He Done Her Wrong: A Toby Peters Mystery (Book Eight) (Toby Peters Mysteries) (11 page)

I put one hand on a desk to steady myself before making the last half-dozen steps to the door. It turned out to be Cawelti’s always neat and polished desk, and his thin voice whispered in my ear, “Get your fingers off my desk or you’re going to be a one-handed typist.”

I got my fingers off, looked at him, crossed my eyes, and gave him a Harpo Marx gookie face. Cawelti’s face turned bright red, the red in a ripe sugar beet or a Walt Disney cartoon. His holster bounced with the rapid beating of his heart as he stood up.

The two women, one with the black eye and the other with the ear bandage, paused with the wino to look at us. I turned my back and walked to the door, expecting a bullet, another dent in my skull, or teeth in my neck.

“It’s coming to you soon, Peters,” Cawelti said.

“I understand your draft notice is in the mail, John,” I said, opening the door. “We’ll all miss you.” And out I went.

It had, so far, been one beautiful morning and the day had just begun. When I got down to the desk, Coronet was talking to the sailor, who was now awake.

“I ought to know Jean Harlow when I see her,” the kid said. “I seen all her pictures.”

“Dead is dead,” said Coronet reasonably between chews of his gum. “I tell you the whole ambience is out of touch, son.”

I handed the kid the stick of Dentyne that Coronet had given me earlier. He looked at me suspiciously, took the gum, and said thanks.

The rain had stopped but it was coming back soon. I found a nearby drugstore open, sat at the counter, and had spaghetti Milanese and a Spur cola for twenty cents. It was early for lunch, but my stomach needed settling and my mind needed stimulation.

The waitress, who was listening to Walter Winchell on the radio, paused long enough to give me change for some phone calls and I went to work.

The first call was to Mae West.

Dizzy or Daffy answered the phone and got Mae West on a few seconds later. She breathed deeply two or three times before panting “Hel-lo Peters. What can I do for you or vice versa?”

“You can stay home for a few days and let that friend of mine, Jeremy, keep you company till we track down this Ressner. He’s getting a bit unruly.”

“Jeremy that big, big fella?” she asked.

“The same.”

“I’d love to spend a day or two discussing the finer things in life with him. Send him down with a change of pajamas and a bad book. I’m going through a bit of divorce and can use the company of an intellec-tual.”

“I’ll tell him.”

“Be careful.”

“I try to be,” I said, fidgeting for coins for my next call.

“I doubt it,” she said and hung up.

I reached Jeremy in his apartment, the only apartment in the Farraday Building. He didn’t like to leave the place even on Sunday. He had been working on some poems for his forthcoming anthology, an anthology that he decided to publish himself using Alice Palice’s portable printing press, for which Alice would receive a month’s free rent. He quickly agreed to spend a few days guarding Mae West, however.

“I think Alice has a yen for you, Jeremy,” I said, counting my remaining coins.

“She is not without charm,” he said. “That is a woman who never dissembles.”

“And Mae West?”

“There is an art to dissembling that she has mastered,” he said seriously. “I’ve just reworked one of the last poems for the collection. Would you like to hear it?”

“Sure,” I said, standing in a Rexall drugstore, my sore stomach full of spaghetti Milanese and worrying about an escaped lunatic. I really did want to hear it, though I never understood Jeremy’s poems. There was something soothing in them, like a lullaby.

“When the red slayer coughed,

I laughed

and warned him that the night air

was not his lair.

His yellow fire eyes met mine

and gave a sign

that told me I knew not what subtle ways

an ailing God’s maze

is laid out in the corridors of time,

by the minions in mime.

Respect what you do not understand,

and bend or break,

he belched and he was right.

I embraced the night.”

“Beautiful, Jeremy,” I said.

“It’s best if you’ve read Emerson,” he said seriously.

“Best,” I agreed.

“Still needs a little work,” he said.

“A little,” I agreed. “Maybe Mae West will give you some ideas.”

I had the operator get me the number on Winning’s business card. There was no answer. I told her to keep ringing. No answer. I went back to the counter, had a cup of coffee and a stale sinker, and talked to the waitress about the weather and her sister, who was pulling in big bucks working a shipyard. I was careful not to ask if she was working in the yard or on the workers in the yard.

“I’d go to the shipyards, but I haven’t got the build,” she confided.

She looked a little like an egg with long hair. We listened to Winchell race on about the rubber shortage and the possibility of Hitler asking for a peace meeting. Then I excused myself to try for Winning again. This time he answered after ten rings.

“Doc,” I said, “we’ve got a problem.”

I told him about Grayson and chasing Ressner. I told him there wasn’t enough in the file to go on. After he got over worrying about who would pay the bill for Ressner, now that Grayson was gone, he told me a few more things about Ressner that might help.

“This is information given in confidence of an analytical session,” he said and hesitated before going on, “but under the circumstances, I think …”

“So do I,” I said. “I’m running out of coins. Shoot.”

“Ressner’s most recent obsession focused on Miss West, Cecil B. De Mille, and Richard Talbott, the actor.”

“I know who Talbott is,” I said, lining up my few remaining nickels and hoping he’d go on. “Academy Award nomination this year for
Fire on Deck
. You suggesting that I get to De Mille and Talbott?”

“I’m informing,” Winning said. “I suppose Mrs. Grayson will continue to want adequate care for her former husband.”

“Seems reasonable,” I said, “especially after he just murdered her present husband and landed her in a golden widow’s sea of Poodle piss.”

“You know what Freud said about scatology, Mr. Peters?”

“No,” I said, “but if I don’t hang up, I’m probably going to find out. Am I still on the case?”

“You are. Report to me or my secretary daily.”

“Will do,” I agreed, and the operator came on to ask me for another dime. I hung up. Went out, and left a ten-cent tip with the egg-shaped waitress dreaming of shipyards.

I knew where I would be going in the afternoon, but I had a stop to make this morning. I could either hit De Mille or Talbott. I settled on De Mille because I knew where he lived. It was no great secret. Every Hollywood tour took in the De Mille house and had since about 1915 or 1916. I had seen it when I was a kid with my old man on one of those days out we had together.

I got a cab and was at the De Mille house before noon. It was a big white, Spanish-looking place with awnings over the downstairs windows and glass doors all over the place that could be kicked down by a Little Rascal.

I noticed that there were plenty of lush bushes to hide behind. The sky was rumbling again, and I went through the gate trotting to beat the rain and protect my suit. A man was running toward me down the path to head me off. He ambled forward, holding a round metal hat on his head. He was, I could see even at this distance of twenty yards, about sixty, putting on a little weight but moving with a straight back and military bearing.

“And where might you be headed young man?” came that familiar radio voice.

“I’m coming to see you, Mr. De Mille,” I said.

He stopped a few feet in front of me, removed his metal hat, and looked at me. He was dressed in a white shirt, poplin brown jacket, and matching pants.

“I’m afraid—” he said, the way he did on the Lux Radio Theater when time was running out.

“So am I,” I jumped in. “My name’s Peters, Toby Peters. I work for Dr. Robert Winning, and I’m here about someone who has escaped from Dr. Winning’s institute, a Jeffrey Ressner, who you may remember.”

“Remember him indeed,” said De Mille, thumping his metal helmet with his fingers. “Please come into the house before the rain starts. I was just on my rounds to check the neighborhood. I’m an air-raid warden for this sector, but it can wait awhile.”

We got to a side door of the massive place just as the rain came darkly down. He led the way, and I followed through glass doors into some kind of study. The floor was wood and the rug a white animal fur that seemed almost lost in the middle. There were two old leather sofas and a leather chair. They were all such a dark brown that they might as well have been black. Various gadgets sat on shelves around the room. I recognized a globe made of wire, but the others made little sense. One looked like a miniature guillotine. De Mille put his helmet down, leaned against the desk, and looked at me. He picked up a square, highly polished green piece of stone, rubbed it with his thumb, and looked at me again.

“Now, Mr. Peters, what seems to be the difficulty with Mr. Ressner now? And please have a seat.”

I sat in one of the leather sofas so that I could face him. His thin hair was white and the top of his bald head slightly freckled. He had a good healthy tan and eyes that wouldn’t stop probing.

“Ressner got out and it looks as if he killed a man,” I said.

“Indeed,” said De Mille without blinking.

“He has also harassed Mae West,” I went on, “and there is, of course, some chance that he will consider seeing you. He hasn’t, has he?”

De Mille put the shiny stone down, walked over to touch the metal globe, and said clearly in that voice that sounded almost English, “Not for more than five years. On that last occasion, he appeared from beneath our dinner table and ranted on about playing Christ in one of my films. I brought him in here away from my family, humored him till the police arrived. He took it as an act of betrayal.”

“And you haven’t heard from him since?”

“I’ve just said no,” De Mille said with a touch of irritation. “Actually, the man did have a certain uncontrolled talent that would have translated well on film. Had he sanely come to me, perhaps through an agent, I probably could have made use of him, not as Christ but as some kind of madman. And you young man, have you ever acted?”

“Not professionally,” I said.

“Interesting,” replied De Mille, looking at me intently. “I’m thinking of putting together a film about Dr. Wassel. Have you heard of him? The president mentioned him on the radio last month.”

I said no and De Mille went on: “A great unsung hero of this war. There are many heroes of this war whose stories will never be told.”

“I’d like to arrange for a police guard on the house,” I said. “Just in case.”

De Mille awoke from his dreams of Wassel and looked at me with a look he probably reserved for insubordinate assistants.

“While I may not be a young man any longer,” he said, “I have military training and the confidence that I am able to protect my own home with my own people. I am neither a fool nor a coward, Mr. Peters, and I shall take all proper precautions. If need be, I’ll have a few Paramount guards assigned to the house when I am away.”

“Good idea,” I said. “Frank McConnell is a good man.”

“A good man, indeed,” agreed De Mille with interest. “You are well acquainted with studio security.”

“Used to be in the business,” I said. “Who are your closest neighbors?”

“Only one,” said De Mille, glancing toward the window. “W. C. Fields in the next house. We are not particularly close, though we are cordial. There was a tragedy involving my young grandchild not too long ago in Mr. Fields’ pool. And while it was not his fault, it is painful …”

“Sorry,” I said.

“I want to make it clear to you that I do not usually disclose either my personal life or feelings to outsiders,” he continued, looking for something to play with with his nervous fingers. “I do, however, have great concern for my family and will do whatever is needed. I will, of course, check your credentials.”

“Please,” I said. “Check with Mae West, or Lieutenant Phil Pevsner of the L.A.P.D., Homicide, out of Wilshire, or even Gary Cooper. He’s worked with you, and I did a job for him last year.”

“I shall,” said De Mille, taking a step toward me. “On Wednesday we’re having a war bond party at Paramount. That will be in the morning. Providing your credentials check out, you are welcome to come and perhaps discuss whatever progress you might be making.”

He shook his head, leading me to the study door.

“With all the madness in the world, we surely don’t need more,” he said. “Perhaps you can find this Ressner and someone can help him. God knows we can use the support of our fellow men. None of us is without blemish. I’ll tell you a little story.”

The rain had slowed but not stopped. He went to the desk, picked up the phone, and told someone to bring the car around to the study. Then he returned to me.