Chipped Pearls

by Helen Jacey

  Contents

  About Helen Jacey

  Visit Shedunnit Productions

  Praise for Helen Jacey’s writing

  By Helen Jacey

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  46

  47

  48

  49

  50

  51

  52

  53

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright

  Helen Jacey is the founder of Shedunnit Productions and the creator of the feminist vintage noir series Elvira Slate Investigations. The first novel in the series Jailbird Detective was published in 2018. Helen has developed numerous projects for international film and television companies. Her biographical BBC 4 radio drama about Jean Rhys Miracle Postponed was short-listed for a Mental Health in the Media Award. Renowned for her expertise on feminism and the creative process, Helen has worked with film institutions and leading brands throughout the world. Her widely acclaimed screenwriting book The Woman in the Story: Writing Memorable Female Characters (Michael Wiese Productions, 2nd ed. 2017) was the first to focus on gender and female representation.

  Helen grew up in South London. She gained an MA in Screenwriting from The London Institute, 2001, and a PhD in Screenwriting from the University of the Arts London, 2010. She has taught screenwriting and creative writing at several British universities.

  Visit Shedunnit Productions:

  Website:

  www.shedunnit.com

  www.instagram.com/shedunnitproductions

  www.facebook.com/shedunnit

  www.twitter.com/shedunnit

  Praise for Helen Jacey’s writing:

  ‘No writer has more intricately explored what contemporary writing for and about women means today. In Elvira Slate, Jacey has created a slick 40’s sleuth that could inspire the toughest 21st century feminist – and a binge-worthy boxset of the highest order!’

  – Celia Walden, US Editor at Large, Daily Telegraph

  ‘Elvira Slate emerges as the new heroine of LA noir.”

  – Terence Bailey, Author of The Sara Jones Cycle

  ‘In Elvira Slate, a fierce female ex-con with an attraction to trouble and nothing to lose, Jacey has created a criminally compelling character I’d follow anywhere – at a safe distance.’

  – Jennifer Steil, Journalist and Author of

  The Ambassador’s Wife

  ‘Welcome back, Elvira. We’ve missed you.’

  – Stephen Wyatt, Writer Classic Chandler, BBC Radio 4 and Author of The World and His Wife

  ‘Elvira Slate navigates the criminal underworld of forties Hollywood according to her own moral compass. Full of a fiery ferociousness first developed as a kid surviving as an orphan in London, entrenched during her years as a gangster’s moll, and perfected during a stint in Holloway prison – she is the noir anti-heroine we’ve long been missing.’

  – Savannah James-Bayly, Associate Producer,

  Queens of Mystery

  By Helen Jacey:

  ELVIRA SLATE INVESTIGATIONS:

  Made Moll (novelette)

  Jailbird Detective

  Chipped Pearls

  Chipped Pearls

  Elvira Slate Investigations Book Two

  By Helen Jacey

  Shedunnit Productions

  In loving memory of

  Lucy Scher

  1965-2018

  1

  ‘Well I never. If it isn’t Jemima Day.’

  The voice hasn’t changed. Not a bit.

  We meet each other’s eyes. I know her face as well as the scar on my belly. Both are faded with age, both trigger memories of hell. A searing pain of rage and helplessness.

  I give a slight nod and head for the hotel entrance lobby.

  Do I make a run for it? Walk out on the case?

  No. That way leads to ruin, and fast. Not just financial, but my reputation as well.

  But she’s spotted me and she will be the destruction of Elvira Slate entirely. Lauder’s words echo in my mind. “You realize how many of your compatriots cross the pond?”

  Damn it! He wasn’t kidding.

  She’s chuckling now, behind me. Her breath wheezes. ‘Like that, is it, duckie? Too good for your old chum?’

  There’s really no choice. I turn around. ‘Hello, Maureen.’

  ‘Hello, Jemima. Or is it Elvira now?’

  Maureen’s eyelids, papery like scrunched silk, are raised as high as they can probably go these days. She’s wearing an unfashionably long tea dress, all pink and white daisies. Her wide-brimmed, pale pink hat is loaded with luscious taffeta roses.

  The last I heard, years ago, she was doing a long stretch. She must have served her time and landed on her feet to roll up here. Resurrected in a flouncy dress, on the arm of a mobster, and now coiling around my neck.

  Her green eyes twinkle at me. ‘You know, we all thought you were a goner. And here you are safe and sound in California. Thanks to our blessed Lady—Mary, Mother of God.’

  Her eyes swivel upwards as she makes the sign of the cross. ‘How I prayed you were safe! Look at you! All grown up into an elegant lady!’

  A dry lump lodges in my throat as I wait for the punch line.

  If she’s the same old Maureen O’Reilly, it won’t take long.

  Sure enough, her thin red lips split into a coy smile. ‘There was a lot of readies on offer for news of your whereabouts. If you’d like to stay looking so well, you and me need to have a little chat, don’t we?’

  2

  Ten Days Earlier

  I read the telegram.

  GREETINGS FROM VIENNA STOP YOUR FRIEND DECEASED STOP INFLUENZA DURING WAR STOP NO OFFSPRING STOP YOU OWE ME TWO STOP MERRY CHRISTMAS STOP.

  Hardly words of comfort and joy, but at least Lois had a sense of humor.

  A photojournalist and like me a resident of the Miracle Mile Hotel, Lois Schulz had recently touched down in Vienna to take pictures of a butchered city and its people. She was on assignment for Family Times, a new women’s magazine. Lois’s remit was to find heartwarming stories of families struggling in the aftermath of the war: hope emerging from the ruins of Europe.

  Before she left, she had reluctantly agreed to try to track down a certain Sophia Spark, whose last known whereabouts were Vienna. ‘A few days is all I can spare. Fifty bucks a day.’

  I told her if she did find Sophia, on no account could she use her in one of her stories. This was a confidential mission.

  The “two” in her telegram meant it had taken her only two days. Lois had been quick, and now had the results I needed. In one way it was a relief—I was in no hurry to fly back to Europe poking around rubble for long-lost daughters.

  But in another way, it was a disaster. Sophia Spark was dead, leaving me to deal with some pretty big implications.

  The late Tatiana Spark’s last wish was for me to find Sophia,
her long-lost daughter, and give her the ultimate Hollywood happy ending—a large inheritance and a new life in the Pacific Palisades, California.

  For my efforts in locating Sophia, the Spark estate would pay me a hefty stipend to help me start up my detective agency.

  I sat down heavily behind my desk, gazing out of the window. To hide from clients what he considered was an ugly view, my secretary Barney had installed venetian blinds in a dark wood and placed an over-enthusiastic cheese plant on the ledge. He instructed me to keep the blinds down, but the slats open. Instead, I kept the blinds rolled right up and moved the plant near the door.

  I found the permanent view of the fire escape strangely reassuring.

  I lit a cigarette and dwelt on my fate. Without the Spark money how would I pay my rent for the office suite-cum-apartment and Barney’s salary?

  It covered a lot else. Like the gold-and-black lettering on the marbled glass of the office door which declared my profession.

  Elvira Slate, Private Investigator.

  Not bad for a former gangster’s moll from London, a wanted killer, a suspected spy and probation absconder.

  But more than anything else, the Tatiana Spark Trust money had bought me mental space. A brief window in time to process the fact that against all odds, I had escaped the noose. And that as far as Blighty officialdom was concerned, I was dead. Well, Jemima Day was. That was the name on my British birth certificate.

  Reborn as Elvira Slate, I had no intention of ever going back.

  Swinging my feet up onto my desk, I reread Lois’s telegram.Sophia died during the war. That could mean anytime during ‘39 to now, December ‘45.

  I couldn’t wait to find out from Lois how she had got the grisly details. I would need everything she had to present to the trustees so they could decide what to do with the fortune in the bank. But Lois wouldn’t be back for a few weeks.

  At the end of the day, maybe it was a good thing. Debts to the dead left a bad odor.

  And I really should find other clients to fuel my business, so I could cease relying on Tatiana Spark’s guilt money. I’d done a couple of what Barney called ‘small jobs’, but nothing was on the horizon.

  Find a new case fast or go bust.

  Now I’d just have to find work the way any new detective does. How the hell was that?

  There was a cough at the door. Barney’s floppy brown hair appeared, a cheeky grin on his face. ‘Good news?’

  I stalled, swinging my feet off the desk. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Any news from Lois?’

  ‘Not yet.’ I shuddered inwardly. He didn’t need to know he might not have a job by the time New Year’s Day rolled around. It would kill me to tell him.

  ‘You look like you need a coffee. Presto!’ He came in, holding a tray with a cup of black coffee. He carefully placed the tray down in front of me. ‘So…decided?’

  ‘On…?’ My blank stare made him roll his eyes.

  ‘The Christmas tree. Be nice for the clients.’

  ‘We only have one client and she’s dead.’

  Barney tutted, ignoring my grouchiness. ‘We could have a cute little silver fairy at the top. I’ll go pick one up at the Farmers Market.’

  ‘A fairy or a tree?’ I winked. Barney preferred the fellas. He knew I knew—we’d had too many drinks after I offered him the job, and he had spilled the beans—but now he was turning beetroot.

  I cursed my tactlessness. At work, he could forget all about the lie he had to live the rest of the time. He had only opened up to me because he sensed I wouldn’t judge and if he was going to quit a stable, if dull, job at The Chronicle to join me, he didn’t want any secrets. He wanted me to be the perfect boss and this to be the perfect job.

  He had told me his beloved parents were busy looking for the right Jewish girl, someone who wouldn’t mind a crippled veteran. Barney had lost a foot in France. Life changing but small fry considering his family had lost many relatives in the camps and his mother was in a deep depression, hardly speaking anymore. Barney knew his parents’ future happiness depended on his prospects. But for how long could he keep the act up?

  In true Barney form, he never let his guilt show. Maybe he had already found Mr. Right and that kept him going.

  Or maybe he simply had figured out that if the odds are against you, there’s no point moaning about it.

  ‘I don’t like Christmas. And you don’t celebrate it, so it beats me why we need a tree.’ I sipped the coffee.

  ‘Well, you never know who might walk in the door last minute.’ Barney reflected, heading back to the doorway. ‘And even if they don’t, you’ll be here all alone for two weeks with nothing pretty to look at. Sad!’

  I raised a sarcastic brow. I’d given Barney a full two weeks off because he deserved it.

  ‘I bet you come January, the telephone won’t stop. You know, there are more death notices right after the holiday. Busy time!’

  Barney’s job at The Chronicle had been in the personal columns.

  ‘So why should the detective business boom?’

  Barney rolled his eyes at my pessimism. ‘Imagine the housewife discovering her hubby whispering sweet nothings to his lover on the telephone on Christmas Day? She’ll be calling in no time to dig up some evidence to bump up her alimony.’

  ‘But I don’t want to do divorce,’ I groaned. The plan had been to take on clients who were in a jam, had someone disappear on them, were being bullied, blackmailed, or tricked. Marriage was a fool’s game and I didn’t have the patience for mopping up the mess of other people’s delusions.

  But did I have a choice?

  I met his eyes. ‘You know what? Get a darned tree.’

  3

  Christmas Eve rolled around a few days later. Barney went back home. The hotel was a shadow of its former self. The lobby, where the residents normally sat chatting after work, and where Mrs. Loeb behind the front desk would bark at us for our misdemeanors, was deserted. The sound of women laughing in the elevator was replaced by silence.

  Earlier that day I heard the wail of a lonesome saxophone, melding with the distant horns and hum of traffic on Wilshire. But now even that had stopped. Most probably Alberta, who played in an all-girl swing band The Charmettes, and was the housekeeper of Dede Dedeaux, the hotel’s owner.

  Well, “housekeeper” was a front. Neither had openly declared it, but Alberta and her white employer, Dede Dedeaux, were an item. The roles of maid and boss enabled them to live together without arousing suspicion.

  I wasn’t exactly chummy with them, but Dede and Alberta knew my identity was a front, too. We had a gentlewoman’s understanding not to pry.

  I wouldn’t bother Alberta anyway, if she were still around. Dede was away skiing in Aspen with her rich family, so this was probably the nearest thing Alberta got to time for herself.

  Now the tree sat in the corner of the front office. Barney had really gone to town. All tinsel festoons and glittery decorations. At the top, a little doll of a fairy with a chalkware face, lacy silver wings and a white frock. She was cute with her gold curls and snub nose. If we went bust next year, Barney could keep her because I’d want to sock her in the face.

  I gave her a sharp look. ‘You better be a fairy godmother because I sure as hell need one.’

  Christmas cards covered the surfaces in the office. I flicked through a few. Most were to Barney.

  That was fine by me. Everybody loved him.

  Then I caught sight of something. At the foot of the tree.

  Gifts.

  Barney hadn’t said a thing. He’d just discreetly put them there. Avoiding any awkwardness? That was his style.

  I picked them up one by one. The contents of the first one were soft. I flicked over the tag. ‘Happy holidays to a great boss!’

  A great boss? Sure, one who forgets to buy a gift for her worker. I opened the crisp pink tissue. Inside, a delicate gray scarf, covered in tiny black dots.

  A larger gift was from June Conway, my gown d
esigner pal who also lived in the hotel. After a nasty experience six months ago, she had left the hotel for a break from the city. But life in the boonies hadn’t suited her. June had moved back in November and opened a dress shop near Olvera Street.

  I tore open the wrapping paper. Inside, a deep ruby velvet gown. I picked it up, the fabric slipping through my hands like soft treacle.

  I stood up and held it against me. It had a ruched bodice and a high, heart-shaped neckline with soft puckers around the edges. The long sleeves were quite full, the cuffs fixed with a pair of little velvet buttons. You could take out a person’s eye with the shoulder pads. The skirt, cut on the bias, fell elegantly to the floor.

  Inside, a woven label in gold and shades of pink. A Miracle Mile Gown, with a little symbol of a palm tree and a woman’s profile.

  It was sweet June had named her dress shop after the hotel because she felt it had changed her life for the better. It was a hotel with a habit of changing lives.

  A note fell out. ‘To my dearest Elvira. I hope you need this dress soon! With love and eternal gratitude. Happy holidays, June.’

  As I had zero parties on the horizon, that was optimistic.

  The third wrapped gift was a stiff rectangular box. The paper was covered in jolly Santas and tied with a cream satin bow. The tag read, ‘This should come in handy. To a prosperous ‘46. Beatty.’

  Curt and to the point. Beatty Falaise was the closest person I had to a mentor. She was the most powerful female detective in LA and had taken me under her wing and shown me the ropes.