"'Fifty dollars a night. Fifty dollars a trick! Fifty dollars to lay a broad and beat her till she's sick.' She laughed a small hysterical laugh at the innane verse that seemed to pound through her mind with the heavy pulsebeat of her heart."
Her love was for sale -- at the right price. But suddenly, life became very complicated for Ann Freeman, a beautiful blonde call girl. Too many people making demands on her. Cal Marker wanted to add her to his stable of high-priced call girls. Mke Lane wanted her for his stable, to help pay for his daily quota of heroin. Clara Lundy needed Ann to satisfy her craving for abnormal love. Casey Shean, sweet and decent, and very much in love wanted Ann for his wife. And as if that wasn't enough, there was Crowley, the vice cop, who was out to "get" Ann, in more ways than one.
-o0o-
hungry for something to read, this was the very first full-length book i ever read. brace yourself, i was six and a half years old, i'd scale the wall separating our room from my parent's bedroom. their room had a ceiling, the rest of the house didn't. and in that little space above their ceiling, my father kept books and magazines. crawling on my stomach, i would read the old american magazines. there were three books of note: a first edition of Gone with the Wind, with frayed covers, too thick and too small prints; another with pictures of naked women and naked men, eww, not my type; then this book, $50 a Night, small and thin and the printing size just right.
there's a written notation by someone: "a story about the oldest profession in the world". from my vantage point i see my mother in the front yard, washing clothes of other people to augment my father's meagre income. laundering clothes: that has to be the oldest profession. so i thought i'd read it. four afternoons i risked going up there, amidst house lizards and exposed electrical wires, their rubber and plastic coatings chewed up by mice. four afternoons and all i ever read was this woman Ann wearing her lipstick, putting on perfume, going to bed with different men. and i kept asking myself 'when is she going to wash clothes?' of course it never happened. a six-year old's mind can only grasp so much. a week later, i asked the neighbour's teenaged daughter what it meant, she laughed at me and she said 'like miss carmen at the end of the street". miss carmen worked in a 'nightclub' in the next town. people said she's a bad woman and the women in the neighbourhood didn't like their husbands looking at her. ahhhhh, miss carmen was doing the oldest profession and it wasn't washing clothes. only then did i understand.
i found the book some years back through the internet and ordered it from a small shop in an out of the way new york township. for posterity's sake, re-read it again. the book sucks!
What a way to end your series. Your story cracks me up as I can envision you crawling into that space, reading the book and then asking the questions. Nice of you to tell us what you really thought of this one.
That is hilarious -- I can so picture you as a 6 year old crawling in that little space, reading this book, waiting for the part where she does laundry -- that is adorable!!!! And how fun to get a copy in later years! It's a great story (YOURS!) -- and a perfect ending to this month's project!! Just love this!!!
@pamfromcalgary - when i went to visit home seven years ago, i told my father that i had bought a copy of that book. he then showed me the exact book that i read. his copy was all yellowed and water soaked. he kept it because he knew i had read it when i was a small girl. it was a testament to how hungry i was for books to read. and yes, the book sucks big time!
awesome story of your childhood escapades, incredible that you remember that much and even more awesome that your dad knew and kept the book. perfect ending to the series. great month of 365 for you!
@cscecil - thanks so much, CS. i thought so, too, that this is a perfect way to end the project. and to tell you guys of my first reading (mis)adventure! well, i hope to have my first book published before i'm 65, although there's a few books floating around in your national libraries with two of my stories in them! thank you again, CS.
Nice one,we have quite a few bookshops that have tons of these paperbacks from the 50's and 60's as a kid i loved the hand painted pictures on book covers.
@steeler - i've read quite a few pb's from that era and most of them were good. i, too, loved those covers. thanks, howard.
@altadc - thank you, alta. there are no graphic descriptions here, it's all insinuations and cliches that's why i could read it at the time but only understanding half of it. "-)
@danig - the cover was the same as this, only really frayed and faded from too much use. i suppose six-year olds or children in general don't look at these drawings or pictures with malice because they are still pure in hearts and minds. gheez, for me to be actually pure in mind and heart, oy! thanks, DG. on to the next challenge?
i don't know if i should laugh or cry for the little girl you were, but honestly, i am laughing right now. what a story. thank you for sharing. wonderful ending to the series!
@catsmeowb - you've got to laugh. i never felt sorry for my faux pas when i was young. when you're poor you want so much to grow up, finish school and find a job ang get the hell out of poverty. our parents protected us, wanting us to be educated, unlike other families they let their children work as early as when they can talk and walk. our parents believed in education and they encourage us to learn and to read. and i think the reason why those books were up in the little crawl space was my father didn't want us to read those stuff. but i learned from them.
thank you for sticking it out with my challenge. i know some stayed away because i wrote too much. on to the next month!
ROFL! This is by far the best commentary I've read yet! I giggled at the way you described moving along the wall avoiding lizards and chewed wires and how you spied your mother doing laundry and thinking how that was the oldest professtion...I seriously think you have a book or two of your own up your sleeve...now go write it, you have much talent girl!
@roth - well, you know, $50 a night (or day) i remember thinking my mother would earn so much if i just find out what the secret was to that woman's laundry techniques. but alas, it was a different laundry the character was doing. dang!
thank you, pam.
@altadc - thank you, alta. there are no graphic descriptions here, it's all insinuations and cliches that's why i could read it at the time but only understanding half of it. "-)
@danig - the cover was the same as this, only really frayed and faded from too much use. i suppose six-year olds or children in general don't look at these drawings or pictures with malice because they are still pure in hearts and minds. gheez, for me to be actually pure in mind and heart, oy! thanks, DG. on to the next challenge?
thank you for sticking it out with my challenge. i know some stayed away because i wrote too much. on to the next month!