Blackmail

by Parnell Hall

  Praise for Parnell Hall’s BLACKMAIL

  “Every page quivers with comic frustration and the result is an absolute joy.”

  —Kirkus (starred)

  “Parnell Hall succeeds in making Stanley Hastings one of a kind .... BLACKMAIL is pleasantly reminiscent of an earlier era, when detectives like Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin brought some humor to their chores.”

  —The Wall Street Journal

  “Here is that rare and highly readable type of novel, the one told mostly in dialogue—and very good dialogue it is, too .... Blackmail is a fun page-turner.”

  —The Denver Post

  “Stanley’s cases also have going for them some of the deftest and trickiest puzzle-plotting in the field today.”

  —Jon L. Breen, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine

  “The characters are funny, the dialogue sings, and Hall continually confounds the reader’s expectations.”

  —Sparkle Hayter, Toronto Star

  BLACKMAIL

  Parnell Hall

  Copyright © 1994, 2010 by Parnell Hall

  Published by Parnell Hall, eBook edition, 2010

  Published in paperback by Mysterious Press, Warner Books, Inc., 1995

  ISBN-10: 0-446-40365-2

  Published in hardcover by Mysterious Press, Warner Books, Inc., 1994

  ISBN-10: 0-89296-521-5

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the author, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review in a newspaper, magazine, or electronic publication; nor may any part of this book be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author.

  ISBN (Kindle): 978-1-936441-02-0

  ISBN: (ePub): 978-1-936441-03-7

  Cover design: Michael Fusco Design | michaelfuscodesign.com

  For Jim and Franny

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Books by Parnell Hall

  1.

  “I’M BEING BLACKMAILED.”

  “Oh?”

  I think she was the first woman to ever tell me that. No, I take that back. I’m sure she was the first woman to ever tell me that. Which may seem strange, since I’m a private detective, and one might expect a private detective to hear that sort of thing all the time.

  Only, I’m not that kind of private detective. Not the kind you see on TV. I chase ambulances for the law firm of Rosenberg and Stone. What that involves is largely interviewing accident victims and photographing cracks in the sidewalk.

  It does not involve listening to beautiful women tell how they’re being blackmailed.

  She certainly was beautiful.

  Her name was Marlena Smith. If she was to be believed. I tended to trust the Marlena and have doubts about the Smith. A deduction which, if I were taking Private Detective 101, would probably not be sufficient in itself to put me in the top ten percent of my class.

  We were in my office on West Forty-seventh Street, the one-room, hole-in-the-wall affair with the plaque Stanley Hastings Detective Agency on the door. She’d been waiting for me when I’d stopped by at nine o’clock that morning to pick up my mail. That in itself did not bode well—it occurred to me that the last woman I’d found waiting for me outside my office at nine in the morning had gotten involved in a murder. Compared to which, blackmail was just a walk in the park.

  But not for me. I had an appointment this morning in the Bronx with a woman who’d slipped on the newly mopped floor of a McDonald’s and broken her hip. With such weighty matters pending, I barely had time for blackmail.

  Except she really was gorgeous, this Marlena whatever. And the fastest way to flunk out of Private Detective 101 is to turn down a beautiful woman in distress. At least without hearing her story first.

  Which I was fully prepared to do. After all, a woman with a broken hip wasn’t going to run away now, was she?

  I leaned back in my desk chair, sized Marlena whatever up. She had shoulder-length blond hair, straight and curled under. It framed a perfectly symmetrical face, wide-eyed and innocent as a newborn babe.

  Only, newborn babes aren’t usually blackmailed.

  I used to discourage clients such as Marlena on the grounds that I wasn’t a real detective and wasn’t competent to help them. I’d recently revised that estimate. It wasn’t that I felt any more proficient, it was just that I’d come to the realization that, aside from the detectives on TV, no one else was that hot either.

  So, rather than tell Marlena that quite frankly there was probably nothing I could do for her, I cocked my head to one side and gave her a world-weary look, as if for me listening to stories of blackmail demands was about as commonplace as reading the morning paper. “Tell me about it.”

  She took a breath. I don’t know if that was to stall for time or to impress me by inflating an already well-filled sleeveless pullover that did not seem to be concealing a bra.

  “That’s it,” she said. “That’s the story. A man is blackmailing me.”

  “Over what?”

  “That’s not important. The fact is, he is.”

  “You have my sympathy.”

  “I didn’t come here for sympathy.”

  “Very well. My sympathy is withdrawn.”

  She took another breath. “You’re not making this easy.”

  “I’m sorry, but I’m having a hard time understanding the situation.”

  “What’s to understand? I want you to deal with this blackmailer.”

  “How am I supposed to deal with him if I don’t know what the story is?”

  “Don’t be silly. The specifics are not important.”

  “They are to me.”

  “Why? What are you, some old lady who’s afraid she’s going to miss all the spicy details?”

  “Not at all. But I have no intention of getting involved in anything if I don’t know what it is. After all, I need some assurance that what I’m doing isn’t illegal.”

  She gave me a look. “Moron. Blackmail is illegal.”

  I looked at her. “Huh?”

  “It’s illegal to begin with. The legal thing to do is to report it to the police. If I were going to do that, I
wouldn’t be here. Well, I’m not going to do that. Because I don’t want this to come out, I want to hush it up. So you may take it for granted what we’re doing here is illegal.”

  I frowned.

  “Now,” she said. “If you don’t want to help me, I’ll get out of here and find another private detective who will. One who doesn’t have so many scruples. And, believe me, there are such detectives.”

  I blinked.

  Immoral logic always confounds me. So does moral logic, for that matter.

  So do women.

  My wife, Alice, can out-argue me on any subject whatsoever. On any given subject, taking any given side. I haven’t got a prayer. If she wants to tell me black is white, I haven’t a chance of contradicting her.

  And in this case, the position Marlena questionable-last-name-blackmail-victim was arguing was that it was all right for me to allow her to pay me a large amount of money to extricate her from her current problem with a blackmailer.

  By a strange coincidence, I happened to need money.

  So, what I’m trying to say is, by and large, I would have to concede that at that moment I would probably have served as an excellent textbook example of what was meant by being in no position to argue.

  2.

  “SHOULD I PAY BLACKMAIL?”

  Richard Rosenberg leaned back in his desk chair, cocked his head at me. “I beg your pardon?”

  Richard was one of New York City’s top negligence lawyers. He was a little guy but burned up twice the calories of a big guy. The man was in constant motion. And even if he appeared to be at rest, his mind was going a mile a minute. Kind of like a clock with the spring wound too tight—at any moment it might start ringing frantically and hop off the shelf.

  Richard Rosenberg had made his reputation by winning a high percentage of negligence cases. Attorneys settled out of court with him because he was so good in court. He was a showman, and loved strutting his stuff in front of juries. He was also tireless, and wore other attorneys down through an inexhaustible supply of nervous energy. Opposing counsel tended to avoid him.

  So did I, for that matter. Except when I really needed him.

  Like now.

  “I need legal advice, Richard. I don’t know who else to trust.”

  “Your instinct is right,” Richard said. “But your timing is bad. Don’t you have a case this morning?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So?”

  “I called and said I’d be late.”

  His eyebrows launched into orbit. “You told my client you’d be late?”

  “So she wouldn’t worry.”

  “Worry, hell. Suppose she goes elsewhere?”

  “She’s got a broken hip. Richard. She’s not going anywhere.”

  “I mean hires another attorney. Suppose she dials L-A-W-Y-E-R-S? Or calls Jacoby & Meyers?”

  “She’s not gonna do that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “’Cause we had a nice talk about how her husband’s gonna come down and open the door for me so I can get in. He’s expecting me, Richard. But I can’t do a good job if I have something else on my mind.”

  “Oh, sure,” Richard said. “How many sign-ups have you done? A thousand? As if you didn’t know the drill.”

  I stood up. “I’m sorry I bothered you. I’ll call her back, tell her I’m coming right up.”

  Richard held up his hand. “Hold on, hold on,” he said. “Don’t be so damn huffy. I thought we were having a conversation here.”

  Score one for the private eye. I’d hooked him. I thought I would. Richard might be a stickler for business, but the man loved a mystery. I had a feeling he wouldn’t let me out of his office till he found out what the blackmail was all about.

  Not that I could really tell him, not knowing that much myself. However, I sat down and gave him Marlena’s buildup, just like she’d given it to me.

  “So why’s she being blackmailed?” Richard said.

  “She wouldn’t say.”

  He frowned, shook his head. “No good.”

  “I know, but there you are. She wants me to pay the guy off.”

  “Damn.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “She’s offered you money to make a blackmail payment?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Without telling you any of the details?”

  “You got it.”

  “How much money are you supposed to pay?”

  “She didn’t tell me that either.”

  Richard looked at me. “What did she tell you?”

  “She’s being blackmailed by a man who gives his name as Barry.”

  “No last name?”

  “No.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “You don’t know how much you’re supposed to pay this guy Barry?”

  “No.”

  “How much is she gonna pay you?”

  “Is that relevant?”

  “I think it is.”

  “Five hundred dollars.”

  “Five hundred dollars?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re getting five hundred dollars for one day’s work?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Not to do anything in particular, just to act as a messenger boy?”

  “Basically.”

  “There’s nothing tricky involved? No plan to trap this guy, or frighten him off, or put any pressure on him? All you’re supposed to do is meet him and pay him off?”

  “That’s right.”

  “So why can’t she do it herself?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Richard frowned, shook his head. “That’s the problem. If the woman is willing to pay a delivery boy five hundred dollars, there’s got to be a reason why.”

  “She doesn’t want a delivery boy, she wants a private detective.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know why.”

  “Exactly.”

  It was beginning to piss me off. And it wasn’t just that he was belittling my position by persisting in referring to me as a delivery boy. No, it was the fact that he seemed to be expressing the opinion that I should turn down five hundred bucks.

  Though he hadn’t expressly said so.

  “All right, look, Richard,” I said. “You know the situation. What would you advise me to do?’

  “Blackmail is illegal,” Richard said. “As your attorney, I’d advise you to have nothing to do with it.”

  Damn. Now he had expressly said so.

  “However,” Richard went on, “should you choose to disregard my advice, there are several things you should consider.”

  Son of a bitch. The sly old dog, while protecting his backside, was with me all the way.

  “Really?” I said. “And what might they be?”

  “To begin with, you should not think of yourself as a private detective. When I said messenger, I meant messenger. In the context of this job, you are serving in the capacity of a common courier. You are merely delivering one package and picking up another.”

  “I see.”

  “Moreover, you take no responsibility for either package. Should either party be dissatisfied with what they receive, that is in no way your fault and should have no effect whatsoever on your payment.” He looked at me. “Did you work out a payment schedule, by the way?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Well, you should. I would suggest half when she gives you the money, or rather the package you are to deliver, and the other half when you deliver the package you pick up.”

  “That sounds good.”

  Richard held up his finger. “And here is where you must be very explicit with this woman. Since you are not being told what it is that you are picking up, you take no responsibility for it whatsoever. So whatever this man gives you, when you deliver it to this woman, your job is done. And payment is due. It doesn’t matter if the woman was expecting treasury bonds and you bring her bubble-gum cards. That is somet
hing you should make very clear.”

  “What if she won’t agree to that?”

  “Then tell her to go fuck herself. If she can’t agree to that, she’s totally unreasonable and you should have nothing to do with her. It doesn’t matter how much money she’s promised you, because if she’s like that, you’re never gonna see a dime.”

  I had sat down again. Now I shifted uncomfortably in my chair.

  Richard shook his head. “I should charge you for this,” he said.

  I looked at him in alarm. “Richard, I can’t afford you.”

  “I know that,” he said. “I can tell you’re not taking this seriously. If you were paying me, you’d do what I said. Free advice isn’t worth listening to.”

  “The advice to turn down five hundred dollars isn’t exactly free.”

  “I’m not advising you to do that. I’m advising you to make sure you get paid the five hundred dollars. I’m pointing out that, if the woman won’t agree to these terms, there probably wasn’t any five hundred dollars to begin with.”

  “All right,” I said. “Well, what else should I do? If I have hypothetically disregarded your advice and taken on this woman’s case?”

  “First off, I’d be careful not to call it a case. It’s a delivery. Aside from that, I’d define everything.”

  “Such as?”

  Richard ticked them off on his fingers. “What you’re delivering and what you’re picking up. Of course you don’t know what it is, but that’s what has to be defined. That you are picking up sealed envelopes or packages or what have you, the contents unknown.

  “Two, who this person is that you’re meeting to make this pickup and delivery. Again, it does not matter as long as it is defined in terms that relieve you of the responsibility of making any verification. If you’re told merely to go to a particular place and have a transaction with a man who gives the name of Barry, well, that’s fine. But be explicit. Ask, ‘How will I know this man Barry?’ If she says, ‘He’ll know you,’ you’re off the hook. If she says, ‘He’ll be the man at that address,’ you’re off the hook. Practically anything she says, you’re off the hook. The point is, you have to ask and throw the onus of responsibility back on her.”

  “Gotcha. Anything else?”

  “Spell out the fact that your employment is limited to this pickup and delivery, and terminates immediately upon your delivery of the package to her.”

  “Isn’t that obvious?”