This was news to me; but Maggie had her ways.
“It’s been discussed,” Krane said, pushing his plate away. He’d close to cleaned it, leaving nothing but a shred of baked potato skin as evidence of the meal. He was one of those live-wire skinny guys who could eat a horse and still weigh in like a jockey.
“Strength in numbers,” Maggie said.
“Yeah.” Krane flipped a hand. “And I’ve been thinking of going that route. Some pretty nice leverage, there. Americana would hardly like to lose its two biggest properties at once.”
I asked, “How could Americana lose rights they already own?”
Krane’s grin was like a joker’s in a deck of cards. “We could challenge those rights. The boys have a case to make, thanks to Sy Mortimer’s foul-up with Wonder Boy. And I have a trick up my Batwing as well.”
Maggie smiled warmly at him, but I saw the ice crystalize in her eyes; she made herself reach out and touch Krane’s sleeve. “What trick is that, Rod? We’re all friends here.”
“Right. Aren’t you an Americana shareholder?”
“Just a few shares the major left me. My biggest concern is that the Starr Syndicate is still able to syndicate Batwing and Wonder Guy.”
I noticed she gave Krane top billing, which he didn’t deserve. Maggie knew what she was doing.
She was saying, “If that means Starr dealing with Americana, so be it; but if you wind up with the rights to Batwing, well . . . it would only simplify the syndication contract.”
This was BS of a rarefied order, and I don’t know if Krane would have bought it, had not his fourth martini been deader than Donny.
“I have no intention of leaving Americana,” Krane said, “as long as they treat me with the respect I deserve.”
Anything short of pushing him down an elevator shaft would qualify by that standard.
“And the trick up your wing,” Maggie said, and smiled wickedly, and sipped her Horse’s Neck, “makes that possible? Come on, Rod—spill.”
The joker’s grin again. “Okay. Good thing you’re sitting down . . . . My entire contract with Americana is invalid. According to my old man.”
Hiram Cohen (Krane’s father) was an attorney who represented many garment factories, including one of the city’s largest, which happened to be run by Hiram’s brother.
“I hope our contract isn’t invalid,” Maggie said lightly.
“Probably not. You see, I wasn’t of legal age when I signed with Donny—only twenty. That means, anytime I care to walk into Louis Cohn’s office, it’s a whole new ball game for Batwing.”
Meaning a major-league jam for Americana—both its top properties facing possible reversion to the creators, in Spiegel and Shulman’s case thanks to the Wonder Boy fubar, and in Krane’s a contract voided because the cartoonist had been a minor at signing.
“You have the birth certificate to prove it?” Maggie asked.
“No. My father was an immigrant, and you know how these old Jews were about such documents—papers like that tended to get lost in the shuffle. But my father and mother will testify that I was born in 1915.”
No records to subpoena, then.
I said, “But your father negotiated the first contract—did he build this in on purpose?”
“Don’t be insulting,” Krane said, but he was grinning again. “My father was a simple immigrant. His math skills were deficient.”
Krane’s “simple immigrant” father had studied law books at home and taken (and passed) the bar, becoming the top garment-center attorney in town.
Maggie asked, “Had you told Donny Harrison about your invalid contract yet?”
“Hell no, Mag! My father and I were in full agreement about that.”
I asked, “About what?”
“About going to Louie Cohn with this,” Krane said, “and not Donny. God knows how that hotheaded son of a bitch Harrison would’ve reacted. Louie, now he’s a businessman.”
Maggie flicked a look at me just as I was flicking one her way: the well-lubricated Krane had just traded us one murder motive for four martinis.
And maybe Krane had told Donny about this minor ploy, and gotten such a bad reaction that removing the publisher, to make way for the more “reasonable” Louie Cohn, had been a tempting option.
The blonde barmaid brought me a second Coke, Krane a fifth martini, while Maggie continued to nurse her first and only Horse’s Neck.
Maggie asked, in a manner so casual it could hardly have been more calculated, “What’s this I hear about Will Hander and Donny?”
No grin. In fact Krane frowned and his deep dimples went AWOL, though the laugh crinkles around the dark eyes tightened and his forehead creased over the black brush strokes of eyebrow. “What about Will?”
Will Hander was widely believed to have been the co-creator of Batwing, but had got none of the credit and only freelancer money for the writing.
“I’ve heard,” Maggie said, “that for several years he’s been pressuring Donny to give him his rightful share of the strip.”
“What he considers his ‘rightful share’!” Krane snapped. “Listen, Maggie, we’ve talked about this before. Batwing was mine—my concept, my character. Will was just the writer I went to, to flesh out my script notions.”
“I don’t mean to step on any toes,” Maggie said with a smile so charming I damn near checked my back pocket for my wallet, “but scuttlebutt has it that Will created Sparrow, and lots of the villains, including Harlequin and Tuxedo.”
Sparrow was Batwing’s kid sidekick.
Krane’s nostrils flared, and his eyes slitted. “Believing scuttlebutt is beneath you, Maggie. I’m like any other major cartoonist, except that because I have both comic strips and comic books to provide material for, I need more help than most. I value Will—he’s the best Batwing writer. I’m second to nobody in my admiration for his work. But he’s just a writer.”
Right—the way the half dozen Batwing cartoonists salted here and there around the New York environs were just artists. Where big-time comics creators like Milton Caniff or Sam Fizer or Hal Rapp openly admitted having studios wherein they worked with their assistants—even posing for group pictures and making their staff’s names public—Krane kept his anonymous “helpers” out of touch with each other, and scattered.
Even the laziest, least talented cartoonists usually did some work on their own strips—doing rough layouts, say, or inking the faces. But I suspected the last pen Krane touched was to write a check, and his last brush had been stuck in his mouth, working to make those teeth so goddamn white.
“I guess what I’m getting to,” Maggie said, “is whether you think Will might’ve had a motive for killing Donny.”
“Oh.”
Krane’s face relaxed, now that the subject had gone from something serious—whether he was a money and credit hog—to something trivial—like his chief writer having killed their publisher.
“Well,” he said, “sure. Maybe. Donny paid Will directly, you know, at my request . . . and paid him well. I don’t think Donny would’ve took kindly to being squeezed like that.”
Or taken kindly to Krane’s lawyer poppa putting the squeeze on him, either.
Krane hadn’t touched the fifth martini yet. Maybe the gin was catching up to him. He looked at Maggie, carefully, doing his best to bring her in focus; then he looked at me the same way. He was weaving just a little.
Finally he said, “What’s this about, fellas and girls? I thought this was a business supper. See how Batwing’s doing. Kind of lay the groundwork for our new contract. And I wasn’t a minor when I signed with Starr, so you should have nothin’ to worry about there.”
“Good,” Maggie said.
“You’re asking me about . . . you’re talking about . . . this is about . . . the murder. Right? Donny’s murder?”
“Yes,” she said.
And I nodded.
“Well,” he said. “Why? That’s . . . police business. I already talked to that Cap
tain Chandler. He seemed like the genuine article. He’ll get to the bottom of it, right?”
Maggie said, “Eventually.”
I said, “I’m checking into the circumstances, Rod. To protect our interests. Some of our most valued talents are on the suspect list.”
“Oh. Sure. Like Harry and Moe?”
“Yes . . . among others.”
He frowned. “Well, hell, I’m not a suspect.”
I grinned. “Good to hear. But maybe you can help me out with zeroing in on some real suspects.”
“Yeah. Sure. Why not? Shoot.”
I leaned back, folded my arms. “Let’s start with Honey Daily.”
He smirked, shook his head. “She can’t be a suspect. She was Donny’s girl.”
“But she was also your girl, wasn’t she? For a while, anyway?”
I don’t know if I ever saw anybody sober up quicker.
Krane said, “Uh . . . who says?”
“She does. She also says you can’t take no for an answer.”
His jaw had dropped. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That when Miss Daily gave you your walking papers, you didn’t take the hint. And threatened to go to Donny about it.”
He was squirming; kind of fun to see a guy in a white dinner jacket squirm. “Well . . . come on, Jackie. You know how it is when a love affair goes on the rocks.”
“No. Tell me how it is. And the name is ‘Jack. ”
The flickering smile was nervous, as were the darting eyes. “I . . . I was crazy about her. When she said it was over, I said all kinds of stupid, lunatic things. Raving and ranting things. . . . You don’t really think I’d tell Donny about Honey and me?”
“She said you told her you were going to ‘stick it to Donny,’” I said. “You knew about his diabetes, right? Or am I just adding insulin to injury?”
The black eyebrows rose so high, they damn near straightened out into exclamation points. “Jack! Please! Of course I knew about his diabetes, everybody knew about Donny’s diabetes, and his shots and . . . I just told you how I was gonna ‘stick it’ to Donny! By my pop sticking it to Americana, with the bit about me being a minor when I signed Batwing over!”
Now it was a “bit.”
Maggie said, “Do you think you were the first, Rod?”
“The first . . . what?”
“The first man Honey Daily strayed with, away from Donny?”
“Hell no! Donny was just her meal ticket—she only saw him a couple days a week, or I should say nights. I was just one of many. One of a parade of chumps who rolled through that suite, helping keep her mind off the monster she had to pay the rent to.”
I asked, “Who else was on that list?”
Besides me, currently.
The joker grin returned. “I don’t know ’em all. Maybe she keeps a little black book, like horny bachelors do.”
I gave him something that was half grin, half sneer. “Why, do you have one?”
He stood and the martini glass spilled and sopped the linen. He leaned his hands on the table, finding dry places, and said, “I’m not the only Americana number in that little black book, that much I’ll tell you.”
Maggie’s voice had an edge. “Who, Rod? Who else from Americana?”
“Why should I tell you?” he said to her imperiously. Then to me, he snarled, “You’re the one playing private eye—it’s somebody powerful, that much I’ll tell you. Maybe the most powerful man at Americana! Figure it out for yourself.”
He left the table, paused at the door and said, “Thanks for the steak, and the martinis—now I know how a dame feels when you ply her with liquor to take advantage.”
“Will it change your style?” I asked cheerfully, and he was gone.
“Hope he isn’t driving,” Maggie said, with a roll of her big green eyes.
“If he is,” I said, “let’s hope he kills nobody but himself, or maybe his ego.”
“That would take a big crash.”
I sat forward. “Have you been doing some sleuthing yourself, Maggie?”
Her smile was genuinely amused now. “Why? Some of my questions surprise you?”
“Yeah. I hate it when you know more than me.”
“Life must be very uncomfortable for you, then.” She had another sip of Horse’s Neck. “Did you drop those thread samples off at that lab, as I suggested?”
“Yes. That stain can’t be blood.”
“Donny was sweating profusely, you said.”
“Right.”
She shrugged a little. “Maybe it was dye residue from the Wonder Guy costume, released by Donny’s perspiration.”
“Maybe. We’ll know tomorrow. You think Rod is our killer?”
She sighed, making me uncomfortable—not because she knew more than me, but because she was my stepmother and when her breasts made themselves known under a garment like that, I squirmed.
“Rod our killer?” she mused. “Could we be so lucky?”
Once again I dropped by Honey Daily’s suite at the Waldorf without calling. Whether I was hoping (or hoping not) to find her with another man—maybe someone powerful from find her with another man—maybe someone powerful from Americana like Sy Mortimer or even Louis Cohn—I can’t say. I do know knocking unannounced on any woman’s door at nine at night is unspeakably rude. But I did it anyway.
I passed the peephole test and the door opened, with her in the same black dressing gown with its touches of pink, some of it ribbon, some of it her. Her hair was a lovely blonde tangle tickling her shoulders and the only makeup she had on was a little lipstick.
She leaned a red-nailed hand against the jamb and gave me a smile I didn’t deserve. “You think you can just show up and get away with it, do you?”
“Worked before,” I said. My hat, a light gray Milan that went well with my suit, was in hands. “I’m an impulsive boy.”
“No phone at your place?”
I shrugged. “Suppose you’d said no?”
“Jack, Jack, Jack . . . you have more confidence than that, surely. . . . Come on in.”
I followed her and her Chanel No. 5 through the foyer into the coral-and-emerald living room. She wasn’t drinking anything. A radio was playing Cugat and his Latin stylings, and I quickly gathered it was a broadcast from this very hotel’s Starlight Roof. A copy of the paperback of Forever Amber was open to her place on the coffee table by the sofa. The painting of the courtesan on the cover was almost as beautiful as Honey.
She sat and I sat. Next to her. Very next to her. She turned her face to mine and I kissed her. She kissed back. We kissed a while. Let’s face it, kissing went on. Lots of it. And some fondling. We were of age.
Then she said, “You’re troubled.”
“No, I feel fine. Anyway, better.”
The big baby blues showed genuine concern; or really well-done fake genuine concern. “You want to talk about it? It’s the murder case, right? You’ve been looking into it all day?”
“All day except for when I was at the funeral.”
She swallowed; turned away, looking toward the unlit fire place. Folded her arms. Sore point?
“Would you have liked to’ve gone?” I asked.
She said nothing.
“I’m not sure I know how you felt about him.”
She shook her head. “I told you. I was fond of him. Very fond of him. He was good to me. I loved him, in my way. And everybody got to say good-bye to him but me.”
I didn’t point out that, on the list of people who got to say good-bye to Donny, the guy’s wife and kids came first, along with their feelings about who they shared Donny’s public farewell with. But, hell, she knew that. She was either feeling sorry for herself, or putting on a show for me.
And it bothered me, in fact pissed me off, that I couldn’t tell the difference.
“Listen, Honey,” I said, in a way that made the “H” ambiguous as to whether it was her name or an endearment, “you’ve been open to helping me. Giving me inform
ation, and sharing your opinions . . . so I can find Donny’s killer.”
“Yes. Yes, of course. I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” I slipped an arm around her shoulder. “Guess who I had the pleasure of dining with this evening?”
“I was kind of hoping it would be me,” she said, and pouted, or pretended to. “But you didn’t call.”
“No, I had a prior engagement. Maggie Starr lined it up and played hostess—I ate with the talented and charming creator of Batwing.”
She shuddered. “That creep Krane?”
“That creep Krane. And he told us his side of your affair.”
“His side?” Her eyes flared. Nostrils, too. It was pretty, and pretty disturbing. “You make that sound like my side was . . . was what? Untrustworthy? A lie?”
“Honey—I’m investigating. I hear everybody’s side, and I take into consideration which end of the telescope each person is looking through. Not talking lies or untrustworthiness, here. Just looking at the various perspectives.”
“You’re treading water, Jack.”
And I was.
I cut straight to the point. “Baby, this son of a bitch says he was only one of a . . . he implied a large group.”
“Group of what?”
Again I was blowing it.
I tried another angle. “You said it yourself—you had a life, aside from, away from, Donny. There were other men in your life. Like Rod, for a while.”
Her eyes no longer flared; they tightened, so much so I could barely tell how she could see out of them. “I never denied it. I don’t deny it. I was with Donny for a long, long time. And I am a normal woman with normal needs.”
“Sure. I know. But what I need is to know . . . who were those other men?”
“What?”
“Honey—baby. I’m looking into the murder of the guy who paid for this suite. I need you to share the names of the other men who’ve, well, been in your life.”
She drew away. “Don’t ‘honey baby’ me, Jack Starr. This is out of line. You are out of line.”
My arm no longer around her, I patted the air with peaceful palms. “Okay. Let’s just limit it to Americana. Krane says you were seeing another bigwig at Americana, besides Donny.”
A Killing in Comics Page 13