[Celebrity Murder Case 10] - The Humphrey Bogart Muder Case

by George Baxt

  “Of course,” said Bogart as he chewed with contentment. “It’s Hollywood. It’s the pier at Venice. It’s all for the tourists.”

  “We go there and we’re not tourists,” said Mayo defensively.

  “I don’t care who it’s for,” said Bogart, “I like the place. It’s great for Christmas presents.”

  ‘‘And the prices are reasonable,” added Mayo, ‘‘and for Bogie, therein lies its charm.”

  “You insinuating I’m a cheapskate?” He said this with rare warmth. Hellman looked at him and then at Mayo. The Battling Bogarts? It’s got to be a sham. He loves her, for crying out loud, and she’d kill for him. I think they beat up on each other because it’s their perverted way of expressing love. She looked at Hammett. If he ever laid a finger on her other than erotically she’d cut off his essentials.

  ‘‘What are you thinking, Lily,” asked Hammett.

  ‘‘Better you shouldn’t know.”

  ‘‘You know, the funny thing about Dickens and his daughter is there’s absolutely no resemblance.”

  “Come to think of it, you’re right,” agreed Mayo.

  Bogart continued, “Maybe Edgar’s a stepfather, or maybe she’s adopted.”

  “Or maybe she’s not a daughter,” suggested Hellman.

  Hammett said, “There you go, Lily. Always looking for the seamy side of things.”

  “They’re the most fun and the most interesting. What makes my Little Foxes so fascinating to audiences, thank God. Most of my characters are rats.”

  Bogart couldn’t resist. “Didn’t I read somewhere they were based on your own family?”

  “That’s right. They were. Thought you'd upset me, Bogie?”

  “No, I was just looking for confirmation. That’s your best play, Lily.”

  “How nice of you, Bogie, how very nice.”

  “And that’s all the nice you’re going to get out of me tonight. You know, Mayo. We might take a drive out to Venice Beach tomorrow. See what’s with the Dickens and cornucopias. There’s no rehearsal tomorrow, Mary’s doing a radio show and that ties her up all day. Dash? Lily? You want to join us?”

  “Do I have to ride the carousel?” asked Hellman.

  Bogart said, “Hazel Dickson’s been abandoned. Her boyfriend’s deserted her.”

  “No, he hasn’t,” said Mayo. “A waiter called him to the phone.”

  “Terrific guy, Herb Villon. And a damned good detective,” said Bogart.

  “We’ve met him,” said Hellman. “Sam Spade he isn’t.”

  “Sam Spade’s fiction,” said Bogart. “Herb’s for real. He’s headed this way. I don’t like the look on his face. Something’s wrong.”

  Hazel left her table and hurried after Villon. She could sense something was up that could prove profitable for her.

  Villon said to Bogart and Mayo, “Sorry to break up the party, folks, but I just spoke to my partner, Jim Mallory. Bogie, Mayo, your house was broken into. Your neighbor out walking his dog saw the front door open. He investigated. The place has been ransacked.”

  “Our housekeeper! Hannah! What about Hannah!”

  “Now take it easy, Slugger,” said Bogart. He asked Villon, “She’s okay, isn’t she?”

  Villon would always remember this moment and the pain it caused the Bogarts. “She’s been murdered. A knife in her chest.”

  “Oh my God!” cried Mayo, “Oh my God!”

  And at the next table somebody said, “The Battling Bogarts are at it again!”

  FIVE

  HANNAH DARROW LAY ON HER back on the foyer floor, the subject of the police photographer’s camera. She had never received this much attention in life. The Bogarts came into the house through the back door. Turning into their usually quiet street, Bogart saw in addition to patrol cars a swarm of reporters and photographers and exploded with a series of expletives. He maneuvered the car into an alley that led to the rear of his house, followed by Hammett and Hellman in Hammett’s unprepossessing roadster. Villon with Hazel at his side drove right up to the front of the house and immediately fielded a barrage of questions from the newsmen. “Men and ladies, you know as much as I do. I just got here. Let me through, damn it!” He elbowed his way through the mass of reporters while Hazel paused to tell a sob sister she knew, “Love your hat.”

  Inside the house, Mayo stared down at Hannah with a pained and sorrowful expression. Bogart gently patted Mayo’s shoulder and she heaved a dry sob. Hellman stared at the sorrowful tableau in the foyer and then switched her attention to the mess in the living room. The overturned chairs, the open drawers with contents spilled out on the floor, the broken wall mirror—which Lillian didn’t know was not the fault of the ransacker—a sideboard from which had spilled a variety of dinner linens. Hellman said to Hammett, “Mayo’s one hell of a housekeeper.”

  “Come off it, Lily. Save the wisecracks for the gang back at the Garden of Allah,” meaning the small hotel on Sunset Boulevard that mostly housed refugees from New York and had once been the elegant residence of silent star Alla Nazimova. Bogart joined Hammett.

  “What an effing mess. Jack Warner ain't gonna like the attendant publicity. I wonder if the countess and her help have solid alibis. Mayo! Don’t go upstairs alone! There might be somebody up there.”

  “Just me,” said Jim Mallory as he appeared on the top landing. “Come on up, Mrs. Bogart, and check if anything’s missing.”

  “That’s just what I intend to do.” She hurried up the stairs followed by Hazel Dickson.

  Hellman said in an aside to Hammett, “I don’t suppose she had much in the way of expensive jewelry.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, that story of the boyfriend who worked at Tiffany’s. It sounded a bit wistful to me. I don’t see Bogie as being a man who showers a beloved with expensive gems.”

  “I see Bogart as a man who’s practical enough to keep from drowning in a sea of unnecessary debts.” He reintroduced himself to Herb Villon, having met him several weeks earlier when there were several break-ins at the Garden of Allah, but Villon most assuredly remembered him. Bogart was at the desk checking for damage. It was one of the few good antiques in the room and he envisioned a good price for it if he should ever have the misfortune to liquidate, something to contemplate if Mayo continued her spending sprees. He saw a man kneeling and examining Hannah Darrow. Obviously a medical examiner. Bogart turned his face away as the examiner removed the knife from Hannah’s chest. The knife was placed in a plastic bag and as far as Bogart and his weak stomach were concerned would forever remain in exile. Bogart joined Hammett and Villon and asked Villon, “You know about the countess?”

  “From Hazel.”

  “Then you know everything.”

  “When Jim Mallory paged me at the restaurant I had him ring the Ambassador at once. The secretary answered the phone. Then the boyfriend got on the phone and last but not least, the kid herself, la Contessa. All present and accounted for.”

  “How convenient,” said Bogart while Hammett wished Lillian would get off her knees and stop nosing about in the Bogarts’ dinner linens. God forbid there should be no damask napkins. Apparently there was. Hellman was holding one up to the light with a look of surprise on her face, and then rubbing the napkin with her fingers to test the quality of the material. From the look on her face, it was a damned good and expensive cut of damask. Poor Lily. Foiled at last.

  Mayo came marching down the stairs with Hazel in tow. “Nothing's missing. Everything’s there, including my good Cartier earrings.”

  Damn fool, thought Hellman, she could have lied through her teeth and collected some insurance.

  Mayo said to Bogart, “I think we’d better check into a hotel tonight. Upstairs it’s a nightmare.”

  Bogart suggested roguishly, “I’m sure we could get into the Ambassador.”

  “Why not our place?” asked Hammett.

  “Allah be praised,” said Hellman, joining them and lighting a cigarette. “Poor Mayo. This is just aw
ful. It’ll be on every front page across the world in the morning.”

  “Oh, no, it won’t!” The one and only, the inimitable Jack Warner had entered unseen by his star, the star’s wife, and their friends. He stepped over the corpse to enter from the foyer and the coroner gave him a sharp and unpleasant look. Two of Warner’s high powered publicity men accompanied the mogul and also hopscotched over the body. Warner said to Hazel, “Thanks for phoning me, Hazel. It’s worth five exclusives.”

  “Ten,” countered Hazel. Warner ignored her.

  “Come off it, Jack,” said Bogart, “what makes you think you can keep this out of the papers? Murder in Humphrey Bogart’s house.”

  “If it was Humphrey Bogart who was murdered, I’d have a lot of trouble,” said Warner, “in fact, I’d cause a lot of trouble, wouldn’t I boys,” this addressed to his press reps, who had brought their cameras and were photographing everything in sight including keyholes. “But when the corpse is only a housekeeper…”

  “What an epitaph,” murmured Hellman, who made a mental note never to work for Jack Warner no matter how much money he offered, even if he threw in the services of Errol Flynn.

  Mayo had built up a full head of steam. “Only a house- keeper! She was a person! A human being! She was our friend!”

  “No offense meant,” said Warner amiably and then he exploded. “I’ve got hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in Humphrey Bogart! He starts a major motion picture in a couple of weeks and there’s three more lined up for him!”

  “What three more?” asked Bogart.

  “They’re a surprise,” swiftied Warner.

  “Sure. Like a big increase in my take home.”

  Warner asked winsomely, “Are you referring to salami sandwiches?”

  “No, I’m referring to cheese.”

  Warner glared at him and then asked, “Who’s in charge of the investigation?”

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” said Herb Villon. “I’m not window dressing.”

  “Oh, of course! Herb!” He crossed to Villon and put an arm around his shoulder. He said to the room, “L.A.’s greatest detective! Say, Herb! Why don’t you collaborate with Hazel on your autobiography? I’ll buy it for Bogie.”

  Bogie said, “He’ll pay you in salami sandwiches.”

  “I don't like salami,” said Herb Villon, and refrained from adding, and I also don’t like Jack Warner and if he doesn’t get his arm from around my shoulder I just might be tempted to break it.

  “Say, Jack,” said Bogart, a quixotic tone to his voice, “how do you plan to keep this quiet? Cross everybody’s palm with silver, and I mean cash, not the Lone Ranger’s horse.”

  “Just leave it to me and my boys!” To an amused Hammett he sounded like W. C. Fields describing how he cut his way “through a solid wall of Indian flesh.” Hammett, like everyone with Hollywood connections, knew Jack Warner considered himself sophisticated and urbane and possessed of a distinct and unusual wit. But like most of his peers, he was crass, vulgar, and about as funny as an infant’s funeral.

  “Not so fast, Jack. You may be losing out on yards of free publicity for The Maltese Falcon.”

  Warner raged, “This kind of publicity we don’t need and I won’t have.”

  “Supposing I tell you the subplot of this murder case is practically synonymous with Dash’s story.”

  “How so?”

  Bogart told him of the pursuit of the mysterious cornucopia.

  “That’s plagiarism!” shouted Warner.

  “It’s cold facts,” said Bogart. “That’s why our place was destroyed and poor Hannah murdered, and the least you can do is send lots of lilies to Hannah’s funeral.”

  “She liked gladiolas,” said Mayo.

  “You!” cried Warner. “You and your father!”

  “Go no further with my father,” warned Mayo. “And my mother and I are just innocent victims.”

  Warner’s publicity men took him to one side for a conference.

  Bogart said to Villon, “If Warner ever bought the rights to your life story, the son of a bitch would assign it to Jimmy Cagney. Don’t you write it!”

  Warner emerged from the brief huddle with his toadies. “Maybe this is a blessing in disguise. As my blessed mother used to say, ‘Every cloud has a silver lining.’”

  “If it was your mother, I’m sure she said velvet,” said Bogart.

  “I’m going to hire Adela Rogers St. John to write our news releases!”

  “That figures,” said Bogart. Miss St. John was Hollywood’s most respected, most prolific dispenser of news and gossip. Even the major columnists deferred to her. Her father had been the notorious, hard drinking criminal lawyer Earl St. John. Adela fashioned a story about herself and her father into A Free Soul, starring Norma Shearer and Lionel Barrymore and a young Clark Gable whose impact as a sadistic gangster made him an “overnight” success after seven years of struggles.

  “Adela has class and respect. She’ll make sure this isn’t turned into a three-ring circus.” Hannah Darrow’s body was being removed from the premises, covered with a sheet and strapped to a stretcher.

  “Say Jack,” said Bogart impishly, “why don’t you consider the life of Hannah Darrow?”

  “Hannah Darrow? Any relation to Clarence Darrow?”

  “That might be arranged.” Hammett’s expression openly admired Bogart and his total lack of respect for his employer. Lillian Hellman was busy hunting for the Bogart’s obviously secret stash of liquor which apparently hadn’t interested the intruder.

  “Who is Hannah Darrow?” asked Warner.

  Bogart pointed to the stretcher being carried out of the house. “There goes Hannah Darrow. Our housekeeper. A hell of a part for Marjorie Rambeau.”

  “Bogie,” said Warner with a sudden attack of piety, “that’s sacrilegious.”

  “How would you know? You never met her.”

  “Let’s get out of here!” Warner barked at his press reps. “And you,” pointing a finger at Bogart,” tomorrow you rehearse.”

  “Tomorrow I don’t rehearse. Huston cancelled it. Tomorrow I take my wife for a ride on a carousel. Want to join us? Maybe you’ll catch the brass ring.” Warner advised him to do something both unprintable and physically impossible and then left the house with his flunkies in his wake. Outside, he paused to pose for the photographers and let himself be questioned by the reporters. Bogart appeared in the doorway. “Hey, Jack!” he yelled, “tomorrow send over a crew to straighten out my place! If Mayo and I have to do it, I’ll be too tired to rehearse the day after tomorrow!” He shut the door while Warner’s face reddened and he clenched his fists.

  In the house, Bogart returned to the living room. The indestructible Lillian Hellman had found a bottle of scotch and glasses in a kitchen cabinet and had poured for herself and Hammett. Mayo was in the kitchen fixing a pitcher of gin martinis with Jim Mallory and Hazel Dickson aiding and abetting. A crew of plainclothes officers and forensics experts were dusting down the room and would spend the better part of the night and possibly the next day working on the rest of the house.

  Bogart said to Villon, “I don’t suppose the countess and her supporting players did the actual ransacking. It’s a long schlepp from the Ambassador to here and then back again. I don't think they could have managed it.”

  “It's an even longer schlepp from Venice Beach,” said Villon.

  “What do you mean?”

  “The countess said they were out visiting the Old Curiosity Shop.”

  “Well, what do you know about that!” He stopped to think. “I wonder if old man Dickens and Nell know the cornucopia story.”

  “By tomorrow or the day after, the whole world’s going to know it. Miss St. John packs a mean typewriter. Say, Hazel, are you going to let her scoop you?”

  Hazel smiled and fluttered her eyelashes. “You may not have noticed, but I have been on the phone with Louella and Hedda and Jimmy and Sidney and Harrison and my sister Clara to tell her I won’t
be home tonight.”

  “Why? Where you shacking up?”

  She glared at him. He said, “Oh,” and returned his attention to Bogart. He took him by the arm and away from the others as Mayo returned with a pitcher of martinis and. Jim holding a tray of glasses. Mayo said to Hazel, “Where’d you disappear to?”

  “I had some phone calls to make.”

  Mayo shouted, “Bogle! Martinis!”

  “In a minute,” he shouted back.

  “Why are you two shouting?” asked Lillian Hellman as she added more scotch to her glass.

  “It goes with the territory,” said Mayo.

  Villon said to Bogart, “It's my theory the countess isn’t the only one hunting for the whatchamacallit.”

  “I’m glad you said it. I've been thinking the same thing but couldn't figure out who it might be.”

  “It could be any number of people,” said Villon. “Collectors, dealers, all very unscrupulous people. Like autograph hounds. You know what they're like.”

  “Vultures with fountain pens and autograph albums. But to commit murder!”

  Villon’s hands were outstretched with palms open and facing upward. “So what? Maybe the killer thought the house was empty. She didn’t live in, did she?”

  “No. She has an apartment in West Hollywood. Lives with an unmarried daughter. Christ. She's got to be notified. Mayo! Where's Hannah’s home number? Call her daughter before she reads it in the papers. She’s probably worried Hannah’s not home by now.” Mayo went to the desk where she kept their personal phone book. It was an assignment she didn’t relish.

  Bogart resumed with Villon. “Sometimes Hannah stayed late to do some chores she couldn’t do if we were at home. That’s what she probably did tonight, poor soul, working in the kitchen, the rest of the house dark. She probably heard the bastard breaking in …”

  “Skeleton key,” corrected Villon. “She probably heard the racket and ransackers make one hell of a racket. It’s my guess she came into this room, made a racket of her own and then started for the front door, got caught in the foyer and you know the rest.”