“You’ve got a connection between Cross and Brown, and I’m already looking for Brown. But as for the other stuff—”
“Come on,” I said, jumping to my feet. “What more do you want—”
“Facts, evidence, something along those lines wouldn’t be unwelcome.”
“What kind of facts?”
“Show me something that says Cross was making fuck films, that Brown was helping him, and that the Saberhagen girl was, uh, involved. Have you got anyone who’ll step forward and swear to any of that?”
I wasn’t sure Fallon—or Ginger—could be talked into going that far.
“I’m not sure,” I said, sitting back down heavily.
“You’ve brought up some interesting points, Jack,” he admitted. “Was Cross in this business alone? Where did he get the money?”
“I don’t think he was alone. He had to have somebody else backing him, at least initially.”
“Or maybe he was just one of a few investors, and just wanted to get more actively involved. You know, personally interview the girls on the casting couch, and all that.”
“I thought of that.”
“Look, you want to do something really helpful?”
“What?”
“Find me Brown.”
“I’ll do that,” I said, standing again. “Goddamn it, I’ll put him right in your lap.”
I started for the door and Hocus yelled out, “Hey!”
“What?”
“Don’t go off half cocked and set up a showdown in Madison Square Garden. This guy ain’t Max the Axe,” he said, “but he ain’t Big Bird, either. He’s mean.”
“I know that better than you, pal.” I rubbed the sides of my mouth, where the bruises were fading, and left.
I stopped by the hospital to see if they were really letting Hank Po out, and found him packing his bag.
“There you are,” Hank said, looking up. He was dressed and on his feet, and the bandage that had encircled his head had been reduced to one that simply covered half his forehead. “I’ve been calling you.”
“You sprung?”
“I’m sprung,” he said. He closed the Staten Island Downs tote bag that he’d been stuffing, and added, “Right now.”
“Let’s get a cab.”
As we rode downtown, I told him everything I’d found out since I last saw him.
“There’s one thing I can’t see,” he said when I’d finished.
“What?”
“How can Brown continue business as usual, and still hope to duck the cops.”
“And why duck the cops unless he’s got something to hide?”
“That doesn’t necessarily follow,” Hank said. “Fallon doesn’t want to talk to the cops, and does she have something to hide?”
“Maybe.” I said, “And maybe Brown just ducks cops instinctively. Remember, he likes to hurt people—and Fallon, she’s too afraid of him to talk to cops.”
“You don’t think that she came clean with you?”
“I don’t think she or Ginger has been absolutely honest with me, but that might simply be out of . . . embarrassment.”
“About appearing in blue movies?”
“It depends on what kind of movies they did.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think,” I said, taking out Cross’s book, “that I’ve got Cross’s little code figured out.”
“Really?”
“Some of these should have been obvious, I think.”
“Like what?”
“Like this,” I said, showing him one of the entries next to Brown’s name.
“SM?” he said.
“Don’t say it that way. Say ‘S-and-M’, and what comes to mind?”
His eyebrows shot up and he said, “I get the picture. The people in the book are all people who have appeared, or are willing to appear, in Cross’s movies.”
“Right.”
“And the letters next to each name signify the types of movies each person is willing to do.”
“Right again.”
“Damn,” he said, “it is a trick book.”
“Yeah, I guess you could call it that.”
When we got to his loft on Eighteenth Street, not far from Debbie’s No-Name tavern, we suspended conversation until we had paid the cab and negotiated our way up to his place.
“Should be some beer in the fridge,” he said as we entered.
“At this time of the morning?”
“After the shit they gave me in the hospital, I don’t care what time it is, I want a beer.”
I got him one after insisting that he sit on his couch, and then shrugged and took one for myself.
“Let me see that,” he said, reaching out for Cross’s book with his free hand.
I gave it to him and sat in an armchair across from the couch while he perused it.
“Three W,” he said. “Three-way sex, right?”
“Ménage à trois,” I said, flaunting my limited knowledge of French.
“You know,” he said, turning pages, “if any one of these people found out that Cross was putting their names in a book—even without last names—”
“One of them might have killed him for it,” I finished. “That thought has just recently occurred to me.”
“B?”
“Bondage,” I said, hazarding a guess, and he nodded.
“Must be. BD?” he asked, trying another one.
“Black dog?”
He snapped his fingers and said, “Back door!”
“Why not ‘G’ for Greek?”
He leafed through it and said, “Can’t find any G’s, but there’s a GS.”
“Good sex?”
“I guess we’ll never find them all out, now that he’s dead,” he said, still turning pages and reading intently.
“Well, at least this will give you something to do while you’re convalescing.”
“Here’s an ‘A’,” he said. “If ‘A’ stands for anal sex, what’s BD?”
“Black dog?”
He ignored me.
“‘L’ that’s easy.”
“What?”
“Lesbian, and ‘H’ must stand for homosexual.”
“Wait a minute,” I said, as a puzzle piece slid into place. It had nothing really to do with the case, but it was something I’d been very curious about, and the scene in Fallon and Ginger’s apartment last night, and what Hank had just said, made it come together.
“Look at the entries for Ginger and Fallon.”
He did so and said, “Fallon’s a little kinkier than her roommate. Let’s see, conventional, bondage, bondage, s-and-m, three-way—what the hell is this?”
“Look at Ginger’s again.”
He turned back to Ginger’s and said, “That last one’s the same, except for the last letter.”
“The last letter of each has to be their initials.”
“Yeah, but the ‘F’ is next to Ginger’s name, and the ‘G’ is next to Fallon’s. And what the hell is LOW?”
“What’s ‘L’?”
“We’ve established that. ‘L’ stands for lesbian.”
“LOWF,” I repeated for his benefit.
“I still don’t get it.”
“Don’t you see? Both girls are willing to have lesbian sex, but only with each other!”
He got it then.
“LOWF,” he said. “Lesbian only with Fallon.”
“And vice versa.”
Which probably explained the impression I had gotten last night just before leaving their apartment. I got that man in a trenchcoat feeling again and shook my head to dispel the thought.
“We’re getting good at this,” he said, picking up his beer to take a swallow, and then leafing through the book again.
“Here’s a winner,” he said, suddenly.
“Where?”
“Right here. This gal will do anything. She’s got C, L, B, SM, 3W, A—Christ, she’s got the whole alphabet here.”
“What’s
her name?”
“Paula.”
I wasn’t sure I’d heard him right.
“What was that?”
“Paula.”
Could it be?
“There’s two of them here, too,” he said. “Two Paula’s.”
“How’d he tell the difference?”
“I guess he could have by their coded entries,” Hank said. “One’s much longer than the other; but he’s got a last initial next to this gal’s name.”
“What is it?”
“B, Paula B.”
It was, I thought. It had to be.
Alan Cross’s boss, Paula Bishop!
When I told Hank what I was thinking he put the book down and said thoughtfully, “Maybe that’s where additional funds were coming from.”
“But according to this, she was also a performer—a very versatile performer.”
“She could have been both.”
“Maybe the best way to find out is to ask her.”
I called her office and spoke to her secretary, who told me that Miss Bishop had called and said she would not be coming in today. I asked for her home address, but the secretary refused to give it to me.
“Now what?” Hank asked after I’d hung up.
“I may not have her address,” I said, leaning forward and picking up the book, “but I’ve got her phone number, don’t I?”
Thirty-Two
Paula Bishop was home when I called and although she sounded surprised to hear from me, she agreed to see me. She gave me her address on Central Park South, and I hung up.
“What’s a businesswoman doing at home on a Tuesday morning?” Hank asked, trying to ease the itch his taped ribs were causing.
I looked at my watch and said, “It’s almost Tuesday afternoon, but when I find out I’ll let you know.”
“Do that. You taking the book with you?”
“Yes. I may need it to rattle her a bit. You can have your fun with it later.”
“But what am I going to do to keep from going crazy in the meantime?”
“Watch soap operas,” I said, and left.
It was after noon when the cab dropped me in front of her building and I wondered if she’d be a good hostess and offer me lunch. The doorman knew my name and passed me through, and I took the elevator to the floor below the penthouse. I guess everyone needed something to shoot for.
I noticed something about her as soon as she let me in and led me into the living room. She wasn’t walking right. She was too stiff, and trying to hide it.
She must have had a rough weekend.
“I called your office, but they told me you weren’t in today.”
“And they gave you my phone number?” she asked, frowning. “I’ll have to talk to—”
“No, I didn’t get your phone number from your office.”
“It’s unlisted. You couldn’t have gotten it any other way. If you’re trying to protect my secretary—”
“I’m not.”
“Then how did you get it?”
“I’ll tell you that later. I have a few more questions to ask you, if you don’t mind.”
She gave a resigned shrug of her shoulders and asked, “Can I offer you some coffee?”
“Fine. Black, no sugar.”
She looked very different today, not much like the businesswoman I’d seen last time. She was wearing a red brocade kimono that extended below her knees, and her hair was down around her shoulders. I watched as she walked stiffly to the kitchen and guessed that it was her back, or possibly her side. I’d walked like that a few times after a fight, when my ribs were sore.
She came back with one cup of coffee for me.
“None for you?”
“I’ve had a few already. What were those questions you wanted to ask me?”
“I wanted to ask you again if you ever had any connection with Cross outside of your business.”
“The answer is still the same.”
“I thought it might be,” I said, sipping the coffee. It was instant. I looked around and said, “Can we sit down?”
“I’d prefer to stand.”
“Hurt too much to sit?”
“What?”
“Your ribs. They must hurt a lot.”
“I wrenched my back . . . moving some furniture,” she said, studying me.
“Moving furniture,” I repeated.
“Yes.”
“Have you seen a doctor?”
“I don’t need a doctor, thank you. Could we get on with this?”
“That was the only question I really wanted to ask you. I wanted to see if your answer would be the same.”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
I shrugged and said, “I just thought that maybe you would want to start telling the truth.”
“I beg your pardon. Are you calling me a liar?”
“I guess I am.”
“I think you should leave, Mr. Jacoby, before I call the doorman.”
“Maybe you should have called him when you had to move that furniture.”
She glared at me. I took Cross’s book out of my pocket and showed it to her.
“What’s that?”
“A book.”
“I can see that,” she said, but she couldn’t seem to take her eyes off it. I think she might have known that things were about to fall apart.
“It’s a very special book. Here, take a look at it,” I said, holding it out to her. She took it and started to leaf through it tentatively.
“It’s Alan Cross’s book, Paula. He listed all of his actors and actresses in there. Turn to the P’s and you’ll see where I got your phone number.”
She turned to the P’s, stared at her name, and then closed her eyes.
“Damn him,” she said in a whisper.
“You want to sit down?”
She bit her lower lip and nodded. I took her by the arm, walked her to the couch, and helped her to sit.
“How did it start?” I asked sitting next to her. “Did he get you to back him?”
“He was very charming, and very persuasive,” she said, slowly. She looked down at the book in her hands and said, “A goddamn book. That sonofabitch!”
“Look, don’t get all upset,” I said, taking it from her. “Nobody has to know about this.”
She got a knowing look in her eyes and said, “All right, how much do you want?”
“Oh, I’m not interested in money.”
“No?” she asked, and then she got another knowing look on her face and I headed her off at the pass on that, too.
“I don’t want sex, either.”
“Then what do you want, Mr. Jacoby?”
“I want to know everything you know about Alan Cross’s porno movie business.”
“I don’t know very much. He started small, using his own money.”
“His own money?”
“Well, it wasn’t my money.”
“Did he have other investors besides you?”
“I guess so.”
“Did he have someone above him, someone he worked for?”
“He never said anything . . . but I always got that impression.”
“I see.”
“Do you want to know how I got involved . . . how I went beyond funding . . .”
“I don’t want to know about you, I want to know about him, and about a man called Brown.”
“Brown,” she said, and unconsciously she put her hand against her left side.
“You know Brown,” I said, and it came out as a direct statement and not as a question.
“Yes.”
“Did he do that? Hurt your side?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know where I can find him, Paula?”
“Brown?”
“I know where Cross is.”
“Yes, of course. No, I don’t know where you can find Brown.”
“You saw him over the weekend, right?”
“Yes, but he picked me up and he brought me home. Have you tried h
is apartment?”
“He hasn’t been back to his apartment since the police started looking for him.”
“Why are the police looking for him?”
“Because they think he might have killed Alan Cross.”
“Brownie? Killed Cross?” she asked, as if realizing that she might have spent time in the company of a killer over the weekend.
“Didn’t that thought ever occur to you?”
“Well . . . no.”
“Doesn’t Brown strike you as the violent type?”
“Of course,” she said, rubbing her side.
“Then you’ve got to tell me where I can find him, Paula.”
“I don’t know, I really don’t.”
I sat back and put the book away in my pocket. What good was putting pressure on her if she didn’t know anything that could help me?
Or did she?
“Excuse me for asking this, but did you shoot a movie this weekend?”
Looking embarrassed she said, “Yes.”
“Where?”
“Where?”
“A theater, an apartment?”
“Oh, I see. No, the shootings have usually been done in a warehouse, or a loft . . .”
“Very classy.”
“Don’t try to make me feel dirtier than I already do.”
“So, if you were shooting this weekend, that means that Brown has taken up where Cross left off, right?”
“I suppose.”
She looked so down that I had to ask.
“I said I wouldn’t ask, Paula, but I have to. Why do you do it?”
She couldn’t meet my eyes as she answered.
“I must admit, I’ve wondered myself why I did it that first time. Alan flattered me, he charmed me . . . he made love to me.”
“And you did it once, but why keep it up after that?”
“Once wasn’t enough for Alan,” she said, bitterly. “After that, he wouldn’t let me refuse.”
Maybe she never really wanted to stop. Why else would she keep on with it unless . . .
“Paula, was he blackmailing you?”
She bit her lower lip again and nodded.
“He said no one would see my face, just my body, but when he showed me the movie . . . there I was!”
“So you were never paid?
“I did it as a lark that first time. Alan convinced me that it would be fun, that I’d enjoy it.”
I decided not to ask her if she had enjoyed it.
“Where did Brown take you this time?”
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