“You in TV, Spenser?” he said.
“No.”
“Oh?”
“Spenser’s helping me on a special assignment, Mr. Hammond. We’re looking into the charges of labor racketeering in the film industry.”
“I’d heard you were doing a series on that, Candy. Or at least that it was on the boards. Have you got anything yet?”
“I got beaten up several days ago.”
“My God, you didn’t. Hell, you did, didn’t you. I can see the marks, now that you mention it and I’m really looking. God, Candy, that’s terrible.”
“I’ll recover.”
“And Spenser,” Hammond said. “That’s where you come in, isn’t it? You are her bodyguard.”
I shrugged.
“Sure you are. You’ve got the build for it. You look like a guy can handle himself. You stay close to this big guy, Candy.”
Candy smiled and nodded. “What can you tell me about labor racketeering in the industry, Mr. Hammond?”
“Roger,” he said. “Call me Roger.”
Candy smiled again and nodded. “What can you tell me?”
Hammond shrugged widely, bringing his hands, palms up, to shoulder level, elbows in. “I wish I could, Candy, but I can’t. I don’t know a damn thing. I’ve never encountered any. I’ve heard rumors, you know, in the industry, but nothing firsthand.”
“I’ve got an eyewitness that said a producer on one of your movies handed an envelope of cash to a thug on the set.”
Roger looked at Candy Sloan for a moment. Then he pressed his hands together beneath his chin and touched the underside of his chin with his fingertips. He rocked back in his high-backed executive swivelchair and gazed at the ceiling. Then he let the chair come forward until his elbows rested on the desk. He dropped his eyes level again at Candy, and with his fingertips still touching his chin, he said, “Candy, that’s bullshit.”
Then he pointed the still-pressed fingertips at her for emphasis.
Candy shook her head. “No, Roger. It’s not bullshit. I have the eyewitness. The producer was Sam Felton. The movie was Savage Cycles. Are you telling me you know nothing of this?”
Roger was shaking his head. “Candy, Candy, Candy,” he said. “This is bad.” He was shaking his head and moving his hands in time with the shake. “This is no good, Candy. This is lousy yellow journalism. Are your ratings that bad?”
“Roger, I’ve got the eyewitness. Now, I certainly wanted to give you a chance to comment before we go on the air with this.”
“Candy, you haven’t got anything,” Roger said. “You got a new director who’s third in the market and he’s scared for his job, that’s what you got. Nobody in my organization is paying anybody anything. That’s my statement. You have an eyewitness, bring him out. Who is it?”
Candy shook her head.
Roger nodded. “Yeah. I thought that’s the way it would be, Candy. You have an eyewitness, but he has no name. You and Joe McCarthy.” He unpressed his hands and made a repelling gesture, as if to brush away a swarm of gnats.
Candy smiled brightly at him and was silent. He was silent. I was silent. Roger stared at Candy and then glanced at me and then stared at Candy some more. He pressed the hands back together again and rested his chin on them, the fingertips against his mouth. Candy’s legs were crossed and her knees were very handsome. So was the line of her thigh beneath the white skirt. Sexism.
“If you have a witness, Candy,” Roger said, “I’d like to confront him, or her. If you have real evidence of wrongdoing in my organization, you owe it to me to level with me.”
“I think there’s danger to the witness,” Candy said.
Roger was aghast. He pointed both thumbs at his own chest. “From me? Danger from me? Who the hell do you think I am?”
“So you deny any knowledge of labor racketeering, payoffs, kickbacks, whatever, in Summit Studios,” Candy said.
“Absolutely,” Roger said. “Categorically. And let me say this, Candy. I resent very much the implication that I might be guilty of complicity. There are libel laws, and I’m going to be talking with our legal people.”
“Sam Felton had to get the money frorn somewhere,” Candy said. “I assume he wasn’t paying out of pocket. Could you put me in touch with your financial officer, Roger? Treasurer, comptroller, whatever you call him here.”
“For God’s sake, I will not. Candy, this has gone far enough. I’ve tried to cooperate, but you are not willing to be reasonable. You come in here and make wild charges and ask for the name of our treasurer.” He looked at me, leaning forward a little. “Spender, what the hell am I going to do with her?”
“It’s not just that you got my name screwed up,” I said, “it’s how you enlisted me in your cause. What are we sensible guys going to do with this silly broad. That’s where you lost me.”
“Geez, I’m bad with names,” Hammond said. “I must have misunderstood, what is your name again?”
“Spenser,” I said. “Like in Edmund.”
“I’m sorry, Spenser. Of course. I don’t mean to get sexist here. I’m just asking you for an opinion. You look like a guy’s been around, Spense. Can’t you talk some sense to her?”
“Not my job,” I said. “If I were you though, I’d take her seriously.”
“I’ll take her seriously,” Hammond said. “I’ll take you both seriously when you give me some evidence besides a goddamn ghost witness. Do you have any?”
“I have enough to make me look for more,” Candy said.
“To go fishing, you mean. If you had anything, you wouldn’t be here.”
“But there is some,” Candy said. “I just haven’t dug it up yet, is that what you’re saying?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth, you bitch,” Hammond said.
“Roger,” I said. “I signed the standard bodyguard’s contract, you know, to protect her against sticks and stones and broken bones. I’m not sure names are covered. My inclination, however, is to interpret the contract loosely.”
“Spense, are you threatening me?”
“I guess so, Rog. I guess I’m saying you shouldn’t call her names, or I will tie a knot in your Ralph Lauren jeans.”
Hammond half rose with his hands flat on the desktop. He leaned forward, carrying his weight on his stiff arms, and said, “That’s it. This interview is at an end. And I fully intend to let the station manager and ICNBS know just what kind of totally unprofessional job was done here today.”
“His name is Wendall B. Tracey,” Candy said.
“I know his name,” Hammond said.
We were all on our feet now. Candy opened the aoor. We went out.
Chapter 6
AS WE WALKED back toward the car, Candy said, “Want a drink at the commissary?”
“Is there a chance I’ll see Vera Hruba Ralston?”
“No.”
“Well, I’ll go anyway. Maybe we’ll see a clue there.” We walked across an open area, past a sound stage and two buildings that looked like barracks, and there was the commissary. It was a pale low stucco building with a small flagstone veranda across the front, facint; inward onto a small lawn among the buildings. Inside was a high ceiling, and around the walls, in living Technicolor, were painted a bunch of mythologicallooking women with harps and such.
“The nine Muses?” I said to Candy.
“Could be,” Candy said. “I didn’t know there were nine.”
“Same as a baseball team,” I said.
“I could use a drink,” Candy said. “What would be good. How about a margarita?”
“Salt may hurt.”
“You’re right. I’ll have a martini.” I had a beer.
“What do you think?” Candy said after she’d sipped at the martini. At the table next to us people I vaguely recognized were having drinks and sandwiches and laughing often. The cast of a television show, but I couldn’t remember which.
“I think Roger’s lying.”
“Why?”
“Well,” I drank some beer and watched a starlet in a very tight dress sit down at a table to my right. She showed a lot of thigh as she slid into the chair. I’d seen her in a movie somewhere. A Western.