Stuart Kaminsky - Show Business is Murder

I let myself in with the key Mary had given me-her stubby, muscular fingers brushing my tingling palm all too briefly-and headed straight for the refrigerator. I didn’t hope to find any clues there. I was drenched with sweat and I needed a cold beer. And I found one. Property being theft and all, I felt free to help myself.

Beer in hand, I gave the place the once-over. It wasn’t exactly neat-dirty plates were piled up in the sink, clothes were scattered across the floor, the sheets on the pull-down bed looked like they hadn’t been made since the Battle of Stalingrad. But I didn’t see any signs of a struggle. A plain, wooden dining table was wedged into one of the bungalow’s dark corners. A typewriter sat on it next to a stack of white paper and a dictionary. I sat down at the desk and tried to put myself in the mind of John Smith, hack. I stared at the typewriter, searching for inspiration. I didn’t have to search long.

The typewriter wasn’t empty. A small wedge of white was still wrapped around the cylinder. I pulled it out. It was about a third of a sheet of typing paper, ripped. Somebody had been in a hurry to pull the page out of the typewriter-too much of a hurry. I read what was on the paper.

D’ARTAGNAN

Thou hast erred, fiend! At this moment, Athos nears!

CARDINAL RICHELIEU

Ahhh, ridiculous rubbish, I vow!

Zontak strikes Richelieu with the butt of his ray gun, sending him to the floor.

ZONTAK

Earth scum!

CARDINAL RICHELIEU

(cowering)

A terrible mistake, I declare!

ZONTAK

No, I g

That was it. For a second there, I considered dropping the case. A writer this bad needed to stay lost for the good of mankind. Then I remembered his sister. And her thirty bucks. And my rent. I slipped the scrap of paper into my jacket pocket and got back to work.

Somebody had nabbed Smith’s screenplay, but they hadn’t done a very thorough job. Maybe they’d left even more behind. I leaned over Smith’s typewriter and pushed down the shift key.

Bingo. The typewriter ribbon was still there. I carefully removed it and put it in my other pocket. Then I turned, ready to nose around some more.

I didn’t get far. Before I’d taken two steps, I heard voices outside. Someone was walking up to the front door.

“So this guy was some kinda pinko?” voice number one said.

“Not a pinko-a Red to the core,” voice number two replied gruffly.

Voice number one I didn’t recognize. Voice number two I did. I started looking for a place to hide.

I threw myself on the floor and slid under the bed just as the front door opened.

“Not locked,” said voice number one.

Voice number two-a.k.a. FBI special agent Mike Sickles-just grunted.

The two men stepped inside.

I began sweating worse than Henry Ford at a union rally. Sickles and I have a little arrangement: If he doesn’t see me, he doesn’t shoot me.

I was anxious to keep my end of the bargain. But if Sickles or his flunky looked under the bed, this comrade would be headed to the big workers’ paradise in the sky.

“Pretty lousy dive, ain’t it?” said the first FBI agent.

“I dunno,” Sickles replied absently. I could see his big feet moving slowly toward the sink, then to Smith’s desk. He needed new shoes. “Makes my place look like the Ritz.”

The other agent moved over to the desk next to Sickles. “Say, what’s that?”

They stood side by side for a moment, silent.

“Nothing,” Sickles finally pronounced. His feet moved in my direction, then suddenly swiveled.

I braced myself. His weight came down on the flimsy bed frame like the Battleship Potemkin. The mattress sagged under him, pinning me to the floor. A bed spring poked my back. Somehow I stayed quiet.

“You think he skipped town? Maybe the country?” Sickles’ partner asked.

“Could be,” Sickles mumbled. “Dirty Reds. Turn on the lights and they scatter like roaches.”

“So what’s our next move?”

“Well, there’s that producer he was working for-Dominic Van Dine. We should lean on him a little, see if he knows anything.” Sickles leaned back and sighed. The spring gouged my back like a shiv. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? Why tomorrow?”

Suddenly the crushing weight on my back was gone. I could breathe again. Sickles’ scuffed shoes shuffled away from the bed toward the door.

“Because I’ve got an itch to play the ponies today, knucklehead,” Sickles said. “And Dominic Van Dine’s not going anywhere.”

The other agent followed Sickles out the door like the loyal lapdog he was. I waited a minute, just in case Sickles was toying with me. There’s not much to do when you’re stretched out underneath a bed, so naturally my eyes started to wander. Having a rat’s-eye-view of the place gave me a whole new perspective.

I caught sight of a bright yellow ball on the floor under Smith’s desk. I slid out from my hiding place and groped under the desk for it.

It was another piece of paper, balled up tight. I flattened it out.

It was notebook paper from an oversized steno pad. Covering it top to bottom, back and front, was a list of scribbled words. It started with “t” words: tacky, tantalizing, tardy, tedious, tempting, tender, terrible, tiresome, etc. Then the list switched to “m” words, then “i” words, “d” words, “n” words and finally a few “g” words.

I folded the list and stuck it in my pocket. There would be plenty of time to puzzle over it later. Right now, I had to get moving.

So Sickles was going to visit Smith’s producer tomorrow. Good. That meant I could drop in for a chat today. But first I wanted to pay a call on an old acquaintance of mine-a safecracker known as Barney the Bat. He had good fingers and tight lips and bad habits. He owed me a favor.

I left Smith’s bungalow and started looking for a ride.

ABOUT FOUR HOURSlater, I was standing in front of Dominic Van Dine’s house in West Hollywood. I’m using the term “house” a little loosely here. It was actually something halfway between a house and a mansion. It was big alright, but it had the wide, flat roof and squat, squashed look of those ultra-modern boxes they’ve been throwing up all over Southern California since the war. I figured at least three families could live in there comfortably. And after the Revolution, they would.

I rang the doorbell. It played the first five notes of “We’re in the Money.” That would have to change, too. Maybe it could be set up to play the Internationale.

The door opened just enough for a head to poke out. It was a good head, if you go in for long, golden locks of purest sunshine and big, blue eyes like two bottomless lagoons and soft, sensuous lips just waiting to be kissed and kissed hard. Me, I don’t cotton to blonde bombshells. The only bombshells that strike my fancy are the ones that will free the proletariat from the shackles of wage slavery.

Her baby blues devoured me. “Yes?” she said, caressing the word, making it sound more like an invitation than a question.

“I’d like to speak with Mr. Van Dine,” I replied flatly.

“He’s not home today. But I’ll tell him you dropped by, Mr…?”

“Menace,” I said. “Fred Menace, P.I. I have a feeling Mr. Van Dine is home today. And I have a feeling he will speak with me once you scoot your pampered caboose inside and tell him a private dick’s nosing around asking questions about John Smith and the House Committee on Un-American Activities.”

She didn’t bat an eyelash-which was a good thing, since her eyelashes were so long and heavy batting one around would probably hurt somebody. “Wait here, Mr. Menace,” she said.

Her head disappeared. The door closed. I waited.