Authors: Michael Mayo
I unlocked my room and found a note that had been slipped under the door. It was from the front desk and said that they were holding a package for me. I hung up my hat and went to the lobby.
Tommy, the nightman, was behind the counter. When he saw it was me, he went right back to the office and came back with a thick envelope from the Pierre that was Scotch-taped shut.
He handed it across and said, “So you've got friends who stay at the Pierre. My, my, I'm impressed.” Tommy was never happier than when he was weaseling gossip out of somebody.
“You'd be even more impressed if you knew who she was.”
“I'm all ears.”
I was about to tell him to shove off but had another idea. “Okay,” I said, “I'll trade a name for information. What do you know about the guy in 624?”
Tommy leaned across the desk to get closer and cut his eyes both ways like he was making sure nobody would hear us, even though the lobby was empty, and lowered his voice. “Isn't their apartment the most astonishing thing you've ever seen in your life? My word, I was simply agog the first time I laid eyes on it. They are certainly the most colorful and exotic residents we have, if you take my meaning. He's a Turk and she's his concubine. They occasionally invite other bon vivants over to join them for an evening or a night.”
He smiled at that, and I figured that Tommy and Saxon Dunbar were sisters under the skin. Both of them loved to talk about people doing the dirtiest things they could imagine.
“And now,” Tommy said, his eyes bright, “I understand that you and Miss Nix have joined their little consortium.” I wasn't sure what
consortium
meant, but he made it sound illegal.
“But of course”âhe acted like he was turning a key in front of his mouthâ“my lips are sealed. Now, who sends you such an intriguing little bundle from the Pierre?”
I tucked the bundle into my coat pocket. “King Kong's costar.”
He didn't believe me.
Back in my room, I loosened my tie, took off my shoes and brace, and poured a short brandy. There was a nice thick stack of bills inside the envelope and two pages of hotel stationery.
Mr. Quinn:
I write this in haste as Fay and I must leave early tomorrow morning. Now that everyone realizes how important the picture is going to be, more elaborate preparations are being made for the Hollywood premiere. Mr. Cooper has actually chartered an airplane just for the two of us!
Even so, Fay is concerned that Messrs. Grossner and Sleave may not live up to their end of the agreement they made now that the matter is settled. So she spoke to the concierge who was so helpful in arranging your expense money. He said it was more difficult on account of the bank holiday, but he managed to find your ten percent for us, even if it took all day. So, here is the $600 they agreed upon, and a small bonus. Again, we thank you for your efforts.
Hazel
Miss Wray wrote the second page.
Jimmy,
Thank you so much for your help. Since you know John, even if it is only as a customer, you understand that he is sensitive to anything that concerns his wife. If he were to learn of the details of this matter, he would be devastated. I'm sure I can rely on your continued discretion.
Your devoted friend,
Fay
At first I thought she was taking a lot for granted about my continued discretion since she really didn't know me. But then I thought,
The hell she doesn't. She knows me. She had my number from the first night she walked into my place
. She knew that pretty women get a lot of favors done for them, and pretty actresses get even more. Particularly from the guys who go to their pictures. So, no, I wouldn't be talking to Saxon Dunbar or Tommy or anybody else about her. Yeah, she knew that.
I finished the brandy and counted the money. It came to $617. So, a seventeen-dollar bonus. It was all I could do to keep from clicking my heels.
I sat back in my chair and went over everything that had happened for the past three days. I guess I should've told Miss Wray and the RKO lawyers about Bobby's
Kong
movie, but they paid me to take care of the guys with the book, and I did that. Then Miss Wray wanted to know about Nola Revere, and I almost did that too, if Nola really had talked to Bobby. But now it sounded like Miss Wray didn't care about that. At least, it wasn't keeping her from leaving.
If I went back to Grossner and Sleave and told them about the other
Kong
, it would probably screw things up for Bobby, and I didn't see any way that I could use it to get more money from them.
So that left the goat, the damn goat. Bobby said he didn't have anything to do with Trodache, and it looked like that was the truth. But there was something going on between Trodache and Wilcox, and the goat was part of it. Was it any of my business? I tried to convince myself that it wasn't, and that I was finished with it and Miss Wray.
Yeah, sure. And I had nothing to fear but fear itself.
Chapter Twenty
-
Two
“Where's Connie? What did you do to her?”
That's the first thing Marie Therese said to me Sunday afternoon. She looked pissed off. I had just sat down at my table in the back with about half a dozen daily papers. I didn't know what she was talking about and said so.
“She called right before you got here and told me she was taking the day off. She's
never
done that before. What did you do to her?”
I told her I didn't do anything. Just a few minutes before, I went up to Connie's room on my way out of the Chelsea, knocked on her door, and she didn't answer. Nothing unusual about that. I was a little late and figured she already left. I expected to see her at the speak, and at first, I didn't know what to think about her not being there.
Marie Therese said, “She said she knew it was going to be a slow night and we wouldn't really need her, so she was going to do something else.”
“She said that? She said she was going to do something else?” I didn't like that.
“More or less. I don't remember her exact words, but that's what she meant. What did you do last night?”
“This is nuts,” I said. “I don't know what the hell you're talking about. If she don't want to work, she don't want to work.” And I opened the paper like that was the end of it. I didn't fool her. She went back behind the bar. I sat there and worried.
At first, I told myself it was nothing. I wouldn't even think about it at all. That didn't last long. Then I decided Connie was just trying to make me mad. But I couldn't buy that either. Maybe she was hurt. No, she would call Marie Therese. Maybe it had something to do with Bobby. No, I wasn't going to think about that. When I realized that I didn't understand the words I was looking at in the paper, I told Frenchy I'd be back soon and went back to the Chelsea.
I got Connie's key from the front desk. Since everybody on the staff knew I was paying for the room, that was okay. As I unlocked the door, I had a bad feeling that I'd find her stuff packed up and gone. But no, the room looked like it always did.
Her place was smaller and neater than mine. Besides the bed, she had a chest of drawers, a wardrobe, and two armchairs. There was only one chair when she took the room, but I bought her another one that was more comfortable. We also got her a good lamp, and the bedside table was stacked with books. The bathroom was sweet with the smell of her perfume and soaps and such. Her makeup and stuff was still there, and she had left underwear and stockings hanging over the bathtub.
I looked over the top of the dresser where she always put her purse, hoping to find the card Bobby left the night before. It wasn't there. I was tempted to go through the drawers but didn't.
I was about to leave when I remembered something Bobby said the first night we were in his place, after he'd been giving her the eye. “Dress her up right and she could do very well for herself, a lot more if she was interested in it.”
Then I thought about this one dress she had. I thought of it as pale orange, but she told me it was called apricot. She bought it with one of her first pay envelopes, and it was a knockout. I checked the wardrobe. It wasn't there.
I went up to the sixth floor and knocked on both of Bobby's doors. No answer. I went back to the speak.
I took the papers up to my office, and for about an hour I tried to read again but couldn't because I kept thinking about Bobby, and Connie, and what Arch had said, and Daphne, and King Kong, and Miss Wray and her husband, and where was Connie? Looking back on it now, I must have gone a little crazy. That would explain what I did, anyway.
I checked the load in the Banker's Special, put on my topcoat, and caught a cab downtown to Grand Street. On a Sunday, it was busier in Chinatown than my neighborhood, but the streets weren't as crowded as they'd been yesterday. It didn't take me long to find the open air market.
I went to the back, just like we did the day before. Another Chinaman in a black suit leaned against the door. He was smoking a cigarette and paid no attention as I limped up on my stick. There was nobody else close, so I got right in front of him and punched him in the gut three times as hard and fast as I could with the knucks. He doubled over. I propped him up with my shoulder, reached around him, and pushed the door open and shoved him into the alley. He was a tough bastard. He pushed away from me and went for a knife. Another shot to the head with the knucks put him facedown on the cobblestones.
That brought the second Chinaman running from the other door. I pulled the .38. He turned and ran before I could cock it.
I hurried up the alley and got into the apartment house. Figuring I didn't have a lot of time, I gimped up the dark stairs to the top floor. The door to the roof was heavy, but the strike plate wasn't. I braced myself on the stick and it only took two kicks with the sole of my foot to bang it open. I went straight to the peaked skylight and looked down into Bobby's studio.
It was cleared out. The big black hand was gone, and all the equipment, lights, and screens had been pushed against the walls. I hurried around all four sides of the skylight, leaning over it and looking down into the corners of the room. I was pretty sure I could see all of it, and there was enough light to see that nobody was inside.
I don't think I really expected to find Connie there. I don't know what I expected. Like I said, I was a little crazy.
I knew the Chinaman who ran away would be coming back with help, so I made my way down the stairs until I heard noises coming up from below. I opened a door on the second or third floor and got out of the stairwell. I figured another set of stairs led to the front of the building, and there they were, halfway down the hall. I heard noises from guys coming up those stairs, too, and went down them with the pistol in my mitt. Two Chinamen were waiting at the bottom. The vestibule wasn't wide enough for them spread out, so they backed out the front door giving me hard looks.
I followed them and pocketed the pistol. We came out on a noisy crowded sidewalk where the sound of angry women's voices cut through everything else. Four Chinese women were scolding the two guys. I saw that the women were in charge of a group of kids. They kept the kids in line with a long rope that had loops every few feet for the kids to hold onto. The women at the back end of the rope were giving the two guys hell for bumping into them. I fell in step with the kids and gimped along with them up the sidewalk.
I didn't know where I was, but it looked like we were headed for an intersection with a larger street and that was fine with me. It felt like everybody was looking at me, especially the kids. They probably were. I was the only white guy on the street. All the storefronts and signs were in Chinese. I listened for sounds of the two guys trying to catch me and didn't hear anything. Hell, I figured they didn't want me that bad. I just roughed up a guy and kicked down a door. It wasn't like I killed anybody. The bigger street was Doyers and when we got there, I looked back for the guys. It was getting dark then, and if anybody was still after me, I couldn't see him.
I got a cab back to the speak.
Before I could take off my hat, Marie Therese asked me if I'd found her. I thought about lying, saying why would I be looking for Connie, but she wouldn't buy it. So I said no and asked Marie Therese if she knew what was going on. “She's been mad at me for a week. What gives?”
“It's not my place,” she said. “Connie will tell you.”
“So you do know where she is.”
“I didn't say that,” she said.
“What's she doing? Is she all right?”
“I don't know. The damn fool girl,” she said, and for the first time, she looked more worried than angry.
In my office I thought about having a drink but wasn't really interested. Didn't feel like eating anything either. You see, I really was a little crazy. I was puzzling over what I should do when I remembered something Bobby said that first night up in his workroom. I opened the safe and got the picture book. The number on the back would tell me whose book it was, he said. And there on the back at the bottom in pencil was “1/144.” Now, I didn't know anything about books or art or collecting those things, but knowing what I did about Bobby's business, it figured that this copy of the book was the first of one hundred and forty-four. That meant it was the best of the bunch, better than the fifty-third or the seventy-fourth. And if it was the best, it must belong to Peter Wilcox.
No
, I thought,
it used to belong to Peter Wilcox. Now it belongs to me.
But the important thing was the book. That's what started all this. And Bobby made the book. He took the photographs. He printed the cover and the words on the page. He stapled the pages together. And he did all that up there in his workroom.
I locked the book in the safe and went back to the Chelsea.