It Was a Very Bad Year (6 page)

Danny jumped to his feet, almost upsetting the table. He grabbed it to keep it from falling over, then stood up straight and stared.

‘I'm glad to meet you Mr Bardini.'

‘Um, me, too, Miss Dalton.'

‘Have a seat,' I said, and Abby slid in so she could sit next to me. She was wearing a tight sweater, a skirt and high heels. Her hair was piled on top of her head, leaving her long, graceful neck bare.

Danny sat, giving me a hard look for not warning him. He was wearing a rumpled suit that looked as if he'd spent the night in it. I was casual and clean in a T-shirt, jeans and windbreaker.

‘Abby, Danny is one of my best friends, and also happens to be a private detective. He's agreed to help us.'

‘Oh, that's wonderful,' she said. She gave him a look that would weaken any man's knees. ‘I'll pay you, of course.'

‘Nonsense,' Danny said. ‘I'm happy to help.' Like me, Danny's Brooklyn accent kind of went and hid when he was around beautiful women.

‘Coffee?' I asked Abby.

‘Yes, please.'

‘Something to eat?' I asked, as I poured.

‘No, I was up early and had breakfast before I went to the bank. I have some cash here—' She started to go into her purse, but I stopped her.

‘We have time for that,' I said. ‘Let's hear what Danny has for us, first.'

‘Well,' Danny said, ‘I picked your man up around two in the afternoon. He was in his studio and didn't leave till five. He had a brown envelope with him, about eight-and-a-half by ten. I followed him home, a dump on Spring Mountain Road between a couple of strip clubs. He went in and didn't come out. I sat on him until eleven, when all the lights went out.'

‘What about the next morning?' I asked.

‘I thought of that,' Danny said. ‘I went back this morning about seven a.m. He left the house at eight. He was carrying a brown envelope.'

‘He's supposed to meet me at a bar tonight with the photos,' I said.

‘Well,' Danny said, ‘maybe that's what he was carrying. Or maybe he'll go back to the house to get them, and he was carrying something entirely different. Somebody's baby pictures.'

‘Why would he do that?' I asked. ‘The bar's practically around the corner from his place. That doesn't sound right.'

‘Then the photos are either in that envelope, in his house, or still at his studio.'

‘We searched the whole studio pretty good,' I pointed out.

‘Look for false bottoms in drawers, false walls, a safe?' he asked.

‘No.'

Danny shrugged. ‘Then the stuff could still be there, somewhere.'

‘Danny, you said his house has strip clubs around it?' I asked.

‘Yup.'

‘Not so busy during the day.'

‘Nope.'

He knew what I was thinking, but neither of us said it in front of Abby. Jerry and I could break into the house while he was at work, take a look around.

‘OK,' I said. ‘OK. You want something to eat?' I asked Danny.

‘I could use something.'

I looked at Abby.

‘I'll just have more coffee,' she said. ‘I've got to watch my figure.'

I looked at Danny, hoping he wouldn't say, ‘We can do that.' He didn't.

‘Yeah, me, too,' I said, and waved the waitress over. Danny ordered lunch. Abby and I drank coffee while he ate.

A
fter Danny finished his lunch, Abby asked, ‘What about the money?'

‘How much do you have with you?' I asked.

‘Five thousand,' she said.

‘Give it to me.'

She opened her purse, which seemed just large enough to accommodate the white envelope she took out. She handed it to me and I could feel the thickness of the wad of cash inside.

‘Will it be enough?' she asked.

‘We'll see,' I said. ‘If they're not the photos we're looking for, I won't even make the deal.'

‘I would like . . . all the photos he has,' she said, haltingly. ‘I mean, even just . . . modeling photos.'

‘All right,' I said. ‘I'll get whatever he brings with him.'

‘Thank you. I have to go, now. I'm supposed to meet Joey for some publicity for the show.'

I got up to let her out, and Danny got to his feet, as well.

‘We'll talk later, Abby,' I said.

‘Thank you, Eddie.' She turned to Danny. ‘And thank you for your help, Mr Bardini.'

‘I'm happy to be of service, Miss Dalton.'

She smiled at him, and left the coffee shop.

After she left, Danny and I sat back down. I poured more coffee for each of us.

‘You'll need back-up for this meet, tonight,' Danny said.

‘He's just a middle-aged photographer, Danny,' I said. ‘I don't think I'll have any trouble.'

‘He might have some friends who aren't so middle-aged.'

‘I'll take Jerry.'

‘You said he told you not to bring Jerry,' Danny pointed out. ‘Besides, he's seen Jerry. He's never seen me. I'll get to the bar early and get myself a ringside seat.'

‘All right,' I said. ‘Thanks.'

‘And keep Jerry away from there.'

‘I'll tell him.'

‘Make sure he understands,' Danny said. ‘You don't need him rushing in and queering the deal.'

‘It's a simple swap, Danny.'

‘I've seen many simple swaps go wrong, Eddie,' Danny said, dead serious. ‘Believe me, you can't be too careful.'

‘Yeah, OK,' I said. ‘We'll do it your way.'

‘For a change, you mean,' he said.

‘Yeah,' I agreed, ‘for a change.'

Together we walked out to the street. The sun was bright, and the day was busy already, valets running back and forth, parking customers' cars. We watched women exit their automobiles in flashes of nylon and heels, men in suits and fedoras. People dressed to gamble in those days. Many of the women wore their Jackie Kennedy influences: dark glasses, shift dresses, pea coats. At night, when the sun went down, they'd put on white gloves, pearls, designer dresses and gowns from Cassini to Valentino to Givenchy just to attend the shows, and then gamble late into the night.

I didn't usually get to rub shoulders with women like that, not while I was in the pit. When they played blackjack they had their men right next to them, guarding their women like possessions. Even the pros, who were on the arms of the men who had rented them, dressed the part.

Danny and me, we still had Brooklyn inside of us. We were more comfortable in some of the downtown casinos, where the people were more concerned with the actual gambling than with what they wore while they tossed the dice.

‘My car's in the back,' Danny said.

‘We could have gone out that way.'

‘I'll walk around,' he said. ‘I wanted to see some of the pretty people.'

‘Where will we meet after?'

‘Downtown,' he said. ‘The Horseshoe. In the coffee shop.'

‘OK.'

He put his hand on my arm.

‘Don't take this lightly, OK?' he asked. ‘If Irwin's a blackmailer, then he's more than just a middle-aged photographer. And if . . . if you're planning on breaking into his house, I don't wanna know about it. Got it?'

I nodded, and watched Danny as he worked his way between the cars, and then rounded the corner. Despite what he said, I couldn't help thinking Barney Irwin was just a wannabe Hugh Hefner, out for a fast buck or an even faster fuck.

I went back inside to find Jerry. I had to tell him I didn't need him that night, and make him believe it.

T
he club on one side of Irwin's house was called The Diamond Club. The other was called Foxy's. The house was a rundown, one-story wood A-frame.

‘We better pull around back, Mr G.,' Jerry said.

‘Go ahead.'

He whipped the Caddy around to the back and cut the engine. As we got out he looked at the two buildings.

‘No doors or windows on this side,' he said. ‘Nobody'll see us.'

‘You gonna pick the locks again?'

‘This cracker box?' Jerry asked. ‘I'll just slip the lock.'

He used a piece of celluloid to slip the lock and open the door. Nobody would ever be able to tell.

We were in the kitchen.

‘He's got to have an office here,' I said. ‘Maybe a darkroom in the basement.'

‘I'll take the basement,' Jerry said.

‘OK,' I said, ‘I'll snoop around up here.'

The living room was cheaply furnished; the linoleum had worn through to show the wood floor beneath it. The furniture was marked with cigarette burns, rings, scratches. I didn't find an office or a desk on the first floor. As I got to the basement steps Jerry called up, ‘Hey, Mr G. You better get down here.'

I went down the steps, found Jerry standing among some file cabinets, trays of chemicals, and clotheslines for drying photos. There was a black light in the ceiling.

‘This is where he develops his photos,' Jerry said. ‘And look here.' He opened the top drawer of a file cabinet, reached inside and came out with a handful of photos. He spread them out on the table. They were all of nude, young girls who looked anywhere from sixteen to nineteen. Some of the pictures themselves were older than others.

‘The whole drawer?' I asked.

‘Filled to the brim.'

‘Any of Abby?'

‘Not that I can see.'

‘We'll have to go through them all,' I said.

He shrugged and said, ‘OK with me.'

We started leafing through photos of skinny girls, full-bodied girls, tall, short, blondes, brunettes, redheads. Hundreds of photos, but none of Abby Dalton.

‘He's got 'em,' I said. ‘He's got 'em with 'im.'

‘So he is gonna sell them to you tonight,' Jerry said.

‘Maybe,' I said. ‘I'll find out when I see him.'

‘I'll come along.'

‘He doesn't want you there, Jerry,' I said. ‘If he sees you, he might not show up.'

‘He won't see me.'

‘Look, Jerry,' I said, ‘Danny's gonna be inside. Irwin's never seen him.'

‘I'll be outside, Mr G.,' he said. ‘Irwin won't catch on and neither will the dick. I won't come in unless there's shootin'.'

‘You didn't bring a gun with you on this trip, did you?'

‘No,' Jerry said, ‘but I can get one.'

‘Look, Jerry, I'll tell you what I told Danny. This guy's a middle-aged photographer, not a hard guy. There's not gonna be any shooting.'

‘And I'll bet I'm tellin' you what the dick told you,' Jerry said. ‘You never know what kind of a guy somebody is. Sometimes, you find out too late. So it's better to be ready.'

‘He didn't tell me that.'

‘Well, he should've.'

‘He told me a simple swap is not always a simple swap.'

‘He's right about that.'

I looked down at the photos in my hand.

‘What do we do now?' Jerry asked.

‘I don't think we're gonna find any photos of Abby here,' I said, ‘but let's keep looking, just in case.'

‘Fine by me.'

We spent a good hour searching the whole house. We found more nudes in a bedroom closet, in a cardboard box, but they were more than nude. They were porn, showing men and women engaged in many different types and positions of sexual activity.

‘Man, that's gotta hurt,' Jerry said, of one photo in particular.

‘These are not just photos,' I said. ‘They look like stills.'

‘From blue movies, you mean?'

I nodded.

‘But this isn't what we're interested in. Let's put 'em back and go back downstairs.'

On the way down I said, ‘I'm thinking we missed something in his studio.'

‘Maybe he just kept the pictures of Miss Dalton all someplace else,' Jerry said. ‘Maybe he's really gonna give 'em all to you tonight.'

‘You believe that?'

‘No. Blackmailers are the worst. They're never satisfied.'

‘We've got to satisfy this one, Jerry.'

‘I'm ready, Mr G.,' Jerry said. ‘I love squeezin' blackmailers.'

‘Well, let me talk to him tonight, and then we'll see about squeezin' him.'

‘With me outside and the dick inside, we gotcha covered.'

‘I know,' I said. ‘I appreciate it.'

‘We gotta clean up here.' We were in the basement again, the nude photos still spread out on a table. ‘Or he'll know we was here.'

‘No,' I said.

‘What?'

‘I want to take all these with us.'

‘All of 'em?'

‘Oh, yeah,' I said. ‘If he's plannin' to blackmail anybody else, I want to throw a monkey wrench into the works.'

Jerry went back to the file drawer and looked inside.

‘We got negatives here, Mr G.'

‘Good,' I said. ‘We'll take all the copies, and the negatives.'

‘Then he'll really know we was here.'

‘He'll know somebody was here,' I said. ‘He won't be able to prove it was us.'

‘OK,' Jerry said. ‘You're the boss.'

We found some brown envelopes, stuffed them full of photos and negatives, then went out the back door to the Caddy.

Jerry looked around as he got behind the wheel.

‘I don't think anyone saw us, or the car,' I commented.

‘Unless somebody came out of the clubs to get a blowjob behind the building.'

I looked over at the parking lots of both clubs as we pulled out. Only a few cars, probably belonging to employees.

‘I think we're in the clear,' I said, with more confidence than I felt.

‘Don't worry, Mr G.,' Jerry said. ‘Even if somebody saw the car we can just say we were lookin' for Irwin.'

‘For over an hour?'