by Ron Goulart
“That’s because these guys are tricky, Frank. They don’t stay behind us every single minute.”
“I took another look, still didn’t see a tail. You’re sure, huh?”
“Pretty near.” She folded her arms under her breasts.
“I didn’t think I’d found out enough about anything to make me dangerous to anyone.”
“From what I hear, this Tartaglia doesn’t require much in the way of motivation.”
On our left we passed a movie palace that was showing Jezebel. “Bette Davis strikes again,” I observed.
“She’s okay,” said Jane. “It’s George Brent I don’t much care for. He’s always just George Brent.”
“No, sometimes he’s George Brent clean-shaven and sometimes he’s George Brent with a moustache.”
“That’s your idea of a wide dramatic range, huh?”
Up ahead loomed Moonbaum’s, the delicatessen where we were going to meet Groucho. “Well, Brent’s better than Henry Fonda.”
“No, he isn’t. Fonda’s cute and boyish.”
“The perennial ingenue.”
“You don’t like him because he’s taller than you.”
I spotted a parking space a quarter of a block down from the restaurant. “Parking in Hollywood is difficult work, miss,” I explained, slowing. “No verbal attacks until we’re safely in the space. Okay?” I took another look back, but saw no sign of the black car Jane’d seen.
“Telling the truth isn’t technically a verbal attack.”
“Nobody tells the truth in this part of California. Do you want to be a misfit?”
A silvery Rolls honked at me while I was maneuvering into the spot. Then a plump gray-haired lady in a rattletrap Ford gave me the finger as she went swerving around me.
“I’m going to quit arguing with you about your failings,” promised Jane. “I realized that you’re simply trying to distract me from the fact that we’ve got goons keeping an eye on us.”
Snug in the space, I turned off the key and set the brake. “We’ve arrived.” I stepped out of the car on the street side.
Before I could head for the sidewalk to open the door on Jane’s side, a big black Pontiac came roaring out of the mist behind us.
I dived back toward my coupé.
The big car missed hitting me by about seven or eight inches, a foot at the most.
“Jesus.” I found I was having trouble breathing and my heart seemed to be beating at several new spots.
“Frank, are you okay?” Jane came running around the car to me. She took hold of me, the way you do when you want to keep somebody from falling down.
I guess I looked like I was a good candidate for falling down.
“I’m fine, yeah.” My voice had an animated cartoon quality to it.
She shook her head. “I don’t think you are. People who are okay don’t turn that deathly shade of white.”
After concentrating on my breathing for nearly a minute, I admitted to her, “You were right about that damn car, Jane.”
“I was. Did it touch you at all?”
“Nope, no. I dodged it.”
“Maybe they intended to do that. Only wanted to scare you.”
“They were terrifically successful.”
From the sidewalk someone called, “Are you two romantic leads going to carry this public display of affection any further or can I continue on my way to the neighborhood peepshow? If there’s going to be any more hugging and smooching, then I’ll stick around until—”
“Quit being a schmuck, Groucho,” Jane, angry, suggested. “Those bastards came close to running him down.”
Groucho came trotting out to our side of the car. “I missed that part of it,” he told us. “Are you injured, Rollo?”
“No, just unsettled.”
He nodded. “Which bastards would this be, Jane?”
She frowned at him. “Somebody you two have annoyed with your Pinkerton act I imagine,” she said. “They followed us from my place.”
“No specific idea who they were, Frank?”
I pointed toward the safety of the sidewalk. “Let’s get clear of the traffic,” I suggested. “I’m still feeling like a target.”
Thoughtfully, as he stepped up onto the sidewalk, Groucho said, “This makes for an interesting coincidence, children.”
“What does?” I was feeling wobbly, but by holding on to Jane I got out of the street.
“I had the distinct impression, as I tooled down here from my palatial manse, that I was being followed, too,” he explained. “Although nobody tried to turn me into paving material.”
“You two are obviously antagonizing somebody,” said Jane.
“I antagonize just about everyone.” Groucho lead us toward the restaurant door. “But since Franklin here is the next best thing to a saint, these vehicular interludes must have something to do with the murder.”
As we entered Moonbaum’s, Jane said, “There may be two murders, Groucho.”
He halted on the white tiles of the restaurant foyer and went up on his toes, eyebrows climbing. “What are you saying, my child?”
She patted my shoulder. “Frank will explain.”
Sixteen
Handing out mimeographed menus, our gaunt waiter was saying, “You’d be perfect to star in my play, Groucho. It’s a comedy set in a delicatessen and is entitled The Rape of the Lox.”
“Don’t tell me, Ira,” urged Groucho. “I bet you want me to play the part of a dashing, quick-witted waiter.”
Ira Mellman snapped his fingers. “That’s it exactly,” he said. “But this is more than the usual low slapstick you and your brothers have gotten trapped into doing.”
“It’s also profound I’ll wager.”
Ira snapped his thin fingers again. “You see, Groucho, this waiter is not only a master of verbal wit, he also has a miraculous effect on all the people he comes in contact with. Changes their lives for the better.”
“It’s The Passing of the Third Floor Back with laughs.”
“That’s it, right.” He leaned closer to our booth, lowering his voice. “We hint, subtly, that he might be some sort of supernatural being.”
I inquired, “How much of this play have you got written?”
He held up a single finger. “So far the first act,” he answered. “But it’s socko, Frank.”
“How’s the pastrami tonight?” asked Groucho.
“Same as always. Mediocre.”
“I’ll have the brisket.”
“Wise choice. And you, miss?”
“Just coffee.”
He gave Jane a disappointed look, but wrote her order on his pad. “Frank?”
“I hate to bring up the topic again. But lox. With cream cheese on rye.”
“I’m not showing my play to anyone until it’s finished. So you can relax until then.” Bowing in Jane’s direction, he headed for the kitchen.
Only about half the pale green booths were occupied so far. Directly across the restaurant from us a pair of blond identical twins were having blintzes.
Groucho rested his unlit cigar on the heavy glass ashtray. “Before we get to this other murder, Rollo,” he said, “I must pass on a message from our gifted director, Annie Nicola. She telephoned me about an hour ago.”
“Colonel Mullens’s birthday party?” I asked. “I thought we didn’t have to attend unless we—”
“Heavenly days, you’re positively psychic, young feller.”
“You always get that particular pained expression on your face when you’re about to talk about the Colonel,”
His nod of agreement was forlorn. “According to Annie, who got it from the top executives at the pudding plantation, we absolutely have to attend this shindig tomorrow night, Frank.”
“Why exactly?”
“The entire pudding team from Batten, Barton, Blinken and Nod—or whatever those advertising scoundrels from the East call themselves—will be arriving here in the Sunshine State tomorrow morning. Colonel Mulle
ns thinks it would be just delightful if I were to perform a few ditties for the assembled multitudes at his shivaree.”
“What’s bad about that?” asked Jane. “You love to inflict your singing on people.”
“I prefer to use my God-given voice, Little Nell, only to entertain those I consider deserving of such a treat,” he countered. “And not to waste it on pudding mavens,”
I asked, “But you’re going?”
“Annie mentioned that she’s heard a rumor—and I hesitate to worry you babes in the wood with this news—that our Hooper ratings have been slipping the past few weeks.”
“How bad is it?”
“If this were a horse race, Rollo, Jack Benny and Edgar Bergen would be a considerable way up the track from us.”
Jane rested her elbow on the tabletop. “So you fellows are expected to butter up the Colonel and the visiting ad men?”
“That’s a polite way of describing our shame, my dear,” he acknowledged. “Oh, and dear little Polly is going to be in attendance, too, and it has been suggested that we perform a duet.”
Jane grinned. “That news must’ve scared the heck out of Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald.”
“Eddy’s already gone into hiding and will only come out to answer requests to sing ‘Short’nin’ Bread,’” said Groucho. “As you may recall, Franklin, the Colonel is taking over the entire King Neptune Playland at the beach in your beloved Bayside for tomorrow night’s funfest. He’s invited three hundred of Hollywood’s finest—Well, actually he could only find twenty-six who qualified as finest. The rest are the usual movie industry lowlifes. We are expected to be there no later than seven.
I glanced at Jane. “Want to come along? It looks like I’m really going to have to attend this thing.”
“Would you mind I don’t?” she asked. “I want to work on getting another week of my strip done.”
“Sure, that’s okay.”
“I’ll arrange for you to meet one of the ladies from the Hula Hula Pavilion, Rollo, should you require female companionship,” promised Groucho. “And now let’s turn to a lighter topic. What second murder?”
“Jane went to Brian Montaine’s funeral this afternoon.”
He nodded at her. “Frank told me you’re an old school chum of Dianne Sayler, the grieving widow.”
Jane said, “I knew Dianne in art school and I’ve seen her occasionally since. We’re not close, but she wanted to talk to me about Brian’s death. And we did that after the services.”
Groucho leaned forward, frowning. “Does she suspect her husband was murdered, too?”
“She doesn’t,” I put in. “But we think it’s a strong possibility.”
“How so?”
“Apparently Brian Montaine had a serious longtime heroin problem,” she answered. “He was getting his drugs from—”
“None other than the respected Dr. Benninger.” Groucho extracted his notebook from out of a side pocket of his checkered sport coat.
“You knew that already?” I asked.
“Picked it up from chatting poolside with the personable Maddy Dubay.” He opened the notebook. “A very distracting name, I might add. I keep thinking it ought to mean something in Pig Latin.”
“Do you also know,” Jane asked him, “that Brian had resolved to quit using the stuff?”
“Nope, that news item Dracula’s Daughter didn’t impart to me while passing out the hemlock highballs.”
“He was planning to make his addiction problem public, tell everybody what he’d been doing and where he got the stuff,” continued Jane. “But before he could do that, he died instead.”
“Not from a heart attack?” asked Groucho.
“Dianne didn’t say anything about its being murder. She figures it was an overdose or a fatal reaction to the drug.”
“Where’d she get that quaint notion?”
Jane filled him in about the actor’s being found dead by his valet, about the subsequent cover up by the Paragon studio people. “Frank and I talked this over, Groucho, and we’re wondering if somebody didn’t arrange that overdose.”
I said, “Murdering the guy and making it look like he’d killed himself accidentally—that would sure as hell keep him from talking.”
Groucho leaned back, eyeing the plaster ceiling of the restaurant. “Benninger was very agitated and nervous during his last days on earth,” he said slowly. “Could it be he knew about the plans to have Brian Montaine do a shuffle off? Could it even be that his pals in the drug trade had requested him to see to the chore of dispatching the actor?”
Jane sat up. “You think Dr. Benninger may’ve been involved in Brian’s death?”
“It’s an interesting possibility, my dear.”
“Then who killed the doctor?”
“Possibly somebody from the firm of Tartaglia and Cortez,” suggested Groucho. “Or maybe someone we don’t even know about.”
“Speaking of those unorthodox pharmacists,” I put in. “I’m betting they’re the ones who put sinister black automobiles on our tails.”
“Ah, that reminds me.” Groucho extracted a folded sheet of paper from amidst the pages of his notebook and handed it across to me. “I’d advise you not to take a gander at this, Jane. It’s a nasty billet-doux that was delivered to me whilst I was exiting my tobacconist’s this afternoon.”
“A threat?” I unfolded the sheet.
It was the morgue shot of the corpse with a Groucho moustache added.
He said, “Like all good advertisements, it’s clear and to the point.”
“Let me see.” Jane took the picture from me. “Whoever did this sure isn’t much of a letterer. Doesn’t draw moustaches all that well either.”
“To cause my grizzled locks to stand on end, my dear, you don’t have to be a Daumier—or even a Rube Goldberg.”
“How’d they,” I inquired, “get this thing to you, Groucho?”
“A very comely blond lass hand-delivered it and then vanished like a…” He stopped talking, tilting his head back. “What was it Edison cried out when he discovered the lightbulb?”
“Now I’ve got something to put in all those empty sockets?” I suggested.
“Eureka?” said Jane.
“That’s it,” said Groucho. “I knew it was the name of some little California town. Eureka, then. My aging old brain has just now remembered where I saw that lass before.”
“You recognized the girl who gave you this thing?”
Ira had arrived with our coffee. “I just now thought up a great opening scene for my second act,” he told Groucho.
“You might want to consider making your opus a one-act extravaganza, my boy.” He pulled his cup of coffee closer to him, making a shooing motion with his other hand. After the waiter had bowed at Jane and gone shuffling off, Groucho continued. “This winsome blonde had apparently been tracking me though the byways of Beverly Hills. She lurked in an antique shop doorway and thrust this crude missive upon me. I had the impression at the time that I’d seen her before, but couldn’t place her.”
“But now you can?” Jane asked.
“I had a feeling she reminded me of someone,” he answered. “The resemblance isn’t all that strong, but it’s there. She looks somewhat like Frances London—or like Frances did in her heyday.”
“Know her name?”
He shook his head. “She’s a would-be actress—and only her vague resemblance to Frances, coupled with a chronic lack of talent, has hobbled her career on the silver screen,” he said, absently stirring three spoonfuls of sugar into his coffee. “About a year ago she wangled an interview with my brother Zeppo—also known as the Solvent Rover Boy—at his talent agency. She was coming out of his office as I was going in and I remember commenting on her charming demeanor to Zeppo. Well, actually her charming bosom. If she hadn’t been somewhat bundled up this afternoon, I’d had recalled her sooner.”
“Would your brother remember her name after all this time?” I asked.
&nbs
p; “I doubt he’ll even remember who I am, but he can, hopefully, put me on the wench’s tail. Which isn’t a bad place to camp for the night.” He took a sip of his coffee, winced.
Jane said, “If she looks something like Frances London and she’s involved in this mess—could she also be the lady those witnesses thought was Frances banging on Dr. Benninger’s door?”
“Aha! Or make that—Eureka!” Groucho straightened up out of his slouch. “You may just have had a brainstorm there, Nurse Jane.” He frisked himself until he found his fountain pen and then scribbled a note on a blank page of his book. “One more thing to chat with the lady anent.”
I mentioned, “She’s probably working for Tartaglia.”
“I’ll keep that in mind and approach her with caution.”
“There are some other people we have to approach,” I said. “What’s the name of Montaine’s valet, Jane?”
“I only know his front-end name. That’s Edwin. I can find out the rest and if he’s still at Montaine’s mansion in Bel Air.”
“Also be illuminating to talk to the troubleshooter from Paragon. Was it Tad Ballard who got Montaine’s possible murder passed off as a heart attack?”
Jane nodded. “Him, yes.”
“I’d like to nominate that actress whose face the good doctor botched up,” added Groucho. “Elena Stanton. A long shot, yet she certainly seems to have a dandy motive for not being fond of Dr. Benninger.”
“If Frances London gets out on bail tomorrow,” said Jane, “you ought to talk with her again.”
“Gracious me,” said Groucho, “we’re all going to be as busy as the little elves who paint the wild flowers such lovely colors. Although now that the elves have joined the union, they’re certain to be making better money than we are.” He tried his coffee again, then gave up on it. “I’ll handle tracking down the blond messenger and Tad Ballard. Him I used to know back when he was writing tripe for The Hollywood Reporter. Can you cover the others, Frank? Then, if we have time before tomorrow night’s debacle, we can pay Frances a visit together.”
I nodded. “Are you going to need me to write you some material for your performance at the Colonel’s doings?”
