Golden Throat (Cable Denning Mystery Series Book 1)

by James P. Alsphert

  Honey was in tears when she finished reading, her mouth curving down as she tried to stop herself from crying out loud. “Oh, you big hunk of a mushy romantic! Now look what you’ve done! I’m going to have to re-do my makeup.” She got up and came over to where I sat, bent down and kissed me again solidly on the lips. “Thank you, Cable. No one ever wrote me a love note like yours—I will treasure it for always…as long as I live…”

  “Awww…don’t take it so seriously, lady, I copied it off another greeting card in a dime store where I got this one,” I said, making light of my single-handed accomplishment.

  “You poop!” she exclaimed as she sat back down. “It’s just like you to put yourself down. But I know you wrote every word. And I know you that well. I can feel you, Cable, all the way from my toes to my heart.”

  “Yeah, well, here’s to us, Honey Combes,” I said as I lifted my glass to toast my fiancée.

  I left the Bella Notte right after our supper, telling Honey I had a lot of homework to do for a court hearing in the morning. I got back to my office and went right to my desk drawer and took out my bootleg bottle of gin and poured a big one. I lit up a Lucky Strike and sat back, feeling pretty damn good. My stomach was full, I had a roof over my head, my business was really picking up—and I was going to marry the classiest dame this side of the Nevada border.

  But I was kind of exhausted from all the shit that’d been flung at me lately and all that food made me sleepy. So I flopped down on my crumply old bed. I began to doze. I wanted to hear some music and so I turned my little box radio on. The band was playing a soppy version of The Man I Love and I thought about Honey. Yeah, life was gonna be just swell!

  But almost immediately I began to have one of those restless, foreboding half-dreams, when you’re in a semi-state of consciousness and you toss and turn and no position seems comfortable. I was back at the Bella Notte and Honey was getting dressed for her evening performance. It was so vivid. She was standing in her slip, fitting one of her gowns over the front of her body and looking into her full-length mirror. As she was checking things out, all of a sudden a dead man appeared at the transom. It was Frank Laggore. His face was twisted and scarred, one eye was partially closed, and he held a .38 in his hand, brandishing it at Honey. “The comely Miss Combes, I presume…” he said in a raspy, twisted voice.

  Honey’s eyes stared at the specter in disbelief. “Mr. Laggore! I—I thought you were—were—”

  “—dead? By the hands of your boyfriend? I heard he always bragged about having nine lives. Well, I’ve got ten!”

  “How—how did you get here? And why aren’t you dead? Cable told me you’d had an accident aboard a train or something—”

  “—accident? Ha! For bein’ the so-called truth man he says he is, you do know that son-of-a-bitch is a liar—”

  “What do you want? You scared me before—before you were—were—” Honey had to look away from that ghastly face of his.

  “—You mean…before I was thrown from the moving train to scrape along the rails—bumpity bump!” Then he drew deadly serious. “Do you know how that feels? Huh? To lose consciousness and wake up a misshapen, grotesque monster?”

  “Mr. Laggore—may we talk about this some other time? I do have to get ready for my performance tonight. I’m very sorry for your disfigurement and I’m sure it was terrifying and very painful—”

  “—painful?” He lunged forward and took Honey’s arm. “Painful…was only part of it…” He took his cold gun barrel and nosed it down between Honey’s breasts. “The other part was wanting you, Miss Honey Combes, star of nightclubs and radio—Lana Loren, some fucking starlet who fucks a stupid private dick who could never appreciate her—never give her what I could’ve!” Then he yanked her slip straps off of her shoulders.

  Honey was scared and began to tremble. “Don’t do that! You don’t want a woman who would kick and scream and fight you off every second—I’d die before I’d let you have me, you crude pig!”

  Laggore glowered at Honey. “You might just have your way, Miss Combes. What better way to get back at the man who made me like this…this thing— a ghastly, ugly creature hiding in the shadows!”

  “And you want to blame Cable for it? I know him, he wouldn’t have started something with you unless he was provoked—and I know you and that other terrible man who got thrown off the moving train ganged up on him—you were out for his blood! You would have killed him if he wasn’t better than you—in or out of bed, Mr. Frank Laggore!”

  “I wouldn’t tempt the devil if I were you, lady—you’re still a whore as far as I’m concerned, like all women, giving out to the highest bidder. Well, whatever Denning had, it wasn’t worth it!”

  Honey came back now with her own brand of anger. “He’s worth a million of you, you dumb Dago! And don’t you think I know, it was all because of me that you went after Cable. It was never that golden thing Jack Dragna was going to get paid big bucks for. Don’t you think I could feel you look at me those nights when Cable wasn’t here? Don’t you think I could feel your lust like a hot knife cutting through me, your eyes staring at my breasts, sitting at the little table at the foot of the stage wishing you could look up my dress and have what Cable has anytime he wants it!” She took a deep breath as Laggore backed away from her. “I always wanted to tell you what I really thought of you—that you were disgusting and slimy and the phony politeness in your voice hid the truth—you were always a monster—only now the outside matches the inside!”

  Unable to control himself any longer, Laggore emptied his gun into Honey, some bullets penetrating her body and shattering the glass on the mirror behind her. Honey screamed, and then whimpered in pain, holding her abdomen as Laggore stood there frozen and half smiling, his gun smoking. Honey’s eyes widened in disbelief and she staggered to the floor and collapsed.

  I woke up, sweating and restless. But I knew it was a nightmare. Maybe I’d better call the Bella Notte just in case. It was still early and Affonso Amadore assured me everything was okay and Honey was resting in her dressing room, getting ready for her Saturday night show. So I went back to work at my desk. After about three hours I had finished my preparations for a court case and held out the photos I had to present the next day at a hearing. Some elegantly dressed man was screwing a little hussy in his own home while wifey was away. She suspected it—and I snapped it with my trusty Kodak!

  Just then a news bulletin came over the radio. “A tragedy to report tonight! Honey Combes, the noted singer and rising Hollywood actress was shot tonight by an unknown assailant at her regular place of work, the Bella Notte nightclub on Wilshire Boulevard. Reports are sketchy, but it is believed that Miss Combes has been transported to the Los Angeles County Hospital—” I was numb as I dashed up and turned the radio off. I stood there in the silence, unable to accept or believe anything. Then on impulse I grabbed my coat and hat and went running out the door. I fled into the street, desperately looking for a taxi. Finally one came and we rushed straight down to Marengo and State, where the L.A. County Hospital was located. I knew the joint well. As a policeman I had visited it many times checking on shot up thugs and goons. But now—my own Honey!

  Frantically I ran into the building to reception. I was immediately directed to a “closed” area and I ran down the corridor looking for Room #11. I bumped into a nurse who told me I had to wait for the doctor before I could enter. But I couldn’t do that and I burst in the door. There with blood seeping all over her pretty green sequined costume, her face distorted in pain, lay my beautiful Honey. “Sir! You are not allowed in here! Please, I must ask you to leave immediately!” a tall man with silvery hair demanded.

  “No way, Mister, that’s my fiancée!” I ran over to Honey’s bedside. “Honey! Honey! It’s me, Cable—can you hear me, babe?” I grabbed her hands.

  She barely opened her eyes, squinting up at me, still writhing with pain, blood seeping out of several wounds, one real bad one in her chest. “We can’t stop the bl
eeding—she’s been shot six times, all of them in crucial abdominal areas. I’m Dr. Evans.” He motioned me aside. “Frankly, I don’t think we can save her—she’s lost too much blood already and I think one bullet nicked her right coronary artery. I’m sorry…”

  I dashed back to her side. “Honey…please…please…don’t go, babe, stay with me here, okay?”

  A faint light went on in her eyes. “Cable…I love you, Cable…oh…what—what happened?…I’m cold, Cable…hold me…hold me!”

  I threw my arms around her as the nurses tried to pry me off Honey’s body. By now her green dress was sopping wet with blood and she looked so pale I almost didn’t recognize her.

  I ran around the room like a maniac, screaming at everyone. “Can’t you do something? Stop the bleeding!…she’s tough, she’s so young…strong! She can survive…country girls are stronger, aren’t they? Let’s give her a warm bath, wash off the blood—then she’ll be okay! Please! Somebody!”

  The doctor leaned over Honey and put his stethoscope to her chest. He listened. Then he looked up at me and shook his head. Honey was gone. In one final exhale of breath, my beloved Honey Combes was dead…like a big light that went out in my world. I gritted my teeth and went back over to her lifeless body. I bent over and kissed her still warm lips. Her eyes looked up at me with that glazed stare I knew so well.

  I was blubbering. “…I love you, babe…and you know…I’m—I’m right behind you—it won’t be long—I wanna hear you sing Sonny Boy again—really soon...” Then I thought of my guilt. “I’m so sorry…sorry, Honey…”

  The doctor urged me away from her body. He gently escorted me out into the hallway. “There is never an answer to this senselessness, sir. But I suggest you go home and let it sink in. Don’t be afraid to grieve. Talk to friends, a priest…be comforted in knowing at least she didn’t suffer long. And now she’s at peace.”

  There was nothing I could say as I felt my feet carry me toward the exit. I stepped out into the cool night air. A breeze from the ocean carried that familiar smell of salt water and dampness. I put my hat on and started for the streetcar line. Why hurry home now? Why take a taxi? Why not just walk all night and drink and smoke until I can’t feel anything at all anymore?

  Just as I was crossing the parking lot, a voice called out me. “You’re next, Denning,” a man’s voice called out from the dark. Then he approached me, his gun drawn. “Surprised, Mr. Detective?”

  Like a nightmare from hell there stood Frank Laggore! Only it looked like some scarred, distorted version of Laggore. But I knew the score as the fiber I was really made of firmed up and I faced the son-of-a-bitch. “It was you, you bastard. You…killed her, didn’t you, Laggore?”

  “Yeah, I did. She preferred you to me—and now we’re even.” He came out into the light. His face was terribly scarred. He ran his fingers over his cheeks and nose. “This is what happens when someone throws you out of a moving train and you skid along the spikes and rails for a while. It kinda tears up your face—and no surgery will ever make it go away, Private Dick!”

  “Don’t slip up, Laggore—because you’ll be dead before you reach the pavement. You didn’t have to kill Honey. You shoulda come for me. Only spineless cowards like you kill women, you worthless fuck!”

  “Over there, Denning.” He pointed to a coupe parked a couple of rows over. “We’re going for a ride. You—you are going for your last ride.”

  I steeled myself. I was trembling inside from Honey’s death. But I couldn’t let him know that. So I said nothing as he put the gun barrel in my side and forced me forward into the back seat of the automobile. Two goons were in the front seat, so he climbed into the back and held me at gunpoint. We drove for what seemed thirty or forty minutes. We ended up at Angeles Mesa Drive Airport in the middle of the night and drove out onto the tarmac until we stopped beside an old silver biplane. This was the same airport that Rusty Wilson and I departed from on our way to Monterrey, Mexico. I was beginning to wonder if the fates had it in for me, bringing me back that unpleasant memory. Laggore pushed me out of the car and we walked toward the plane. “Why don’t you just shoot me here—now, Laggore. It’s better that way, like putting a wounded animal out of his misery. I wouldn’t wanna live in this cesspool of a world with you in it, anyway.”

  “Have no worries, Denning. You will be dead soon enough. It’s just that I have special plans for you.” He pointed to the plane. “You see, my boys here are gonna tie you up to the stunt man’s guy wire above the top wing. You’re gonna be a stunt man tonight. At about three thousand feet or so, the rope will be cut—and the fall will—will, uh, you know—spill your worthless guts all over the ground below. I had a lotta time to think about it, hiding in dark corners while my face and body began to mend. So now it’s all about making you sweat before you die. Brilliant, don’t you think?”

  “Shut up and get it over with! I think those scars make you look more like what you’ve always been inside, Laggore, sinister, dark, mean and without conscience. So don’t spare me any mercy, you worthless maggot!”

  He hit me hard on the side of my skull with his gun butt. It hurt and at once I could feel the blood pour down the side of my face. He yanked my hat off and threw it to the ground. “You won’t be needing that, either. The famous Cable Denning fedora. Nix on the trench coat, too…in fact, one of my boys could use both of those items, even if they are dirty and used.”

  “Before I go, how about one more Lucky Strike? Don’t dying men get a last smoke before the firing squad does its thing?”

  “Not my brand, Lucky Strike. I’m a Camel man…you lose.” Then he took his gun barrel and popped the buttons off my jacket, one by one. “Do you know what fun it was to empty my gun, bullet by bullet into your little songbird whore? I made sure she saw me first and that I saw the whites of her eyes before I let her have it. She looked so surprised, Denning.” He chuckled with delight. “Like—like, uh, ‘why me?’ was written all over her pretty face as she crumpled right there before me. You know, dead is dead—and she just lay there…dead. You shoulda seen it, detective!” My teeth were clenching and in that moment I woulda risked getting killed just to get at Laggore. “I made sure I didn’t mess up her face, though—she really was quite striking. But she wouldn’t fuck me—she was filled with some silly illusion that you were something special, but I know about all the dames you were ballin’.” Then he shouted into the air like an insane idiot. “But you’re not! You’re not, Denning! I was the special one—me, Frank Laggore, Primo Capo, senza misericordia!” He brought his voice down to a whisper. “I…I…who was born with nothing…made a place in the mob for myself—I was headed for the top of this pile of shit—until you! You killed me…while I was still breathing. I’m gonna enjoy snuffing you out—and guess what?” He laughed. “You will not be breathing when you splatter to the ground, Denning—finito!”

  Out of nowhere shots began to ring and Laggore’s two punks folded up onto the tarmac, dead. Laggore spun around wildly, looking for the killer. “Jack—is that you? I knew you wouldn’t have…approved…but even if she was a moneymaker for you…she’s really better outta the way, you know. I’ll make it up to you, Jack. I’m back, Jack! Here to stay—” I slugged Laggore’s gun hand and the revolver went clanking to the ground.

  Just then three more shots rang out of the night and found their mark in Laggore’s body, one hitting him squarely in the middle of the skull and he dropped like a potato sack. Out of the darkness came a figure with his gun drawn. Oh, shit, I thought, I’m next. But as he approached I couldn’t believe my eyes. “Joe! What the hell?” He came closer and put his gun away. He looked terrible, his face sunken, his eyes sad and tearing.

  “She was my daughter, Cable. He killed my only daughter! I lost her mother through stupidity, but I lost Honey through ignorance. And you lost her because you neglected her. Your friend Crazy Jack knew. He had warned you again and again. Now…it’s too late…for all of us…”

  “I’m—
I’m sorry, Joe. It’s been a hell of a night.”

  “I’m sorry for you, too, Cable. My tears are part of the ones you can’t cry yet. But you will. I know you loved Honey and she was nuts about you.”

  “What’ll Dragna say when he finds out you killed Laggore and two of his henchmen?”

  “Who cares, Cable? I have to go away. I may never see you again. You see, when one of my kind kills a human, it’s an automatic given that we be re-processed. We are pledged not to kill. I broke that rule.” He approached me. “Can you drive? If not, I can take you back to your office.”

  “Shit, Joe, I can’t go back to my office. Not tonight. I’ve gotta walk—and walk, and then walk some more until the reality sinks in.”

  “I understand. So…can I leave you off somewhere?”

  “Yeah, how about Honey’s place? I have a few memories to clear out.”

  Joe Lorena ended up being one of the nicest men I would ever know. We sat in the car in silence in front of Honey’s place. When it was time to go, I reached out my hand to shake his. Instead, he reached for me and hugged me tight and sobbed for a minute. Then he withdrew and smiled faintly at me. “Good-bye, Cable Denning, Private Detective. May you heal from all this and see yourself in the stars some perfect night, a night when this memory has faded and you recall your life. And in the balances, you’ll recall that to have really loved—even if suffering the painfulness of its loss—it was far better than never to have loved at all.”

  I got out and he sped away into the night. I slowly made my way to the cottage. I used my key and opened the door. Sitting at the kitchen table with the saddest of postures sat Zelda. She had been drinking. “Cable!” she cried as she came running to me and threw her arms around me. “I heard on the radio. I went down to the hospital. But I was too late. They said you’d been there.”