return” she demanded playfully. Casting off the robe she casually slung it over the top of the partition. I paused, wondering what I ought to reveal.

Her eyes met mine, and the pleading look on her face helped me decide. “Well, there is something you might know.”

I had my companion’s undivided attention while I related that only the other night someone with a gun came into my apartment unbidden.

At the end of my tale, she appeared to be in total shock.

“It was okay, I scared them away, whoever they were” I said, attempting to calm her down.

However, Gloria’s terror remained. “You must cease working on my case immediately” she exclaimed.

My repeated assurances only mollified her anxiety slightly. “While the case is unsolved you must sleep here. If anything happened to you on account of me, I would never forgive myself.”

At her insistence I eventually agreed that I would give my apartment a wide berth at night with one proviso. “I will need to go back there, if only to change my clothes at the very least. Later today I have an important meeting planned, where I really ought to be very formally dressed.”

“That’s not necessary. You must wear something of mine.” Gloria looked so pleased with herself at the brilliance of her suggestion, it was comical. My hostess’s expression resembled that of the cat that got the cream.

“Merely the thought of dressing you in my clothes is something I find enchanting” she enthused.

How was it that I had to yield to her, against my inclination? As always!