by Ron Goulart
Closing the door, the detective roamed to a cookie jar shaped like a teddy bear. “You and Groucho pretending to be detectives again?” He lifted off the bear’s head and dipped a hand into the jar. “Sugar cookies aren’t my favorites.” He extracted two.
“Groucho and I don’t think Frances London killed anybody,” I said, leaning against the sink. “We’re trying to prove it.”
He took a bite of one of the cookies. “How you coming?”
“Nothing yet, Ned, that we can turn over to the police.” I didn’t want to tell him we might have a statement from Maggie Barnes tying Sergeant Branner in with the murder of Dr. Benninger. For one thing, I didn’t know if the lawyer Groucho had dispatched to get the statement had succeeded.
“Where do you think Frances London is?” Opening the icebox, he looked inside. “Chocolate milk.” He took the bottle out, held it up toward me. “Want any?”
“Nope,” I said. “Suppose we can prove that there’s a crooked cop involved in this whole mess?”
Detective Gorman found a glass in a cupboard, poured the chocolate milk. “Let me guess,” he said. “You suspect that Sergeant Branner of the Bayside Police isn’t completely honest.”
“We suspect he’s directly tied in to the Benninger killing.”
The cop put the bottle away, took a sip of milk. “You’re not a reporter anymore,” he said, “so I guess I don’t have to warn you not to quote me.”
“Whatever you tell me, though, I’ll share with Groucho.”
He laughed. “I’m not especially afraid of any of the Marx Brothers,” he said. “Branner is the worst kind of rotten cop and I’d like to see him knocked flat on his skinny ass.”
“But?”
“Branner’s got a lot of influential friends.”
“Like Jack Cortez.”
Nodding, Gorman finished his first sugar cookie. “You know what the setup is like in Bayside,” he said. “Tartaglia, Cortez, Salermo, guys like that, pretty much tell the law what to do. If you came up with a technicolor movie showing Branner shooting a little old lady down in broad daylight and had a troop of Boy Scouts and six archbishops as backup witnesses, Branner would still get off. That is, if you turned your proof over to any of the top officials in Bayside.”
“We weren’t planning on doing that, Ned.”
Gorman bit into the second cookie. “Some of the biggest crooks and conmen I know always start their spiels with ‘You can trust me,’” he said. “But, Frank, you do know that you can trust me.”
“I do, which is why I brought this up.”
“You get anything tangible against Branner, give me a look and I’ll see it gets to people who can do something about it.” He looked directly at me. “What are you going for specifically?”
“Can’t talk about it yet. But we’ll have something soon.”
“You think he killed Dr. Benninger?”
“He was definitely an accessory,” I answered, “but it’s more likely he was covering for some one else. He had a hand in framing Frances for the job.”
Gorman wiped crumbs off his chin with the back of his hand. “What do you think happened here?”
“She was dragged off. Whoever did it wants everybody to think she’s guilty and ran rather than face a trial.”
“Let’s say that is what happened. Any idea where they’d take her?”
“Not yet, no,” I answered. “You and your partner have gone over the whole place—you don’t believe she just packed up and took off, do you?”
He smiled and returned to the cookie jar. “Like the good policeman that I am, Frank, I’m keeping an open mind,” he told me as he helped himself to another cookie.
“You never got around to telling me how you happened to show up here?”
“Got a phone call.”
“Anonymous tip?”
“No, it was—”
“You no good son of a bitching bastard! Why’d you do that?”
Gorman frowned at the door. “Is that the kid yelling like that?”
“Yeah, it’s Polly.” I sprinted to the door and pulled it open.
* * *
“What have I told you, young lady, about using that kind of language?” said Roger Pilgrim.
Polly hit her father in the face with her fisted hand, shouting, “You stupid asshole. You phoned them because you’re trying to make her look guilty.”
Putting both arms around her from behind, Groucho pulled her back out of range of Roger Pilgrim. “Let’s get into a neutral corner, Battling Nelson.”
The young singer struggled to break free for about thirty seconds, then subsided and began sobbing. “Now they’re all going to think she’s run away.”
After dabbing at his cheek with his starchy pocket handkerchief, Pilgrim said, “I don’t know why Frances left here, Polly,” he said in his calm voice. “But the important thing, honey, is that she’s disappeared. Whether she fled or whether she was abducted, I felt it was my duty—once I got your phone call telling me she was gone—to notify the police.”
“We could’ve found her,” said Polly. “Groucho and Frank and me. Now she’s going to be labeled a fugitive and—”
“The police, as I’m sure even Groucho will concede, are better equipped to find missing persons.”
As he escorted Polly back to the sofa and urged her, with a gentle pressure on her shoulder, to sit down, Groucho said, “Your pop’s right, Pollyanna. Sooner or later we were probably going to have to contact the law ourselves.”
“But because of him it’s sooner.”
Detective Gorman told her, “Nobody’s going to brand your mother anything, Miss Pilgrim. But we do want to locate her.”
Polly looked at Groucho. “They shoot fugitives.”
“Mostly in Warner Brothers epics.” He settled beside her, patting her shoulder.
Her father asked Gorman, “In your opinion, officer, what happened?”
“Tough to tell, Mr. Pilgrim,” he answered. “We’ll have to get out an all-points bulletin on her. You check the garage yet, Kendig?”
The redheaded cop nodded. “Yeah, car’s gone. I checked with Motor Vehicle and she’s driving a thirty-four green Chevy sedan, license number 914JB18.”
“I bet she isn’t driving,” said Polly. “Whoever kidnapped her stole her car, too.”
“Even so, we still have to find the car.”
Pilgrim cleared his throat. “Polly, I wonder if you’d go outside on the porch for a few minutes.”
“I want to stay here.”
“There are some things I have to talk over with the officers, not the sort of things I want you to hear.”
“What does that mean? Haven’t you done enough harm to her already?”
“Please, dear.”
Groucho gave me a nod. “C’mon, Polly,” I invited, “we’ll go look around the neighborhood and see what we can find out.”
“I earn more money than anyone in this room, except Groucho,” she said, angry. “But I’m treated like a little kid whenever—”
“My family always shoos me out of the room when they discuss anything serious,” Groucho told her. “When a topic such as Albanian literature, solid geometry, or how to build a canoe comes up, it’s ‘Go to your room, Groucho.’” He stood. “Since my room happens to be in the Pasadena YMCA, it makes for a substantial hike every—”
“Okay, I’ll go, Groucho. You don’t have to humor me.” She gave him a disappointed look and went out of the house.
When I caught up with her, she was standing forlornly on the porch.
* * *
Detective Gorman asked, “What was it you wanted to talk about, Mr. Pilgrim?”
After glancing toward the door, he said, “It upsets Polly whenever her mother’s past life is discussed, officer. But, as you know, Frances was … well, promiscuous.” He paused. “I wanted to know if there was any indication that there was a man staying here with her.”
“None.”
“And nothing to sug
gest a sexual encounter?”
“That’s right.”
Pilgrim sighed out a breath. “I was concerned that Frances might have picked up someone at a bar and brought him home,” he explained. “In the past, some of her escapades in that direction led to violence.”
“She didn’t have a guest here last night, far as we can tell.”
He looked again toward the doorway. “I talked to my ex-wife, briefly, last evening when—”
“What time was that?” asked Gorman.
“Somewhere around nine.”
“So she was still here then,” the detective said.
“What I was about to tell you, officer, was that Frances sounded extremely depressed,” Pilgrim continued. “There were, as you probably know, at least two suicide attempts in the past. Is there anything pointing to the possibility that she intended to harm herself in any way?”
“She didn’t leave a suicide note behind, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s good news,” said Pilgrim. “Although it doesn’t rule out suicide.”
“Why, pray tell, would she kill herself?” inquired Groucho.
“I’d like to be as optimistic as Polly is,” said her father. “Even though I put up Frances’s bail and arranged for an attorney, I’m not completely convinced that she didn’t actually kill Dr. Benninger while she was drunk. Feeling guilty and wanting to spare us the pain of a trial, she might well—”
“Frances didn’t kill that quack,” Groucho assured him. “And, by the way, remind me not to come to you the next time I’m in need of a character reference.”
“It’s fine to humor an unhappy young girl,” said Pilgrim, “but I believe in facing reality.”
“You’re facing in the wrong direction this time.” Groucho took a fresh cigar from his jacket pocket, crossing the room. “I do believe I’ll go outside and see if I can scare up a rousing game of kick the can.”
Thirty-two
I hadn’t anticipated that as the day faded that Jane and I would be driving to the town of Cottonville out in the San Fernando Valley. All because of a hunch of Groucho’s.
When he and I had asked questions of the neighbors of Frances London, we learned that no one had seen or heard the Ford leaving her garage between the time Pilgrim said he’d talked to her on the telephone the night before and the time her daughter found she was missing the next morning. Old Mr. Stapleton, however, swore he’d seen Roger Pilgrim’s peach-colored limousine draw up in front of France’s place at about 11:00 P.M. He’d turned in right after that, so he didn’t know how long the car’d been there.
Polly told us both her father and his chauffeur had left the mansion at about ten the night before, but she had no idea where they went nor exactly when they got home. She was all for going in and demanding that her father tell her what he’d been up to.
“Although I’m not noted for my subtlety,” Groucho told her, “I think we’d be better served if we kept mum about what we’ve found out. Then later, Mum can keep us.”
“You think my father had something to do with what’s happened to her?”
“I think, child, that he was doing a very good job of trying to make her look bad in the eyes of the law when the gumshoes were talking to him.”
“So do I,” said the young singer. “That’s why I slugged him.”
We were standing on the sidewalk down the block from Frances’s house by this time. Groucho halted and produced a fresh cigar. “Besides your palatial mansion, Pollyanna,” he inquired as he lit the stogie, “does your pappy have any other houses hereabouts? Hideaway cottages, flats, mountain cabins?”
“There’s that place in the Valley,” she answered. “It’s in Cottonville, near that old Western movie location. They have meetings there sometimes, when my father wants privacy. And once in a while, an out-of-town client stays there.”
“Eureka,” observed Groucho and asked her for the address. “Rollo, I would appreciate it if you go take a look at that choice patch of real estate.”
“You think my mother’s there?” asked Polly, fists clenching. “Then we better go in right now and face my father and—”
“What I’m suffering from now, kiddo” he explained, “is just a hunch. But I think we ought to look into it.”
“But maybe we don’t have all that much time to—”
“There’s time,” he said. “Can you undertake this chore, Frank?”
I nodded, saying, “Sure, but what—”
“Since I’m a great believer in the latest criminology equipment, Rollo, I’ll try to arrange to have an old acquaintance of yours help out on this escapade.”
“You’re going to be doing what while I’m—”
“I’ll be playing the bait in a trap.” He exhaled smoke. “In order to facilitate that, I’d be awfully pleased if you’d plant a bit of information with some of your underworld informants and suggest that they circulate it far and wide.”
“What bit of information?”
“The present whereabouts of Maggie Barnes.”
* * *
As my Plymouth went bumping along a side road in Cottonville, I said, “This may not be too safe, Jane, and—”
“If you’re going to get killed, Frank, I think I ought to be around,” said Jane from the passenger seat. “That’s what devotion is all about.”
“True,” I admitted. “But I wasn’t talking about getting knocked off, only roughed up some. Once we get there, you should probably stay in the car and—”
“No, I intend to tag along.” She reached out and put her hand on my shoulder. “I’ll help you load the muskets and all the other things dutiful females do in situations such as this. Do you think Frances London really is being held at Pilgrim’s hideaway?”
“Well, it seems like a strong possibility,” I answered, slowly. “I do agree with Groucho that Pilgrim seemed to be setting up a suicide for Frances when he was talking to Detective Gorman in Manhattan Beach this morning.”
“That doesn’t mean the guy grabbed her out of her house, dragged up here, and is going to fake the suicide himself,” Jane pointed out. “Could be he simply wanted to make her look bad to the cops.”
“That’s true,” I agreed, slowing the car. “What I’m really looking into is Groucho’s hunch that she might be here.”
Up ahead on the road loomed a high redwood fence. Above the wide gate was a weathered sign that announced—Cottonville Ranch. Where some of the greatest western motion pictures of all time were filmed! Duke Cotton, proprietor.
“I didn’t know Hoot Gibson and Ken Maynard made some of the great Western motion pictures of all time,” mentioned Jane as I guided the car through the open gateway and stopped on the false-front main street.
“Well, not as great as Bob Steele probably,” I said. “This used to be a thriving location for B movies, though.”
“I’m aware of that,” she said, “which is why I mentioned Ken Maynard.”
“Howdy.” A tall, lanky man in Levi’s, plaid shirt, and scuffed cowboy boots had come strolling over to the car. He removed his low-crown Stetson with a sweeping gesture and bowed in Jane’s direction. “Right pleased to meet up with you, Missy. You’re mighty pretty. I’m Duke Cotton.”
It was indeed the cowboy star of silent movies, older and grayer than in his heyday.
I said, “Groucho Marx was going to arrange with you for us to—”
“Yep, he sure enough did. You’re interested in one of my neighbor’s, huh?”
“The Roger Pilgrim setup, yeah.”
Cotton nodded. “And you’re Frank Denby?”
“I am and this is Jane Danner.”
“Not hitched up?” He bowed again. “Welcome to the Cottonville Ranch, miss. If you’ll park this buggy over front of the saloon yonder, Frank, I’ll point you in the direction of the Pilgrim spread.”
“Groucho was also supposed to—”
“Yep, that’s all took care of, too. I’ll go fetch the critter whiles you’re park
ing.”
“Critter?” inquired Jane as we drove along the dusty road and parked near the hitching rail in front of the Golden Bear Saloon.
“I was keeping it as a surprise.” Turning off the engine, I got out and went around to open her door. “Groucho hired Dorgan for us again.”
She smiled. “That cute bloodhound we used when you fellows were working on the Peg McMorrow case.”
“The same.”
“He helped us find a body and…” He voice faded, along with her smile. “You think Frances is buried out there someplace?”
“Nope,” I said. “Dorgan finds live people, too, remember?”
A yelping commenced off in the gathering dusk.
“Whoa there, fella,” said Cotton.
Dorgan, yelping in a pleased way, came running in his wobbly fashion toward us.
He threw himself enthusiastically, sending a cloud of dust swirling up, at Jane’s feet. Then he rolled over on his back, panting happily.
She bent and rubbed at his gray belly with the palm of her hand. “A pleasure meeting you again, Dorgan.”
He rolled from side to side, tongue lolling, panting.
“His trainer dropped him off here about half an hour ago,” explained the cowboy actor. “He’s been fretting ever since, must’ve known you folks were going to drop by.”
Kneeling, Jane took hold of the bloodhound’s leash. “Should we get going, Frank?”
“In a minute.” Opening the rumble seat of the Plymouth, I fetched out a flashlight and the paper bag I’d acquired at Frances London’s house.
“You in the picture business?” Cotton asked Jane.
“No.” Standing up, she brushed dust from her tan slacks. “C’mon, Dorgan.”
Tugging at his leash, the bloodhound waddled over to me. He rose up on his hind legs and planted his forepaws against my groin.
I patted him on the head, set him on the ground again. “We’ve got another job for you, Dorgan,” I informed him while he licked my hand. From the paper bag I took the blouse that Groucho had smuggled out of Frances’s closet. “This is who we’re looking for.”
The dog devoted himself to giving the blouse a thorough sniffing. Raising his head, he then took a whiff of the night air.
