The Pitiful Player
A Nick Williams Mystery
Book 14
By Frank W. Butterfield
Nick Williams Mysteries
The Unexpected Heiress
The Amorous Attorney
The Sartorial Senator
The Laconic Lumberjack
The Perplexed Pumpkin
The Savage Son
The Mangled Mobster
The Iniquitous Investigator
The Voluptuous Vixen
The Timid Traitor
The Sodden Sailor
The Excluded Exile
The Paradoxical Parent
The Pitiful Player
Nick & Carter Stories
An Enchanted Beginning
Golden Gate Love Stories
The One He Waited For
Their Own Hidden Island
© 2017 by Frank W. Butterfield. All rights reserved.
No part of this story may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without express written permission of the copyright holder.
This book contains explicit language and suggestive situations.
This is a work of fiction that refers to historical figures, locales, and events, along with many completely fictional ones. The primary characters are utterly fictional and do not resemble anyone that I have ever met or known of.
Cover image of Nils Asther by Alexander Binder is in the public domain and used via Wikimedia Commons.
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NW14-K-20170913
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Epilogue
Pitiful
ˈpi-ti-fəl
1. Deserving or arousing pity or commiseration
Player
ˈplā-ər
1. a : An actor
b : One actively involved especially in a competitive field or process
Chapter 1
1198 Sacramento Street
San Francisco, Cal.
Friday, July 8, 1955
Half past 7 in the morning
I stood up from the kitchen table and said, "No."
Carter stood and said, "Excuse us, everyone. We're gonna move this argument into the other room."
We'd been having breakfast in the kitchen with Mrs. Strakova, our wonderful cook, Mrs. Kopek, her friend and our housekeeper, and Ferdinand, our gardener and ersatz chauffeur. The other three kids who worked for us had already left the table.
I said, "Thank you, Mrs. Strakova, for another delicious meal." With that, I turned on my heel and made my way through the dining room and into the great room.
As I did, I heard Carter say, "Yes, thank you."
Mrs. Strakova replied, "You are very welcome, Mr. Carter."
As I stood in the great room, looking at the roaring fire that Carter had built while we were waiting for breakfast, I sighed audibly. I was, to put it mildly, sick and tired of having the same conversation over and over again.
Right then, I heard Carter say, "What is the problem, Nick?"
I shook my head and made my way for the stairs. As I made my way up, I could hear him following me. At the top of the stairs, I sped up, passing the two bedrooms on either side of the hallway, and breaking into a trot before banging open the door to our bedroom. I discovered a startled Gustav, our butler and valet, who was putting away the laundry he'd picked up the day before from down on Clay Street.
He looked at me from where he was standing in front of the bureau. "I am sorry, Mr. Nick," he said apologetically.
I slammed the bedroom door behind me and leaned against it. "Don't apologize, Gustav," I said with a sharpness to my voice that he didn't deserve.
"Is this about—"
"Yes."
He smiled wanly and said, "I agree with you."
As Carter knocked on the door behind me and started fiddling with the doorknob, I said, "That's fine, Gustav, but no one asked you." As soon as the words came out of my mouth, I instantly regretted it. I said, "I'm sorry."
He shrugged. "That is fine, Mr. Nick. Shall I come back again to finish?"
"Go ahead and finish. I'm not letting him in." As I said that, Carter banged a little louder on the thick oak door.
Gustav raised his eyebrows for a moment and then turned to finish unfolding and refolding the clothes he was putting away. He had a very specific way that he liked to fold our BVDs and socks. He'd stopped trying to get the laundry to follow his instructions and, instead, had decided he would just have to do it on his own each time the clothes came back.
"Nick." That was Carter. "Let me in."
"You said I was stubborn and you're right. I've already told you. It's not gonna happen." I leaned against the door and kicked off my shoes.
Gustav looked down at my stocking feet with a question on his face.
In a whisper, I said, "Makes it easier to get traction on the rug. My shoes will slip. I may need your help." I wasn't really serious but I wouldn't have turned him down if he offered. Carter banged again.
"No, Mr. Nick. I must not get involved. We all have our little fights, now and then."
I grinned but was also tempted to walk over and knock his block off for quoting me back to me. However, right at that moment, I was too busy trying to figure out which piece of furniture would be heavy enough to keep my very tall, muscular, ex-fireman of a husband from getting in the door. I knew that I had little chance of keeping him out. But I wasn't going down without a fight.
"Nick, I'm gonna start pushing my way in, son. You better get ready."
"I don't care, fireman. You don't scare me." I hoped that by saying those words, usually reserved for our romps in the hay, that I might defuse the tension.
"Look, Nick," said Carter from behind the door. "I have a meeting at 10. We need to get to work. And I don't want to have this argument again."
"If you don't wanna have this argument again, then you should stop asking me about it."
Carter sighed. "But I refuse to believe that you're gonna keep refusing me what I want." He was playing dirty. That was talk straight from our bed. I tried to get mad about it but realized I'd just done the same thing.
"Gustav is in here, fireman."
"Are you gonna stay in there with him and leave me out here, all alone?"
Gustav looked at me with a grin on his face.
/> I couldn't help but laugh. I stepped away from the door. As I did, Carter opened it. I bent over to pick up my shoes and should have known better because I left myself wide open. Carter took advantage of the situation and gave me a hard swat on my ass. I stood up and turned on him. "What was that for?"
"For being an ass about all of this." He looked down at me with half a smile.
For some reason, I could feel the tension come back. I nodded, walked over to the bench by the bed, and began to put my shoes on.
"What are you doing?" asked Carter.
"What does it look like I'm doing?"
"I know what you're doing. Why do you need to do it?"
"Because these are new and the soles are still too slick."
"Too slick for what?"
Finished, I stood and said, "For getting traction to keep that door closed."
Carter folded his arms. "You thought you were going to be able to keep me out?"
Gustav, who didn't appear to be finished, made a beeline for the door. Without saying anything, he slipped out and pulled the door closed behind him.
I nodded, putting my stone face on. "I did."
"Don't try that look with me, Nicholas Williams."
I melted a little, like I always did when he used my full name. But I wasn't ready to give in. Not yet. "Or what?"
"You know."
That tension was back. And it was riding on the back of unreasonableness. "Look, Carter. Cut the crap."
He rolled his eyes. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
I took a deep breath and thought about his perfectly reasonable question. After a moment, coming up with nothing, I replied honestly. "I don't know."
"Well, I wish you would either tell me what is bothering you about all of this or just get mad and try to slug me or something." His voice cracked at the end.
I blinked several times, trying to keep the tears from getting out. "I dunno. Really, Carter, I don't."
Carter, whose face had been contorted in a frown, appeared to relax. He sighed. "You've been through a lot this year—"
I exploded. "And so the hell have you! So what? Why do you keep saying that? Yes, this has been a tough six months." I waved my hands in the air. "Seven months. However long it's been, it's been tough. But it's over." I brought my voice down. "Can't you see that it's over? Life is back to normal. Why do you have to keep bringing all of that up, over and over again?" I knew I was losing it, but I had a point and I wanted to make it. "Maybe, just maybe, if we stopped talking about it and just got back to living our lives, then it would go away." I plopped down on the bench and looked out the window. "It is fucking cold as fuck in this goddam house. Why the hell do we have all the goddam windows fucking open?"
Suddenly, I couldn't stand the house any more. I wanted out of our gilded cage. I was sick of dealing with all our staff and running the business. I just wanted out.
I looked at Carter for a long moment, wondering if he understood. He just stared at me as if he did but didn't know how to reply. Not knowing what else to do, I stood up, grabbed the shoe box by the wall, and pitched it against the mirror over the bureau. It shattered into several long pieces of glass and made quite a racket. I stood there, not quite sure how to respond to my own violence, and felt really, really cold.
Carter walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder behind my neck. He ran one finger up and down my spine. It felt soothing in a way I hadn't felt in a while. I thought I was going to cry, but the tears didn't come.
There was a loud knock on the door. "Mr. Nick? Are you OK?" It was Mrs. Kopek.
Carter replied, "We're fine, Mrs. Kopek. We need some time alone."
"Yes, Mr. Carter."
I could hear her walk away down the hall. Whispered voices spoke in Czech and then faded as whoever was there made their way downstairs.
Carter grabbed me by the shoulders and turned me towards him. He looked down at me for a long moment. His eyes were red but no tears came for him either. I wondered if we were just both cried out.
He pulled me over to the bench. We both sat and he put his arm around me. We sat there for a long time. Finally, he stood and walked over to the side of the bed. He picked up the phone and dialed a number. After a moment, he said, "Marnie?" There was a brief pause. "Fine. Look, neither of us are coming in today. I have a meeting at 10. Burgess can take care of it. And, whatever is on Nick's calendar, just move it around or do whatever you have to do." There was a long pause. "We're fine. We just need to find some warm weather, that's all. Now, can you get Robert on the line for me?"
Chapter 2
Hotel Riviera del Pacifico
Ensenada, Mex.
Friday, July 8, 1955
Half past 11 in the morning
"How are you both?" The woman standing behind the desk and asking the question was Marjorie Rocha. She was the owner, with her husband, Alfonso, of the hotel we were standing in the middle of. It was quiet. There didn't seem to be a lot of guests.
It was also hot. On the plane down, we'd changed into the summer-time clothes we'd picked up in Australia back in February. But, even in short sleeves, I was still sweating.
Carter replied, "Better for seeing you." He was using his southern charm and she smiled in return, like she always did.
"How are you, Marge?" I asked.
She nodded. "About the same as you two, if I'm any judge of the looks on your faces. I've never seen you two look so down before."
I wanted to change the subject. "It was getting cold up in the City and we thought we could use a couple of days in the sun. Sorry we didn't call ahead. You have any room for us?"
She laughed bitterly. "You can have the whole place. We're practically empty."
"Why's that?" asked Carter.
"Well, after the big fiasco with Taylor Wells being murdered here back in 1953, the studios made our place off limits and started sending all their stars down to Acapulco." Taylor Wells, once a rising star, had been brutally murdered at the hotel by person or persons unknown. At the time, he was going with my ex-lover, one Jeffery Klein, Esquire. Before the crime could be solved, all the suspects had died, in one way or another. It had caused quite a stir.
I shook my head. "I'm sorry about that, Marge."
She shrugged and sighed. "And Maldonado is all over us, trying to get us to sell out. For nothing, of course."
"Why hasn't he just appropriated the hotel? That's what he threatened to do." Braulio Maldonado was the Governor of Baja California. He was a mean S.O.B. and had been trying to take over the hotel from Marge since she'd bought it and made it a success, thanks to her Hollywood connections. She'd once been a Ziegfield girl and had been in a few pictures in the 20s and 30s.
"He can't. I'm a Mexican citizen, thanks to Alfonso, and appropriation is for foreign-owned properties, of which there are almost none in the state. He's trying to get a bill through the state congress. He's almost succeeded twice but he's not very popular right now." She tilted her head to one side. "But when I asked about you, you changed the subject."
I nodded. "You're right. I did."
. . .
Once we were in our bathing trunks and stretched out under the hot Mexican sun, Carter asked, "Feeling any better?"
I sighed. "I'm warmer, that's for sure."
He laughed. It wasn't a happy laugh. I turned and looked at him. We both had on sunglasses, so I couldn't see his eyes. But he was frowning again.
"Look, Carter. You know I love you."
"And, I love you, Nick."
"But we can't keep having the same argument over and over again."
He sighed and nodded. "I know. I just don't understand why it bothers you so much."
I turned away and looked up at the blue sky. "What's to understand. It's idiotic. I hate it. I've told you that a thousand times."
"You have. But," he took a deep breath and gingerly said, "it's my house, too."
That, for whatever reason, finally made me cry. The tears started flowing and I let
them. I sat there until I saw Alfonso coming out from the hotel and heading towards us.
Using the towel provided by the hotel, I wiped my eyes and tried to put on a presentable face.
Alfonso wasn't a particularly handsome man, although he was tall and distinguished with a long, aquiline nose and very dark eyes. He was friendly and kind and very much in love with Marge. He was dressed in a light-weight suit and looked like he'd just come from his office in the middle of town. He was a lawyer by trade and, from what I knew, was successful at it.
He walked up to us and shook his head. "So," he said with a smile, "who are you here to rescue or investigate this time?"
Carter laughed. Again, it wasn't a happy laugh. "We just needed the sun. It was fifty degrees at home this morning. It's been a cold July so far."
"Well, we are most glad you are here. I do not wish to disturb you, but when you have a moment, may I speak with you both?"
Carter said, "Sure. How about we meet after lunch?"
"That is fine. Perhaps in the bar? Let us say at half past 2?"
Carter replied, "That's good. We'll see you then."
Alfonso looked at me for a moment. An expression of concern passed over his face but he quickly smiled, nodded, turned, and made his way back inside.
. . .
Marge had put us in our old room at the very end of what my ex-lover Jeffery had dubbed, "Queer Row." It was the last of four bungalows which faced the beach. On our first visit, each one of them had been occupied by either a homosexual or a lesbian couple.
We changed clothes for lunch in silence. With Carter leading the way towards the dining room, I followed him and tried to gather my thoughts. I was warmer and that was good. Or better, at least. We were mostly alone. In fact, it was almost spooky how alone we were. But I was still not prepared to give in to what he wanted. I was being unreasonable but I felt as if once I gave in, it was going to be awful. Who knew where things would go from there?
The pretty hostess sat us at a table by the window so we could see the ocean. Carter put in for a steak, well done, with some french-fried potatoes. I asked for the raw fish that came in a glass with limes. I wasn't very hungry.
As we ate, neither of us spoke. I watched Carter saw into his piece of shoe leather that he always seemed to enjoy. He suspiciously watched me eat the fish. We both had the Mexican dark beer we liked so much.
The Pitiful Player (A Nick Williams Mystery Book 14) Page 1