THE CURTAIN
ONE
The first time I ever saw Larry Batzel he was drunk outside Sardi’s in a secondhand Rolls-Royce. There was a tall blonde with him who had eyes you wouldn’t forget. I helped her argue him out from under the wheel so that she could drive.
The second time I saw him he didn’t have any Rolls-Royce or any blonde or any job in pictures. All he had was the jitters and a suit that needed pressing. He remembered me. He was that kind of drunk.
I bought him enough drinks to do him some good and gave him half my cigarettes. I used to see him from time to time «between pictures.» I got to lending him money. I don’t know just why. He was a big, handsome brute with eyes like a cow and something innocent and honest in them. Something I don’t get much of in my business.
The funny part was he had been a liquor runner for a pretty hard mob before Repeal. He never got anywhere in pictures, and after a while I didn’t see him around any more.
Then one day out of the clear blue I got a check for all he owed me and a note that he was working on the tables — gambling not dining — at the Dardanella Club, and to come out and look him up. So I knew he was back in the rackets.
I didn’t go to see him, but I found out somehow or other that Joe Mesarvey owned the place, and that Joe Mesarvey was married to the blonde with the eyes, the one Larry Batzel had been with in the Rolls that time. I still didn’t go out there.
Then very early one morning there was a dim figure standing by my bed, between me and the windows. The blinds had been pulled down. That must have been what wakened me. The figure was large and had a gun.
I rolled over and rubbed my eyes.
«Okay,» I said sourly. «There’s twelve bucks in my pants and my wrist watch cost twenty-seven fifty. You couldn’t get anything on that.»
The figure went over to the window and pulled a blind aside an inch and looked down at the street. When he turned again I saw that it was Larry Batzel.
His face was drawn and tired and he needed a shave. He had dinner clothes on still and a dark double-breasted overcoat with a dwarf rose drooping in the lapel.
He sat down and held the gun on his knee for a moment before he put it away, with a puzzled frown, as if he didn’t know how it got into his hand.
«You’re going to drive me to Berdoo,» he said. «I’ve got to get out of town. They’ve put the pencil on me.»
«Okay,» I said. «Tell me about it.»
I sat up and felt the carpet with my toes and lit a cigarette. It was a little after five-thirty.
«I jimmied your lock with a piece of celluloid,» he said. «You ought to use your night latch once in a while. I wasn’t sure which was your flop and I didn’t want to rouse the house.»
«Try the mailboxes next time,» I said. «But go ahead. You’re not drunk, are you?»
«I’d like to be, but I’ve got to get away first. I’m just rattled. I’m not so tough as I used to be. You read about the O’Mara disappearance of course.»
«Yeah.»
«Listen, anyway. If I keep talking I won’t blow up. I don’t think I’m spotted here.»
«One drink won’t hurt either of us,» I said. «The Scotch is on the table there.»
He poured a couple of drinks quickly and handed me one. I put on a bathrobe and slippers. The glass rattled against his teeth when he drank.
He put his empty glass down and held his hands tight together.
«I used to know Dud O’Mara pretty well. We used to run stuff together down from Hueneme Point. We even carried the torch for the same girl. She’s married to Joe Mesarvey now. Dud married five million dollars. He married General Dade Winslow’s rickety-rackety divorcée daughter.»
«I know all that,» I said.
«Yeah. Just listen. She picked him out of a speak, just like I’d pick up a cafeteria tray. But he didn’t like the life. I guess he used to see Mona. He got wise Joe Mesarvey and Lash Yeager had a hot car racket on the side. They knocked him off.»
«The hell they did,» I said. «Have another drink.»
«No. Just listen. There’s just two points. The night O’Mara pulled down the curtain — no, the night the papers got it — Mona Mesarvey disappeared too. Only she didn’t. They hid her out in a shack a couple of miles beyond Realito in the orange belt. Next door to a garage run by a heel named Art Huck, a hot car drop. I found out. I trailed Joe there.»
«What made it your business?» I asked.
«I’m still soft on her. I’m telling you this because you were pretty swell to me once. You can make something of it after I blow. They hid her out there so it would look as if Dud had blown with her. Naturally the cops were not too dumb to see Joe after the disappearance. But they didn’t find Mona. They have a system on disappearances and they play the system.»
He got up and went over to the window again, looked through the side of the blind.
«There’s a blue sedan down there I think I’ve seen before,» he said. «But maybe not. There’s a lot like it.»
He sat down again. I didn’t speak.
«This place beyond Realito is on the first side road north from the Foothill Boulevard. You can’t miss it. It stands all alone, the garage and the house next door. There’s an old cyanide plant up above there. I’m telling you this —»
«That’s point one,» I said. «What was the second point?»
«The punk that used to drive for Lash Yeager lit out a couple of weeks back and went East. I lent him fifty bucks. He was broke. He told me Yeager was out to the Winslow estate the night Dud O’Mara disappeared.»
I stared at him. «It’s interesting, Larry. But not enough to break eggs over. After all we do have a police department.»
«Yeah. Add this. I got drunk last night and told Yeager what I knew. Then I quit the job at the Dardanella. So somebody shot at me outside where I live when I got home. I’ve been on the dodge ever since. Now, will you drive me to Berdoo?»
I stood up. It was May but I felt cold. Larry Batzel looked cold, even with his overcoat on.
«Absolutely,» I said. «But take it easy. Later will be much safer than now. Have another drink. You don’t know they knocked O’Mara off.»
«If he found out about the hot car racket, with Mona married to Joe Mesarvey, they’d have to knock him off. He was that kind of guy.»
I stood up and went towards the bathroom. Larry went over to the window again.
«It’s still there,» he said over his shoulder. «You might get shot at riding with me.»
«I’d hate that,» I said.
«You’re a good sort of heel, Carmady. It’s going to rain. I’d hate like hell to be buried in the rain, wouldn’t you?»
«You talk too damn much,» I said, and went into the bathroom.
It was the last time I ever spoke to him.
TWO
I heard him moving around while I was shaving, but not after I got under the shower, of course. When I came out he was gone. I padded over and looked into the kitchenette. He wasn’t in there. I grabbed a bathrobe and peeked out into the hail. It was empty except for a milkman starting down the back stairs with his wiry tray of bottles, and the fresh folded papers leaning against the shut doors.
«Hey,» I called out to the milkman, «did a guy just come out of here and go by you?»
He looked back at me from the corner of the wall and opened his mouth to answer. He was a nice-looking boy with fine large white teeth. I remember his teeth well, because I was looking at them when I heard the shots.
They were not very near or very far. Out back of the apartment house, by the garages, or in the alley, I thought. There were two quick, hard shots and then the riveting machine. A burst of five or six, all a good chopper should ever need. Then the roar of the car going away.