Taco Noir (10 page)

            “And I told you that Old Lady Bancroft is expecting me,” I said to the primate. Inching closer to me, he started to roll up his sleeve. With sleeves like his, that would take quite a while.

            I was taking a mental inventory of all the tender places on the goon’s anatomy I could place a cheap shot before he tried to kill me. Luckily for me, before any shots were placed, cheap or otherwise, a voice rang out from somewhere behind Kong.

            “Andrew!” came the cry, stopping the goon in mid-homicide. “This gentleman is my guest!”

            Andrew immediately dropped his arms and stood straight, as if a drill sergeant had called him to attention. And I guess in a way, one had.

            “Mrs. Bancroft!” Andrew stuttered. “I thought…”

            “I don’t imagine that you thought at all!” Mrs. Bancroft said in a frosty tone. “Otherwise you would not make me strain my voice before the season begins!” The voice in question, Mrs. Bancroft’s, was indeed a forceful and powerful weapon. And the package it was attached to wasn’t a wilting flower either.

            Mrs. Bancroft looked to be in her late fifties, stood about six-foot one, and had enough bulk on her to play middle linebacker when the Metropolitan was in off-season.

            “Please follow me,” Bancroft told me from behind the ape. Andrew shuffled off to the side, just enough to let me pass, his mouth gaping.

            “You got a little of that horseradish on your lapel,” I told him, pointing to his jacket. When he looked down, I zipped my finger upwards and gave him a chuck on the nose.

            “Lead the way, Mrs. B,” I told the woman, and she showed me down a long corridor towards the dressing rooms.

            “You’ll have to forgive Andrew,” she told me over her shoulder. “He is the sentry of the grandest Opera House on Earth and is sometimes a little overzealous.”

            “Didn’t he know you were expecting someone?” I asked.

            “I told him I was expecting a guest,” she said, opening the door to her dressing room. “I’m sure that he was expecting someone a bit…different.”

            She looked at my wrinkled suit as if it might crawl off my body and bite her.

            “I’m sure he was,” I said. “Now why don’t you tell me what it is a mug like me can do for a dame like you?”

            Bancroft sighed and collapsed onto a sofa-like structure. The sofa groaned a little, but held up its end of the bargain.

            “I’ve asked you here on a matter of considerable…discretion.” She looked put out, as if I had asked her if Rigoletto was a German opera, so I imagined that the matter was serious indeed.

            “Lady, when you pay me, you also pay for my silence.” It sounded remotely chivalrous, but if you go around spilling your client’s secrets, soon you have no clients left. Mrs. Bancroft seemed relieved by my answer. The old bird sat up straight on her sofa, head held high, and addressed me in the manner of an elegant lady addressing the help.

            “As you may know, I have spent many years at the forefront of European culture and have been an eminent champion of the Opera in the U.S.”

            “Do tell,” I said, examining a little bit of the shipyards I had caught under my fingernails earlier that day. “Go on.”

            Clearing her throat, Mrs. Bancroft regarded me with the disdain of someone who wasn’t worthy of washing her pet poodle, but she managed to soldier on.

            “Anyway,” she continued, “I am in the middle of financing this season’s opening production of the Metropolitan Opera. This is a precarious junction for the Opera, and I have spent much of my personal fortune and reputation making sure that this season’s Pagliacci is performed flawlessly.” She paused, looking down over the frames of her pearl glasses, searching for understanding in my eyes. There was none.

            “Pagliacci is a timeless story …” she sighed, as if she were explaining Calculus to sixth-graders.

            “Yeah, yeah,” I mumbled. “Everyone loves a clown.”

            That stopped her in her tracks, and her jaw dropped floor-wards. As I said, Ma used to drag me to the opera.

            “Well, at any rate,” Mrs. Bancroft muttered, regaining her composure. "I have invested heavily in this production, both in monetary and social equity, and I stand to lose substantially should anything disrupt this premiere.”

            I had to hand it to her. She certainly could talk up a storm.

            “And is there any reason that this production could suffer…disruption?” I asked, and immediately regretted it. As soon as the words left my mouth, she broke down, sniffles, tears, and a strange ‘neighing’ sound erupting from her all at the same time. Her hand fluttered behind her, and it looked to me as though the old broad might swoon. I stood up quickly, figuring I might have to catch her before she hit the deck. As I maneuvered in behind her to try and catch the old bird, I had visions of hazard pay in my future. Luckily the old dame righted herself before I abused my sacroiliac.

            She sat on the edge of her sofa and took a few deep breaths before she was able to speak. It was real emotion in her eyes when she turned back to me, instead of the fake society stuff that passed for it. I gave her a moment to wipe her tears and catch her breath before she spoke. When she did speak, it was as if a little girl had taken the place of the woman.

            “Have you ever been guilty of a youthful indiscretion?” she asked me. I answered yes to the ‘indiscretion’ part, but no to the ‘youthful.’ She smiled an actual smile and continued.

            “When I was a bit younger, and a bit more naive, I met a man. I was married to my late husband Randolph at the time, but this man was young, vigorous, and exciting.” I imagined that they are all young, vigorous, and exciting when you are married to a mug like the late Randolph Bancroft.

            “We made vows to each other. Promises were made, oaths were taken….”

            “Letters were exchanged?” I added with a sigh.

            “Letters were exchanged,” she sighed back in resignation. In my trade, I’ve noticed that letters were always exchanged.

            “The man for whom I had fallen vanished into the ether! He had asked for a thousand dollars to arrange for us to run away and have a fresh start. Another life, if you will. And on the day he was to come and collect me…” She broke down, and the words dried in her throat.

            “He never showed.”

            “No,” she sobbed. “He never came.” She reached over and pulled a handkerchief from off of one of those chiffarobes, or highboys, or whatever the hell the society dames call those fancy little dressers. After a moment, she regained her composure.

            “After Maurice left me…”

            “Maurice?” I asked.

            “Maurice.” She answered. “After Maurice left, I resigned myself to making my marriage work. I finished my education and Randolph and I left for the continent. It was there I immersed myself in the life that is the opera. Randolph and I made the best of our lives, and fell once again into love. It was only after Randolph passed that I left the continent to return to the city.”

            With full control of the Randolph fortune, I thought. But the meter was running, and it was her dime.

            “When I returned to my life in America,” she continued, “I dedicated myself to the cause of bringing enlightenment to the deprived masses.”

            “By means of opera?” I asked.

            “By means of opera.”

            “All was well as society welcomed me back with open arms. I found a place with the Met, and established myself as a driving force in the creative community.” Her eyes had that far-way look, and for a moment, I feared she might break out in song. “Everything was falling into place in my life.”

            “Until…?” I interjected.

            “Until the letters arrived,” she sighed, and the faraway look in her eyes vanished, replaced by a here-and-now look of resignation. “Just one or two letters, but there were more letters out there, and they were by far more…” The words escaped her.

            “And I am assuming that they came from Maurice?” I asked.

            “Never!” she protested. “What Maurice and I shared was a special bond. A melding of the spirits! What we had he would never betray for filthy lucre! I can only assume that some tragedy has befallen Maurice. Our passion may have been star-crossed, but our love was eternal! He must have perished, and our letters fallen into unscrupulous hands.”

            “So,” I said standing and making my way to the door. “You want me to find your blackmailer and …?”

            “And retrieve my letters!” she commanded. “I want to make sure that my good name remains untarnished and that the Metropolitan’s season opens without scandal of any kind!”

            “And if it turns out that old Maurice is the guy pulling the strings?” I ventured.

            “Impossible!” she said, dismissing me as the help I guess I now was. “I want you to find this cretin and return to me the memories of my youth.” She stood and turned her back to me, letting me show myself out. As I made my way back to the gorilla at the door, Mrs. Bancroft called to me from over her shoulder.

            “Detective, if you have to give this ne’er-do-well a thrashing in the process, I shan’t mind!”

            It took me about fifteen minutes to find Maurice. His full name was Maurice De Leon, and he had kept anything but a low profile. Working through my list of contacts, I simply had to describe the slimy little weasel to Benny at Chez Petite Francois, cross his palm with a sawbuck, and Benny sang me a tune that was both enlightening and nauseating.

            Maurice was a gold-digging hustler, but managed to keep his trade secret by virtue of his appearance. Although he was a short, sweaty, doughy, pug-like man, Maurice dressed in tailor-made suits that cost more than my annual rent, and adorned himself in jeweled tie-clips, pinkie rings, and watch fobs that defied imagination. If clothes made the man, then old Maurice was a prince.

            Maurice, according to Benny, had never worked a day in his life but was accustomed to the finer things. He was often seen on the arm of rich, if not desperate, older women in society, and would feed off of them like a leech until the well ran dry or until marriage was unavoidable. Then he would run off in the night as fast as his fat little legs would carry him, often to greener and more lucrative, pastures.

            I caught up to the snake as he was leaving the Leaping Lord, an old-fashioned, honest-to-goodness private club in the city. The Lord was an old-world joint that cost an arm and a leg to join, but apparently was a little lax on character requirements.

            I tailed Maurice past the park, to a brownstone off Weber Street. The building was an impressive piece of architecture. It stood proudly near the great park, side-by-side with some of the finest homes in the city. Maurice had done well for himself after making Mrs. Bancroft’s acquaintance on the continent. He had wealth, stature, and a place in the very society that Mrs. Bancroft was working her way towards.

            It occurred to me that high society played a little lax with its character requirements as well.

            Maurice entered the house, turned on a few lights, and made his way to the kitchen. As the rattle of the pots and pans grew, the smell of chicken and garlic wafted through the air. I pressed my face to the window, watching Maurice lay a bowl for himself and ladling it heavy with stewed chicken, onions, mushrooms, and wine. He sat the dish down on a small table in the kitchen, uncorked a bottle of Burgundy, and poured himself a healthy snootful. From there I watched him as he walked into the parlor and over to one of the many enormous bookshelves lining the walls of the room.. Each shelf overflowed with phonograph records. He studied the shelves as if he were going to be tested on them and, after some time, a smile pushed through his many chins as he pulled a record from the shelf.

            Carrying the record as if it was his first born, he walked to the nearby oak chest and opened the lid, revealing a very elegant and very expensive phonograph. He carefully placed the record on the player, lowered the needle, and was rewarded with the powerful blast of an Italian tenor filling the house. He closed his eyes and smiled as he soaked in the music. It filled every part of him, almost lifting the pudgy little toad off the floor. He hovered for a few more moments in rapture before remembering his dinner.

Walking back through the small hallway that connected the parlor to the kitchen, Maurice paused at a framed playbill from a European opera hall. He quickly looked from his left to his right as I dove into the bushes, catching a mouthful of Hydrangea for my troubles. From the peeping tom position, I watched Maurice pull on the corner of the framed picture, revealing a wall safe on the other side. This complicated matters.

His considerable bulk blocked my view of his sausage-like fingers working the dial. When the door opened, he tossed in his wallet, his watch, and a few stray papers. From what little I could see in the safe, it looked as if most of its contents were paperwork. And most of the paperwork looked like stationery.

I began to doubt that Mrs. B was his only pigeon.

I watched Maurice return to his bowl of stew in the kitchen, and the muscles in my jaw tightened. The presence of the safe was an issue. I couldn’t just waltz in and slap the little weasel around for the letters. I could wait for Maurice to leave, but since Mrs. B was on his hook he might just decide to move the letters.

The time to strike was now, but I was coming up snake-eyes. I was tired, out of ideas, and my stomach was protesting the copious amounts of coffee I drank all day. To make matters worse, the scent of Maurice’s chicken stew was intoxicating and my already rebelling gut gave a rumble in protest. I was about to call it an evening and find some grub when inspiration struck. It was after five o’clock and, down the street a newsboy was getting ready to start hawking the evening edition.