Sheri Cobb South (11 page)

“If you were really famous, they’d be more likely to rip that pretty black frock right off your back,” Frankie observed pragmatically. “Wait a minute! If that’s who I think it is, we’re in!”

Picking up her pace, she headed straight toward a young policeman struggling to hold back a gaggle of girls dead set on catching a glimpse of Clark Gable among the mourners.

“Why Officer Kincaid, fancy meeting you here!”

“ ‘Afternoon, Miss Foster.” The young policeman nodded at her, then glanced at her companion with combined curiosity and admiration.

“I’d like you to meet my roommate, Kathleen Stuart.” Frankie gestured toward the British girl. “Kathleen, this is Officer Kincaid, one of L.A.’s finest.” As the two shook hands, Frankie came to the point. “Officer, can you get us past the rope?”

He raised a skeptical eyebrow. “You’re not still trying to play detective, are you?”

“No, no,” Frankie assured him with less than perfect truth. “Kathleen and I both worked for Mr. Cohen in some small capacity, and we’d like to pay our last respects—which is more than you can say for most of the people here,” she added, glancing across the expanse of green to where the Marx brothers wept sentimental tears for the benefit of a
Variety
photographer. A scant ten yards away, gossip columnist Louella Parsons scribbled furiously in her notebook as a script girl from
The Virgin Queen
described a lurid scene that bore very little resemblance to reality.

“—Blood simply
everywhere
, and poor Mr. Cohen
moaning
in agony—”

The policeman, who had been inclined to turn the two girls away, struggled in defeat. “I guess it’s okay,” he said, dropping the velvet rope for them to pass. “I’ll be going off-duty after the funeral. Can I give you a ride home?”

“That would be lovely,” said Frankie, thinking of the forty cents she would save.

A light breeze ruffled the skirt of her black-and-white spotted crepe dress as she and Kathleen made their way closer to the grave site. Frankie had never been to a Jewish funeral before—Mama didn’t quite approve of Jews, even if they were God’s chosen people—and she was struck by how similar and yet how different it was from her grandmother’s funeral five years ago. The chief mourners, family members of the deceased, were gathered in a tight cluster about the grave. Letitia Lamont was there, dressed in black from head to toe—at least, Frankie assumed it was the producer’s widow beneath a wide-brimmed hat swathed in black netting. Maurice Cohen stood at her elbow, pale and heavy-eyed. Yet the casket itself was nowhere in sight, and the mourners looked down on a gaping hole; apparently the casket had already been lowered into the grave.

“Who can say unto the Lord, ‘What workest thou?’ ” intoned the rabbi, bringing Frankie’s attention back to the burial service. “He ruleth below and above; He ordereth death and restoreth to life.”

Frankie was almost certain it had not been the Lord but someone else entirely who had ordered Arthur Cohen’s death. Maybe it was a pity the actual death hadn’t been a bit more dramatic, like the script girl’s description; if there had really been blood everywhere, the police might have been a bit more thorough in their investigation.

When the rabbi had finished, Maurice Cohen shoveled the first scoops of dirt onto his brother’s casket. There was something very final about the
thud
of earth on the lid of the casket, as if any secrets Arthur Cohen’s body might have revealed were being buried with him.

Frankie frowned as a new thought occurred to her. It was true that there wasn’t any blood, but what if there was some other form of evidence? When he burst onto the soundstage, Arthur Cohen was practically foaming at the mouth. Surely it wasn’t too much of a stretch to think he might have spilled or coughed something onto his clothes—certainly not blood, but something else, something that could be tested for poison. Since Mr. Cohen had fallen forward and landed face down on the floor, she hadn’t seen anything. She glanced at the hearse from the Shady Rest Mortuary. No, she hadn’t seen anything, but she knew who would have, if there had been anything to see.

The rabbi bowed his head and began to back away from the grave. “In the world which He will create anew, where He will revive the dead, construct His temple, deliver life, and rebuild the city of Jerusalem, and uproot foreign idol worship from His land, and restore the holy service of Heaven to its place, along with His radiance and splendor, and may He bring forth His redemption and hasten the coming of His anointed one
.
. .”

A murmured chorus of “amens” marked the end of the prayer, and the knot of mourners clustered about the casket began to disperse.

“Do we go, or stay?” asked Kathleen, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “We’re more than sightseers, but not exactly mourners, either.”

“We stay,” Frankie said decisively. “Remember, Officer Kincaid is giving us a ride, and he can’t leave until the mob goes home.”

Kathleen muttered something about getting back in time for
Fibber McGee and Molly
.

“Give you girls a lift?”

Frankie hadn’t heard Mitch’s approach—hadn’t even known he’d come to the funeral at all, in fact—and was annoyed to find her heart racing like a roadster competing for the Vanderbilt Cup
.
Even more distressing was the fact that Mitch didn’t seem to be suffering any similar ill effects, standing there in his dark suit and tie with his hands dug into his pants pockets smiling at her as if they had parted on the chummiest of good terms.

“What are
you
doing here?” she asked frostily.

“Same thing you are, I imagine. Paying my last respects to the guy who gave me my big break. So do you want a ride back to the Studio Club, or not?”

“Not.” Frankie tossed her head and set out in the direction the young policeman was stationed. “Officer Kincaid is giving me a lift as soon as he gets off duty.”

Mitch grinned and fell into step beside her. “If you really want to ride in a paddy wagon, I can arrange it.”

“I’d rather ride in the
front
, if it’s all the same to you!”

“I’d love a ride, Mitch, if you’re sure you don’t mind,” Kathleen put in eagerly.

“I thought you were coming with me and Officer Kincaid,” Frankie protested, feeling somehow betrayed
.

Kathleen shook her head. “Two’s company, three’s a crowd.”

“Great!” Mitch pulled a handkerchief from the breast pocket of his suit coat and swiped it across his forehead. “It’s gotten awfully warm. We could stop at Schwab’s for an ice cream soda, if you’d like.”

“Chocolate, with whipped cream and a cherry on top?” Kathleen asked eagerly, Fibber McGee apparently forgotten. “Heavenly! What girl could resist?”

Mitch reached out a hand to steer Kathleen around a low headstone. “I don’t know, you might be surprised at the girls these days who’d rather drag a fellow all over town. Come on, Kathleen, my car’s over here. See you around, Frances.”

He led the British girl away, leaving Frankie alone to cool her heels while she waited for her ride.

“Sorry to take so long,” the young policeman said, joining her at last. “Some of these folks don’t give up easily. Can you imagine, begging for autographs at a funeral? Sheesh!”

Lost in a waking nightmare in which Mitch and Kathleen sat hip to hip at Schwab’s soda fountain, heads bent together as they sipped a single ice cream soda through two straws, Frankie greeted Kincaid more warmly than the situation warranted.

“Thanks awfully for giving me a ride, Officer,” she said, smiling up at him as she slipped her hand through the crook of his arm.

“I’m off-duty now,” he reminded her. “Why don’t you call me Russ?”

“Russ, then,” she echoed, trying it out. “Would you mind making one tiny stop on the way back? I have an errand to run.”

“I’d be glad to take you anywhere you want to go.” He grinned dopily into the wide brown eyes sparkling up at him. “Just name it.”

Her forehead puckered in concentration as she recalled the writing on the side of the long black car. “Four twenty-two Camden.”

A short time later, the squad car drew up to the curb in front of the Shady Rest Mortuary.

“A
funeral parlor
?” Russ’s eyebrows lowered ominously. “Miss Foster, I warned you—”

“I’ll only be a minute,” Frankie said brightly, hopping out of the car and slamming the door on his protests.

Frankie had never been in a funeral parlor, her grandmother’s body having been laid out in the parlor of the old antebellum home where she’d lived for more than fifty years. Inside, the Shady Rest was sparsely yet carefully furnished to convey an air of churchlike dignity without declaring in favor of any particular religion. The heels of her black patent leather shoes clicked on the polished hardwood floors, sounding unnaturally loud in the stillness.

“Hello?” she called. “Is anyone there?”

A stirring sound emanated from the back room, and a moment later a tall, thin man bustled forward, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. “Good afternoon, young lady.” Frankie found his ingratiating smile somehow at odds with the solemnity of his dark suit and necktie. “How may I help you in your time of bereavement?”

“You can’t. That is, I’m not bereaved.” Frankie took a deep breath and started afresh. “I’m here on behalf of the Arthur Cohen family.” That much was true, so far as it went, although Arthur Cohen’s family would have been surprised to hear it.

“Dear me!” exclaimed the mortician in some chagrin. “Were they unhappy with the arrangements?”

“No, no, the service was lovely,” Frankie assured him hastily. “I’ve just come for Mr. Cohen’s clothes—you know, the things he was wearing when he died.” She only hoped his clothes hadn’t been returned to his wife or, worse, destroyed.

“How very odd.” He rubbed his hands together in a nervous gesture. “Miss Lamont—Mrs. Cohen, that is—indicated that there was no need to return the late Mr. Cohen’s clothing.”

“Maybe she changed her mind,” Frankie suggested, crossing black-gloved fingers behind her back. “She was probably too distraught to know what she wanted, poor thing.”

Even as she said the words, Frankie knew this was laying it on a bit thick. When she’d spoken to Miss Lamont, the “poor thing” had been as cool as the proverbial cucumber.

“I suppose you’re right. As luck would have it, I haven’t yet disposed of the deceased’s clothing. If you’ll wait right here, I’ll fetch it.”

He disappeared through the back door, and returned a few minutes later carrying a bulging canvas sack.

“I’m afraid they haven’t been laundered,” he said apologetically.

“That’s perfect! That is,” Frankie amended quickly, “I’m sure Miss Lamont won’t mind.”

She thanked him as profusely as she dared without arousing suspicion, then carried her prize outside to Russ’s squad car, where the young policeman sat impatiently drumming his thumbs against the steering wheel.

“Jeepers creepers!” he exclaimed. “What are you up to now?”

Frankie tugged open the drawstring and rifled through the sack. At last she located a once-crisp white cotton shirt. She held it up by the shoulder seams, displaying the greenish-brown stains liberally spattered across the front.

“There! Smell that!”

Russ wrinkled his nose in distaste, but obediently sniffed at the stained fabric.

“Well?” Frankie demanded.

“I’d say it was some kind of herbal concoction.”

“Exactly! Arthur Cohen drank some kind of herbal tea for his stomach, and his brother knew it.”

Kincaid gave an exasperated sigh. “So what? My grandmother swears by chamomile and honey. Says it calms her nerves.”

“Is she still living?”

“Yep. She’ll be eighty-three next August.”

“That’s more than poor Arthur Cohen can say.” Seeing Russ was not impressed, she hurried on. “Maurice didn’t even have to be present to knock his brother off; all he had to do was slip something into the canister, and the next time Arthur drank his daily dose—
bang
! He’s—he’s—
achoo
!”

“Gesundheit.”

“Thank you.” Frankie fumbled in her purse for a handkerchief, and dabbed at her nose. “It’s that herbal stuff. It makes me sneeze. But that’s nothing to what it did to poor Arthur Cohen.”

Russ heaved a sigh. “Look, I know you’re a good kid, and your heart’s in the right place. If I take this stuff and have our boys in the lab I.D. it, will you
please
give it a rest?”

Frankie was all smiles. “Oh Russ, would you do that?”

Russ raised a finger in warning. “If I do, will you quit playing detective?”

“But what if it turns out to be poison?”

“If it turns out to be poison—which I doubt—the police will take it from there.”

With this Frankie was forced to be content. Russ dropped her off at the Studio Club, and she entered the common room to find Roxie, clad in a man’s sweat suit of gray jersey, stretched out on the floor doing slimming exercises. The redheaded girl sat up at her entrance.

“Hey, Frankie, where’s Kathleen? You didn’t lose her at the cemetery, did you?”

Frankie shook her head. “She got a better offer. I take it she hasn’t made it back yet?”

“Nope—two—three—four.” She leaned forward to touch her toes. “Haven’t seen hair nor hide of her.”

“How long does it take to drink an ice cream soda, anyway?” Frankie muttered, starting up the stairs.

“What did you say?”

“I said, ‘Do you have any plans for the rest of the day?’ ” Frankie shoved Mitch and Kathleen and their shared soda to the back of her mind. “What to catch a movie? There’s a new Clark Gable picture at Grauman’s.”

Roxie, now on her feet, bent deeply from the waist and looked up at Frankie from between her legs. “Sorry, maybe another time.” She gave Frankie an upside-down grin. “I’m going to a gramophone dance at the YMCA with a dreamboat named Harry.”

“Some girls have all the luck,” Frankie grumbled in mock indignation before scampering up the remaining stairs.

Upstairs, she fitted her key into the lock and opened the door. The room was dark, as she’d expected. She switched on the light and found a little pile of letters on the floor. Someone—probably Roxie—had collected her mail and pushed it underneath the door. Frankie picked it up and thumbed through the correspondence, keeping those addressed to her and tossing Kathleen’s onto the other girl’s bed. Her spirits lifted somewhat at the sight of her mother’s handwriting; sometimes her father tucked a fiver inside. With the fate of
The Virgin Queen
in limbo, she could certainly use the money. She put the letter aside to save for last.