Chapter VI (1)

    When I was a kid on the Rock, one of my friends turned racketeer and went into the bicycle-stealing business. He put the heist on six bikes which he hid in the Indian Caves in Isham Park where the Hessian deserters holed up during the Revolutionary War. We used to dig for musket balls and flint arrow heads up there, just a few blocks from the spot where they found a dead-type dinosaur.
    Anyway, my thief friend was too dumb or too honest to sell the bikes, and the first time he tried to ride one around our neighborhood he got caught with the stolen goods. He made his getaway and hid in the caves until dark. Then he sneaked out to make amends and return the rest of the loot to the rightful owners. This was up at the north end of The Rock where there were still private homes. Nobody could sleep that night for the crash of stolen bikes being thrown over fences into backyards.
    Likewise, for the next few days nobody in the business could sleep for the crash of Lennox switching from the Bad Guys to the Good Guys. He had a formidable list of antagonists to pacify. He had his Poison Pen Test to spring without creating any additional hostility. Lennox made an exuberant try. If he was villainous at times, as Cooper suggested, he could be heroic when he tried to combat his own villainy. Here are the highlights of his fight.
    He phoned Rox Records, the offices of Suidi, Le Jazz Hot, prepared to do battle with the aid of a French dictionary. He was saved by a Bronx speaking secretary.
    "I think we ought to promote Sam Cooper's hit," Lennox explained. "My idea is a professional party for Sam. A big name party on Wednesday or Thursday. You invite your big wheels. I'll invite ours. I've got a gimmick in mind that might be a natural for publicity. Say you're celebrating the history of song hits ... starting with someone as far back as Handy and bringing it down to Cooper. If you could get enough names there it ought to be worth a double-truck in any magazine."
    Rox Records admitted that it certainly ought.
    "I want to finance this myself, but don't let Sam know."
    They kicked it around enthusiastically and agreed that Lennox would be permitted to finance a cocktail party for Cooper at the studios of Rox Records on West 50th Street Thursday next.
    Lennox hired a network photographer and took him up to Mason's apartment on the west side, which is the unfashionable side of The Rock.
    The apartment was in a building that had never had a celebrated tenant from the entertainment business. As a result, the staff was stage-struck and dying to get into the act. The doorman cultivated a Low Dutch dialect. His eager expression informed Lennox that he was ready for Discovery. The elevator man had worked up a comedy monologue in Irish, Cockney and Chinese. He also was ready. At the top floor, Lennox rang Mason's doorbell, opened the door and entered with the photographer. The apartment was never locked.
    They came into a bare foyer, the size of a boxing ring. It was ankle deep in wall-to-wall blue carpeting. Lennox called: "Mig? It's Jake Lennox." No answer. They went through an archway into a bare living room the size of a tennis court. It was naked except for wall-to-wall grey carpeting. "Mig!" Lennox called again. No answer. They peeked into the dining room and two of the bedrooms, all empty and bare except for wall-to-wall carpeting.
    "Must be out buying furniture," the photographer said.
    Lennox shouted again, then listened. He heard the faint sound of music. They followed it and found Mason in the study. It was the size of a study with wall-to-wall green carpeting. It was empty except for a giant TV set with a thirty inch screen in the corner. A silver plate on it proclaimed that it was the gift of the network to their well-beloved Mig Mason & Diggy Dixon. Before the set was a bridge table at which Mason and his wife were seated, silently eating canned hamburgers and watching the screen.
    Mason glanced up. "The Thinker," he said morosely and turned back to the screen.
    "The Thinker," Irma said.
    "Bon appetit. French for it smells good," Lennox answered cheerfully. "Mig, I haven't had a chance to congratulate you. You were great Christmas night. Sensational. It was a great show. Sensational. Your timing was great. Your gags were sensational. It's great working with you, Mig. You make any writer look sensational."
    "Thanks, Jake." Mason looked modest.
    "Thanks," Irma said,
    "Was it St. Nicholas?" Mason asked abruptly.
    "Of course it was St. Nicholas."
    "Then I was right. It was that phone girl that loused me."
    "Of course you were right."
    "Why didn't you say so?" Mason demanded. "You're all trying to louse me."
    "Did I say you were wrong?"
    "You didn't say I was right."
    "Because I work for Grabinett. Have a heart, Mig. You're a great star. You can tell anybody off. But I haven't got your sensational talent. I have to work for a living. Be kind to the hired help."
    The scowl disappeared from Mason's face. It also disappeared from Irma's face.
    "I've brought a photographer for some pictures," Lennox continued briskly. "We're nominating you for Comedian of The Year, and by God you're going to be elected."
    Mason brightened.
    "Not in those clothes," Irma said. "He's got to get dressed up."
    "Never mind the clothes," Mason complained. "What about the background? There's no furniture in the house."
    "There's no furniture in the house," Irma told Lennox. A moment later she added: "It's all being custom built."
    "To hell with the furniture," Lennox said. "We don't want formal pictures. We want behind the scenes shots. What makes a talent great. Mig in his workshop with the dummy. How he builds Diggy.... How he paints him.... The tricks he invented.... All that sensational stuff you showed me, Mig."
    "Great! Sensational!" Mason leaped up, delighted. He was prouder of his mechanical ability than anything else. He led the way into another enormous room, carpeted from wall to wall, containing a long carpenter's bench cluttered with tools. Various portions of Diggy Dixon were scattered on the bench; heads, legs, arms, bodies, eyes. An open closet was hung with the dummy's wardrobe. Mason's three gag writers were seated on camp chairs in a tight circle bitching their competitors.
    Lennox greeted them perfunctorily. He had long ago given up all attempts to communicate with them. Gag writers are alien creatures and even a casual "Hello" can lead to complications. Their entire lives boil down to a single-minded search for jokes and it's impossible to conduct a coherent conversation with them. In thirty-nine weeks Lennox had never been introduced to the gagmen by Mason, and although he finally discovered their names, he still identified them as the Sourball, the Post-Nasal Drip and the Monk. Incidentally, it was the Sourball who later turned spy.
    "Got a sweetheart of a gag, Mig baby," the Monk beamed.
    "It stinks," Sourball snapped.
    "Try it on him, just for size." The Drip began snuffling in anticipation: "Hnkhhh...."
    "It's a sweetheart, baby. Diggy says to you: 'How's your wife, Mig?'"
    "I'll have you know my wife's an angel," Sourball snapped.
    "You're lucky! Hnkhhh.... My wife's still living."
    Mason looked at them nervously. The truth was, he didn't know a good gag from a bad one, and was always apprehensive.
    "I'm afraid of it, fellas," he said. "Diggy's a wholesome American boy. He wouldn't make fun of marriage."
    He dragged the photographer to the bench. There he demonstrated the inner workings of his genius ... the dummy's weighted eyes, the carefully fitted mouth and jaw, the regular body with right-hand controls for the head, and an extra body with left-hand controls; for dummies, like baseball gloves, must be fitted to the hand. Mason would have been in great difficulties last September, he explained, when he had rheumatism in his working hand, if he hadn't had a left-hand dummy to switch to.
    "Not rheumatism. Neuritis." Sourball said.
    "Wait a minute. Room. Attic. Hnkhhh.... Diggy's a poet working in an attic. Mig's the landlord. He asks Diggy where he could work better, in a room or attic, and Diggy says: 'That's why I'm bent over my desk. Rheumatics.'"
    "Switch it to neuritis," Sourball snapped. "Diggy's an editor. Mig's the poet. Mig's sore because Diggy says his poem is old fashioned."
    "Right. Right. Hnkhhh.... Mig says: 'Which is better, the old writers or the new writers?'"
    "That's it, sweetheart." The Monk took up the running. "So Diggy answers: My brother's got that."
    "Got what?"
    "Hnkhhh.... Neuritis!"
    They beamed at their employer.
    "I don't know, fellas," Mason said dubiously. "Diggy's a wholesome American boy. He wouldn't make fun of disease."
    Lennox ignored all this and concentrated on the photography business. There is nothing so sunny as the twinkle of flash bulbs, and by the time the photographer departed, Mason was suffering from 3rd degree burns and smiling happily. Lennox felt the time was right for the attack. He asked for a private conference and Mason sent his writers into the study. Then he began tinkering with a new head on the bench and told Lennox to go ahead. Lennox took the photostats out of his pocket. "Hit him hard," he thought. "Knock him off balance."
    "Read these letters," he said in an ominous voice.
    Mason took the photostats and read them one by one. Lennox watched him intently, searching for a give-away expression, a gesture, a sign. Mason handed the photostats back indifferently and picked up the dummy head.
    "Crazy," he said. "They write like that in subway johns. What do you think, Jake? Does Diggy's new face look wholesome?"
    "Mig! Don't you understand? These are threatening letters. I think they're written to you. You're in danger."
    "Me?" Mason was fascinated. "Me? I never...." He put the dummy down and stared at Lennox.
    "Yes, you. Did you read that last one? There's going to be dynamite Sunday. I'm here to help you. I want to do all I can. Who's writing them to you, Mig? Do you know?"
    "Sure they're to me. Sure. I should of realized." Mason nodded with growing conviction. "Stars always get anonymous letters. Like presidents." He began to get excited. "It hits the fan on the Sunday show, huh? This is sensational, Jake. Can we have a couple of reporters there?"
    "Reporters!"
    "Wait a minute. Wait a minute." Mason grabbed the photostats and ran through them again. "I just thought of something. Yeah. Here. You better not let the reporters see this one, Jake. Number three."
    "Don't let the reporters see...." Lennox echoed faintly.
    "Uh-huh. Keep it back. They'll know I'm not getting the letters if they see this one, but I ought to be getting them. That Spanish faker was getting blackmailed every night when he worked The Chert Room and I got twice his billing."
    "You're not getting the letters?"
    "Sure I'm getting the letters. Except Number three. Here's the line. 'You east-side so-and-so.' See? This one can't be to me. I live on the west side. But the reporters don't have to know. Hold that one out on them." Mason clapped Lennox on the shoulder appreciatively. "If I ever made a crack about you thinking, Jake, it was only for laughs. You got a head on you I admire. We'll get a spread out of this if we get any action Sunday. I tell you what. Let's be smart. Hire a guy. I bet you thought of that already, huh, Thinker?"
    "Hire a guy? For what?"
    "In case this one don't show up. Write a little script for him and we'll have him stand by in the house. If we don't get any action by the final comedy spot you can cue him in and he'll give us a production." Mason began to laugh. "I just thought of a great ad lib for Diggy when this guy starts the fuss. Diggy says—"
    "Mig! For God's sake! This is serious. The letters are legitimate. The threat's legitimate too. Don't you understand?"
    "Great, Sensational. Then we won't have to use the stand-in. But have him there anyway. Jake, I love ya!"
    Lennox made his escape. He was thunderstruck by Mason's reaction, then indignant, finally amused.
    "One down. Five to go," he muttered and continued the campaign.
    He phoned Tooky Ween and made peace.
    "Tooky? Jake Lennox. I've got a promotion in mind for your property that I'd like to discuss."
    "Which property?" Ween rumbled in a hostile voice.
    "Far as I'm concerned you've only got one hot property. The great man. Mig."
    "What's the promotion, Lennox?" Ween asked, a little more affably.
    "Sam Cooper's got a hit tune just breaking. That duet he wrote for Mig and the dummy."
    "What duet?"
    "'We're The Most.'"
    "That's a hit?"
    "On the way. Here's my idea. Mason & Dixon brought the tune out. How about using their picture on the sheet music? Might be a nice promotion."
    "That ain't bad, Jake. Ain't a sour note in the whole notion." Ween was back to first names again and definitely friendly.
    "It's only a suggestion. I've got nothing to do with it, but I can ask Sam for you."
    "Thanks, Jake. It could do Cooper a lot of good. My boy could double his sales. So 'We're The Most' is socko, huh? Who's handling Cooper?"
    "Nobody."
    "A boy like that needs handling, Jake."
    Lennox laughed. "That's between you and Cooper. They're giving him a promotion party at Rox Studios Thursday. Come on over. There'll be names and photographers, so bring your properties too. You can talk it up with Sam between flashes."
    Kay Hill received him in her east side Early American apartment, conducted him through a Colonial hall to a Federal parlor where she seated him on a Duncan Phyfe couch. Her dark green dressing gown clashed with the background, but set off her acid eyes and acid red hair.
    "Men," she spat in her strange clipped accent. "Bloody lice! They only come when they're hungry. What are you after, Lennox?"
    "Trouble," Lennox said.
    "We'll pickle it first. What's your brew?" Before he could answer she made a couple of drinks, handed him one and finished hers.
    "When was the last time you were here, Lennox?"
    "This is the first."
    "They keep passing through. I lose count." She opened a window, then closed the drapes with a savage flick. She blew dust off pewter tankards and opened and slammed drawers. "I've been asked for plenty in my life but they never called it trouble." She shuffled a deck of cards once. "They've had it but never asked for it."
    "I'm not asking, Kay."
    "No? You're here, aren't you?" She cupped his chin in her hand, smiled contemptuously, then slapped him. "We'll pickle it."
    She went to the bar. "Christ, it's bloody hot. D'you want ice?"
    "No thanks."
    "There isn't any anyway." She pulled irritably at the dressing gown until it opened, displaying a black bra and black panties. She fretted around the room, the green gown trailing behind her.
    "Are you English?" Lennox asked.
    "Are you starting something?"
    "I want to know."
    "I'm English. Now you know."
    "The dialect bothers me."
    "Not dialect, Lennox." Her speech became more clipped and more English. "It's called an accent, darling. I have most unfortunately acquired a dreadful American accent. Mummy and Daddy will be terribly amused when I come home from the States." She dropped the English. "We'll pickle it."
    She made another pair of drinks.
    "Jesus, Kay!" Lennox protested. She finished both, came to him and sat on his lap. Lennox was startled when he noticed her eyes were terrified. She was desperate.
    "Make a pass, Lennox," she said.
    "Are you putting me on?"
    "No. You're putting me off."
    She got up. Lennox caught her wrist and pulled her down alongside him.
    "Do you know why I'm here?" he asked.
    "I don't give a bloody bug why you're here."
    "What's eating you out?"
    "You don't give a bloody bug what's eating me out. We'll pickle it."
    "Not now, we won't. There's something else first."
    "I've changed my mind."
    "I haven't." Lennox drew out the photostats and handed them to her. "Read these."
    "What?"
    "Read them."
    She began to shriek with laughter. "Read these, he says." She rocked around the room, neighing hysterically. Lennox went after her, took her by the shoulders and slammed her into a chair.
    "You're petrified," he growled, "and I think I know why. Read those letters, damn you, and we'll find out."
    She wiped her eyes with the hem of the dressing gown and read the photostats. Lennox watched her closely. Her face reflected every word she was reading. Her body reflected her face. She was savage, sick, vicious, threatening. For the length of all six letters she was the writer of those letters. She was completely identified. When she came to the end she looked at Lennox.
    "Who's writing them, Kay?"
    "How should I know?"
    "They're to you, aren't they?"
    "No."
    "Don't lie, damn you. You're halfway into a strait jacket and this is what's doing it to you."
    She smiled wearily. "Clever Jordan Lennox. Mummy's favorite bright boy." She got up and kissed his brow chastely. "We'll pickle it."
    Lennox followed her to the bar. "They're written to you, Kay. I came up here to help you out, but you've got to level with me. Who's writing them? Who's threatening you?"
    "I told you. I don't know."
    "This isn't anything to fool with, Kay. It's loaded with dynamite and it's set to go off Sunday."
    "What the hell do I care what happens Sunday," she blazed. "The whole damned show can bloody off Sunday. Give me the damned letters." She snatched the photostats from him. "They're not to me. Look at this line in Number four. 'You black-headed lying etcetera.' Is that me?" She jabbed at her red hair angrily. "That's red. It's always been red. If you don't believe me I can show you the convincer. Go look for somebody else, Lennox."
    Lennox examined the line silently, then put the photostats away. When he looked at Kay again, she was smiling crookedly, her eyes still terrified.
    "What d'you say, Lennox?"
    "On my way."
    "I've changed my mind again."
    "No you haven't."
    "One for the road?"
    "No thanks."
    "Christ, you're a bloody Square, Lennox."
    "I guess everybody is, one way or another."
    "Mummy's favorite model boy. That's the way out." She waved her arm indifferently. "My love to your model roommate, Sam Stacy."
    "Stacy! Is that it, Kay? Oliver Stacy?" Lennox stepped to her and took her shoulders. "Is he what's eating you out?"
    "It was a slip. I meant Cooper. Sam Cooper, of course. I always get his name mixed up with Oliver's. Let go of me, Lennox. Damn you, let go of me."
    "Is it Stacy?"
    "To hell with Stacy. It was a slip, I tell you. Slip of the tongue...." She began to shake and clung to him. "My God, Lennox. My God! I haven't seen him in two weeks, outside rehearsal. 'Good morning. Good night. Take it from the top. Cue, please. Take your cross after I say the line. Oh Jesus, Lennox, what's he doing to me?"
    "Running up a score, Kay. Face it."
    "You son of a bitch!" Kay wrenched herself out of his arms. "You're gloating too, aren't you? All of you. Counting up your scores. Get lost, Lennox. Get lost fast!"
    Lennox got lost fast. Down on the street he murmured: "But she's the one who's lost. Lost in the tunnels. At least I gave her a half hour's entertainment. Balance! Two down and four to go."