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.”
31
Tom Terry got out of Jack Barron’s Beech Staggerwing at Milwaukee’s General Mitchell Field and grabbed his suitcase and briefcase. He and the pilot got a cab into the city and went to a medium-sized hotel recommended by the driver, one that specialized in traveling salesmen. They registered under false names, and Tom paid for both rooms in advance. Tom had a room-service dinner and got a good night’s sleep.
The following morning Tom took a taxi to the address given him by his Milwaukee P.D. contact and told the cab to wait. The house was a duplex in a working-class neighborhood. No one answered the bell, and the mailbox was full; Tom went through everything, finally striking gold: among the letters was a bill, in a plain brown envelope, for dues from the Milwaukee Communist Political Association. Tom wrote down the address in his notebook, stuffed the mail back in the box and rang the doorbell on the other side of the duplex. A small woman in a house dress and apron came to the door.
“Good morning,” Tom said, “I’m Jim Fellows from the Central States Insurance Company. I just want to deliver a check to Mr. Harold Schmidt. Does he still live next door?”
“I don’t think so, sir,” the woman replied. “He got arrested for his union work and did some time for it. He got out a couple of days ago and came back here to get his stuff and moved out.”
“I noticed he has a lot of mail piling up in his box. Do you have any idea of his forwarding address?”
“He told my daughter he was moving to sunny California,” she said.
“Did he say where?”
“Hollywood.”
Tom knew that a lot of people outside California thought of all of Los Angeles as Hollywood. “What’s he going to do out there, I wonder?”
“Well, I don’t know, but all he knows about is unions and trouble, far as I can tell.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Tom said, tipping his hat. He went back to the cab and gave the driver the address of the Communist Political Association. The building was in a light industrial part of the city, and the CPA was a doorway next to a printing shop.
Tom opened the door and went up a long staircase to the second floor, where he found another, fogged-glass door with the name lettered on it. He opened it and stepped into a small reception room, manned by a thin, primly dressed young woman at a desk.
“May I help you?” she asked, looking at him suspiciously.
“Yes, miss,” Tom said. “I’m Jim Mitchell, and I’m new in Milwaukee, looking for work. I went to some meetings back in Buffalo, New York, and I was kind of interested in the party. I wonder if you could give me a pamphlet about it, or something.”
She brightened. “Why yes,” she said. “Please wait for a minute; we just had a new supply delivered from the printers this morning, and they’re in Mr. Warchovski’s office.” She got up from her desk and went into the next room.
Tom could hear her tearing open a box. He brought his attention to bear on four two-drawer filing cabinets behind her desk, neatly labeled. One of them said “Membership.” All of them had built-in locks.
The woman came back and handed Tom two envelopes. “There you have a pamphlet explaining our principles and also a membership application.”
“Thank you, Miss...”
“Wilson,” she said.
“And Mr. Warchovski is...”
“He’s the local representative of the national party.”
“I wonder if I could speak with him for a moment?”
“I’m sorry. He’s out of the city all day, today. May I make an appointment for you tomorrow?”
“Could I call you later in the day? I’m not sure of tomorrow’s schedule just yet.”
“Of course. I’m here all day, except between twelve and one.”
“Thank you so much, Miss Wilson.”
“Would you like a copy of yesterday’s Daily Worker?” she asked, handing him the newspaper. “I’m afraid we get it a day late.”
“Why, thank you very much,” he said. Downstairs, he checked his watch: 11:40 A.M. He walked to the corner, leaned against the building and opened the Daily Worker. At one minute past noon, Miss Wilson emerged from the building, crossed the street and walked half a block to a café. The moment she was inside, Tom went back to her office.
The fogged-glass door was locked, but Tom produced a zippered manicure kit from a pocket that contained, in addition to the normal tools, a set of lock picks made for him by a burglar of his acquaintance. It took him half a minute to open the door, and he went straight to the membership filing cabinet, prepared to pick that lock, too. Fortunately, Miss Wilson had not bothered to lock the filing cabinets before she left for lunch.
For a long moment, Tom couldn’t remember Glenna Gleason’s original name, but finally it came to him: Louise Brecht. He went through the Bs three times, worrying until he found a manila folder with her name on it jammed down behind a lot of other B names. The folder contained an application and, stapled to it, a membership card.
He was about to leave when he had another thought. He opened the M drawer and found a neatly typed mailing list. Louise Brecht’s name was there with the notation. “Hold all mail.”
Hers was the last name on the page, so Tom found a pair of scissors in Miss Wilson’s desk drawer and snipped Louise’s name off the paper.
He went into Mr. Warchovski’s office and went through his desk, looking for other related documents, and found another copy of the mailing list. He snipped Louise’s name off that, too, and replaced it, stuffing both strips of paper into a pocket.
Tom tucked the manila folder into his belt in the small of his back and left, taking the time to lock the door behind him. A quick check of the nearly empty street, and he was out of there.
He had to walk a dozen blocks before he found a cab, and on the ride back to the hotel he read the slim contents of the file. The application was filled out in block capitals and signed “Louise Brecht,” but the signature was simple script without the flourishes or scrawling that usually came with a person’s signature; it looked written rather than signed.
Back at the hotel he found the pilot in the coffee shop, had a sandwich himself, then they checked out and headed for the airport. It was after midnight before, after a fuel stop in Denver, they landed at Clover Field.
The following morning Rick was in his office when Tom Terry was announced. He came into the office and handed Rick a manila folder. “This is all they had on her,” he said, “and it looks to me as if Schmidt filled out the application and signed her name. It doesn’t look like a signature, you know?”