Chapter 3

By 11:30 I was out of Ginger Ale and the whiskey was warm enough to let me know I had had enough. I figured it wouldn't hurt to cruise on down to The Showtime, where Dickey had originally picked Sissy up and see if they knew anything. I figured chances were slimmer than me getting a date with one of the dancers, but I could think of worse ways to waste my time. 

The Showtime was only twenty minutes outside the city down some winding mountain roads that the sauce in my belly didn't agree with. I pulled my sedan into the parking lot just before midnight. It was a Tuesday so I was able to get a spot. The Showtime was a popular hangout for upper class gangsters and lower class politicians. The types of City Councilmen that kept company here didn't have to worry about re-election as snug as they were in the pockets of people like Dickey. Lambert ran a regular shift down here Fridays and Saturdays so it was never any secret who was coming or going, and some of the John Does even took a little pride in being associated with the place. I had only ever read about it in black and white. Private Dicks don't impress any one enough to get special treatment in a place like this. 

I took a seat at a booth near the back and watched some five piece discount orchestra go through the motions. Half the tables were full of the usual characters, a few of them still wearing their hats and overcoats. A short little number in a skirt too high and a blouse too low made her way over to me and I ordered a Manhattan and sat back and cased the joint. I didn't bother getting up or going far, figuring the action would come to me. I was right. About halfway through my second drink I felt a cold hard hand on my shoulder and a voice like a bass drum. 

"What's the big idea Mack? Don't have a better way to kill a Tuesday night?" 

"Don't me mind," I reassured him, "I'm just here for the air conditioning." 

A tall dark fellow just slightly smaller than the room we were sitting in came around from behind and managed to make himself comfortable across from me. His head was shaved smooth and reflected the lights from the ceiling above him. He was wearing one of those big wide lapeled suits with an orchid in the front pocket and a tie that looked like it was cut from the Ringling Brother's circus tent. A fragrant little mini cigar hung out of the corner of his mouth. It smelled like a funeral parlor when he exhaled across the table, which he seemed to take a particular pleasure in doing. 

"We don't get many Shamuses throwing back here at the Showtime, Mack. Spill it, what gives?"

"How do you keep from the shoe polish from dripping down off that dome of yours and mussing up that Zoot? And who so says I'm here on business, can't a guy just hold down a table for a couple of hours without bothering anybody?"

"No." 

"Well in that case, why don't you tell me how I get an audience with old George Stansall on a night like tonight. Doesn't seem like there's too much else going on and if he's not too busy sitting around in his office counting his money, I'd sure like to chat him up."

The pile across the table from me grunted and sort of grinned, but didn't say anything and just went on smoking.

"Go ahead, you can even till him Dickey Bernard sent me here to ask the questions. Maybe that'd get his nose out of his checkbook." That almost did it. I saw a small flash of interest flicker in his eyes, but just as quickly it was gone and that grin was all that was left of it. 

"Dickey Bernard sent you, here, to bother me?" He graced me with another of his characteristic grunts. "That'd be the day, but I tell you what, it's the best yarn anyone's come up with in a while, so I'll go and get Mr. Stansall and spin it for him. We'll let him try it on for size."

He got up and walked away past the stage and through a small door in the corner that I hadn't noticed. He wasn't gone for long and when he returned that same damn grin was smeared across his face. "I guess you got him on a good night. This ought to be fun." He nodded for me to follow him and we went back through that small door next to the stage. It led to some sort of small sitting room with some cheap tin chairs and a couple of posters of foreign cities. It looked like the waiting room for some fly by night travel agency. Two doors faced us, I figured on of them went to where the girls got dressed and the other was probably Stansall's office. Titus and I barely fit into the room together and I was doing my best being patient and waiting for him to point me towards the right door. Instead he turned, exhaled some more of that putrid little cigar and put that grin back on. 

"Got to frisk you, Shamus. Don't hold it against me." 

"Knock yourself out, but you won't find anything. I don't carry heat, can't stand the stuff, bad for my disposition." He didn't seem dissuaded and felt out all my pockets and otherwise.  He pulled my wallet out of my coat pocket and took a peak at the inside. Not much to see, but it did have my cellophane Private Investigator license. He held on to that, for posterity I suppose. When he was done he pulled back his jacket showing off a little snub-nosed detective special tucked into his waist band. Just in case there had been any doubt. 

He led me through the door on the left into a large office, empty except for an oak desk bigger than the bed I slept in facing two wing back chairs. George Stansall, owner and operator of the Showtime, sat behind it. I took a seat in the chair on the left and my companion stayed back by the door. Even so I could still feel him and his handy little .38 staring me down. 

The room was lit by a single desk lamp that faced directly at a large leather bound ledger on Stansall's desk. There wasn't much light to go by but Stansall seemed to be a uniquely underwhelming man. He didn't bother rising to greet me so it would be hard to say exactly but I would put him at no taller than five eight. He wore a custom suit with the all the trimmings. His bald head sported a pair of thick glasses and was held up by a neck thinner than my toothbrush. He looked like someone's bald kid brother dressed up in Dad's Sunday best. Just goes to show you that it's not all muscles and jaw lines in this business. 

"Curtis Maxwell, Private Eye. The pleasure seems to be all mine." 

Stansall pulled out a gold pocket watch, flipped it open and looked down at it, all the while managing to keep one eye on me. He put the watch down on his desk, under the lamp. 

"You have five minutes of my time, Mr. Maxwell. Do your best not to waste it." He frowned at me in a way that said that I would probably do just that.

"So much for asking about the Dodgers' chances this fall, I guess we'll just have to get down to business." Nothing from across the desk except that same concrete frown. This town sure seemed to be taking itself pretty seriously lately. "I was sent here by Mr. Richard Bernard. He wants to know when he can expect the money that you owe to Sissy Kanopolis." It was a shot in the dark and a pretty broad one at that, but it seemed cooler than coming right out with Dickey's actual business. Stansall took the bait though and bit hard.  

He seemed to grow an inch or two in his chair and his pale cheeks got just a little pinker. Though it was hard to tell behind those coke bottles on his face, his eyes seemed to get just a little smaller as well. 

"Tell that son-of-a-bitch that Sissy's contract was for six months and if she wants to get paid, she still owes me two. Tell him that she and I had an agreement and that this ain't no charity house I'm running here. And tell him that just because he got tired of sending his goons out my way and got the gumption to hire some Private Dick to track down his business doesn't scare me one bit. I'm a business man and he if doesn't respect that I don't know what to tell him."

"Well I can't speak for Mr. Bernard, but I get the idea that there's a whole lot in this town that he does respect. In any case I'll be sure and relay him your message. Sorry for taking up your time." I got up to go and walked back to the door behind me. The gorilla was still guarding the door and for a moment stayed put and acted like he wasn't going to let me through. I sized him up and decided there was no way through any door he didn't want me to get through. Eventually though he just grinned and thrust my wallet back into my chest hard enough to nearly knock the wind out of me. The grin came back. 

"Have a nice night, Curtis."

****

The long drive home gave me a chance to sort out my thoughts. If Stansall was still sore at Sissy for bailing out of her contract it stood to reason that he would have no idea as to her whereabouts. Otherwise, he would have her back at work by now. It was understood that Stansall's girls were more like indentured servants than showgirls. They drew up contracts, agreed to a certain length of time, six months say, and at the end of it, were given a paycheck and an option to renew. In the meantime, he gave them a living stipend and put them all up in bungalows outside of town. Some nights those bungalows made it into my dreams. 

I took the same winding mountain roads back to the city that I had come in on. Out here there's no hiding, and it didn't take me long to notice my tail. To be fair though he didn't seem to be hiding himself either. I sped up about fifteen over the limit just to test him and he stayed the same fifty or so yards behind me. Then I slowed way down, seeing maybe if he would pass. He didn't of course. I figured I would just make it back to the city and shake him there. It was probably just the gorilla with the circus tent tie making sure I didn't cause any more trouble around the club. Just the same I reached over and opened the glove box. I rooted around for a minute and took out the Luger I kept in there and put it on the seat beside me. Knowing it was there made me drive just a little straighter. 

All the sudden though the headlights behind me got a lot bigger and before I knew it they were just a few feet from my bumper. I felt a bump from behind and held the wheel tight with my left hand while the right reached for the Luger. Another bump and the back of the car was fishtailing all over the road. All the sudden I was cussing the whiskey and sodas. A third bump was enough to send me to the shoulder of road, turned around backwards, my grill facing the way I had come from. The high beams on the other car were on full blast and pointed right at me, blinding me to anything that may have been in front of me. I threw open my door, thrust the heater out in front me and hoped for the best. I never even had a chance. 

He had managed to get behind me somehow and the blackjack came across my skull like a whip and the ground rushed up to meet me. I lost my gun somewhere and groped around for it, but without luck. I tried my hardest to hold onto consciousness but I knew that it was no good. A dull warmth was coming from where my hat should have been and spreading down towards my neck. A healed leather boot planted itself right next to my nose. 

"Sissy Kanopolis appreciates your dropping this case and staying out of her business." The voice was high and effeminate and with some sort of European accent that in my state I couldn't manage to place. "She will be most appreciative to not have to deal with the matter again."

The last thing I remember before blacking out was the smell of expensive French cologne and the sound of a lighter being flicked open and struck. After that it was curtains.

Chapter 2

Guy Lambert was my eyes and ears down at the paper. Bred from pure Irish stock, he was a bulldog of a mick and a damn fine reporter. He specialized in the social lives of gangsters and the company they kept. Normally any bone headed rag man dim enough to stick his nose into someone like Dickey Bernard's business had another thing coming, but Guy Lambert knew just how to play the game. He treated them like stars of the silver screen or robber- baron millionaires. If Dickey had dinner out at La Botana, the new steakhouse down outside of Culvert city, Guy was there snapping photos and taking quotes. The next weekend you would have better luck getting a seat behind the mayor's desk than you would at La Botana. If, however, Guy overheard Dickey complaining about his fettuccine being overcooked, well La Botana might as well pack it up and try again in Peoria. Any respectable paper in any respectable city would have rightfully turned their nose up at what Guy called his stories: Gossip and rumors centered around gangsters and their social lives. But Guy was smart enough to be employed by neither a respectable paper nor a respectable city. The bottom line was his stories sold papers and lots of them.

Guy made his living riding the coattails of dangerous people while staying on this side law, and he did it by making everybody happy. The gangsters loved seeing their picture in the paper and the public loved reading about them. The bulls down at county couldn't hold much against him either, as long he kept people like Bernard high profile, they figured they would be easy to keep an eye on. Any case dealing with Dickey Bernard was bound to start with Guy.

I phoned him down at his office and asked if he could meet me for a steak and a beer. He tried to blow me off with some crow having to do with tracking down a lead involving Cheeks Carmichael and his missing prize bulldog, but all it took was the mention of one name.

There was a long silence on the other end of the phone and finally Lambert said simply, "Buster's grill, 5:30. Beers are on you." The click on my receiver told me that that was all Lambert had to say on the matter.

I looked at the clock on the wall. Buster's was thirty minutes away with traffic so that gave me two hours. Already this afternoon I had more work under my belt than the last two weeks combined. I buzzed Sylvia and told her I would be reading up on this new case and to hold my calls and tell visitors I was out. I took a folder out of the bottom right draw of my desk, opened and spread its contents over my desk. Then leaned back, propped two sized 12 leather dogs on top of it all, and put my hat over my face. I'm sure Sylvia could hear my snoring from the outer office.


********

At 6:10 Guy rolled into Buster's, sat down across from me in the booth, and held up two fingers to the bartender.

"I got two in me already, Guy," I told him nodding towards the glasses I had emptied waiting for him, "don't worry about me."

"You shamuses think everyone's just out to do you favors all the time don't you?" He asked as the bartender set two mugs down in front him. He gripped them both and neither one of them slid my way. He didn't say anything for a couple of minutes and I let him get intimate with his suds.

He was a big guy, taller than me and broad as the doorway he walked through to get in here. A patch of red hair that had forgotten what a comb was perched above his ears and eyebrows and I couldn't help noticing that there was less of it lately. He had that type of chin that micks seem to have patented, hard and sharp and for all I know he used it to open his beer bottles. His brown suit looked like he'd slept in it and his shirt cuffs were frayed and stained with ink. These newspaper men are all the same, too busy chasing leads to do their dry cleaning but still self aware enough to hide their three day stink with half a bottle of Five and Dime aftershave whenever they went out.

He finished his first beer, and pulled out a tin cigarette case. He pulled out two hand rolled cigarettes and handed me one. I don't smoke, but it didn't seem like the time to bring that up. I accepted the flame of his lighter and inhaled what seemed like a combination of stale tobacco and fresh fish.

"These things are disgusting," I said through the thick blue haze between us.

"Sissy Kanopolis, eh?" He said, taking no notice of my critique. "You're going to sit here and tell me that Dickey Bernard just strolled into your office and asked you to track down Sissy Kanopolis? And that you agreed? I got to hand it to you Maxwell, either you're dumber than I thought or times are tough and you're mouth starts watering at the first smell of a fresh twenty."

"It's probably a little both," I told him, "though I never got the impression that you ever took me as too smart."

"That you got right. But seriously Maxwell, you been around this town just as long as I have. You know what you're into here and it ain't tracking down some fussed up kid's milk money. These people don't kid around. You don't dig up this fellow's dame and you're as good as finished. And I don't mean as a private dick, though you can count on that, I mean finished period. I don't think you swim too well with concrete boots on." He exhaled the rest of his cigarette and shook his head. "In any case I hope you got your will wrote up."

"If the homily's over, Father Lambert, why don't you tell me what you know? Who is this girl and whys Dickey take it so personal that she bumped off? Can't he just find some other arm candy to show up to the theatre with?"

Guy sort of scoffed and shook his head, took another mouthful of beer and started. "He met her down at the Showtime. She was dancing and he was paying. She's a broad shouldered gal, a little thick around the middle but she fills it out nicely and looks good in heels. I guess she reminded Dickey of the tough broads that he used to rope cattle with back in Tulsa and he took a liking to her. What Dickey wants, Dickey gets and what broad waiting tables and dancing for dimes wouldn't want to be on the arm of the most powerful man in town? The rest is history. That was only a few weeks before Cherry's..." he hesitated, the reporter in him choosing his words wisely, "accident, so there are those who suggest maybe Sissy was some sort of catalyst for what went down." He shook his head and lit another square. "But I've never been sure. That's another thing that really gets me about this girl. I'm square enough with Bernard's crew that they don't mind me poking around a little when there's a bite of gossip to be had. But bring up the girl and I come up with a roomful of clams. That's the way the game goes. Dickey lets me put his picture in the paper and the people are happy and the bulls think they got their eyes on him, but all he's really doing is catching their eye with what doesn't matter and holding the rest of his cards right up against his lapels."

"Sounds like a fine romance" I said, "but I could have read it down at the drug store for a penny. But I don't buy that pulp. Why's he want her back so bad, why not rescue some other doll, clean her up, feed her Filet Mignon and call it at that?"

"For a Dick you sure don't listen good." Lambert replied rolling his eyes. "She's more to him than just showing off. He took a liking to this one and doesn't let anyone get too close to her. She popped off on him and now he's hurt. I probably don't need to tell you how queer it is that Dickey would come to any old private Dick to track down his ladies. Believe me, whatever Dickey needs tracked down, he's sure as hell got his own people to track it down for him. But I think the fact that he's willing to drop dough your way means he's a little embarrassed. He's outsourcing so his own people won't know how desperate he is to get some broad back." He sat back and stared at the ceiling fan spinning slowly in the center of the room. "I don't envy you Maxwell," he said finally, "Dickey Bernard is dangerous enough, but get him desperate and who knows what he's likely to do."

"If you're done philosophizing, why don't you tell me where I'm likely to find her?"

"Like I said, I don't know much more than what I've told you. After she and Dickey were spotted around town together a couple of times, I started doing some homework. All I could dig up was a brother in San Bernardino who wouldn't return my calls and a small criminal record. Little things from before Dickey picked her up, drunk in public, shoplifting. Nothing that would sell any papers." He took a folded up scrap of paper from his breast pocket and slid it my way. "There it is, what I've dug up over the last year, it all fits on one sheet of paper."

I took one of the bills that Bernard had given me, reached over the table and tucked it into his shirt pocket. "Thanks Guy, you're a pal."

"Curtis," he said, using my first name, "For a minute here, I'm not a newspaper man, I'm your friend and I'd really hate to write your obit. I mean it, this thing could get ugly."

"Thanks for the concern, old man, but I've been watching my back long enough to know when someone's sneaking up. I've dealt with love-sick Johns before, and gangster or not, just get their lady back to them and they're happy."

He didn't agree, but he didn't argue either. We ordered a pair of steaks and ate in silence. By the time we finished and Guy had packed it up it was 8:30. Too late to drive to San Bernardino, but still too early to bribe the night watchman down at the courthouse to let me poke around in the records. I drove back to my apartment, took off my jacket and spent the next couple of hours getting caught up on some drinking I'd been meaning to do.

Chapter 1

I was sitting in my office working my way towards the bottom of a cheap bottle of not quite new Scotch. It was August and the day was as damp as the back of my shirt and just a little warmer. I had only been back from lunch for 20 minutes and already I was thinking about dinner. I leaned in towards the small electric fan on my desk and thought about a pair of tall black pumps that I connected to a pair of legs that went all the way to the ceiling. With that and the hooch, it was nice enough to make an afternoon of.

The small electric buzzer on my desk rang like the grim reaper’s doorbell. I eyed it with suspicion and no small amount of loathing.

“Curtis a call for you.” Said Sylvia, my secretary. She was the third one in as many months and not unlike the others. She wore too much powder, probably stayed up too late on weeknights and rode around with boys that were no good for her and insisted on getting paid on time. A bothersome habit in my profession where work came at its own pace if it decided to come at all. I would have been happy to let the lot of them go, but then I’d have no one to answer the phone myself when Hilda, my landlady called pestering me about the rent on the office. Sylvia was good for brushing her off and reassuring her that I was off on a high paying case rescuing the duchess of Windsor’s grand champion pup or some nonsense.

“Tell her I’m not in. Better yet, tell her I’m at the post office right now, buying a money order with her name on it.” I hadn’t used that one on her in a couple of weeks, so it just might work.

“It’s not Hilda, Curtis. It’s a man, but I don’t think he is who he says he is, or else he wouldn’t be calling this office.” Sylvia popped her gum loud enough for me to hear and waited for my response.

“Unless he claims to be George Hatfield, put him through. Old George hasn’t talked to me since I won 50 off of him in Tahoe.”

“Whatever you say boss.” Replied Sylvia in a tone that implied that she either didn’t catch my jest or couldn’t care less about it. It was hard to tell with that one.

The small black rotary on my phone rang once, twice and on the third ring I picked it up out of its cradle and brought it to my mouth. “Curtis Maxwell here, Private Eye for hire, what can I do for you Mister…?” I trailed off, realizing I hadn’t caught his name from Sylvia.

“Bernard, Richard F. Bernard, Mr. Maxwell. It’s a pleasure to speak with you.”
I almost coughed up the mouthful of liquor that I had just imported, and I couldn’t tell you if it was from surprise or laughter. I managed to contain myself.

“You’re Dickey Bernard and that was Vivien Leigh that answered the phone. Listen mister, I got a lot or work to get to today so why don’t you go and buzzkill some other jokers?” That part about the work was a lie, but it beat talking to this clown.

“I can understand your skepticism, Mr. Maxwell. I got your name from a friend of mine down at the precinct. I’d rather not say who, if it’s all the same to you.” It was. “I’m looking for a missing person and he told me that you just might be the man to dig them up. I understand you’re quite adept at finding things that have gone missing.” I was. “Anyway I would consider this a sensitive matter and would rather prefer to talk to you in person. I have here the address where your office is located and will be there in approximately on hour’s time if it suits you.” It did.

“Sure it does,” I replied. “I’ll hold my breath.”

“I will see you in one hour then Mr. Maxwell.” He hung up and I sat there waiting for the empty line to sing to me. I put the mouthpiece back in the cradle and picked up the bottle next to it. Empty already. If Dickey Bernard really was coming to my office, I would need a little more liquid courage. I buzzed Sylvia and told her to run down to the corner and pick me up another bottle, and to two step it, would she.

* * * * *


Dickey Bernard had come out to Los Angeles from Oklahoma in ’29. Rumor had it he was born first of the year in double zeros and was exactly the same age as the century itself. But when it came to Bernard, it was hard to tell between truth and rumors. He had left the farm where his grandfather had homesteaded, and headed straight for the city. As if in response to his absence, the country withered up and died, blew east and all ended up in the Atlantic. He left behind his country ways, his Okie accent and his sodbuster boots. And judging from our conversation, somewhere between Tulsa and Malibu, picked up English manners and an East coast determination. But anyone who was born and raised on that hard Southern soil knows you can never get it out of your blood and the grit that lived in the bottom of Bernard’s gut was the same grit that paved the way to him owning half this town.

The story goes that the day he arrived in LA he strolled up to Cherry Maloney, a transplanted Chicago bootlegger turned gun runner and offered him his services. When Maloney laughed at his face and told his two goons to rearrange this young punk’s features, Bernard promptly broke one jaw, handed out a pair of black eyes and made history out some poor fellow’s pretty nose. Turns out Chicago polish is no match for mean Okie blood. Maloney had no choice but to hire Bernard and in just under 9 years, Bernard had worked his way up to second in command of Bernard’s empire. Just last year, Maloney was walking from Boulevard to Broad when he forget to look both ways and walked right out into a traffic of Tommy Gun fire. No one’s quite sure who ordered the hit but Bernard was quick to assume leadership and everyone was smart enough not to ask any tough questions. Since then this has been Dickey’s town.

He had told me he got my name from someone down at the precinct and that seemed square enough. Most of the bulls downtown are smart enough to walk a thin line between city hall and their actual bosses. The fact that Bernard had someone downtown who would sing a name on command didn’t surprise, but the fact that that name happened to be mine did. I mopped the back of my neck with my handkerchief and started naming names in my head.

Bernard arrived, just as he said he would, at 2:30. I heard a car park in the alley facing my office window and I looked down to a see a Rolls Royce in matte gray standing sentinel down below. It sat heavy and low on its shocks, probably from the quarter inch steel plates welded into the doors to make it bullet proof and the windows were tinted black as the ace of spades. A man in a plain black suit leaned against the door and smoked, the bald patch on his head staring up at me.

I heard conversation in the outer room to my office and turned to face the frosted glass on my door. Without a knock or an invitation, Dickey Bernard strode into my office. He wore a gray flannel suit that looked as though it had been pressed on the way over. His shirt was as white as a baptism gown with a green silk ascot tucked into it. His hair was parted in style and looked like it had been waxed right along with his car. Though his shave looked fresh enough, he had that hard Oklahoma edge that no razor can take off. He walked toward my desk, with only the faintest hint of a limp, most likely evidence of his latest survived hit. He sat down, took out a gold monogrammed cigarette case, stuck one in a ceramic holder and eyed me for a good long while. After what I supposed was long enough I held out a lit match and he accepted.

“You’re taller than in the papers.” I told him.

“As I said on the phone, Mr. Maxwell,” he began, without taking to my crack. “I seem to have lost something and I was told you might be able to recover it for me. I am sure that you need no assurance of my monetary standing and though I am not one for written contracts, I am good for my word. The job that I am offering pays fifty dollars a day with a guarantee of two hundred and fifty. That is all considering you come up with the goods.”

I looked at him long and hard, and nearly in the eyes. “Twenty five dollars a day plus expenses is my going rate, and no guarantee is necessary, I’ll get the job done. Considering of course, that whatever you lost wants to be found, and I can tell you from plenty of experience that that’s not always the situation. I can track down someone that’s looking ahead at their next move no problem, but a dame looking backwards, and don’t try and tell it’s not a dame you’re after, a dame looking backwards is almost always impossible to catch up with." He exhaled a elegant blue plume of French tobacco smoke and smiled. He reached inside his coat and took out two crisp twenty dollars bills and grinned across my ragged plank of a desk. He put the money on the particle board and slid it across with the bravado of a hundred dollar chip in Reno.

“I think you’re just my man Maxwell.” He said through his cigarette.

“Yeah sure,” I heard myself promising him, trying hard not to stare a hole in the bills, “and this sounds just like my kind of job.”