by George Baxt
“Sure. Keep going.”
“In comes this big party, the kind of suckers Tex goes for, except they ain’t no suckers. This is the cream. The big boys. The accents are straight from Sicily. What ain’t from Sicily is from Chicago. This I figure is the syndicate, the boys who back Tex and the Broadway shows …”
“And the biggest dope-smuggling operation in the world.”
“You said it, I didn’t.”
“Don’t horse around, George.”
Raft mopped his perspiring brow with a handkerchief
“In the middle of this bunch, at the head of the table actually, is this Lacey Van Weber. I get his name from Tex because she’s puffed up with pride the boys are paying her a visit. Well, Van Weber sees me, and he suddenly looks at me like I’m a head of rotten cabbage. I wonder what the hell’s rubbing him wrong. I think and I think and then it hits me. It’s Dennis Byron. I mean there’s this resemblance there, even though he’s changed a lot. I mean physically now he’s all filled out. Where once he was a string bean, now he’s got beef and muscles. The face is filled out and real handsome, I mean you seen for yourself, he’s a sharp looker. So I wait till I see him making for the head, and I follow him into the toilet and introduce myself. Boy, did he blow it at me. Then we got it straightened out with each other, still old buddies, see, but I keep my trap shut about Dennis Byron …”
“Or else.”
“The warning didn’t come from him. It come from Tex. Well, you know Van Weber’s history since. You know about the estate, his office in town, his parties at the penthouse …”
“He’s a front for the syndicate.”
“One of them. They got them all over the world. They groom them. They train them.”
“Where?”
“All over, for crying out loud. Europe, South America, Mexico … Don’t you get it? I was being set up for Hollywood. They were going to make me a star.”
“Was Valentino poisoned because he recognized Van Weber?”
“Rudy wasn’t murdered. What killed him was genuine.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t blame you. But I don’t think Lacey had anything to do with that.”
“Valentino could have met him in Hollywood.”
“Maybe he did.”
“Stop bullshitting me. You crashed that party of Van Weber’s. You took Valentino and Ilona Mercury with you. That was a big mistake. Van Weber didn’t want any of you at the party, he didn’t want you anywhere within a mile of him. That got you into real trouble, didn’t it, George?”
“Yeah, yeah, it did, real trouble.”
“Did Mercury know Van Weber from Hollywood?”
“I didn’t know she’d been out there.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I swear to God I don’t know.”
Singer told Raft about Mercury’s relationship to Horathy in Hollywood when she called herself Magda Moreno. “It’s all news to me,” insisted Raft, “I swear.”
“You swear too much. How deep into the organization is Horathy?”
“He’s one of their best mechanics.”
“What do you mean?”
“In the lab. He knows how to transform morphine into cocaine.” Singer whistled. “The office is just a front. Sure, he shoots up there and gives out prescriptions, but that’s small pickings for the organization. They don’t want any part of that. Horathy banks that stuff for himself. They let him; you know, it’s like slipping a fin to a headwaiter.”
“Do you know who murdered Ilona Mercury?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Vera DeLee?”
“I might know.”
“Who do you think suffocated Lita?”
“The same son of a bitch that strong-armed me too often.”
“Is he in my precinct?”
“He’s yours.”
“Don’t keep me in suspense, George.”
“Al Cassidy.”
Singer got to his feet and plunged his hands in his pockets. Al Cassidy. The man with the big hat. The Stetson. Al Cassidy. We have worked together for five years. Me and Al and Yudel. Al Cassidy, a rogue. The man with the handkerchief at his nose. The man who probably killed Vera DeLee. The man who beat up Raft and the hell knows how many others. The man who attempted to push Cora Gallagher from the second balcony at the Paramount. The man who probably killed Ilona Mercury. Al’s wife. Al’s two kids. The man who suffocated Lita Young.
“They call him the ‘man,’” continued Raft. “He’s their trouble-shooter. When they need a job done, send for the ‘man.’”
The man. Mr. Man. Singer shook his head sadly and exhaled. Now to handle this without causing a scandal. How to spare the department another blemish. There was so much damned corruption in the city, it was almost bigger than an epidemic. How to handle one of his best friends, Al Cassidy. Singer was shaken.
“George, I’m taking you down to the Tombs.”
Raft leaped to his feet. “Ah, come on!”
“Now hold your water and calm down. It’s for your own protection. Make believe it’s like going away for the weekend.”
“I never go away for the weekend. Nobody asks me.”
“I’m asking you. I’m inviting you down to the Tombs for the weekend starting now. Pack an overnight bag. Take your tap shoes, maybe you can do a show for the boys. I’m putting you on ice until Sunday.”
“Tex’ll wonder where I am.”
“You forget Tex sent the man after you?”
Raft’s face twisted into a vengeful snarl. “That moth-eaten twat.”
“Start packing, George. And don’t ask any questions. You’ve done fine. I’m going to need a signed statement from you. I’ll take care of all of that downtown. Mind if I use your phone?”
He called the precinct and asked for Yudel Sherman. He asked if Al Cassidy was there. Cassidy had gone out for a sandwich. Singer told Sherman to send some boys and the coroner to Raft’s hotel. He was taking Raft into secret custody. Sherman said he’d meet him down at the Tombs in half an hour. No, he would be sure not to tell Cassidy. “Is it something real lousy with Cassidy?” asked Yudel.
“Real lousy …” and he couldn’t resist adding, “old sport.”
Mrs. Parker left the beauty parlour, looking, she decided, no better than she had when she entered, but then, she was always much too modest about herself. She was downhearted and wondered if Lacey Van Weber had been trying to reach her. She flagged a cab, looked around to make sure her protection had flagged one, too, and headed home.
There, she phoned the Barbizon to make sure Charlotte Royce was comfortable. Charlotte thanked her for her concern. She called the precinct and was told Singer was unavailable for the rest of the day, but he’d said that if she called, he’d left word with Mr. Woollcott. She phoned Woollcott, who snapped, “Well, it’s about time! Where the hell have you been?”
“I’ve been to the beauty parlour because it was necessary for tomorrow. Now what’s been going on?”
“Jacob Singer wants us to have dinner with him tonight.”
“Please, not Chinese again.”
“No, he suggested Tony’s where we ate after the theatre, which is quite fine by me. I’ve heard from Lacey Van Weber.”
Her heart flip-flopped. Damn me and damn him. I care, I care, and I mustn’t care. My lover could be my killer. My killer. Oh, dear, oh, dear. “Yes? What are the arrangements?”
“Our limousine will pick us up at six and six-ten respectively. You’re six. Be prompt, will you, lotus blossom?” His voice was unusually kind and tender. He recognized she was in one of her frequent states of emotional fragility.
“I’ll be prompt. After all, I’m to be queen of the prom.”
“That’s the way I like to hear you! See you at Tony’s at seven.”
That would give her time to soak in the tub. She hung up and sat at her dressing table. You’re thirty-three years old and today you look it. That’s not so old, really. That’s
not old like Edna Ferber. I’ll bet Neysa’s older. Neysa! My God, I haven’t checked in with her. How did she survive the night? She hurried across the hall, but on the McMein’s door in huge block letters was a sign that read do not disturb. She returned to her apartment and ran her bath. Drops of water were falling into the tub, and Mrs. Parker looked up to see if there was a leak in the ceiling. The ceiling was perfectly fine. Mrs. Parker wasn’t. She was crying.
There wasn’t much of a crowd at Tony’s, and the head-waiter almost fractured his skull bowing and scraping Mrs. Parker to the table where Jacob Singer and Alexander Woollcott had awaited her arrival for over fifteen minutes. She ordered a Jack Rose on the rocks and told them both how fine they looked. She told them about her morning with Charlotte Royce.
“Bigamist,” said Singer. “I wonder who he was.”
“Is,” said Mrs. Parker. “I’m pretty sure he’s still alive.” Jacob Singer told them about his day with George Raft. Lita Young was in the morgue where an autopsy would be performed the next morning. Her murder had been withheld from the newspapers and would not be released until Sunday in time for the Sunday evening editions. He told them he was holding Raft in the Tombs for his own protection.
“I’ve put Miss Royce into the Barbizon Hotel for Women,” said Mrs. Parker. “Did I do the right thing?”
“You did fine,” Singer assured her. The waiter who was hovering nearby wondered if they were ready to order dinner, but none of the three seemed to have an appetite. They told him to come back later, but first to conjure up another round of drinks.
“I don’t mind telling you,” said Mrs. Parker, “I’m terribly nervous about tomorrow.”
“I’m not,” said Woollcott stoically. “I expect to have a perfectly marvellous time and the makings of a superb essay on deceit, fraud and international crime.”
“Everything’ll be just fine,” said Singer, hoping neither of them noticed his fingers were crossed. “I have a heavy Sunday ahead of me. Very sad.”
“Somebody dead?” asked Woollcott.
“Yup. One of my partners. Suicide. Killed himself in one of our cells. Deeply depressed. Al Cassidy.”
“Oh, my, how sad,” said Mrs. Parker. “When did he do it?”
Singer looked at his wristwatch. “Any minute now.”
Mrs. Parker was aghast. “You mean you know he’s going to commit suicide and you’re doing nothing to prevent it?”
“Mrs. Parker, he was a bad apple,” said Singer unhappily. “He was one of my best friends and he betrayed me. He betrayed the force. He betrayed his family.” He stared into his gin. “He betrayed himself. He was on morphine. He admitted it to me. Oh, my God, what an awful scene that was. Me and him and Yudel in my office, the three musketeers, me laying Al out to filth, confronting him with everything Raft told me.”
“You trust that leech?” asked Woollcott.
“I trust anybody who makes a positive ident. Raft was scared. He was set up. Tex fixed it for Cassidy to suffocate Lita Young in Raft’s bed. She’ll have some answering to do.”
“Are you arresting her?” asked Mrs. Parker.
“I’ll let her do her answering to the big boys. That was Cassidy’s big mistake, doing Tex a favor in return for a C-note.” He leaned back in his chair and sighed, “Imagine. Cassidy, a two-shot-a-day doper, and we never guessed. But I should have recognized his modus operandi. He was a genius at getting in and out of places unheard and undetected. The man with the handkerchief to his nose. The man who tried to kill Cora Gallagher. An hour ago, this big beefy menace was sitting on the floor of my office slobbering like a kid who lost his bike. It was awful. And poor Yudel. I mean those two were like brothers. They come up in the force together. At one point I catch Yudel eying me like maybe I could also be tainted. And I don’t blame him. Who do you trust if you can’t trust a guy who was more than a brother to you? Who do you trust, Mrs. Parker?”
“In my circle, that’s not easy,” she replied wryly.
“You trust me,” blustered Woollcott.
“On a clear day,” replied Mrs. Parker. “So Mr. Cassidy was in their employ. How do they do it? How do they get to a man like that?”
“In his case, it was the dope. In somebody else’s case, it’s greed.”
“There’s somebody else?” asked Mrs. Parker.
“Probably. Nobody I know, but probably. Anyway, Cassidy’s a write-off. Let’s get on to more important matters.” Mrs. Parker was astonished at the way the detective could switch his emotions. Cassidy’s a write-off. Let’s get on to more important matters. Let’s have another cup of coffee and let’s have another piece of pie. She caught Woollcott’s eye. It was telling her to accept Cassidy as an entry in the debit side of the ledger and get on to other things. Singer was talking while crumbling a breadstick. He was repeating Raft’s rendition of his earliest acquaintance with Lacey Van Weber.
“Dennis Byron. How poetic,” said Mrs. Parker. “Of course Lord Byron was also a shit.”
“He was mad, bad and dangerous to know,” recited Woollcott mellifluously. “And if you’re wondering where that dreadful line originated, I am quoting a contemporary of Lord Byron’s whose name thankfully escapes me.”
“Gentlemen, I have a theory.” Mrs. Parker sounded like an auctioneer about to knock down an expensive lot. “I must admit a lot of it is inspired by Charlotte Royce’s revelations about Ilona Mercury having married a bigamist. A marriage. I’m prone to believe, that took place in Mexico.”
“If it took place,” said Woollcott.
“It took place. The Mercury girl didn’t sound to me like someone who noised about her fantasies. If she was married, then she was married. You see, Alec, you have never roomed with a girlfriend.”
Woollcott looked as though a platoon of deadly comebacks was assembling at the tip of his tongue, but happily, he kept his peace.
“Girlfriends get to let their hair down rather frequently. In the wee hours of the morning, especially when liquor has played havoc with caution and one is brushing her hair and the other is wondering why she was sent home alone. Are you all right, Mr. Singer?”
“Don’t I look okay?”
“You look sad. We need more drink.” Woollcott barked at a waiter. Mrs. Parker returned to her theory. “I must remind you of the Los Angeles police report. Ilona and several others thought it prudent to escape to Mexico when William Desmond Taylor was murdered. I think Desmond Taylor was a set-up, much like Lacey Van Weber is now. I think he was the front through whom drugs were disseminated in Hollywood. Undoubtedly he displeased his people for one reason or another. I personally think he wanted out because he was genuinely in love with one of his little stars, possibly Mary Miles Minter, and because he was becoming a major name in the directorial field. Desmond Taylor had a brother, we have learned. We have learned Taylor’s real name was William Deane Tanner. Isn’t that clever? Same initials. Now the brother. The suspicion was that Sands, Taylor’s butler, who was among those who disappeared, might well have been that brother. The brother’s name was Dennis Deane Tanner. I think that’s Dennis Byron, also known as Lacey Van Weber. And he married Ilona Mercury somewhere along the line.” The replenishment arrived, and Mrs. Parker was terribly pleased with herself. “Is my deduction so staggering? You’re both so quiet. Alec? Rebuttal?’
“I think the marriage took place before they left for Mexico,” said Woollcott, bringing his notes from his pocket. “I’ve been working on this all day. It mostly dovetails with your theory, Dottie, but now listen to this.”
Singer was feeling better. He was proud of his students. Mrs. Parker didn’t miss the superior look that had developed on the detective’s face. How easily he controls his emotions. Why can’t that be infectious, like some virus, so he can pass if on to me, she thought.
“Miss Repulsive! You are not listening!” raged Woollcott.
“Believe me, Alec, the centre ring is all yours.” She dabbed at her nose with a handkerchief, looking about as demure as an ax
e murderess.
“Mercury married Dennis in Hollywood. A quiet ceremony, I should think, wouldn’t you, Dottie?”
“Probably not to disturb the neighbours.” She sipped her Jack Rose and made a mental note to offer up a prayer later for bootleggers.
“Desmond Taylor probably didn’t know about this marriage, because he was aware there was a wife somewhere back in the boondocks and might have cried foul. After Desmond Taylor’s murder, it was politic, to say the least, for Dennis to disappear. He knew too much. He musn’t fall into the hands of the police. If they interrogated him, the jig, as they say in certain circles, would be up. So he was sent off.”
“Sent off?” Singer was leaning on the table. “What do you mean ‘sent off?”
“I think he was offered the job of replacing his brother in the organization’s favor. They offered to groom him into the person we know today. The offer, of course, was irresistible to a man who’d had to whore his way across a continent and then accept the subservient position offered by his sibling. Imagine asking your brother to be your butler.”
“It’s worth considering,” said Mrs. Parker. Woollcott flashed her a nasty look.
“Having accepted their offer, he is off to Mexico to lie low for a while. But now he has a problem. He has Ilona Mercury on his hands. He makes a deal with her to fade Into the background in return for certain future monetary favours, which she accepts with alacrity, because I think by this time Hans Javor, later to become Bela Horathy, has attracted her eye. It was probably Mercury, when she assumed the alias of Magda Moreno, who realized Horathy’s talents far exceeded his chiropracticing or whatever it was he did, and brought his superior talents for rendering morphine into cocaine to Van Weber’s attention. Tight little circle, don’t you think, my friends?”
“So are we,” commented Mrs. Parker as she sipped her drink.
