The Case of the Poisoned Eclairs

by Howard Fast

“Now.”

  “I got a date.”

  “Call them and tell them you’ll be late.”

  “I don’t have to answer any questions.”

  “I don’t have to be nice,” Masuto said gently.

  “All right. You win. You want coffee?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  Cooper regarded him curiously. “You’re a damn funny cop. I never knew they had a Jap on the police force here.”

  “You live and you learn.”

  “I shouldn’t have said that—Jap,” Cooper said. “I meant Japanese. What the hell, you pick it up. I’ll get the coffee. Maybe you want a drink?”

  Masuto shook his head, and Cooper went to the back of the place and then emerged with two cups.

  “Sugar and cream?”

  “Just straight.”

  He handed Masuto the coffee and sat down beside him. “Since that lousy film came out, everyone thinks this business has class and glamour. It doesn’t. You work your ass off and take crud all day. I been on my feet nine hours.”

  “A man should enjoy his work,” Masuto said.

  “Do you enjoy yours?”

  “At times, yes. Right now, no.”

  “Where do I fit in?”

  “Here are four names: Laura Crombie, Alice Greene, Nancy Legett, and Mitzie Fuller. How many of these women do you know?”

  “I know all of them.”

  “Oh? And how is that?”

  “They’re customers.”

  “I’d like to know about them.”

  “I don’t talk about my customers. I got maybe two or three principles. That’s one of them.”

  Masuto smiled. “That’s admirable. But I’m a cop, and these four women are in great danger. So in this instance, I suggest you put your principles aside.”

  “What kind of danger?”

  “Someone is trying to kill them. I’m telling you this because I think it’s the only way I’ll get you to open up, but it stops with you.”

  The hairdresser stared at Masuto. “Are you putting me on?”

  “No. I’m telling you the truth.”

  “Who? Who’s trying to kill them?”

  “I don’t know. It could even be you.”

  Cooper shook his head slowly. “Not likely. Oh, I hate some of these biddies enough to want to kill them, but it’s not my style. I couldn’t kill a mouse. Anyway, I’m a vegetarian.”

  Masuto did not regard it as a non sequitur. “You’re not a likely suspect, but you do know all four of them.”

  “Customers. I know maybe two or three hundred dames in this town. Mostly they don’t bother me. I take them for what they are. They take me for what I am. It doesn’t drive them out of their minds to have their hair cut by a guy who’s gay. It’s only the cops and Anita Bryant who climb walls at the thought that somebody maybe don’t have the same sexual preference.”

  “How well do you know them?”

  “The way a hairdresser knows his customers. Some more, some less.”

  “Start with Laura Crombie.”

  “She doesn’t talk much. I don’t know whether I like her or not but she’s straight on. She doesn’t dye her hair.”

  “Who would want to kill her?”

  “You’re asking me? She doesn’t even take alimony from the son of a bitch she was married to.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “The women talk.”

  “Do you know her husband?”

  “Just by reputation. Crombie and Hawkes, real estate.”. “Who is Hawkes?”

  “Nobody. He’s been dead for years.”

  “Alice Greene?”

  “Tall willowy blonde. Not real, but a great head of hair. She’s the type I’d go for if I were straight. Real class, except that a buck is a buck. No other reason why she married that creep Alan Greene—you can’t turn on the tube without seeing his ads for his string of stores. Since I’m talking, I’ll talk. Her alimony is five grand a month. I know some guys who’d murder their own mothers to save sixty thousand a year, and to add insult to injury she’s been having an affair with Monte Sweet, the comic. But they’ll never get married. They’d have to be crazy to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.”

  “Meaning her alimony.”

  “You bet your ass. The best investment there is. You put in a couple of years, and not only have you got the community property law going for you, but you got a fat check coming in every month.”

  “And is that the case with Nancy Legett?”

  “Now there’s something else. She’s a quiet little mouse—the one in ten in Beverly Hills who just lets her hair go gray. I don’t know what to make of her—quiet, polite, no gossip. She was married twenty-two years to Fulton Legett, the producer. He’s a big swinger, and for a long time he was up on top. But the past few years, he’s had one bomb on top of another, and today they say he’s broke. That don’t mean he’s poor, but maybe he’s tired of keeping her in that big house up on Lexington Road. She’s got three kids. They’re away at school, the way I hear it, two of them in swanky Eastern colleges and one in a prep school back east. That don’t come cheap.”

  “And Mitzie Fuller?”

  Tony Cooper leaned back and grinned. “Mitzie. She’s a doll—she’s an absolute doll. Red hair—real, not from the bottle—a great face and the best pair of boobs this side of the Grand Canyon. Never heard a bad word out of her. She is the sweetest, nicest bundle that ever walked into this tonsorial cathouse. Tell you something, Sarge, if I was straight I’d break my ass trying to get next to her. One thing about broads you can bet your last dollar on, the nicer they are, the worse bums they tie up with, and Mitzie’s ex, Bill Fuller, is no exception to the rule.”

  “William Fuller, the director?”

  “That’s right. Now let me tell you something. I don’t run the biggest hair shop in Beverly Hills, but I like to think it’s the best, and I get the pick of the classy broads, and they talk and they talk and they talk. If I didn’t have trouble writing my own name, I could write you a tome on the habits of so-called straight men that would curl your hair, and I’d have a chapter on film directors. They are the meanest, most arrogant, egotistical set of bastards that ever lived, and Billy Fuller is one of the top runners. I’m still waiting to hear something nice about him. Now I don’t know why they got divorced, because Mitzie don’t talk. They were only married six months when it broke up, but Mitzie got the house on Palm Drive, which the real estate ladies tell me is worth three-quarters of a million on today’s market, and the word is that she gets a fat check every month. Well, she earned it. Six months living with Billy Fuller has no price on it. But you want a candidate, you got him. He’s a killer. He’d kill anything that got in his way.”

  Masuto was silent for a long moment. Then he said, “I wouldn’t mention that to anyone else—for your sake, as well as mine.”

  “You asked me.”

  “I know. And you told me. And for the time being, it rests with us. Right?”

  “Right.”

  Chapter 5

  The L. A. Cops

  Masuto stopped off for a hamburger and a cup of coffee, and he had them wrap two and fill a container of coffee for Beckman. Knowing Beckman, he knew that it would make no appreciable difference to Beckman’s appetite if he had brought a sandwich to the vigil. For Beckman to sit in the car, preserving a sandwich for some future dinner hour, was unthinkable. He turned out to have been right.

  “I’m starved,” was the first thing Beckman said to him.

  “I brought you two hamburgers and coffee.”

  “With pickles?”

  “With pickles.”

  “You know,” Beckman said as he unwrapped the first hamburger, “under that cold, inscrutable shell of yours, you got heart.”

  “I’m relieved to know that. What happened?”

  “You mean with the kid or here?”

  “First the kid.”

  “Well, we rounded up a couple of kids near the bakery, and they identi
fied him. Jesus Consolo, fourteen years old. A good kid. Never got into any trouble, no dope, tenth grade, good marks. The L.A. investigators matched it up with a missing report, and I let them break the news to his parents. I’m no good for that kind of thing. I got a fourteen-year-old kid of my own, Masao, and I swear if I ever find that lunatic bastard—”

  “No, you won’t. Now what about the kids who identified him? Did they see anything?”

  “Nothing, nothing—nothing until it stinks. This bastard leaves no loose ends.”

  “They all leave loose ends.”

  “I sure as hell hope so.”

  “And what about here?”

  “Well, when I got here, I rang the bell and told Mrs. Crombie that I’d be here in the car. She wasn’t crazy about the idea, and I asked her about the three other women, just to make sure they were inside.”

  “Were they?”

  “Yeah, they’re there. I told her to bolt the back door and to call me in case anyone came to the back door. That’s it. All quiet as a graveyard.”

  “Good. Patch in a call to your wife and tell her you won’t be home tonight.”

  “What? She’ll skin me.”

  “I want you to stay overnight in the Crombie house.”

  “You’re putting me on.”

  “Dead serious. I’m going to convince all four women to remain there overnight and I want you to stay with them.”

  “And that’s what I tell my wife—that I’m sleeping in Beverly Hills with four dames?”

  “If you want to be perfectly honest.”

  “Masao,” Beckman said seriously, “I think you’re a little nutty with this one. They don’t need me there overnight. They lock the doors and the windows. Every one of these Beverly Hills houses has a burglar alarm system.”

  “I need you there.”

  “You’re a heartless bastard.”

  “Am I? Locking you up with four lovely women—that’s what every red-blooded American boy dreams of, or so I’m told.”

  “Okay, okay. When will you be back?”

  “Before ten. Just hang in.”

  “I still don’t know exactly what I’m supposed to do if someone comes to the door.”

  “Just find out who he is and what he wants. You don’t keep him or her out. Let Mrs. Crombie decide about that.”

  Masuto’s radio phone was speaking to him as he drove off. Wainwright’s voice was demanding, “Where the hell are you, Masao?”

  “Turning a corner two blocks away.”

  “Well, get over here. Do you know what time it is? It’s eight o’clock, and I’m sitting here on my butt when I should be home eating a decent dinner, and I’m sitting here because the Los Angeles cops are sore as hell. They want your scalp and they want me here when they take it.”

  “I’ll be there in two minutes.”

  “What in hell have you been up to?”

  “Two minutes.”

  Masuto pulled into his parking space on Rexford Drive and went inside. Wainwright was pacing in front of Masuto’s office. “What’s this all about?” he snapped.

  “I don’t know. I have to call my wife.”

  “So help me, Masao, if there’s one thing a crummy little police force like ours can’t afford, it’s a ruckus with the L.A. cops. Not now. Not with the city refusing to shell out a nickel for new equipment. We depend on those miserable bastards. I don’t want them to mark us lousy.”

  “Who did you talk to?”

  “A lieutenant, Pete Bones. He’s coming up here with a Captain Kennedy.”

  “Pete’s an old friend.”

  “He didn’t sound like a friend, old or new.”

  “Let’s take it easy and wait until they get here. Meanwhile, I have to call Kati, or I’ll have more trouble than the Los Angeles cops could ever give me.”

  Masuto went into his office and dialed his home number. The first thing Kati said was, “Your dinner has spoiled.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I don’t think you are. I think it’s something you’re saying. There are other policemen in the world and they work from nine to five and they see their children and their wives.”

  “You haven’t gone to that women’s consciousness-raising session yet?”

  “I’m going tonight. I thought you would be here. Then when I realized you would not be here, I telephoned Suzi Asata, and she will be my baby sitter. I will have to pay her five dollars. I don’t think it ought to come out of my household money. I think it ought to come out of your pocket.”

  “I agree with you,” he said meekly.

  “You do?”

  “Yes. Why should that surprise you?”

  “Oh, Masao, why do you make me so angry?”

  “I don’t think you’re really angry.”

  “Please tell me that you will not do anything dangerous tonight.”

  “I promise you.”

  “And what will you do?”

  “Only talk to some ladies.”

  “Stop teasing me. Why must you always tease me?”

  “I’m not teasing. I promise to tell you the whole story when I see you. I am not talking to these ladies for pleasure. I am talking to them because they are part of this case I am on.”

  “I sometimes think that it is always a pleasure for you to talk to American ladies.”

  “Kati, I love you.”

  “Well—”

  “Believe me. And how are the children?”

  “Someday you will see them and decide for yourself.”

  He put down the phone as Polly entered. She was still small, blonde, and pretty. “I stayed an extra hour waiting for you, Masao.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’m not making a pass. I’m saving that until you get divorced.”

  “I have no intention of getting divorced,” he said severely.

  “Baloney. All cops get divorced. Their wives can’t put up with them. Anyway, we can save that discussion for another time. What I got for you now is a very funny phone call.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “First place, foreign accent but phony.”

  “How do you know it was phony?”

  She shrugged. “You watch enough TV, you know. He says to me, Who’s on the poisoned candy case? Me, nobody tells me anything. I just answer the phone, and everything else I do, which is practically everything around here, it’s guess-work. So I ask for his name, and he says Horst Brandt, to go with the phony German accent.”

  “Address?”

  “Just as phony, I’m sure.” She took a slip of paper from her purse and read him the address. It had a familiar ring, and Masuto consulted his notebook. It was Alice Greene’s address on Roxbury Drive.

  “Does it mean something?” Polly asked him.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. You’re sure he said candy? Nothing about éclairs?”

  “What éclairs? Candy, éclairs. Nobody tells me a thing around here.”

  “And you’re sure it was a man’s voice, not a woman’s?”

  She stared at him in disgust. “What am I, Masao, a jerk, a nut? A man’s voice. I told you that.”

  “I’m sorry. Go on.”

  “So I tell him that if it’s a homicide case, it’s Sergeant Masuto’s department. Then he says, ‘Masuto? You mean that Jap plainclothes cop?’ He sort of forgets his accent too, and believe me, I get plenty steamed with that kind of talk and I’m ready to tell him to buzz off and sell his apples somewhere else, but I got enough sense to know that it may be important, so I tell him, yes, but we don’t talk about people that way, and then he wants to talk to you, and I tell him you’re not in but expected.”

  “Very interesting,” Masuto said.

  “Okay, I’m going. But if you don’t tell me what this is all about tomorrow, I won’t talk to you again.”

  “Promise. And thank you, Polly. Thank you for waiting.”

  “You can say that again.”

  For a few minutes after she had left, Masuto sat at his desk and stared at the
door facing him. He was still staring at it when Wainwright opened the door and said shortly, “They’re here. In my office.”

  Masuto followed Wainwright into the captain’s office. Bones and Kennedy were seated. They made no move to rise, nor did they smile or do any more than nod their heads coldly. Kennedy was the very image of a proper Los Angeles cop, about forty-five, trim, handsome, sandy hair, cold blue eyes.

  Bones opened the conversation by saying, “God damn you, Masuto, we dragged our asses up here for your cute tricks, Like we got nothing else to do with our time.”

  Watching Masuto, Wainwright saw his dark eyes harden, his mouth tighten. He had fought for Masuto before, and he often said that Masuto was the best cop he had on his force, but he also knew that Masuto was unpredictable. Whereby he stepped into the moment of silence and said, “Now, hold on, Bones. I don’t know what you and Kennedy are so pissed off at, but you’re in our town, and that calls for a little bit of restraint. So suppose you tell us what this is all about and we’ll save the name-calling.”

  “I’ll tell you what it’s all about,” Kennedy said coldly. “Today this joker—” nodding at Masuto—“comes downtown to get the advice of our poison lab, which we don’t begrudge him, and then he goes to Pete here and tells Pete that a chemist whom he doesn’t identify but who has a criminal record is going to be murdered. Then he walks out, and then two hours later the man is murdered. Now what in hell goes on? You don’t want us to be pissed off? He’s your cop. Why the hell aren’t you pissed off?”

  Masuto watched Wainwright, who was trying to repress a smile. “How does it stand?” Wainwright asked. “Do you think Masuto killed him?”

  “It could be.”

  “All right,” Wainwright said tiredly. “You drove all the way up here from downtown and I missed my dinner and my wife is sore as hell. As far as Sergeant Masuto is concerned, when he left headquarters downtown, he drove up to Mulholland Drive. He was there for almost an hour, and then he came here. So how the hell could he kill your goddamn chemist? Anyway, I got cause to be pissed off, the two of you coming up here sore as hell because I got a cop on my force smart enough to figure out that something is going to happen!”

  Bones started to say something, and Wainwright cut him off. “Also, I don’t like nobody coming here and accusing one of my men. I’ll match my force against any.”