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Authors: Ron Goulart

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I
t rained the first two nights we were back home in Bayside and we didn’t take Dorgan for his twilight walk until the evening of the third. The sky was overcast, the oncoming night sultry.

Our gift bloodhound, nose to the sand, gave the impression he was trailing somebody.

“Well, I suppose so,” Jane was saying. It was her turn to manage the leash.

“Dogs aren’t anywhere near as screwy as people,” I reiterated. “Therefore, I repeat that I seriously doubt Dorgan was overly upset by our stay back in New York City.”

“Our protracted stay,” she said. “And I don’t know, he seems extra mopey these past few days.”

“He’s a bloodhound. Bloodhounds are mopey-looking by nature,” I said. “Has something to do with heredity and Mendelian laws.”

“And right now he’s snuffling along the beach, pretending to be a bloodhound and—”

“He is a bloodhound,” I reminded.

“Sure, but we aren’t a posse and we’re not tracking an escaped murderer.”

We were a few yards from the Bayside Diner when our dog gave out a gratified yowl and began tugging Jane in that direction.

“Hey, no dogs allowed in there, remember?” she said.

But Dorgan was determined to reach the place.

“Maybe Enery’s on duty tonight and he’ll fix him a burger to eat out here,” I suggested, trotting in their wake.

When he reached the screen door of the diner, Dorgan went up on his hind legs, pressed his front paws against the jamb, and commenced howling.

“Hush,” advised Jane.

The door was opened from within. “Goodness gracious me, a body can’t hear himself think with all this unseemly noise out here.” Groucho looked out at us. “Usually the sound I hear when I’m thinking is a melodious
plink plink,
although now and then it’s more an
oompah oompah.
The point being, kiddies, that your odious hound is interrupting the process with his baleful caterwauling.”

Jane said, “What the heck are you doing here?”

“I first dropped by your cottage and found you out,” he replied. “I came here next, hoping against hope that you’d eventually turn up at your favorite haunt.”

“We were taking Dorgan for a walk,” I said.

“A likely story. You’ve probably been luring merchant ships to their doom on our rockbound coast and then looting them for rum.”

“Well, that, too.” Jane tied Dorgan to a low nearby post. “Stay here, boy, and we’ll bring you a snack in a few minutes.”

The dog produced a gurgling whimper.

“You don’t want to get too close to Mr. Marx, do you, Dorgan? You know his scent makes you sneeze.”

The bloodhound subsided, settling himself into a patient waiting position on the weedy sand.

Enery McBride was behind the counter, consulting a thick cookbook he had opened in front of him. “Welcome back,” he said to Jane and me. Now that he was acting fairly regularly in the movies, he only worked occasional nights at our neighborhood diner. “And congratulations on landing the radio show.”

“How’d you know about the
Hollywood Molly
deal?” I leaned an elbow on the counter.

“It was in
Variety
and on Johnny Whistler,” he answered. “Oh, and I think Leo Haskell had an item in his column, although I’m not quite sure what he was trying to say.” He tilted his head in Groucho’s direction. “I think I can do it.”

“What’s he going to try to make for you?” Jane asked.

“Blintzes.” Groucho returned to the booth where he’d been waiting for us.

“They’re pretty much like crêpes,” decided Enery, shutting the cookbook and returning it somewhere under the counter. “You guys want an order, too?”

Jane shook her head. “Just cocoa for us, Enery.”

He looked at me. “She makes all your food decisions now?”

“Yep, and also picks out my pajamas.”

Jane said, “And a hamburger for Dorgan.”

“He prefers cheeseburgers,” said our friend.

“Cheese then.”

When we were seated across the booth from Groucho, I asked him, “Any special reason for your running us to ground?”

He said, “I got a long-distance telephone call from Lieutenant Lewin of the New York constabulary, my dears.”

“And?”

“It seems Hal Arneson was found shot dead in his Manhattan hotel room at approximately noon today.”

“Jesus,” I said, sitting up. “Somebody from Salermo’s mob must’ve caught up with him.”

“That’s Herb Lewin’s theory,” Groucho said. “Though he doubts he’ll ever be able to prove it.”

Jane shivered, hugging herself. “I know Arneson was probably as guilty as Manheim,” she said quietly. “But I’m scared by this vigilante stuff.”

“You can call it that, true,” said Groucho. “You can probably also call it poetic justice. Even though it doesn’t rhyme.”

Also by Ron Goulart

Elementary, My Dear Groucho

Groucho Marx, Private Eye

Groucho Marx, Master Detective

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.

GROUCHO MARX AND THE BROADWAY MURDERS. Copyright © 2001 by Groucho Marx Productions Inc. and Ron Goulart. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.minotaurbooks.com

eISBN 9781429938839

First eBook Edition : July 2011

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Goulart, Ron.

Groucho Marx and the Broadway Murders / Ron Goulart.—1st ed.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-312-26598-0

1. Marx, Groucho, 1891-1977—Fiction. 2. Broadway (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction. 3. Comedians—Fiction. 4. Theater—Fiction. 1 Title

PS3557.O85 G75 2001

813’.54—dc21

2001019157