My information on Beaumont was minimal. I remembered him in a few roles, a tall, somewhat softly good-looking guy with dark, wavy hair. He’d start a picture tough and end up in reel five a mass of jelly, begging George Raft or Jimmy Cagney not to hit him. He certainly wasn’t a star. I wondered where he earned enough to live in Beverly Hills.
Beaumont’s house didn’t give me an answer. It was big and white and stood alone on a hill with plenty of land and an ornamental steel gate and fence. The gate was open. I parked and walked up the driveway. Then I froze. Two massive Doberman Pincers had dashed at me from around the house. They sniffed at me growling, showing teeth and generally suspicious. I tried to say gentle things, but they weren’t buying any.
After a full minute of this, a woman’s voice called from the house:
“Jamie, Ralph, come.”
The dogs backed off reluctantly eyeing my juicy arms and disappeared around the house. I walked slowly up the drive and to the door.
A woman in a light blue dress stood there with her arms folded. As soon as I looked at her, I had the answers to several questions.
The beautiful blonde woman in front of me was Brenda Stallings, a wealthy society deb of a little more than a dozen years earlier. She had doubled for Harlow and then had a short, successful film career before marrying an actor. The actor, I now remembered, was Harry Beaumont. Her money accounted for the home.
I had not seen all of her pictures, but I had seen her in the one in Charlie Cunningham’s apartment that morning. The photograph of her and the dead blackmailer was in my pocket, and I touched it for luck. I also smiled.
“Yes,” she said coldly.
“My name’s Peters. I’m working for some people at Warners on a rather delicate matter. I’d like to talk to Mr. Beaumont.”
“He’s not in,” she said starting to close the door. I stopped the door from closing with my hand.
“Then I’d like to talk to you.”
“Remove your hand or I’ll call the dogs.”
With my free hand, I pulled the photograph of her and Cunningham and held it up so she could see it. She looked at it soberly and let go of the door.
“Please come in, Mr. Peters,” she said. I did.
Brenda Stallings Beaumont walked ahead of me without looking back, which suited me fine. I enjoyed watching her. Her legs were great and her yellow hair bounced softly on her neck.
Every inch of the floor was carpeted, thick white carpeting. We moved from room to room. The house was big, and each room was streamline decorated in brown, black or white or combinations. It looked like an R.K.O. set.
Everything was soft, plush and looked unlived in or on.
We stopped in a room the size of a tennis court. It was a kind of living room with two extra-long white sofas, three soft white chairs and a couple of black tables. A gold Oscar stood on one of the tables.
On the wall above a white brick fireplace were two huge painted portraits. One was of Brenda Stallings, bronzed and queenly in white. The other portrait was Harry Beaumont wearing a white jacket and a red scarf around his neck. He was looking down at me with his trademark, a combination of smile and sneer.
Brenda Stallings dropped lazily into an armchair and motioned toward one of the sofas in front of her. I sat.
“Well,” she said looking at me, “I assume you are not soliciting for campaign funds for Wendell Willkie.”
I had sunk uncomfortably deep into the sofa. I felt out of place.
“You said something like that in Three Men,” I smiled, “to Ronald Reagan.”
“Something like that,” she said without a smile, “but it was to Franchot Tone. You have the wrong studio. Now, what do you want?”
“Blackmail,” I said.
Without looking at me she plucked a cigarette from a silver box on the table in front of her and put it to her lips. Then she reached for the Oscar which stood on the table in front of her. She raised it, touched something on the back and a flame spurted out of Oscar’s gold head. She lit her cigarette.
“I didn’t know you or your husband ever won an Academy Award? Is that a fake or did I miss something?”
She looked at the statue and not at me and blew a cloud of gray smoke.
“It’s real, belonged to an actor who pawned it two years ago. We bought it and had it converted to a lighter to remind us how quickly fame and respect can be lost.”
“Blackmail,” I repeated, trying to shift to a comfortable position. There was none.
“I heard you,” she said. “I have no intention of paying you for that photograph.” She looked at me. Her eyes were cold blue, and very beautiful.
“You don’t care if your husband sees it?” I said.
“Not in the least. Harry and I are separated and have been for some time. If you read the columns you would also know that we are past the verge of divorce. I don’t think Harry would have the slightest interest in the photograph. I am willing to give you, say, $100 nuisance payment, but not a cent more, and if you don’t want it …” She shrugged and pouted slightly.
I grinned. “You pouted like that in Tortuga Bay when Lionel Barrymore wanted you to sign away your father’s ship.”
“A fan,” she said dryly.
“Why haven’t you asked me where I got the picture?” I continued.
“You got it or stole it from Charlie,” she said. “I rather expected something like this from him. Did he put you up to it?”
“I took it from his apartment,” I went on.
“He won’t like that Mr..…”
“Peters, Toby Peters. I told you at the door. Charles Cunningham is dead, murdered, a 38 slug in his eye.”
I watched her face. She took another gentle drag at her cigarette and looked at me without emotion. She shrugged again.
“I knew him for a few months. At first he was interesting. I liked his looks, his ambition and his confidence.”
“And you got him a job at Warners with Sid Adelman?”
“Yes,” she sighed. “Charlie Cunningham’s death is of little interest to me. In fact, I am.…” She stopped and rose with her arms folded.
“You are what? Happy? Relieved?” I tried to stand gracefully, but sank awkwardly back into the sofa.
“I am going to ask you to leave. You can take the photograph or the $100.”
“You misunderstood me.” It was my turn to sigh and shrug. “I didn’t come here to blackmail you. I work for Sid Adelman, and I am here to talk about blackmail, but not yours.”
She sat again, cocked her head at me with curiosity and began to play with the Oscar lighter.
“Your husband was at lunch a few days ago with certain people at Warners when one of them received a blackmail threat from Cunningham complete with a photograph, not the one of you and Cunningham. Didn’t your husband tell you about this?”
“We are separated, Mr. Peters, remember. Harry has not lived here for six weeks, and I doubt if he ever will again.”
“Well,” I said, finally pulling myself out of the seat, “I guess I’d better go find Mr. Beaumont. I may have to talk to you again. It strikes me as quite a coincidence that Cunningham was trying blackmail, that you knew him well, and that your husband happened to be at the table when the blackmail note came. Did you know Cunningham went in for blackmail?”
“No,” she said, putting out her cigarette, “but I knew that he was ambitious and a miserable character in addition to being a liar.”
“And a photographer,” I added. She looked at me puzzled.
“Do you mind telling me your husband’s financial situation?”
“Harry’s career is doing very badly. The studio will not be renewing his contract. He has no money of his own and as soon as the divorce is completed, he will have no money of mine. His father has a slightly better than menial job, and Harry owes a great deal to a very impatient gambler in Las Vegas.”
“Maybe not a good candidate for murderer, but how about blackmail?”
“No,�
� she said, “He has no spine. He’s perfectly typecast in his movies, but this really doesn’t concern me, Mr. Peters.” She looked at her wrist-watch and said, “Now, I’m afraid you’ll just have to excuse me, I’m expecting someone.”
“One last thing,” I said, fishing into my pocket and pulling out the torn photo with the head of the girl. “Cunningham was pushing his blackmail with a photograph of a certain actor and a young girl in an indelicate situation. I have a photograph of the girl. Can you tell me if you ever saw her with Cunningham.”
I handed the photograph fragment to her. She looked at it blankly for a few seconds and then handed it back to me.
“No,” she said, tossing her golden hair, “I don’t know that girl. Now, you’ll have to …”
Something had changed, but I didn’t know what. I did know she was suddenly very anxious to get rid of me, and I decided to slow things down a little.
“I’m afraid I have to ask just a few more questions,” I said, taking a step toward her and trying to look determined. “It’s either that or answer questions from the police. Cunningham has been murdered. You knew Cunningham. Your husband knew that blackmail was going on.”
She glanced at her watch again and suddenly shivered and looked at me in a different way. I didn’t know what was happening, but there was a change in her attitude. She had made up her mind about something.
“Mr. Peters; Toby,” she said softly, looking intently at me so long that I wished I had shaved before I came, “there is something I want to show you, something important in the pool house.”
She smiled and opened the door into the garden. I walked behind her, and she waited this time till I caught up. She leaned very close to my ear breathing softly.
“It is very important.”
“I’m with you,” I said, and I was.
The heart-shaped pool was as blue as her eyes, with a few wooden lounge chairs around it. We walked around the pool into the pool house, and she closed the door behind us. The light from outside flickered through a window bounced from the surface of the pool. The room was small, with a large white wicker chair and a black leather lounge. The floor was covered with dark carpet. There was a bar in the corner and the photographs on the wall were all of Brenda Stallings. They were stills from her movies.
On the lounge was the morning newspaper. GERMANY CONSIDERS INVASION OF ENGLAND, was the headline, and the story under it, with a photograph, was TROTSKY ATTACKED, DIES OF WOUNDS. She swept the newspaper and current history on the floor and motioned for me to sit on the leather lounge. I did.
She stood in front of me for about a minute and then, slowly and deliberately, unzipped her skirt and let it fall to the floor. Beneath it she wore a pink slip.
“Are we going swimming?” I asked.
She shook her head no and unbuttoned her white blouse. The bra matched the slip and her skin was tan and smooth. It was happening, but I couldn’t figure out why and didn’t want to ask. Brenda Stallings, the beautiful blonde who had appeared in front of me in theaters ten times her own size in love scenes with Gable and Freddie March, was looking at me as if I were Flynn.
“I don’t get it,” I said reluctantly as she bent over to unbutton my shirt. “I’m not giving you the photograph.”
She smiled and finished unbuttoning my shirt. Then she leaned over and put her mouth against mine. She caught mine open. To say I was excited would be as useless as saying FDR wanted a third term.
“I don’t want the photograph,” she whispered.
She unzipped my pants and helped me out of them and then stood back to drop her bra and slip so that I could see her. Her breasts stood up and the hair between her legs was golden yellow. If she’d asked then, I would have gladly given her the photograph and the hell with the case, Adelman and Flynn.
I dropped my drawers and sat naked on the lounge looking at her as she walked toward me, the light from the pool reflecting against her browned body.
She leaned over me again gently touching the stitches in my head. Then she kissed them and pushed me on my back on the lounge.
“How did you break your nose?” she whispered, returning to my face.
“Accidents,” I said, thinking of other things.
“You’ve had a violent life haven’t you?” she said, her wide blue eyes inches from mine and her body on me.
“More than most,” I said. I knew I was sweating.
She was up on top of me with a push, and I felt myself entering her. She was soft, wet and warm and moving rapidly. I was confused and barely in control. I don’t know how I knew she was ready, but I knew, and it was just in time. I let go and she groaned happily. She leaned forward and kissed me again for a long time before getting off of me and moving away.
“That was nice,” she said, putting her clothes back on.
I followed her lead and began to dress. I think I was shaking, but I don’t think I showed it.
When I was dressed and standing, she moved close to me and put her arms around my waist. I put my battered nose into her hair and smelled perfume or sweat.
“We’ll have to do this again,” she said taking my hand and leading me to a door at the back of the pool house.
“The sooner, the better,” I said. She kissed my cheek and opened the door. About ten yards in front of us was a gate. It looked like the rear of the house.
“You can go through there and around to the front for your car. Next time we’ll meet at your place.”
“I don’t think you’ll like it,” I said, grinning at her stupidly.
“I’ll like it,” she said moving away and back to the pool house.
Then I heard the voice, a girl’s voice from the house or the pool. I couldn’t make out the words.
Brenda looked suddenly nervous and waved goodby. Something was strange. I took a step toward her and not toward the gate. She started to close the pool house door. I put my hand on it, and we repeated the scene we had gone through at the front door.
“I want you to leave, Mr. Peters,” she whispered urgently.
“I thought I was Toby, and we were in love,” I whispered back, forcing my way into the pool house past her. She followed me to the door.
On the other side of the pool, across from us stood a girl in a blue dress. She was looking into the sun and squinting at us.
She took a step or two toward us around the pool, and I could see that she looked about 14, a little older than she did in the photograph with Flynn. I fingered the picture of the girl’s head I had in my pocket as she walked toward us, a slight touch of curiosity on her face.
“Mother,” she said, looking at Brenda, “you weren’t in the house, so …”
“That’s all right, Lynn,” said Brenda brightly. “Mr. Peters is from Warners. He was talking to me about a picture. Well, Mr. Peters, perhaps you could call me later, and we’ll finish our talk. I think we can work something out.”
She shook my hand and smiled as if nothing had happened. I had been taken, but not far enough. She had wanted me out of that house when the girl came home, and she knew the way to get me out. She hadn’t batted an eyelash when I had showed her her daughter’s picture.
“Your mother is a very fine actress,” I said to the girl.
The girl looked childish and innocent. Her eyes scanned me, my clothes and my scars with some question about my credentials as a studio executive, but she was too polite to say anything.
“Brenda,” I said, taking both of the woman’s hands. “I’ve enjoyed our talk, and I look forward to hearing what you have to say later. I’ll call.”
“Please do,” she said, guiding me back through the house. The girl trailed behind us.
As I stepped out the front door and down the stairs I looked back at the mother and daughter. The girl was shorter than her mother, and dark like her father. They both smiled and waved.
“I hope to see you again, Mr. Peters,” Lynn said politely.
“You will,” I said, with a wink and a return wave. Bren
da was still smiling politely. The world continued to smile at me, and I didn’t know what the hell it was all about.
As I walked toward the street, I heard the distant growl of the two friendly dogs. I hurried along and went out of the metal gate, closing it behind me just as Jamie and Ralph appeared. I didn’t know if Brenda Stallings would have called them off this time, and I didn’t want to find out. I’d had enough excitement for one afternoon.
My office was in the Farraday Building on Hoover near Ninth, not far from my apartment. I don’t know who Farraday was, but the building bearing his name deserved to be condemned in 1930 or restored as an historical relic.
The Farraday Building was a four-story refuge for second-rate dentists, alcoholic doctors and insolvent baby photographers. My rent was paid not to the management but to Sheldon Minck, one of the dentists. I sublet a side office from Sheldon, who had been one of my first clients when I became a private investigator. I tracked down deadbeats who didn’t pay their bills. I threatened to forceably remove their bridgework if they didn’t spit up what they owed. I did pretty well until one fat woman in North Hollywood hit me in the face with a bottle of Fleischman’s Gin. Sheldon fixed my teeth, and we had become something like friends.
There was an echo and smell of Lysol when I walked through the lobby toward the fake marble stairs. I could hear the faint snoring of a bum somewhere in the darkness. I ignored it and started walking up the three flights.
Very few potential clients came to my office. If a client called, I met him at his home or business or a cafe or coffee joint.
Fading black, block letters greeted me on the pebble glass door:
SHELDON MINCK, D.D.S., S.D.
Dentist
TOBY PETERS
Private Investigator
The S.D. after Sheldon’s name didn’t mean anything. He thought it might give him an edge with off-the-street patients. It was probably the only office in California where you could get your teeth filled and your runaway grandmother found in one visit.
I stepped into the reception room, which had just enough space for three wooden chairs, a small table with an overflowing ash tray and a heap of ancient copies of Collier’s. I went into Sheldon’s office where I heard the drill growling.
Bullet for a Star: A Toby Peters Mystery (Book One) Page 4