The Talk Show Murders

by Al Roker

  “I don’t see how reporting the news—”

  “Don’t kid a kidder, Trina. When it comes to reporting the news, you’ve got two anchors and a newswoman on the show. Use one of them for your murder investigation updates. I’ll stick to the recipes and the joke of the day.”

  Trina signaled the waiter for the check. Arnie studied the petits fours crumbles on the serving plate. I sat back in my chair and waited for the venison and wild huckleberries dinner I’d eaten to stop doing the Running Man in my stomach.

  Chapter

  THIRTEEN

  One of the first things you learn about interviewing is that silence can be a useful tool. You ask a question, and the interview subject answers, expecting another question. If you remain silent, the subject often will try to fill in the conversational hole, and in doing so often will provide you with the best quotes of the session.

  Since the three of us were old hands at the silence game, the only words spoken on the taxi ride back to the hotel were Arnie’s, informing the driver of our destination.

  The interlude of thought and introspection calmed things down a bit, and in the hotel’s lobby, I thanked Trina for the dinner. She said she’d decided Lance would do the reports on the investigation into Patton’s murder. “I’d appreciate your not telling him he was my second choice.”

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “I’m going to my room to phone Gretchen,” she said. “I don’t want to delay the bad news. She’ll be as disappointed as I am.”

  She remained in place, staring at me. Hoping I’d change my mind? When I didn’t, she turned on her heel and marched toward the elevator bank, where Arnie waited, peeling off his wilted blazer and exposing one of his trademark Hawaiian shirts, like some six-foot-two mantis shedding a dull layer of skin and emerging as something new and colorful.

  I waited to take the next car up.

  It’s never a good idea to get in Dutch with your producers, but I didn’t think Trina could fire me. Even if she did, self-preservation would trump employment.

  Or so I told myself. The fact of the matter was, if Gio Polvere, or whoever, had sent the men in the SUV to remove me from planet Earth, I might as well have gone along with Trina’s plan. But I preferred to take the optimistic approach. The SUV’s inhabitants gave up rather easily. They hadn’t been waiting outside the hotel when I hailed a cab to go to Everest. They hadn’t been behind us on the drive back to the hotel.

  Heading up to my suite, I decided that I’d have to rein in my imagination. As FDR once put it so succinctly, we’ve nothing to fear.…

  The red button on the phone in my suite was blinking.

  I watched the blinks for what seemed like a full minute, then lifted the receiver.

  I was informed: “The following message was left for you at seven-thirteen p.m.”

  “Chef Blessing, we met a few days ago.” The recorded voice was male, nasal, and vaguely familiar. “I’m Larry Kelsto. The comic. I know you’re a busy guy, but I’d really appreciate your catching my set tonight at the Komedy Krush on North Wells Street. I’ll be on around ten-thirty. I’ll leave a pass at the door, and we can have a drink after. I think you’ll be interested in hearing my pitch, Chef Blanch … ah, sorry, Chef Blessing.”

  Kelsto’s subtlety was something of a surprise. Anyone else hearing the voice mail would write the “Blanch …” off as a slip of the tongue. He’d assume Kelsto was selling his comedy talent, not issuing a blackmail threat.

  My watch told me I had a little less than an hour to wonder how the little weasel had discovered my real name and, presumably, my checkered past. It had to have come from Patton. Was there a connection? As I recalled, Kelsto had disliked the ex-cop. What was it he’d said? Something about Patton treating his employees badly. But he hadn’t worked for Patton himself.

  Well, I’d find out more at the Komedy Krush.

  Or not.

  The club was located in Chicago’s Old Town just a few blocks south, in location if not in class, of the legendary home of comedy, The Second City. Its bright orange façade, black awning, and black frame windows presented a year-round Halloween effect that didn’t strike me as being particularly humor-appropriate.

  “You sure?” the cabbie asked when we pulled up. “If you’re looking for laughs, it’s too late for Second City, but you got Zanies down the way. Or The Spot—”

  “What’s wrong with this place? I see people going in.”

  “Basically, it’s the manager, Herman ‘the German’ Schwartz. He’s a …” He used a hyphenated word that suggested Herman might have been a bit too fond of his mother.

  Hard to tell that from just the look of the man as he stood at the door to his establishment, welcoming customers. He was porcine, in his fifties, wearing a tie-dyed T-shirt and baggy denim pants. White hair coated his cranium, cheeks, and chin, and an emerald-green earring winked merrily from his left lobe. His right arm was decorated with a tattoo of Lenny Bruce caressing a snake.

  He seemed pleased to see me. Shook my hand heartily and led me through the crowd to an area near the bar where the night’s comics waited to go onstage. I didn’t see Larry Kelsto.

  Herman introduced me to the mainly young hopefuls, which included a pretty woman dressed like a cowgirl and a guy with his face painted like a rabid football fan, then finally got around to asking, “Here to sample the best of the hottest new mirth-makers, Billy?”

  “Larry Kelsto said he’d be going on at ten-thirty,” I said. “It’s a little past that.”

  Herman the German looked pained. “He an old friend of yours, Billy?”

  “Not exactly. I just met him a couple of days ago.”

  “Ah. Okay. Then here’s the story on Larry. Emus. The guy’s a nudnik. Now, take Sy Stern over there.” He pointed to a handsome young guy in a black silk shirt and pressed denims who was holding court with a collection of very pretty women. “Sy’s a Jerry Seinfeld waiting to happen. He’s got the moves, and he brings the funny. If you’re looking for class on your show, Sy’s the guy. Lemme get—”

  “Hold on. I’m here to see Larry,” I said.

  “Well, the thing is: Larry’s a no-show.”

  “He’s not here?”

  “That’s what I’m sayin’. See the guy onstage now, the one using a hammer on the Ping-Pong balls and gettin’ zero laughs because it wasn’t funny when Gallagher did it? I had to send that putz in to fill for Larry tonight.”

  “He left me a message earlier that he’d be here,” I said. “He’s probably running late.”

  “Billy, the one thing Larry never is is late. The schmuck usually shows up at eight or nine and stays until I kick him out. This is a very unusual occurrence, him not being here.”

  “You wouldn’t have his address?”

  He cocked his round head, frowned, and said, “I doubt it, but if …”

  He was distracted by an occurrence onstage. The comedy hopeful had stopped smashing Ping-Pong balls and was addressing the mainly silent audience. “Why aren’t you laughing?” he asked, looking as if he was on the verge of tears. “This stuff is funny.”

  “Aw, shit,” Herman said. “I gotta go give that little pisher the hook before he clears the house. Stay, Billy. I’ll send a broad over for your drink order. On the house, of course.”

  I watched him plow through the tables, step into the spotlight, and take the mike from in front of the wannabe comic. “Time’s up,” he said to the kid. “You and your crap, off my stage, now.”

  The audience was suddenly invigorated. Applauding. Facing them, Herman the German blessed his customers with a wide grin, then turned to observe the wretched young man on his hands and knees, picking up his smashed Ping-Pong balls. “Comedy sure is fun, isn’t it, Willis?”

  That was it for me. I’d get Kelsto’s address some other way, tomorrow.

  Out on Wells, surprisingly active with Chicago’s young night crawlers, I hunted for a taxi, finally found one where Wells collided with Lincoln and Clark.


  Halfway to my hotel, the driver, a wiry black man wearing puka shells and a beret, leaned his head back and asked, “Know sumboddy ’n a black RAV4? ’Cause he on our ass.”

  Looking through the rear window, I saw nothing. “Where?”

  “Jus’ behin’ the bus.”

  I saw it. The black SUV.

  “Wan’ me t’ lose it, mah bruther?”

  There was no way they’d picked me up at the Komedy Krush. That meant they’d probably been following me from the hotel. Following me all day. Doing nothing more than following.

  I told him not to bother.

  Chapter

  FOURTEEN

  “You can eat all the soup you want,” Adele Ricklas of the Lose-It-Fast Weight-Reduction Clinic was explaining to me and the Wake Up, America! audience at six-twenty-four a.m. the following morning. “And you can eat all the fruit. Except for bananas. No bananas on the first day of the diet.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  Adele Ricklas blinked. She was in her thirties, well groomed, appropriately slim, and perfectly pleasant. But she didn’t know the answer. “I … Well. It … The banana … The Cabbage-Soup Diet doesn’t work if you eat bananas on the first day.”

  “But you can eat apples, or strawberries?” I asked, just to keep the ball rolling.

  “Oh, absolutely,” she said, clearly relieved. “Pears, oranges. Grapes. And on the fourth day of the diet, you can even eat bananas. As many as eight.”

  It was a rough way to start the day, holding a conversation about the Cabbage-Soup Diet. Anything with cabbage. I’d never really developed a taste for the cultivar, though I had a girlfriend once who claimed that the raw leaves had cured her father’s stomach ulcer. I’d never thought about it before, but he was a Son of the Confederacy, and it could have been my relationship with his daughter that had caused the ulcer.

  The floor manager was holding up two fingers. Two more long minutes to go.

  Just off the set, Kiki shifted her weight impatiently, notepad in hand.

  I asked Adele Ricklas if there might be any health problems with a diet that supposedly results in very fast weight loss. She allowed as how it might be a good idea to take a vitamin supplement while slurping toward thinness.

  Then she said, “I brought some spicy cabbage soup with me, Chef Blessing, in case you’d like to sample it.”

  “I’d love to, Adele,” I lied, “but, regrettably, it will have to be off camera. Because right now, it’s time for the news. Thank you so much for telling us about the Cabbage-Soup Diet.”

  Our red light clicked off.

  I thanked Adele again. Instead of going on her way, she asked, “Aren’t you going to try the soup?”

  “Once the show is over and I can relax,” I said.

  She gave me a wan smile and thanked me for “the nice interview.”

  Watching Ms. Ricklas depart, Kiki said, “You could have tried her soup, Billy.”

  “Billy no like cabbage in the morning,” I said. “Not even at cabbage time, which, in my opinion, is the hour of thirteen.”

  She showed me her large, round wristwatch. “Speaking of time, you’ve got six minutes before sitting down with Dr. Hemmick and several dogs to discuss fleas and ticks.”

  “When did that get added to the list?”

  “About a half-hour ago,” Kiki replied. “Trina said you’d understand.”

  I did. Because I’d refused to do the daily on the Patton investigation, she was going to stick me with diet fads and fleas and ticks. Fair enough.

  “Lead me to the dogs,” I said. “But, at a more decent hour, I want you to call Gemma Bright’s office and get Larry Kelsto’s phone number and address for me.”

  “The comic? Why?”

  “In case the guy you picked up at the hotel doesn’t work out. I thought Larry could fill in.”

  “Ewww. If you must know, my hotel pickup and I are doing just fine. Seriously, Billy, why do you want Kelsto’s information?”

  “It’s personal,” I said.

  Seeing her storm off, I realized I’d forgotten to take my tact pills that morning. I suppose if I needed an excuse, I could say that being chased through the streets by a mysterious vehicle tends to put one on edge. On the other hand, there’d been no black SUV on view while I taxied to Millennium Park at five a.m. Hey, even potential cold-blooded killers need their beauty sleep.

  Glancing at a monitor, I saw that the show had segued from the news to Gin’s interview with the star of The Thief Who Stole Trump Tower, my old talk show comrade Carrie Sands. The camera had moved in on the women, holding on a tight two-shot, which, in this hi-def world, could have been brutal. But both Gin and Carrie looked great—clear-eyed and smooth-skinned.

  I was concentrating so much on their physical attributes that it took a few seconds for me to get the drift of their conversation, which had veered from the usual “How’s the movie shaping up?” to something a bit more interesting.

  “A couple?” Carrie was saying in reply to a question I’d missed. “No. But we’ve become good friends since we began shooting the film.”

  “How’s that friendship working out, with his wife right there co-producing the movie?”

  I pulled a director’s chair over and sat.

  “Well, first,” Carrie said coolly but exhibiting remarkable self-control, “Gerard and Madeleine have been separated for nearly two years. And it’s not like he and I have been making out on the set. We’re not in some kind of passionate affair. Even if we were, I doubt it would have much effect on the way Madeleine Parnelle does business. She’s an exceptional woman. Very focused and very professional. She’s produced several successful films in France. And, of course, she edits his manuscripts.”

  “But they are still married,” Gin insisted. “Why is that, by the way? Religion? Children? Or is it a financial decision because of the phenomenal success of the books?”

  As the camera held relentlessly on Carrie’s face, the tension was starting to show in her darting eyes and tightened lips. “That’s something you’d have to ask Gerard or Madeleine,” she said.

  “I’d love to,” Gin said. “We’re hoping to get both of them on the show.”

  “It’s not the best time for Gerard. He’s away, working on book three.” Carrie flashed a passive-aggressive smile.

  “Will he be coming back before the filming ends?” Gin asked.

  “Not unless he’s finished writing the book.”

  And that was the close-down.

  I stood, thinking I should stroll over to their set to say hello to Carrie. But Kiki intervened. “Your ticks and fleas await, sire,” she said.

  Show business is rrrrufff!

  Chapter

  FIFTEEN

  Just before our eleven a.m. staff meeting started, I entered the large tent and rounded the portable conference table (it wouldn’t be a real meeting without a conference table) to present Trina with a little blue Tiffany box.

  She raised her eyebrows in surprise. “What’s this, Billy?”

  “A small token of my esteem,” I said.

  Almost giddily, she undid the bow and opened the box. She removed the top layer of cotton and gawked. “What the hell?”

  “Three fleas,” I said. “Plucked from my own body after the interview with Dr. Hemmick and his dogs.”

  She put the top on the box and gave me a wide smile. “Thank you, Billy. Now I owe you a gift. I’ll have to think of something equally appropriate.”

  When the rest of our folks arrived, carrying coffee and edibles—sugar and carbo for the fearless, fruit and yogurt for the health faddists—Trina began her critique of the morning’s show. It was, by her standards, moderate criticism. No one cried, except for Lance Tuttle, who was singled out for his flubs in his report on the CPD’s progress in finding the person or persons who murdered Pat Patton.

  The report was that there was no news to report, but that didn’t stop Lance from continuing to refer to the victim as Pete Patton.

/>   After the meeting, free from the constraint of work, I felt it was time to use Larry Kelsto’s contact information Kiki had pried from someone on the Midday with Gemma staff. When the phone number took me directly to voice mail, I decided to try and catch him at home.

  A taxi took me to his address on Eugenie Street, only a few blocks from the Komedy Krush. It was an old clapboard house with flaking gray paint. The rusty waist-high iron gate creaked like the opening of a casket in a horror movie. I walked gingerly along a weed-patched brick pathway and up several wide steps.

  The leaf-strewn porch was in the form of an L, the short part fronting a jutting section of the house that featured a stained-glass bay window that may not have been cleaned since Da Mare was in office. The longer portion of the porch led me to a dark brown wooden front door decorated with four small glass panels. Beside it was a brass or copper doorbell covered with what looked like several decades’ of verdigris.

  The doorbell worked, for whatever good that did me. Nobody answered.

  Annoyed, I reviewed the bidding.

  Kelsto wanted to meet with me, presumably with blackmail on his mind. But he didn’t show, surprising not only me but the lovely Herman the German. And now he wasn’t answering his phone or his doorbell. Conclusion: The comic just might have made the same mistake as Patton.

  I scanned the street. I didn’t see the black SUV, nor had I seen it on the taxi drive from my hotel. Common sense told me I should walk a block and a half to Wells Street, flag down a taxi, and forget about Kelsto, who might very well have been inside the run-down clapboard building, drawing flies.

  On the other hand, if he were merely out in the city blackmailing somebody else, it was possible that whatever he hoped to peddle to the former Billy Blanchard was inside the house just waiting to be found, taken, and destroyed forever.

  I walked down the front steps and followed the brick path to the rear of the house and a patchy yellow grass yard separated from the neighboring properties by a high wood plank fence. A work shed of the same clapboard construction as the house stood near the far end of the fence.