Hunter S Thompson

On my way to the kitchen I was jolted by the sight of a naked woman slumped awkwardly in the corner with a desperate look on her face, as if she'd been shot. Her eyes bulged and her mouth was wide open and she appeared to be reaching out for me.

I leapt back and heard laughter behind me. My first thought was that Leach, unhinged by his gambling disaster, had finally gone over the line with his wife-beating habit and shot her in the mouth just before we knocked. She appeared to be crying out for help, but there was no voice.

I ran into the kitchen to look for a knife thinking, that if Leach had gone crazy enough to kill his wife, now he would have to kill me, too, since I was the only witness. Except the Judge, who locked himself in the bathroom.

Leach appeared in the doorway holding the naked woman by the neck and hurled her across the room at me....

Time stood still for an instant. The woman seemed to hover in the air, coming at me in the darkness like a body in slow motion. I went into a stance with the bread knife and braced for a fight to the death.

The thing hit me and bounced softly down to the floor. It was a rubber blow-up doll: one of those things with five orifices that young stockbrokers buy in adult bookstores after the singles bars close.

"Meet Jennifer," he said. "She's my punching bag." He picked it up by the hair and slammed it across the room.

"Ho, ho," he chuckled, "no more wife beating. I'm cured, thanks to Jennifer." He smiled sheepishly . "It's almost like a miracle. These dolls saved my marriage. They're a lot smarter than you think." He nodded gravely. "Sometimes I have to beat two at once. But it always calms me down, you know what I mean?"

Whoops, I thought. Welcome to the night train. "Oh, hell yes, I said quickly. "How do the neighbors handle it?"

"No problem," he said. "They love me."

Sure, I thought. I tried to imagine the horror of living in a muddy industrial slum full of tin-walled trailers and trying to protect your family against brain damage from knowing that every night when you look out your kitchen window there will be a man in a leather bathrobe flogging two naked women around the room with a quart bottle of Wild Turkey. Sometimes for two or three hours...It was horrible.

"Where is your wife?" I asked. "Is she still here?"

"Oh, yes." he said quickly. "She just went out for some cigarettes She'll be back any minute." He nodded eagerly. "Oh, yes, she's very proud of me. We're almost reconciled. She really loves these dolls."

I smiled, but something about this story mad me nervous. "How many do you have?" I asked him.

"Don't worry," he said. "I have all we need." He reached into a nearby broom closet and pulled out another one -- a half-inflated Chinese-looking woman with rings in her nipples and two electric cords attached to her head." This is Ling-Ling," he said. "She screams when I hit her." He whacked the doll's head and it squawked stupidly.