“Blackmail her? Luna? I wasn’t. . I didn’t,” he said, looking around the empty little studio for sympathy or help.
“Luna recorded her conversation with you, Willie,” I said. “The police have the wire. They’re going to find you the way I found you. And they are going to ask you the same questions. Only, they won’t be as sweet as I am.”
“Shit, damn, crap,” Talbott said, throwing what was left of his cigarette at the cracked mirror.
“And snap, crackle, pop,” I added.
“It can’t get any worse,” he said helplessly.
But he was wrong.
The door behind me crashed open, rattling the glass. Talbott’s eyes widened with terror as he stared over my shoulder at whoever had come in. I turned. The dancing couple on the door were quivering. Two men stood in the doorway. Both were big. Neither was well dressed, neither wore a hat, but who am I to talk. The shorter one was a bulldog. The bigger one a Saint Bernard.
“You ain’t home,” said the bulldog.
It was an observation that couldn’t be challenged.
“I spent the night here,” Talbott said, his voice cracking.
The Saint Bernard closed the door.
“Who’s this?” the bulldog asked.
“A client,” I said.
“Blow,” the bulldog said to me.
“Peters, no,” Talbott pleaded.
“Blow, client. Willie and us have business to talk about,” said the bulldog.
“I’ll tell you about Luna,” Talbott almost wept, clutching my sleeve.
“How much does he owe you?” I asked.
The bulldog looked at me for the first time.
“He owes Mr. Chavez, Mr. Constantine Chavez, three thousand dollars,” the bulldog said. “You got three thousand dollars, client?”
I was supposed to be impressed by the mention of Constantine Chavez. Normally, I would have been. Chavez was a middle-level mobster with a reputation for having no patience.
“No,” I said, facing them, Talbott behind me. “But I work for a man who has, Arthur Forbes.”
“Fingers?” the bulldog said suspiciously, turning to the Saint Bernard, who showed no emotion. The bulldog turned back to me and cocked his head. “What’s Fingers got to do with this jamocko?” asked the bulldog.
“Mr. Forbes wants some information from him,” I said. “Mr. Forbes may well be willing to pay three thousand dollars for the information.”
Bulldog thought about this for a while. He examined our faces, turned once more to the Saint Bernard, who said, in a surprisingly high voice, “Chavez said we get the money or we break him up.”
The bulldog sighed and nodded. “Asked you once, ask you again. You got the cash, client?”
“No,” I said.
“Then we break him up. Tell Mr. Forbes we hope there’s no hard feelings. We’ll leave him so’s he can still talk.”
Talbott let out a pained gasp behind me.
“Hold it,” I said, holding up my hands.
“We got a job,” said bulldog. “Don’t make it no harder than it is.”
What happened next was fast and confusing, but I think I’ve got it straight. Bulldog was about two inches in front of me now. The Saint Bernard was at his side, looking at Talbott. I heard glass shatter and turned to Talbott’s cubicle. The cubicle’s window crashed to the floor, sending shards of glass in a burst in our direction. I covered my face with my arm and got a glimpse of a naked girl, undoubtedly Miss Perez, who had given up her meditation, had a gun in her hand, and was now firing at me, the bulldog and the Saint Bernard. I went to the floor. So did the bulldog and the Saint Bernard. Behind me I could hear Talbott letting out a series of strangled whimpers.
The cracked mirror on the far wall exploded with the second shot from Miss Perez. I covered my head, tasting glass shards on my lips as I tried to push through the wooden floor. There were four more shots, more breaking glass, and then the place went quiet, except for heavy breathing and Talbott’s groaning.
We all got up slowly, gingerly brushing glass from our clothes and skin. Bulldog’s forehead was bleeding. The Saint Bernard looked as if the palm of his right hand had been shredded. I seemed to be all right. We all looked at Miss Perez, who still held the pistol in her hands, aiming it in our direction. She was dark with long straight black hair. She was very pretty and she was very, very young and she was very naked. She should have been very scared as well, but she didn’t look it. She just looked dazed and stood there blinking. I wondered what she and Talbott had been doing besides evening out their body liquids.
“This don’t change nothing,” bulldog said.
“Someone must be calling the cops right now,” I tried.
“We work fast,” said bulldog.
“We are professionals,” added Saint Bernard.
“Oh, God,” Talbott groaned behind me. “Peters.”
“Look,” I said.
Bulldog pushed me toward Saint Bernard, who punched me in the shoulder and sent me awfully damned close to stumbling into the jagged glass left in Talbott’s cubicle window. Bulldog had Talbott by the neck now. Saint Bernard was watching me. I knew I was going to try something ridiculous and I was pretty sure I didn’t have a chance in the world. I looked over at Miss Perez. Eighteen, tops, I figured, and started back toward the fugitives from the kennel.
“Pardon me,” came a voice from the doorway.
Everyone in the room froze, then turned to the newcomer who stood in the doorway, hands on his hips.
“I have to tell you I’ve danced in worse,” said Fred Astaire.
I looked at bulldog and Saint Bernard. A faint look of possible recognition touched the bigger man’s face. The bulldog showed nothing.
“Get out, now,” bulldog said. “Now.”
“Can’t do that,” Astaire said with a smile, tiptoeing over broken glass.
“Throw him out,” the bulldog said, and the Saint Bernard lumbered toward Astaire.
It was no contest. Astaire jumped to his right as the big man reached for him. Astaire threw a short, sudden kick to the rear of the big man’s left knee, and the Saint Bernard went down with a grunt. Bulldog left Talbott and moved toward Astaire, who circled to his right, saying, “If we can just be reasonable.”
Bulldog was in no mood to be reasonable and he was quicker on his feet than Saint Bernard. He anticipated Astaire moving to his left or right and had his arms held wide open. Astaire stepped into the open arms, planted his left foot flat on the floor, and leveled a stomach-high kick at the bulldog, who staggered back, slipped on glass, and fell heavily.
I moved to the Saint Bernard, who was doing his best to get to his feet and finding it hard to do without the support of his left leg. Bulldog was rolling on the floor, holding his stomach, and trying to catch his breath.
“I’ve never done anything like that in my life,” Astaire said.
“I think we should get out of here,” I said.
I grabbed the open-mouthed Willie Talbott and pushed him toward the door. Then I went into Talbott’s office and moved toward Miss Perez, who backed away from me as I circled around the desk. I took the empty gun from her hand, put it on the desk, reached down, picked up a flowery dress from the floor, and handed it to her. She looked at the dress as if it were some alien and puzzling item from Mars.
“Put it on,” I said. “Fast.”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw Astaire and Talbott going through the studio door.
Miss Perez took the dress and got into it.
“You have shoes?” I asked. “You don’t want to walk through this glass without shoes.”
She blinked around at the floor, spotted a pair of slingback pumps, and slipped them on. I looked over at bulldog and Saint Bernard. They were recovering slowly, but they were recovering. I guided Miss Perez out of the cubicle and past the Saint Bernard, who turned to me and said, “I can’t walk, I can’t work.”
“Should have thought of that before you became an
insurance salesman,” I said.
Astaire and Talbott were standing on the sidewalk. Talbott looked at Miss Perez, turned to me and said, “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“How did you find me?” I asked Astaire.
“Wasn’t looking for you,” he said with a shrug. “I called Forbes and asked him if he knew the name of the dance studio where Luna taught before he met her. He told me and. .”
“Here you are,” I said. “Thanks.”
“Let’s not do it again,” he said, looking at Miss Perez.
“Talbott’s right,” I said. “We should get out of here. I can only take one passenger in my Crosley.”
Astaire led us around the corner to a big black Lincoln with darkened windows. I kept my hand on Talbott’s shoulder to discourage him from taking off down the street. Astaire had no trouble leading Miss Perez to the front seat.
Fifteen minutes later we dropped Miss Perez at her aunt’s apartment on Burnside. Astaire gave her two twenty-dollar bills and asked if she was going to be all right.
Miss Perez had managed to find her way halfway back to the planet and, as she got out of the car, twenties in hand, she looked at Fred Astaire and said, “You’re him.”
“Always have been,” Astaire said.
“Is it okay I tell my Tia Alicia?” she asked.
“It would be my pleasure,” Astaire said as she opened the door.
“I don’t think I’m gonna spend this money ever,” she said.
“I suggest you do spend it,” said Astaire.
“Well,” she said, stepping onto the curb and brushing back a stray strand of hair. “Maybe one of them. Sorry I tried to kill you.”
I waved a hand in my best nonchalant manner.
“Willie?” she said to Talbott, but his head was down and he was in no mood for words of love.
Astaire pulled away from the curb and looked at Talbott and me in the rearview mirror.
“Well, Mr. Peters, where do we go from here?”
Chapter Seven: The Last Waltz
“What were you threatening Luna Martin with?” I asked, biting into my hot dog.
“Pardon me?” Willie Talbott answered.
I finished my dog, a giant Poochie Dog with kraut and a Pile-O-Fries from the Tastee Pup, a stand on Washington shaped like a giant Collie. Sandwiches were served over the counter in the dog’s belly. We-Fred Astaire and Willie Talbott-sat at one of the four wooden tables next to the dog. A couple of young women dressed for office work kept looking over at us, trying to decide if the man in sunglasses and Greek fisherman’s cap was someone famous.
Astaire sat with his legs crossed, facing Talbott. Astaire’s dog was naked, no ketchup, no nothing, just a red dog on a bun. I stood at his side next to the table, reaching down for my fries. My rear was only slightly improved. It felt better to stand.
“When I was a kid, I mean back in Seattle, they used to call me Twinkle-Toes, Twinkle-Toes Talbott,” Talbott said, wolfing down onion rings and looking over his shoulder for the Saint Bernard and the bulldog. “I had this talent with my feet, could pick up, improvise, show people how to do it.”
“Twinkle-Toes,” Astaire said, putting down his hot dog, “what were you threatening Luna Martin with?”
“Luna wasn’t much of a dancer,” Talbott said, looking at my side of fries now that his pile was exhausted. “But she looked good and she wanted to learn. So, we made a deal. You know what I mean?”
“Like the deal you have with Miss Perez?” I asked.
“Something like that,” he said. “You mind?” He pointed at my fries. I shrugged. He took a handful.
“And you taught her how to dance?” Astaire asked.
“Everything she knew,” Talbott said. “And she showed no gratitude, no loyalty, no appreciation. You think I might have another dog? I left all my money back in the office.”
Astaire fished his wallet out and handed Talbott a buck.
“Be right back,” he said and hurried to the open stomach of the collie, who looked suspiciously like Lassie, though Vivian Starbuck who owned the place insisted when asked that it was just a coincidence. “All collies look alike,” she said. “Mine just happens to look more like Lassie.”
“Having Luna Martin teach people to dance is like asking Hitler to teach the principles of Buddhism,” Astaire said, watching Talbott who stood patiently waiting for his food. “Maybe we should have let those two back there shoot him.”
“You mean it?”
“No,” said Astaire, looking at me over his sunglasses. “But the Twinkle-Toes Talbotts of the world are unleashing a plague of lead-footed smiling robots on the dance floors of America, robots who then go on to teach the Twinkle-Toes method of dance to their unwary friends and defenseless children.”
“That bad?” I asked.
“Worse, far worse,” said Astaire as Talbott came back to the table with an overloaded dog and a double side of fries.
“Before you put your teeth into that, Willie,” I said, pulling his full paper plate in front of me the moment he put it on the table. “Tell me what you had on Luna.”
Talbott looked to Astaire for help. The dancer was impassive under his Greek fisherman’s cap.
“Okay,” said Talbott with a sigh, glancing at the two lunching women who were sipping Pepsi and eyeing our table. “I needed a few dollars and I asked for a loan from Luna, just enough to pay off a few debts. You saw back there.”
“We saw,” Astaire said.
“Well,” Talbott went on, “I’m not proud of it, but I told Luna I’d tell Fingers Forbes that she used to work in cheap dime-a-dance joints when she got started and that she was overfriendly with some of the clients when I took her under my tutelage at On Your Toes. All right?”
Talbott reached for his plate. I pushed his hand away.
“You’re lying,” I said, eating a couple of his fries.
“Me?” Talbott said, putting his left hand to his chest and once again looking at Astaire for help.
“I think Mr. Peters means you’ve told us a lie of omission,” said Astaire. “What you’ve told us may be true, but it wasn’t enough to hold Luna Martin up for blackmail.”
I nodded my approval of Astaire’s reading of the situation.
Talbott ran his tongue over his lower lip and then nervously chewed at it. I assumed this was an indication of deep thought.
“If I can get back to Seattle, my uncle-his name’s Jeff-owns some buildings. He’ll take me on as an apprentice janitor, a hundred a week, which is more than I ever made dancing.”
“There’s something telling in that,” said Astaire. “What will it take to get you to Seattle?”
“It’s not that I’m not grateful you two came along, but. . five hundred. That’ll keep me going for a while.”
I looked at Astaire and thought I saw a go-ahead behind his glasses.
“Three hundred, if the information is good,” I said.
Talbott nodded and said, after an elaborate sigh, “She was still seeing someone she met at the studio. After she got together with Forbes. From what Luna said, I think she was still seeing whoever it was right up to now. She said Forbes would definger her if he found out, and she’d be lucky if that was all he did to her. So, I figured when things got a little difficult for me, Luna might come up with enough to get me to Seattle. Is that so bad?”
“It’s blackmail,” I said. “And I think you’re still lying.”
Talbott reached for the plate again. I pushed his hand away again.
“Have a heart, here. The food’s getting cold.”
“Who was she seeing?” I asked.
“Not sure. I’ve got a guess. But I’m not sure. Look, let’s make it five hundred and I give you a list of all of Luna’s clients since she came to On Your Toes. Don’t worry. It’s not a long list.”
“Four hundred,” Astaire said.
Talbott shrugged his agreement and reached for the plate warily. I let him take it.
“I keep th
e books in my apartment,” said Twinkle-Toes. “Nice and neat. All in a row. Every payment. Every lesson date with a comment by the teacher. Five hundred and the book is yours, plus my best guess on who Luna was still seeing.” Talbott stuffed the hot dog in his mouth and took a big bite. His cheek expanded as he chewed and looked at us.
“Five hundred,” Astaire said.
The two women had finished their lunch and were advancing cautiously on our table. Astaire turned his head away.
“And we go to your apartment right after you finish eating,” I said. “You give us the book and your best guess and we drive you to the bus station.”
Talbott nodded.
“Excuse me,” said one of the two women, a brunette with swept-up hair, a little hat, and a dark twill suit. Up close she looked more like forty than twenty, but still not bad.
Her younger, blond companion, in a tan dress, hovered behind her.
“Yes,” I said.
“Could we have an autograph?” the brunette said.
I looked at Astaire, who nodded.
The woman came up with a pad of paper from her purse and placed it in front of the startled Willie Talbott.
“If you’d just write, ‘To Gretchen from her friend Brian Aherne.’ ”
Talbott took the pad and the fountain pen Gretchen offered and signed.
“Thank you,” said the woman with a grin, looking at the autograph and inscription and showing it to her friend, who said, “I thought you spelled your name ‘Aherne.’ ”
“That’s my stage and movie spelling,” Talbott said. “The traditional family spelling is ‘Ahurn’ and I promised my mother before she died that I’d always use the family spelling, even in contracts.”
“You don’t have an English accent?” the blonde said.
“Lost it years ago. Now. .” Talbott said with a sigh, “I have to fake it. I could tell you about the family history if you’re really interested.”
The blonde looked at her friend, who encouraged her with a nod.
“Well, I can give you my. .”
“Remember you’re leaving town, Mr. Aherne,” I reminded Talbott.
“Right,” he said. “Sorry, ladies.”
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