Beverly Hills Dead (28 page)

"So do I."

Vance Calder packed the last of Susie's clothes in a cardboard box and stacked it on top of the box she had left in her dressing room the day she went missing. He carried the two boxes downstairs to the kitchen, where his housekeeper, Maria, was sewing a button on one of his shirts, and set them on the table.

"Maria, these are some things that belonged to Miss Stafford," he said. "If there's anything you want, or if you know anyone who might need the clothes, please take them. Anything else you can drop off at a Salvation Army store on your way home tonight."

"Thank you, Mr. Calder," Maria said. "And I'll put your shirt back in your dressing room in just a moment."

Vance walked through the house to the study; his new desk had arrived the day before, Sid Brooks having taken the old one, and he began putting office supplies that he had brought from the studio into the drawers. With the help of the studio's design department he had replaced the furniture that Sid or his ex-wife had removed, and the living room had been painted a warm yellow. He had begun to feel that the place belonged to him and no one else.

Maria knocked at the door.

"Yes, Maria?"

She walked in and handed him a blue-velvet jewelry box. "This was in the bottom of the carton with the sweaters, Mr. Calder."

"Thank you, Maria." She left, and Vance opened the box. It contained a pair of small, diamond ear studs, along with a Bulova wristwatch and a couple of brooches. Also in the box was a gold, heart-shaped locket on a matching chain.

Vance picked up the locket and pressed the clasp. Inside, was a photograph of Susie with another girl, who Vance assumed was Hank Harmon. Both women appeared to be naked, at least from the waist up. Susie was leaning against Harmon, wrapped in her arms. One hand was resting on Harmon's left breast. On the other side of the open locket was engraved an inscription: "Susie and Hank, one forever."

Vance closed the locket and put it back in the box. He thought for a minute, then he picked up the phone and called Centurion Studios. "This is Vance Calder," he said to the operator. "Will you please connect me with Tom Terry in security?"

"Of course, Mr. Calder."

A moment later, Terry was on the line. "Hello, Vance. Can I help you?"

"I need some advice, Tom. I gave some clothes that belonged to Susie Stafford to my housekeeper, and in one of the boxes she found a jewelry case that contained, among other things, a locket holding a rather...affectionate photograph of Susie and a woman I assume to be Hank Harmon. I don't think I want to send the photograph to her parents. My question is: what should I do with it?"

"You should give it to the police, Vance. I'll call the detective in charge of the investigation and let him know about it. I expect he'll send someone over to get the locket."

"Thanks, Tom. Did you see the item in the paper this morning by Hedda Hopper?"

"Yes, I did, and I think it's a good one."

"Do you think they're near an arrest?"

"If they are, they must have some new information I'm not privy to. I'll call Lieutenant Morrison now; I expect you'll hear from him soon."

"Thank you, Tom. I'll wait to hear from him."

Ben Morrison was at his door half an hour later. Vance let him in and shook his hand.

"We met once before, Mr. Calder," Morrison said.

"I remember; at my bungalow at the studio. Come into the study; the jewelry box is there."

Morrison followed him into the study, and Vance handed the velvet box to him. He sat down, opened the box and examined the locket carefully. "This is very interesting," he said.

"It doesn't seem like a crucial piece of evidence, does it?" Vance asked.

"It could be valuable, in that it helps establish the relationship between the two women."

"I'd hate for that photograph to be displayed in open court; so would her parents, I think."

"I can keep it out of the papers, but when we go to trial, I'm sure it will be placed in evidence. There's nothing I can do to prevent that, except extract a confession from Miss Harmon, and I don't think her lawyer is going to let her do that."

"I saw something in the papers this morning that implied you are close to an arrest."

"I saw that, too, Mr. Calder. It didn't come from me, and I doubt that it came from any of my people. My best guess is that it came from RKO."

"Are you close to arresting Hank Harmon?"

"No, sir, we're not, but please don't tell anyone I said that."

"Do you feel any need to correct the newspaper account?"

"Oh, I don't think so," Morrison said. "Maybe it will stir the pot a little. You never know."

"I hope so," Vance said. "When you're finished with the jewelry, would you return it to Susie's parents? Not the photograph; I don't think they should see that."

"Of course, I'd be glad to." Morrison stood and offered his hand. "I'll let you know if we come up with anything new."

"Thank you, Lieutenant." Vance showed him to the door, then returned to his study and sank into a chair. Once again, he drove the recurring thought from his mind that he should buy a gun and shoot Hank Harmon. He made himself calm again, as best he could.

51

Tom Terry sat in his car across the street from Hank Harmon's apartment house and watched a passel of photographers and reporters mill around. The shades were drawn on Harmon's windows upstairs, and there was no sign of life.

Then Tom saw a prewar Chevrolet convertible, with the top up, edge out of the parking lot behind the building, driven by a woman. He wasn't sure it was Harmon, but he was going to find out.

The Chevy turned up the hill, away from Sunset and the photographers, and accelerated. Tom started his car and followed, staying well back. The car made a couple of turns, then headed back toward Sunset. Tom made a note of the plate number and followed. The convertible turned up Coldwater Canyon and began climbing the mountain. As it crested the ridge at the top, it pulled over, and the top went down. Hank Harmon was at the wheel, and she seemed to believe that she had gotten away from her pursuers. She started down the other side of the mountain and into the San Fernando Valley.

Tom followed her for another twenty minutes, until she turned into a residential neighborhood and then into a driveway. He stopped down the block and watched her get out of the car, take a couple of suitcases from the trunk, ring the doorbell, then go inside. Tom made a note of the address.

He made a U-turn and, back on the main road, found a phone booth. He called the city desk of the newspaper that had run the Hopper piece about Harmon and, without giving his name, gave the man who answered the make, model and license plate number of Harmon's car and the address of the house she had run to, then he got back into his car and drove back to L.A. As he came over the mountain he passed the car of a photographer he knew, going the other way. His work was done, for now.

He had another date, though. He drove to the bar where he had first met with Hal Schmidt of Milwaukee, went inside, took a booth and ordered a drink. Schmidt was ten minutes late. He slid into the booth, and Tom signaled the waiter for one more drink.

"How you been, Hal? Settling into L.A.?"

"I've been well, thanks, Tom, and I'm enjoying the city. The quality of the women is a definite improvement over Milwaukee."

"I can believe that. You want some dinner?"

"Sure."

Tom picked up the menus along the wall and handed Schmidt one. They ordered dinner and another drink.

"I guess you're wondering why I called," Schmidt said, looking pleased with himself.

"Yeah, I am," Tom replied.

"I've got something for you on those party membership cards your boss received."

"I'm all ears."

"I guess you know my boss at the union is a party member."

"I figured. He's also chummy with the mob, you know."

"Yeah, I've met Mickey Cohen in the office."

"Seems like he's working both sides of the street," Tom said.

"The party is not above dealing with anybody it finds useful," Schmidt replied.

"You want to be careful with Cohen," Tom said. "He's easy to get chummy with but hard to shake, and he can play rough."

"That's good advice I already gave myself," Schmidt said. "As I was saying, the party will deal with anybody it can use. I made a call to Milwaukee, to a guy I used to know who ran the local office, until recently. A few weeks ago, he heard from a guy at the union named Murray Fox. Now Murray used to live in Milwaukee, too, back when Louise and I were seeing each other, and he knew about my signing her up for the party. He asked my buddy to photostat her party card and send it to him."

"Aha," Tom said. "Progress. Did he give it to somebody at Centurion?"

"Hang on; I'm not finished. About three months ago, the party sent Murray to New York for some special indoctrination. They do that from time to time. He was based in the local office there, and he would have had access to the membership files. Now, I don't know for a fact that he was the one who copied the other guy's card, but he's a very good bet."

"Okay. Let's assume he got hold of both Louise's and the other guy's cards. Who did he give them to?"

"Hang onto your hat, Tom."

"Come on, Hal; the suspense is killing me."

"He gave them to Leo Goldman."

Tom sat back and shook his head. "That doesn't make any sense at all, Hal. We both know that Goldman is playing for the other team. How would he even know this Murray Fox?"

"He doesn't know him; Murray just mailed the two photostats to Goldman."

"This still doesn't make any sense, Hal."

"It does if you know how the party works, and you obviously don't."

"God knows, that's true."

"I already told you the party would use anybody to further its ends, right?"

"Right."

"Well, for some reason not known to me or, probably, to Murray either, the party wanted it known that Louise and your other guy...what's his name?"

"Sidney Brooks."

"Yeah, Sidney Brooks, the writer. For some reason, the party wanted it known that these two people are party members."

"But why would they want that? You'd think they'd protect their members."

"This was around the time when the subpoenas went out, wasn't it?"

"Yeah. I guess it was."

"Well, try this for a scenario: the party knows HUAC is investigating Hollywood, and they don't necessarily view that as a bad thing. Maybe they want it known that prominent members of the Hollywood community are Communists or fellow travelers, because it makes the party look good for the public to know that well-known Americans in a glamorous field see things the party's way."

"Boy, if I was a Communist Party official, that's not how I would run things. Don't they have any interest in protecting their members?"

"Not necessarily. You remember how the hearings went, right?"

"Yeah. A whole bunch of people got cited for contempt of Congress and are going to go to prison, unless the Supreme Court saves them."

"Right. Now the reason that happened is because the two party lawyers advising the twenty or so people who got subpoenaed, told them to use the First Amendment as a defense. If they had told them to use the Fifth Amendment, instead, they wouldn't be facing prison, because taking the Fifth can't be construed as contempt."

"So, you're telling me that the party
wants
a bunch of its most prominent members to go to prison?"

"Yeah, and to get blacklisted, too. What's better publicity than a martyr? I'll tell you: ten martyrs. If they'd taken the Fifth at the hearings, it would all be over. Okay, maybe they would have been blacklisted anyway, but they wouldn't go to jail and become martyrs."

"So why did they pick Leo Goldman to send the party cards to?"

"My guess is they did the same thing at other studios, too; maybe all of them. Leo is just the noisiest anti-Communist at Centurion."

"Hal," Tom said, calling for the check, "I owe you one."

Driving home, Tom's excitement turned to anxiety. How was he going to tell Rick Barron that the guy he had just promoted to a big job was the guy who sent him his wife's Communist Party membership card? Certainly, if he did that and word got back to Leo, he'd make an enemy of Leo Goldman. And, Tom reflected, in this town, word always got back.

52

Rick Barron sat at a table with the two stars and the director of
Greenwich Village Girl
and listened to the first read-through of the script. As the picture's producer he was entitled to sit in, but Rick had another reason: he wanted to find out how a director made a script funny or, at least, revealed the humor already there.

Sam Sparrow, the director, had a very simple technique. When the first read-through was done, he said to his two actors, "All right. Let's do it again but faster, and as the script progresses and the two characters begin to argue and snipe at each other, I want you to play it
very
fast. In fact, I want you to step on each other's lines. Got it?"

The two actors nodded, and Rick sat back and tried to see it on the screen. Pretty soon he was laughing, and soon after that he nearly had to leave the room, because he was laughing so hard. By the time they had finished, the director was laughing, too.

Rick stood up. "Well, thanks for the entertainment, folks," he said. "I'm obviously not needed here, so I think I'll go and scare up some work for myself." Sparrow looked pleased. As Rick left the building and started to walk toward his office he remembered that, although Hattie Carson was reading from her script most of the time, Vance Calder had never once looked at his and not once had he blown a line. Where had he learned to do that?

Rick looked up as Tom Terry drove up to him in an electric cart. "Can I give you a lift, Rick?"

"Sure, Tom." Rick got into the cart.

"I've got some news for you."

"What about?"

"About the Communist Party cards you got in the mail. And it comes from our old friend, Hal Schmidt."

"Tell me."

Rick listened as Tom ran through the story of how Murray Fox had gotten hold of the two cards and mailed them.

"Who did he mail them to?"

"I don't know," Tom replied. "Fox wouldn't tell him, but Schmidt said he wouldn't be surprised if Fox had done the same with other cards mailed to other studios."

"You think we have any chance of finding out who got the cards at Centurion, then sent them to me?"

"Frankly, no. I mean, what we've got came from a source inside the party, and we were very lucky to have that source. If he can't find out, I don't think we can find out without him."

"Well, I guess this is one we should just put behind us," Rick said. "After all, Sid Brooks has already been publicly humiliated, and you've destroyed any record of Glenna at the Milwaukee party office, so it seems unlikely that any further harm can be done."

"That's the way I look at it, Rick. Just forget about it."

Tom stopped the cart at the door of the main building, and Rick got out. "By the way, Tom, did you see the story by Hedda Hopper in the paper yesterday?"

"Yeah, and there was another one this morning."

"What did that one say?"

"Apparently Hank Harmon fled her apartment ahead of the press and moved in with a friend out in the valley, but they caught up with her there, too."

"With what result?"

"No result; she refused to come to the door. They've got her pretty well staked out, though, I would imagine."

"Tom, did you give Hedda the first story about Harmon?"

"No, Rick. I didn't."

"What's your best guess as to where it came from?"

"My best guess? From the LAPD, although somebody at RKO would run a close second. It may be that the studio wanted people to know that they'd fired Hank, but they didn't want to make any kind of official statement."

"I guess that makes sense," Rick said. "Thanks for the lift, Tom."

Tom waved good-bye and started back toward his office. As he drove along, a big, black Packard pulled alongside him.

"Hey, Mr. Terry!" the driver yelled.

Tom looked over at the man. "Morning."

"Remember me?"

Tom stopped and looked closer. "Oh, yeah. You're the studio driver I met at Vance Calder's house; you're the one who was supposed to drive Susan Stafford to the airport, right?"

"That's right. I was just wondering if anything new had come up in the investigation. I mean, I saw the stuff in the papers about the script girl at RKO, but I wondered if there was anything else."

"It's Jerry, right?"

"That's right."

"No, Jerry. Nothing new at all, and believe me, I've been keeping tabs on the investigation. I think that, short of a confession from Hank Harmon, the police are not going to get any further."

"Oh, okay. Thanks a lot, and take care."

The Packard pulled away, and Tom started for his office again.

53

Sid Brooks sat on a stool at the counter of the diner in Santa Monica where he had lunch nearly every day. He needed a midday break from his work, since he was at the typewriter for eight hours a day, compared to the four hours he had been working before he had been blacklisted.

He was deep into a bowl of homemade clam chowder and paid little attention when someone took the stool next to him.

"You're a real piece of work, Brooks," a voice to his right said.

Sid turned and looked at the man. He recognized him as Fred Blair, another blacklisted writer. He knew the man only from the meetings of the nineteen subpoenaed writers when they were discussing their legal defense. "Hello, Fred," Sid said. "What are you talking about?"

"We've heard what you're planning to do," Blair said.

"Who is 'we,' and what am I planning to do?"

"You're going to purge yourself before the committee, aren't you." It wasn't a question. "You're going to rat us out."