[Celebrity Murder Case 08] - The Mae West Murder Case

by George Baxt

  “Then I’m right!” the rabbi said triumphantly. “If it was really a vampire, he would have sucked his victims dry, give or take a few drops. If this so-called vampire has to use a knife to finish off his victims, then he’s just plain meshuga.”

  Through clenched teeth Mae explained to Agnes, “Which means he’s just plain screwy.” To the rest of the table she declaimed, “Screwy or not, he’s dangerous. Not only to me, but to my sister.” In reply to the confused look on the rabbi’s face, Mae told him about her sister, Beverly, and her impending arrival in Hollywood and booking at the Tailspin Club.

  “I am told it is positively a den of iniquity,” said the rabbi, addressing his remarks to Herb Villon. “You should close it.”

  “We’ve got no reason to close it. True, it’s a hangout for homosexuals, but it’s one of the better bars in town. They serve good food and drinks. The prices are reasonable. They get a well-behaved clientele including a lot of the movie and radio crowd. I’ve been there myself with my girlfriend. They have great entertainment. The drag acts are a riot. The has-beens who are grateful to get a date there are still good entertainers, and they’re truly appreciated and warmly applauded. No, Rabbi, it’s not a den of iniquity. It’s an oasis where the oddballs can rub elbows with and look after their own. And believe me, Rabbi, lots of single women go there because they know they’ll find good company and won’t be hassled.”

  “Lesbians!” snapped the rabbi.

  “And Lithuanians and Latvians,” dead-panned Villon, paraphrasing a tired Sam Goldwynism. The apocrypha being that when told Lillian Heilman’s play, The Children’s Hour, which he planned to film, was about a suspicion of lesbianism being practiced by the two female leads, Goldwyn said impatiently, “All right, so we’ll change them to Lithuanians!”

  “Now listen. Rabbi,” counseled Mae, “not all women in gay hangouts are lesbians. Besides, they stick to their own places, like the one in the valley called the Warrior’s Husband.”

  “What about this shady character, Milton Connery.7 Isn’t he supposed to be connected to the Tailspin Club?”

  “All of Los Angeles knows about that,” said Villon.

  Mae leaned forward. “Rabbi, let me give you a little education in shady characters. Will you think any less of me if I tell you most of my shows on Broadway were backed by gangsters? You heard of Owney Madden? Lepke Buchalter? Arnold Rothstein? Frank Costello? To you they were gangsters and still are, to me they were angels. Does associatin’ with these guys strictly on a business level make me a shady character?”

  “No, my dear Mae, it most certainly does not. And I apologize for being so straitlaced and seeming so narrow-minded. Let alone it’s unbecoming in a rabbi, it is unbecoming in anyone.”

  “Good for you. Rabbi. Let me set you straight about the immediate vicinity. The studios and their unions are up to their ears in mob infiltrators. Right, Herb?”

  “Dead right.”

  “Who knows, maybe one of them has a contract out on me and the assassin is sufferin’ from a case of the cutes and decided to lay it all on a vampire. Vampires can’t defend themselves because I suppose they ain’t got no union. Say, Agnes, do witches have a union?”

  “No, dear, we have an association that publishes a monthly newsletter. I do a column, ‘Straight from My Broomstick.’ “

  “That must be a tough balancin’ act.”

  Agnes’s voice was deadly. “No, dear, that’s the name of my column.”

  Mae smiled. She enjoyed annoying Agnes. She realized that her maids had been in attendance and on their feet all this while. “Girls, why don’t you clear away, have your lunch, and take a siesta. I wonder how Timony and Seymour are makin’ out in the gyms. They’re both probably tryin’ to double cross me, holdin’ out for guys with crossed eyes and warts on the tip of their noses. Well, those can always be medically treated. In my time,” she said as she sinuously led the way back to the living room, “I’ve had a lot of medical treats. Say, Herb, I’ll be takin’ a big table for Beverly’s openin’ Friday night. Why don’t you and Jim join me, I’d be delighted to have you. Bring your girlfriends too.”

  “I don’t have one,” Jim Mallory said quickly.

  “Why, honey?” asked Mae. “Can’t you afford one?”

  Herb explained with a sly grin, “Jim doesn’t seem to make out with women. He’s very shy.”

  “Of what?”

  “The poor man’s blushing,” said Agnes. “Don’t be mean, Mae.”

  “I ain’t bein’ mean,” Mae said good-naturedly. “Jim’s too attractive to be unattached. Why, Jim, if I didn’t think Seymour Steel Cheeks would crush every bone in your body and a few more, I’d invite you to be my escort. Anyway, I want you there just the same. The more the merrier. They say there’s safety in numbers. Do you suppose they mean the ones from one to ten or those prowlin’ around on the scent? Agnes, there’s that damned creepy look on your face again.”

  Agnes was embracing herself, warding off a chill. “I can’t help it when these things come over me. Tomorrow’s Hallowe’en, All Hallow’s Eve.”

  “Yeah, honey, I know. The night the witches come out to play. Is it a night for kind witches or evil witches?”

  “It’s a night for all witches. There’ll be mischief afoot. There’s an open house at all the bars. The big party is at the Tailspin.”

  “You goin’?”

  “Oh, yes. It’s de rigueur.”

  Mae exploded. “There you go again, damn it, with some more of that fancy French footwork of yours!”

  Agnes folded her arms and said sternly, “De rigueur has been adopted into our language. Everyone uses it.”

  “This is the first time I ever heard it!”

  “It means that it is expected I be at the party.”

  “So why the hell don’t you say so!” Mae froze in position. A thought struck her. Suddenly she snapped her fingers. “Marie Antoinette!”

  “Where did she come from?” asked Agnes.

  “Austria,” the rabbi told her.

  Mae was off on a cloud of her own creation. “Marie Antoinette! That’s who I’ll do next! I can’t do Catherine the Great, I’ll do Marie Antoinette!”

  Herb Villon knew his next words were a calculated risk. “Er, Mae, I think I read in one of the trades that MGM is thinking of Norma Shearer as Marie Antoinette.”

  The hands were firmly entrenched on the hips. The eyes were narrow, threatening slits. “Shearer couldn’t play no queen. She ain’t got the class. Even Shirley Temple would do a better job then her. Me!” She jabbed her delightful bosom with a carefully manicured thumb. “I’m the queen of queens. When I tell the peasants who are bein’ revoltin’ to eat cake, I’ll even lend them a couple of recipes. I can see myself climbin’ the steps to the guillotine, seductively wigglin’ my backside. That’ll give them somethin’ to think about. Then when I get to the scaffold platform. I’ll turn to them with a look of defiance. I’ll put my hands on my hips like I’m doin’ now and maybe sing somethin’ like ‘Minnie the Moocher’ and then a big peasant dance number choreographed by someone like Madame Albertina Rasch. Yeah! Somethin’ real snappy. And I go over so great, they decide to spare me and I don’t lose my head, except maybe to one of the guards standin’ near me if he’s gorgeous enough.”

  “Mae,” Agnes said dryly, “you can’t screw around with history.”

  “Agnes, I can do anythin’ I damn well please. Hmmm.” She was back floating on her cloud. “Now for the dauphin what’s my husband, I think I’ll insist on Gary Cooper.”

  “He is physically all wrong,” advised Agnes.

  “Get your eyes examined, honey. He is physically all right, and how, ummmmm!”

  “Mae, I’ve got to be going,” said the rabbi.

  “Choir practice.7”

  “You must be psychic.”

  “No, all you clergymen use that for an exit line. Father Wally also had to get to choir practice. Well, I’ve seen your choir. They’re a little young, even
for me. Give Goldie my best and remember, you treat her to a night out. All work and no play make a rabbi’s wife a dull girl.”

  She took his arm, walked him to the door, and opened it. “Hey will you look at my mezuzah! Nice and shiny and protective.” She kissed her fingers and touched the mezuzah. “How about that.7”

  “Very good, Mae. Very very good.”

  A few minutes later, sitting in the throne chair and contemplating Agnes and the detectives, she announced a decision. “I ain’t waitin’ till Bev’s openin’ night. I’m gonna check out the Tailspin tomorrow night.”

  “It’ll be a madhouse,” advised Agnes.

  “So who told you I was all that sane?” She saw the look on Villon’s face and it was a patently disapproving one. “I’ll have my bodyguards with me, Herb. And what’s more, there’s bound to be a lot of Mae Wests there.”

  Villon said, “There might also be a vampire.”

  FOUR

  THERE MIGHT ALSO BE A VAMPIRE.

  After the detectives left, Agnes opened a window that led to a balcony, sat on the sill, and lit a cigarette, directing the smoke to the outdoors. Next to the window were double doors that opened properly onto the balcony, but Mae had yet to furnish the balcony with chairs. Mae West had one thing in common with vampires. She avoided the sun. She liked her skin white and she kept it that way. Los Angeles seemed to always be ablaze with sunlight, and it was frequently ferociously hot and unbearable. On the rare occasion she took a short walk in the daytime, Mae protected herself with an oversized parasol. She also favored garden hats with abnormally wide brims. In defiance of any current fashion, she wore her dresses to the ankle. The spiteful rumor was that this was because she had fat, ugly legs. This was not so. Her legs were shapely, but Mae felt dresses to the ankle gave her stature, especially with the help of her platform shoes.

  “One of these days, them cigarettes are gonna do you in like they did my father. Battlin’ Jack had a wrackin’ cough all his adult life, which wasn’t a very long one. I like you, Agnes. I’m glad we’re friends. I ain’t got many women friends. There’s you, there’s Beverly when she isn’t being a pain in my backside, and there’s Desdemona and Goneril.”

  “How long have they been with you?”

  “Ever since I decided to settle out here and make my fortune. I didn’t get them through no agency either. I got them through Central Castin’. Central sent over a dozen black ladies to audition to be my maid and my cook. When in walked Desdemona and Goneril lookin’ like twins, which they ain’t, I knew I had it made. They share a nice apartment on the floor under me. I had a special staircase constructed for them that leads from their kitchen into my kitchen. They’re a real comfort to me.”

  “Don’t you have any women acquaintances at Paramount?”

  “No, there’s nobody there I’ve taken to. Dietrich is cozy with Claudette Colbert, Miriam Hopkins is cozy with herself, Carole Lombard prefers the fellers and curses like a longshoreman, and Sylvia Sidney cries a lot. I never get too friendly with the women in my pitchers because I think they’re all afraid of me. I liked Rafaela Ottiano on She Done Him Wrong. She played Russian Rita, but she also did it with me in New York so we had a lot to talk about. She’s settled out here too, but she lives with her father and doesn’t welcome men’s advances.”

  “She a dyke, maybe?”

  “If she is, she’s a very quiet one. Sends me Christmas and Easter cards. Nice lady.”

  “Jim Timony still giving you a hard time?”

  “Agnes, nobody gives me a hard time. Anyway, Jim’s on the verge of retirement.”

  “Oh, really? I didn’t think he’d ever retire.”

  “Neither did he. But it’s time he went. He’s in love with me and I sure ain’t with him. I’ll give him a good settlement.”

  “What about Seymour Steel Cheeks?”

  “Just a nosh. An interim booking. One day soon he’ll move on. They always do. Especially I’m so much older than they are. When the novelty of livin’ with Mae West wears out, they move out. And I move on. You got a new man in your life, Agnes?”

  “I think I do. He’s a warlock.”

  “Who are the warlocks?”

  Agnes flipped the cigarette stub out the window and sat in an easy chair opposite Mae’s throne. “Warlocks are male witches.”

  “Say, listen, spooky. Was all that jazz true about you comin’ from a long line of witches?”

  Agnes smiled. “It is very very true. Now listen, Mae, do you really think it advisable you go to the party tomorrow night? It’ll be bedlam. The boys’ll be girls and the girls’ll be boys and there’s going to be a lot of heavy drinking and it could be dangerous.”

  “You haven’t known real danger until you’ve faced the New York critics on an openin’ night. All kiddin’ aside, I’ve got to get out and see what’s doin’ in the world. When I’m not locked into shootin’ a movie, I’m cooped up here mostly because there’s no place to go and if there was, there’s nobody to go with. And believe me, Jim Timony is no one to go with. Oh, I go to the fights on Friday nights and then down to Chinatown afterward for some chop suey. Now and then I steer Steel Cheeks to the Mocambo or the Cocoanut Grove, but after half an hour or so of everybody starin’ at us, I want to go home and flip pages in a movie magazine. This here vampire is about the most excitement I’ve had in ages, and I want to make the most of him.”

  “Just make sure he doesn’t make the most of you.”

  “Agnes, bein’ a woman, you’ve heard of woman’s intuition. Well, I’ve got a pretty good one. When Paramount asked me to come out and do Night After Night with Georgie Raft, who’s a good pal from the old days, I had an intuition a whole new career was openin’ up for me and that I’d become a big movie star. It was a small part and my billin’ was rotten, but I wrote my own lines. I wore my own diamonds. And when that hat check girl in my first scene when I enter Georgie’s club says to me, ‘Goodness, what diamonds!’ and I say to her, ‘Dearie, goodness had nothin’ to do with it.’ Well, it tore the house down in every pitcher house across the country and I had it made. Georgie Raft said I stole everythin’ but the camera. Paramount gave me a great contract with solo starring billing above the title and the option to write my own scripts. After all, I wrote all my own plays and I had a lot of hits. I’ve done all right for myself and for Paramount, even if no thanks to the Legion of Decency now forcin’ me to clean up my act. I’ve been slippin’ a little. But still I’m makin’ money for Zukor and his boys, and my contract’s ironclad for another two years. I can always go back to the theeyater, and there isn’t a show house in America that wouldn’t offer me a small fortune to do personal appearances. Anyway, gettin’ back to intuition ...” She left the throne chair and positioned herself in front of a mirror that hung above a white table. “Agnes, I’m gonna live a long life. Look at my face. Not a line in it. Pure alabaster. It shows no character but believe me, there’s plenty there under the skin. I take good care of myself. My mother made me. She made me write my own material. She was a saint. I lost her too soon and I’m still grievin’.” She moved her hand from her head to her waist. “See all this. It’s a façade. A false front. Underneath, I’m just a kid cryin’ for her mama. Anyway, what I’m gettin’ to is this, this here vampire, this phony vampire—”

  “There’s nothing phoney about those murders,” Agnes interjected quickly.

  “Oh, yes there is. Them puncture wounds are plenty phony. Father Riggs and the rabbi are right. There ain’t no such things as vampires.”

  “There’s a species of bats called vampires.”

  “Yeah and there are primitive people all over the world drinkin’ blood. Well, hospitals give patients blood transfusions, don’t they? What’s the difference except in hospitals it’s inter Venus?”

  “Intravenous.”

  Mae shot her a look. If looks could kill, Agnes would have been a candidate for a mortuary. “I think Villon suspects what I’m up to. I’m settin’ myself up.”


  “You’re a fool!”

  Mae relished Agnes’s anger. “Like hell I am. I’m sayin’ Come on, killer, here I am out in the open, yours for the takin’. Come and get it. It’s bein’ served up to you on a diamond platter. No killer’s goin’ to make a move in as public a place as a nightclub. It’ll be mobbed and I can guarantee you I’ll be the center of attention from the minute I make my grand entrance. And I can guarantee you a very grand entrance.”

  “You listen to me, Mae West. Stanford White was shot dead in a packed nightclub. A gangster was knifed to death on a dance floor doing a tango with his girlfriend.”

  “He musta been a rotten dancer.”

  “Please, Mae! You’re crazy to expose yourself to this danger!”

  “What danger now.7” asked Jim Timony, standing in the doorway. As Agnes told him what Mae was planning to do, Timony advanced slowly into the room, Seymour Steel Cheeks behind him.

  “You’ll do no such thing,” Timony said sternly.

  “It’s no more dangerous than goin’ to Bev’s opening or to the studio tomorrow. There’s more danger on a sound stage than there is anywhere else. There’s plenty of hidin’ places from which a killer can strike.”

  Agnes was upset. She asked Timony, “Is there no reasoning with this woman.7”

  Timony shrugged.

  “Sure there is, honey,” Mae said as she sauntered about the room, “ask any number of my old boyfriends. And if you find any number of my old boyfriends, they’ll be old, Agnes, they’ll be old.”

  “Can’t you ever be serious? You’re life’s in danger!”

  “I am often serious and this won’t be the first time my life’s been in danger. A couple of years ago I got a kidnap threat. Paramount kept it out of the papers. They didn’t want to give anybody else any ideas. Jim got me a small-caliber handgun, which can do an awful lot of damage. It’s in my bedroom now, in a dresser drawer gettin’ its beauty sleep. Tomorrow night it’ll be in my handbag. And I’m one hell of a shot.”