Beverly Hills Dead

30

Rick got two scenes and five setups done that day, finishing at seven that evening. He called Glenna to let her know he was on his way home, then walked to his electric cart. As he reached it, Tom Terry pulled up in his own cart.

“Hang on, Rick,” he called.

Rick sat in his cart and waited for Tom to turn his around. “You got something on Schmidt?” he asked.

“Turned out to be easy,” Tom replied. “I got connected to a source in the Milwaukee department, and as soon as I mentioned Schmidt’s name, the guy knew who I was talking about.”

“Is he a criminal?”

“Labor organizer. He put together a strike at a brewery in Milwaukee, and after a few weeks the whole thing blew up; big fight: scabs and hired cops against the strikers. Schmidt was convicted of inciting a riot, got two years in the Wisconsin State pen. He got out three days ago.”

“Can you find him?”

“I believe so. I could get a plane to Milwaukee in the morning.”

“Do that, please, Tom. This is on me, not the studio.”

“It’s personal?”

“Yes.”

“What do you want me to talk to him about?”

“Back before the war — this would have been ’38, or so — Schmidt went out for a while with a girl named Louise Brecht. A few weeks ago, somebody at the studio sent me an interoffice envelope with a photostat of a CP card with that name on it. She acknowledges knowing Schmidt but denies ever joining the party or even attending a meeting, though she says she did go to a couple of cocktail parties with Schmidt during the time she was seeing him. A knowledgeable source has told me it would have been possible for Schmidt to enroll her in the party without her knowledge. I want to know if he did and, if so, exactly how and if it exists, I want the record of that card expunged. It’s possible the local party never issued the card to her but hung on to it in their files.”

“You want me to get Schmidt to get the card and expunge the record?”

“I’m going to leave that to your judgment, Tom. You can offer him a thousand dollars to do that, but you’re going to have to decide if you can trust him.”

“And if I don’t think I can?”

“Then I want somebody to go in there, wherever it is, and take care of it. You can do it, and I’ll give you the thousand, or you can hire somebody, and I’ll pay for it. I want it clean and quiet, Tom, and I don’t want you to get caught with your hand in the cookie jar. Got it?”

“Got it. One other thing: do I need to know who Louise Brecht is?”

“She’s Glenna, and you’re to keep that entirely to yourself.”

“Of course.”

“Come back to the office with me. There’s some cash in my safe.”

“I’m right behind you.”

It was nearly nine before Vance was able to leave Susie and meet Sid Brooks at his house. He drove up the street, past the address, checking the neighborhood. It was beautiful. He turned around and pulled into the driveway, and Sid met him at the door.

“Hi, Vance,” Sid said, offering his hand. “Come in.”

“Hello, Sid. First of all I want to say how sorry I am for your problems, and I don’t want, in any way, to take advantage of your difficulties.”

“Actually, Vance, if you buy the house you’ll be easing my difficulties considerably by hastening the day when I’ll have this behind me. I’m not offering the house at a knockdown price, and I’ll actually get more money by not having to pay a broker. Come on, let me show you around.”

Vance followed along while Sid showed him the handsome living room, then the study with the walnut paneling and custom-made cabinets and bookcases. He led him upstairs and showed him two bedrooms, then the master, which included two baths and two dressing rooms. Then he took him down the back stairs to the dining room and kitchen, which was fitted with new, postwar appliances, including an electric Hotpoint dishwasher.

“There’s a laundry room at the back and a three-car garage. The previous owners, who built the place, had three. There’s a three-room flat over the garage if you want a live-in couple. We’ve never used that; we have a housekeeper who comes daily, and I recommend her to you.”

“How many square feet?” Vance asked.

“About forty-two hundred, and the lot is an acre. The houses on either side have bigger lots and big gardens so this lot seems bigger.”

“What about the furnishings?”

“Alice wants some of the pictures but no furniture; I need a few pieces to furnish the apartment I’m moving into. You can have everything else for another five thousand.”

“I’d like to buy it,” Vance said. “The furniture, too. When do you want to close?”

“The sooner the better. Will it be all cash?”

“Yes.”

“Good. That will make things go faster. I’ll tell my lawyer to get a title search done and to draw up the sales documents. I should think we could close in a week or ten days.”

Vance took out his new checkbook and wrote one for ten thousand dollars. “This and a handshake will secure the deal, as far as I’m concerned.” He handed the check to Sid, who put it into his pocket.

The two men shook hands.

When Rick got home there was a messenger-delivered envelope from Hyman Greenbaum waiting for him on the front hall table. He opened it and found a hardback copy of a slender novel, Greenwich Village Girl, and a neatly typed treatment by someone he’d never heard of, Wesley Hicks. He put it back in the envelope to read later.

After putting the girls to bed and having dinner, he and Glenna lay in bed, propped up on many pillows, Glenna reading the novel, Rick reading the treatment and making notes in the margin. Rick finished first. “What do you think?” he asked.

“I’m not finished.”

“Yeah, but what do you think so far?”

“I think I’m too old for the girl.”

“Any other thoughts?”

“Vance and Susie, of course. They’re perfect for it, and it’s perfect for them.”

“That’s what I think, too,” he said. “I’ll call Hy in the morning.”