“Well?” she said. “Did you learn anything?”
“Oh yeah,” I said. “I learned to say on the sidewalk. I learned how loud a door can slam. I learned how ornery a guy can get if you step on his new grass. But no, nothing we can use. What about you?”
“The woman there said that Joey had moved out six days ago,” Gloria said. “She didn’t know where he’d moved to but she did remember where he used to hang out. It’s a bar called the Plaid Rabbit on Sunset. Now we’ve got two places left to check out—the bar and the place where he works. Where was that again?”
I looked at my notes. “The guy works at the public library,” I said. “Doesn’t exactly fit the mental picture I had of this guy. I was picturing some greasy grunt in a foundry or machine shop. But a library?”
“Well,” Gloria said, “At least our interview with him will be a quiet one.”
I looked at my watch. It was too early for the guy to be sucking suds at the corner bar, but not late enough for him to be off work just yet. “Drive over to the library,” I told Gloria. “Now I’ve got my curiosity up wondering what kind up guy we’re up against here.”
It took us nearly half an hour through city traffic before Gloria pulled into the library parking lot. I stuck a quarter in the meter and the two of us walked in through the front door. We approached the information desk, where a woman wearing small-rimmed glasses and with her hair in a bun, sat checking something on her computer screen. When she’d finished, she motioned us over.
“I can help whoever is next,” she said.
“I’ll take this one,” Gloria said and walked up to where the woman sat. “Excuse me,” Gloria told the woman. “I’m looking for Joseph Hendricks. I was told he worked here in the library.”
Without looking up, the woman said, “Second floor reference desk.”
“Thank you,” Gloria said, but the woman was already beckoning to the next person in line.
Gloria met me behind the velvet rope and jerked her head toward the elevator. “Second floor,” she said.
We got off on the second floor and walked directly to the reference desk. There was a meek-looking man with a slight frame, wearing horn-rimmed glasses. One of his arms sported a white plaster of Paris cast and hung in a sling. He was paging through a fat dictionary, running his finger down the page. When he stopped, he turned to the paper in front of him and wrote something down before closing the dictionary and returning it to a shelf behind him. He looked up as we approached.
“May I help you,” he said.
“Yes,” I said. “We’re looking for Mr. Hendricks.”
“I’m Mr. Hendricks,” the man said.
“Uh no,” I said. “We’re looking for Mr. Joseph Hendricks.”
“I am Joseph Hendricks,” the man said. “And you are?”
“My name is Elliott Cooper,” I said and then gestured toward Gloria. “And this is Gloria Campbell. Is there someplace private we can all talk, Mr. Hendricks?”
“What is this in regard to?” Hendricks said.
Gloria stepped up and said, “It might be better all around if we could speak to you in private, Mr. Hendricks. Or would it be all right if I called you Joey?”
“Oh god,” Hendricks said. “Now I get it. She sent you, didn’t she?”
“Please, Mr. Hendricks,” I said. “Do you have a back room where we could talk?”
Hendricks got up out of his seat and gestured for us to come around to the side door next to his desk. “Come in through there,” he said and met us on the other side of the door. He let us in and invited us both to sit. He pulled up a chair facing us and sat down. “Don’t tell me,” he said. “This has something to do with Donna. Am I correct?”
“Yes it does,” Gloria said. “That’s what we need to talk to you about. Donna has asked us to make sure you stay away from her and it is our intention to make sure...”
Hendricks laughed. “That’s rich,” he said. “That sounds like something she’d do.”
“This is no laughing matter,” Gloria said. “You can get yourself in a whole lot of trouble if you don’t...”
“Hold on, both of you,” Hendricks said. “I don’t know what Donna told you or what kind of opinion you’ve formed of me, but I can almost guarantee you that you’ve got it wrong, whatever it is.”
I pointed my finger in Hendricks’ face. “Are you denying that there was a restraining order issued?”
Hendricks shook his head. “No. I know there’s one,” he said. “What about it?”
“And you don’t see that as a problem for you?” Gloria said.
“Only if she violates it,” Hendricks said.
“And furthermore,” I said. “You’d better... Wait a minute, what was that you said?”
Hendricks stood now and paced. “I said, I don’t see a problem unless she violates it.”
“What are you talking about?” Gloria said. “She’s the one who took out the restraining order against you.”
“Is that what she told you?” Hendricks said.
Gloria and I looked at each other, dumbfounded. I looked up at Hendricks. “Are you telling us that you are the victim here and that she is the stalker?”
“I think you’re finally getting a grasp of the situation,” Hendricks said. “I took out a restraining order on Donna more than a month ago. It got so bad, I finally had to move out of the house I was renting. She kept coming over and breaking in. That woman is crazy.”
“Donna claims you verbally abused her and beat her on occasion,” Gloria said.
Hendricks lifted his cast and rolled his eyes. “Who beat whom?” he said. “That’s right, she did this to me. I tried to break it off with her after I realized she was a nut case and she broke my arm.”
“Donna tells us that you are the stalker and that you’re after her money,” I said. “Any truth to that?”
“Sure,” Hendricks said, “If you turn it around again. I’m the one with the money. She’s the one who’s after it. As soon as she found out that one of my uncles died and left me a tidy sum, she’s been like a crazy woman. She won’t leave me alone and I told her we were through more than a month ago. She comes in here sometimes, making a scene. I’m afraid I’ll lose my job if she doesn’t stop it.”
Gloria looked at me and I shrugged, spreading my hands. She looked back at Hendricks. “Now I’m really confused,” Gloria said.
“You don’t believe me?” Hendricks said. “Let me guess, she stole your clothes from a changing room in some store, right?”
Gloria stood up now. “And just how would you know that unless you were stalking her?” she said.
“You think you’re the only one she’s done this to?” Hendricks explained. “She always does the same thing. She finds a way to contact the owner of the clothes and tells them where they can pick them up again and how she’s sorry she had to do it. And as a convincer, she tells the victims that she’ll leave and extra ten dollars in their clothes to make up for the trouble.”
At that moment Gloria and I realized that we had been had. Now I stood and walked over to where Joseph Hendricks was standing. I laid a hand on his shoulder.
“Mr. Hendricks,” I said. “I hope you’ll accept our apologies. We had no idea.”
“You’re not the first,” he said. “And you will not be the last. I guarantee that. A few weeks ago she actually hired a private eye to follow me and tell her where I was. Can you imagine that? A gumshoe following me? I found out after he’d already stopped tailing me so I never got a look at him. I’m picturing some sneaky type in a long trench coat, tied at the waist and felt fedora with a rakish tilt. Probably drives an Oldsmobile from the thirties and talks in that noir vernacular.”
“Sounds like you’ve been watching too many Raymond Chandler movies,” I said. “I happen to know a real private eye and your description is way off. But that’s beside the point. The point now is to contact Donna again and try to get a straight story out of her.”
“Good luck,”
Hendricks said. “That gumshoe I told you about? Well, she hired him with the same sob story and paid him with a rubber check. He still hasn’t collected on that one. She didn’t even give that guy her real name or address. Sounds like he’s going to need a private eye to track the elusive Miss Cornwall down.”
“Who is Miss Cornwall?” I said.
“Donna Cornwall,” Hendricks said. “Isn’t that who we’ve been talking about all this time?” Hendricks looked us over and added, “Did she use Goodwin again, or was it something else this time?”
“Thank you for your time,” Gloria said. “Sorry to have bothered you.”
Gloria and I headed out the door and back around to the counter just as Joey Hendricks returned to his station. “Good luck finding her,” he said, and went back to whatever it was he was doing when we’d arrived.
Back in the car Gloria turned to me and sighed. “Now what do we do?” she said.
“We cut our losses and forget about this whole mess,” I said. “We’re not wasting any more time or resources on this woman. Let’s get back to the office.”
“I’ll drop you off there,” Gloria said, “But I have a personal errand to run, if you don’t mind.”
“Sure,” I said. “Why not?”
Gloria dropped me at the front door to our building and drove away again. I went back upstairs to the office, settled into my chair and pulled Donna Goodwin’s contract out of my drawer. I looked it over, hoping to find some clue as to the woman’s real identity and decided to file it under experience. I took a felt-tip marker and wrote ‘VOID’ across the face of the contract. With my pen, I made myself a note at the bottom containing information we’d learned from Joey Hendricks. I picked up the check and tore it in half, dropping both pieces into the folder again. I filed the folder away and put my feet up on the desk and settled back. I needed the rest.
Forty-five minutes later Gloria came back in carrying a package. She set the package on her desk and then hung her jacket on the coat hook.
“What’s in the box?” I said.
“You’ll see,” Gloria said, taking the box with her into the bathroom. She emerged fifteen minutes later wearing the slinky red dress that she’d tried on at Madame Michelle’s earlier. Her hair cascaded down over her shoulders and she’d made up her face like a model. She had the matching red shoes on her feet and she walked to a spot in front of my desk and slowly rotated, giving me the full effect.
I whistled a long, drawn-out wolf whistle and shook my wrist a couple of time. “Man oh man,” I said. “You look fantastic in that dress.”
“You like?” she said.
“I like,” I said and got up out of my chair and came around to where she stood, her open arms inviting me closer. I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her close, kissing her with a passion I didn’t know I possessed. When we parted, Gloria stepped back, took one look at me and laughed.
“Is that the effect I have on you?” I said, my feelings somewhat bruised.
Gloria held her hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry, Elliott,” she said stepping aside and gesturing toward the bathroom. “Just step in there and take a look at yourself in the mirror.”
I did as she asked and I had to laugh myself when I saw my bright red lips and the smear of lipstick that continued down to my chin and up to my nose. I grabbed a tissue and wiped it across my mouth, using a second tissue to get the last remnants of the greasy paint off my face. I pulled a third and forth tissue out of the box and returned to Gloria’s side.
She looked at the two additional tissues and asked, “What are those for?”
I smiled. “I’m not done yet,” I said, and locked lips with her again. This time when we parted I sidled over to the office door and locked it.
“Why’d you do that?” Gloria said.
I pointed to the leather sofa against the wall. “We haven’t broken it in yet,” I said, lying on the sofa and pulling Gloria down on top of me.
67 - Jack the Stripper
“A little to the left,” I said, squirming in my seat. “Now up a little, that’s it, now over to the right. Ooh, yeah, right there.” Gloria scraped her nails across my back as I leaned forward in my chair. I sighed heavily when she’d finished. “You’ve got a job for life,” I said.
“Even when Clay comes back?” Gloria said.
“Well,” I said. “Maybe not as a P.I., but you have a job for life as a back scratcher. Now that’s job security around here.”
She slapped my shoulder. “Does it come with medical, dental and a pension plan?”
Clay was my father and the second generation owner of Cooper Investigations. I was the third generation and it looked as if our private investigations business would end with me. Here I was, thirty-two years old and still single. There was no one for me to pass along the P.I. baton to when I retired. Maybe there was still time for that yet. My grandfather, Matt Cooper was nearly forty before his son, Clay was born. My own dad was just thirty when I was born, so I guess I wasn’t not too far behind schedule. But before I could think about a son, I’d have to decide how I felt about marriage. It was one of the oldest traditions out there and as far as I knew, no one ever died from it, except maybe the odd wife who occasionally turned up missing or dead after her disgruntled husband had reached the end of his rope.
I smacked Gloria on her butt and she settled onto my lap, her arm around my neck. She promptly stood up and straightened herself out when we heard footsteps outside the inner office door. We pretended to be looking over a report when the knock came. I glanced up toward the door and said, “It’s open, come on in.”
A woman with short cropped red hair, who appeared to be in her late thirties opened the door and peeked her head inside. “Mr. Cooper?” she said, still not all the way into the room.
Gloria stepped aside and I rose from my chair and strode over to the door to greet the woman. “Hi, I’m Elliott Cooper,” I said, extending my hand. “And you are?”
The woman came in now and closed the door behind her. “My name is Margaret Holden,” she said. “Can we talk?”
“Certainly,” I said, handing her one of my business cards. “Won’t you have a seat?” I gestured toward my client’s chair.
Margaret Holden sat, stuffed my card into her purse and then looked toward Gloria, who was standing nearby with a report in her hand. Margaret looked back at me. “Could we talk in private, Mr. Cooper?” she said, nervously squirming in the chair.
“I’m sorry, Miss Holden,” I said. “Where are my manners? This is Gloria Campbell, an associate here at Cooper Investigations. We usually work together on our cases. Anything you can say to me, you can say in front of her.”
Gloria offered her hand to Margaret, who reluctantly took it and gave it a single pump. Gloria put the report down on her own desk, picked up a clipboard with a yellow legal pad clamped onto it and pulled up another chair beside us.
“Now,” I said. “What is it we can do for you today, Miss Holden?”
“Actually,” Margaret said, “It’s Mrs. Holden, Mrs. Jack Holden.”
“All right, Mrs. Holden,” I said. “How can we help you today?”
Margaret looked at Gloria and then over at me. “I’d like you to help me find Jack,” she said.
Gloria and I exchanged glances and then I said, “Excuse me?” I said.
“Jack’s missing,” Margaret said. “I came home from work this evening and he was gone without a word. I’m worried, Mr. Cooper.”
Gloria leaned in and said, “Mrs. Holden, do you suspect foul play in Jack’s disappearance?”
“What do you mean, Miss Campbell?” Margaret said.
“Are you thinking that maybe someone kidnapped him?” Gloria said.
“I don’t think so,” Margaret said. “No one has called with any demands and some of Jack’s clothes are missing. Would kidnappers let him take extra clothes along? I don’t think so. I think Jack may have left on his own and I need to know where he is and if he’s all right.�
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“Okay,” I said. “You don’t suspect foul play and if Jack did leave under his own power, what makes you think that he’s not all right or that he wants to be found?”
Margaret squirmed some more and bit her bottom lip. “Maybe he left to get away from Billy,” Margaret said. “Maybe he just couldn’t take it anymore. I don’t know. But if that’s the case, I’d like you to find him and tell him I understand and that I’d like to go with him, wherever that might be.”
“Who’s Billy?” Gloria said, making notes on the legal pad.
Margaret turned to Gloria. “Billy Gibson,” she said. “He was Jack’s manager.”
“I can see this isn’t going to be easy,” I said. “Suppose you start at the beginning and tell us what you know about all this. Then maybe we can understand what it is you want and how we can go about getting it for you. First tell us why Jack has a manager.”
Margaret took a deep breath and let it out. “All right,” she said. “Jack is an entertainer and Billy Gibson is his manager. Billy owns a club on Sunset called Beefcakes, Unlimited. It’s a ladies strip club. That is, it’s a club where ladies can go to watch male strippers.”
“And Jack’s a stripper?” Gloria said.
“That’s right,” Margaret said. “Jack used to work in the construction business and then one night when he was drunk, he got up on the stage at Beefcakes, on a dare. When he finished, Billy Gibson took him backstage and told him how much he could make stripping for a living. Well, the construction business is not at all stable. Some weeks he’d make good money and then there’d be no work for months at a stretch, sometimes longer. Billy’s offer was twice what Jack was making even when times were good, so he dumped his tool belt and took up stripping. That was six months ago and he’s made himself a ton of money since then.”
“And the problem here is what?” I said.
Margaret hung her head. “Billy was after Jack in a different way,” she said. “And Jack is not like that at all. Most of the other strippers are, but not my Jack. I don’t know what kind of arrangement Billy made with Jack, but it seemed like Jack was feeling trapped in something that was making him uncomfortable and I guess he just wanted out.”
The Complete Cooper Collection (All 97 Stories) Page 194