The Black Dahlia

by James Ellroy

  Sheryl Saddon was out of breath and sweating from her metallic costume. I pointed to a bunk bed. “Sit down and answer my questions, or I’ll roust you for the reefers you flushed down the toilet.”

  The three-day Cleopatra obeyed, giving me a look that would have withered Julius Caesar. I said, “First question. Does a Linda Martin live here?”

  Sheryl Saddon grabbed a pack of Old Golds off the bunk and lit up. “I told Sergeant Stutter already. Betty mentioned Linda Martin a couple of times. She roomed at Betty’s other place, the one over on De Longpre and Orange. And you need evidence to arrest someone, you know.”

  I took out my pen and notebook. “What about Betty’s enemies? Threats of violence against her?”

  “Betty’s trouble wasn’t enemies, it was too many friends, if you follow my drift. Get it? Friends like in boyfriends?”

  “Smart girl. Any of them ever threaten her?”

  “Not that I know of. Listen, can we hurry this up?”

  “Simmer down. What did Betty do for work while she was staying here?”

  Sheryl Saddon snorted, “Comedian. Betty didn’t work. She bummed change from the other girls here, and she cadged drinks and dinner off grandfather types down on the Boulevard. A couple of times she took off for two or three days and came back with money, then she told these fish stories about where it came from. She was such a little liar that nobody ever believed a word she said.”

  “Tell me about the fish stories. And about Betty’s lies in general.”

  Sheryl stubbed out her cigarette and lit another one immediately. She smoked silently for a few moments, and I could tell that the actress part of her was warming to the idea of caricaturing Betty Short. Finally she said, “You know all this Black Dahlia stuff in the papers?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, Betty always dressed in black as a gimmick to impress casting directors when she made rounds with the other girls, which wasn’t often, because she liked to sleep till noon every day. But sometimes she’d tell you she was wearing black because her father died or because she was mourning the boys who died in the war. Then the next day she’d tell you her father was alive. When she was out for a couple of days and came back flush, she’d tell one girl a rich uncle died and left her a bundle and another that she won the money playing poker in Gardena. She told everybody nine thousand lies about being married to nine thousand different war heroes. You get the picture?”

  I said, “Vividly. Let’s change the subject.”

  “Goody. How about international finance?”

  “How about the movies? You girls are all trying to break in, right?”

  Sheryl gave me a vamp look. “I have broken in. I was in The Cougar Woman, Attack of the Phantom Gargoyle and Sweet Will Be the Honeysuckle.”

  “Congratulations. Did Betty ever get any movie work?”

  “Maybe. Maybe once, but then again maybe not, because Betty was such a liar.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, on Thanksgiving all the kids on the sixth floor chipped in for a potluck supper, and Betty was flush and bought two whole cases of beer. She was bragging about being in a movie, and she was showing around this viewfinder that she said the director gave her. Now lots of girls have got chintzy little viewfinders that movie guys give them, but this was an expensive one, on a chain, with a little velvet case. I remember that Betty was on cloud nine that night, talking up a blue streak.”

  “Did she tell you the name of the movie?”

  Sheryl shook her head. “No.”

  “Did she mention any names associated with the movie?”

  “If she did, I don’t remember.”

  I looked around the room, counted twelve bunk beds at a dollar a night apiece and thought of a landlord getting fat. I said, “Do you know what a casting couch is?”

  The mock Cleopatra’s eyes burned. “Not me, buster. Not this girl ever.”

  “Betty Short?”

  “Probably.”

  I heard a horn honking, walked to the window and looked out. A flatbed truck with a dozen Cleopatras and pharaohs in the back was at the curb directly behind my car. I turned around to tell Sheryl, but she was already out the door.

  The last address on Millard’s list was 1611 North Orange Drive, a pink stucco tourist flop in the shadow of Hollywood High School. Koenig snapped out of his nose-picking reverie as I double-parked in front of it, pointing to two men perusing a stack of newspapers on the steps. “I’ll take them, you take the skirts. You got names for them?”

  I said, “Maybe Harold Costa and Donald Leyes. You look tired, Sarge. Don’t you want to sit this one out?”

  “I’m bored. What should I ask them guys?”

  “I’ll handle them, Sarge.”

  “You remember the kitty cat, Bleichert. Same thing happened to him happens to guys who try to jerk my chain when Fritzie ain’t around. Now what do I roust them guys for?”

  “Sarge—”

  Koenig sprayed me with spittle. “I’m ranking, hotshot! You do what Big Bill says!”

  Seeing red, I said, “Get alibis and ask them if Betty Short ever engaged in prostitution” Koenig snickered in reply. I took the lawn and steps at a run, the two men moving aside to let me through. The front door opened into a shabby sitting room; a group of young people were sitting around, smoking and reading movie mags. I said, “Police. I’m looking for Linda Martin, Marjorie Graham, Harold Costa and Donald Leyes.”

  A honey blonde in a slacks suit dog-eared her Photoplay. “I’m Marjorie Graham, and Hal and Don are outside.”

  The rest of the people got up and fanned out into the hallway, like I was a big dose of bad news. I said, “This is about Elizabeth Short. Did any of you know her?”

  I got a half dozen negative head shakes, shocked and sad looks; outside I heard Koenig shouting, “You tell me true! Was the Short bimbo peddling it?”

  Marjorie Graham said, “I was the one who called the police, Officer. I gave them Linda’s name because I knew she knew Betty, too.”

  I pointed to the door. “What about those guys outside?”

  “Don and Harold? They both dated Betty. Harold called you because they knew you’d be looking for clues. Who’s that man yelling at them?”

  I ignored the question, sat down beside Marjorie Graham and got out my notebook. “What can you tell me about Betty that I don’t know already? Can you give me dates? Names of other boyfriends, descriptions, specific dates? Enemies? Possible motives for somebody wanting to kill her?”

  The woman flinched; I realized I was raising my voice. Keeping it low, I said, “Let’s start with dates. When did Betty live here?”

  “Early December,” Marjorie Graham said. “I remember because there was a bunch of us sitting here listening to a radio program on the fifth anniversary of Pearl Harbor when she checked in.”

  “So that was December seventh?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how long was she here?”

  “No more than a week or so.”

  “How did she know about this place?”

  “I think Linda Martin told her about it.”

  Millard’s memo stated that Betty Short spent most of December in San Diego. I said, “But she moved out shortly afterward, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why, Miss Graham? Betty lived in three places that we know of last fall—all in Hollywood. Why did she move around so much?”

  Marjorie Graham took a tissue from her purse and fretted it. “Well, I don’t really know for sure.”

  “Was some jealous boyfriend after her?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Miss Graham, what do you think?”

  Marjorie sighed. “Officer, Betty used up people. She borrowed money from them and told them stories, and … well, a lot of pretty hard-nosed kids live here, and I think they saw through Betty pretty quick.”

  I said, “Tell me about Betty. You liked her, didn’t you?”

  “Yes. She was sweet and trusting and
sort of dumb, but … inspired. She had this strange gift, if you want to call it that. She’d do anything to be liked, and she sort of took on the mannerisms of whoever she was with. Everybody here smokes, and Betty started smoking to be one of the kids, even though it was bad for her asthma and she hated cigarettes. And the funny thing is that she’d try to walk and talk like you, but she was always herself when she was doing it. She was always Betty or Beth or whatever nickname for Elizabeth she was going by at that moment.”

  I kicked the sad dope around in my head. “What did you and Betty talk about?”

  Marjorie said, “Mostly I just listened to Betty talk. We used to sit here and listen to the radio, and Betty told stories. Love stories about all these war heros—Lieutenant Joe and Major Matt and on and on. I knew they were just fantasies. Sometimes she talked about becoming a movie star, like all she had to do was walk around in her black dresses and sooner or later she’d get discovered. That sort of made me mad, because I’ve been taking classes at the Pasadena Playhouse, and I know that acting is hard work.”

  I flipped to my notes from the Sheryl Saddon questioning. “Miss Graham, did Betty talk about being in a movie sometime in late November?”

  “Yes. The first night she was here she was bragging about it. She said she had a co-starring role, and she showed around a viewfinder. A couple of boys pressed her for details, and she told one of them it was at Paramount, another that it was at Fox. I thought she was just fibbing to get attention.”

  I wrote “Names” on a clean page and underlined it three times. “Marjorie, what about names? Betty’s boyfriends, people you saw her with?”

  “Well, I know she went out with Don Leyes and Harold Costa, and I saw her once with a sailor, and I …”

  Marjorie faltered; I caught a troubled look in her eyes. “What is it? You can tell me.”

  Marjorie’s voice was stretched thin. “Right before she moved out I saw Betty and Linda Martin talking to this big older woman up on the Boulevard. She was wearing a man’s suit, and she had short hair like a man. I only saw them with her that one time, so maybe it doesn’t mean—”

  “Are you saying the woman was a lesbian?”

  Marjorie bobbed her head up and down and reached for a Kleenex; Bill Koenig stepped inside and hooked a finger at me. I walked over to him. He whispered, “Them guys talked, said the stiff peddled her twat when she got strapped bad. I called Mr. Loew. He said to keep that zipped, ‘cause it’s a better caper if she’s a nice young cooze.”

  I bit off an urge to spill the dyke lead; the DA and his flunky would probably quash it, too. I said, “I’ve got another quick one here. Get statements from those guys, okay?”

  Koenig giggled and walked outside; I told Marjorie to sit still and moved to the rear of the lobby. There was a registration desk, an open ledger on top of it. I stood at the counter and leafed through the pages until I saw a childishly scrawled “Linda Martin,” with “Room 14” printed across from it.

  I took the first-floor corridor back to the room, knocked on the door and waited for an answer. When none came after five seconds, I tried the knob. It gave, and I pushed the door open.

  It was a cramped little room containing nothing but an unmade bed. I checked the closet; it was dead empty. The nightstand held a stack of yesterday’s papers folded open to “Werewolf Murder” brouhaha; suddenly I knew the Martin girl was a lamster. I got down on the floor and ran a hand under the bed, brushed a flat object and pulled it out.

  It was a red plastic change purse. I opened it and found two pennies, a dime and an identification card for Cornhusker High School, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The card was made out to Lorna Martilkova, DOB 12/19/31. There was a photo of a beautiful young girl below the school’s crest; in my mind I was already typing out an all-points juvie runaway warrant.

  Marjorie Graham appeared in the doorway. I held out the ID card; she said, “That’s Linda. God, she’s only fifteen.”

  “Middle-aged for Hollywood. When did you see her last?”

  “This morning. I told her I called the police, that they’d be coming by to talk to us about Betty. Was that the wrong thing to do?”

  “You couldn’t have known. And thanks.”

  Marjorie smiled, and I found myself wishing her a speedy one-way trip out of movieland. I kept the wish silent as I smiled back and walked outside. On the porch, Bill Koenig was standing at parade rest and Donald Leyes and Harold Costa were sprawled in lounge chairs with that green-at-the-gills look that comes with taking a few rabbit punches.

  Koenig said, “They didn’t do it.”

  I said, “No shit, Sherlock.”

  Koenig said, “My name ain’t Sherlock.”

  I said, “No shit.”

  Koenig said, “What?”

  At Hollywood Station I exercised the Warrants cops’ special prerogative, issuing an all-points juvenile runaway warrant and a priority material witness warrant on Lorna Martilkova/Linda Martin, leaving the report forms with the daywatch boss, who told me the APBs would hit the air within the hour, and that he would send officers over to 1611 North Orange Drive to question the tenants on Linda/Lorna’s possible whereabouts. With that taken care of, I wrote my report on the series of questionings, stressing Betty Short as a habitual liar and the possibility that she acted in a movie sometime in November of ‘46. Before finishing it up, I wavered on whether to mention Marjorie Graham’s lead on the old dyke. If Ellis Loew got ahold of the dope he would probably quash it along with the skinny on Betty as a part-time prostie, so I decided to omit it from the report and give the information verbally to Russ Millard.

  From a squadroom phone I called the Screen Actor’s Guild and Central Casting and inquired about Elizabeth Short. A clerk told me that no one by that name or any diminutive of the name Elizabeth was ever listed with them, making it unlikely that she had appeared in a legit Hollywood production. I hung up thinking of the movie as another Betty fairy tale, the viewfinder a fairy-tale prop.

  It was late afternoon. Being free of Koenig felt like surviving cancer and the three interviews felt like an overdose of Betty/Beth Short and her low-rent last months on earth. I was tired and hungry, so I drove to the house for a sandwich and a nap—and walked straight into another installment of the Black Dahlia Show.

  Kay and Lee were standing around the dining room table, examining crime scene photos shot at 39th and Norton. There was Betty Short’s bashed head; Betty Short’s slashed breasts; Betty Short’s empty bottom half and Betty Short’s wide-open legs—all in glossy black and white. Kay was nervously smoking and shooting little glances at the pictures; Lee was eyeballing them, his face twitching in a half dozen directions, the Benzedrine man from outer space. Neither said a word to me; I just stood there playing straight man to the most celebrated stiff in LA history.

  Finally Kay said, “Hi, Dwight,” and Lee stabbed a shaky finger at a close-up of the torso mutilations. “It’s not a random job, I know it. Vern Smith says some guy just picked her up on the street, took her someplace and tortured her, then dumped her in the lot. Horseshit. The guy who did this hated her for a reason and wanted the whole goddamn world to know. Jesus, two fucking days he cut her. Babe, you took pre-med classes, you think this guy had medical training? You know, like some kind of mad doctor type?”

  Kay put out her cigarette and said, “Lee, Dwight’s here” Lee wheeled around.

  I said, “Partner—” and Lee tried to wink, smile and speak at the same time.

  It came off as one awful grimace; when he got out, “Bucky, listen to Kay, I knew all the college I bought her would do me some good,” I had to look away.

  Kay’s voice was soft, patient. “This kind of theorizing is just nonsense, but I’ll give you a theory if you’ll eat something to calm yourself down.”

  “Theory on, teach.”

  “Well, it’s just a guess, but maybe there were two killers, because the torture cuts are crude, while the bisection and the cut on the abdomen, which are obviously both postmor
tem, are neat and clean. Maybe there’s just one killer though, and after he killed the girl he calmed down, then bisected her and made the abdominal cut. And anybody could have removed the internal organs with the body in two parts. I think mad doctors are only in the movies. Sweetie, you have to calm down. You have to quit taking those pills and you have to eat. Listen to Dwight, he’ll tell you that.”

  I looked at Lee. He said, “I’m too hopped-up to eat,” then stuck out his hand like I’d just walked in. “Hey, partner. You learn anything good about our girl today?”

  I thought of telling him I learned she wasn’t worth a hundred full-time cops; I thought of spilling the dyke lead and Betty Short as a sad little floozy-liar to back the claim up. But Lee’s dope-juiced face made me say, “Nothing that’s worth you doing this to yourself. Nothing that’s worth seeing you useless when a bimbo you sent to Quentin is three days away from LA. Think of your little sister seeing you this way. Think of her—”

  I stopped when tears started streaming from Lee’s outer-space eyes. Now he just stood there like the straight man to his own blood kin. Kay moved between us, a hand on each of our shoulders. I walked out before Lee began weeping for real.

  University Station was another outpost of Black Dahlia mania.

  A wager pool sign-up list was posted in the locker room. It was in the form of a crudely drawn crap table felt, featuring betting spaces labeled “Solved—pay 2 to 1,” “Random sex job—pay 4 to 1,” “Unsolved—even money,” “Boyfriend(s) pay 1 to 4,” and “ ‘Red’—no odds unless suspect captured.” The “House $ man” was listed as Sergeant Shiner, and so far the big action was on “boyfriend(s),” with a dozen officers signed up, all plopping down a sawbuck to win two-fifty.

  The squadroom was more comic relief. Someone had hung the two halves of a cheap black dress from the doorway. Harry Sears, half gassed, was waltzing around the Negro cleaning woman, introducing her as the real Black Dahlia, the best colored songbird since Billie Holliday. They were taking nips from Harry’s flask, the cleaning lady belting gospel numbers while officers trying to talk on the phone clamped hands to their free ears.