A Killing in Comics (10 page)

With an elaborate, taunting shrug, she brought her hands to the bowed black sash at her waist and began undoing the dressing gown.

Rolling my eyes for nobody’s benefit but yours, I went out and sat on the sofa by the unlit fireplace and drank my Coke. Suddenly it didn’t seem all that air-conditioned in the place.

Twenty minutes later, she emerged from her bedroom. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to “dress up,” but I had no doubt she would have been welcome at the Starlight Roof. Her dress, which stopped just below her knees, was black but her shoulders and midriff were bare under misty black lace, her arms mostly bare, too. A simple strand of pearls was at her pink throat, and now her lips were rouged, red as blood.

I was already on my feet. “You look swell.”

“Thanks. I feel . . . better.”

“So do I,” I said, going over to her. “Listen, a meal will do you good. Way you’re going, you’ll either starve yourself, or drown in martinis.”

She managed a smile. The blue eyes didn’t look so bloodshot now, either—she must have used drops. “I didn’t fall on my keister, Mr. Starr . . . Jack. But you did ride to my rescue. Thank you.”

“I’m available twenty-fours,” I said, “to beautiful women, anyway.”

The Tony Sarg Oasis, off the lobby, was more cocktail lounge than restaurant, the curving wall decorated by a whimsical mural (courtesy of the cartoonist whose name graced the place) of Disneyesque animals—gin-guzzling giraffes, reeling rodents, tipsy tigers. A small bandstand of violinists and cellists put out the room’s signature Hungarian pop rhapsodies, with the main menu item (beyond sandwiches) reflecting the music with a tasty goulash that was a favorite of mine.

So, as we sat beneath a fan-dancing elephant, I ordered this hearty specialty for both of us, plus another Coke for me and coffee for the lady. She did not object but requested cream. Thus it was that I set about to sober up this female in the midst of full-scale cocktail lapping.

“I notice you don’t smoke,” I said.

“No,” she said. “Smoking ages a woman. I notice you don’t, either.”

“I used to. But for me, smoking and drinking went together, so when drinking went, so did the Lucky Strikes.”

She gestured to all the booze consumption as well as the haze of cigarette smoke. “Doesn’t it bother you, being in this atmosphere?”

“No. After you’ve been off the sauce a while, you start to enjoy the edge you get, being one of the sober few in a soused-up joint like this.”

She gave me that smiling-mouth-frowning-eyes expression that she should have patented. “Was that some kind of veiled dig?”

“No. You seem sober enough right now. Just getting up and moving around and getting dressed was enough to set you on the straight and narrow. When you get some chow down you, you’ll be a new woman.”

“Didn’t you like the old one?”

“Nothing old about you, Honey. You’re still fine with me calling you ‘Honey,’ aren’t you?”

“Jack, I’d be offended if you didn’t.”

The Coke and coffee came.

I sipped at the icy glass, then said, “I am sorry for your loss. I know Donny meant a lot to you.”

She lifted her coffee cup to her lips and studied me over its rim while she drank; she was looking for sarcasm in my words and my face, and couldn’t find any.

“Thank you,” she said, setting the cup down steadily. “I know Donny wasn’t your favorite person.”

“He was a lot of people’s
not
favorite person.” I sat forward, spoke as softly as I dared, competing with “Golden Earrings” in the background. “Honey, am I the first person to drop around today?”

Now just her eyes frowned. “Didn’t I tell you? That’s how, I mean,
who
woke me up, around four—a Captain Chandler, and some other police detective.”

“I see. Then you’re aware that Donny’s death . . .”

“Was a murder? Yes. Why do you think I was hitting the martinis so hard?” She shook her head, the blondeness bouncing. “You pop enough pills to sleep just short of forever, to try get away from the . . . the
awfulness
of losing somebody you care about. Then some goddamn policeman comes around and makes it . . . makes it even worse.”

Her voice was trembling but her eyes were steady; no tears. Maybe she’d cried every tear she had out of her. Or maybe she was just steeling herself, digging into the capacity she had for living thirty-some years and not wrinkling that lovely mug an iota.

“Was Chandler . . .” I tried to find the word. “. . . unpleasant? Rough on you?”

“No, no. He was nice enough. Very gentlemanly. You know, he’s even cuter than you are.”

“That’s a matter of opinion,” I said. “And, anyway, you don’t have to rub it in.”

She smiled; her teeth might have been too large for some people’s tastes, but not mine—big and white and beautiful, framed in full red lips. “Didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, Jack.”

“I’m dainty. Delicate. Remember that.”

“I’ll try to.” She was still smiling, though she’d put the teeth away. “All Captain Chandler did was inform me about the murder, and ask a few questions, and asked if I minded if he looked around. I said of course not.”

No wonder he was so goddamned nice—Honey was undoubtedly one of his top suspects, and the cute cop had been allowed to search her apartment without a warrant.

I asked, “Did he take anything with him?”

“Yes. Several bottles of insulin that were in my refrigerator. Donny had diabetes, you know. Donny always kept several bottles on hand at the apartment.”

“And at work? And at home?”

She nodded. “He always said, ‘Boy Scouts like me are always prepared.’ He had such a wonderful sense of humor.”

Well, that was depressing to hear. Honey Daily, who laughed at all my jokes, found Donny Harrison a riot. I was going to have to rethink my material.

The goulash came, and was as usual delicious. Honey damn near wolfed hers down, so this had been a good call. I even talked her into a little dessert, some cheesecake and strawberries, not Lindy’s worthy, but not bad.

Our talk remained small over the meal and cheesecake. I learned that she had grown up in Cleveland, came to New York to try to be an actress. She admitted her good looks got her plenty of auditions, but that her lack of talent meant the only offers were the kind she could have gotten anywhere, from a Cleveland soda fountain to any New York street corner.

She had switched showbiz gears and taken dancing lessons for a while—her parents, who ran a haberdashery back home, had agreed to stake her for a year out here to pursue her dream; but her terpsichorean talents weren’t any better than her thespian ones. Finally she and another failed actress signed up for a secretarial school, and here Honey excelled. After graduation, she worked for several bosses, but meeting Donny in 1940 had changed her life.

A waiter had taken the empty cheesecake plates away, and brought Honey more coffee and me some iced tea—Coke and cheesecake don’t mix—and I began to probe a little deeper. We were better acquainted now, and she was as sober as a judge, ruling out the high percentage of drunken New York judges, that is.

I squeezed the lemon into my tea and asked, “What does Donny’s death do to your . . . situation?”

“Nothing, really.”

“Nothing? You mean, you’ll continue living in a Waldorf suite . . . . I don’t mean to overstep, but how is that possible?”

She frowned enough now to show the potential for wrinkling. “You
are
overstepping a little, Jack.”

I shifted in my seat, leaned forward to be heard over the syrupy “Gypsy Love Song,” the little string combo taking Victor Herbert way too seriously. “Honey, I want to be on the up and up with you. I’m looking into Donny’s murder.”

Her eyes, tight with confusion and wide with sudden distrust, bore into me. “You’re . . . what?
Why?
. . . That sounds wrong,
of course
I want Donny’s murder looked into, and whoever did this awful thing brought to justice, but . . . that’s the
police’s
job. Isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is. But I’m licensed investigator, Honey. And among my duties for the Starr Syndicate is protecting its interests.”

She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. “What interests?”

“The Americana comic properties we syndicate. And their creators—like Spiegel and Shulman, for instance.”

“Why them?”

“Come on, Honey. You must know they’re bound to be prime suspects in this thing. Donny made his share of enemies, but they’re at the top of the list.”

She untilted her skull but kept the eyes narrow. “And you want to . . . what?
Help
them, or . . . what?”

“If they’re innocent, I want them cleared, fast. If they’re guilty, I want them caught the same way. Minimize the damage to the interested party.”

“Interested party,” she said, and sipped coffee, “being the Starr Syndicate.”

“Frankly, yes. I have no doubt that Captain Chandler is competent, and . . .” I nodded to the fan-dancing elephant. “. . . cute as these cartoon critters. But I know the comics business, and the people involved, better than he ever will.”

One eyebrow hiked. “And . . . the people involved who you
don’t
know all that well? Like me, for instance? Them you need to cultivate?”

I raised both palms, chest high, in surrender. “I’m being on the up and up, Honey, like I said. Nobody on earth knew Donny better than you—in fact, I’m convinced you knew things about him, knew sides of him, no one else did.”

She swallowed—not her coffee, just swallowed. “I was very fond of him.”

“And he was fond of you.” I leaned forward again. “But fond enough to remember you in his will? Despite how that might look?”

Her eyes and nostrils flared. I braced for getting coffee splashed in my face, but she drew in several breaths and finally said, “I’m a suspect?”

“Of course you are. Hell, so am I. I was there, wasn’t I, when the murder happened?”

“
Happened
, Jack? Donny’s murder didn’t, didn’t ‘happen’—somebody
did
it. And it wasn’t me. I . . . I loved Donny, in a way. I wasn’t
in
love with him, but he was sweet to me and good to me and I saw, yes, I saw sides of him nobody else ever did.”

Now I sipped coffee, trying to calm the conversation. I needed to set a pace quick enough to get answers that weren’t overly thought out, and slow enough not to rush her into irritation.

I said, “What I’d really like to do is rule you out, and then make an ally of you.”

She actually laughed a little; a bitter edge to it, but a laugh. “You’re Nick, I’m Nora? No thanks.”

“I’m not looking for a partner. I just need you to answer some questions.”

“Haven’t I been?”

“Yes. And I appreciate that. But you didn’t answer my question about Donny’s will.”

She shrugged. The strings were having a go at “Wandering Gypsy Girl.” She said, “I’m not in his will.”

I squinted at her through the cigarette smoke. “But you said your life wouldn’t be interrupted . . . .”

She raised her chin, very dignified. Or trying to be. “Years ago Donny set up a trust fund for me. It’s entirely mine, and generates enough money for the rest of my life to keep me in . . . comfort.”

“Did . . . excuse me, I have to ask . . . did Donny’s death mean you can access the principal?”

She took no apparent offense. “No. When I reach age fifty . . . I’m thirty-three now . . . that automatically comes into effect. I believe Donny did assume he’d be gone by then, and that I should have control over my own life.”

I drew a breath. Let it out. “Another personal question. Do you pay for the Waldorf suite yourself, out of the money the trust fund generates?”

Quickly she shook her head. “That’s taken care of by Americana. I have a contract with Americana as Donny’s executive secretary; it, too, is set up to run until I’m fifty. My ‘salary’ is the cost of the suite, set up for any increases at the hotel to be compensated by Americana.”

“What if Louis Cohn just . . . fires you?”

“If I’m let go, according to that contract, Americana pays me a lump sum of $150,000. I don’t think Louis is likely to exercise that . . . and if he does, well, I’ll move on with all that money.”

“I see. Donny really did look out for you.”

“Yes.” Her tone was mildly defensive. “And you can see that I don’t really improve my situation by having him gone.”

I sat back. My mind spun with possibilities. Finally I said, “I’m going to have to seem impolite again. I’m sorry.”

“Go on.”

“Suppose you were sick of Donny. Suppose you secretly loathed him. Hated having to . . . deal with him and his, excuse me, needs—”

She’d started vigorously shaking her head halfway through that. “No, no, no, that’s ridiculous. I was very fond of him. He was like a big, generous uncle to me.”

The
come-sit-on-Uncle’s-lap-sweetie
kind.

Again I leaned forward. “Did Chandler ask you about any of this?”

“About . . . Donny’s will, and my . . . situation?”

“That’s right.”

“No. Not at all.”

I sighed. “Well, he’ll get around to it. The fact that you will continue to get Donny’s money, and to live in that suite, without having to put up with him and his—”

“I didn’t look at it that way!”

“Well, Chandler will. Honey, your best course of action is to trust me. To tell me anything you know about Donny that might have . . . no nice way to say it . . . made somebody have wanted to murder him.”

She was breathing hard. “Could we go back upstairs? I don’t want to talk about this here, anymore.”

“Sure.”

Within ten minutes we were again seated on her sofa by that cold fireplace. I had allowed her to fetch herself a martini, which she was not by any means gulping.

Her feet were up on the glass table—she had kicked off her black heels—and her nyloned legs were crossed. She was sipping the martini and staring into nothing particular.