Jimmy and Fay (8 page)

Polly said she shouldn't have done it, but she agreed. Within a couple of weeks, word got out that she had a mother and daughter working together in her place, and they attracted a different kind of customer, guys who were willing to pay a lot more to see them in the sack together. It only lasted for a month or so until Kitty's Mother moved back to Chicago and Kitty went back to the street. But the night Polly told me the story, she said it was one of the few things she had done that really made her feel dirty.

Made me queasy, too, and I had reason to remember it later when my business with Miss Wray was working itself out.

Chapter Seven

When the taxi dropped me in front of the speak, I checked the parked cars. No Olds.

I knocked on the door. Fat Joe Beddoes unlocked it and snarled, “There's some fucking newspaper guy to see you.”

By then, it must have been close to midnight. I saw that the crowd was on the thin side but lively. Democrats, no doubt, happy their man was about to take office.

Arch Malloy was working the tables. Connie was with Marie Therese behind the bar. She gave me a quick smile before she remembered that she was mad at me and frosted over. I still didn't know why. I hung up my coat and hat and stopped at the bar. Connie said, “Saxon Dunbar is waiting to see you, and one of those lawyers who was with Miss Wray has called four times. His number is on your desk. ‘No matter the hour,' he wants you to call him.”

“That's what he said, ‘no matter the hour?'”

She nodded and I asked how business had been while I was gone. She said good and asked if I'd found out anything about the pictures.

“Not what I was expecting. When I'm finished with this guy, come up to the office and I'll tell you all about it. And ask Vittorio to make me a sandwich. I'm starving. Something hot. Didya eat yet? No? Tell him to make two.”

She answered with a sly look that was almost a smile and said, “Whatever you say, Jimmy.”

Saxon Dunbar held out a hand and got up from his seat at my table in the back. As usual, it was covered with the day's newspapers, four or five of them. I bought a lot of the papers in those days. Customers brought in more, and everybody who worked in the place gave me the ones that were left lying around. By that time of night, my table was a mess. He had dug out his paper, the
Gotham Comet
, from the stack. Looked like he'd been reading his own column and marked it up with a fountain pen.

Dunbar was a tall, narrow-shouldered guy with a cheviot suit, tartan plaid bow tie, smudge of a mustache, and a British accent. His column was called “Dunbar's Rialto.” It was gossip and news about Broadway, moving pictures, nightclubs, and speaks. He was about half as popular and powerful as Winchell in his heyday. All the guys who wrote that kind of stuff could cut deep when they wanted to, but it always seemed to me that Dunbar took more pleasure from it, saying that somebody or other was Red or lavender.

I recognized him from the caricature that ran over his column, and I saw him around here and there. Even though we knew a lot of the same mugs, he'd never given me the time of day, and that was the first time he'd ever been in my place. But then, he never wanted anything from me before.

He shook my hand and went into his pitch, “I've heard a lot about you. Glad to finally make it official. Nice little place you've got here. I must admit that I didn't completely believe it when I heard that you serve only the McCoy. How do you manage?”

Connie came over before I could answer. I asked for a short brandy and another of whatever the ink-stained wretch was drinking. Rum and ginger ale with a cherry, as it turned out. She brought the drinks, and he danced around for a few more minutes, talking about this and that. There had been a time just a few years before when I'd have been pleased as punch to have Dunbar in my place, hoping that he'd say something wonderful about it in his column. Then after the free publicity, I'd have to turn away dozens of famous folks every night and sell twice as much of the most expensive booze as I did. But things didn't work out that way.

Jimmy Quinn's was a neighborhood bar. The gang guys who had a taste for the good stuff came around, and the cops who could afford it had always found their way in, too. But the limelight eluded us, and the place was popular enough without being so busy that we went crazy. Maybe I was lying to myself when I said that it didn't bother me, but I don't think so. I just didn't have the white-hot ambition that drove guys like Lansky. I made a living, and enough interesting things seemed to happen to keep me from getting bored. Yeah, I lacked a private library, but I'd get around to that by and by.

When he finally decided to get to his point, Dunbar cut his eyes back and forth, making sure nobody was listening in on him and lowered his voice. “I've been told that you are in possession of some extremely graphic and embarrassing photographs of a certain leading lady who's the toast of the town right now. Is there any truth to that?”

He smiled, looking like we were both in the know.

My first reaction was simply to lie and say that I didn't know what he was talking about. It figured that he'd been tipped by the two dimwits from the diner. On orders from their boss, the guy in the backseat of the big Olds. What were they trying to do? Just tighten the screws on the studio? Again, it figured that they didn't know what they were doing.

When I didn't answer, Dunbar got chummier. “Look, I understand you're caught in the middle on this business, and I don't have all the facts yet, but I smell a good story here and I'm willing to do whatever I have to do to get the scoop. I know she was here tonight. They were still talking about her at the bar when I came in. Fay Wray.”

That, I could work with. “Sure, she was here. So?”

“How are you involved with the photographs?”

I decided to play dumb. “I don't know how to answer that. Exactly what are we talking about?”

“All right,” he said, starting to get tired of my act. “Since you read the column, you know that I spend most of my evenings at Jack and Charlie's 21. I've got press agents and publicity men fighting with one another to get a mention for their clients. Tonight I got a call on the telephone they keep at my booth. It's not a published number. Only a few significant people have it. The man who called told me that he has seen nude photographs of Fay Wray, and not just nudes but pornographic nudes. She's trying to buy them back and you're the middleman.”

He paused, and I could see that he was trying to judge my reaction. I tried not to give anything away, but I probably did.

He went on, “Given that sweet little face and disposition, it may be hard to believe, but this isn't the first time around the track for this little filly. Some ‘artistic' photographs that she posed for when she first came to Hollywood came to the surface a couple of years ago. The studio swept them under the rug, but people knew. And that was before it became so unhappy for her at home. Yes, things are stormy at the Saunders household, and it's no surprise that she's fed up with him, the way he acts. Believe me, she's not doing anything that he hasn't done already. Sauce for the goose, you know.”

I nodded and he continued, “The story I was told tonight is that she learned that her husband, John Saunders, had some fluff on the side. They're really a mismatched couple, you know. He's ten years older than she is, frightfully good looking, glib, smooth, worldly, knows exactly how to dress and talk. Rhodes scholar, Oxford, Magdalen College, veteran of the Great War. She's from some Hicksville in western Canada. She's had a few decent roles, but just barely. The little lady is damned lucky to have landed this one.”

He paused and winked like we both understood what he meant.

“Then while she was working on the
Kong
picture, she decided that she needed a little jungle love and set her sights on one of the sambos who played the natives. They spent a lot of long nights on the set. She wasn't as discreet as she might have been, and someone on the crew got the pictures. I'm sure there's more to it than that, but for now it's all I have. The salient point here is that she's willing to do anything and pay anything to get them back.”

Salient
? I'd have to look that one up.

He stopped, gulped his rum, and fished the cherry. “Of course, anyone could say that. When I asked for proof, he said I should talk to you because you are going to handle the money. You'll be making the payoff to the blackmailers tomorrow.”

I reminded myself that the best lies are almost true. “You're misinformed,” I said. “Yeah, I met Miss Wray tonight. If you know anything about me, you know that I don't talk out of turn. Anything between her and me stays between her and me. I'll be speaking with her. Maybe tonight, tomorrow, I'm not sure. When I do, I'll tell her that you want to talk to her.”

Trying to hide his eagerness, he turned his glass and coaster in a circle and spoke slowly. “Yes, do that. And though she doesn't need to be reminded of this, tell her that I'm going to follow through on this with or without her cooperation. I mean her no harm. Truly. I can be her friend, if she'll let me. I just want a good story.”

“Okay,” I said, “I'll pass the word along.”

“And I can do the same for you. Be your friend. You may not think that you need it now because you seem to have cornered the market on good liquor in this part of town. A year from now, that won't be the case. Every other bar and nightspot on the street will have the same bottles that you've got.”

Then I had to give him a look of my own. “You think I haven't figured that out a long time ago? Come on.”

“I can help you stand out from the pack.”

He stood up. “But that's not something we need to worry about at the moment. The lovely Miss Wray is our concern. Here's my number at 21.” He produced a card and handed it to me. “If we handle this properly, it can be extremely profitable for all of us, Miss Wray foremost. I'll be in touch tomorrow, and if you learn anything, you really should let me know about it first.”

After he left, I dug out the copy of the
Comet
he'd been reading. In his doodles, he'd turned his caricature into a devil with horns and a forked tongue.

Arch Malloy had moved behind the bar with Marie Therese. I went to the empty stool at the back corner, motioned him over, and asked if he'd noticed a couple of guys he probably hadn't seen before. “One of them's a kid—messy hair, bad complexion. The other one's older, horse faced, whispery voice. Had coffee stains on his shirt. They didn't order anything expensive.”

“Ah, yes,” he said, “those two. Nursed a couple of beers for an hour. Didn't tip.” Arch had been with us for a few months then. He was an older gent, another mick, but he'd been in New York so long you hardly heard it in his voice. He was one of those guys who read everything he could get his mitts on, and he loved nothing better than to sit back and talk about this, that, and the other. I enjoyed his company, and I've got to admit that if we'd been left alone, not a damn thing would have been accomplished at the place. Arch would spend the whole day jabbering on and on. But he was a good worker, and he'd been spending most of his time going through our inventory in the cellar and doing whatever was needed upstairs in the evening.

“They didn't talk much,” he said, smoothing his soup strainer with a knuckle. “The boy was antsy. The older gent chain-smoked. Can't tell you anything else about them.”

“They got in. Fat Joe must know them, or they mentioned the right name. Ask him about it if you get a minute. I'll be in my office.”

Up in the office, I went to my dictionary and looked up
salient
. Prominent or conspicuous. Good word, but I wasn't sure he'd really used it right.

Then I saw the notes that Connie had left from the RKO lawyer wanting me to call him back “no matter the hour.”
To hell with that
, I said to myself.
I'm not going to talk to anybody until I've had something to eat.
That's when the phone rang.

I shouldn't have picked it up. The lawyer said, “Jules Bennett Grossner here. What do you have to report?”

“Grossner,” I said. “You're the one with the regular glasses. Right.” He was also the one who was so concerned with the long-distance charges to California.

He snorted at the mention of the other guy's specs. “Yes, Shreve and his pince-nez. Were you able to learn anything tonight? Are any of your . . . associates involved?”

How much to tell him? On her way out, Miss Wray's friend Hazel said to talk to her first. And I still thought that someone in the lawyers' office might be in on it, so I said, “No, none of the guys I work with know anything about it. And nobody's making payments to Tammany to handle this kind of stuff. You'll hear from them tomorrow, probably. The guys with the books. You gonna pay them?”

He didn't say anything, and I got the idea they were still trying to figure out how to weasel out of parting with any cash.

“Let me know when you decide,” I said and hung up.

I was still worrying over everything when Connie bumped the door open with her hip and brought in a tray with two grilled cheese sandwiches and a couple of cups of coffee. She put the tray on the table by the divan, pointed to the sandwich closest to me, and said, “That one's got the extra mustard.” We dug in.

Vittorio from the Cruzon Grill upstairs made a hell of a grilled cheese. He sliced the bread thick and browned it up just right. The sandwich had a French name and he objected the first time I asked for mustard on it but he came around.

Between bites, I told Connie that Lansky and Charlie had nothing to do with the pictures, and that the guys who were trying to shake down the studio had tailed me from the speak to Lansky's and I'd talked to them in a coffee shop.