by Craig Rice
“You must tell everything,” the Sergeant said softly. With a cold stare at poor, bedraggled Dolly he added, “No one is going to hurt you, Miss Angel.”
Alice’s lower lip trembled just enough to make a pretty picture. She said, “Well, La Verne didn’t believe me when I thaid the picture wath there tho I went back to the room with her and showed her where it wath hidden. Then she made me tell who hid it. I honethtly didn’t want to but I wath afraid she wath going to hit me if I didn’t tell. I did thay it wath jutht a joke, but when she got madder thtill, I left in a hurry. Then on the way downthtairth I thaw …”
Dolly shook the policeman’s hand from her shoulder and stood up. “She saw me!” Dolly almost screamed it. “That’s what she’s leading up to. Sure I went back to the room. But I didn’t say one word to La Verne, I didn’t even see her.” Dolly sighed deeply before going on. Her voice was more normal when she explained that she had gone back for a cigarette.
“Sammy called us too early for the finale,” she said. “I didn’t know it until I got downstairs, so I went back for my cigarettes. I got one and left.”
“You didn’t notice La Verne?” the Sergeant asked.
“I didn’t see her,” Dolly replied. “Words like notice I don’t know from.”
“Why didn’t you mention this earlier?”
Dolly shrugged her shoulders. She did it well and at that moment it was a perfect gesture. She threw her next line away. “I guess it just slipped my mind.”
The Sergeant looked at her from under his eyebrows. When he looked at me like that I almost confessed that I was the murderer, but he didn’t upset Dolly.
“Anything else you want to know?” she asked.
“Not at the present.” He turned to Sammy. “Would you see that I have a list of names and addresses?” he asked.
Sammy told him, with great importance, that he would “personally” see to it.
No one had dismissed us but there was a general movement toward the door. Joey and Russell left. The policeman didn’t stop them, so I hoped that the meeting was over. Biff whispered to Dolly to “Buck up.” I thought that she of all the people concerned needed no encouragement. That was, until I looked at her. Her eyes followed Russell but I doubt that she really saw him. She seemed dazed, too dazed to know what was going on. The Princess swept past her without a glance. Then Sandra left.
“Come on, Doll,” Biff said. “We’ll go downstairs and get us a quick drink and …”
Dolly pushed his hand away angrily. “I don’t want a drink,” she said. “I can’t go in that room again. Never.” She was trembling.
It was heartless of me, but when Biff left her standing there, I followed him. I was on the verge of nervous shrieks myself and all I needed to go into my act was a word or two with Dolly.
From the landing I saw that the rest of the company was on their way to the basement. I asked Biff what went on.
“They moved the party liquor down there,” he explained. That was all I wanted to know; not that I’m a drunkard or anything close to it, but at that moment I would have given a lot for six straight ryes.
Biff must have read my mind. “I want a couple, too,” he said. “But I gotta get something first.”
The door to our dressing room was closed but not locked. I thought it strange that there were no cops guarding the “scene of the crime.” Later I found out that the door to the toilet was locked and sealed. With their usual efficiency, the police picked the wrong door to bolt. Biff opened the iron door and entered the room. I wasn’t much keener on going in than Dolly had been but I followed him.
They had moved La Verne, I thanked the Lord for that. Aside from a few used flash bulbs and the bolted closet door there was nothing to remind me of what had just happened. The window to the roof was still open, the faded chintz curtains blowing in a thin banner across the room. It was chilly and damp. I started over to close the window and saw that it was raining. A cold, misty rain. The window had jammed again and while I struggled with it Biff came over to me.
“Wait a minute,” he said. He reopened it and threw a leg over the sill, then he dropped to the roof. He was looking for something. He flicked on his lighter and shielded the glow with his hands. It was so dark I could see nothing but the yellow wavering light, until he stooped down to pick up a glittering patch of rhinestones. Before he hurriedly concealed it in his pocket, I saw the plush lining and the string of dental floss. It was Jannine’s G string. The same one I had seen hanging from La Verne’s neck!
“What in the name of Gawd are ya hanging out the window for, Gyp?” Dolly had evidently got over her nervousness about the dressing room. She looked a little drunk as she walked over to me and peered curiously at the window.
“Biff’s out there,” I said quickly. “He found Ja …”
“It’s all right.” Biff was climbing back through the window. He flashed a warning glance at me. “Lost my handkerchief, jumped out to get it.” He patted his hip pocket. “Got it right here.”
“Well, cut out that flapping business,” Dolly said. “You look like you’re taking bows for a seal act.” She pulled a bottle out of her apron pocket and began unwinding the top. “I’ll make with the drinks, if you get the water.”
“And where did you get that?” Biff asked, with a happy eye on the quart.
“It was the last bottle from the party,” Dolly replied. “I didn’t think one measly lil bottle would do ’em any good, so … well, here’s to it.”
The third time the bottle was going around, Gee Gee and Sandra came in. They had been to Louie’s, they explained. Seems everyone had dropped in for a couple of quick ones when the party liquor gave out.
“Jiggers was there, too,” Sandra said. “Only he was on business.”
“What kind of business?” Biff asked.
“He was looking for Louie. Don’t look.” She had her coat and dress off before Biff could turn his head.
“Who’s looking?” he said. “Did he find him?”
“Find who? Oh, Louie.” Sandra reached for the bottle and wiped the top with the back of her hand before drinking. “Nope,” she said, “and what’s more I don’t think they will,” she added with importance.
“What makes you think that?” Dolly asked casually.
“Well, far be it from me to hamper justice.” Sandra made a pious face. “Nobody bothered to tell the cops about the fight he had with La Verne. All they did was squawk about you and Russell, and Gyp. So I just told ’em how he took a poke at her and what he said about giving her worse than that if she wasn’t careful. Only I made it a little stronger and I said it loud enough for Moey to hear so he’d go and tell Louie. Sure enough, that’s what he did.”
“Louie’s gone, bag and baggage,” Gee Gee added helpfully. “Took his car too. Not that it’ll help him. Jiggers said they got a radio thing out describing the car and what he looks like, what he was wearing and everything.” She was taking her make-up off while she was talking. The cosmetic from her eyelashes she picked off carefully and put back in the little pan. She used so much she thought it wasteful not to remelt it for a second time.
“Say,” Dolly exclaimed suddenly. “We got a midnight show. Why are ya taking off the war paint?”
“No midnight,” Sandra said, pulling a beret on her head. “Sammy said he thought it would look too mercenary. With Moss outta town his word’s law. Anyway, the place is crawling with newspaper guys. We got out through the coal chute.”
Gee Gee giggled. “It’d made ya die laughing. We got out right behind the crowds. Mandy helped us lift the manhole cover and he peeked around to see if anyone was looking. Everybody was hanging around the stage door, so when he told us the coast was clear we all crawled out and started mingling with the crowds. Mandy goes up to some goggle-eyed guy and says, ‘What’s cooking?’ and the guy says, ‘A dame just got bumped off in the burlesque joint.’ Then Mandy goes ‘tch, tch, tch.’”
Gee Gee’s imitation of Mandy going “tch, tch, t
ch” was almost as good as her imitation of the Hermit. Biff joined in the hysterical laughter.
Between guffaws Gee Gee added, “Mandy kept asking one guy after the other what happened and every time they told him he got that sanctimonious look on his kisser like when he’s playing the preacher in the ‘Peace on You, Too’ scene. Once he said, ‘The wages of sin is death,’ and he shook his head real sad-like. I hadda roar.”
“Well, I don’t think it’th funny.” Alice Angel stood in the door. Her eyes were a little red from weeping. They usually were but she managed to look lovely in spite of that. Maybe because of it. When I cry, my face looks like a red balloon but on Alice tears were becoming, and she knew it.
“I don’t know how you can joke about anything tho … thad,” she sobbed. With a languid hand she brushed a tear from her cheek and turned her gaze on Biff.
“Make them thtop, pleathe,” she asked appealingly.
Biff looked down at her. She did look helpless, I almost didn’t blame him for smiling at her that special way.
“Where were you, and who made you cry?” he asked softly.
“Sergeant Harrigan wanted to athk me a few more quethtions,” she said with a wan smile. “He wath very nithe to me but he made me thay thingth I didn’t want to thay.” She made wide eyes and puckered her lips.
“I don’t know why he thingled me out but he thaid I wath the most obtherving woman in the theater.” Dolly started to interrupt but Alice turned to her and smiled blandly.
“I only told the truth, Dolly,” she said. “And if the truth hurtth you it ithn’t my fault, ith it, Biff?” He got the smile then, a radiant one. I thought she was overdoing it, but Biff was as bad as the others. He melted right before my eyes.
Gee Gee broke up the act. “Well, I’ll be damned!” She stood in front of La Verne’s make-up shelf with her hands on her hips and her mouth half open. “The picture of La Verne’s mother is gone!”
She turned back to the shelf and began moving things around looking for the photograph. She tilted the mirror forward and peered behind it, then she lifted a make-up towel and looked under that. There was something almost frantic in the way she searched. The bottle of gallstones glistened in the reflected light and Gee Gee pulled her hand away from it quickly. With the towel she picked it up and tossed it into the wastebasket. Her eyes were frightened when she finally looked up.
“Do you think the … murderer took it?” she said.
Alice was the only one to speak. “I showed La Verne where it wath. I thaw her take it out from under the shelf paper where Dolly hid it.”
“Shut up,” Dolly said. “Nobody asked you.”
Alice turned and faced Dolly, “I won’t shut up.” Her voice was as loud as Dolly’s, her mouth was hard. “I think you took it. Tho there.”
For a minute I thought we were going to have another fight on our hands, but Dolly turned her head away. “I don’t care what you think,” she said. There was a weariness to her face and voice. When she sat down her shoulders sagged.
Gee Gee smiled at her sympathetically. “It’s my fault for getting so excited about it,” she said. “The cops probably thought it was a clue, and they took it. I’ll bet it’s got a sign, Exhibit A, on it right now.”
When Dolly looked up I was shocked at the change in her face. She tried to smile and it was worse. The deep smudges under her eyes weren’t from make-up and the yellow color of her skin was ghastly.
Gee Gee didn’t stop babbling. “I hope the cops don’t think every G string in the theater is a clue, too. If they do we’ll all be catching a hell of a lot of colds.”
Dolly managed a little smile. I heard Biff laugh, so I turned to him. He was watching Dolly intently and the laugh was a prop if I ever heard one. He said he would change his clothes and if we waited he would lift the manhole cover for us. When he passed Alice he put his arm around her.
“You’re too pretty to get all mad like that,” he said. Then he had the nerve to look at me and grin! I grinned back but it must have been rather terrifying because he left quickly. From the steps he called to me, “Punkin?”
I didn’t answer, so he called again.
“If you feel hungry we’ll go to the Peerless and put on the feedbag.”
Alice was getting all my attention but I managed to yell, “O.K.”
She was going into a number that was pure summer stock. She couldn’t help it if every man she knew fell madly in love with her. She didn’t want men to feel that way about her, but she just couldn’t help it. Her big blue eyes tried to tell me that she was sorry Biff felt like that. I let my big brown eyes tell her to stop kidding.
Meanwhile Gee Gee was finished dressing and I had to hurry to catch up with her. Dolly had pulled a hat over her face. I guess she thought it was easier than putting a full make-up on. Alice was combing her hair out. It hung in golden waves over her shoulders. I wasn’t surprised when she said she wasn’t going to leave with us. She tried to cover it up by explaining that she thought exiting through the coal chute was undignified and that “after all, we owe it to the preth to make an appearanthe.” She was going to make an appearance all right, dead-white make-up, a hint of blue eye shadow, and a pathetic mouth.
All she needed was an armful of lilies to make the picture complete. The crowd at the door would fall for it, though. I was certain of that. She’d give them one of those “I’m so small and you’re so big and strong” looks and to a man they’d feel the urge to protect her. She rehearsed her character as she said good night to me.
“I wish I could be brave like you, Gyppy,” she said with a little sob.
I didn’t bother telling her that with what she had she didn’t need bravery. On the way downstairs I rehearsed a little number myself. From now on I was going to be completely defenseless. Being a foot taller than most of the cops was going to hinder my style to a certain extent, but I made up my mind to wilt. And good.
Chapter Nine
Getting out through the coal chute wasn’t as much fun as I had expected. I wanted cobwebs, eerie sounds, and maybe a skeleton or two.
The hall leading to it was dark enough and it did smell a little dank, but that was no different from the regular stage exit. We had to walk single file because of the narrowness of the hall. Biff led the way and Gee Gee and he were giggling. Dolly was behind me and Sandra and Jannine followed so closely on my heels that every now and then they’d bump into me.
“This’d make a swell place to hide a body,” Biff said with his usual misplaced humor. He added, “In fact, I wonder why I didn’t think of it before.”
When he said “body,” Dolly grabbed me. She muttered, “The murderer, maybe he’s hiding here.” Her teeth were chattering and she held me so tightly that I almost had to wrench her fingers loose.
I wanted cobwebs and all that, but I didn’t bargain for a woman who was pretending to be terrified. There was no doubt in my mind that it was pretense. She was no actress and the phonyness came through too strongly.
It must have impressed Biff the same way. He started shouting, “Bats! Bats!” in a loud voice.
Gee Gee faked a horrified scream and Sandra cried, “They’ll get in your hair. Help! Help!”
Dolly stopped trembling and her voice was steady when she said, “Go to hell.”
I heard Biff grunt from the exertion of lifting the manhole cover and our parade stopped. A streak of light, like a thin moon, was above us. Biff moved the cover over and pulled himself up through the opening.
He leaned over and grabbed Gee Gee’s arms. I pushed from the rear and, after a struggle, she was out on the street. When Jannine climbed out she helped Biff by grabbing one of Sandra’s arms and by then I had sense enough to lean over and make a step out of my back. Sandra’s heels pressed too firmly into the flesh for comfort, so I made Dolly take off her shoes when it was time for her to get out.
“They oughta get a ladder installed,” Biff said. “Make it more convenient when we have our murders.”
His remark brought on another fit of terror for Dolly. There was a difference of about forty pounds between her and the others, and even with the shoes off, my back was too tired for her to start that trembling act.
“I’m a strip teaser,” I gasped, “not the under man for a balancing act. Make the jokes later, please.”
By the time Biff grabbed my arms and got me out to the street I was weak. They all looked so funny staring down at me, and the idea of our being pulled out of a manhole started me laughing.
Biff was laughing and pointing. I thought he was laughing at me, but one look at the theater entrance showed me what he found amusing. Alice was making her exit and there wasn’t a single man there to protect her or sympathize with her. The street was empty and the theater lights out; her scene was played to an empty house. When she saw us watching her, she waved sadly and with bowed head disappeared down the street.
Dolly didn’t lose a second getting to the only light on the block. It came from Louie’s bar on the corner. The three girls joined her. After the good nights were said Biff and I made for the subway.
“We make a fancy exit to avoid what crowds?” I remarked as we hurried along.
“You have to admit it was fun, Punkin. And if we’d gone through the regular stage door, we would have missed the perfect example of what not to do in case of murder.”
“Alice?” I asked hopefully.
“And the terror of your friend Dolly.” Biff emphasized the “your.” He didn’t give me a chance to remind him that she was as much his friend as she was mine. “She wouldn’t be that frightened if she came face to face with a boa constrictor.”
I had to agree with him. Dolly wasn’t the type for trembling unless she wore a fringed skirt and had an audience of paying customers.
“She certainly wasn’t nervous when the cops questioned her,” I said. “The way she answered them you’d think she’d rehearsed it.”