Laurel and Hardy Murders (6 page)

We walked over to Broadway and I stepped out in the street to flag down a taxi, but Butler tapped me on the shoulder. I turned. He was waving a couple of one-dollar bills in my face.

“Hey, boy, you got any quarters in change? This is important!”

I rooted in my pocket and found three quarters, a nickel and two dimes. He exchanged the coins for one of the dollars, told me to come along if I liked, and hurried up the block toward 43rd.

I followed, and saw him duck into Nathan’s. I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just tell me he was hungry. But then, that didn’t make sense, either...there was no reason why he needed quarters to buy a hot dog.

Opening the door of the raffish frankfurter emporium, I glanced around to locate Butler in the crowd. I saw him right up front, between the clam bar and the ice cream stand. He had both hands around a radar scanner, part of a kids’ coin-play machine. His eyes were pressed to the visiplate, and he was gleefully demolishing enemy submarines.

“I saw this on the way over tonight,” he told me when he’d blown up his final enemy vessel. “Figured it’d steady my eye for our game.”

We didn’t leave till he’d used up the other pair of quarters and bought a can of Schaefer’s to “tranquilize” his nerves against the upcoming cab ride.

“You know what they say about New York City drivers, boy!”

In the taxi, I asked him why the sudden surge of admiration for Wayne Poe. He looked at me in astonishment.

“Are you loco? I’m gonna fry that bastard’s ass!”

“How? By telling lies about how good he was?”

“Never mind,” he said sullenly. “You just leave it up to the Old Man.”

By way of informing Butler that I had no use for Poe, either, I said I’d never seen anything crummier than what Poe pulled on Bryan Harper, the young singer.

“He murdered the poor punk,” Butler replied.

“You could say that.”

“No, I mean, he
murdered
him!”

I looked sharply at Butler. His big face was grim. “What are you talking about, Old Man?” I asked, unconsciously adopting the label he regularly employed for himself.

“I mean, Poe killed that kid sure as if he’d shoved ’im under himself. Who do you think told the little dope to sing without the orchestra, instead of picking another number?”

“Yeah, but that’s not—”

“And the combo got paid off by Poe, I checked. Y’know why?”

“Why?”

“Cliff Waxman was in the audience. Produces “Bright New Stars” for WCAU, big talent agent, too. Harper broke his nuts getting Waxman to come hear him (not that the kid was ready to be heard). But Poe sets the kid up, then sings the song himself with the band, and Cliff sees Poe afterwards and signs
him
for some rat’s-ass cruise ship gig—right in front of Bryan! So junior gets the career-nipped-in-the-bud blues, goes out, gets sozzled, and steps off a curb in front of a truck—
whammo
! Instant gravy! Only thing didn’t get twisted like a pretzel was some damn-fool good luck medal his uncle gave ’im. They fished it out of the pudding that was left on the street.”

“Jesus Christ,” I murmured.

“
He
wasn’t there,” Butler snapped. “Unless you think singing off-key’s a good reason for Divine Zapping.”

We were silent the rest of the ride, mulling over Harper’s fate.

H
ILARY CONTROLLED HERSELF WITH
considerable effort.

“He doesn’t look all that drunk to me,” she snapped.

“I am! I am!” Frank Butler assured her from his vantage point behind me.

“Trust me, he is,” I told her in a low voice, “and don’t you know a blow to the adam’s apple could kill someone?”

It happened fast, practically as soon as Butler and I entered the apartment/office. Hilary went to shake his hand, but he gave her an affectionate pat on the bottom. The next thing I knew, he was scuttling behind me and the initial blow meant for Butler’s neck landed on my own clavicle.

“Get out of the way!” she ordered, drawing back her hand for an intended karate chop in the general direction of the Old Man’s gullet. I grabbed her hand with difficulty—she’s petite, but strong as hell—and did my best to reason with her.

“Jeez, toots!” Butler said, over my shoulder. “I meant it as a compliment! If you were a dog, I wouldn’t’ve bothered!”

She stared at the two of us, speechless. I was positive his unique explanation would further incense her, and for a second I think Hilary thought so, too. Then the absurdity of the situation struck her and she exhaled a series of little gasps that sounded suspiciously like suppressed laughter.

“That,” she remarked, “is the damnedest excuse I ever heard. Okay, you can come out from behind Daddy Gene’s back, the Big Bad Broad won’t hurt you.”

Hilary asked how my collarbone felt. I said it hurt enough to convince me I wasn’t cut out to be a masochist, but I was pretty sure it was still in one working piece.

“Glad to hear it, brightness. Now kindly tell me why you brought this old lech over here.”

I pretended to explain, and she assumed the attitude of one who listens with polite interest. It was really a put-up performance for Butler’s benefit. I’d told Hilary all about my Philadelphia escapades and she’d promised to watch our rematch to see whether she could catch him foxing the cards.

We adjourned to the sitting room-library where I’d left a new pack upon the tabletop where we were going to play. Butler walked ahead, and when he couldn’t see us, Hilary shook her head in dismay.

“Saint preserve us,” she muttered, her blue eyes glancing at the ceiling in mock appeal, “he has to be a detective yet!”

To Hilary, that was undoubtedly the unkindest cut of all.

The next hour and a quarter was devoted to gin rummy. We used a Bee-back deck, which I’d bought because of the eye-confusing red crisscross design which I’d heard was the hardest to mark impromptu.

Despite my precautions, Butler gained the lead after two hands and kept it practically straight through. My indebtedness mounted.

Hilary watched us silently as we played, perched on the edge of the sofa, her azure bathrobe comfortably wrapped around her tantalizing body. I pretended to myself that part of the reason I was not playing well was because the view of her legs distracted me more than it did Butler.

The Old Man had an uncanny knack of catching quick gins. He played in a loose, relaxed style, not squinting nervously over the cards he drew. The whole time we sat, he yakked about all manner of things, from his formidable relatives to the current status of the Two Tars tent. As he talked, he frequently lubricated his larynx with a swig from the fifth of gin stuck in his jacket pocket. At Hilary’s request, he limited his cigar intake to two.

“Well, boy,” he grinned after raking in his earnings at the end of the match, “you ready to admit the Old Man’s a better player?”

“I still think you’re pulling something. No offense.” I’ve often wondered about people who say something inflammatory and then try to minimize it with the ridiculous phrase I’d just employed. But I meant it. I tried to convince Butler that I was more interested in learning how he’d flummoxed me than in achieving redress.

Nodding, Butler obtained Hilary’s permission to light a third stogie. “Say, toots,” he asked her, “you ain’t got some walnuts in the house?” She shook her head. Shrugging, he muttered to himself, as if he couldn’t comprehend a household lacking such a basic staple. “Well, now,” he grumbled, puffing away, “y’want to know the Old Man’s secrets, huh? Okay. I
will
admit I’m not as much in the bag as you figured. I don’t mean just now, I’m talking about at The Lambs, too.”

I considered it. “You mean, you
deliberately
blew the pool game just to make me overconfident?”

“Bingo, boy, you win the fur-lined jock-strap!” An anxious scowl contorted his homely features. “Hey, now, y’won’t tell Kilgore, will you?”

“No. But I still don’t know what you pulled. You did not read the card backs, I know that for a fact since we used my deck. I’m also positive you didn’t manage anything fancy like dealing seconds or palming cards. Right?”

“Too much work,” he grunted, exhaling the tantalizingly familiar aroma of his special brand of cigar in my direction. Then he reached into his vest pocket and yanked out an old-fashioned timepiece. “Tell you what, make you a sporting proposition. Give you five minutes to work it out, double or nothing the winnings.”

“Does that offer include me, too?” Hilary asked, smiling ingenuously. Her innocent air was a credit to her early training as an actor.

“You?” Butler eyed her suspiciously. “What d’you know about gin rummy?” Before she could answer, he turned to me. “You two pulling some kind of swindle?”

“Us
?” I laughed. “Who just named double stakes?”

“All right, you’re in, cutie,” the Old Man said, not too eagerly. “But the two of you can’t talk it over. No conferences, see?”

“Agreed,” Hilary replied, tossing her head so her hair glinted with highlights. “All I want is an opportunity to examine the cards with a magnifying glass.”

Butler grinned. “Go right ahead!”

I started to tell her not to bother, but he repeated his stipulation about our not comparing notes. He looked craftily pleased with the situation. No wonder.

“I warn you, Mr. Butler,” Hilary taunted, “I have very keen eyes.”

“I’ll say, toots!”

“Thank you. I don’t suppose you’d care to up the ante, double stakes either way?”

The old pirate probably wanted to hike the bet to a triple multiple, but he pretended to mull over her challenge. I knew he was totally confident, despite the act he was putting on. She could study the deck with a magnifier or even a microscope, it didn’t matter, there wasn’t the remotest chance she’d learn anything from a card-by-card scrutiny of a brand-new pack. He knew it, I knew it, and I didn’t know why the hell she didn’t.

Finally, he ventured to take the “risk,” double stakes. Hilary rose, cards in hand, and went to the front office for her magnifying lens. Butler grinned at me a little sheepishly. He must have been a bit ashamed to accept such a sure thing.

Hilary reentered, apologizing for the delay. “I couldn’t find the damn thing,” she said, holding up the enlarger.

“It’s okay,” said Butler, “but you already used up two minutes.”

Without another word, she sat down and studied the back markings of each and every card, pausing scarcely more than a second before going on to the next. She totally ignored the faces.

Butler sat watching the second hand of his Bulova sweep away the dwindling time. At the end of five minutes, he stuck the watch back in his vest pocket and asked her what she’d found out, if anything. He sounded pleased with himself.

“But how will I know if I’m right?” she challenged him. “All we’ll have will be
your
word.”

She let the heavy-footed implication dangle.

“Okay,” Butler said smugly, “you go outta the room and I’ll tell Gene here what I did, and he’ll judge whether you come anywhere close. Copacetic?”

“All right,” Hilary agreed.

She left the room long enough for Butler to explain his system. When I heard, I felt stupid for not getting it, but I’d been too busy pondering more complicated methods. I was only sorry that Hilary was about to blow her money on some hyper-subtle hypothesis.

We called her back into the library. She took the cards and began idly shuffling them as she spoke.

“Gin,” she said, “is a game in which both players start with ten cards in their hands. The winner of each round deals the next hand. Those are important facts. As for clues—the way you shuffled tended to leave the top cards undisturbed. Second, from one hand to another, there was an unusual recurrence of similar meld sequences when you called gin.”

Butler began to look worried.

“As dealer, all you have to do is assemble some of those melds on the table as consecutive, undisturbed packets and make sure they go on top of the deck. Then you take care to riffle-shuffle so they fall in a heap at the end of the mixing. It’s so easy and natural to do that no one can call it cheating.”

“Anything else?” Butler growled.

“Oh, yes. All you need to do to get those winning melds where you want them is to pass the cards to Gene to be cut. Card custom is not to cut less than ten cards, and as a matter of fact, most people divide the deck in half. I imagine you remember the top card of your first undisturbed meld and watch for that one to be turned up in the course of play. When you see it, you start picking up every single card you can lay your hands on—top of the talon, your opponent’s discards.
He
sure can’t use the cards that are turning over to improve his hand, while all the time you’re just trading your initial cards for the sequenced ones you’ve stacked in the middle.” Pausing, she raised one eyebrow and regarded him with sardonic amusement. “Well, am I right, or am I right?”

He grimaced, but said nothing, so she turned to me. I nodded. “You’ve got it, Hilary. The only difference is he memorizes the top
two
cards of the middle melds, just in case the other player draws the first and doesn’t discard it.”

Butler was silent for a time, then, turning to Hilary, stuck a fat finger in her direction. “How come you went through all that crap about examining the cards with a magnifier?”

“I believe,” she said, smiling icily, “that’s what’s known as setting up the mark. I wanted you to take my double-stakes bet.”

I thought Butler would utter a few choice imprecations, but he surprised me by grinning and passing his bottle to Hilary.

“You’re okay, blondie! Here—have some firewater!”

She took it, too—though Hilary doesn’t like liquor unless it’s iced or watered or mixed. But she downed a good two and a half ounces. The improvident helping of gin brought on a coughing fit, followed by an attack of the giggles, a decidedly uncharacteristic phenomenon for Hilary. I felt embarrassed for her.

We sat and talked for a while, and Hilary held onto Butler’s bottle, taking a few more swigs. She grew decidedly tipsy.

“I’ve got an idea,” she said, after several minutes. Her voice was somewhat thick, as if her tongue was too big for her mouth. “How about—Gene, what do you call it? You know, when you decide you’re going to keep your money in the pot?”