Stuart Kaminsky - Show Business is Murder

“Since you put it like that, it’s no dice, sister.” I wanted to bite my tongue off with every word. Somehow I managed to keep going. “I’m a traitor to my class, but not my country. I’m not giving you that script.”

I didn’t even get a raised eyebrow out of her, let alone a wistful tear. She simply pulled a revolver from her jacket and leveled it at me. My heart was broken. And in a second, it was going to be filled with hot lead.

“Now hold on. We can still talk this out, comrade.”

“You are no comrade of mine,” she hissed back at me. “You call yourself a Communist, yet you let nationalist loyalties come between you and your duty to the revolution. I should shoot you down like a dog.”

“But then you wouldn’t get the other copy of the script.”

“Other copy?” The barrel of the gun wavered just a bit-from my heart to my gut. It wasn’t much of an improvement, but I wasn’t in a position to be choosy.

“When a typewriter key hits the ribbon, it leaves an impression. And I’ve got the ribbon from John Smith’s typewriter. Or, to be more exact, a friend of mine has the ribbon. A blind friend. I gave it to him this afternoon after I left Smith’s bungalow. He’s had plenty of time to go over it. I’m sure he’s got the whole script transcribed by now.”

It looked like my little visit to Barney the Bat was going to pay off for the second time today. Looked like that for about two seconds, that is.

“But as you pointed out, it’s written in code. He won’t know what it means or who to take it to-if you’re dead.”

What could I say? “Good point”?

She cocked her revolver. “Now give me Van Dine’s copy of the script.”

“Like I said, no dice. And if you shoot me, you’ll never find it. Looks like we’ve got us a stalemate.”

She waved the gun at a corner of my desk. “But isn’t that the script sitting right there?” She sounded amused. At last, I’d gotten a little warmth out of her. It didn’t help me feel any better.

“Well, I guess that was the dumbest bluff I ever tried to put over.”

“I’ll have to take your word on that, Mr. Menace.” The barrel moved again. Now it was pointed squarely at my forehead. “Das vedanya.”

I sighed again. “Yeah, O.K. So long, sister. Tell the boys in the Kremlin I said-”

A shot rang out before I could finish. I thought that was pretty rude. Not only does she kill me, but she’s got to interrupt me, too. Some people ain’t got no manners.

Then an amazing thing happened: The woman who just killed me toppled off her chair. The back of her head looked like a lasagna. Even more shocking-I was alive.

“Boy, am I gonna regret that in the mornin’,” a familiar voice said.

FBI special agent Mike Sickles was standing in the doorway of my office, his gun in his hand. He was shaking his big, bald head.

“If I’d just waited two more seconds- bang . You’d have been out of my hair forever, Menace.”

I wanted to say something like “What hair, cueball?” But I wasn’t about to push my luck. He could still change his mind and let her shoot me retroactively. It was just a matter of how he wanted to write it up in his report.

Sickles stepped into the room and bent down over Mary Smith. He was followed quickly by the lackey I’d seen him with earlier in the day. At least it looked like the same guy from the shins down.

“She dead, Mike?” Sickles’ partner asked.

“Nah, she’s just hibernatin’. Now call the meatwagon, knucklehead.”

Knucklehead scooped up the phone off my desk and asked the operator for the coroner’s office.

Sickles waved his meaty hand back and forth before my eyes. “Hey, anybody home? Snap out of it, Menace. She scare you to death or somethin’?”

I blinked, maybe for the first time in a good minute. “Thanks,” I said.

Sickles grimaced. “Don’t thank me. I handed you a break because you wouldn’t give the broad the script. Next time I might not feel so merciful.”

“How long were you there in the doorway?”

“Not long. I only moseyed over when things started to heat up.”

“Moseyed over?”

“Sure. Knucklehead and me, we were next door listening to the whole conversation. It was mighty entertainin’, too. Like The Bickersons and Suspense rolled into one.”

“You’ve got my place bugged?”

Sickles cocked his head and gave me a don’t-ask-stupid-questions frown. “Course not. We had tin cans pressed up against the wall.”

I didn’t push it. Besides, I had other questions on my mind. I nodded at Mary Smith’s body without letting my eyes move that way.

“So what’s her real name, anyway?”

Sickles ran his hands over his smooth, sweaty skull. He was obviously trying to decide whether or not to tell me the truth. The truth won out. What a day for sworn enemies. Around the world, cats and dogs stopped fighting and kissed each other on both cheeks.

“Beats me, Menace,” Sickles said. “I didn’t even know she existed until she walked in here and started gabbin’ with you.”

He saw my confusion and went on. “You were the one we were following. Ever since we walked in on you at John Smith’s place.” He cracked a cock-eyed smile. “You were hidden O.K., but that beer you were guzzling wasn’t. It was still cold when we came in. All the windows were closed and bolted, so I knew somebody was still in there somewhere. I dropped a little hint about Dominic Van Dine-the next stop on my hunt for Smith-then stepped back to see what happened.”

I grunted with grudging admiration. “You amaze me, Sickles. You played this one better than Machiavelli himself.”

Sickles glared at me. “He some kinda Commie?”

I shook my head.

He allowed himself a half-smile. “Yeah, well, maybe. Only if I’m so smart, how come I’ve got boils on my butt the size of grapefruit from all the hours I spent sittin’ in the car today? I tell ya’, Menace, tailin’ you is like getting in a high-speed chase with a three-legged turtle.”

What a charming development. Sickles and I were so thoroughly bonded now he felt free to tell me about his carbuncles. I stifled a sigh.

My eyes drifted back to the body of Miss X, the Unknown Communist. I hadn’t killed her, but I hadn’t helped her, either.

What kind of revolutionary was I? What kind of detective was I? What kind of man was I?

“All that is solid melts into air,” Marx wrote. That was me alright. Fred Menace, the Red Detective, had melted. I’m just vapor now, part of the smog that chokes L.A.

I still charge thirty dollars a day plus expenses, though. Even vapor’s gotta make a living.

EVERYONE LOVED WATCHINGGeorge MacCready die. His dying was unparalleled. No one could clutch at his throat quite like George MacCready. No one’s knees buckled with the gusto of George MacCready’s. Nor could they sprawl ontheir backs, legs quivering ever so slightly, as they gasped their final breath. Only for him would the ermine trim of a velvet tunic kiss the floor as he fell, then twine about his outstretched legs like fingers of a foggy night.

No one could die quite like George MacCready. And no one enjoyed watching him die more than I.

For you see, George MacCready learned how to die from life. Not his life, for that would have been pointless-to die in order to perfect the business of dying. George MacCready learned by watching others die.

The first time I saw him watching death was after a performance of Macbeth . I left my seat in the stalls and hurried outside to wait for the great expirer at the stage door. MacCready had just exited the theatre when a cry rose up from the street behind us. MacCready lifted his head, listening. Then he strode down the alley, brushing away his admirers as if they were mere coal dust. I joined the others who followed in his wake.