Parnell Hall: The Naked Typist

“But you acted in good faith.”

“Tell it to the Bar Association.”

“Well, if Castleton paid fifty grand to keep this quiet, he’s not going to make a stink now.”

“Great, Mark,” Steve said irritably. “Now you’re suggesting I blackmail him to keep quiet.”

Taylor rubbed his head. “Jesus Christ.”

“Don’t mind him, Mark,” Tracy said. “He’s just in a bad mood today.”

“Right,” Taylor said. “So that’s what you think now? That it was just a badger game?”

Steve sighed. “I would, except for one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“This is where the whole thing doesn’t make sense, and this is why I’m going crazy, and this is why I’m really in a bad mood today.”

“What’s that,” Taylor repeated.

“She didn’t get the money.”

“What?”

“The cash. The loot. The thirty-three grand. She didn’t get it. Castleton made the settlement out to me. I gave her a check for her share. Tracy called the bank this morning. That check hasn’t gone through.”

“So? That’s not unusual,” Taylor said. “If she deposited it at her bank, it could take five business days to clear.”

“But it won’t.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because the address is phony, the phone number’s phony, you can bet the name Kelly Blaine’s phony, too. That’s almost a sure thing, because when I picked up her purse there was no wallet in it, just a change purse. You can see why. She didn’t want anyone to know who she was, and she didn’t have any driver’s license, credit card, what-have-you, in the name Kelly Blaine. And if Kelly Blaine’s an alias and she’s got no I.D. for it, there’s no way in hell she can cash that check.”

Taylor frowned. “That’s right.”

Steve shrugged. “So there you are. That’s what’s driving me crazy. Here’s a perfectly straightforward, simple scam that went off without a hitch except for one thing. The person who pulled it off didn’t get any money. I, on the other hand, am sitting on the whole fucking fifty grand.”

Taylor chuckled. “An embarrassment of riches. Well, that’s a new one. Okay, I get the picture. The only thing I don’t understand is, what do you want me to do about it?”

“I want you to have Kelly Blaine in my office by four o’clock this afternoon.”

Mark Taylor stared at him. “What?”

Steve grinned. “Just kidding. You can’t do that. That’s the problem. There’s absolutely nothing to go on. So forget finding the girl. I’ve had Tracy type up her description just in case your men should happen to bump into her. But that’s a slim chance at best. Yeah, run down the name Kelly Blaine, but I know you’re gonna come up empty. No, the only lead right now is Castleton. I wanna know how he got in this mess, and why he paid off so easily. Start to work on him. Also David Castleton-that’s the grandson. And Stanley Castleton-that’s the son, now running the business. Though, from what the grandson told me, he’s a figurehead and granddad is still the one pulling the strings.

“Also Phil Danby-that’s Castleton’s right-hand man. Milton Castleton, I mean. Go to work on him too.”

“You want these guys followed?”

“That isn’t necessary. Basically, I just want information. How you get it is up to you. Consider you got a free hand.”

“That’s pretty broad. What, specifically, do you want?”

“I want the dope on these guys. I want the dope on Castleton Industries. Look for anything that might give me a lead to my client. It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack. Worse than that, ’cause the needle I’m looking for may not exist. Right now, I just want data. Somewhere in it maybe I’ll find a clue as to why this girl did what she did.

“One other thing. Maybe I’ll get a lead as to someone who might have been running her.”

“Running her?”

“Yeah. Suppose it’s a badger game like I said, but the girl isn’t the principal, she’s only a pawn in the game. Someone programmed her to set Castleton up.”

Taylor frowned. “Set him up for what? A settlement check he can’t cash?”

“That may not have been the idea, Mark. The idea may have been to put Castleton in an embarrassing position in order to gain some leverage. I may actually have scotched that plan by rushing in and getting an immediate settlement.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, either. The girl came to you. She sent you to Castleton. She agreed to the settlement. In fact, from what you said, she would have settled for less. If settling would have scotched the deal, why would she agree to it?”

“I don’t know, Mark. That’s the problem. The whole thing makes no sense at all. That’s why I need the information. First off, I’d like to find my client-which is probably next to impossible. Barring that, I want all the information I can get.”

“This is getting to be a bad habit with you,” Taylor said.

“What’s that?”

“Not knowing who your client is. Remember the Bradshaw case?”

“That was different.”

“How so?”

“In that case I never met my client. All I had was an anonymous letter. Here, I’ve sat with my client, talked with her face to face, and I still don’t know who she is.”

“Well, I’ll see what I can do. You got that description?”

Tracy passed over a sheet of paper. “Right here.”

Taylor took it, read the description, whistled. “Some plum assignment. My men will be falling all over themselves to be the first one to find her.” He cocked his head, grinned. “This is not a bad description, Tracy, but don’t you think ‘generously endowed’ is a trifle euphemistic?”

Tracy gave him a look. “You expect me to put ‘big tits’ in a memo?”

Taylor raised his eyebrows and fluttered his fingers in front of his mouth as if he had a cigar. “You can put ’em anywhere you like.”

Steve groaned. “Jesus Christ.”

“My Groucho that bad?” Taylor said.

“Frankly, yes. But not as bad as this damn case.” Steve shook his head. “And I’ve got a feeling it’s only gonna get worse.”

Mark Taylor was on the phone when Steve Winslow and Tracy Garvin walked into his office late that afternoon. He grunted acknowledgment, motioned them to sit down and kept on talking. The conversation was unilluminating as far as they were concerned. It consisted of Taylor grunting, “Uh huh,” and scribbling notes on a pad. Finally he hung up.

“Okay. Thanks for coming up,” Taylor said. “I can’t leave here ’cause I got stuff coming in all the time.”

“On my case?” Steve asked.

“Sure. I got eight operatives out now.”

“Eight?”

“Sure. You said I got a free hand, so I’m using it. I got people going over newspaper files, I got people digging into Castleton Industries, I even got an operative primed for personal contact.”

“With whom?”

“I got a girl’s gonna make a play for David Castleton.”

“Oh yeah? They make contact yet?”

Taylor shook his head. “Too early. What time is it, five o’clock? No, she’s in place to pick him up when he leaves work. Which should be any time now.”

The phone rang. Taylor scooped it up, grunted a few times, scribbled a few notes and hung up.

“See,” Taylor said. “It’s been like this all afternoon. Little dribs and drabs. But it adds up to a lot of dope. Not that it’s gonna do you any good. As far as finding your client, I mean. But aside from that you should love it.”

“Why is that?”

“Well, this Castleton’s a character. Milton Castleton, I mean. The girl’s typin’ his memoirs, it’s gotta be one hell of a book.” Taylor flipped the pages of his notebook. “Milton Castleton, self-made man. Naturally. Born in Brooklyn in 1912 of poor but honest immigrants. Father ran a fruit stand. Mother took in wash. Fourth of five children. Never finished high school. Dropped out and joined the army. Got out just in time to get hit by the Depression.”