This Girl for Hire Page 3

  He whisked me into his Cadillac convertible before I could argue. A quick thought struck me. If Bob Swanson had slipped arsenic into Aces’ drink, it was just possible he still might have some of the poison lying around. I wanted to have a look at his personal stationery too. Herb Nelson had said the threat note had been typed on bright orange bond with a giant letter “S” embossed in the corner.

  “Why waste time in a bunch of dingy bars?” I leaned against his shoulder. “Why not your place? I bet you even have a swimming pool!”

  His eyes lit up like a neon sign. “Have I got a swimming pool?” he roared. “This pool was designed especially for you, baby doll. Wait until you see it!”

  We zipped out to Beverly Hills in eleven minutes flat. Bob Swanson’s home was fantastically modern. It was so low-slung you had to duck to get through the front door. The house was a gigantic flat-roofed square with a swim ming pool in the center. There were no inside walls, only a few moveable partitions, and at each corner of the house there were elevated platforms. These were built much like television sound stages with arc lights in the ceiling and steps leading up. There was only one major difference. They were entirely carpeted with thick foam rubber. From each of them, things happening on any of the other stages could obviously been seen merely by looking over the low-slung, unwalled kitchen, the tremendous indoor swimming pool or the equally un walled bathrooms. Bob Swanson’s home was the most spectacular, and at the same time vulgar looking, place I’d ever seen.

  He pointed at the four raised stages. “The bedrooms,” he said casually. “This is a four bedroom home.”

  “But, no beds,” I observed. “Where do you sleep?”

  “What do you mean, no beds?” Swanson demanded. “Four of the biggest king-size hammocks in captivity. Twelve by twelve. A foot depth of the softest foam rubber you ever snuggled your lily-white rear into, I’ll bet!”

  “You sleep on the floor?”

  Golden Boy grinned. “Natch. Best place to sleep. No falling out of bed. Plenty of room to roam. No pillows. Just pull a blanket over you if it gets a little cold.”

  I looked at this guy and shook my head. “Did you design the place?”

  “Every last inch.”

  “You don’t like privacy, I take it?”

  “The hell with privacy,” Swanson said. “Notice! No permanent walls. A few partitions for those futile numbskulls who have to hide something that nobody gives a damn about seeing in the first place. You ever think about that? Nothing’s worth seeing if it’s ugly. The partitions are for the ugly ones. I get a few of those now and then.”

  He led me to the swimming pool. It was immense and shaped like the body of a very large-bosomed woman.

  “What are you, a nudist?” I asked.

  Golden Boy raised his eyebrows as if he smelled some thing foul. “Hell, no. Nobody is ever allowed in this pool in the nude. It contaminates the water. We have bathtubs for that sort of thing. Anyone who swims in this pool wears one of my special suits.”

  “What?”

  “Plastic,” he said, pulling one of the suits out of a poolside cabinet “The men wear plastic trunks and the women have plastic pants and bras.”

  I examined the two-piecer he handed to me. It was fantastic. And transparent. So transparent not even a mole could go undetected underneath. I wondered what kind of queer psychosis affected this man, but undoubtedly it had no conventional name. It was a perfect blend of nature and sanitation. Bob Swanson was what could have been called a natursanicotic. He was crazy about living in the raw, but wanted to keep the microbes caged while he was doing it.

  He asked me to go for a swim.

  “Let’s have a drink first,” I suggested quickly. “I’d like to look around the rest of the house.”

  “Sure, baby.” Then he laughed. He was still pretty drunk. “But don’t get lost”

  My return laugh didn’t feel right in my throat. I won dered who’d get the last laugh. If I couldn’t find some of that deadly white powder quick, Golden Boy was certain to have me in one of his peek-a-boo bathing suits. There was only one thing on my mind—arsenic. And only one thing on his mind—my chassis. I had to locate what I was after before his plans began to jell.

  Swanson switched on his hi-fi and the throbbing rhythm of Taboo filled the house. As casually as pos sible, I mamboed into the modern kitchen area. The all-electric stove, oven, roaster and charcoal broiler were housed in a long, low-slung orange-colored case. The sink faced a floor-to-ceiling window that looked out into a green landscape. Glancing over at Golden Boy, who was bent over a bar built low enough to serve kids in grammar school, I silently cursed his idea of no walls. You couldn’t do a thing around this place unnoticed. I reached quickly down and tried to pull open a cabinet drawer. It wouldn’t budge. A try for another drawer yielded the same results. The next instant, he was breath ing down my back.

  “Wha’cha doing?” he asked curiously.

  I turned around slowly. “Oh, nothing. Thought I’d look at your kitchenware. Women go for that sort of thing, you know.”

  He laughed. I didn’t like that laugh. It sounded too much like the last one. “Drawers and cabinets are all electric,” he said. “You got to know where to touch them to make ’em work. Cost me a fortune.”

  “That’s a crazy thing. What’d you do that for?”

  He led me back to the kindergarten-size bar. “I don’t like snoopers,” he said. “That’s one thing you’ll learn about me. I don’t trust anyone. I had this setup installed in every moveable object in the joint. It makes me rest easier. This way I know nobody is going through my stuff. Whether I’m here or not.”

  “But what if somebody learns the spot to touch to open things up?”

  He grinned. “Oh, that’s easy.” He pointed to a tiny metal plate on one of the bar doors. “This is the place to touch, but you got to have this to touch it with. “He held up a piece of metal that was attached to his key chain.

  “It’s a magnet,” he said proudly. “A special magnet. I’ve got the only one that will spring these locks.” He laughed again. “Simple, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. This was one character who would never be caught with his poison out in the open. In fact, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he had a special key and a special vault for such appetizing spices as arsenic.

  He handed me an orange-colored drink in a tall glass.

  “What’s this?” I asked quickly.

  “A screwdriver,” he said. “If you don’t mind my saying so, I make damned good ones.”

  The drink went crashing to the slate surface that surrounded the swimming pool. Swanson leaped to his feet. I stood, holding an invisible glass, staring blankly at the orange liquid soaking into the stone. It had been a stu pid reflex action. Talk about Sam Aces being allergic to milk. At that moment, I was sure I’d never be able to drink anything with even a hint of orange flavor again.

  It took a bit of doing, but I managed to cover over the accident without arousing too much suspicion. He did think it was strange when I turned down a second of his “superb” screwdrivers for an “unspectacular” martini.

  Then came swim time.

  “What size do you wear?” Golden Boy asked.

  “I’m a working girl,” I said. “It’s getting late. I’d better be getting home.”

  “You just got here,” he said, flexing his biceps. “You have to swim in my pool. That’s standard procedure for all female visitors.”

  “It isn’t standard procedure with me.”

  “You can change right here,” he persisted. “I won’t mind.”

  “I’ll bet!”

  “You’re almost twice as broad on top as you are in the middle,” he said, scanning my figure.

  “I didn’t think you noticed,” I said sarcastically. “Anyway, you’re still not going to get me out of my clothes.”

  “Get into that bathing suit!” he demanded.

  I threw the bra and pants in his face. “You put it on! You designed
it, you wear it!”

  I should never have done that. His eyes, widened into a passionate glare. He obviously liked women when they got rough.

  “I love you!” he yelled. “Nobody’s ever done that to me! Nobody!”

  He uttered a drunken beastly growl which must have been a throwback to the days when he played a poor man’s Tarzan. Then he staggered toward me with his arms outstretched. I thought about using some of the judo tactics I’d learned from my father, but decided in favor of some healthier conversation.

  “Now look, Mr. Swanson,” I argued. “Let’s simmer down, brush back your hair and drive me home.”

  He kept coming with the determined gait of a fullback driving off tackle. The conversation period was over. I sidestepped, brought my foot up and he went straight into the pool. That was exactly what he needed. A good cooling off. I started for the phone to call a taxi, then thought about Mr. Swanson’s swan dive. I glanced at the pool. He hadn’t come up!

  Bubbles gurgled to the surface where Golden Boy had gone down. Maybe he couldn’t swim!

  I slipped off my shoes, yanked down the zipper on my dress and dove in.

  FOUR

  SWANSON WAS FLOATING FACE DOWN A FOOT UNDER water. I slipped the crook of my elbow under his chin and brought him to the surface. A silly thought crossed my mind! Tomorrow’s headlines: TV HERO DROWNS IN HIS OWN MICROBES! We reached the edge of the pool and I drifted underneath to get more leverage. I never got it.

  His lips suddenly split open, sucked in a tremendous gasp of air and he was after me again. With a roar, Swanson rolled over, locked his legs around my bare middle and we went down, straight to the bottom. This guy was one of the greatest actors I’d ever seen. He’d faked the drowning.

  His big hands reached for me. I shook him loose for an instant, got a foot up under his chin and kicked. He buckled slightly. Then I caught him again with my heel, a glancing blow that bounced off his left eyebrow. He recoiled, swallowed some water and finally surfaced. I followed him up.

  All the fight was drained out of Mr. TV. He sagged on the stone rim of the pool, glowering at me out of the eye that wasn’t swelling up. “Get out of my pool!” he bellowed. “Now I’ll have to have it drained and sterilized. I ought to sue you.”

  I climbed up a ladder on the far side and flashed him a smile that was dripping with dislike. “Why don’t you sue me, Mr. Swanson? We could bring the jury down here for a swim—in your plastic suits.”

  He touched his eye and winced. “I’m cancelling your contract, you can be sure of that! You’ll never work for the WBS network. In fact, I’ll have you so completely blackballed you won’t even be able to get a job in Hell!”

  “You ought to have a lot of influence down there,” I said.

  He groaned, the eye closing into a tight black lump of pain. “Get out of my house! Now! This instant! Get out!”

  I slipped on my clothes and called a taxi. In the confused rush of leaving, I left my bag and had to have the cab driver turn around and go back. It was lying on the front steps where Swanson had obviously thrown it. I looked inside. Everything seemed to be in order, except for one important item. My .32 revolver was gone!

  The next morning Bob Swanson marched into Studio Sixteen wearing a patch over his left eye. I was going over a TV script with Sam Aces and his chief writer, Joe Meeler. The muscle man stormed toward Aces when he saw me.

  “What’s this girl doing here?” Swanson bellowed. “I might ask you the same question,” Aces said. “Isn’t this one of your golf days?”

  “No, it is not!”

  Aces grinned. “My mistake. The way you look I thought sure someone had used your eye for a hole-inone.”

  Swanson’s face began to twitch with rage. He demanded my immediate removal from the studio.

  “Miss West has a contract,” Aces reminded him.

  “I don’t care! She tried to kill me last night!”

  “No fooling?” the lanky producer said, grinning. “What’d she hit you with, the side of a house?”

  Swanson turned on Sam Aces. “I warn you Mr. Producer!” he hissed. “If you don’t get this girl out of here, I’ll—”

  “You’ll what, B.S.?” Aces taunted. “Kill me? Murder me the way you murdered Herb Nelson?”

  Swanson stepped back, a jolting wobbly step of a man who takes a jarring right cross and isn’t certain he won’t collapse from the blow. “What—what are you talking about?”

  “You threatened him, didn’t you?” Aces answered quickly. “You told him you wished he were dead. You tried to ruin the poor guy, didn’t you?”

  “That’s ridiculous—”

  “You hate everybody, Swanson!” Aces continued viciously. “Anybody who gets up near the top, or guys like Nelson who’ve hit it and gone down—you shove them good, don’t you?”

  Swanson whirled angrily and left the studio. I glanced at Sam Aces. A small glint flickered in his deep-set eyes as he stared after the fleeting figure of Bob Swanson. I tried to analyze the look and the incident. Had Sam Aces used the element of surprise to stun an innocent man into seeming guilty? Or was Swanson so obviously the murderer that nothing could help him form a verbal defense against such accusations? Three factors stacked up strongly against Bob Swanson. His name, according to Herb Nelson, had appeared on the threat note. He had accused Aces of murdering Nelson without furnishing any motive for the crime. And it appeared almost certain that he had stolen my .32 revolver.

  Privately, I told Aces about the missing gun.

  “Great,’ the producer groaned. “It wasn’t bad enough having to filter all my drinks, now I’ll have to filter the air for bullets.”

  “Swanson must have that gun, Sam. We’d better notify the police.”

  “No!” Aces said sharply. “We can’t do that, Honey. The police’ll think I’m crazy. It was bad enough when I refused to tell them my story about the poisoned drink. What if they picked up Swanson and found nothing? Not even the gun?”

  “They’d release him, naturally, but—”

  “You two met last night at the Golden Slipper, is that right?” Aces asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you open your bag while you were there?”

  I thought for an instant “No. He paid for my drink, but—”

  “Did you open it after you got to his place?”

  “No.”

  Aces pinched his thin lips together thoughtfully. “Is it possible someone other than Swanson could have re moved your revolver while you were at the Golden Slipper bar?”

  I nodded. “Sure, I guess it’s possible. Why?”

  Aces gathered up his lanky frame and ambled nervously across the sound stage. “Honey, I’m in a helluva spot. This gun business really scares me. Rod Caine is an expert with a revolver.”

  “Rod Caine?”

  “He’s a TV writer—originated the idea of the Bob Swanson show. I fired him several months ago.”

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t like him.”

  “That’s all?”

  “Not exactly,” Aces said grimly. “One night I came home unexpectedly. He was in bed with my wife, Lori.”

  “That sort of thing does get under one’s skin.”

  “Lori is a very beautiful woman,” Aces said, his eyes growing intently dark. “Very beautiful, and very young. She’s only twenty. A rare little child. She doesn’t know any better. Caine does.”

  “Where is he now?’

  “I don’t know. He disappeared. Nobody seems to know where he is. And that’s what worries me. I hurt him. Hurt him bad. A cowardly thing. I hit him in the face with a broken glass.” He wiped hands over his eyes. “I don’t know why exactly. They were lying there, naked and drunk. I grabbed an empty glass from a table beside the bed, shattered it on the metal rim and hit him in the face.”

  I winced. “How dirty can you get?”

  Aces nodded. “I know. There was blood all over the place. I never even saw how bad he was cut. He just put his hands to
his face and ran. Nobody’s seen him since.”

  “He must have needed stitches. Did you check the hospitals? His doctor?”

  “Sure. He just vanished. Naked, too. The police had no record either.”

  “Where do you live?”

  “Newport. Lido Isle on the bay front.”

  “Is Caine a good swimmer?”

  “I don’t know. It was dark as hell. He could have made it to the water. Rain was pouring down and I couldn’t follow his trail. But he was bleeding.”

  “He might be hiding because he’s scarred.”

  “I don’t think he’s hiding,” Aces said tightly. “The incident occurred four months ago. Plenty of time for plastic surgery. I keep wondering if he still has the same features.”

  “Do you think it was that bad?”

  Aces stopped pacing, lit two cigarettes and handed me one. Then he said, “I walk down the street now and look at faces and I ask myself, ‘Is that Caine? Where is he? What does he look like?’ It drives me crazy. I wonder if he was sitting in the Golden Slipper the night my drink was poisoned. I wonder if he was there last night, if he stole your gun, if—”

  “Wait a minute,” I interjected. “You forget one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If he was bleeding as freely as you say, he might have tired and drifted out to sea.”

  “I thought about that,” Aces said quietly.

  “He could be dead.”

  “Yeah, and if he isn’t, the tombstone may be on the other grave. If you know what I mean.”

  While Meeler and Aces made further script changes, I decided to search the dressing room where I’d left my bag during my appearance the day before. An attractive, green-eyed brunette stopped me just inside the doorway.

  “Hi!” she said, much too sweetly. “Remember me?”

  “Sure. We met yesterday. You’re Ann Claypool, one of the contestants.”

  “That’s right.” She flashed me a pasted-on smirk that reeked of bourbon. “I’m the contestant who was supposed to win but didn’t. Have you ever heard of a fix that was fixed?”

  “I don’t think I understand.”

  “Of course, you wouldn’t,” she said, weaving slightly. Ann Claypool looked like a grown-up doll with a deep dimple in her cheek, long sweeping eyelashes and a small voluptuous figure. She couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred pounds soaking wet.