by Craig Rice
“Everything,” Victor Budlong said. “And everything furnished!” He added, “Simple! Utilitarian! Tasteful!” He began to draw a long breath.
Bingo beat him to it with “Charming!”
“Well,” Victor Budlong said modestly, “I just wanted you to see it.” He led the way back to the reception room. “And the rental—” He paused. “As a matter of fact, the building is for sale. With the model agency’s long-term lease on the top floor, it would pay for itself. But since you’re planning to build—”
“We are,” Bingo said quickly. He thought he heard a soft sigh of, relief from Handsome.
“The rental is absurdly low,” Victor Budlong said. “Twelve hundred a month. And while you’re building—” He paused again, to prove he was no high-pressure salesman. “You’ll want to look around before you decide.” The next pause was longer, and meaningful. “But since I feel that the inadvertent use of my name has put you to a little difficulty—I think I can arrange to have it held for you—for an extremely small deposit.”
He clapped an almost paternal hand on Bingo’s shoulder. “We’ll talk it over back in my office, yes?” and led the way out.
Crossing the street on the way back, he walked a good distance ahead with Detective Hendenfelder, chatting idly, and giving his prospects a chance to talk things over.
There wasn’t time, Bingo thought, to explain to Handsome all that was in his mind. He said, “Handsome—”
“Everything’s going to be all right,” Handsome said. “That girl probably wears glasses.”
Bingo blinked. “You saw her too?” Obviously Handsome had seen her too, he reminded himself. He wondered if Detective Hendenfelder had. “How do you know she probably wears glasses?”
Handsome said seriously, “Because, Bingo, girls with that color skin and that color hair, natural, always have bad eyesight. If they have brown eyes, I mean.” He added, “They usually get fat easy, too, and freckle. I read about it in a magazine article once. Of course, I couldn’t see the color eyes she had. The article said—”
But they were in through the entrance of BUDLONG AND DOLLINGER before Handsome could go into more details.
“While we wait,” Victor Budlong said, with that warm cordiality, “shall we be comfortable in my private office? And talk over the possibilities of that little office suite?”
Victor Budlong’s private office was not small, nor was it simple, but Bingo decided it must be tasteful. Handsome gazed around with a puzzled and faintly reminiscent look, and finally said, “I been here before.”
Victor Budlong chuckled happily. “So you think, so you think. This is a small-scale, but almost exact, replica of the Mayor’s office in New York’s City Hall.” He smiled proudly and said, “Just a little foible of mine.”
Hendenfelder spoke up unexpectedly and said, “This is Hollywood. Everybody’s got to have some foibles.”
Bingo wondered suddenly, and uncomfortably, where Perroni was, and what he was doing.
“How right you are,” Victor Budlong said, offering more cigarettes. “Now that little suite of offices—”
The extremely small deposit turned out to be a mere two hundred dollars. The advantages were manifest and obvious. Bingo hesitated only a minute or two, keeping his eyes resolutely away from Handsome.
Drawing up the papers, turning over the money, and affixing signatures was also a matter of minutes.
“At least this time,” Victor Budlong said, handing over the receipt, “you’re dealing with a genuine Budlong.”
Bingo managed to pretend that he, too, thought that was very funny.
“And if you’d like to use the offices temporarily between now and when you move in permanently,” Victor Budlong said, “my girl here has a set of keys. And if you’d like to have a design drawn up for your firm name on the building, there’s an artist I can heartily recommend. He did ours.”
Bingo mentally measured the size of the little nearly Colonial building as a background for the name International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, and decided that they would not need just an artist, but a genius. Possibly an engineering genius. But that was a detail to be worked out in its own time.
“Oh yes,” Victor Budlong said, as though he’d just remembered. “My daughter’s picture!” He pulled an oversize glossy print from his desk drawer and handed it to Bingo.
“Janesse is a talented girl,” he said, spelling out the name, and adding, “Numerology. Her mother’s idea, not mine. Could be changed, of course. Real talent. Not just a father’s prejudice, either.” Proudly.
Janesse Budlong’s black and white picture showed a delicate and almost lovely face, perhaps a little too thin, slightly parted lips curving in a delicious smile, large and incredibly soulful eyes, and a lot of glossy hair which tumbled over her shoulders, one of them invitingly bare.
“I can see she’s talented,” Bingo said admiringly. “And beautiful.” He meant that, too.
Handsome looked at the picture thoughtfully and critically. He said at last, “It’s hard to tell much from pictures. Even if you take pictures yourself, I mean. You have to see a person in person.”
“Exactly,” Bingo said, quickly taking the picture from Handsome and returning it. “We’d certainly like to meet the young lady, when we get settled and going.”
Victor Budlong looked pleased almost to the purring point, and said, “Well! I’m sure that can be arranged!”
Herbert Reddy from the trust company arrived at that moment, with Perroni a few steps behind him. He was a short, chubby, breathless little man, baldheaded and with a round, pink, bewildered face, who looked as though he might bounce like a rubber ball. He wasn’t bouncing now, though. He looked at Bingo, at Handsome, at Victor Budlong, at the papers in his hand, and finally said, “This is very confusing.”
“There’s nothing confusing about it,” Perroni said sourly. “These guys got took, that’s all.”
“But look—” little Herbert Reddy began anxiously.
Perroni waved him aside. “I been on the phone. Bunco squad has a make on this artist. Description fits. Small-time artist, works mostly on widows. Usually oil stocks. Uses the name Chester Baxter.”
“Courtney Budlong,” Bingo said, trying to sound firm. He began thinking of the initialed cuff links and tie pin.
“Same fella,” Perroni said. “It checks.”
Bingo found himself about to say, “Courtney Budlong,” again. Instead he said, wildly and unthinkingly, “The furniture.”
“What furniture?” Perroni said.
Bingo heard himself talking about the furniture that was in storage and that was to be delivered immediately, the antiques, all beautiful stuff, the paintings, the boxes of linen and silver. He heard his voice fading away.
“There isn’t any furniture,” Perroni said scornfully. “Lattimer’s widow sold every stick of it except those pieces of junk in the living room and the housekeeper’s room. When she found out we were on to her and the whole deal, and might find his body any day, she sold everything she could lay her hands on before she beat it. Isn’t that right?”
“That’s right,” Hendenfelder said. He looked sympathetic about it.
“There isn’t any Courtney Budlong,” Perroni said. “There never was any Courtney Budlong any more than there was any furniture. You got took, that’s all.” He seemed to be glad of it.
Victor Budlong, the genuine Budlong, took a hand. He said smoothly, “Coming from New York, where everyone rents, naturally you wouldn’t know the complications of real estate transactions.” He gave a brief and bewildering lecture about contracts, escrow, payments, first and second mortgages, title search and other details.
“Maybe,” Bingo said, “we’d better go back to the big city, where a guy is safe!”
“This is all very interesting,” Herbert Reddy said stiffly, in a high-pitched, almost squeaky voice. “But you’re overlooking the important feature. Mr. Julien Lattimer’s signature.”
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“Mr. Julien Lattimer,” Perroni stated flatly, “was murdered by his wife nearly five years ago.”
“Mr. Julien Lattimer’s signature,” Herbert Reddy said, “is on both those papers. Or maybe you think they were signed by his ghost?”
eight
“All right,” Perroni said. “All right! I admit the signatures look alike.”
“I’m not a professional handwriting expert,” Mr. Reddy said, “but I say they’re written by the same hand.”
Everybody, including Victor Budlong’s middle-aged and dignified secretary, had looked curiously at the signatures on the papers Bingo had been given, and at the undisputed Julien Lattimer signatures Mr. Reddy had brought with him for comparison purposes. Everyone had agreed that yes, they did look very much alike. Including Perroni.
“I guess I looked at his signature enough times to remember it,” Perroni said, looking as though the sorrows of the universe had accumulated on his narrow shoulders. “When the question arose of whether or not his widow might’ve forged his name to some checks before she took off, which it turned out she had done, and not too skillfully, either.”
“Skillful enough to fool a few people,” Mr. Reddy said coldly.
Hendenfelder threw everything into renewed confusion by suggesting that Mrs. Lattimer, whether wife or widow, had forged these particular signatures.
“These,” Mr. Reddy said, “are not forged.”
Victor Budlong helpfully pointed out that obviously it was time to refer the signatures in question to a handwriting expert. Los Angeles, he reminded them, had the best handwriting expert in the world.
“Me’n’ Hendenfelder’ll take these downtown to him,” Perroni said. “That way there won’t be no argument anywhere.”
Mr. Reddy announced in a determined voice that he was going right along as trustee for Mr. Lattimer’s estate, somehow managing to convey by his tone of voice that Mr. Lattimer was not only alive but probably in the best of health. “In the meantime,” he said, “the house—”
Everybody looked at everybody else a little helplessly.
“And the keys to the house—” he went on.
Everybody looked at Bingo.
“Mr. Budlong gave them to me,” Bingo said, in what he was afraid was a very weak voice. He took them out of his pocket. “I mean, Mr. Courtney Budlong.” He could feel his voice growing weaker. The keys still warmed his hand, though. If necessary, he’d fight anyone in the room, maybe in all Beverly Hills, for their possession.
“Mr. Courtney Budlong,” Perroni said, and snorted rudely.
“The man who called himself Courtney Budlong,” Bingo said. His fingers tightened on the keys.
“But where did he get them?” Hendenfelder asked suddenly.
This time everybody looked at Mr. Reddy. Mr. Reddy, in his turn, looked at the keys in Bingo’s hand and said unhappily, “I don’t know. He must have gotten them from someone.”
“From, for example, who?” Perroni asked.
Mr. Reddy spread his hands helplessly. “There were a few sets. I have one. The trust company had it made. Mr. Lattimer and Mrs. Lattimer had keys. And the caretaker. This Pearl Durzy.” His face lighted up. “They could have been gotten from her!”
Bingo thought of the look Pearl Durzy had given their Mr. Courtney Budlong. He thought of the fact that she’d had nothing in her possession except a few bus tokens. He decided to keep his mouth shut, slipped the keys unobtrusively into his pocket, and hoped someone would change the subject right away.
Someone did. Mr. Reddy said, “While we’re asking questions, I’d like to know how that letter, and that receipt, were on Budlong and Dollinger paper?”
Everybody looked this time at Victor Budlong, who came within an inch of his life of losing his composure, his dignity and his voice, but who managed to state that he had absolutely no idea, that he’d had no part in this disgraceful piece of chicanery, that he was a businessman of long and good standing in his community and a member of the Chamber of Commerce, and that he would ask Miss Meadows.
Miss Meadows stated efficiently that as far as she knew, it was impossible for anybody to get hold of any Budlong and Dollinger stationery or receipts, but she would make inquiries.
Suddenly Bingo said, “Look, yesterday Mr. Courtney Budlong came in here. We waited for him out in the car. He was in here just a little while, and then he came out with these papers. Maybe you’d better make those inquiries right now.”
The slightly alarmed young receptionist was called in. Yes, she remembered the man who answered the description of Courtney Budlong. He’d come in yesterday and spent some time trying to sell her a magazine subscription, and then gone out again. But he hadn’t been near any of the office stationery or anything else.
There didn’t seem to be any more questions from anybody. Finally Bingo got all his courage together, looked Mr. Reddy in the eye, and said, “Well—?”
“It’s an unprecedented situation,” Mr. Reddy said. Then he repeated, “This is very confusing.” He not only looked as though he wouldn’t bounce, he looked as though he’d been deflated.
“Confusing,” Victor Budlong said, in his beautiful, sonorous tones, “but not impossible. I am not a lawyer. But I would say that if these two signatures are genuine, the gentlemen are at least temporarily entitled to live in the house in question.”
He read the letter aloud. “It states very clearly,” he said, “that having paid the sum of two thousand dollars—no mention of to whom—they are entitled to occupy the mansion pending delivery and signing of the deed—”
“But this guy who called himself Courtney Budlong didn’t have any authority,” Perroni said.
“If that is Julien Lattimer’s signature,” Victor Budlong said, “it doesn’t matter whether he did or not.” There was a silence while everybody thought that over.
“I don’t want to see any trouble, or any suits against the estate,” Mr. Reddy said, in a thin, worried little voice. “And there ought to be somebody staying there, now that Pearl Durzy—” He looked at Bingo and Handsome a little dubiously.
“I’ll vouch for these young men,” Victor Budlong said heartily. “They’re businessmen. Just rented an office, in fact. Important men in the Industry.”
Everybody looked impressed, except Perroni.
“All right,” Perroni said, back to his normal gloom. “Only don’t you guys go shooting your traps off to the columnists.”
Bingo upped his eyebrows at him.
“In this town,” Perroni said, “anything happens to anybody, even the old cat having kittens, they got to run right to the phone and call up the columnists. You guys keep this out of the newspapers. Until we find Mr. Lattimer’s body.”
Bingo suddenly remembered Adelle Lattimer and reflected that he was just as interested as anybody in finding Julien Lattimer’s body. He said, with all the dignity he could muster, “I’m sure nobody wants to see any of this get into the newspapers.” He wondered if he sounded anything like Victor Budlong.
Perroni looked skeptical, but he nodded glumly. “We kept that dame’s death quiet, so far.”
Hendenfelder softened things by adding, “And if none of this gets into print, maybe we can catch that guy and get your two thousand bucks back.”
He didn’t say it with conviction, and Bingo didn’t feel any real hope, but at least it was the brightest thought of the day so far.
Apparently everything was over, at least for a time. Victor Budlong wished them a cheery good morning, told Bingo and Handsome he’d be in touch with them soon and arrange a meeting with his little girl, and that meantime if they needed anything, call on him. Miss Meadows smiled at them amiably. Mr. Reddy shook hands nervously and said he would talk to them later. Perroni went to make one more telephone call.
Hendenfelder came over to the convertible and leaned an elbow on the door. “By Perroni,” he said, “Julien Lattimer’s murdered, and his wife murdered him. Probably right. But Perroni isn’t going to be happy
until he finds the body. He don’t care so much about finding the wife, he just wants to find the body. And he’ll do it, too.” He sighed. “That’s the way he is because, well, that’s the way he is.”
“Hollywood,” Bingo said. “Everybody’s got foibles.”
“Even cops,” Hendenfelder said. He went on in a confidential tone, “My advice is, what you guys oughta do is get yourself a lawyer right fast. I don’t know much of that kind of law, but it sounded to me like you maybe own that house after all. Enough of it so you ought to have a lawyer. Everybody ought to have a lawyer all the time anyway. Especially out here in Hollywood. I come from Milwaukee, myself. Believe me, out here, people are different.”
“They have foibles,” Bingo said, nodding sagely.
“And you can repeat that any time,” Hendenfelder said. He dropped his voice. “Say, I know it’s been a long time since she was there, but you living in what was her house, you think maybe you might run into, sometime, some souvenir of April Robin?”
Bingo thought it was just possible.
“Account of,” Hendenfelder said, “I got a niece back in Milwaukee she collects stuff like that. Some real genuine souvenir of April Robin, why her Uncle Horace, he’d be a hero!”
“I’ll make it a point to look,” Bingo promised. He looked at Detective Horace Hendenfelder’s pink round face, and thought how nice it would be for him to be a hero, even if only to a movie-struck niece in Milwaukee.
“I’ll do something for you someday,” Hendenfelder said gratefully. “And don’t forget now, get you a lawyer fast!”
Perroni came out from his telephone call, walked over to the convertible and said grudgingly, “If we ever do find that guy, and if he has any of your dough left, you’ll get it back.”
Bingo thought that would be very nice, and said so.
“And if while you’re staying in that house,” Perroni said, “if you run into any helpful information, will you get in touch with me right away?” He said it as though he didn’t expect much.
