Blood on the Boards

by Gault, William Campbell

  “We’re building a set this afternoon. You can help with that if you’re so ambitious.”

  “Maybe I will,” Joe told him. “There are some people I have to see first, though. I might not be through in time.”

  The first person he had to see was Norah, but she wasn’t at the office. She was taking a few days’ vacation and the girl in the office didn’t know where she was spending them.

  He went from there to Hollywood, to a dim and dusty tobacco store on Ivar. It was less dim and not nearly as dusty now; it had gone through a change of management. The new owner actually sold tobacco.

  Joe drove from there to Beverly Hills, to one of the showplaces off Sunset Boulevard. He was stretching a thin friendship to its cracking point coming here with questions, but it was his best hope.

  He’d known the occupant of the house before he’d gone respectable; Joe had saved his daughter from marrying a man even less admirable than her father. The old man had expressed his appreciation for that. But the old man might resent acting as a pigeon.

  To the butler at the door, Joe said, “I’d like to see Mr. Brennan. You can tell him it’s Joe Burke calling.”

  The butler was back in less than a minute. “This way, sir.”

  Joe followed him through the entrance hall to another hall which ran through the center of the house. Through a closed door at the end of this hall, Joe heard the spat of a small-caliber weapon.

  The butler opened the door. “Mr. Brennan will see you here, sir.”

  Joe went in and the door closed behind him. It was a narrow room. At the far end there were a number of targets such as are used in small-caliber shooting galleries. At this end of the room, Ray Brennan was standing, sighting a .22-caliber target pistol.

  There was another spat and one of the smaller ducks at the far end flipped over. Brennan continued to load and shoot, working the entire row of ducks.

  He must have been over sixty but his white hair was full and lustrous and his tanned face unlined. And there wasn’t any doubt as to the steadiness of his hands. This was a rifle range; Brennan was using a pistol.

  He turned finally, and smiled at Joe. “Pardon the theatrics. I was rude, I know, but I wanted to impress you.”

  “You did,” Joe admitted. “That’s sweet shooting, Mr. Brennan.”

  “Thank you.” Brennan was running a swab through the barrel now. “I see by the papers you’ve retired, Joe.”

  “You must read carefully; it didn’t get much ink.”

  “I read them carefully. And watch television faithfully and practice here every morning. I’m retired, too, Joe.”

  “I know.”

  Brennan put the gun on a small table near by and picked up another. “Social call, Joe?” “No. Just checking a rumor.” Brennan looked up, waiting.

  “About Lonnie Goetz,” Joe went on. “I heard he was alive and in town.”

  Nothing showed on Brennan’s face. “Checking for whom, Joe?”

  “For me, so far. For the law eventually.” “And why come to me?”

  “Because you’d know. He was working for you, wasn’t he, about the time he was supposed to have died?”

  “Maybe. There aren’t any feathers on me, Joe.”

  “I know that. It’s one of the reasons I hesitated about coming here. Do you remember a girl named Sharon Cassidy, Lonnie’s girl?”

  Brennan shook his head. “Where did you hear this about Lonnie being alive?”

  “From the police, who probably got it from somebody with feathers.” Joe smiled. “Sorry to have bothered you, Mr. Brennan.” He turned toward the door.

  “Just a moment,” Brennan said quietly, and Joe turned back.

  “Lonnie’s dead,” Brennan said flatly. “I know it. I watched him get on the plane.” “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

  Brennan nodded. His smile was thin. “Drop in any time, Joe. But never with questions again. Fair enough?”

  “Fair enough, and thanks again.”

  Brennan nodded. He was sighting the new gun now. Joe heard the spat as he closed the door. In the entrance hall, the butler was waiting to open the front door for him.

  So quiet, so dignified, so upper class. And all built on the narcotics trade. But then, there were bigger houses in the town built on the patent medicine trade, which was considered legitimate.

  At the super-market in the Palisades, Joe stocked up on meat and frozen vegetables, eggs, fruit juice, breakfast food, and canned soup.

  It was nearly two now and he broiled one of the steaks he’d bought and made a sandwich of it. That, with a glass of milk, was his lunch.

  Then he phoned the station but Krivick wasn’t there, nor was he at home. Joe put on some working clothes and went down to the clubhouse.

  Hamilton and Leonard Smith were there, pulling some flats out of the small shed that opened off the prop room. The flats they were choosing were a hideous shade of green.

  “Damn it,” Smith said. “I wish Norah were here. These should be painted today, if we get them up.” “I can paint,” Joe volunteered.

  “We can all paint,” Smith said, “but who can mix the colors we want? I’ve seen some of your sport shirts, so that eliminates you. Norah’s the girl with color sense.”

  “Couldn’t you get her at the office?” Walter asked.

  Smith shook his head. “She’s taking a few days’ vacation.” He looked steadily at Joe. “I don’t know why. Do you, Joe?”

  “Shut up and let’s get to work,” Joe said.

  Walter, oblivious to it all, said, “She’s certainly the number-one worker around here. I shudder to think of how little we’d accomplish without her.”

  “Exactly,” Smith said. “I’d rather have anybody in the organization quit before she did.”

  Joe was bending over, trying to extricate a flat. He stood erect now and looked at Smith. “Nothing personal in that, Leonard?”

  Smith didn’t answer.

  Walter paused to look at them. “What the hell goes on here?”

  Smith smiled. “I’m sorry. I was needling Joe and I now realize it wasn’t all in fun on my part. I apologize, Joe.” Joe grinned at him and winked.

  Hamilton said, “If I’m not too young to know, what has Norah’s absence got to do with Joe?”

  “Nothing,” Joe said. “Leonard was guessing and guessing wrong.”

  Smith shook his head. “I’ve watched her and admired her for a long time. I’m not likely to be wrong about Norah.”

  “Let’s drop the subject,” Joe suggested, “and get to the work at hand.”

  “I’ll second that,” Smith said.

  They went to work, and while they worked they talked. Joe learned about ground rows and sill irons, about lash cleats and brace cleats, corner blocks and lash lines. He learned the difference between scenery linen, enameling duck, and muslin, between gauze and scrim, between a drop and a border.

  At five-thirty his stomach was growling at him, but they still had a full hour’s work ahead of them. Neither of the other two made any comments about being hungry; Joe worked uncomplainingly on.

  A little after six-thirty Walter said, “Well, that should just about do it. I’ll admit none of us is a Bel Geddes, but I think we’ve shown a certain esthetic flair.”

  “Would you translate that for me?” Joe asked.

  “He means he’s seen worse,” Leonard said. “I’m trying to remember if I have.”

  The big door at the far end of the auditorium opened then, and they all looked that way.

  It was Norah.

  “Greetings,” Hamilton called. “I thought you were out of town.”

  “I was, but I remembered about the set and what a horrible sense of color Leonard had.”

  “Thank you,” Leonard said. “Hope we didn’t interrupt anything? Like a rendezvous in some glamorous desert watering place?”

  Joe said, “I think I left a hammer back of that fireplace. I’d better get it before we forget it.”

  There wasn’t any
reasonable reason why his heart should pound, or his knees suddenly turn to butter. He was hungry, of course, but he’d been hungry before.

  He went around the edge of a wing and squirmed his way through the narrow passage between the wing and the side of the stage.

  He heard Leonard call, “Watch it, Joe—” and then he felt the pain right above his ear. He was conscious of the ripping sound of the scenery linen just before the lights went out….

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  NO VISIONS IN THE BLACKNESS, but the smell of Norah’s perfume and then a drop of moisture on his cheek and he opened his eyes.

  Norah’s face was above him; his head was in her lap. She was sitting on the stage and she was crying; it was her tear on his cheek.

  “Hello,” he said. “Stop crying.”

  She sniffed and rubbed both her eyes with the back of one hand. “You stupid, vulgar Irishman.” He smiled. “Want a cigarette?”

  Over Norah’s shoulder, Hamilton was looking down anxiously. “Are you all right, Joe? Leonard’s gone for the first-aid kit. Can you get up all right?”

  Joe grinned at him. “Why should I? Would you?”

  “You’re bleeding,” Norah said. “It’s quite a gash, Joe.”

  He sat up quickly. “On your skirt? I’ll ruin it, honey.”

  Smith was back now with the kit. “God, I’m sorry, Joe. I just remembered, when you started back, that I’d left a hammer up on that wing. The claw must have—” Leonard stopped, looking sick.

  Norah said, “I’ll handle it, Leonard. You’d better get some air. Let’s go into the kitchen where we can wash this, first. And I’ll want scissors, Walter. We’ll have to cut away some of the hair.”

  Walter, too, was looking pale. “I know where there’s a pair.” He went away.

  Smith still stood there, looking bleakly at both of them.

  Norah asked, “Shall I help you up, Joe?”

  He shook his head and got slowly to his feet. There was very little pain, but perhaps that would come later. Smith looked at him a second before turning and going down the steps to the auditorium.

  Norah said quietly, “Leonard is acting strangely, isn’t he?”

  “He’s goofy for you,” Joe said. “I guess I am, too, honey.” Joe looked at her skirt, spotted with blood, and up to meet her gaze. “I love you, Norah.”

  A faint color in her cheeks. “Let’s not be too gallant, just because I’ve—Let’s get into the kitchen.” She jostled his arm. “Come on.”

  Walter was in the kitchen when they got there and he had blended the water in the swing faucet to the proper temperature.

  Norah worked quickly and gently and finished by putting a pad of gauze over the cut. She said, “I think you should see a doctor, Joe. It might need a few stitches. I think we can get Doctor Gendron at home.”

  “I want to eat first. I’m dying of hunger. Are we friends again?”

  She nodded.

  He lifted her chin. “No more than that?”

  Her gaze met his and dropped. “I don’t know. I want to be sure, Joe. Some things in you—You’re—Oh, I don’t want to talk about it now.”

  “I’m dumb, huh? And vulgar.”

  “I don’t believe you’re either. Please—” She took a breath. “I don’t want to sound like Elsie Dinsmore. Let’s drop it for now, Joe?”

  “All right. Have you eaten?”

  She nodded. “I could use a cup of coffee, though.” She put a hand on Joe’s arm. “Ask Leonard to come along. We can go to Ned’s Grille; you two won’t need to change for that.”

  “All right. You like him, don’t you?” She nodded, and flicked Joe’s nose with a forefinger. “I like him.”

  He found Leonard out on the patio, smoking a cigarette. He asked, “How about going to Ned’s, Leonard? I’m starving.”

  “Fair enough. Are we going to paint the set after that? We should.”

  “I’m willing. We’ll talk it over with Norah.”

  Leonard dropped his cigarette and stepped on it. He didn’t look at Joe as he said, “It’s been a bad afternoon. That hammer business didn’t make it any happier. Joe, I’m sorry. I’m rather—pathological about Norah. But I know you’ll treat her right.”

  “Don’t be playing cupid, Leonard. Let’s get cleaned up.”

  Hamilton was going home for dinner; he agreed to come back for the painting.

  It was a quiet meal. Joe’s head was beginning to throb a little and Norah and Smith couldn’t seem to find any conversational topics worth expanding.

  Norah had phoned Doctor Gendron from Ned’s; Joe drove to the doctor’s home after dropping Norah and Smith at the clubhouse.

  The cut required seven stitches, and the doctor told Joe, “You’re not the first casualty the Players have sent over. You people certainly earn the money you don’t get.”

  Joe kept a straight face as he said, “There’s no sacrifice I wouldn’t make for my art.”

  Doctor Gendron finished without further dialogue.

  At the clubhouse, Norah donned a paint-spattered smock and was mixing a yellowish chartreuse in a huge bucket. Hamilton was painting a cabinet a chocolate brown.

  Joe stayed with it as long as he could. But the smell of paint increased the throbbing ache of his bruised head and he had to quit before they were finished.

  He sat at the rear of the auditorium and watched the flats become a room. When they were almost finished, Joe went to the kitchen. He found a quarter pound of coffee and put one of the big pots on to heat.

  The coffee was ready by the time they’d cleaned the brushes and the buckets and themselves. Norah came into the kitchen and sniffed. “That’s a finer aroma than we’ve had the last few hours. How’s the head?”

  “It aches steadily, but it doesn’t seem to be getting worse. When do we set up the furniture?”

  “Tomorrow, I suppose. We open Thursday. There’s nothing new on the murder? At least there isn’t in the papers.”

  “Nothing new that I know of,” Joe told her. Then Hamilton and Smith came in and Joe poured the coffee.

  Walter said, “The advance ticket sale is the best we’ve ever had. And the play isn’t very well known. Amateur Hawkshaws, I suppose.”

  “As long as they pay,” Norah said, “who cares why they’re here?”

  Walter sipped his coffee. “I do. We can’t arrange for a murder every month. Sharon’s right about this play, you know. It’s very weak. Larry’s saved it with his directing, but I’m sorry we ever chose it.”

  “Larry wanted it,” Smith pointed out. “All these amateur directors favor something they’ve handled before. I think, from now on, we should choose the play and then look for a man to direct it.”

  Hamilton smiled. “And look and look and look. You know how arbitrary they can be, Leonard.”

  “Because we baby them.”

  “Probably. Because we need a good man who’ll work for nothing. And if we don’t give him what he wants, there are a dozen other amateur groups within shouting distance who will.” Hamilton sighed. “Considering all the limitations we have, I think we’re lucky to have lasted as long as we have.”

  “I can give you one reason for that,” Smith said. “Or two, rather. You and Norah are willing to do all the dirty work so some of these young snips can show off for their relatives. In any amateur group, it’s the people like you and Norah who keep it going.”

  Norah bowed. “Thank you, kind sir. And add the name of a man called Leonard Smith.” She inclined her head toward Joe. “Not to mention our apprentice on the sucker list, Hole-in-the-Head Burke.”

  Joe raised his cup high. “To all of us.”

  They drank solemnly.

  Norah said, “All those years on the Force, and Joe hasn’t a scar. A few days after he meets us, he’s knocked out by a producer and then has his scalp laid open with a hammer.”

  They laughed.

  Joe asked, “Who told you the man was a producer? Have you and Sharon been talking?”

&n
bsp; Norah smiled coolly. “No, dear. I inquired around a bit.”

  Smith rose and said, “Good night, people. I’ve had a full day.”

  “And I,” Walter said. He, too, rose. “Joe, when you decide to invest that money of yours, remember Walter Hamilton and Associates.”

  They went out, and Joe looked at Norah. “Still gloomy?”

  “Some. It wasn’t just that Sharon business. It was Dysart’s death, too. Do you ever think of death, Joe, of your death?”

  “Once in a while. And then I tell myself it isn’t that important, I’m not that important. Everybody dies. Think of all those who’ve gone ahead of us, Norah.”

  “I think of them. I think of my father. But Joe, they died believing.”

  “Oh. And you don’t?” “No. Do you?”

  “I don’t know. Have a cigarette.”

  She took one and he held a light for her. She said, “I used to get by with that Stevenson bromide, that ‘Glad did I live and gladly die, And I laid me down with a will.’ But not any more. And if there’s no tomorrow, what am I leaving behind?”

  Joe thought of Smith’s “some small sound.” He said, “You could leave some kids. I’d be glad to help you with that.”

  She studied him. “Were you trying to be funny?”

  “No. What am I leaving behind? What am I contributing, for that matter, while I’m here? And there are millions like us, Norah, leaving nothing but their kids as contributions. We should get married.”

  She shook her head. “That isn’t a good enough reason. I still feel that I have some talent I should develop. I feel so wasted.”

  “You can still develop it, married to me. I can afford a talented wife.”

  She smiled. “You must like me. We’d better go. I imagine the place will be locked up soon.”

  “Why don’t we go to my house?” Joe suggested. “I’ve some records I don’t appreciate. You can explain them to me.”

  She smiled wryly. “What, no etchings?” “Now who’s vulgar? It wasn’t what I had in mind, honestly.”

  “It must have been in my mind, then. All right, here we go.”

  The night was cold and gusty, but the stars were clear and the moon bright. Joe followed Norah’s car over to the parking lot behind the Point Realty Company, where she left it.