Blues in the Dark

by Raymond Benson

  “Eldon, I’ve come to ask you about the loan. You know it’s past due.”

  “Ah, of course. I thought that might be what you wanted to talk about.” He sat forward with his elbows in the desk, his hands clasped below his chin. “The studio is making lots of money now. We’re finally in the black. I’ll be able to pay it back by Christmas.”

  “Christmas? Why not now?”

  “All right. Sure. I can do that. Tell Tonino I’ll send a check tomor—”

  “You’ll write one now, Eldon. Three hundred thousand. That’s the down payment on the interest you owe. Tonino understands your liquidity problems, so he’ll allow you to pay off the rest in installments. Just know that the interest increases as time marches on.”

  “Oh, I know. I’ll do it right now.” He opened a drawer and removed a studio check register. “Three hundred thousand? Made out to the same, uh, attorney?”

  “Yes.” She squinted at the register. “You don’t want to use studio funds, do you? Won’t that … look funny?”

  Hirsch cursed to himself. He would have to write a check out of his personal account. “You’re right, Malena. What was I thinking?” He laughed again and opened another drawer. He removed a different check register and wrote out the draft. Hirsch tore it off and handed it across the desk to her.

  Malena glanced at it to confirm the check’s accuracy and then opened the Prada purse in her lap. She dropped the slip of paper inside and snapped the bag shut.

  “Have you had dinner?” Hirsch asked. “We could go to—”

  “Don’t have the time,” she said. Malena abruptly stood, crushed the lit end of her cigar in the ashtray near his elbows, and left the drink virtually untouched. “See you later, Eldon. I have to run.”

  She turned and started to walk away from the desk, which was a relief to Hirsch. But then the woman stopped suddenly and turned around. “Eldon, you wouldn’t be embezzling a portion of Tonino’s profits from the studio, would you?”

  Hirsch’s stomach jumped into his throat. “Wha—what? What are you talking about?”

  The woman’s cold, dark eyes bore holes into his.

  Christ. They know. Hirsch swallowed.

  “Be careful, Eldon,” she said. “I’ll give you a few days to think about things. We’ll have another talk soon, all right?”

  He just stared at her, speechless.

  “All right?”

  “Sure, Malena. You’re welcome to come back anytime. We’ll do dinner.”

  The corner of her mouth turned up in a smirk. “I’m not one of your little starlets you screw on your couch here.” She gave him a little wave and left the office.

  Hirsch took a handkerchief from his pocket, dabbed his forehead, and pressed the call button attached to the desk. He heard the faint buzz elsewhere in the building. A few minutes later, another figure—this time a bulky, stocky silhouette—stood in the open doorway on the other side of the room.

  “Did you want to see me?”

  “Buddy. Come in. Close the door.”

  The man who entered was thirty-eight years old, had an army crew cut, and was still dressed sharply in a suit. Buddy Franco moved across the floor and took the chair that had previously been occupied by Malena Mengarelli.

  “So, you’re still here,” Hirsch said. “Do you ever go home to your wife?”

  “You know I don’t leave the studio until you do, sir.”

  “And you should know you don’t have to do that unless we talk beforehand and I need you for something.”

  Franco shrugged. “I’m like you, Eldon. I feel at home at the office.”

  Hirsch emitted a short laugh that sounded more like a snort. “Trouble with the old lady, Buddy?”

  “Not really. I just have priorities.”

  Hirsch pulled out another cigar and offered the box to Franco. “Have a Cuban.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Both of them lit their cigars with the elephant lighter.

  “Malena Mengarelli was just here.”

  Franco nodded. “I know. I let her in.”

  “I thought so.”

  “I couldn’t very well refuse.”

  “No.”

  There was a pause as the men puffed. Hirsch considered the man who was the studio fixer at Ultimate. Could he trust Franco? The guy seemed to be very loyal. He had overseen the elimination of a number of problems that Hirsch hadn’t wanted the press to find out about. He did as he was told and protected the boss. The two of them had become friends—perhaps. Or was it all an act? Hirsch knew very well how Franco had come to be employed at Ultimate. The question was—to whom was Franco really loyal? Hirsch? Or the boys in Vegas?

  Franco nodded at the stogie in the ashtray. “She didn’t finish hers.”

  “Waste of a good cigar.”

  “Everything all right?”

  “She thinks I stole their money.”

  Franco’s expression didn’t change. After a beat, he asked, “Did you?”

  “Of course not. I still owe them some cash on the loan, you know. I made a down payment.”

  “That should hold off Tonino for now.”

  “And Meyer will be happy.” Hirsch drummed his fingers on the desk and looked away. “Beatrice wants to take Justin to the Grand Canyon this weekend. Wants him to see that big hole in the ground for his birthday.”

  “How old will he be?”

  “Nine.”

  “I’m sure he’ll enjoy it, sir.”

  “Are you kidding? Justin’s a little brat.” Hirsch inhaled on the cigar and blew several smoke rings into the air, just as he had seen Malena do. “What the hell … he’ll probably grow up and take over the studio someday. I guess being a brat is a good qualification for the job.”

  Franco did not respond to that one.

  Hirsch picked up a coin on his desk and held it between his thumb and index finger. It was silver-colored, with a man’s head in profile wearing a wreath of leaves in his hair, like a Roman orator. “Do you see this, Buddy?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “It’s a Barber quarter, S mint, from 1901. There are a lot of fakes out there, but this one’s real. Just a little over seventy thousand were produced, and it’s very rare.”

  Franco had indulged his boss many times regarding the coin collection. “Very impressive, Eldon.”

  “I’ll say. Meyer found it for me. Someone he knew in New York acquired it—somehow. I didn’t ask. I got it for a song. I guess it’s worth about five hundred bucks. But who knows what it’ll be worth when Justin’s my age, huh?” He gave Franco a grin. “Part of it belongs to you, you know.”

  “I appreciate that,” the fixer said. “But I’m not looking for you to cash in. You need to hold on to them. I don’t care about my percentage until you decide it’s time. Or until Meyer Lansky does.”

  “I know, I know. We all have a percentage, don’t we? He procures and gets thirty percent, and you get ten for, well, just being here.”

  “And the other sixty is yours, Eldon. He knows that, I know that. It’s okay. It’s part of your deal.”

  “Damn right, it’s okay. Every man has a fetish.” He laughed. “What’s yours, Buddy?”

  Franco didn’t answer.

  Hirsch slowly and lovingly rubbed a palm over one of the binder’s pages. “I’m grateful he allows me to be the custodian. He knows I’ll take better care of it than him.”

  “True, but Mr. Lansky can be very enterprising in other ways. How’s the hotel doing?”

  “They don’t tell you? It’s going gangbusters. He’s really turned it around. That fucking Bugsy Siegel was going to lose everyone’s money—I’m not surprised they bumped him off last summer. The hotel casino business in Vegas is taking off. In five years, there will be three or four more on the Strip, and I don’t know how many downtown. In ten years, God, who knows what it’ll be? It’s going to become the Hollywood of the desert. The Pink Flamingo—well, now it’s the Fabulous Flamingo—it started it all. Bugsy—may he rest
in peace—was a visionary. But he sure was a fuckup. I’m going to the head. I’ll be right back.”

  Hirsch got up and went to his private bathroom. Franco crossed his legs and continued to smoke. From his point of view, the studio mogul was certainly—and conveniently—in denial that the boys in Las Vegas had bankrolled Ultimate Pictures back when it was starting up. Hirsch wouldn’t be where he was without them. They had also placed Franco at the studio to keep an eye on things. While he technically worked for Hirsch, the reality was a different story. Hirsch’s “investments” in the casinos amounted to very little. The truth was that he owed the mob a great deal of money. Could the man also be stealing from them?

  If they’d sent Malena Mengarelli to deliver a message, then perhaps, Franco thought, he should investigate the matter himself.

  Hirsch returned, sat behind the desk, and resumed fiddling with his coins. “How’s the musical doing?”

  “It’s on schedule.”

  “Is that Kraut director spending too much money?”

  “We may need to go over the budget a little. The water fantasy sequence is going to cost more than anticipated. Can’t be helped.”

  “I figured we’d lowballed it. All right, you can approve the extra dough, as long as it’s not my arm and my leg. What about the war picture?”

  “Doing fine. Wraps this week.”

  “Any trouble keeping Bill off the bottle?”

  “I read him the riot act before we started production. He sobered up real quick.”

  Hirsch shook his head. “It’s a shame when a star is a drunk. Or takes drugs. Have you heard anything about, uh, what’s her name—Virginia?”

  “Recuperating nicely, from what I’m told. You’re not going to renew her contract, are you?”

  “No. She was a mess. That piece Hedda Hopper did on her nearly took down the studio. What was she thinking, that girl? No wonder the Hays Office gets after us all the time. We ought to outlaw Hollywood parties for anyone under contract.”

  Hirsch took another drag from the cigar and then leaned forward. He spoke a little softer, as if he might be afraid someone else would hear.

  “What have you heard about our girl?”

  “She’s still seeing him.”

  Hirsch slapped the palm of his hand hard on the top of the desk. The move was so sudden it made even Franco flinch.

  “Goddammit.” The man moved his head back and forth, as if he was searching for something. “Why the hell does she want to sleep with a colored boy? That goddamn nig—”

  “They were seen at the Dunbar Hotel just the other night,” Franco interjected. “Marley and his band were playing there. Blair was at one of the tables, alone, and then she was joined by some other coloreds from her neighborhood. After the set, she went off with Marley.”

  Hirsch closed his eyes and rubbed his brow. “If Parsons or Hopper or Fidler gets hold of this … Christ, what is she thinking? Doesn’t she know she can’t do this?”

  “What would you like me to do, Eldon?”

  “I want you to stop it, Buddy! Jesus, what do you think I want you to do?”

  Franco nodded. “I assume you’d rather not approach this from Blair’s side of things, but from Marley’s side?”

  “That’s the place to start, certainly!”

  Franco paused, inhaled on the cigar, and blew out the smoke. “Shall I hit ‘soft’ or ‘hard?’”

  Hirsch looked at him and answered, “Why don’t you try ‘medium’ and see how that works?”

  14

  KARISSA

  Karissa and Marcello sat in the Stormglove Productions office attending to various bookkeeping chores while discussing the elements of the Blair Kendrick story they had uncovered so far. The mystery of the man at the World Stage who had threatened Karissa had been pushed aside for the time being. As Marcello had said, “Chalk it up to another Hollywood bullshit scam.”

  Karissa wanted to return to the nursing home to see Ray Webster again. So far, attempts to contact his son Gregory had been fruitless. Googling “Gregory Webster” and “almond” or “nuts” indicated there was no man like him anywhere near Los Angeles.

  “I overheard him saying that it took him three hours to drive to the nursing home,” she said. “Where could that be?”

  Marcello laughed. “Anywhere! In LA? Are you kidding?”

  She had to agree with him. “Depending on the traffic, yeah, you’re right. Hell, it could be San Diego, for all we know.”

  Karissa continued to work on spreadsheets on her computer, when her e-mail indicator dinged. She usually gave incoming mail a quick glance to see who they were from in case she could afford to open them later. This one, however, was from the festival people.

  She started reading and immediately felt a rush of anxiety that only occurred when she knew she was facing something dreadful.

  “What the fuck?” she gasped.

  “What?”

  “Marcello! The film festival has dropped us!”

  “What?”

  “Did you get this e-mail from Barbara? It was sent to you, too.” Barbara was a producer in charge of the endeavor.

  “Let me see …” He looked at his monitor and typed on the keypad. “Yeah.” He read it and his eyes went wide. “What the hell is this?”

  Karissa read it aloud. “‘We are sorry to say that after further consideration, we have decided that Stormglove Productions’ proposal does not meet the requirements set out in the production agreement.’”

  “That’s bullshit. Everything was approved.”

  “I’m calling her.” Karissa pulled out her cell phone and dialed the woman’s number. She waited a second and then groaned. “Voice mail.” Another few seconds. “Barbara, this is Karissa Glover. Marcello and I just received your e-mail. What’s going on? This can’t be right, can it? Please call me back.” She gave her cell number and hung up.

  They looked at each other. Marcello pursed his lips, something he did whenever he was angry.

  “What does this mean?” Karissa asked.

  “I have no idea. It’s got to be related to that guy the other night.”

  “I think so, too. Wait a minute.”

  “What?”

  She picked up her phone again and dialed. “I’m calling Derek Morton.”

  “At Ultimate Pictures?”

  She nodded. Her eyes brightened when he picked up. “Derek? Karissa Glover. Hey, listen, sorry to bother you, but I—what?” She listened. “Yeah, but listen, Marcello and I have been dropped from the festival and we want to know—no, I—Derek, wait.” She winced. “Oh, come on, is it the subject matter? Because that’s crazy. I don’t see why—” Karissa made a circular motion with her index finger, indicating she was being given the runaround. “Derek. Stop, please, let me ask you a question. Is this Justin Hirsch’s doing? You told me there might be a problem, so just tell me straight. Uh-huh. Well, what is it? What do you mean, you don’t know? I think you do, Derek. Look, he can’t just hand down an order to fire us. Yes, I know Ultimate Pictures is a major sponsor. So, he has that kind of power? Oh, for Christ’s sake, just tell me the truth.” She blinked, did a double take at her phone, and slammed it on the desk. “He hung up on me.”

  “Jesus. Was it Hirsch?”

  “He wouldn’t say, but what do you think? Eldon Hirsch’s son doesn’t want Blair Kendrick’s story to come out. The big question is why. A lot of it is public knowledge!”

  “Well … no, not really,” Marcello said. “As we’ve discovered, there’s also quite a bit of mystery we don’t know.”

  She leaned forward and looked at him. “They’re hiding something. What if they killed her?”

  “They? Who?”

  “Buddy Franco. The studio fixer. He was supposedly connected to the mob.”

  “Karissa …”

  “You have to admit there’s something fishy about all this. There’s so much we don’t know. Think about it. How come we haven’t seen any of Blair’s movies? The studio withdre
w them decades ago. They don’t want her to be remembered. And what happened to Hank Marley? He disappeared, too, vanished around the same time that Hirsch was shot and killed in his office at the studio. And that guy Franco—he went missing, too, until, God, nearly thirty years later, when he was executed in a Las Vegas diner. What the fuck, Marcello? There’s a hell of a story here!” She stood and started pacing around the room.

  “So, what are we going to do?”

  Karissa stopped and leaned over her desk toward him. “I’ll tell you. We’re going to develop the movie anyway. Screw the festival. We’ll keep going. We’ll find another studio that will work with us. If we have to fund the picture ourselves, go into production, and finish the damned thing—and then find a distributor—then we will. Plenty of people do it that way.”

  Marcello raised his eyebrows. “Are you that dedicated to this story to go through that kind of shit?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “Well …”

  “Okay, fine, I realize you’re not as committed to it as I am. Marcello, there’s something here. I really believe that if the truth comes out, there will be fireworks.”

  “What if Hirsch tries to stop us? He has the money and the lawyers to do that.”

  “On what grounds? We’re not stealing anything from him. Is he developing a movie about Blair Kendrick and Hank Marley? No, he just doesn’t want one made. He can’t stop us. We don’t work for him. Fuck Justin Hirsch.”

  Marcello laughed.

  “What?”

  “It’s the old Karissa Glover I used to see back at UCLA. Whenever you hit an obstacle, you’d get all mad and forge ahead despite everything just to prove you could surmount the problem.”

  “And what’s wrong with that? It’s why I’m a damned good producer! And so are you.” Marcello held up his hands in surrender. “So, are you with me or not?”

  “All the way, babe. All the way.” He held up a palm and she high-fived it.

  15

  THE MOVIE

  The film shifts to a nighttime exterior of the Dunbar Hotel, the center of African American nightlife on Central Avenue in 1940s Los Angeles. The block is jumping, as cars and taxis pull up to the front of the hotel and let out the likes of Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Joe Louis. Black couples and singles mill around on the sidewalk, dressed to the nines for a night on the town. The fashion for women is small waists, full skirts, and long hemlines. Waves, rather than curls, is the order of the day. The men are in singlebreasted or double-breasted suits with center vests and peaked lapels. Wide, short ties in a Windsor knot come in patterns and are adorned with tiepins. No man is without a hat.