1 The Hollywood Detective (11 page)

“And what is it you’re looking for, in particular?”

I reached into my pocket and pulled out a card. I handed it to the young cop but still spoke to his boss. “I can’t tell you that, but maybe when you cut him open, if you find anything interesting your pal here can give me a call and let me know. You know, in exchange for saving his life earlier.”

I figured if he really did feel like he owed me, he’d pick up the phone. Of course, if they found a piece of Clara, I’d be reading about it in the papers. Not even Strickling could keep that out of the headlines.

I pushed my way back out through the alley. There was still a big crowd wanting to see the slain beast, and their ranks were swelled by the arrival of photographers and reporters. I was just about to head back to my car and finally check in with Red when I saw someone lingering at the edge of the throng. It was the tall guy from the studio trying to peer over their heads. He was still clutching the packet close to his chest. I didn’t take my eyes off him. I wasn’t planning on losing him again.

Maybe the panther had already coughed up a gem for me.

McGill’s bookstore was not the kind of establishment you’d expect a meat head to frequent, so when the tall guy walked in there I knew something odd must be going on. I left it a couple minutes after the door had closed behind him and stepped inside.

The bell above the door rang and the man behind the counter came to greet me.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Sure, just looking.”

“No, I mean with all the action outside.” He was in his mid-twenties, with slicked back hair and wire-rimmed spectacles that complimented his tweeds. He was trying just a little too hard to look bookish.

“Yeah, I saw the crowd—what’s going on out there?”
 

“They got the panther, at least that’s what a couple customers have said.”

“Jeez, that’s a relief. The newspaper owners will be disappointed though. It must have sold them a few extra copies, a story like that.”

“You heard the latest?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“Apparently there’s another cat out there. A tiger this time.”

“What happened? They break out of the zoo?”

“Maybe. Or maybe Hearst is releasing them to get more people buying the Times.” He headed back toward the counter. “Let me know if you’re looking for something special.”

It wasn’t a big store, but it was divided by ten feet high shelving units that turned the place into a thieves’ playground: the tall guy I’d followed in could have been anywhere. I stood in front of the fiction stand and listened hard. I could hear the counter guy flicking through his magazine, I could hear the dying hubbub from the street, but that was it. I seemed to be the only customer in the store. No one dragged a book from a shelf. No one flicked through pages, or shuffled between shelves. Which begged the question: where had Mr Tall disappeared to? I walked slowly through the maze of book stacks, but I didn’t really expect to find him. He didn’t really look like a bookworm.

A door had opened with a noisy creak and the sounds of a back office—typewriters, desk fans and gossip—drifted into the store. The door slammed shut again.

“See you then, Joel.” It was the tweed-suited bookseller’s voice.

“Seeya, Nathan.” I heard heavy footsteps heading toward the front door, the ding of the bell followed by a crescendo of traffic noise. Then the dull clunk of the door closing again. I retraced my steps back toward the door, but when I looked out of the large plate glass window, I couldn’t see who had just left.
 

I picked up a random book from a shelf and leafed through it, sending whorls of dust into the air: this was a bookstore where no one picked a book off a shelf from one month to the next. I wasn’t all that surprised: I’d had a pretty good idea of the kind of store it really was the moment I’d seen the tall guy walk in. It was time to put my theory to the test. I approached the counter.

“Hi there,” I said.

“Need some help?”

“I’ve gotta say, I haven’t really found what I’m looking for.”

“Oh yeah? Well what kind of mood are you in?”

I paused and looked at Nathan’s face very carefully. “Blondes,” I said, testing his reaction. He didn’t bat an eye. He just nodded at me, his gaze tracing up my body from my shoes to my hat.

“Somebody tell you you could get that here?”

I thought quickly and named the only person that I knew the tall guy had been in contact with: “A Russian guy, Tomasky, I think his name was.”

“Willie? He sent you here?”

“To be fair, he didn’t exactly send me. It was more a case of me overhearing a conversation. But this is the right place, isn’t it? You do have what I’m looking for?”

He studied my face for a few moments, then said, “You a cop?”

“No! Jeez, what’s a guy got to do to get hold of a little harmless entertainment?”

His expression softened a little. He smiled, then quickly explained that customers weren’t allowed into the back room. I figured this was a way of protecting their profits: after all, if a guy can peruse a hundred dirty pictures for free out back, he might not be so keen to pay for just one of them. I had to tell the counter guy what I wanted, and someone would find a small selection of pictures tailored to my particular tastes.

“What do you really like?” he asked.

An awkward flash of Red passed through my thoughts, but I repeated that I was into blondes. He asked me some graphic questions that I managed to answer keeping a straight face, and he passed my request on to someone in the back room. Five minutes later a gal—dressed as bookishly as Nathan—emerged with a large manila envelope in her hands.

“Come with me,” she said, strict like a schoolteacher.
 

She led me past several banks of books to a corner where the shelves had been arranged so that a customer could examine the store’s wares in privacy. It wasn’t much bigger than a phone booth, but it served its purpose.

“Please take a seat.”

I did as I was told.

She laid out five photographs on the table, all about four inches square, and all featuring a blonde woman, or two, engaged in various forms of sexual gratification. I reached out to touch them so I could get a better look.

“Keep your hands on the table!”

I was sure glad she never taught me in elementary school. I stood up so I could peer over the images.

“Please sit down.”

“Then would you please pick one up for me? I need to take a closer look.”
 

She gave me a stern look, but consented to my request.

“It’s the one on the right hand side, the one with—” Thankfully she picked it up before I had to say describe it in detail.

She brought the photograph closer to my face.

“Is she what you’re looking for?”

There, in crisp black and white, was the girl who checked all my boxes, naked as the day she was born, and posing in a way that left nothing to the imagination.

“Well?” The schoolteacher was still waiting for my reply.

I nodded, mutely: she was just what I was looking for.

This was one discovery I couldn’t share with Mary Treen.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” I said, my head bent low as I stood hesitating in the doorway.

“So you should be.”

I put my hat on the coat rack, wandered over to my desk and sat down. I took a second to inspect the room. The office looked a lot tidier. “You’ve been busy,” I told Red.

“Well I was here on my own for longer than I expected. D’you think I was just going to sit here twiddling my thumbs waiting for you to return and give me instructions?”

“Everything properly labeled in the file cabinets?” I asked. “All in alphabetical order?”

“Gee, I never thought of that. Alphabetical… now that would have been smart. I just jumbled everything up and shoved it all in the drawers. Everything that didn’t go straight in the trash, that is.”

“Excuse me?”
 

“Well, you leave a girl for hours on end, you can’t expect her to use the brain she was born with.” She shook her head. “Exactly how dumb do you think I am, Mr McCoy?”

I pulled a face. She had me. “Something real important came up,” I said to turn the conversation away from my gullibility. “I already said I was sorry.”

“Maybe I need to hear it a few times before I start to believe you.”

She was a picture of indignation. Hands on hips, chin held high, looking down her perfectly straight nose at me, one eyebrow arched. She was waiting for me to make it better. I was damned if she’d make me apologize again. Whose office was this, anyway?
 

“Well?” she said. I expected her to start tapping her toes on the floor any second. She blew out an impatient breath instead.

I slowly rolled something over in my mind. I figured the best thing I could do right then was take the wind out of her sails, before the haughty expression on her face set hard. I got to my feet. “I’ve got to check out a place, up on Hollywood Boulevard,” I said, and risked a gentle smile. “You want to come with me?”

Her shoulders relaxed a little and she returned my smile. “I thought you’d never ask.”

Because I didn’t want her to see me shuffling through the passenger door of the Plymouth like some kind of low life schmuck, I convinced her we should walk the ten or so blocks to Hollywood Boulevard.

“What about the big cat?”

“Which one are we talking about?”

“The panther—you know, the one in all the papers?”

“The panther is out of the picture.”

“It is?”

I filled her in on my little adventure as we walked north. For the first time since I’d met her, Red listened carefully to what I had to say. She didn’t interrupt my story once.

“You don’t really think Clara has been eaten by a big cat?” she asked when I’d finished the tale.

“It’s a crazy idea, I know. But why not rule it out? If the cops find anything, they’ll call me.”

“Before or after they call the papers?”

We walked a little while in silence while Red mulled something over. After a few moments she slowed, her forehead puckering slightly. Then she stopped and held onto my arm. “You were gone for hours. You weren’t slaying wild beasts all that time.”

I couldn’t believe she wanted me to apologize again.

“You haven’t told me what happened at the studio with Mary Treen.”

I relayed the details of our conversation, picking up the pace a little as we continued north.

“Well, Clara can hardly have been eaten if she’s sending postcards to her roommate,” Red said. “Why are we even still looking for her?”

“There’s still the mystery of the L.A. postmark. And Mary can’t be sure it was Clara’s handwriting.”

“Are you wondering if Clara Lockhart even wants to be found?”

“All I know is that Mary Treen wants me to find her. And as that’s what I’m getting paid for, I intend to do just that.”

“And you think this photographer, this Tomasky guy, is the answer?”

“He was seen arguing with Clara at Powell’s party. We need to talk to him.”

I don’t know why, but for some reason, I felt too uncomfortable to tell Red about my second adventure in the bookstore. There are some things a dame doesn’t need to know.

“Ever come across him when you worked in the pictures?” I asked as we carried on walking.

“The name’s not familiar, but I might recognize his face.”

“That’s what I’m hoping.”

We were only two blocks away from the photographer’s studio.

“Why do you want me to speak to him?” She pulled back her shoulders a little.

“Because the last time I tried, I got a sock on the jaw.” I rubbed my face, wondering if the bruise was starting to show. “Don’t worry. I’ll be close by. You won’t be in any danger but you do need to remember this guy is a total slime ball.”

“I know how to handle myself.”

“Truly, I wouldn’t be taking you if I didn’t think you could, even though I know I’ll probably be getting a second sock on the jaw when you realize I’ve put you in a pretty nasty situation.”

“Don’t worry, your face is safe. Us secretaries have got to be very careful we don’t damage our hands. Those letters won’t type themselves, you know.”

Damn, that girl knew how to make a point.

“I worked out a cover story for you.”

“I think I’d rather play it by ear.” She tugged on the cuffs of her blouse and unfastened her top two buttons.
 

I found myself staring at the pale flesh beneath and quickly looked away.

“Just think before you say anything,” I pleaded

“For crying out loud, Spencer, you’ve got to learn to trust me.”

That, I thought to myself, you have to earn.

We crossed the street toward Tomasky’s building. It was behind a gas station and after a couple big Fords pulled out onto the boulevards, I could see there was a very unusual car parked next to Tomasky’s studio.

“Yeuch!” Red said, pointing at a Cadillac convertible parked on the road outside. “Those two colors really do stand out.”

I checked the plate. It was definitely the car I’d seen at the MGM lot. Maybe the Cadillac belonged to the slime ball after all.

Red pulled a lipstick from her purse and applied a perfect cupid’s bow on her lips without the aid of a mirror. She tidied her hair.

“How do I look?”

“Like a movie star.”

“That’s exactly what I want Tomasky to think I am. Why else would I be here to inquire about headshots?”

“He may…” How could I warn her about the photographer’s sideline in dirty pictures without embarrassing the both of us? “Just be careful—his intentions may not be completely honorable.”

“Quit getting so worked up—you’re making me nervous. I told you I can—”

“—Handle yourself. I know.” I stepped back and looked at her. She may have been five feet eight in heels, but she wasn’t nearly heavy enough to deal with Tomasky in a struggle. “I’ll be right outside. You holler and I’ll come running.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”

I watched her push open the door and disappear inside. I waited a few seconds then shoved my foot between the door and its frame so I could hear what was going on. I stared at gas station attendants filling up cars and wiping down windshields. It seemed an odd location for a Hollywood photographic studio, but in the last ten years so many businesses had gone bust that landlords had gotten desperate. They’d lowered their rents and now new businesses were setting up in the most unexpected places. I stood next to the doorway and leant against the wall as the gas attendants continued their endless chores. I became so mesmerized by their toing and froing that I almost forgot why I was there.