This Girl for Hire Read online

  “What?”

  “Close up your office for a couple of weeks. Go to Hollywood and get a job.”

  “What for?” I demanded.

  Fred chewed on some soggy potato chips, then shoved the plate away. “You want to find Nelson’s murderer, don’t you?”

  “Of course—”

  “What do you measure, Honey?”

  “What?”

  “What do you measure?”

  “Where?”

  He smiled, got up and with the aid of his cane, circled my chair. “Everywhere,” he said pointedly.

  “What’s that got to do—”

  “Answer my question!” he barked stubbornly.

  I groaned. “38-22-36. Five feet five. One hundred and twenty pounds. Normal childhood diseases. No dimples. Small birthmark on inside of right thigh. Parents both dead. No known living relatives.” I stood up and snapped him a salute. “Anything else, General?”

  “Yeah, can you act?”

  “Of course not I’ve never been on a stage in my life.”

  “That doesn’t matter. With your taffy-colored hair, blue eyes and baby-bottom complexion, you ought to set Hollywood on fire with your looks alone.”

  “Thanks, pal,” I said, “but who would hire me? There must be a thousand real-live dolls living in Hollywood and starving. It’s a great idea. Sure, if I could get into the studios through the actor’s entrance instead of through the private eye’s keyhole, I’d probably land something fast. But without experience I wouldn’t get past the casting desk.”

  Fred wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Yeah, ‘I guess you’re right. Well, it was a good idea while it lasted. Would have made a great story. Terrific headline. Succulent Shamus Shucks Stiletto for Stardom.”

  “Very funny.”

  We started back toward town, Fred’s metal-tipped cane cracking hollowly on the cement. Thoughts about Herb Nelson’s blowup at Television Riviera drummed the same rhythmic cadence in my head. Was the killer affiliated with Bob Swanson’s TV show? Was he the director, the producer, the cameraman?”

  Sunlight broke through brightening the dull sky as Fred turned off down Ocean Avenue. He grinned, threw me a kiss and vanished in the mid-day crowd.

  I continued on to my building, climbed the two flights of stairs and tried the doorknob. It wouldn’t budge. The office door was never locked during the day, but apparently I’d been careless this time and snapped the latch on my way out to see Fred.

  I rummaged futilely in my bag for the key. Then, recalling that one of my office windows opened onto the fire escape, I went downstairs, around to the alley and climbed up the metal staircase to the third floor.

  The window was open just wide enough for me to squeeze through on my stomach.

  When I got inside and turned around, the cold ugly snout of a gun was pressed squarely between my eyes.

  Looking up the barrel of a loaded revolver is an experience not many people have the opportunity to put into words. For a long instant I was speechless.

  Then I managed to say something which didn’t make any sense at all, except that it was the truth. “I—haven’t paid my insurance premium this month.”

  “What do you want?” a male voice snapped.

  “I might ask you the same question. This is my office.”

  “Your—” the voice stopped. What are you talking about? This is H. West’s office. He’s a private detective.”

  “He was,” I said, “until somebody did what you look as if you’re planning to do.”

  “You mean there is no H. West? He’s dead?”

  “That’s right,” I said. “I’m his daughter. The name’s Honey. I’m running the business now.”

  The revolver lifted up, and the hand that was holding it tossed the weapon on my desk. I focused in on a short dark mustache, a large hooked nose and a pair of black horn-rimmed glasses. “I—I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know. I thought you were somebody else.”

  “Who were you expecting?” I asked, trying to shake off the tingle in my spine.

  “Bob Swanson. He’s trying to kill me.”

  “Bob Swanson? The TV actor?”

  The man with the mustache had curly black hair and he ran his fingers through it nervously. “Yeah, the very same. My name’s Aces—Sam Aces. I produce his show.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I—I need help. No kidding. Somebody followed me from L.A. Even came into this building. That’s why I locked the door. I figured when H. West came back he’d use a key. Then you appeared at the window and I got all shook up, grabbed the gun and—”

  “Why do you think Swanson wants to kill you?”

  Aces nervously lit two cigarettes and handed me one of them. “He’d like to get me out and produce the show himself.”

  “There must be an easier way!” I said suspiciously.

  “I own the rights to the show. Besides, I got a long-term contract with WBS-TV. He couldn’t budge me any other way. He’s tried to poison me twice.”

  I drew a mental picture of the TV star, Bob Swanson. He was the athletic type with a round boyish face and muscular arms. “I’ve watched him on television,” I said. “He doesn’t strike me as the poison type. A golf club in a dark alley, maybe. He could always say he was having a couple of practice shots and didn’t see you.”

  Aces blew a few smoke rings. Then he said, “Two weeks ago I was working late in Studio Sixteen. I thought everyone had gone home hours before. Suddenly old B.S. came staggering in out of nowhere with a couple of drinks in his chubby little fists. He said he’d been around the corner at a bar called the Golden Slipper lapping up a few when he thought about poor old Sammy back at the studio. He handed me a drink. It was a screwdriver. That’s all I ever drink. Anything with orange juice. So I faked a healthy swallow and sent him on his merry way. The next morning I had the contents of that glass analized. It was loaded with four grains of white arsenic.”

  “Did this report reach the police?” I demanded.

  “Yes,” Aces said quickly. “Naturally I didn’t cooperate when I learned Max Decker, the owner of WBS-TV, had been with Swanson when that drink was ordered.”

  “You don’t think Decker—?”

  “I don’t know,” Aces said, stubbing out his cigarette. “Max has never been fond of me. So you can see what would have happened if I’d spilled my story to the police. They’d have brought Decker in, too. Max wouldn’t like that sort of thing. If I couldn’t have proved absolutely it was Swanson who loaded that drink—long-time con tract or not—Decker and B.S. would have killed me in the TV field.”

  “You would have been killed, period, if you’d downed that screwdriver,” I said.

  “Yeah, I know, and that’s what brings me here. Last night we did a live Swanson show themed around a bathing-beauty contest. The winner was supposed to be signed to a six-week contract. But we couldn’t get together on the choice. Before the show we held the judging in Decker’s office. Max liked one, B.S. liked another and me, well, hell, I didn’t really care just so we got the show on the road. I got pretty nervous so I went downstairs to a little juice bar on the first floor. I ordered my usual when B.S. suddenly appeared. We got into an argument about the judging and I guess I wasn’t watching him too closely. Next thing I knew he’d gone back up to the studio, leaving me with the ultimatum that if I didn’t bring a winner up in five minutes he’d person ally knock my brains out. So I gulped down the orange juice and rushed upstairs. I folded up right in the middle of Decker’s office.”

  I said, “You figure Swanson slipped something in your drink during the argument?”

  “That’s what I don’t know. Ann Claypool, one of the bathing-beauty contestants, grabbed a glass of milk and forced some down my throat. I was sick as a dog for a few minutes, then I felt fine.”

  “Did you feel stomach pains after drinking the orange juice?”

  “I felt something,” Aces said, “but I don’t know whether it was really pa
in or just in my mind.”

  “But the milk,” I said. “It caused a reaction.”

  “I’m allergic to milk. It makes me deathly ill.”

  “Did you know Herb Nelson?” I asked.

  “Sure,” he said, growing solemn. “I was a good friend to Herb Nelson. We worked together years ago when I was producing at Metro. In fact, I was the guy who dug up the script that won him an Academy Award.”

  “What caused the argument last month when Herb tore up the studio at Television Riviera?”

  Aces didn’t hesitate. “Swanson, as usual. I hired Herb for a bit part—an old broken-down comedian. He needed work bad and was drinking pretty heavy. Well, old B.S. bitched when he saw what a tremendous actor Herb was. He criticized Herb, changed his part, made a fool out of him. Herb finally blew his top. He told old B.S. off and then started wrecking the set. We had to call the cops.”

  “How did Swanson feel after they took Nelson away?”

  “Mad as a hornet. Herb hit Swanson with a flood lamp and really floored him.”

  “Who do you think killed Nelson?”

  Aces said, “Who do you think I think? Herb was a nice guy. Only a maniac would do something like that.”

  “Have you ever had any maniacal moments, Mr. Aces?”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “You were present when the fireworks started. Are you sure Herb Nelson didn’t say anything derogatory about you?”

  “Of course not!” His deep eyes rolled angrily. “Say, what is this? I came here to hire someone to help me, not to be accused of harming one of my oldest friends.”

  Sam Aces appeared to be about fifty. He was tall and gangly with an ambling body that seemed plucked out of some animated cartoon about comical dizzy-eyed giraffes. Despite his poor features, he had a look of warmth and sincerity. He was the kind of person you somehow wanted to like.

  “You’re perfect,” he said after a moment “B.S. is crazy about beautiful dames—especially blondes. Will you work for me?”

  “That all depends on what kind of work you want done,” I said.

  “This afternoon I want you to go see Swanson at Tele vision Riviera. We still haven’t picked a winner in our beauty contest. Ten to one he’ll go for you. All I have to do is second the motion and you’ll be in. You’ve got to be around when we go on location. He’s going to get me, I know he is—unless—”

  “But, wait a minute, Mr. Aces—”

  “Call me Sam, baby.”

  “Look, Sam,” I protested, “this six-week contract—you know I’m not an actress.”

  “Who cares? With your face and figure—”

  “But I can’t learn lines—”

  “Lines?” Aces said. “Who learns lines in television? This is the modern age, Honey. We’ve got little men who do nothing all day but type scripts into big letters on machines. Acting’s a cinch. Ask Swanson. He spends two days on the golf course, two days drunk and two days in bed. On the seventh day, he condescends to stand in front of a camera, read from the carding device and look at women with shapely navels.” He shrugged his lanky frame. “What do you say? If I go to the police, the publicity will kill me dead. You’re the only one who can really help me now. I don’t want to windup like Herb Nelson in an adjoining grave.”

  I scanned his face for a hint of phony melodramatics, but it revealed nothing but despair. His jaw sagged slightly.

  “All right,” I said. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  We shook hands. Mentally, I considered the possibility of Sam Aces having killed Herb Nelson, then quickly discarded the idea. He seemed honestly afraid. It was the same kind of fear I’d seen in Herb Nelson’s eyes the week before his death. As Aces filled out information forms, I kept wanting to tell him I couldn’t guarantee his staying out of a six-foot hole. But I never got the words out, because that’s exactly where I pictured him. I don’t know why, except at that moment Sam Aces’ slouched, dejected shoulders and unhappy drawn face gave him the look of a man who was about to die.

  THREE

  AT FOUR O’CLOCK THAT AFTERNOON I STOOD IN THE center of one of Television Riviera’s mammoth sound stages wear ing a skin-tight bathing suit. Max Decker, a ponderous bear of a man, sat on two wooden chairs, chewing on a black cigar and squinting under thick brows at my torso. Bob Swanson stood a few feet away, flexing his muscles and undressing me with his eyes.

  Sam Aces was in a glass-faced monitor booth above the stage floor. His voice suddenly boomed out over a speaker, “Well, what do you think of her?”

  Decker grunted, got a new grip on his cigar and continued to peer at me. Bob Swanson glanced at the booth. “You may be a lousy producer, Sam, but you can sure pick the girls. I vote yes. Can she act?”

  “Of course,” Aces lied.

  “Okay,” Swanson said. “What do you say, Max?”

  Apparently Decker liked looking at females wearing bathing suits, but couldn’t cope with the emotional problem that went with it. “Damn you, Sam!” he barked. “You had to go think up this crazy contest idea, then you went and filled up my office with a lot of fat female fannies, now you come up with a dame who’s got more dangerous curves than Indianapolis Speedway and who makes me feel like an H-Bomb about to be triggered. Get her out of here!”

  “But, Max!” Swanson protested. “I want this girl.”

  “Well, have her!” Decker blared back. “Just get her out of my sight. And keep her out of bathing suits!”

  I changed my clothes, signed a six-week contract at four hundred a week, then left with Sam Aces.

  “What’s wrong with Decker?” I asked.

  Aces grinned. “High blood pressure. I don’t blame him for getting mad. You must have raised his reading at least twenty degrees.”

  “What about Swanson? I thought he was going to hang around for the contract-signing business?”

  “Honey,” Aces said patiently, “there’s one thing you’ll learn about Swanson. The minute the sun goes down he heads for the nearest bar.”

  “And where would that be?”

  “Just around the corner. You know, the place I told you about. The Golden Slipper.”

  I said good night to Sam, warned him to stay away from orange juice and then walked to the Golden Slipper. It was a ritzy little place with an ornate front and a bar that was as dark as the bottom of the River Styx. I signalled the bartender and ordered a martini. Two seconds later I was joined by the Golden Boy himself, flexing and snorting.

  “Hello, baby,” Swanson laughed drunkenly. “I hardly recognized you in clothes.”

  I smiled half-heartedly. “Thanks for the contract, Mr. Swanson.”

  “Don’t thank me. Thank Sam Aces, the miserable bastard. He brought you in.”

  “You don’t like Mr. Aces?”

  “That’s exactly right, sweetie. In fact, I hate his guts.” He took a big gulp of his drink and leaned against the bar for support.

  “I don’t see how you could feel like that,” I said. “He seems like such a nice guy.”

  Swanson bit hard on his teeth, scowling angrily. “Why that dirty son-of-a—” He stopped, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. “What’s it to you?” He banged for another drink. “You make a lot of observations for a blonde walk-on with no talent but plenty of chest muscle. What’s your name?”

  “Honey West.”

  “Where’d you get that handle, in burlesque?”

  “It’s on my birth certificate, Mr. Swanson. No middle name. I was never in burlesque.”

  He gave me a knowing look. “Baby, you really missed you’re calling.”

  “Now you’re making the observations, Mr. Swanson. Why don’t you like Sam Aces?”

  “You writing a book?”

  “Maybe.”

  Television star, Bob Swanson, winner of last year’s award for best male performer, slugged down his fresh drink, wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand and grinned drunkenly. “Okay, put this in your first chapter, baby. You ever hear of an actor named
Herb Nelson?”

  “Sure—”

  “He’s dead,” Swanson interrupted. “Murdered. You must have read about it in the papers. You want to know who did it? Sam Aces, that’s who. And he’s going to kill me next. You understand? That is, if I don’t get him first!”

  “Those are pretty strong words, Mr. Swanson,” I said. “Why would Sam Aces want to kill Herb Nelson?”

  “I don’t know.” He answered quickly as if he knew but didn’t want to put it into words.

  “Second chapter,” I said, staring at my martini. “Why do you think he wants to kill you?”

  “Power. I got too much power and Aces doesn’t like it. There’d be no show without me. Aces can’t stand it. He’d like to blow my brains out.”

  Bob Swanson talked exactly like the frustrated guy he was supposed to be. Prior to Herb Nelson’s death I’d spent several hours digging into the muscle man’s notoriously unspectacular past. He had migrated to TV from motion pictures after a sporadic career as a temperamental child star and an even more-impossible-to-work with postwar jungle hero. From that point it had been a series of breaks which had sprung him into the choice situation comedy series about a bachelor-writer who mixed verbs, consonants and beautiful women.

  These criss-cross accusations were puzzling. Sam Aces and Golden Boy suspected each other of murdering Herb Nelson and of plotting the same end for each other. I was more inclined to believe my client’s story. A phone call earlier to Daws, Inc., a pharmaceutical lab in Beverly Hills, had verified the presence of arsenic in Aces’ drink. L.A. police had backed this up with an official re port listing the incident as “closed due to insufficient cooperation.”

  “Third chapter,” I said.

  “Third chapter,” Swanson said, grinning slyly, “is where beautiful blonde with gorgeous blue eyes throws her book out and agrees to accompany handsome young television star on a tour of the night spots. Come on!”