Hollywood Calls!

Hollywood Calls!

VELDA Hollywood

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Calls!

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Ron Miller

Copyright © 2003 by Ron Miller All Rights Reserved

Timberwolf Press, Inc. 202 N. Allen St., Suite A Allen, Texas 75013 USA

Visit our Web site at http://www. TimberWolfPress.com This story is a work of fiction. All characters, events and dialogues portrayed herein are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Any use of the names of real persons, places, organizations or products is for literary purposes only, and does not change the entirely fictitious nature of this work. Trademarks are the property of their owners. Velda: Hollywood Calls! is copyright © 2003 by Ron Miller. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form, on any media, by any electronic, magnetic, digital, optical, mechanical or by any other means without express written permission from the publisher, Timberwolf Press, Inc.

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Hollywood Calls!

Books by Ron Miller VELDA THE DREAM MACHINES SPACE ART THE HISTORY OF ROCKETS THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE FICTION THE SUN MERCURY & PLUTO THE EARTH & MOON MARS VENUS JUPITER SATURN URANUS & NEPTUNE ASTEROIDS, COMETS & METEORS EXTRASOLAR PLANETS THE ELEMENTS SPECIAL EFFECTS IN THE MOVIES BRADAMANT: THE IRON TEMPEST THE BRONWYN TETRALOGY: PALACES & PRISONS SILK & STEEL HEARTS & ARMOR MERMAIDS & METEORS

With Frederick C. Durant III: WORLDS BEYOND THE ART OF CHESLEY BONESTELL With Pamela Sargent: FIREBRANDS With William K. Hartmann: THE GRAND TOUR THE HISTORY OF EARTH CYCLES OF FIRE IN THE STREAM OF STARS

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VELDA Hollywood

Calls!

HOLLYWOOD WAS EXACTLY WHAT I’D EXPECTED, WHICH IS TO SAY THAT THE SOONER I SAW NEW YORK again, the better. Don’t get me wrong—it was fun while it lasted, like a Popsicle in August. I’ve got to admit I was all in a dither when Howard Vole called. Someone had read my book—the one I’d written about how I’d cracked the famous Sline case. Not only someone, but Someone. Capital S. A real Hollywood producer. Never mind that his last film had been Naboo the Tarsier Boy vs. Stalin, which had played as the second feature to The Bowery Boys Go Straight, he made movies and that was pretty much all that mattered to me. In due time a contract arrived along with a first-class Greyhound bus ticket and as soon as I could pack my bags I was on my way to California. The disillusionment started not long after I arrived. Oh, I had fun enough for a while, I suppose. Six-foot ex-showgirls seem to always be welcome at Hollywood parties, but the novelty soon wore off. At least for me at any rate. Maybe if Gregory Peck or Cary Grant came to Vole’s soirees, I might have maintained my enthusiasm, but the only big male stars I ever met were John Agar and Arthur Franz. Which was okay, of course. I mean, after all they were in the movies and everything, but I think you know what I mean. The biggest disappointment of all, though, was when I discovered that I wasn’t going to play myself. I mean, really! Who’d be more perfect to play me in a movie about me except me? Lizabeth Scott apparently, because that’s who Vole, the rotten bastard, hired. She was okay and all that, but, Jesus, she’s a blonde and had to wear this godawful wig. I hope to hell my hair doesn’t look as bad as that, but I guess maybe it does. To top it all off, they ignored my book and turned me into a cross between Sadie Thompson and an FBI agent. When I saw that the title was going to be G-Girl, I decided I’d just about had it with Hollywood and called Raoul Biederbeck, the talent scout and agent who was representing me, to tell him I wanted out of my contract. I was pretty sure he could do it. Raoul was an all right sort of guy—the squarest I’d met in Hollywood, if that means anything. After my fourth call went unanswered, I drove over to his place, a little bungalow nestled into a wooded area on Benedict Canyon Road. It was dark when I got to the trim little greenand-white house. The windows were dark but I went on up to the door anyway and knocked. There wasn’t any answer. I went around to the back. I was surprised to see Raoul’s brand-new turquoise Packard sedan parked in front of the garage. Perhaps, I thought, he was out with his girlfriend, Natalie Frubble. http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

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I went to the back door. It was locked, which was no big surprise—but there was a carton of eggs sitting on the porch. He had these delivered fresh every Friday afternoon by a local farmer and I knew Raoul would never have left perishables sitting outside all day. He was fussy about things like that. I decided to leave him a note and put his eggs in the icebox all by way of the simple expedient of picking the lock. I figured I would be doing both of us a favor. I was sure he wouldn’t mind. It only took about six seconds to get in and I switched on the kitchen light. Blinking in the glare, I was startled by a sudden movement. “Oh, hello Orson.” It’d just been Raoul’s fat grey cat, who had an overdeveloped sense of the dramatic. There was a desk in a bedroom down the hall that Raoul had converted into an office. I went in and snapped on the light. And froze. Raoul was a fussily precise man with impeccable taste. His office had been furnished in modern blonde oak, glass and aluminum, with not so much as a paper clip out of place. Now I’d be lucky to even find a paper clip. The place looked like a bomb had gone off. All of the file cabinets had their drawers pulled out and their contents upturned onto the floor, the pictures had been knocked off the walls—including the framed one of me that I’d given Raoul the day I’d arrived in Hollywood—and all of the cushions on the chairs and sofa had been ripped to shreds and their stuffing strewn everywhere. That was the big stuff. What sent a chill down my back was a little thing. Across the papers strewn over the floor were tiny footprints leading from the bedroom that attached to the office. They were Orson’s and he’d obviously been walking in something red, because his feet had left little red imprints across the room. I hated to think what that red stuff might be. I didn’t really want to do it, but I went into the next room, my heart pounding like a trip hammer. It was empty. Just the bed, a big bureau, a dressing table and a couple of chairs. I followed Orson’s footprints across the white carpeted floor. They led to the closet. A pool of blood had leaked from beneath the floor. That was what the cat had strolled through. My stomach did a little back flip at the thought of Orson somewhere else in the house licking his paws as he groomed himself. I tried the knob, but the door was locked. Knowing better, I nevertheless went out to the garage and brought back a short crow bar. The door popped open easily. And there was Raoul. Or what was left of him, anyway. When I got back from the bathroom, where I’d heaved up everything I’d eaten since the previous Tuesday, I got a better look at what happened to him. The body had been bound in what looked like strips torn from a bed sheet and the mouth gagged with a brightly colored scarf. A knot tied in the middle had been shoved between his teeth. The back of his head and what of his face I could see had been beaten to a pulp. The walls and floor of the closet were splashed with blood. He was dressed as he usually was: a gaudy Hawaiian print shirt and khaki slacks. He wore no shoes and one of his socks had been pulled partly off the foot, for whatever that was worth observing. I went back into the office and called the Sherman Oaks police. While I waited, I didn’t see how there could be any harm in having a look around. God knows I didn’t want to touch Raoul—for any number of reasons—but I saw right away that his wristwatch was missing. It’d been a gold Rolex Oyster that’d probably cost Raoul more than I’ve made in any five years. It wasn’t much, but it sure suggested robbery. http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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I wondered what he’d been beaten with—it had to have been something pretty massive—so I started poking around the room. I kicked at the bedding that’d been pulled onto the floor and my toe struck something hard. I gingerly lifted a corner and looked underneath. It was a log about two feet long and three inches thick. I could see that the end was covered with blood. I dropped the sheet back over it. Glancing around the floor, I could see bits of bark strewn everywhere. The log had obviously been the murder weapon. I went back to the hall and to the front of the house. The living room was spacious and as carefully decorated as the rest of the place. There didn’t seem to be much out of order that I could see. I went over to the low coffee table. I noticed that rings had been left on the glass top, mainly because Raoul’d been a stickler about that sort of messiness. I touched one. It was still sticky. I went back to the kitchen, where I found a couple of empty beer bottles on the counter and a pair of glasses in the sink. Raoul never drank—he’d been on the wagon for years—but kept beer and assorted eats in the fridge and a well-stocked liquor cabinet for company. If there were two glasses in the sink, then he must’ve had two visitors. Had they been his murderers? It sure beat the hell out of me. If the visitors had been the killers, had they helped themselves to the beer? It would’ve been pretty cold-blooded to have calmly sipped their brews while a bloody corpse was leaking all over the closet floor in the next room. Besides, someone might’ve shown up at the door at any time—and the half dozen calls I’d made surely would’ve made anyone jumpy. But I suppose there are people like that. The kitchen, however, was in perfect order and there didn’t seem to be a drop of blood on either the bottles or the glasses—even though the killers must’ve been drenched. At that thought, I looked around the floor, but didn’t see any sign of blood there, either. I went back to the bathroom, where I’d been too busy barfing to look around before, and this time saw the bloody towels that’d been tossed into the tub. I supposed they’d cleaned up first, after killing Raoul, and, chilling thought though it may be, apparently then had a couple of leisurely beers. Jesus, there are some nasty people out there. I heard car doors slamming, so I went out back to meet the cops. The next couple of hours were pretty much routine. I introduced myself as one of Raoul’s clients and told how I’d happened to come over. I told the lieutenant in charge that I hadn’t touched anything, but when his eyebrows shot skyward at the sight of the jimmied closet door I had to elaborate. “A private dick?” he said, with insulting disbelief. “Are you kidding?” I showed him my ticket but he didn’t look very impressed. “Just stay out of the way, okay, kid? But don’t go too far, understand? I ain’t suggesting you had anything to do with this—it took a man to club a guy to a pulp like that—but you’re not exactly a midget, are you? I just might have some questions for you later. Get it?” “Got it.” “Good.” I hung around a while, but finally went out to my car and drove back to the hotel. I ordered up a sandwich and a beer and then went to bed. The phone woke me at dawn—no, it wasn’t even dawn yet, I decided, glancing out the window. Just that crappy-looking period when it can’t decide whether it’s night or day and settles for this soulless drab. I grabbed the receiver off the hook and croaked, “Yeah?” http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

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“Miss Bellinghausen?” “Yeah?” I repeated. It’d been a woman’s voice. A kind of nice one—not mannered like an actress, but businesslike and precise. “Velda Bellinghausen?” “Probably. Is there some problem?” I figured it was someone with the hotel. Was Behemoth Pictures having me tossed out? Just because I whined about wanting to go back to New York? Vole was a bastard, but he was a square one, or at least so I hoped. “This is Natalie Frubble. Could I see you? It’s about Raoul. It’s awfully important.” “Well, yeah, I suppose so . . .” “That’s wonderful. Could I meet you downstairs here in the coffee shop? Have you had breakfast yet?” Breakfast? I wasn’t even seeing in color yet. But I figured a couple of mugs of black coffee’d probably take care of that. I told Frubble I’d be down in fifteen minutes. I threw myself into the shower, brushed my teeth, pulled on a blouse and slacks, swiped a brush through my hair and was downstairs in twenty minutes. I assumed Natalie Frubble was the girl pacing back and forth in front of the entrance to the coffee shop. Her head swiveled like a radar dish as she caught my movement and her gaze locked onto me like a guided missile. She was a good-looking girl, a few years younger than my thirty. About five six, with shoulder-length auburn hair and a round, pleasant-looking face, she was dressed expensively but conservatively. Obviously a girl with considerable class. Although her face showed a flash of disapproval when she saw me, it was quickly replaced with a smile that seemed like the genuine article. She held out a gloved hand. “Miss Bellinghausen?” “Velda, please. You’re Natalie?” “Yes. I’m terribly sorry to bother you so early in the morning. I can see I must’ve gotten you out of bed, but this is terribly important.” “You said it was about Raoul?” “Yes. Would you care for some coffee? Breakfast? We can go in and sit down . . .” That seemed like several fine ideas. The place was nearly empty, so when we took a booth in a corner, it was as private as we could’ve wished. A sleepy waitress took our orders and as soon as she left, I asked Natalie how I could help her. “Raoul and I are—were engaged to be married.” This was something of a surprise to me. I’d figured Raoul to be homosexual. I guess I’d just never known any such tidy men before. “We’d had a terrible, terrible row two nights ago. I’m afraid there was quite a scene. Raoul’d had some friends over for cocktails and, well, I guess I’d had one too many and started accusing him of being unfaithful.” “Unfaithful?” “Yes. I’ve this awful jealous streak, always have had. It’s hurt more than one relationship and I was just terrified that it might break up Raoul and me. You see, I know he represents a great many starlets—attractive young women who’d do just about anything to get into the movies.” She looked at me with those piercing eyes so I was pretty sure she was including me in, so I hastened to reassure her. http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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“Raoul was really helpful in getting me a deal with Behemoth, but I don’t think I’m cut out for Hollywood. In fact, the reason I’d gone over to see Raoul yesterday was to ask him to get me out of my contract.” “Really?” I could see that she didn’t entirely believe me, but the hell with her. What did I care? “Really. Tell me more about this fight you had.” “Yes, the fight. Well, I was just sure Raoul was having something to do with Audrey Bumpwell, You’ve seen her? The little tramp who made such a cheap sensation in Sorority Girl?” Yeah, I knew who she was talking about and her description of Audrey hadn’t been the least colored by jealousy. It was dead on target. “Well, I said some things I shouldn’t have. Some really awful things . . .” “I suppose you told Raoul in front of a dozen people that you’d beat him to a pulp if you ever caught him looking at another woman?” “Something like that.” “And you figure the police are going to be interested in that little contretemps—if contretemps is the word I want?” “It is and they are already.” “So?” “Well, I didn’t have anything to do with Raoul’s murder! I mean, the police have already admitted that a man must’ve done it.” “Doesn’t mean you couldn’t have gotten someone to do it for you.” “That’s a terrible thing to say!” “The police are going to say it, so you might as well hear it from me first. So what do you want me to do about it?” “Find who really killed Raoul, of course!” “I doubt if you have anything to worry about. The police’ll do their job. They’ll find the murderer faster than I could.” “You don’t understand. They’ll have good reason to think I did it, more reason than just my threat. You see—well, I’ve been in trouble before. Well, not really trouble, but I’ve been involved, in a way, in another—another murder.” “Well, now that’s interesting. Another jealous fit?” “Yes and no. A few years ago this fellow I was seeing—was engaged to—was killed. Someone had drowned him in his pool. I was completely exonerated, of course! But you can see that a shadow has been cast on my character. And, well . . .” “There’s more?” “There’s my brother. Freddy. He’s—he’s been in a lot of trouble before. In and out of jail I don’t know how many times. He’s just an awful embarrassment. But, you see, he’s mostly been arrested for assault. He’s never killed anyone, but he’s come awfully darn close sometimes. He’s a big guy and has got a violent temper.” “So even if the cops figure you couldn’t have done it yourself, being a weak little girl and all, you could’ve had this thug of a brother of yours do it for you?” “Something like that.” Well, the upshot is that I told her I’d give the thing a shot. It gave me something to do, http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

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anyway, and it sure beat moping around while trying to see Howard Vole. I drove back out to Sherman Oaks There were still some cops there, but not the obnoxious lieutenant I’d talked to before. It was a warm summer morning and I was wearing my new white shorts and halter, so it wasn’t hard at all to sweet-talk some information about the case. Fingerprints had been found that weren’t Raoul’s, big surprise. There’d been bloody footprints, too, but probably nothing good enough for identification. “You say this bird was your agent?” the cop I’d been talking to asked. “Yeah.” “He drove a fifty-two Packard, right?” “Uh huh.” “You got any idea where it is?” “How would I know? The goons that killed him probably took it.” “Yeah. That’s what I figger, too.” “I think Raoul may have known the men who killed him.” “Oh yeah? And how you figger that?” “He’d never have left the glasses and empty bottles sit out like he did. He was very particular about things like that. He’d of rinsed them and put them away. It’s pretty clear to me that his murderers helped themselves to his beer after they killed him.” “Ho ho! What have we here? Shirley Holmes?” God, I hate being called that. I went next door, where I knew a nice old lady named Mrs. Athelstan lived. She didn’t answer my knock right away and when she finally did, she peeked around the edge of the door as though she were expected Jack the Ripper. “Oh, it’s you, Miss Bellinghausen. I’m sorry,” she said, opening the door and inviting me in, “I thought it was those pesky police again.” “I’m sorry to bother you. I was just wondering if you might have heard anything last night, or maybe might have seen Mr. Biederbeck’s car leaving.” “Nope. Told the police that, too. Didn’t see nor hear a dang thing. Lucky at this age to see and hear anything at all, let alone someone else’s car.” There was a bang from the back of the house that sounded like a gunshot and I must’ve jumped three inches straight up. Mrs. Athelstan turned and yelled, “Tommy! I’ve told you a thousand times not to slam that screen door!” A high-pitched voice shouted back, “Sorry grandma!” “That boy,” the old lady said, turning back to me and shaking her head, “he’ll be the death of me yet!” She was kind of laughing when she said it, so I figured she was probably kidding. “Your grandson, I take it?” “Yes, the little hellion. His ma is in the hospital for a couple days getting her tubes tied, and about time, too. Dropped off the little monster yesterday morning. Be back tomorrow to pick him up, thank God.” “Say, was the kid around yesterday afternoon?” “He was everywhere yesterday afternoon.” “Can I speak to him for a minute?” “It’s your funeral. Hey, Tommy! Someone wants to talk to you!” http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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“Aww, I ain’t done nothin,” whined the miniature Hopalong Cassidy who came through the door from the kitchen. “Ain’t no one said you did. This nice lady just wants to ask you a question or two.” The kid, who must’ve been about twelve or thereabouts, turned an appraising eye on me that I’d seen from few grown men. Kind of gave me the willies I can tell you. “I was just wondering,” I asked, “if maybe you might’ve seen or heard anything next door yesterday afternoon.” “Like what?” “Well, did you happen to see when Mr. Biederbeck’s car left?” “Sure. It was right around two thirty, maybe. I know ‘cause I’d just watched Kit Carson on TV and I’d gone outside and that’s when I saw Mr. Biederbeck’s car pull out. I only noticed ‘cause he seemed in such a big hurry, leaving skid marks an’ everything.” “Did you hear anything from the house? Any funny noises?” “Yeah. When I first gone out I heard some funny thumpin’, like somebody was hammerin’ on somethin’, you know.” “How long was it after that you saw the car leave?” “Mebbe a half hour, I guess.” I thanked the kid and gave him a quarter that he sneered at but pocketed anyway, and thanked his grandmother. I went back next door. The cops were finished and were sealing the place up. “Well, lady,” said the cop I’d been talking to earlier, “looks like the case just got itself wrapped up.” “How’s that?” “Just come in over the radio. They arrested the girlfriend, Biederbeck’s girl. Figger she either bumped him off herself or had someone do it. And there you go. Say, I ain’t had nothin’ to eat since breakfast. You ain’t busy, whattaya say we go somewhere for lunch?” “Sorry. I’m on diet and never eat lunch in California.” Needless to say, I found Natalie in something of a state. More precisely, I found her in jail. The matron brought her into the visitors room so we could talk. “Jesus!” she said as soon as she saw me, “I told you what was going to happen.” She sounded like it was all my fault. “Tell me everything you remember about yesterday,” I said. “Well, Raoul called me around eleven. We had a date that afternoon. He said he had some fellows coming over on some business, but it wouldn’t take long. He said he’d call me as soon as it was finished. When I didn’t hear back, I called and there wasn’t any answer.” “What time was that?” “Oh, around twelve thirty or so.” I’d started calling Raoul about then, too. This placed the murder at sometime between eleven and twelve or twelve-thirty. If that were so, then his killers stuck around for a couple of hours before leaving. The thumping the kid heard must’ve been them ransacking the house. I asked Natalie what she knew about Raoul’s friends and business associates, but she wasn’t much help. “Raoul was a talent scout for Behemoth before the war. After Raoul got out of the Air Force, he went back to work for them, this time as a casting director and assistant producer. http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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In fifty-two, he had to give up his job because of some liver problems he’d picked up in the service. Since he had all these contacts in the industry, he thought he could start up business as an agent, since it was something he could do from home.” “Was he any good at it?” “I don’t know. I don’t think so. He had a lot of debts, I know, but he liked to put up a good front. He was borrowing from everyone and I think he was even trying to draw unemployment. It was pretty hard on him.” “Maybe he put up too good a front,” I suggested. “Maybe who killed him thought he had more money than he really did. No one would kill a fellow who was out of a job and on the dole—unless it was for revenge.” “Yeah. That’s what the cops think, too. Thanks a lot for reminding me.” On my way out, I stopped to see if there was anything the lieutenant could tell me. He didn’t seem to be particularly glad to see me, so I propped myself on the corner of his desk and crossed my legs. Guys like that. “I’m not telling you anything that you’re not going to be reading in the papers tomorrow,” he said, swallowing hard and trying to find someplace on me his eyes could rest without either embarrassment or compromise. He seemed to settle on my left elbow. “Well, why don’t you just go ahead and fill me in,” I said. “I just hate reading newspapers.” My Marilyn Monroe impersonation is just terrible, but the lieutenant seemed willing to overlook its faults. “Well, ah, we got the post mortem in. Your friend apparently put up quite a fight it seems. He died of, uh, let’s see here . . . uh, ‘intracranial hemorrhages, resulting from cer-cerebral contusions due to multiple skull fractures’.” “That certainly does sound serious.” “Not serious enough to croak him right off, though. The doc says he must’ve lived at least a few minutes after he was chucked into that closet. His wrists and ankles showed signs of a struggle and his knuckles were scraped raw.” I wondered if maybe that was what Tommy’d heard: the sounds of Raoul’s struggle in the closest. I shuddered at the thought. “So what do you have on poor Miss Frubble?” “Plenty! That robbery idea never did look any good to me. I ain’t kidded about his watch and wallet being missing. There was too much other stuff in the house they could’ve taken, too, and didn’t. And, besides, the killer didn’t bring a weapon with him—or if he, or she, did, they didn’t use it. Instead they just grabbed that chunk of cordwood from the fireplace and let him have it. Looks more to me like the result of a sudden quarrel.” “Must’ve been some quarrel, to beat up a guy like that and then bind and gag him.” “That’s exactly what I been thinking. Whoever it was, went in there with murder in their hearts. That’s why I put the snatch on the girlfriend. Just look at it my way. Here’s this fellow, casting director, talent scout, agent, must meet a hundred babes every week. Some he gets jobs for, some he don’t, whatever. There’s still a lot of dames passing through his fingers. I got to thinking, what if someone gets the wrong idea—or maybe the right one for all I know? Some husband, maybe . . . or a girlfriend?” “Well, I guess it looks pretty bad for Miss Frubble, doesn’t it?” “You said it. Say,” he said, sitting up and looking at his watch, “I go off duty in fifteen http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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minutes. What do you say we go out and get ourselves a nice steak somewhere?” “Sorry,” I said, “I’m a strict vegetarian.” I drove over to Natalie’s place. She’d asked me to pick up some things for her and I thought, why not? Give me a chance to do her a favor and poke around in her stuff a little, see what I might turn up. She had a small apartment about four miles from Raoul’s bungalow. I let myself in with the key she’d given me. It was nice little place, about the size of my apartment back home but about ten times classier. Any one thing she owned chosen at random was probably worth more than every possession I had combined, dammit. I was just going through her underwear, wondering what might fit me, when the phone rang. I let it ring twice, then picked up the receiver. “Frubble residence,” I said, cautiously. “Natalie?” asked a nice-sounding male voice. I figured since he had to ask, he wasn’t too familiar with her. “Yes?” “This is Hugh. Hugh B. Huber. I just read about poor Raoul! How awful! I’m terribly sorry . . . this must be a dreadful time for you.” “You can’t imagine.” “I just spoke to him yesterday. He’d invited me to join the two of you for dinner. I was just asking how he was—I hadn’t seen him in weeks, you know—when he had to ring off. Said his friend Bob had suddenly shown up from out of town. What a shame we were interrupted! That was the last time I ever spoke to dear Raoul.” There was a sniffle on the other end of the line. “Bob? Who’s Bob?” “I really haven’t the slightest idea. His exact words were, ‘Old Bob’s here, you know, the Canadian. Just dropped in with a pal’.” “You don’t have any idea who this Bob was, then?” “Well, not exactly. Let’s see . . . it was about five, maybe six weeks ago. No—it was five weeks ago, tomorrow, I was taking Foofles on a walk along Yucca Street when I saw Raoul sitting in his car with this other fellow so I went over to say hello—Raoul just loved Foofles and I knew he’d never forgive me if I didn’t bring him over—and he introduced me to his friend. He called him Bob—Bob something or other. Dunsmore or Dunsmire or something like that. Pleasant sort of fellow—I assumed he was someone Raoul’d known in the service.” “Why’s that?” “He was still in uniform—one of those Canadian Army or Air Force uniforms, the greenishgrey ones with the cute berets.” “He say anything to you? What did he look like?” “I don’t remember a word of what he said. Nothing important, I’m sure. We all just chatted for a moment, about nothing in particular. You know. Nice fellow, like I said. All I remember is that he was youngish, maybe in his early twenties. That’s about all.” We chatted for a couple more minutes, with me desperately trying to maintain the illusion of being Natalie, until I could finally get Huber off the line. I thought about going to the police with what I’d just learned but figured, the hell with them. The lieutenant annoyed me. Instead, I went back out, got in my car and drove over to the Behemoth lot. http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

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Like most studios, Behemoth maintained a pretty good reference library, including all the local and most big out of state papers. I found myself an empty table and started going through the Times, beginning with the day of the murder and working my way back. It didn’t even take half an hour to find what I’d hoped for. It was only a couple of inches of column on page twelve and so small I’d nearly overlooked it. I only caught it on the second time through. It was just a brief paragraph in yesterday’s paper reporting a routine police response to a burglary call. It’d been filed by an Elmo M. Kneecap, a clerk living in a bungalow court in Van Nuys. He told the police that a Canadian soldier named Densmore had been staying with him for a few days, along with an American ex-paratrooper he knew only as “Sam”. They’d spent Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as his guests. He’d left them asleep when he went to work on Friday morning. When he got home, surprise, surprise: all of his clothing and a $400 camera were gone and what were the police going to do about it? Kneecap didn’t seem to be particularly displeased to see me standing on his porch when he answered my ring. In fact, he goggled, his mouth agape and eyes bugging in a style that’d gone out with the Keystone Komedies. It was a little disconcerting—I mean, all false modesty aside, I know I can have an impressive effect on men, but I’ve seen dogs less happy to see Timmy, their beloved little crippled master, than this bird was to see me standing there. I knew it was going to be snap pumping him. He was about a foot shorter than me, his shoulders half as wide and his waist half again wider. He reminded me of a yam. He had a round face, round glasses and a smooth, bald head. When I told him I was a detective his mouth dropped open with an audible click. “I’m interested in those two men who robbed you the other day.” “You are?” he said. What did he think? That I’d come to see him? Just to see if it would take his mind off me, I told him that the pair were suspected of beating a man to death the day before yesterday. That seemed to do it. He started talking. For no particular reason I could see, Kneecap had invited the two men to stay with him until they found places of their own. They were supposed to have shared expenses, he complained, but it quickly became clear they had no money of their own. Neither did they appear to have any military duties and he suspected them of being deserters. “I don’t suppose you can describe these guys, could you?” “I can do better than that. I’ve got a snapshot of one of them!” I followed him into his place, which was dark, vaguely moist and smelled of camphor. Kneecap dug out the photo and handed it to me. It showed a husky-looking fellow in just the sort of uniform Hugh had described, beret and all. He looked to be in his early twenties. My host filled in some of the other statistics. Bob Densmore was about five feet six or seven, a hundred and fifty pounds or so, with brown hair and eyes. His pal, Sam, appeared to be the same age, but was bigger and heavier. “I understand that Densmore was in the Canadian Army?” “Yes, but he wasn’t Canadian himself. He was from some little town back east—Arkansas or Tennessee or something like that.” “Anyone see these guys leave with your stuff?” “Yes. It turned out the lady in the next bungalow did. She saw them piling armloads of my http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

14

Ron Miller

clothes in their car, but didn’t think anything of it. She told the police she thought they were taking out my laundry for dry-cleaning! Can you imagine?” I told him no, I surely couldn’t. Then it occurred to me what he’d just said. “Their car? What car?” “Beats me. They never had a car when they were here. You’d have to ask my neighbor.” I did. And she was only too happy to fill me in on what had evidently been the most exciting thing in her life since Valentino died. “It was about three thirty, four o’clock,” she said, when I seen them two young men pull up in front of Mr. Kneecap’s bungalow. They piled out of there like they was in the biggest hurry in their life. Wasn’t in the place but five minutes when they come rushing right back out again, their arms full of poor Mr. Kneecap’s clothes. They dumped them in the back of the car, hangers and all and drove off lickety split.” “What sort of car was it, ma’am?” “How would I know? Them machines all look alike to me. It was green, though, I can tell you that. Most godawful-looking color I ever seen on a automobile.” That was Raoul’s car all right. The two men must have high-tailed straight over here after they’d killed him. I thought about telling Kneecap that, just to see what his reaction would be, but figured what the hell, why overstimulate him? Well, now what? I wondered as I climbed back into my car. The two killers surely weren’t stupid enough to still be hanging around LA. They were probably well on their way to Mexico if they had even half a brain between them. The only thing to do was to let the police know what I’d discovered. At least it’d get Natalie off the hook, which was all I’d been asked to do. It was getting kind of late in the day, though, so I thought I’d first try and find a hamburger stand somewhere since I hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast. I must have had my mind on food since I not only didn’t notice that the car following me had been, well, following me for some time, but that it was a turquoise Packard. I didn’t like that so much, especially since I’d just turned onto a narrow canyon road. I don’t think I’d even had a chance to say Yikes! before the Packard suddenly roared past me. It swerved across the road and I slammed on the brakes. I piled into them anyway since they, too, had hit their brakes. I only just saw the tail lights ahead flash red before they disappeared under my hood. My chin bounced off the steering wheel, but I hadn’t been going fast enough to do more than knock the wind out of me for a moment. I saw the doors on either side of the car ahead start to open. I stomped on the clutch, threw the gears into reverse and gave my buggy all the gas she wanted. I could hear gravel rattling off the trunk of the Packard as my spinning wheels peppered it like buckshot. Grinding the gear lever back into drive, I gunned the engine and started to swerve around the roadblock. Or at least I started to. The driver’s side door suddenly flew open and, startled, I swerved to miss it, which was a big mistake. I went careening off the road and down the steep embankment. The car only rolled maybe its own length before slamming with a crunch into a wall of dirt and rock. I fumbled for my bag, which had flown onto the floor under the passenger side of the dash. I finally managed to got my automatic out, but not quite in time. I was still sprawled across the seat when the door beside me was jerked open and someone grabbed me by the collar. Before I could do much of anything, I was dragged backwards out of the car. I fell to the ground with a tooth-jarring thud, the sharp gravel jabbing painful holes in my butt. “Well, looky there, Bob! We surely do got ourselves something, ain’t we?” http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

15

I still had my gun, so I was going to show him just exactly what he got himself. I rolled onto my side, looking to shoot whatever I saw first. Instead, I got the toe of an army boot in my wrist. That not only hurt like hell, it sent my gun flying. “Lord God, Sam, but she’s a feisty one!” One of the bastards grabbed the wrist he’d just kicked and started to haul me to my feet. I shook him loose and got up under my own steam. There were just the two of them standing there, looking like a couple of chinless hicks. One, the shorter, dumpier-looking one who I assumed was Sam, had my gun in one hairy paw. The other, who must’ve been the famous Bob, was unarmed. I dusted off my butt and gave them a glare that would’ve killed small birds at thirty paces. It had no effect on the men. “Holy Jesus, but you’re one hell of a long drink a water, lady!” “So I’ve been told.” “I ain’t seen so much leg on a woman in all my born days. They must go all the way to her shoulders, Sam, I swear they must.” “Why’s she keep on squinting at us that way, Bob? Gives me the willies.” “Why, I do think we’ve done gone and pissed her off some. You mad at us, lady?” “She’s something at us, Bob. Ask her why she’s been following us all over the place, asking people questions and all.” “Yeah, lady. What’s the big deal, anyway? I ain’t never seen you before in my whole life.” “Well, I sure wish I’d never seen either of you. The sight’s going to haunt me for a long time.” “She just insult us, Bob?” “I ain’t sure, Sam, but I think so. Looky here, lady, I mean it. What’s the deal? We ain’t nothin’ to you, but you done gone and poked your nose in our business and now we all of us got a real problem.” “Well, under any other circumstances I might say you inspired the same sort of fascination in me that, say, a cockroach or garden slug would a hungry chicken, but at the moment I’m only interested in you because you killed a friend of mine the day before yesterday and, so far as I can see, for no particularly good reason.” “You mean that fruit? Was he your boyfriend or somethin’?” “No, he wasn’t my boyfriend. He was my agent.” “Agent? You a actress or somethin? Shoot, Bob, I just knew someone’s purty as her just had to be in the movies or somethin’! You in the movies, lady? I ever seen you in anythin’?” The only thing either of these clowns would have been likely to have seen me in was Slotnik’s Follies and if you think I was about to tell them I’d been a stripper you got another think coming. Instead, I said, “Right now what you’re seeing me in is a really lousy mood. Just exactly what do you boys think you’re going to do?” “Well, now, you kinda got us there.” “She sure does.” “Look, at least tell me why in the world you killed Mr. Beiderbeck?” “Aw, hell. That weren’t nothin’ but a accident.” “You mean he just fell and hit his face twenty-seven times on that piece of fireplace timber?” http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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“Naw. I mean we didn’t set out to do him no harm. A pal of mine did some work for the guy a coupla months back, said he’d be good for a touch if we ever needed any dough, that he was always spreadin’ it around pretty generous-like, you know? Well, Sam and me, we had a idea we wanted to go to New Orleans so we hiked over to this bird’s place to see if we could get a stake. The guy was friendly as all hell, but I didn’t know why until he tried to make a pass at me. I just don’t stand for that kind of thing and, well, I just kind a slapped him around a little. Must a lost my temper, I guess, cause the next thing I know the fairy’s stretched out on the floor and I got a bloody log in my hand.” “You went to Beiderbeck’s to get money? That’s a laugh. He was as broke as you two bums.” “What d’you mean by he was broke?” “What d’you mean ‘bum’?” “He didn’t have a dime to his name, you stupid hillbillys. He was living on credit and what he could borrow from his friends.” “Well, shoot, don’t that just about beat all.” “Well, we done got ourselves a swell car,” said Sam, “so it weren’t a total loss. And we pawned the clothes and a camera and some other stuff we found, so we done okay after all.” I didn’t believe a word of what Densmore had said about Raoul making a pass at him. Raoul might have been a little aesthetic, but I don’t think he ever gave Natalie anything to complain about. Besides, even if Raoul had been a fairy, I certainly would have credited him with better taste than to have made goo-goo eyes at either one of these two unwashed ridgerunners. I’d heard about thugs trying to weasel their way out of a rap by claiming they had just been defending themselves from a homosexual advance. I didn’t doubt for one second that these idiots had deliberately set out to rob and murder poor Raoul. On the other hand, if they were that coldblooded, I didn’t like to think about what they might have in mind for me. Sam’s next comment showed that his thoughts, such as they were, had been running along the same lines as mine. “Say, Bob, what’re we going to do with this dame?” “I been thinkin’ bout that. I don’t think she’s said nothin’ to the cops about us. I think she’s been workin’ all by herself, ain’t you, lady?” I told him that contrary to his expectations, I’d spilled everything to the police and if I disappeared they’d know exactly who to look for. Bob just laughed in my face. Maybe I would have made a lousy actress after all. “Get on over there,” he said, waving my gun in the direction of some scrubby-looking trees. “Watcha goan t’do, Bob?” Sam begged as he followed us into the bush. “Huh? Watcha goan t’do?” “I ain’t had me a girl since Wanda Lou put out behind the A&P back home in Lackluster. And Wanda Lou, well, she’d put out for just about anyone, lookin’ the way she did. I sure ain’t never had a purty girl before. And this’n’s a real movie star, too.” “Me neither, Bob. I ain’t never had a purty girl neither!” “This is far enough. Ain’t no one can see us from the road now. Here, Sam, take this and keep her covered.” Sam took the gun from his partner. He had to hold it in both hands, which were shaking like a wino’s, but managed to keep it pointed well enough in my direction to keep me from acting http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

Hollywood Calls!

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on any bright ideas I might’ve been having. I’d been backed up against a tree and Bob stood facing me, just a couple of paces away. “Well, now, purty lady, whaddaya say we all have a little fun?” “How could I possibly be having more fun than I am right now?” “Haw! Haw! I’ll show you how!” And with those words stretched out a hairy, greasy hand and ripped open the front of my blouse. The lousy bastard. It was silk and brand new—I hadn’t had it more than a few days. I’d never been able to afford anything made of silk before. I was too angry to do anything more than clench fists and teeth and glare at the stupid, pimple-faced hick. “Well, looky there! Ain’t them just about the purtiest things I ever saw!” “Lemme see, Bob! Lemme see!” Sam cried, hopping from one foot to the other. Bob had blocked his view and he couldn’t see what was going on, isn’t that just too bad. Which meant, of course, that he couldn’t shoot me without shooting through Bob’s back. Which would have been all right with me, naturally, but I doubted if he’d do that. Still . . . “Well, lord God, Bob, if you’re not just the manliest man I ever did see!” I said in my best Daisy Mae, shrugging off what was left of my poor blouse. Bob let loose a low, appreciative whistle, which set Sam off into a veritable paroxysm of anxiety, if paroxysm is the word I want. Bob snarled at him to shut up. “Shut up, Sam. You’ll get your chance soon enough!” “Well, Bob,” I continued, “I guess a girl’s just got to know when she’s met her match, you know what I mean? No use fighting the inevitable, not with a big ol’ manly man like you.” I followed up this repulsive nonsense by hooking my thumbs under the elastic band of my shorts. I started to edge them down my hips. I didn’t take my eyes from Bob’s face, which I assure you took more will power than I would’ve given myself credit for. A string of drool hung about three inches from the corner of one livery, pendulous lip and his bulging eyes were riveted to the descending waistband. No point in wasting any further time, I decided, and raised a knee into his crotch as hard as I could. He didn’t react immediately, but turned a brilliant beet red, his already protuberant eyes popping like a squashed frog’s. He slowly bent over, his breath hissing through his clenched teeth. “Watcha doing, Bob? Watcha doing?” cried Sam, who’d long since forgotten anything about the gun he held. As soon as Bob had bent over far enough, I grabbed the back of his head and slammed his face into the same knee that had just pulped his manhood. By then, of course, Sam realized something was amiss, but it was too late. His partner went flailing backwards and fell into him. Both men went to the ground, arms and legs just every which way. I snatched the gun on the first bounce and stood back, waiting until the two morons got themselves untangled. Sam was the first to appreciate the new situation, since Bob was still on his hands and knees vomiting his chittlins into the grass. “Jesus Christ, Bob. Wanda Lou never took it as hard as this girl.” Bob managed to get his face, such as it was, raised toward me. My knee’d certainly done nothing to improve his looks. It’d spread his nose across his pan like a bug on a windshield. I think I’d knocked out a couple of teeth, too, but I couldn’t be sure since he hadn’t had a full set to start with. I heard a siren in the distance. Someone must’ve finally spotted the cars and called the cops, http://www.Timberwolfpress.com

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thinking there’d been an accident. I didn’t particularly want to greet the police half naked even if this was Hollywood. Dammit. I had a terry robe in the trunk, left there from when I last went to the beach., but the cops were coming fast. I couldn’t leave those two clowns but neither did I want to chance herding them back out to the road in the near dark. Bob was still on his hands and knees retching his lungs out, so I did him the favor of a good, solid kick to the temple that relieved him of his suffering, at least for the time being. I told Sam to give me the shirt he was wearing, which he nearly tore off without unbuttoning it, so anxious was he to please me. I couldn’t figure out how to get the shirt on, however, while at the same time keeping my gun on the little creep, so I shot him in the knee. I know, I know, but before you say anything, don’t forget: it’s going to be a long time before I can afford silk again.

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