The Noir Novel

by Thomas B. Dewey

  I played with a handful of wrapped sugar cubes as Vicki told me of Sam’s early days when he had been a bootlegger, therefore reasonably respectable and everything peaches and cream. Sam and Brenda were happy together and in due course, to prove this, their union was blessed with a daughter they named Elizabeth. However, it wasn’t long before tragedy reared its ugly head because Sam Talmadge put himself on the wrong side of a double-cross involving a bootleg shipment from sunny Mexico. This had to be punished, so one afternoon when Sam took his little family out for an airing, the boss had the boys oblige him by ventilating the car with a machine gun.

  At this point I whistled, and the waiter arrived with the food. Vicki waited until he was gone, then went on.

  “This all happened out on the Coast Highway.” She toyed with her fork and I knew she wasn’t interested in what she had ordered. “By the time help arrived Brenda was dead and it looked like Sam was dying. By some miracle the baby was unharmed. Sam was pretty small potatoes then so it didn’t get any publicity.”

  She picked up her coffee and took a sip. “Sam recovered, as we know, and he came out of it bitter.”

  “Understandable,” I said. “Things like that can set back family outings ten thousand years.”

  Vicki nodded and continued: “Sam, for his own protection, decided not to be that unimportant anymore and started collecting himself a gang of riffraff and politicos to make himself an organization. Meanwhile he had Elizabeth, and it looked like the child was going to be even prettier than her mother. When this was established, Sam decided the kid was going to be class. And as soon as he started cashing in he shipped her east to the very very best schools and fixed a budget on her that made her appear to be a government project. The girl grew, blossomed, and acquired polish, and before Europe had Lend-Lease it had Elizabeth Talmadge, which amounted to practically the same thing.” At this point the story got tricky, and Vicki paused for more breath. “Liz Talmadge made the usual mistake and fell in love. And the object of her affection was big Eastern society. Elizabeth, being impulsive and oh-so-madcap, decided to surprise papa by arriving home in California—unannounced—with her fancy fiancé under her arm. Heretofore, Talmadge had always visited her in the East, and Elizabeth believed he was a big man in California real estate.

  “No one knows exactly what happened,” Vicki said, “but it must have hit the delirious couple practically the moment they walked in the door that papa was a glorified pimp and a hot dealer in narcotics.”

  “Messy,” I said.

  “Especially for romance.” Vicki smiled.

  “I see what you mean about domestic drama.”

  “The boyfriend did a fast fade the next day, which left Talmadge with one hysterical daughter on his hands, who subdued into a nervous breakdown.”

  “That’s not the end,” I prompted.

  “The upshot of it all was that she disowned Talmadge.” Vicki’s expression told me to be patient. “But not before she swore to find some way to wreck him if it was the last thing she did. She contended that he had ruined her life by letting her think she was the queen of the universe when she wasn’t. Personally,” Vicki said, and closed an eye in judgment, “I can see her point. Anyway, she left Talmadge, changed her name to Wakely, and settled down to a life of revenge.”

  Vicki took a sip of coffee, stabbed a lettuce leaf with her fork, and leaned back in her chair. “There’s more,” she said.

  “I’m more and more interested,” I said, and nodded.

  “First crack out of the box our Liz lined herself up with a new romance carefully calculated to put Talmadge’s wig on end. The guy was Joe Welles, one of Talmadge’s own, with an important reputation as butcher. She must have accomplished her purpose because it wasn’t long before Joe was found smashed up in his car one morning at the foot of the hill below Liz’s apartment.”

  Vicki’s gesture indicated that this accident made Elizabeth a terrible romantic risk with the boys so she decided to forget about love with any one man and to spread her goodies around, and in so doing add another blot to the family escutcheon. For a while she was one of the fastest moving girls in town but her concerned father had her shadowed, which was easy to do, and kept it all out of the papers because the old boy was still crazy about her.

  “How was Liz financing all this cruising?” I asked. “Or was there anyone stupid enough to pick up the tabs?”

  “That’s the fascinating part. Talmadge was financing it. He kept her allowance up to par and she used it against him. She’s still doing it. Does it pay to have children?” Vicki asked with mock rhetoric.

  “She’s still kicking around town?”

  “Not as high as she used to,” she replied. “Apparently Liz’s come around to a more sedate point of view and settled down. In recent years she’s contented herself with spending her time and daddy’s money supporting any and all reform movements aimed at daddy’s downfall.”

  “Where did she get the name Wakely?”

  Vicki’s shrug meant this didn’t interest her. “I guess she picked it out of a hat. Anyway, I hear she’s still a raving redhead with a taste for raw meat.” She grinned at me. “I only ask that you try not to look like a lamb chop in this lady’s presence—if you should meet her. I saw you first.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind—if I meet her.”

  “She has a beach house out near Malibu. You can find her and it in the appropriate directory. And that”—Vicki pushed back her practically untouched salad—“is the story.”

  “Some story,” I said. “In other words, if I have trouble with daddy, daughter Elizabeth might come in handy.”

  “I thought she might.”

  I gazed out of the window into the street as I thought the story through. Whether I needed it or not it was worth knowing. If I needed it and Elizabeth Talmadge—or Wakely—was an enemy of her father’s, then she was probably in touch with others who felt the same way. I filed it away for reference—until after I’d seen Talmadge.

  “You’ve had a night to think it over,” Vicki said, interrupting my reverie. “What sort of deal do you think you’ll get from Talmadge?”

  I looked around. “I keep thinking what I’d do in Talmadge’s place.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’d throw me to the dogs. It would be my best protection.” Her eyes were hidden behind the glasses but her lips parted. She started to speak, then didn’t.

  We finished eating, and after I paid the cashier and returned to our table, I checked my watch: it was a little after twelve. “Gotta go,” I announced. “Shall I take you back?”

  Vicki shook her head. “The taxi’s coming back for me.”

  I stood up and moved around to her chair. “You’re a sweetheart.”

  She gave me a smile. “Don’t forget it,” she said. There was a beat of dead air. “When am I going to see you again?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll try to get in touch with you later.”

  “I’ll be waiting around.”

  “In the meantime,” I said, “thanks a lot.”

  “In the meantime, welcome.” She reached out for my hand. “Be careful, Steve. Take care of my interest in you.”

  I put a little more pressure into the hand squeeze than I intended. “Tell it to Talmadge,” I said and felt like a fool. Then I took off.

  * * * *

  By the time I fought my way through the traffic into downtown L.A., located the Glass Garter, drove around the block to case it, and found a place to park, it was a little after one. The Glass Garter was in the middle of the block, with onyxed windows that had gone scaly and a lot of neon tubing twisted over the front like chicken entrails drying in the sun. Luckily I found a spot opposite the Garter that gave me an unobstructed view of the coming and going patrons because I wanted to see Talmadge & Company show before I put in an appearance.

  It was ten to two when a long black Cad hauled to the curb and Talmadge got out and was followed by his chauffeur, a low-browed gorilla who
had the self-satisfied, stupid look of a heeled trigger man with business at hand. Believe me, the ape was licking his chops as he followed Talmadge from the car and into the Garter.

  For a little longer I waited and watched the length of the street along the block. Everything appeared standard. Nothing made it look like a cop setup. Maybe Talmadge couldn’t afford an arrest while he was in the neighborhood. Maybe he didn’t have as much drag as he tried to make everybody think. Maybe there was a bigger Mr. Big.

  I pulled out, rounded the block to the opposite side and parked again as an added precaution. If Vicki’s license plates weren’t hot I didn’t want to heat them up any for her. Then I hoofed it back to the Glass Garter.

  The place reminded me of my happy childhood. It was like Old Home Week to enter the dark interior and smell the sweetish odor of stale beer, dampness and despair. A couple of cut-rate tarts were making hollow laughter and flexing their leg muscles down at the end of the bar. The bartender, an ex-pug with a smashed face and little pig eyes checked me too close which meant he had been wised to the pitch, whatever that might be. For Talmadge to meet me here—it didn’t set right. Spotting Talmadge in a booth I crossed over and slid in beside him as he looked up at me with cold dead eyes.

  “You’re late,” he said.

  “I got held up in traffic,” I said to gave him a standard reason.

  “How’re you traveling?”

  “Roller skates,” I told him. Smelling the blood of my own sacrifice, I didn’t see any reason for diplomacy.

  “You’re a smart boy,” he said. “Maybe too smart. Maybe stupid. Two things you should never do when you celebrate—destroy property or send people to the other shore.”

  “That shouldn’t hurt you any.” I looked across at the gorilla who was grinning at me with a full set of teeth while he also checked me for size. “And I’ll remember your good advice.”

  “It might help,” Talmadge said. “It doesn’t do me any good to have you making grandstand plays with the cops always trying to sit on my doorstep.”

  For that one he deserved a slow glance. I had guessed right: he no longer hauled his old weight. He was slipping.

  “That tells me little,” I said. “Why’m I a patsy?”

  Talmadge stared at me. He must have spent hours in front of the mirror practicing that fishy eye which was meant to mystify and terrify. And keeping the gorilla outlined from the side, I gave it back to him.

  “How do I know you didn’t kill them?” Talmadge’s voice was low.

  I shook my head slowly. “You know damn well I didn’t.”

  “Then who did?”

  “You tell me. You were in Vegas just before it happened.”

  “You talk like a guy that’s got nothing to live for,” the ape put in from across the table.

  “Down, boy,” I snapped. “When I want gab from uglies I’ll let you know.”

  The muscler colored with rage, looked to his boss for an order, and I got ready for action.

  “Relax, Marty,” Talmadge settled his gorilla with a wave of his fat hand but the complacent look was off his pan, which gave me a hell of a lot of satisfaction.

  Talmadge shifted his flab so he could face me. “How could I make a fix?” he asked.

  “Don’t you bother to get acquainted with your employees?” I asked. “That’s lousy labor-management policy.”

  “I figured you for a smart boy, Walters, which proves how wrong even I can pick them.”

  “Let’s quit waltzin’, Talmadge,” I said. “I’m working for you because you choose them clean. Who am I taking this for, you? Let me finish,” I wouldn’t let him interrupt me. “Who goes clean because I’m left in it up to the chin?”

  Talmadge saw I meant to have it without the salve. “You’re in,” he shrugged. “If the investigation goes too deep it could ruin my operations in Vegas. All I can say now is that Mike was my boy and the wrong people got bumped in the wrong places.” He put his fat hand out on the table in front of me. “It’s got to be stopped before it grows. How do you figure it?”

  “You tell me,” I growled because he still hadn’t said anything.

  “You’ll have me behind you,” he promised, but probably crossed his fingers. “I can’t afford to have the cops around right now. Everyone takes a rap sooner or later in this racket, Walters, and your number came up, that’s all,” he broke it to me. “Still, you’re lucky.”

  “Lucky!” I exclaimed.

  “You’ve got everything in your favor before you start.” He nodded. “Me,” he added. “You take a couple of years’ rest and come out with a good spot all fixed for you.”

  “I come out a con,” I said, “if I come out.” The bartender was keeping tabs on me and not attending to business.

  Talmadge kept selling. “You’re a gambler, aren’t you?”

  “The same kind of gambler you are,” I said. “Sore as hell when I lose.”

  “But you don’t lose.”

  “Sorry,” I began flatly, “I can’t trust you. So tag someone else for the rest. For instance, the operator who did it.” Talmadge’s red face began to get redder because I wasn’t playing his way.

  “It’s not just me you’re up against, Walters,” he rumbled at me. “And whether you like it or not you’ve been tagged as ‘it’.”

  “Just like that?” I snapped my fingers and slid out of the booth. “I’m not buying.”

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Talmadge growled. “I’m not finished.”

  “To the can,” I said. “You make my kidneys ache.”

  As I walked to the rear of the bar I glanced quickly at the evil-eyed bartender and the two tomatoes who waited for business. The three of them could mean trouble.

  The Gents was at the rear with a wooden partition that closed in the entrance, a set-up okay for my purposes. I slid around the partition, stood there, opened the door to the john, shoved it wide for the sound effect, then let it slam. Then I backed against the wall and braced, but not for long because Talmadge didn’t waste any time in calling his signals. I heard Talmadge say something to his gorilla, then the seat creaked as he got up and padded toward the street door because he wasn’t going to hang around for the crude stuff. The ape held his seat until Talmadge cleared the entrance. Then he didn’t waste any time. He left the booth, crossed to the bar to say something to the slob mopping the top with a soggy cloth before he started for me, and I waited for him with my hand tight around the butt of the .38.

  I let him get around the partition and his hand on the door before I stepped out to give him a dirty grin.

  “Going tinkle?” I asked.

  He swung around as if someone had jabbed a burr up his butt and his lips pulled back from his teeth in a primitive snarl. “You dirty sonofabitch!” he growled.

  I pulled the .38 and let him have a good look into the muzzle. “The murder weapon,” I said. “Your fatso boss’d give a lot to put his hands on this. You play your cards right and you can have one of the slugs.”

  The guy’s face was darker than midnight as the rage piled up in him like an overflowing storm-swept creek and with a grunt like a wounded bull he lunged for me as he brought up his knee. I swung away, took it on the thigh, then swung back again fast and while he was still off balance connected solidly to give him what he planned for me.

  Although he was heavy the pain lifted him off his feet. He groaned and went crashing down against the door into the can, clutching his crotch as the door gave and he fell inside. I moved in on him and wedged myself into the room with him where his head lay next to the can in a nasty puddle. Pain was like a sharp light in his eyes as he looked up at me and darted a hand for the bulge inside his coat. My right toe smashed it into the side of his face and took his nose with the follow-through that crunched cartilage and started a spurting fountain of blood. He let out another groan, then lay still, staring up at me with glazed eyes.

  I stood over him, looking down at his cheek open to the bone and his mutilat
ed nose. “I’ve dropped better things than you in worse cans than this,” I said and backed out with the gun still on him.

  At the bar the trolls, frozen to their stools, looked at me as If I was a man from Mars. The bartender stared at me as if I’d returned from the dead.

  “Take it easy, girls,” I advised the chippies as I passed them. “Don’t bother screaming like ladies.”

  They got it all right. I was glad they did.

  Chapter Six

  I followed the alley to the end of the block, rounded back to where I had parked Vicki’s convertible, and headed for Hollywood.

  Now that there wasn’t going to be any deal, the streets wouldn’t be free to me much longer. Talmadge and his guns would be on one side, the police on the other, and I squarely in the middle. And the bartender had probably been at the phone the moment I left the Garter.

  I cut west on Santa Monica Boulevard and followed it straight out to the Coast Highway. As I made my right turn and headed north the ocean lay clear blue and sparkling with reflected sunlight. There was no time for admiration so I stepped on the gas, kept rolling and hoped Liz Wakely was home to casual callers. Talmadge wanted a cover-up bad; bad enough anyway to put me on the spot for it. His play called my shot: to pin the rap on him before he pinned it on me. A big order, but who had a choice? One minimum thing in my favor: Talmadge probably thought I’d be too busy trying to save my own hide to even attempt tanning his. However, I was going to need friends and my best friends could only be Talmadge’s enemies. So I hoped Liz Wakely would turn out to be more than just another social reformer.

  The sun was moving toward the west, just starting the final down-grade curve as I passed Castle Rock and the rows of small beach cottages clinging to the cliffs above the ocean.

  Malibu is probably the only place in the world that has a police station that looks like a vine-covered lover’s retreat. I passed it, keeping to the prescribed limits of the law, and pulled up at the gas station next door. While the gas pump jockey filled my tank I went into the station and looked through the phone directory and found that Elizabeth Wakely had a telephone at 31926 Coast Highway.