Design for Dying

by Renee Patrick

  I must have been lightly stunned myself, because without thinking I snatched the comb from her hair, taking a few blond strands with it. Vi gasped.

  “Did Tommy give this to you?” I waved the comb in her face. “Because he stole it from the store. Right in front of me.”

  “Keep it. I only wore it to be nice. It looks cheap.” Still startled by what she was saying, she returned to the foyer.

  Tommy offered Vi his arm. Ready glanced at me, then blocked the door. “Hold on. I believe you’ve got something to say to Lillian.”

  This time, Tommy’s smirk blossomed fully. “I do, but Lillian doesn’t want to hear it.” He shouldered Ready aside, then guided Vi through the door with all the compassion of a slaughterhouse lineman. Vi never ventured a look my way.

  Kay threw an arm around my shoulder. “Vi sounded almost like Ruby there, didn’t she? You okay, sweetheart?”

  “Yes. No. Give me a minute.”

  I walked down the hall, stopping by the house telephone near the kitchen. Vi’s duplicity cut deep. It hurt to learn the girl I thought of as an impressionable little sister had only pretended to heed my advice. I could hear Kay and Ready murmuring to each other. Then Ruby piped up in my head.

  You know what you do when life gets you down, mermaid? Whatever you feel like doing.

  Pitching a nickel into the jar Mrs. Lindros kept on the hall table, I dialed the now familiar number for Paramount Pictures. Hearing Edith soothed me instantly.

  “I hoped I’d be receiving an update today, Lillian. How have you been?”

  “Busy. Do you have several moments?” She did, so she got a full report, including my abortive expedition to Armand Troncosa’s house and Natalie’s unexpected phone call. When I finished, she had me repeat the conversation with Natalie word for word.

  “If only I hadn’t asked if she and Ruby were related. It scared her off.”

  “Might I suggest another possibility? This Esteban Riordan at Mr. Troncosa’s home indicated that Natalie was traveling, did he not? And am I also right in saying while Natalie hung up after you asked if she and Ruby were family, it was also after the operator cut in requesting more money to continue the call?”

  I said nothing, floored by what she was suggesting.

  “You understand my point,” Edith said. “If you’d heard how much the operator wanted, that would have been some indication of how far Natalie had traveled. It wouldn’t have given you a precise location—”

  “But I’d know where to start looking. I never thought of that.”

  “I’m accustomed to dealing with expenses. Natalie’s call to tell you she wouldn’t assist the police almost assisted the police. And it certainly sounds like Mr. Nolan may have taken that photograph of Ruby. I wish Mr. Groff hadn’t so cavalierly dismissed him. A regrettable missed opportunity.”

  I was fed up with being stymied. By Gene’s prudence, Groff’s machinations, the universe’s indifference. I wanted to stir the pot. “It doesn’t have to be,” I said.

  Edith paused. “I couldn’t possibly speak with Mr. Nolan today. These costumes for Joan Bennett have to be ready by morning.”

  “Tell her I loved her in Vogues of 1938. And I wasn’t thinking you would talk to him.”

  “There’s no way I’d send you to see him alone.”

  “It sounds like you were prepared to see him solo, and I’m taller than you. Besides, I’ll bring a cowboy with me.”

  That Edith never inquired what I meant by that was one of the reasons why I loved living in Los Angeles. “I happen to have Mr. Nolan’s address,” she said.

  Information in hand, I yelled to Kay that I couldn’t stay for dinner and needed to borrow her fiancé.

  15

  THE COMPANIONABLE SILENCE of the drive was broken only by Ready humming snatches of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” Ready was a fascinating man, down to his nickname. Henry Blaylock had ridden out of Oklahoma in 1931 with the idea of seeing the ocean and no intention of joining the throng at Gower Gulch hoping to work in pictures. But his way with a horse came to the attention of a B producer at Columbia and the young cowhand found himself on the set of Sagebrush Serenade. The lead stuntman on the picture was Elmer Redding, known as Reddy, famed for his prowess with both beast and bottle. He and his leather kidneys were sleeping one off when a novice assistant director waded into the stuntmen, pointed at Hank, and inquired, “You Reddy?”

  Hank, thinking he was being asked about his preparedness to shoot, replied, “You bet.”

  Thus did Hank debut as a stuntman in a dangerous stampede scene. He performed flawlessly, commandeering Reddy’s moniker and several of his jobs in short order. Or so the legend goes. Ready, when asked, would neither confirm nor deny the tale. It was the only sensible course of action.

  * * *

  KEN NOLAN’S HOUSE in a down-at-heel stretch west of Hollywood had been blue like the neighborhood had been prosperous, a lifetime ago. The white shutters hanging askew from the front windows gave the place a cockeyed look, as if it couldn’t believe the state it was in either.

  “Behold there was a very stately palace before him,” Ready muttered, “the name of which was not Beautiful.”

  “You got that right, bub. Maybe you should wait in the car. You might make him nervous.”

  “I plan to. This feller is going to know I’m here.” He knocked on the door.

  It flew wide. Ken emerged into the glare to glare. “You again. Here to gloat?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Then what do you want? And who the hell is that?”

  “My driver.”

  “And bodyguard.” Ready pitched his voice even lower than his usual rumble.

  “A bodyguard? That’s a tad excessive, don’t you think?”

  Ready took in Ken’s slight frame and argyle sweater vest. “Upon reflection, yes.”

  “Don’t I know you?” Ken surveyed Ready with interest. “A party at George’s?”

  “Could very well be,” Ready answered. With a hint of the vamp, about the last thing I needed.

  “It’s too bright out here.” Ken sighed. “You may as well come in.”

  “I’ll have a smoke, if you don’t mind.” Ready left it unsaid that he’d be within hollering distance.

  * * *

  THE HOUSE’S TIDY front room was set up as a photography studio. A tripod and lamp huddled in a corner next to a large wooden cabinet. Ken gestured to a scarlet rococo love seat in the middle of the bare wood floor. “If you want to sit, it’s that or the kitchen. Why are you and that redwood here? Didn’t you and your pal Edith have enough fun at my expense?”

  “We didn’t finish our conversation. You were about to give us your impressions of Ruby when the detectives arrived.”

  “Was I? Funny, all I remember about yesterday is getting the sack. Wasn’t even asked a question before the ax fell. John Engstead won’t take my telephone calls.”

  If I didn’t circumvent his self-pity, we’d never get anywhere. “You said you didn’t take any photographs of Ruby. Does that include one of her all dolled up, getting the full glamour treatment?”

  “No photographs means no photographs.”

  Time for a calculated risk. “Then another photographer has this love seat’s twin sister. With this identical woodwork.” I laid my arm along the settee’s back, caressing the filigreed detailing.

  Ken paled. “How…? There was only one print. Ruby swore she sent it to her mother.”

  “Her mother is proud of it. Shows it to everyone. Tells them her daughter was almost a movie star.”

  “Ruby looked like one that day.”

  Finally.

  “She showed up in that beautiful suit. She looked stunning. Or she did once I fixed her makeup. I asked why she didn’t pay for a real photo session if she could afford clothes like that. That’s when she told me how she got them. She promised she wouldn’t use the photo to land auditions. That could get us both in trouble.” Ken chuckled. “Truth is I admired her pluck
. She hadn’t been at the studio a week.”

  “Did she also promise she’d bring the suit back?”

  “First thing in the morning. Which meant she had it overnight. She said it was a shame to leave such a lovely outfit hanging in the dark, so she was going to give it an evening on the town. She had enough money for one drink. I donated cash for a second.” He pointed toward the front door. “I watched her sashay to the Red Car stop. It was chilly that night. She was freezing, but you’d never have known it.”

  “Then what?”

  “She wound up in clover. She went to a hotel bar and fell in with a bunch of swells, drank all night on their dime. Never spent her own money. Never gave mine back, either.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  “Doesn’t it just. She returned the suit and liberated a gown for her next night out. This crowd had invited her to a party, and that led to another. And another.”

  “Until she was fired. And asked you to steal clothes for her.”

  No denial, only a trace of petulance. “Not steal. Borrow. It was only supposed to be borrowing. I said no initially, told Ruby she was crazy. She said she’d find some other way.”

  “Some other way” being me and Tremayne’s extreme employee discount. I was Ruby’s plan B. For some reason, the news hurt.

  “What changed your mind?” I asked.

  “Her relentlessness. She wore me down. It was easy for me to take items from storage and return them a day later.”

  “Then how did Ruby end up with a suitcase full of Paramount wardrobe?”

  “She stopped bringing the clothes back. Just stopped. Told me to live with it. That was Ruby. She didn’t hesitate to change the rules in the middle of the game.”

  “That sounds like her, all right.”

  “You knew Ruby. That’s why you’re here.” When I nodded, Ken waved toward the kitchen. “Do you want a drink? I want a drink.”

  I accepted his offer. Ken handed me a glass with two fingers of what tasted like bourbon. His glass contained an entire hand’s worth, and he carried the bottle with him.

  “If Ruby stopped returning the clothes, why’d you keep helping her?”

  His drink was half gone already. “Because I enjoyed living vicariously through her too much. Because I didn’t have the brass to do what she did.”

  “And look what it cost her.”

  “Don’t start the violins. If Ruby knew the price, she’d have paid it. She’d rather live high for a few weeks than low for a lifetime.”

  He had that right. I sipped my drink, the liquor burning a bright, clear trail down my throat.

  “She’d come by every few days.” Ken canted his head as if expecting the swirling dust motes to resolve into Ruby’s form. “I’d give her the clothes. She’d tell me stories.”

  “Care to repeat a few of them? Who was she seeing?”

  “I didn’t press for names and addresses. Ruby wouldn’t have given them, anyway. She mostly told me things like the proper technique for removing a gentleman’s hand from her thigh politely so the champagne would keep flowing.”

  “No names at all? No Natalie Szabo?”

  “Oh, you mean women’s names. Come to think of it, there was a Natalie. Ruby said this Natalie could be her ticket out.”

  “Did she say how?”

  “Something about lining her up for a studio contract.”

  “What did she tell these people about herself?”

  “As little as possible. She let the clothes do the talking. Look the part and no one asks questions. You know how these people are.” He glanced at me. “On second thought, maybe you don’t.”

  “Just when I was beginning to like you,” I said. Ken apologized by pouring me another inch of whiskey. It was, upon consideration, pretty good bourbon. “Stories were reason enough to risk your job?”

  “I’m the frivolous type, can’t you tell?” He smiled and contemplated his empty glass. “They were for a while. Then about three weeks ago I got caught in Wardrobe after hours and had to lie my way out of it. I told Ruby I was done. I wasn’t going to ‘borrow’ anything else. She raised hell, but I found some backbone. Shortly after that, her friend came to see me.”

  “What friend?”

  “The dreadful man who knew everything. Knew I was taking clothes. Knew Ruby wasn’t returning them. I was surprised he didn’t want some himself, considering the tat he was wearing.”

  My fingers tensed against my glass. “Who was he?”

  “He didn’t divulge a name. Said unless I kept providing Ruby with wardrobe, something untoward would happen to me. Making threats with a sleepy half smile, like he found the whole thing endlessly amusing. I wanted to—”

  “Slap his big blond face?” Beckett.

  “Sounds like you know him, too,” Ken said. “You know Ruby, you know her confidante, you know George’s friend on yonder doorstep. You keep interesting company.”

  A fervent hope sprouted in my breast, that Winton Beckett was still at the police station with Gene. “You did as Ruby’s friend asked, then.”

  “It was made clear I didn’t have much choice.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to have a copy of that picture of Ruby, would you?”

  “Why would I? A photo of Ruby wearing clothes stolen from Paramount would be a confession. I tossed the negative and never took another photo of her. Kind of wish I had, though. I could get a bundle from the papers. Thanks to your chum Miss Head, I need the money. Are we done? Because I’ll finish off this bottle.” He poured another round. Before long he wouldn’t be bothering with the glass.

  “What’s your beef with Edith anyway?” I asked.

  “She’s trying to get Travis Banton ousted so she can poach his job. Owes the man her livelihood and she undermines him every chance she gets.”

  “I find that hard to believe.”

  “Everyone at the studio says it’s true.”

  “From what I hear, she’s keeping the department running while he’s painting the town.”

  “Not like it matters to me. My Paramount days are done. And Edith’s will be soon enough, thanks to Ruby’s hijinks. Everybody’s going to get theirs.” Ken deposited himself rather gracelessly on the floor. “Damn Ruby. She was something, wasn’t she?”

  * * *

  THE ALCOHOL HADN’T hit me as hard as I’d feared; I only needed to hold on to the wall with two hands. Ready led me to his car, reassuring me the vehicle was not yet in motion. I sat quietly until something made me feel nauseous. And it didn’t come out of a bottle.

  Winton Beckett in his trademark attire covered Ken’s walk in two strides and pounded on the door as only an ex-cop can. He then pushed his way inside.

  “You saw that, right?” I asked Ready.

  “Feller wearing a jacket the color of an oil slick on a puddle?”

  “We need to go back.”

  “Hold on. That shutterbug was one thing. Slim there is a whole other kettle of fish.”

  “Could you not mention fish right now?” We heard glass shattering. As if a liquor bottle had been heaved across a room in a cold fury.

  Ready and I were halfway up the walk when Beckett lurched out the door, head snapping to and fro. Ken had obviously told him I’d just left. He saw me and flashed a grin to make mothers lock up their daughters. “Hello, kitten! You bring those delicates I asked for this morning?”

  “Delivery’s extra. I’m surprised to see you out on the street so soon.”

  “Like I told Gene, my mouthpiece is the finest under the sun.”

  Ken peered out of the doorway as Beckett eyeballed my escort. “You always travel with a watchdog? Maybe not a bad idea.”

  Ready stepped forward, and Beckett raised his hands like a hausfrau spotting a mouse. “Relax, Buck. I’m just advising the lady there are some circles she shouldn’t move in alone. And they’re not always the shady ones. A tip from your uncle Win.”

  “I’d ask what you’re doing here but I already know.”

  “
Ken can’t keep his mouth shut. Especially when he’s had a few. He’s like a woman that way.” There was that smile again, all rancid insouciance. I was amazed there wasn’t a permanent impression of a palm print on his face. Ken, meanwhile, had retreated almost entirely behind the front door.

  “I’ll be telling Detective Morrow about our conversation.”

  “I figured as much.” He leaned closer to me. Ready moved with him. “Easy, big fella. Give my regards to Tom Mix. It occurs to me I never gave you the skinny on Gene’s love life.”

  Ready’s shadow gave me boundless confidence. “Get on with it, then.”

  “Okay, kitten. He’s already squiring a woman all over town.”

  “That’s his right.”

  “Only the woman is the widow of his ex-partner. Who died in the line of duty while Brother Gene emerged unscathed. Funny how that worked out. Word is Gene and the widow were seeing each other long before bullets were exchanged. Some friends on the force have questions about that.”

  My stomach began to hurt.

  “Some of those same friends also tell me Natalie gave you a jingle this morning. Let me guess. You’re not going to say a word to me about it.”

  Far be it from me to disappoint him.

  “That’s okay. I’ll find her anyway.” Beckett turned toward the door. “Now if you’ll excuse me, Ken and I have our regular pinochle game. Don’t we, Ken?”

  Ken inched into the sunlight and nodded.

  “I’m up for a hand or two,” Ready said. “Why not deal me in?”

  Ken spoke quietly. “I appreciate your concern. It’s better if you left.”

  “You heard him. I’ll see you again, sweetheart, when I come to pick up my order.” With a victory smirk, Beckett slithered up the front steps and through the door. It swung shut, the grim little house swallowing him whole.

  16

  HOBNOBBING WITH A Hollywood costume designer made surveying my closet’s meager wares even more of a chore. I was happy to abandon the task mid-sulk when Mrs. Quigley summoned me to the phone.

  Naturally, my caller was said Hollywood costume designer. I tightened the belt on my robe, certain Edith’s powers extended to divining how I was dressed based solely on my voice. “Have I got a story for you,” I said.