Down for the Count: A Toby Peters Mystery (Book Ten)

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “Calls?” I asked.

  “No calls,” he said.

  I took the five quick steps to my office before he could say more. Inside I went to my desk, found the Blake poems in the drawer, pulled out two one-hundred-dollar bills and an envelope to put them in. The envelope said WARNER BROTHERS STUDIO in the corner. I crossed it out. I folded the bills into a sheet of paper, stuffed it all into the envelope, and licked it closed and put it in my pocket.

  When I got back to the outer office, Shelly was still there, standing with his arms at his side. He looked like a pathetic meatball.

  “What’s the problem, Shel?” I asked before I could stop myself.

  “Mildred,” he said. “She’s in Sacramento visiting her mother.”

  “That’s nice, Shel,” I said, going for the door.

  “I’ve got nothing to do tonight,” he said. “No one to eat with. You know how that is.”

  “Enjoy it, Shel. It doesn’t happen often. You deserve it.” My hand was on the doorknob, and I almost made it.

  “How about you and I having dinner together?” he said as if he had just thought of it. “On me. I mean if we don’t go anywhere too …”

  “Gotta work, Shel,” I said. “There’s a party I have to crash and—”

  “A party,” he said, moving toward me and adjusting his glasses. “I haven’t crashed a party since I was in college. Cal Fleischer and I crashed the Beta Phi pledge party. That’s how I met Mildred.”

  “I thought you met Mildred after you graduated, at a dental convention,” I said. “You hired her as your dental assistant.”

  “That’s right,” he said, snapping his fingers. “That was Jenny something I met at the Phi Beta Party.”

  “Beta Phi,” I corrected. “You won’t like this party, Shel. Believe me.”

  “Okay,” he said, moving to his dental chair. “Okay, I know when I’m not wanted. I’ll just get a sandwich and sit here. Maybe I’ll listen to the radio or something. You just go on ahead and crash your party.”

  Normally, Shelly did not know when he wasn’t wanted even when it was made as clear as I was making it.

  “Come on, Shel,” I said. “But don’t blame me if it’s not what you expect.”

  “Hah,” Shelly cackled, jumping up. “I knew I could count on you, Toby. We’ll have fun. You’ll see. And what Mildred doesn’t know …”

  “Right,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  He followed me out of the door through the small waiting room and into the hallway of the fourth floor of the Farraday. Someone was chanting in a foreign language down the hall.

  “Whose party are we crashing?” Shelly said eagerly.

  “Fella named Lipparini,” I told him. The name didn’t seem to mean anything to him.

  We made one stop. It was far out of the way, but I had to make it. I drove up Laurel Canyon to the Valley and made my way to Bluebelle Street in North Hollywood. I told Shelly he could come in, but he preferred to stay in the car and rest for the big night ahead, which was fine with me. The screen door was open and I called, “Anyone here?”

  “Toby?” came Ruth’s voice, followed by Ruth carrying Lucy, who was now old enough to walk but not very interested in that means of transportation. Ruth was skinny, tired, with tinted blond hair that wouldn’t stay up, and a gentle smile. Lucy looked at me with round brown eyes that showed recognition.

  “Uncle Toby,” she said to her mother and scrambled to be let down.

  “Where are the boys?” I said.

  “In back,” my sister-in-law said. “I’ll get them. Toby, what happened to your face?”

  Lucy had scrambled to me and I picked her up, checking her hands to be sure they weren’t concealing weapons. Lucy had a pet lock she liked to suck on and use to tap out a tune on an unsuspecting victim. She had her father’s blood in her, that girl did. She also had the same favorite victim: me.

  “A little scrape with the law,” I said, stopping myself from touching my cheek.

  “Phil?” she asked softly.

  “No,” I said. “Phil and I are getting along like brothers.”

  “Cain and Abel,” she supplied.

  “Daddy shoots,” Lucy informed me, looking into my ear.

  “Sometimes,” I told her, and then to Ruth, “How is he?”

  “He” was my nephew Dave, who had recovered well from the collision with the truck. Dave was nine, and if he kept challenging trucks he would fulfill his destiny as my logical heir.

  “He’s fine,” Ruth said, playing with the collar of her gray dress. “You’ll see.”

  “The bills?” I went on.

  “The bills.” She shrugged. “You want a cup of coffee?”

  “No, I’ve got to go to a party,” I said. “Phil’s new job …”

  “Oh, he got a raise,” she said, “a nice raise, but we still owe … a lot.”

  I shifted Lucy into my other arm and she decided it would be interesting if our heads collided. She caught me just below the nose, which hurt her more than it did me. While she screamed, I pulled the envelope with the money out of my pocket. Ruth reached over to take the yowling kid, but I held onto Lucy and handed her the envelope instead.

  “Toby I …” she said, looking down at the envelope with tears starting.

  “Sure you can,” I said. “I hit the jackpot. Let me feel like big time once in a while. You think I have something better to do with my money? I’d blow it all on food, clothes, rent, luxury items.”

  Ruth laughed and found a pocket to put the envelope in. “Thanks,” she said, kissing my cheek, the good one. Lucy leaned into my ear and used it for a microphone. I went deaf from her scream and lifted her over me and let her tummy rub against my head. The screams turned to laughter. I’d missed my true calling, kindergarten teacher.

  “Don’t tell—” I began, but Ruth stopped me.

  “I couldn’t tell Phil,” she said. “Not now, maybe someday.”

  Lucy was laughing above me now and drooling on my back. I was having a good time.

  “It’s not worth someday,” I said. “Hasn’t been that much.”

  Before this got any more sentimental, Nate and Dave broke into the room. Nate was twelve and practical.

  “Uncle Toby, who did you kill yesterday?” Dave shouted. It was his favorite question. He pushed his dark hair from his forehead and waited for my answer.

  “Yesterday?” I said, putting Lucy down on the floor to scurry in search of her lock or some other weapon. “What about today? I put a hole through the head of a killer named Weasel Fultch and maybe three or four others. It’s hard to keep track.”

  Nate shook his head tolerantly. He was too old for such tales, but there was enough about me that kept him off balance and left open the possibility that some of my tales of mayhem might be true.

  “That’s how I got this bruise,” I said, pointing to my cheek. “The Weasel threw a boomerang at me. I ducked just in time and took a shot at him before the boomerang came back on its second pass.”

  Ruth was leaning against the wall, her skinny arms folded, shaking her head.

  “A boomerang?” Dave said, moving close to examine my cheek, which I turned to him so he could have a good look.

  “Razor sharp,” I said. “I won’t have to shave that side of my face for a month. What were you guys playing?”

  “Mr. Fate,” Dave said. “You want to come out in the yard and play with us?”

  “Can’t,” I said as Lucy came back into the room with a big smile and toddled toward me with her lock in hand. “I’ve got to get to this party a big gangster is throwing and try to talk him out of killing me.”

  “Uncle Toby,” Nate sighed, shaking his head just like his mother. I danced out of the path of Lucy, and she plunged gleefully into the sofa. This was her favorite game.

  “How do you play Mr. Fate?” I said, keeping an eye on Lucy, who was organizing herself for another attack.

  “You point your finger at someone like this,” Dave said, poin
ting his finger at me, “and say ‘Laxo.’ Then the person you’re pointing at gets diarrhea. It’s a super power.”

  “Very effective.” I grinned.

  Lucy came at me and Nate yelled, “Lulu, no.”

  She missed me and tumbled into her brother’s arms. Nate took the lock from her hand, and Lucy started to cry again, reaching for her toy.

  “Can you take us out, Uncle Tobe?” Dave asked.

  “Not today,” I said, aiming for the door and giving Ruth a wave. “I’m late for that party. Besides, I’ve got a case. I’m working for Joe Louis.”

  “Joe Louis?” Nate said, still holding the lock from his sister. “He was in the comics.”

  “And the ring,” I said. “He’s the heavyweight champ of the world.”

  “I know that,” said Nate as Lucy advanced on him, mouth open, to sink her few teeth into his leg.

  “Are you going to fight him?” Dave asked, ignoring the by-play of his sister and brother.

  “Naw,” I said. “I’m giving him a few tips, but it wouldn’t look good for him to get into the ring with me. Think of the embarrassment if I hurt him.”

  “I see,” Dave said seriously.

  “I’ll take you to a movie Saturday if your mom says okay. Elephant Boy with Sabu,” I said as I pushed open the screen door.

  “Great,” Nate said.

  “Great,” Dave repeated.

  “You don’t have to copy everything,” Nate said, making a face at his brother.

  Dave did a Mr. Fate and pointed his lethal Ex-Lax finger at his brother, who feigned a sudden attack of the lower abdomen.

  “Thanks, Toby,” Ruth called. I waved and went out to join Shelly for our night on the town.

  7

  The sun was just going down when we pulled up half a block away from Marty’s Lounge on Beverly in Beverly Hills.

  “That’s it,” I told Shelly, who strained to see through his glasses and the windshield.

  “Classy,” he said appreciatively.

  “Classy,” I agreed and got out of the car.

  Marty’s Lounge was a two-story brick place with only a small sign at the entrance to indicate its name. MARTY was tastefully etched in white on an amber window. Next to it was a white outlined caricature of a man with a massive nose, probably Marty.

  We entered and took a few seconds to adjust to the near darkness.

  “Can I help you, sir?” came a deep voice. I made out a man in a tux a few feet in front of me. He looked a little like William Powell.

  “A table,” I said.

  “Name?” he shot back.

  “Peter,” I said.

  He checked the list on the table and shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he purred, “but you have no reservation. Perhaps another night?”

  “I’m with the Lipparini party,” I said.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again, “but Mr. Lipparini left the names of all the guests, and your name is not on the list.”

  “Look …” I began.

  The man in the tux turned to the table and pressed a button.

  “Another night,” I said, moving toward the door.

  “Another night,” the man said with a pleasant smile.

  “That’s it?” Shelly said on the street. “That’s how you crash a party?”

  “I’m not finished,” I said, walking toward the corner.

  “A party crasher, you are not,” Shelly said, waddling along at my side.

  “Then go home,” I growled. “Get a cab and go home. Coming with me was your idea.”

  “You need my help here.” He grinned as we hit the corner. “I’ll show you how to crash a party.”

  Shelly scooted ahead of me around the corner, and I hurried to keep up with him. At the back of the building he made another turn, and I followed. We were in an alleyway, but a nice clean alleyway, everything in shiny cans with lids. A person could live in an alley like this.

  “There,” Shelly shouted triumphantly, pointing at a rear entrance. “Let’s go.”

  He opened the door and went in with me behind, and we almost ran into two gentlemen in tuxedoes. One of the two was big, the other small. Both looked tough and both had clear bulges under their coats where their hearts should have been but where hardware resided instead.

  “Where you going?” the smaller one said.

  “Going?” asked Shelly.

  “To the party,” I said.

  The two looked us up and down.

  “We’re late,” Shelly went on.

  “You’re the extra waiters?” the smaller one asked.

  “Who else?” Shelly asked.

  “I thought they couldn’t get extra waiters?” the big hood asked in return.

  “We were at another party, big dinner for George Raft,” I said. “Overstaffed.”

  “George Raft is at this party,” the big one said suspiciously.

  “That’s why we were sent here,” Shelly explained.

  This seemed to both satisfy and confuse the two, who stepped back.

  “Uniforms are in the room over there,” the big one said. “Get a move on. They already started.”

  I pushed through the door with Shelly at my side, and we found ourselves alone in a small locker room.

  “Damn, this is fun,” Shelly beamed, puffing out his cheeks. “George Raft is here.”

  “I’m thrilled and delighted,” I said, looking for another way out of the room. There was none. The only way out was past the two armed penguins. We found a rack of uniforms in the corner and put two of them on, Shelly with glee, me with foreboding.

  “Wait till I tell Mildred about this,” Sheldon said, putting on a pair of black pants with a red stripe. “On second thought, maybe I’d better not.”

  “Suit yourself, Shel,” I said.

  “I won’t forget you for this, Toby,” he said, picking out the fattest maroon jacket on the rack. I grunted, found a shirt and maroon bow tie, and got dressed. The jacket I finally selected fit fine across the shoulders, though the sleeves were a little short. We were surveying ourselves in the mirror when the door to the room opened and the smaller thug yelled, “Shake your asses.”

  We moved into the hallway with him holding the door open for us. “That way, to the left,” he said, and we moved.

  When we pushed through the hinged double door, we found ourselves in a lunatic asylum of a kitchen. Two chefs in white were facing each other and shouting. One had a walrus mustache and wore a chef’s cap that bounced on his head. The other chef was thin. His hat kept threatening to cover his eyes. Around them, waiters bustled, picking up trays, barely missing each other.

  “I’ll take this knife,” the one with the walrus mustache shouted, holding up a knife that looked like the sword Errol Flynn carried in The Sea Hawk, “I’ll take this knife and slice you into shashlik before I let you garnish the potatoes.”

  “Slice,” said the thinner chef defiantly, his hands on his hips. “Slice. You don’t know how to season a hot dog, you Austrian schnitzel.”

  The walrus chef raised the knife over his head while Shelly and I watched. The waiters scurried around the chefs, paying no attention, though one mumbled, “Scuse me,” as he brushed past.

  Then the thin chef spotted us. “So, what are you waiting?” he shouted while the walrus chef stood patiently holding the knife in the air. “You’ve got tables seven and twelve. We’re on the soup.”

  “Seven and twelve,” I repeated.

  “Soup,” said Shelly.

  We got into the stream of waiters, and each of us picked up a tray covered with bowls of soup. I tried to hold the tray up like the other waiters, balancing it on one hand and holding it with the other over my shoulder. The bowls slid but didn’t spill.

  “What are you?” bellowed the walrus chef.

  “New at this,” I apologized.

  Shelly had picked up his tray and was bounding happily toward the door through which the other maroon-clad waiters were hurrying.

  The walrus chef h
anded his sword to the thin chef, who took it. Then the walrus chef showed me how to hold the tray. “Like this, like this. What were you before you became a waiter?”

  “An exterminator,” I said.

  “There is no humor in that,” he said seriously. “Move.”

  He took the knife back from the thin chef as I barely missed an incoming waiter. Juggling soup bowls, I went through the big double doors and then through a brown velvet drapery that had been opened enough for us waiters to pass through. I found myself in a huge room where the sounds of people laughing played over and under a five-piece band in the corner that was belting out “Silver Dollar.”

  There were tables all over the place and on a slightly raised platform against the far wall, a long table. In the middle of the long table sat Lipparini. His head was cocked to the side. He was listening seriously to an old man who whispered to him. On the other side of Lipparini sat a woman in a blue gown, her hair dark, piled high, and lacquered on her head.

  I found my table by the big number twelve planted in the center of it next to a bowl of flowers. A small table between two tables let me put the tray down. Two tables down at number seven, Shelly was just finishing doling out his bowls.

  I couldn’t remember which side to serve the soup from. There was no time to worry about it. I just handed it out, and no one at the table seemed to mind except one too-thin and almost pretty, heavily made-up woman, who gave me a dirty look. I smiled apologetically and went for more soup.

  “You know who I just served soup to?” Shelly whispered loudly over the band, which had gone into a rendition of “Amapola.” “I just served soup to Wallace Beery. Or maybe it was Noah Beery. Whoever he is, he has some really fine dentures.”

  “Great,” I said, looking around to see how I could get to Lipparini. The prospects weakened when I saw a tuxedo-clad Moe, the last of the Stooges, step directly behind Lipparini.