by Keene, Day
The midget took a business card from his wallet and handed it to Daly. The printing on the card read:
CARNIVAL COSTUME COMPANY
RENT OR SALE
Dance & Ballet Harem
Cancan Leotards
Roaring 20’s Santa Claus
Keystone Cop Western
Clown — Devil Cutaways
Wigs & Beards Makeup
26 Alameda St. OL 2-5168
Colonel Thumb continued the story. “And when we talked to this guy we came up smelling like roses. To begin with, we knew a number of acts he’d outfitted. So we talked about the business for awhile. Then he told us what we wanted to know.”
Daly removed the last of the pancake makeup he’d used in an attempt to cover his discolored eye and tossed the towel on the shelf in his combination office and dressing room. “Go on, please, Colonel.”
“Well, this is what he told us. Last Friday afternoon, just before he closed, a big pink Cadillac pulled up in front of his place and this blonde broad, dressed to the nines, came in. She’s very high society, see? She claims her name is Mrs. Milo Bennett and she gave a swank Beverly Hills address. And she says that she and her husband are going to a costume party and they would like to go as clowns. And she rented two identical Pierrot outfits, one large and one medium, complete with caps and bladders. Then she bought two rubber clown masks, the kind kids wear on Halloween.”
Daly touched the swollen flesh around his eye. “This is beginning to make sense. And whoever wore them used them twice. Once outside in the studio parking lot. Then when they looted the truck. No wonder those clowns disappeared so fast. All they had to do was rip off their masks and put a pair of coveralls over their costumes and no one would pay any attention to them.”
DuBoise asked, “But why didn’t the owner of the costume company go to the police when he read about the robbery?”
The midget told him. “Because he has a second house in Palm Springs and after he closes on Friday, he drives down for a long weekend and doesn’t come back until Tuesday morning. While he’s there he plays golf and relaxes and doesn’t pay too much attention to what’s going on in the world. Besides, like he told Uriah and me, he rents or sells maybe two hundred costumes a week and he had no reason to connect a Beverly Hills society broad with the robbery of an armored truck.”
Daly considered the information. “It was nice thinking, Colonel. But I don’t see that we’re much farther ahead than we were. I imagine the address she gave was a phony.”
“That’s right, Mr. Daly,” Uriah said. “But here’s the snapper. Sure, the address in Beverly Hills was a phony. Me and the colonel checked it out. That’s why we’re so late getting here. But here’s the great big beautiful blow-off. The dame is so chintzy that to save an extra day’s rental she brought the costumes back about two o’clock Saturday afternoon and collected her deposit money.”
DuBoise puzzled, “I thought you said the owner drove down to Palm Springs after he closed on Friday.”
“He does,” Colonel Thumb said. “But his store manager keeps the shop open on Saturdays. It’s one of their best days.” He took a slip of paper from his pocket and unfolded it. “And while I don’t know if you know it or not, I didn’t, it’s a state law that after you rent a costume you have to have it cleaned before you can rent it again. And when the manager went through the pockets before throwing the clown costumes in the bin of things to be cleaned, he found this crumpled up in the pants pocket of the smaller outfit.”
DuBoise took the crumpled piece of paper from the midget. “I’ll be damned. A traffic citation issued at 9 a.m. on Saturday morning last to one Tommy Banks for illegally parking a 1961 Volkswagen, license plates HIU-587, all night in a restricted zone on Ventura Boulevard. The citing officer, Radio Car Officer Anthony DiFanti, working out of the Van Nuys Police Station.”
Daly asked if it gave Banks’ address.
“Yes. Rural Route 3. Box Number 36A. Big Bear City.”
Daly slipped into his coat “Let’s drive out to the Van Nuys station and find out where Officer DiFanti lives. It may just be that he can tell us something.”
Chapter Twenty-two
VISTA VIEW proved to be a pleasant street of modest homes in the fifteen-to-seventeen-thousand-dollar class. Most of the houses were dark and Daly had to ring the bell of 2132 three times before a light came on in one of the rooms, presumably a bedroom. Almost simultaneously a baby began to cry and a young woman’s voice said soothingly, “Shh. It’s all right, sweetheart. Mother’s right here. You be a good boy and I’ll feed you in just a minute.” She added in a sharper tone, “As soon as I find out what dope is ringing our bell at two o’clock in the morning.”
A moment later the light in the living room came on and, peering through one of the leaded glass panes in the front door, Daly could see a tall, attractive, bare-legged, black-haired girl wearing a baby doll nightdress trying to slip her arms into the sleeves of a matching negligee while she held a crying infant in one arm. It made a pleasant, homey picture.
Then, with the negligee belted securely and swishing around her bare legs, she crossed the room and turned on the outside light. Opening the door the length of the safety chain, she asked, “Yes?”
“Mrs. Anthony DiFanti?”
“That’s right.”
Daly introduced himself. “I’m Tom Daly and this is Gene DuBoise. And while we know it’s very late, we’d like to talk to your husband.”
“Can’t it wait until morning?”
“I’m afraid not,” DuBoise said. “It’s about a traffic citation he wrote the other morning. We just came from the station and the watch commander, a Captain Ferguson, said it would be all right. Officer DiFanti can check with him if he cares to.”
The black-haired girl was dubious. She shifted the crying baby from one arm to the other. Then leaving the door on the chain, she said, “Well, all right. I’ll go wake Tony. You wait there.”
“Thank you,” Daly smiled.
As seen from the rear, the young mother reminded him slightly of Miss Lindler. While nature hadn’t been overkind to the cashier, both she and young Mrs. DiFanti had attractive derrieres that undulated as they walked. It was a pity that Miss Lindler was so plain. She would probably have made some man a good wife.
In the bedroom of the house he heard the girl say, “Tony, wake up, honey.” A muffled male voice fogged with sleep said something Daly couldn’t hear and young Mrs. DiFanti added, “No. It isn’t morning. It’s still the middle of the night. But there are two men here to see you. They say it’s about some traffic citation you wrote and Captain Ferguson says it’s all right for you to talk to them.”
“They want to talk to me about a traffic citation this time of morning?”
“That’s what they said.”
“Did they say who they were?”
“Yes. One of them said he was Tom Daly. You know, the big mouth on Channel 15 that you like so much. He even looks a little like him.”
DiFanti scoffed, “Aw, what would a big shot like Mr. Daly want with me at two o’clock in the morning?”
Young Mrs. DiFanti was practical. “There is one way to find out. Put on your pants and go see while I give Junior what he wants before he wakes up the whole neighborhood.”
A moment later a muscular young man appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, bare-chested and in his bare feet, but wearing his uniform pants. Combing his hair with his fingers, he crossed the living room, unhooked the chain and opened the door. Recognizing Daly immediately, he was still puzzled, but pleased.
“Come in, Mr. Daly. Come in, both of you. Please. Like I just told the wife, while I don’t know why a guy like you would be looking me up this time of morning, this is an honor. I watch your show every chance I get, when I don’t pull a night tour, but I never thought I’d get to meet you in person.”
Daly shook hands with him. “It’s nice to meet you.” He introduced DuBoise. “Officer DiFanti, Gene DuBoise, my friend and pe
rsonal manager.”
DiFanti shook hands with DuBoise. “I’ve read about you. You’re the guy who was a captain in the French Foreign Legion.” He picked a child’s coloring book and a box of crayons from one chair and a transparent plastic space helmet from another. “Sit down, if you can find a place to sit. With four kids walking and one crawling, plus the new baby, sometimes that’s hard to do. Like the old saying goes, the rich get richer and the poor get kids.” He offered the hospitality of his home. “Can I buy you fellows a drink, or maybe have Stella put on a pot of coffee?”
“Thanks a lot,” Daly said. “Perhaps some other time. But if you don’t mind, we’ll take a rain check for now and get right down to business.”
“Whatever you say, Mr. Daly.”
Daly continued, “As you may have read in the papers or seen and heard on the air, some of the boys downtown, including Lieutenant Schaeffer of Homicide and the District Attorney’s office, don’t see eye to eye with Gene and myself on that armored car robbery last Saturday.”
“Yeah. How about that?” DiFanti said. “That’s a tough one to figure. What evidence there is is against them. But both Stella and I are pulling for the Laredos. Especially since we read that she’s going to have a baby. We even went to church yesterday and lit a candle for her. Isn’t that right, honey?”
Daly glanced up and saw why the baby had stopped crying. Reluctant to miss any of the conversation, Mrs. DiFanti had returned to the living room and, without embarrassment and holding a fold of her negligee to at least partially cover the operation, she was using one of her shapely breasts for the purpose for which nature had intended it.
“That’s right,” the young woman said. “But Tony only being a patrolman, we don’t dare say too much. He won’t get into any trouble talking to you, will he, Mr. Daly?”
“I promise he won’t,” Daly promised.
DiFanti accepted a cigarette and a light from DuBoise, “Now what’s this about a traffic citation, Mr. Daly?”
Daly said, “You wrote it Saturday morning, at nine o’clock. Somewhere along Ventura Boulevard. For the illegal parking of a 1961 Volkswagen in a restricted zone.”
“I remember it,” DiFanti said. “Seeing as how, for the last six months, I’ve been assigned to a radio car and spend most of my time answering squeals, I’m usually too busy to pay much attention to traffic violations. But I’d just answered a drunk and disorderly at the La Hacienda Motel. Not that they’d called in. They never do. The squeal came from one of the guys who works at the service station next door. The way I got the call on my two-way, some drunk was pounding on a dame and she was screaming bloody murder. Anyway, it was a little before nine when I got there. The screaming was coming from Unit 6 and when I walked in both of them were so drunk it was difficult to tell who was doing what to who, or who was getting the worst of it. So I made both of them get dressed, both of them giving me lots of lip while they did, and I walked them out and put them in my car. Then, just as I started to pull away I noticed this Volkswagen parked at the curb in a red zone, right where it completely blocked the view for anyone coming out of the gas station. Then, while I was checking the registration slip, this wise young punk came out of the motel and he started to give me trouble.”
“In what way?” DuBoise asked.
DiFanti shrugged. “The usual. More lip and lots of it He said he’d parked there a half dozen times and had never gotten a ticket And he asks, snotty like, what am I trying to do, build up my ticket quota? So, having just been over that route a few minutes before, and though I had no proof of it, I cited the smart son-of-a-bitch for parking all night in a no parking zone.”
“What did he look like?” Daly asked.
“Young. Eighteen or nineteen. I think it said nineteen on his driver’s license.”
“He had a valid license?”
“He did.”
“Would you describe him?”
“He was about five feet eight, one hundred and fifty pounds. Light complected. One of those long haircuts. Not bad looking, if you like punks.”
DuBoise asked, “Did you notice anything unusual about the way he was dressed?”
DiFanti thought a moment. “Now that you mention it, yes. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but he was wearing a cheap trench coat, all buttoned up, over a pair of white pants. Why?”
Daly said quietly, “I imagine that Gene is wondering if he could have been wearing a clown costume under his coat.”
DiFanti ran his fingers through his hair. “I should have thought of that. No wonder after eight years on the force I’m still riding a prowl car. Yeah, sure, the way he had the collar turned up and the coat belted, all I could see were his pants. But they could have been part of a clown costume. Don’t tell me you think he was one of the guys in on that armored truck job?”
“We think so,” Daly said. “You say he came out of a motel?”
“That’s right. The La Hacienda. As I understand it, it used to be a nice place. But that was some years ago, before the valley became so crowded and the freeway was built. Now it’s not much more than a riding academy, you bring your own filly.” DiFanti added, “Not that we’ve ever been able to prove it. Even if you can get someone to sign a complaint, it’s almost impossible to make a charge like that stand up in court.”
Daly asked, “I don’t suppose you know if Banks spent the night at the La Hacienda? Or with whom?”
“No. I didn’t have any reason to check. I was citing him for a traffic violation.” DiFanti added, “But come to think of it, the punk had that look on his face. You know. The cat-who-ate-the-canary look of a guy who has just spent the night beating a mattress with some hot pantsed little broad. You could practically see the feathers sticking out of his mouth. And you know which end of the bird I mean.”
“Well, thanks. We’ll try the La Hacienda next.”
Daly got to his feet and started to pay his respects to Mrs. DiFanti and realized why her husband had felt free to express himself in the terminology he’d used. Mrs. DiFanti had left the room to return her contented and now sleeping infant to his crib. She came back a moment later to ask, pleasantly, if he and Mr. DuBoise were certain they wouldn’t like her to make a pot of coffee.
In the few minutes she’d been gone there’d been a subtle change in the young matron. She was still the same woman, still dressed in the same negligee, but she looked, somehow, younger, plainer, much less mature. At the time Daly was merely mildly puzzled. Later he realized why.
Smiling, he refused her offer. “Thank you. I’m certain, Mrs. DiFanti.”
Still barefoot, DiFanti accompanied them to the door and down the walk to Daly’s car. “I could kick myself,” he admitted. “I could have made detective with this one. Sure. Tommy and Thelma Banks. A 1961 Volkswagen with license plates HIU-587. There’s been a pick-up on him since Sunday. The car has been on the hot sheet almost as long. I feel like a fool for not connecting the two. But at the time the incident was so unimportant that it never entered my mind after I wrote the citation.”
• • •
The youthful night clerk at the La Hacienda was, understandably, reluctant to talk. “Of course I recognize you, Mr. Daly,” he admitted. He pointed to the television set in one corner of the office. “I watch you five nights a week. I watched your show tonight. But with the kind of setup we have here, I’d lose my job if I talked to you. And what with one thing and another, it’s not too bad a job.”
“Ah, yes,” DuBoise said. “A dollar here, a dollar there. Plus the lagniappe. But I’m afraid you haven’t much choice. Would you rather talk to us or to Lieutenant Schaeffer of Homicide?”
The clerk admitted defeat. “Okay. What do you want to know?”
“Were you working the desk Friday night?”
“I was.”
Daly said, “Then tell us this. Did a Tommy Banks check in with a blonde woman?”
“The name isn’t familiar.”
“Nineteen. Five feet eight or nine.
A husky one hundred and fifty pounds. One of those ducktail haircuts.”
“Oh, him.”
“You recognize the description?”
“Yeah. I know the guy you mean. He’s been here a half dozen times. And Friday he stayed all night. At least he hadn’t come up for air when I went off duty at eight o’clock.”
“What name did he register under?”
“No name.” The clerk explained. “None of her boy friends ever sign in. It’s a little system she has. She always comes in first and pays for the unit and signs the registration card as Mr. and Mrs. Milo Bennett of Beverly Hills.”
Daly and DuBoise exchanged glances.
Daly asked, “Does this Mrs. Bennett come in often?”
“At least two or three times a week.” The clerk added, “Usually with her regular boy friend. But sometimes with a punk like the one you’re talking about and sometimes with older men who look like she might have picked them up in some bar.”
“Then Banks wasn’t her regular boy friend?”
“No. She’s been coming here for maybe six months or so, but he only came around the half dozen times, all of them in the last few weeks.”
Daly took a newspaper picture of Tim Kelly from his pocket. “How about this man? Is, or was, he her regular friend?”
The clerk studied the picture. “No. I never saw him with her. Her regular boy friend is perhaps thirty-five, rather thin, with a deeply lined face. About my height. A flashy dresser. I never heard him say what he does, but he looks and talks as if he might be a promoter of some kind.”
The description was vaguely familiar but neither Daly nor DuBoise could place the man.
Daly said, “All right. So far so good. Now describe this Mrs. Bennett. And take your time. We aren’t in any hurry.”
The clerk took the breast pocket handkerchief from his coat and patted at the drops of perspiration beading his face. “Well, to begin with I’d say she is about five feet two and weighs one hundred and ten or fifteen pounds, with plenty going for her fore and aft. What I mean, she’s really stacked.”