The Prince of Beverly Hills (26 page)

“All right, all right,” Stampano said quickly. “I’ll be there.”

“At six A.M., before there’s anybody on the beach. Don’t be late.” Rick hung up. He checked on Glenna again, then ordered dinner sent over from the commisary.

He slept on the floor next to Glenna that night.

54

RICK WOKE AT FOUR A.M. without an alarm clock. Glenna was still asleep, and he didn’t disturb her. He went to his office, showered and got Eddie Harris’s money from the safe.

He examined the five five-thousand-dollar bills closely, since he had never seen one before. James Madison’s picture was, indeed, on the notes. He stacked them together squarely, then took some scissors from his desk and cut them in two, lopping off the right-hand one-third of each. Then he took cellophane tape and joined them together again and returned them to the envelope.

He checked his .45 again, put on his coat, put the money in a pocket, then went to his car and left the studio. He was parked at the north end of the beach lot at five-thirty. It was still dark and very foggy.

He got out of the car, walked over to the little building housing the toilets and checked both pay phones to see that they had a dial tone. “Al?” he called. “You there?” He couldn’t do this without Al.

Al’s voice came from the roof of the building. “I’m here.”

“Can you see the beach in front of you?”

“Just barely. The fog should begin to lift a little when it gets light.”

Rick hoped so. He hadn’t counted on fog when he’d made his plan. “Okay, I’m going down to the beach.” He walked down a flight of concrete steps to the beach, found a rock and sat down on it. The light was slowly coming up, and he could just make out the line where the water met the sand. The tide was low, leaving a wide stretch of wet, packed beach. He waited as patiently as he could, checking his watch frequently. It was at times like this that he missed smoking.

At five minutes to six, he heard a car, then the engine stopped and a car door slammed, then another. Stampano hadn’t come alone.

Rick got up and walked down to where the sand was wet and waited. The light was coming up fast, now. He unbuttoned his jacket, reached inside it and unsnapped the thumb break on the shoulder holster, made sure the gun was cocked and locked.

Then, as he gazed into the fog, a single figure materialized. Stampano kept walking, then stopped about ten feet from Rick.

“Okay, let’s do it,” Stampano said.

“Tell the other guy to come up here and stand next to you, where I can see him, and tell him his hands better be empty.”

Stampano thought about it, then turned and called out something to somebody. A moment later a large man appeared, his hands empty but his jacket unbuttoned. He came and stood next to Stampano.

“All right,” Stampano said, “I’m here.”

“I told you to come alone,” Rick said. “You broke the rules.”

“I’m here. Let’s get this done.”

Rick opened the right side of his jacket so that Stampano could see there was no gun there, then he reached into the inside pocket and took out the envelope. He removed the five bills, spread them out and held them up. “Five five-thousand-dollar bills,” he said. “Let me see the prints and negatives.”

Stampano reached under his jacket for the small of his back.

“Careful,” Rick said. “Do it slowly, and don’t show me any hardware.”

Stampano slowly produced a large brown envelope and held it up. “Here they are.”

“Show me.”

Stampano reached into the envelope and pulled out some eight-by-tens. “Six prints,” he said. He replaced the prints and pulled out half a dozen negative strips. “Here are the negatives; twenty-four exposures.”

“Stand very still,” Rick said. “Either of you moves a muscle, you’re dead.”

The big man’s hand began to move inside his jacket.

Rick raised his left hand and pointed one finger at the sky. Half a second later, a burst of automatic fire erupted, making a row of explosions in the sand between Rick and the other two men. They froze.

“You bastard,” Stampano said.

“You brought backup, I brought backup,” Rick said. “Now I want you to walk over to me and hand me the envelope. I want to inspect the goods. If they pass inspection, you’ll get your money.” He pointed at the other man. “And if you move a muscle, your head will explode.” He beckoned to Stampano.

Stampano walked slowly forward and stood three feet from Rick, who held out his left hand. Stampano gave him the envelope.

Rick opened it, looked at the prints, which were all of Glenna and Stampano, but with his face cropped out. He held the negatives up to the increasingly bright sky. They were all duplicates of the print of Glenna. None showed the Keans or Stampano’s face.

“Take five giant steps backward,” Rick said.

“Gimme the money.”

“In a few minutes. We’re going to wait for a phone call.”

“A phone call? What are you talking about?”

“Shut up and walk backward if you want the money.”

Stampano backed up. “What’s going on?”

“Be patient, Chick. We’ll be done in a few minutes.”

The three men stood on the beach, staring at each other. Ten minutes passed, then another five. Twenty minutes were gone before Rick heard a phone ring once, then stop. He held up his hand. “Stand still.” A moment later, the phone rang twice, then stopped. Rick smiled. “All right, Chick, come and get the money.”

Stampano walked up and held out his hand. “Gimme,” he said.

Rick opened his envelope and removed the print of the four people, with Glenna’s face cut out, and handed it to Stampano. “You cheap little chisler,” Rick said, “you held out on me.”

“Where’d you get this?” Stampano demanded.

“It shows you with the Keans, doesn’t it? And only a few days before you killed them. This photograph, along with Glenna’s testimony, can put you in the death chamber up at Quentin.”

“Sez you.”

Rick took the five bills from the envelope, ripped them apart where they had been taped, and handed the short ends to Stampano. “Here’s all the money you’re going to get for now. A year from today, you’ll get the rest—on the following conditions: One, Glenna doesn’t hear from you again, and neither does
any other actress
in town. Two, none of the photographs of Glenna or any of the other girls is circulated or published. I’d better not ever even hear of a rumor to that effect. I’m not going to ask you for the rest of the prints and negatives because I already have them. That’s what the phone call was about.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re all cleaned out, Chick, but there’s more. If Glenna or the other girls hears from you again,
ever
, you’re dead. You get a bullet in the brain. If any of them, or me, for that matter, stubs a toe, or gets so much as a flat tire, you’re dead. If I or any of them ever walks into a restaurant or a club and you don’t leave immediately, you’re dead. Do you understand everything I’ve said?”

Stampano stood, his jaw working, but speechless.

“Or I can just lift one finger, and you die right here on this beach, right now, you and your man. You hear me, Chick?”

Stampano still didn’t speak.

“Say it.”

“I hear you,” he finally managed to say.

“Now go get in your car and drive away from here. And remember this: You ever mess with anybody in this town again, Ben Siegel won’t be able to help you; Charlie Luciano won’t be able to help you. You’ll be done.”

Stampano turned around and walked down the beach, followed by his man. The fog had lifted, so Rick could see them all the way to their car, see them drive away.

“Okay, Al!” he shouted. “Come get your money, and let’s go home!”

55

RICK DROVE BACK TO THE STUDIO, to his office, and waited. Ten minutes later, Ben Morrison and Tom Terry showed up with a handful of envelopes.

“You got it all?” Rick asked.

“We cleaned out two safes, one in Stampano’s house, one in Ben Siegel’s office at the Trocadero and a locked filing cabinet in the photographer’s darkroom. You were right; Glenna wasn’t the only girl he was blackmailing. There’s pictures of Lara Taylor and some others.”

“Did you pay Hans?”

“We did.”

“Here’s another five hundred apiece for a job well done.” Rick doled out hundreds. “Ben, thanks for your help. I still want you to keep an eye on Stampano, especially for the next month or so.”

“Will do.”

“I need to talk to Tom for a minute, so I’ll say goodbye.” They shook hands and Morrison left.

“Sit down, Tom.”

Terry sat down.

“Tom, it looks as though I might be moving up at the studio pretty soon. How would you like my job?”

Terry grinned. “I’d like that just fine.”

“Don’t say anything to anybody yet. I still need to get Eddie Harris’s approval, and that may take some time, but I think we can get this done by the end of the year. You’ll like the money, I promise.”

Terry left, grinning broadly, and Rick began opening envelopes. Stampano had been a busy boy. He had photographs of half a dozen actresses at different studios. Rick locked all of them in his safe, except those of Glenna and the Keans, then he left his office and went to the soundstage and Glenna’s trailer. She was just waking up as he came in.

“You slept well,” he said.

“I must have been out for nearly twenty-four hours,” she replied, kissing him. “What’s happened?”

“We’re done with Stampano,” he said, holding up the envelope. “I have all the prints and negatives. Do you want to see them?”

She shook her head.

Rick retrieved a steel wastebasket and set fire to the envelope, and they both watched it reduced to ash. “Now all you have to worry about is doing good work on these last scenes,” he said.

She stood up and came into his arms. “I will, I promise.”

“This is going to be a good film,” he said, “and with this success on top of the musical, you’re going to be the newest star in this town.”

HE WATCHED HER WORK that morning, then, satisfied that she was doing well, he went back to his office, retrieved the photographs of the other actresses and went to see Eddie Harris.

Eddie was at his desk, going through a budget. “How’s
Caper
going?” he asked.

“On schedule and a little under budget,” Rick said. “We lost a day’s shooting, but Glenna is back on the job, and she’s looking great.”

“How did it go with Stampano?”

Rick handed him the envelope with the five five-thousand-dollar bills. “I gave him a third of the notes and told him he’d get the rest in a year if he behaved himself. Frankly, I don’t care whether you give it to him or not. You’ve got two-thirds of each bill there, and that’s enough to take them to the bank. He can’t do anything with what he’s got, except frame them.”

“You think he’ll behave himself?”

“I’ve explained to him that if he doesn’t, bad things will happen to him. Do you have any way to get to Luciano?”

“I know somebody who knows somebody who knows him.”

“I think he’s the key. If you can persuade him to bring Stampano back to New York permanently, then he’ll be out of our hair for good.”

“He’s going to want something from us to do that.”

“Tell him we’ve got the goods to send Stampano to prison for twenty years.”

“Do we?”

Rick handed him the envelope with the photographs of the actresses. “My guy took these out of two safes and a filing cabinet in Stampano’s house and at the Trocadero while I was talking to Stampano out at the beach.”

Eddie went through the envelope quickly. “This is the most appalling stuff I’ve ever seen,” he said. “There are two girls from Metro here, one from RKO, one under contract to David Selznick and one with Sam Goldwyn.”

“And they’ve probably all paid Stampano money.”

“I’d love to prosecute the guy, I really would, but I can’t see these girls or the studios ever testifying against him.”

“He’s counting on that, I think, but maybe the threat will keep him in line.”

“I hope so.”

“You should know that some of those came out of the safe in Ben Siegel’s office at the Trocadero, so he’s got to be in on this.”

“Then I’m going to have to get to Luciano, one way or another.”

“That would be a good idea. There’s something else I’d like to talk to you about.”

Eddie grinned. “You found a property.”

Rick nodded.

“I was impressed with how quickly you learned on
Caper
, and I’ve seen the rough cut to date, so I think you’re ready. What do you want to do next?”

“I found a script in your slush pile that I like. It needs some work, though.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a kind of screwball comedy called
Ready to Go
.”

“I remember liking that when I read it, but you’re right, it needs work. I’ll assign you a writer.”

“So, I’m a producer?”

“Just as soon as you can replace yourself.”

“I can do that today. Tom Terry was a big help on the Stampano thing. I think he’d do a great job for us.”

“Then hire him. Offer him a little less than you’re making and let him pick out a car for himself. When can he start?”

“Right away, I should think. I’ll call him today.”

“Then today, you are a producer, my son. Here’s what I have in mind.”

Rick listened as Eddie sketched out a production deal, and he liked what he heard.

“But, Rick, you’ve got to remember that in this business you’re only as good as your last movie.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“I’ll find you an office in this building and a new secretary.”

“I’d like to bring Jenny with me, if that’s all right.”

“Okay, I’ll find Tom Terry a new secretary.”

“And if you’d still like him to move into your guest house, I think he’d like that.”

“Absolutely. Suzanne will like him.”

The two men shook hands, and Rick walked out of the building on a large cloud. He headed back to the soundstage to tell Glenna the news.

56

THE NEXT MONTHS WENT briskly and happily for Rick and Glenna. He finished shooting on
Caper
and simultaneously worked on the post-production for that film and the pre-production for
Ready to Go.
He discovered that he loved editing and spent many hours in a darkened room with an editing machine and an editor.