Groucho Marx, King of the Jungle

by Ron Goulart

  Four

  I can carry coffee cups into the kitchen,” Jane assured me.

  “No, you rest, and I’ll do it,” I said, getting up. “As I recall, that was part of the marriage vows. Love, honor, and carry coffee cups.”

  “Hooey,” observed my wife, but remained on the sofa.

  I took two cups and saucers out to the kitchen, came back for the third. “Enery didn’t drink much of his coffee. Too upset, I guess.”

  “Either that, or he happened to taste the coffee.”

  Cup in hand, I inquired, “Are you implying that the coffee I brewed wasn’t up to snuff?”

  “As snuff it was fine, but as coffee …”

  “You’re showing symptoms of Grouchoitis,” I pointed out.

  “There’s no reason,” she said, “why I can’t, even in my delicate condition, make a darn pot of coffee.”

  When I returned from the kitchen, I settled into the chair Enery’d occupied. “I don’t mean, Jane, to treat you like an invalid,” I told her. “Maybe I’m being overly cautious, but that’s because—”

  “I know, Frank. It’s okay,” she said. “Let’s talk about Enery.”

  “I’ll call Groucho. Pretty sure he wants to work on this case.”

  “You’ve got two basic problems. Or three, if you count Groucho.”

  I nodded. “As I said to Enery—we have to find out what’s become of Dorothy Woodrow, and we’ve got to track down the real murderer.”

  Jane asked, “You don’t think Dorothy might actually have killed Spellman?”

  “Doubt it, although that might turn out to be the situation,” I answered. “I don’t know her anywhere near as well as Enery does, but I don’t think she’s capable of killing anybody.”

  “Neither do I. Even so, you’d best keep an open mind.”

  “Actually, my mind’s already closed for the season, but I’ll do the best I can.” I moved to the telephone on the end table.

  “After you talk to him,” said Jane, “we try those other friends of Dorothy’s and see if they know anything.”

  “Or if they’ll tell us.”

  Jane’s slim shoulders rose and fell, and she sighed. “It’s really damned stupid.”

  “Which?”

  “That Enery and Dorothy can’t even openly get together. That she’s afraid to let all her friends know she’s in love with him.”

  “Apparently you haven’t noticed,” I said as I picked up the receiver, “—in many ways it’s a stupid world.”

  “I had noticed that, yes,” she said. “So call Groucho.”

  Groucho himself answered the phone at his Beverly Hills home. “Shadrach’s Kosher Pet Shop, offering the only Yiddish-speaking parrots in all of Greater Los Angeles. Mr. Shadrach is attending to the furnace, but I’ll be absolutely delighted to serve you.”

  “Groucho, how’d you like to investigate the Spellman killing?”

  “That would both thrill and delight me, but, alas, I fear the wrath of your dear wife,” he replied. “I’m also a little wary of the Grapes of Wrath, although I find the Bananas of Wrath quite tasty.”

  “Jane is the one who first suggested we take up the case.”

  “Well then, Rollo, I’m glad you called,” said Groucho. “Because I’ve been champing at the bit ever since we encountered that defunct jungle lord this morning. I don’t know if you’ve ever champed at a bit, but they have a decidedly metallic taste and are nowhere near as flavorful as, say, pastrami or lox. Unfortunately, one can’t go around saying, ‘I’m champing at the lox,’ unless one is perhaps understudying Georgie Jessel in a revival of The Jazz Singer. What caused Jane to change her mind?”

  “Our friend Enery McBride.” I gave Groucho the details of Enery’s recent visit.

  When I’d finished, Groucho suggested, “We’d best get together at my office on Sunset tomorrow to work out our plan of action. Meantime I’ll do some cogitating. I may even have time for a little thinking.”

  “What time tomorrow?”

  “Be there at the crack of dawn,” he instructed. “And keep in mind, Watso, that dawn doesn’t crack in that part of Hollywood until about 11 A.M.”

  Five

  When Groucho emerged from Moonbaum’s the next morning, he later told me, the middle-aged newsboy was shouting a new headline, “‘Police Still Hunting for Scorned Woman in Jungle King Murder!’”

  Groucho took a copy of the newspaper. “Do you have change for a dime, my good man?”

  “You trying to steal that cheapskate routine from Jack Benny?”

  “No, I really am a cheapskate.” He handed him a dime. “But if you don’t spread it around, you can keep the whole ten cents.”

  Tucking the paper under his arm, Groucho braved the traffic on Sunset. He was aimed at the building, which resembled something left over from Gone with the Wind, that housed his office.

  Just before he reached the entryway, a plump woman in a flower-print dress hailed him. “Mr. Marx, will you sign my book?”

  “It all depends on the book,” he replied. “I won’t sign Mein Kampf or The Trail of the Lonesome Pine, but I’m sort of partial to Nancy Drew and the Haunted Delicatessen and The Many Loves of—”

  “No, I mean my autograph book.” She, a bit timidly, held out a green-covered signature album toward him.

  “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” He whipped out the fountain pen he’d swiped from me and scrawled his name across a blank page. “And, dear lady, to quash for good and all the rumors that I’m a tightwad, you may keep this fountain pen. It’s sure to become a souvenir that you’ll cherish for all your born days. Or even longer if you so desire.”

  A bit perplexed, the woman took the album and my pen. “Why thank you, Mr. Marx.”

  “The next time somebody tells you that Groucho Marx is a cheapskate, you can tell them where to get off,” he advised. “Myself, I always like to tell them to get off at the corner of Hollywood and Vine, but you may have another intersection you’re fonder of.” Bowing, he went bounding gracefully up the stairway to the second floor.

  His secretary was seated at the reception desk, reading a newspaper.

  “Had I but known,” said Groucho, “I could have saved a dime.”

  Nan Somerville was a muscular woman in her late thirties. The fact that she’d been a circus acrobat and a stuntwoman at MGM had convinced Groucho she was ideally suited to be his secretary. Fortunately, she was also a crackerjack typist.

  “Good morning, Groucho. I don’t believe any of this malarkey about Dorothy Woodrow.”

  “And well you shouldn’t. Do you know the lass?”

  “Sure, she did some stunt work over at MGM while I was still there; nice kid. Are you and Frank really working on this Spellman case?”

  Perching on the edge of the desk, he answered, “Yes, Nanette, once again the greatest detective team since Gallagher and Sheen is back in business.”

  “Gallagher and Sheen weren’t detectives.”

  “Even so.”

  Nan said, “I thought you and Frank were laying off this sort of thing until after the baby arrives.”

  “Jane has given us her permission to take up the investigation,” Groucho informed his secretary. “And while we’re at it, we’re going to take up the hall carpet as well.”

  Resting both palms on the newspaper spread out on her desk, Nan asked, “Do you have any idea as to where Dorothy might be?”

  “Nary a one.” He took a fresh cigar from the pocket of his strawberry-colored sports coat. “Although Frank may have some fresh information when he arrives—he’s due any moment now. We’ve committed ourselves to finding the lady, as well as the solution to the murder case.”

  “I haven’t run into Dorothy for a couple of years or more,” said Nan. “Suppose the police find her before you guys do?”

  “Then I’d feel most chagrined.” He lit his stogie. “Of course, I’d first look up chagrined in the dictionary to find out what it actually means. For all I know, I
’m already feeling chagrined and have for years. Know anything about the late jungle man?”

  Nan said, “I’d bet that one of his hobbies killed him.”

  Groucho’s eyebrows rose. “Such hobbies as?”

  “He was a womanizer and—”

  “I used to be a harmonizer, though I don’t suppose that’s the same thing. And once I had myself simonized, but—”

  “ … and an adulterer,” his secretary continued. “Oh, and he was also an amateur photographer.”

  Exhaling smoke, Groucho inquired, “Specializing in the sort of snapshots that people weren’t anxious to share with their friends and neighbors?”

  “That sort of stuff, yeah.”

  “My, you’d think a fellow with all those admirable traits would have been ideally suited for life in Hollywood and environs.”

  “He was, until yesterday,” said Nan. “Friend of mine, Jason Brinker, who used to double for Spellman, told me the guy even got in some kind of squabble with Alicia Benson while they were shooting out at Rancho Tygoro on the last Ty-Gor flicker. She’s Benson’s only daughter.”

  “A romantic squabble?”

  “More a quarrel of some kind. Jason never found out what exactly it was all about.”

  “Delving into Spellman’s past,” observed Groucho, “sounds like it’s going to be jolly fun for one and all.” He glanced toward the doorway, cupping a hand to his ear. “But hark, I believe I hear the approach of Franklin on little cat feet.”

  A moment later I entered the office.

  Seated behind his desk in his private office, Groucho said, “According to the morning papers, Dorothy Woodrow is still at large.”

  “We can’t even be certain she’s still alive,” I said.

  “Come, come, Pollyanna, let’s look on the bright side.”

  “Which is?”

  After considering the buff-colored ceiling for a few seconds, Groucho replied, “Come to think of it, there isn’t a bright side. If the young lady isn’t on the wrong side of the Pearly Gates, then she’s a fugitive from justice. Which is better than being a fugitive from a Georgia chain gang, but not by much.”

  “Last night I talked to three of her friends. Nobody has any idea where she’s gotten to.”

  “Could they be covering for her?”

  “Possible, but it didn’t sound like anyone was lying to me,” I said. “I did a lot of interviewing back in my LA Times days, and I can usually tell when somebody’s hiding something.”

  “Remind me to take you on my next scavenger hunt.”

  “And this morning I called Joel Farber out at Warlock. Told him we’d decided to investigate Spellman’s murder,” I informed Groucho. “So what we ought to do now is get out to the studio and start looking around.”

  “If Dorothy left a trail of crumbs, it would be a big help,” he said. “Not only could we locate her, but we could save on lunch. Especially if they’re bagel crumbs or—”

  The phone on his desk rang. “If it’s a creditor,” Groucho said into the receiver, “I’m on an extended tour of Central America. If it’s a Central American creditor, simply say I’ve flown the coop. You might add, Nanette, that I hold the world’s record for solo coop flying and have a large trophy to … oh, so? Put her on.” He handed me the phone. “It’s Jane, but you needn’t fret. Has nothing to do with your impending offspring.”

  “Hi, what’s up?”

  Jane said, “I’ve got a feeling I’d better not go into too many details over the phone.”

  “That’s accepted B-movie detective logic.”

  “Enery just phoned,” explained my wife. “He’d very much like you to meet him, soon as you can, at a cottage in Westwood.” She gave me the address, which was over near the UCLA campus.

  “Is Groucho invited, too?” I asked.

  “He wasn’t specifically excluded, so, if you must, I suppose you can drag him along.”

  “This has to do with what we were about talking about last night?”

  “Yep. He’s got some information in the missing persons area.”

  “Okay, ma’am, we’ll get right over there,” I told her. “How are you feeling?”

  “You know how pregnant women have cravings for strange things?”

  “I do, yeah.”

  “Well, for the past couple hours I’ve had a craving for Warner Baxter.”

  “It’ll pass,” I assured her. “Bye, sweetheart.”

  Groucho sighed soulfully as I hung up. “Ah, young love,” he said, rolling his eyes.

  “Surely you can still recall when you were young and in love.”

  “Yes, it occurred while I was charging up San Juan Hill with Teddy Roosevelt.”

  “Would you like to accompany me to Westwood to talk to Enery McBride?”

  “Has the lad unearthed something?”

  I said, “I have a hunch he knows where Dorothy Woodrow is.”

  Six

  Groucho parked his Cadillac on a side street off Westwood Boulevard. He’d been telling me what Nan had to say about Randy Spellman’s private life. “The lad’s past ought to be delved into,” he concluded, easing out of the car.

  “I’ll handle that,” I volunteered.

  The afternoon was bright and clear. A warm, gentle wind was drifting through the pepper trees lining the narrow lane we were walking along.

  We’d covered less than a block when, from a large, ramshackle white house up ahead on our right, a bunch of college kids emerged. Two girls and three guys, the huskiest guy wearing a blue-and-gold UCLA letterman sweater.

  He was the first one to recognize Groucho. Stopping on the sidewalk about ten feet in front of us, he cried out, “Hey, Groucho, have you shot any elephants in your pajamas lately?”

  Shuffling to a stop, Groucho eyed him. “Of late, young sir, I’ve been limiting myself to shooting down louts who quote lines from my old movies.”

  A pretty blonde in a plaid skirt, white sweater, and saddle shoes asked, “When are you going to do another radio show, Mr. Marx?”

  “My colleague Mr. Denby,” he said, gesturing in my direction, “and I have a terrific, I might even describe it as supercolossal, radio program in the works. It’s entitled Dead Air with Groucho Marx and consists of nothing but complete silence for thirty minutes.”

  “Thus far, though,” I added, “Groucho’s been unable to remain silent for more than a minute and a half, which is hindering our attempts to sell the show to a network.”

  “Aren’t you,” inquired the other coed, a plump redhead, “the fellow who writes the Hollywood Molly radio show?”

  “I am, yeah.”

  “I think that’s a very funny program. We listen to it in the dorm every—”

  “Ahum,” observed Groucho, and consulted his watch. “If this conversation isn’t going to stay concentrated on me, I suggest—”

  “Seriously, Mr. Marx, when are you going to do another radio show?” asked the blonde, shifting her grip on three hefty textbooks.

  “Seriously, I’m going to be replacing President Roosevelt on his Fireside Chat broadcasts,” he replied. “FDR’s been getting extremely sooty on his left side from sitting so close to the fireplace, and he’s taking a hiatus. Originally he was going to take a Greyhound bus, but the Secret Service felt—”

  “We’d best be continuing on our way,” I cut in to suggest.

  “Pity I forgot to bring my guitar.”

  “One man’s pity is—”

  “Farewell to all and sundry. And especially to you, Our Girl Sundry.” He grasped the blonde coed’s hand and kissed it enthusiastically. “I regret not being able to kiss both your mitts. However, if you make an appointment with my social secretary, I should be able to handle it before the year is out.”

  As we moved on, one of the college boys observed, “Groucho’s still pretty spry for an old man.”

  “You’ve used that Our Girl Sundry line before,” I mentioned.

  “True, but we old men get very sentimental about our
favorite bons mots.”

  The address Enery had passed along was at the end of the block. It was a Tudor-style cottage, overly quaint, and fronted by a yard full of flowers and shrubs.

  Sprawled in a lopsided wicker armchair on the stone porch was a weatherworn ventriloquist’s dummy. He had on a tattered tuxedo, was missing one shoe and his left eye. All in all, he looked very forlorn slumped there in the midday sunlight.

  Contemplating the dummy, Groucho said, “I’d heard that Charlie McCarthy had been hitting the sauce. But I didn’t realize he’d fallen so low.”

  I knocked, quietly, on the door.

  The door, quietly, opened about three inches. “Hi, Frank. Hello, Mr. Marx.”

  “Jane said you had something to tell us,” I mentioned.

  “C’mon in,” Enery invited. “Dorothy can tell you herself.”

  The ventriloquist dummies that shared the cottage parlor with us were in much better shape than the fellow on the porch. The dummy inhabiting one side of the candy-striped love seat was a golden-haired moppet in a gingham dress, the one sharing the sofa with me was a freckled kid of twelve, and the dummy straddling the arm of Groucho’s Morris chair was a plump old gent with a walrus moustache and a military air.

  “This cottage belongs to a friend of Dorothy’s, fellow named Arnie Carr.” Enery was standing in the doorway. “The guy is, as you maybe guessed, a ventriloquist. Right now he’s up in the town of Santa Francesca for their Fiesta Week, doing his act at a local inn.”

  I asked him, “Has Dorothy been here since she disappeared?”

  “Yeah, she has. She’s known him for years and has a spare key.”

  “Why,” inquired Groucho, “is she hiding out at all?”

  “She’ll explain that.”

  Dorothy made her entrance then. She was wearing dark slacks and a light blue pullover. Her blonde hair was pulled back, her face pale, and her eyes were underscored with shadows. She walked with a slight limp. “Hello, Frank. Hello, Mr. Marx.”

  Enery took her arm, helped her settle into a fat orange armchair. He slid a fat orange ottoman under her left leg. “I know we can trust you guys,” he said.