Death Spins the Platter

10

Layton glanced at his watch. It was a few minutes past five. He debated with himself whether to phone Linda Hathaway for the information he wanted and had forgotten. He decided against it.

Instead, he stopped in at a drugstore on Santa Monica Boulevard and phoned KZZX, asking for Hazel Grant. To his relief, she was in. Apparently she worked on Saturday afternoons, too.

“Jim Layton,” he said. “Hazel, what’s Hathaway’s new home address?”

“You again,” she said. “What did I want to be nice to you for? Mr. Layton, I can’t give out confidential information like that!”

“Sure you can, honey,” Layton said. “Because I can always get it from Mrs. Hathaway. I have a hunch she wouldn’t mind telling me anything I want to know about your boss-man.”

The phone was silent. Then Hazel Grant said in a venomous undertone, “If you tell him I’m the one who gave it to you, I’ll kick you right where it will do you the most good. I mean it. He’s in the San Granados Apartments on South McCarty Drive.” She hung up so viciously that Layton’s ear rang.

The Beverly Hills address was less than a mile from the Carmelita Avenue mansion. It was a tasteless “better-class” apartment hotel with a tiny lobby. A fat young desk clerk sat behind the desk, within reach of a switchboard, reading a comic book.

“Where will I find Mr. George Hathaway?” Layton asked him.

The clerk barely bothered to look up. “In back. Across the court.”

“Is he in?”

“Dunno. He usually sneaks in and out through the back way.” He set his comic book down resentfully. “I’ll ring him. I’m supposed to do that, anyway.”

Layton slid a dollar bill across the desk and it fluttered into the fat young man’s lap. “Look at all the comic books you can buy if you didn’t see me blow by you. How do I get there?”

The bill vanished. “For a buck’s worth of comic books I’ll give it my personal attention.” The clerk grinned. He got up and indicated a short hall leading to the fear of the lobby. Layton followed him.

The hall led to a central court. Across the court an archway opened into a rear alley. On each side of the archway there was a door into the rear building. The clerk indicated the door on the right.

“Through there and up the stairs. You’ll find his name plate on apartment 23-E — second door to your left from the top of the stairs. How’s that for service?”

“Perfect,” Layton said; and he crossed the court, went through the right-hand door, and climbed the fake-Spanish black iron-and-tile stairway. Just as he reached the landing, George Hathaway came out of the second doorway on the left.

“Well, hello, Mr. Hathaway,” Layton said. “This is my lucky day.”

The KZZX manager peered; the hall was darkish. “Layton?” He seemed disagreeably surprised. “If you’re looking for me, I was just going out to dinner.”

“This is important, Mr. Hathaway.”

Hathaway hesitated. Then he said, “All right,” and stepped aside.

Layton found himself in a typical “exclusive” Los Angeles furnished bachelor apartment, consisting of a big flashy room with a wall bed, a recessed kitchenette masked by a mauve plastic fold-back screen, and a tiny bathroom. The furniture was what Layton called “Grand Rapids Swedish Moderne”; there was a television set; there was a small portable bar; a single mass-produced abstract “painting,” all blots and doodles, was self-consciously off-centered on one long, otherwise blank wall. The San Granados Apartments, Layton knew, contained scores of almost identical “adventures in living.”

“Sit down,” Hathaway said ungraciously. Layton sat down in a back-breaking contour chair; the station manager remained standing. “How did you know where to find me?”

“There are no secrets from the Press,” Layton smiled. “Now that that’s behind us—”

“Of course, this is only temporary,” the handsome old man said. “I had to, ah, move rather suddenly. I wish you wouldn’t publicize where I’m living, Layton. You see—”

“Why not?”

“Well, it’s only a hundred and eighty a month — with maid service, mind you — but it was all I could get in such short notice—”

“It would bankrupt me.”

Hathaway seem mollified. “Can I fix you a drink?”

“No, thanks,” Layton said. “I don’t drink a man’s whisky when I’m going to clobber him.”

Hathaway’s ruddy cheeks became noticeably less so. “What do you mean?”

“I just came from a long talk with your wife.”

The ruddiness dwindled to a milky pink. “I knew you were bad news the minute I laid eyes on you! Well, if you expect a statement from me about my marital affairs, Layton, you’re a fool. And I don’t think you’re a fool. What do you want?”

“Exhibit A.” Layton produced from his inside breast pocket a sheet of stationery. He unfolded it and held it up. “I hold here the original of a letter from one Reinhard K. Ault, Director of Public Relations of the Best-Play Recording Company, addressed to Mr. George Hathaway at his former home—”

“She gave that to you,” Hathaway said in a choked voice. “She dug that up and gave it to you.” He towered over the contour chair with his manicured hands clenched and raised, as if he meant to use Layton’s head as a drum. “Give me that letter.”

Layton folded it and slipped it back into his pocket in one fluid motion.

“Give it to me or, by heaven, I’ll take it away from you?”

Layton crossed his legs very suddenly, and Hathaway involuntarily took a half-step back. “My strength is as the strength of ten because I’m on a reporter’s diet. Besides, I’m a generation younger than you, Mr. Hathaway. And while the position I’m in seems to make me a sitting duck, allow me to point out that before you could land a blow you’d be nursing a broken kneecap.” His right foot, crossed over his left thigh, was swinging gently. At the top of its arc it came within an inch of Hathaway’s right knee.

Hathaway completed the backward step and turned and went across the room and slowly sat down on the sofa, under the blots and doodles. He leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.

“It wouldn’t do you any good to muscle Exhibit A away from me, anyway,” Layton said. “I have Exhibits B, C, D and so forth stashed elsewhere. They prove, Hathaway, that you’ve been taking measly but indisputable payola from at least a dozen record companies for five years. Will you please tell me how in hell you allowed them to pay you off by check, and on top of that saved the letters with those ridiculous secretarial ‘enclosure’ lines?”

The hands dropped; everything in the handsome face was sagging. “Nobody thought it would ever come out. Stupid, stupid. And the letters. I’d told my wife to burn them. I thought she had. The bitch. The treacherous, lecherous bitch!” He looked over at Layton. “I suppose you’re going to publish them.”

‘“Not necessarily,” Layton said.

The feeblest hope kindled in Hathaway’s eyes. “You have a price?”

“Yes.”

“What?”

“Your cooperation.”

“Cooperation?” Hathaway stared. “In what?”

“In getting at the truth of Tutter King’s death.”

“What truth? I told you, and I told those detectives, King committed suicide.”

“And I told you,” Layton said, “I think he was murdered.” He got up and began to stroll around the room, hands in his trouser pockets. “I’m going to level with you, Hathaway. I want you to realize the spot you’re on. If this was murder, you’re a prime suspect.”

“You mean you think I killed King?” Hathaway cried.

“I didn’t say that. I say the facts now suggest it.”

“What facts?” The handsome old man was wholly ashen now.

“You instructed Edwards, your engineer chief at the station, to cut King off the air if he started to say anything nasty about anyone connected with KZZX. The letters your wife gave me show what you might have been afraid King would say. If it came out that you’d been taking payola, too, you’d be out of KZZX on your ear in five minutes. Mrs. Hathaway told me you’re broke, that you have nothing but your salary. At your age, and with that kind of public smear — in this town! — what chance would you have of getting another job? I think the police would consider all this a mighty convincing motive for shutting King’s mouth.”

Hathaway said hoarsely, “As God is my witness, Layton, I didn’t kill King. If he didn’t commit suicide, somebody else killed him.”

“Then you tell that to Sergeant Trimble.”

“Is that what you meant by cooperation?” Hathaway gripped the edge of the sofa suddenly. “Or am I missing something? You could have taken those letters straight to Trimble. Why didn’t you?”

“Because I’m a newspaperman,” Layton said, “not a cop. First, I’m giving you a chance to come clean with me — everything you know. I’m after a story — a damn big story, if you ask me.”

“I come clean with you, as you put it, and you hang me,” Hathaway muttered. “Is that it?”

“Not if you had nothing to do with King’s death.”

Hathaway was silent. After a while he said, “What about those letters?”

“What about them?”

“Would you use the letters if I can somehow convince you I didn’t kill Tutter?”

“It’s Sergeant Trimble you’ll have to convince.”

“So you are going to turn the letters over to Trimble,” Hathaway said bitterly. “Big deal!”

Layton turned to face him. “Let’s understand each other, Hathaway. I’ve certainly no intention of withholding material evidence from the police. At the same time, if you co-operate, I’ll do my level best to keep the letters from being published.”

“You wouldn’t use them, of course,” the TV executive said with a hard laugh.

“I’d be a pretty bum reporter if I couldn’t see what a story they’d make. But I’m willing to horse-trade. You give me a better story and I’ll do everything I possibly can to protect you.”

“A better story.” Hathaway mused. Then he looked up. “Keep going,” he said.

Layton sat down on the edge of the contour chair, leaning forward. “I’ll ask Trimble to sit on the letters. I can’t guarantee he will. If he decides to release them, I’m obviously not going to let the other papers scoop me on my own story. In that case, you can be damn sure the Bulletin will publish the letters faster than you can lift your leg. But if Trimble agrees to play ball, you’re safe.”

“For how long?” Hathaway jeered. “So I’ll be ruined next week instead of tomorrow.”

Layton said patiently, “Not if you’re innocent. If Trimble decided to book you for murder, naturally he’d present the letters in court as evidence, to establish your motive. If he doesn’t have to use them as evidence, my personal opinion is that he’ll go along with my request to keep them in confidence.”

It was the station manager who got to his feet this time and paced.

“You’ve got me hung up by the crotch,” he muttered. “If I talk, I’ll be fired just as surely as if you’d published the letters.”

“Not if you talk off the record. I’ve never violated a confidence in my life.” Layton added, “Always provided, of course, that what you tell me isn’t self-incriminating. I won’t sit on a confession.”

“I have nothing to confess.” Hathaway halted to study the reporter. “You’ll guarantee not to disclose the source of your information if and when you relay it to the police?”

Layton nodded, “With the aforementioned proviso.”

The old man struggled with himself. He sat down again suddenly. “What did my wife tell you about those checks?”

“That they were bribes for not interfering with King’s subsidized song plugging.”

Hathaway shrugged. “That’s true only in effect. Actually, there was never any understanding, written or oral. The checks just started coming. What would you have done? Sent them back?”

Layton said dryly, “You knew what they were for, didn’t you? The point is, you kept the money and didn’t interfere with King.”

Unexpectedly, the old man laughed. “It’s almost funny. I couldn’t have touched King anyway.”

“Why not?”

“Orders.”

“From whom?”

George Hathaway said, “Hubert Stander, chairman of the board.”

Layton was silent. Then he said, “Stander... What was Stander’s interest in Tutter King?”

“King plugged his records.”

“Stander’s records? What are you talking about?”

“Stander owns the controlling interest in the Southwestern Recording Company,” Hathaway said with relish. “King gave Southwestern’s platters a free ride with the understanding that his payola deals with other companies wouldn’t be interfered with.”

Layton said softly, “So Stander has secret control of a record company. Wouldn’t the FCC regard that as a conflict of interest?”

“You’re damned right they would,” Hathaway snapped. “At worst, KZZX could have its license suspended, maybe revoked. At best, Stander would be forced to dispose of his interest in either the station or the recording company. Why should the announcement King said he was going to make have concerned me? He had a lot bigger fish to fry. It was Stander he was after.”

Layton sat very still. “How far from the station does Stander live?”

“Ten, fifteen minutes at the most. He lives in Beverly Hills, too.” Hathaway’s eyes were glittering.

Layton pretended not to notice.

“He got to the station at 4 p.m. by his own admission. King had gone on the air at three o’clock and right away announced that he was going to make an important statement at the end of the telecast. With King doing his last show, Stander sure as hell must have been tuned in.”

“You bet!” Hathaway said eagerly. “So he had loads of time to drive over to the station. Maybe purposely timing it so that he got there just at the beginning of the news break. That way there’d be less chance of his being collared by somebody on station business, and—”

“And what?” Layton said when Hathaway hesitated.

“You know and what, Layton.”

“Then why don’t you say it? You think Stander stuck that ice pick into Tutter?”

“I’m not saying that, you are,” Hathaway said quickly. “I’m merely pointing out that he had opportunity, and a lot stronger motive than mine.”

“The strength of motives, Hathaway, is relative. A starving man might kill for a loaf of bread. For you to keep your job was as strong a motive as for Stander to protect his millions.”

“Whose side are you on, anyway?” Hathaway cried.

“You force me to use lofty language,” Layton murmured. “I’m on the side of truth.”

Hathaway shouted a four-letter word. “You’ve conned me into this, Layton! You want to know something else? Stander had two motives!”

“Oh?” Layton said.

“Tutter beat his time with Lola Arkwright!”

Layton had to work to keep his voice casual. “I didn’t see any sign of a relationship, present or past, in Stander and Lola yesterday. Are you sure you aren’t giving me a typical Hollywood rumor as a fact? Stander’s old enough to be Lola’s father, and then some.”

“Where were you born, Layton, under a mushroom? You expect an experienced old lech like Stander and a professional tramp like Lola to betray themselves under the eyes of a couple of detectives in a mess like this? I know what I’m talking about! Stander was paying her rent before Tutter started his show on KZZX. As a matter of fact, it was Stander who introduced Lola to Tutter. The next thing Stander knew she was working Tutter’s turntable during the show and his bed after it. Our distinguished friend was all broken up about it — don’t ask me why; he must have known all along she was playing him for the usual sucker, who’d leave him the minute someone better came along.”

“Better?” Layton’s brows rose. “Stander’s a multimillionaire. Tutter wasn’t in his class.”

“Yes, better,” Hathaway said viciously. “Right from the start that redhead saw the possibility of steering Tutter into marriage. She couldn’t have married Stander in a thousand years.”

“Because he’s married and has a son older than Lola?”

“No! Because Stander couldn’t marry her, even if he got rid of that wife of his. Stander’s social position means as much to him as his money, and to have made Lola Mrs. Stander would ruin him in that precious ‘set’ of his. Just the same, as his mistress, Lola made him feel young again, and he was pretty much involved emotionally. It was a real crusher to him when King took her away from him. Yes, I’d say Stander had a double motive!”

Layton rose abruptly. Hathaway kept watching him.

“Where does Stander live?”

“On Crescent Drive somewhere. I don’t know the exact address.” Hathaway added bitterly, “I’m not on his social list.”

“How about the Arkwright girl?”

“Hollywood, I think.”

Layton went over to Hathway’s telephone table. He dug out the Beverly Hills book, looked up Stander’s address and phone number, and jotted them down in his notebook. Then he consulted the thick Los Angeles directory. There was no Lola Arkwright listed.

“You sure she lives in Hollywood?”

Hathaway shrugged. “That’s what I’ve always understood.”

Layton replaced the phone books; Sergeant Trimble had the address and telephone number of everyone involved. He went to the door.

“Wait!” George Hathaway said anxiously. “What about me? What happens now?”

“Sit tight,” Layton said; and he left.