by Bill Crider
“Are you telling me that Stella Gordon is a lesbian? But she’s married to Robert Carroll.”
“Who’s the biggest he-man in Hollywood. Kinda makes you wonder, doesn’t it.”
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Well, yes, it did. If Stella leaned to one side, it wouldn’t be surprising at all if Carroll leaned to the other. And it certainly wouldn’t be the first time that a studio had arranged a marriage between two of its moneymakers who couldn’t stand the sight of each other. The marriage would work to cover up what some people, mainly the ones who bought the cheaper kind of magazines, would consider decidedly unnatural tendencies.
“So I think you should drive us to whatever clubs there are that cater to women like that,” Bogart said. “I’ll bet you know where they are.”
“Only because of my job.”
“That goes without saying. So what do you think?”
I told him I thought it was worth a try, and we’d started off. Before getting to the Club Sappho, we’d been to a couple of other places, but nobody at either one of them knew a thing about Wendy Felsen and Stella Gordon. Or so they’d claimed. You could never be sure about the truth in a situation like that.
It seemed as if Harry might be about to make the same claim, but something in her voice made me think that she knew more than she was willing to tell. I hadn’t detected anything like that at the other places we’d been.
“Look, Harry, we don’t mean any harm to any of your clients. If Stella Gordon is here, we just want to talk to her. This isn’t even about her. It’s about someone she knows.”
I hoped I sounded sincere, because I wasn’t at all sure I was telling the truth. If Robert Carroll, Bob to his pals, would kill to keep his secret from getting out, why wouldn’t Stella do the same?
I could buy the idea that men were more likely to kill than women.
I read the papers, after all. On the other hand, I didn’t think you could rule out a woman just because she was a woman.
Harry looked around. Nobody had entered the lobby since Bogart and I had some in, so I don’t know what, or who, she was looking for.
“OK You’re right. Stella Gordon comes here sometimes. Not that she’s ever used that name, but I recognized her the first time she came in.”
“Who was she with?” Bogart asked.
“I don’t know. Someone very pretty. That’s all I can tell you.”
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Bogart, as good as he was at the private-eye game so far, had asked the wrong question. I asked the right one.
“Is Stella Gordon here now?”
“Yeah. She’s upstairs. But you can’t go up there, Mr. Scott. You know that.”
I’d been upstairs before, so I didn’t know that. I reminded Harry of my past trespasses.
“That was different. You were trying to keep somebody’s name out of the paper, and I respected that. So did Johnnie.”
Johnnie was the owner of the club. She was a pale blonde flower who always wore diaphanous gowns and lots of make-up so that it was hard to judge her age, which I was sure was a lot closer to Bogart’s than to mine.
“He’s trying to keep somebody’s name out of the paper this time, too,” Bogart said. “Mine. Attached to a murder rap.”
Harriet thought some more and then said, “Oh, all right, then. If it’s that important, you can go on up. But you know the rules, Mr.
Scott.”
I told her I did: no talking, no touching, no nothing. Just get off the elevator, pass right on through the big main room without opening my big yap, and then go down a hall to a room where Stella would meet me. The meeting would be arranged by Harry, who would call Johnnie, who would set it up. But only if Stella would agree.
“Give me five minutes,” Harry said.
Bogart and I drifted over to a standing ashtray with a top filled with smooth white sand. There wasn’t a butt in it, though Bogart was about to change that.
“I think I have an instinct for this kind of work,” he said when he had the Chesterfield going. “Maybe doing all those movies has rubbed off on me.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But don’t forget all those gangster movies you did. They didn’t help you with Charlie O.”
“You’re forgetting how we got in to see him in the first place.”
I was, but his reminder brought back to me what had happened.
Bogart had been as much like a gangster as any of Charlie O.’s boys.
Maybe more like one. That’s the way it was in Hollywood. You could never tell what was real and what was fake because the fake was sometimes so much more genuine.
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I was saved from my philosophical speculations when Harry called out my name and said that Johnnie would meet us on the second floor.
Bogart stuck his cigarette butt into the sand, and we headed for the elevator.
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CHAPTER
23
Usually Johnnie trusted me to make my own way, but she must have felt that this time was different. Or maybe she just wanted to meet Bogart. At any rate, when the elevator door opened, she was standing there waiting for us.
She was quite a sight in her filmy, floating, shimmery gown. Her hair, which had been blonde the last time I’d seen her, was red, and her skin was pale as a vampire’s, thanks to all the powder she’d applied to it.
“Meet Humphrey Bogart,” I said to her. “Mr. Bogart, this is Johnnie.”
She held out her hand to Bogart, who took it in his, raised it to his lips, and planted a light kiss on it as if he did that sort of thing all the time. Maybe he did, though I sure hadn’t seen him.
“Charmed, I’m sure,” Johnnie said.
“And I’m equally charmed,” Bogart said.
Johnnie simpered at him. Bogart might not have impressed Harry, but Johnnie was a different story. She had little use for men, but a movie star was more than just a man, at least to her.
We were standing in a long hallway. Across from us were doors that appeared to lead to different offices. The doors were half wood and half pebbled glass, and on the glass I could see names like George D. Wood, D.D.S. Having been there before, I knew that all the doors 135
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opened into one big room, and we could hear music coming faintly from within it. It sounded like a Marlene Dietrich recording.
“I believe you want to see one of my customers,” Johnnie said to me when she’d recovered from Bogart’s greeting.
“That’s right. Stella Gordon. Didn’t Harriet tell you?”
“She told me. I had to ask someone to find Miss Gordon. I don’t know her personally, and people seldom use their real names here, as you’re well aware.”
“Did you ask her if she’d see us?”
“I did, and she agreed. She doesn’t know you, Mr. Scott, but I do, and I think you can be trusted. And she knows Mr. Bogart, or so she says. I understand from Harry that he’s in some sort of difficulty and believes Stella can help him.”
“That’s right,” Bogart said. “We just need to ask her a few questions.
We won’t cause any trouble for her or for you.”
Johnnie sighed as if she’d heard that line before, as I was sure she had.
“She has a friend with her,” Johnnie said.
“Who?” I asked.
Johnnie smiled, but not so wide as to crack her make-up.
“I have no idea. She’s using the name Bobbette, but that doesn’t mean a thing.”
I figured that Bobbette was most likely Wendy Felsen. I found he choice of names interesting, given that Stella was married to a guy that people called Bob.
“Names don’t matter,” I said. “Is Stella in the usual room?”
“Yes,” Johnnie said, “but I’ll go with you. Please follow the rules.”
She turned away and went to the door of Dr. Wood. When she opened it, th
e music spilled out into the hallway. Dietrich was getting rowdy, singing “See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have.”
We went through the door. I’d seen it all before, but it was new to Bogart. The big, dimly lit room was full of women, not all of whom looked like women. Some of them were in suits, looking imperially slim, and a couple even wore tuxedos. Some of them looked like dewy-eyed refugees from the set of Gone with the Wind. And some of them looked like dockworkers.
Smoke floated in the air near the ceiling, and several of the women 136
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were smoking cigarettes in long, thin holders. Others held their smokes the way Bogart usually did, cupping their fingers over their cigarettes.
Johnnie led us right through the middle of the room. The crowd parted in front of us, but nobody looked directly at us. To everyone there, we were as insubstantial as the smoke.
We reached the other side of the room and went to a door that opened onto a short hall. On both sides of that hall were other doors, but these were of solid wood. Now and then some of Johnnie’s clients needed a little privacy, and these rooms were available for a small fee. The first room on the right was the one where I’d always talked with people before.
Johnnie went to that door and knocked.
“Come in,” someone said from inside, and Johnnie opened the door.
We went in and saw Stella Gordon and Wendy Felsen. They weren’t wearing their jungle costumes now. Wendy had on a skirt and bobbysox. She looked like a sweet-faced high-school student, sort of like Andy Hardy’s girlfriend, Polly Benedict. Stella was wearing the pants, which were part of a sharply tailored business suit. Her hair was pulled back tight and wound into a little bun at the back of her head.
What we had here, I thought, was an interesting bit of role reversal, with Stella now taking on the male role in a relationship with someone who was calling herself Bobbette for the occasion. I figured a psychologist would have a wonderful time looking into it, but it wasn’t my department.
Even with the suit on, Stella Gordon looked like Stella Gordon, which was certainly good enough for me. I had one of those inevitable and involuntary flashes of thought: if she just met the right man (me, naturally), she might change her mind about Wendy. I knew better, of course. I just couldn’t help myself. A psychologist would probably have a great time with me, too.
The room was furnished with an armchair, which is where Wendy was sitting, a bed, and a small night table. On the table were a clock, a lamp, and an ashtray. Stella sat on the edge of the bed with her legs crossed, swinging her foot. Her arms were at her sides, her hands flat on the bedspread.
Johnnie performed the introductions, and Wendy looked a bit frightened when she heard what I did for Warner Brothers, but Stella 137
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wasn’t bothered at all. She seemed genuinely interested in helping Bogart.
“What’s this problem you have, Bogie?” she asked.
Johnnie appeared satisfied that things were going to be fine and that we weren’t going to start any fights, so she excused herself and left the room.
Bogart explained to Stella and Wendy that Frank Burleson had been trying to blackmail him because Burleson owed Charlie O. a lot of money for gambling debts. He told them that the cops had found out about Burleson’s shakedown attempt and because of that Bogart found himself a suspect in Burleson’s murder.
“I’m sorry to hear it,” Stella said. “But what does it have to do with me?”
We’d agreed on the drive to the club that Bogart wouldn’t tell the exact truth at this point. There was no need yet to mention that we thought her husband might have killed Burleson.
Or that she might have.
“I was just wondering if Burleson had tried his blackmail gag on anyone else,” Bogart said. “I knew you were vulnerable.”
“How did you know that?”
“Let’s just say I’m an observant guy,” Bogart told her, not mentioning that what he’d observed had occurred only that day.
“Don’t tell them anything, Stella,” Wendy said, her voice unsteady.
“Let’s leave here. Right now.”
Bogart looked at her. “Maybe he didn’t try it on Stella, after all.
Maybe it was someone else he picked on.”
Wendy stood up. “We don’t have to listen to him, Stella. He’s just trying to cause trouble.”
I was beginning to think that Johnnie shouldn’t have left so soon, but I needn’t have worried.
“Sit down, Wendy,” Stella said, and Wendy sat. But there were tears in her eyes.
“Don’t mind her,” Stella said. “She gets emotional sometimes.”
Wendy bit her lip and sank deeper into the chair as if trying to make herself disappear.
“What about it?” Bogart said. “Was Burleson trying to put the squeeze on either of you?” Then he added, as if it was an afterthought,
“Or on Bob?”
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“What do you know about Bob?”
“We know why the two of you got married,” I said, stretching the truth a little. “The cover was as much for him as it was for you. But don’t worry. We’re not going to tell anybody.”
Stella didn’t deny that I was right. Instead, she asked Bogart for a cigarette. He got one for her and one for himself, then lit them.
“Bob doesn’t think anyone knows about him,” Stella said. “He’d be embarrassed if he knew you’d found out.”
She didn’t mean me. Carroll didn’t give a tinker’s dam about me.
She meant Bogart, who said, “Bob’s sex life doesn’t matter to me. It’s his business. He’s still the same Bob. Is he the one Burleson was after?”
“Frank was a turd,” Stella said. “He knew about me and Wendy, and he knew about Bob. I suppose he found out in the course of his job, but he never had to do anything that involved any of us. He tried something on me several months ago, right after my marriage. He didn’t want money.”
I knew what he’d wanted, and I felt a little guilty for my own lecherous thoughts. But at least I hadn’t acted on my thoughts, as Frank apparently had. I had a feeling that he hadn’t gotten anywhere, however. And I was a little surprised that even Frank would stoop that low, though I shouldn’t have been.
“Asshole,” Wendy said, to no one in particular. I hoped she was talking about Frank.
“When he didn’t get what he wanted from me,” Stella said, “he went after Wendy.”
Wendy stood up again. “I don’t want to talk about this. I don’t even want to hear you talking about this. I’m leaving.”
“Sit down, Wendy,” Stella said, but Wendy didn’t sit down. She started for the door.
Stella stood up and grabbed her arm, twisting her around, and practically flung her at the chair. Wendy caromed off the arm of the chair and over to the room’s only window. She stood there with her back to us, looking out at the night. Stella went on talking as if nothing had happened.
“Frank didn’t try anything more, not then, but a few days ago, he came back. This time, he said, he meant business. He needed money, and if I didn’t give it to him, he was going to let the papers in on my 139
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little secret. Those were his exact words, your ‘little secret.’ He went to Bob and told him the same thing.”
“And what did you do about it?” Bogart asked.
Stella blew out a plume of smoke and smiled.
“I didn’t kill him, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“What about Wendy?” I asked. “She’s getting pretty worked up about all this.”
Wendy’s back stiffened, but she didn’t turn around.
“Wendy wouldn’t hurt anyone,” Stella said. Then she added thoughtfully, “But Bob might.”
Well, that was what we’d come to hear. Bogart walked over to the night table and snuffed his Chesterfield in the ashtray.
Stella did the same.
“Tell us about Bob,” I said.
“He has a friend. I don’t know who. I don’t ask. I’m not even sure if he knows about Wendy. We live in the same house, and we get along fine, but we don’t often talk about personal things. He has his life, and I have mine.”
“You talked about Burleson, though,” I said.
“Yes, we talked about him. We decided that we were going to Mr.
Wayne and get him fired. But it didn’t work out like that.”
Wayne had strung me and Bogart along, but we’d known that. We just hadn’t known that his stars had been complaining to him about Burleson.
“Wayne didn’t do anything,” I said, though I thought I already knew the answer. “Did he?”
“No. He told us not to pay Frank, that he’d see to it that Frank didn’t bother us again.”
“And did he keep his word?”
As if there was any chance of that. This was Hollywood, after all, where a man’s word wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.
“No. Frank came back again, to both me and Bob.” Stella looked down at the floor. “We told him we’d pay.”
Throughout this part of the conversation, Wendy had stood motionless at the window. Now she turned around.
“He came to me, too,” she said. “He told me that he was going to ruin Stella if I didn’t pay him. He said he wouldn’t worry about ruining me, because I didn’t amount to anything.”
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Her shoulders shook as she began to cry, and Stella went to the window and put her arms around her. She did a lot, I thought, first with the spiders and now with the blackmail story.
“She’s right,” Stella said. “I didn’t have the money. But neither did Bob. He’s the one who said he was going to get Frank some other way.”
“And you think he killed him,” Bogart said.
“I don’t think anything. It’s something we haven’t discussed. If he did it, though, I’m proud of him.”
I couldn’t blame her for feeling that way, and it looked to me as if the word Dawson had scrawled in the dirt must surely have meant Bob Carroll.
“What kind of car does Bob drive?” I asked.