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  Jacob Troy was an old man who had it all; a movie-star wife, a vast and thriving business empire—even a castle he’d bought in Germany and had transplanted brick-by-brick onto some of Hollywood’s primest real estate. But he wanted more. That’s why he had hired mobster Danny Hester to put the squeeze on nightclub owner Paul Huntsman.

  Huntsman hired Larry Kent to find a connection between Troy and Hester that would stand up in a court of law. If he could expose Troy, then he could ruin him.

  Almost before Larry took the case, however, things moved fast. A case of kidnap, a sadistic beating, a neat little frame-up and a grisly murder, just for starters.

  What should have been a straightforward assignment soon found Larry Kent fighting for his life.

  LARRY KENT :CRY TWICE, KITTEN!

  No. 539

  First Published by The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd

  Copyright © Piccadilly Publishing

  First Digital Edition: July 2019

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Series Editor: David Whitehead

  Text © Piccadilly Publishing

  Published by Arrangement with The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd.

  Chapter 1 ... how many dames make five? ...

  “Take a look,” said Callendar.

  The big black Cadillac had pulled up smoothly on the clear space outside the Copacabana. There was the usual crowd gathered on the sidewalk to see the celebrities arrive; tourists mainly from out of State, and Hollywood residents just stopped by to take a look, and guys like myself, over in the Sunshine State because a guy must live.

  A flunkey held open the door of the Cadillac and a dame stepped out.

  I heard a little gasp of admiration from a couple of tourist dames in front of me.

  “Genevieve Troy,” said Vincent Callendar. “The girl who didn’t need a press-agent to marry a millionaire.”

  She took a few steps away from the car, stopped and half-turned waiting.

  “That’s him,” said Callendar.

  A little, old, wizened-up guy like a tired monkey had clambered out the car, shaken off the hand the flunkey offered him and tottered after the gorgeous blonde who had preceded him. She was dressed in an ivory gown that fitted her like a sheath. Her golden blonde head was poised on a long, graceful neck and I saw, in the light pouring from the Copacabana entrance, the flash and glitter of diamonds, in her hair, at her throat, her ears, on her hands as she unpeeled long gloves. She seemed to be smiling and talking animatedly as the two of them made their way slowly to the doors. She seemed unaware of the small crowd that was watching her so intently, and so was he. He had his hand on her arm, and she towered over him like one of those statuesque amazons with a captive male in tow.

  The crowd gave no demonstration. In fact, they were strangely silent as the two headed up the shallow steps. I guess it was just another entertainment to them—something to look at, like a flea-circus or a two-headed guy at a tennis match.

  “Well?” said Callendar.

  “Well what?”

  “What did you think of her?”

  I shrugged, lit a cigarette.

  The crowd was dispersing. The doorman at the Copacabana had re-emerged, having piloted the couple inside. Another car pulled up, spilling out a couple of once-famous film stars. But the onlookers had lost interest.

  We walked to the corner and Callendar tried vainly to flag down a cab.

  I said, “How old is he?”

  “Older than most of the mortgages around Beverly Hills.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Why not just let him die? Then your client can move in on Jacob Troy’s estate.”

  He gave me a fleeting smile. “I see you brought your Yankee sense of humor with you, Larry.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I also brought a man-size thirst.”

  “I’ll do my best to help you over that one.” He dived away from me as a taxi slowed a dozen yards away. He managed to grab it and as he got in, said, “Having seen the lady, maybe you’ve got some idea now what Huntsman is up against.”

  “I wouldn’t have any idea,” I told him. I dragged at my cigarette. “For my money, Hollywood’s got more luscious blondes to the square acre than any other place on earth. So what does Genevieve Troy have?”

  “She’s got Jacob,” replied Callendar tersely, and lapsed into a moody silence.

  Vincent Callendar was a good lawyer. He was also a good guy who had made one big mistake in his life—he had gone over to California to practice law. Which meant he had suntan even on his ulcers.

  He had called me long-distance and offered me a thousand dollars to help out a client, Paul Huntsman, who was in plenty trouble. Seems this Huntsman was a realtor with a big stake on the West Coast. At least he did have until the fabulous Jacob Troy moved in on him. Among other interests, Huntsman had the Santa Rosa Estate which he had converted into a plush roadhouse on the highway between Los Angeles and Santa Barbara. Guys like Huntsman get the urge now and then to give their dough a fancy cellophane wrap with tinsel and glitter to make it even better. Huntsman had put plenty dough into that roadhouse, but it was just too bad that Troy, with his usual methods of undercover finance manipulation, secretly bought out a weak member of Huntsman’s syndicate and proceeded to eat into Huntsman’s domain. Huntsman got wise to this too late—Troy was not the kind of guy you gave a head-start when you wanted to beat him in anything from a game of pinochle up.

  And right then, in the middle of the fight between one financial big shot—Huntsman and Troy—a guy so big he had a grade all to himself—things got tough out at the Santa Rosa Roadhouse, and rumors of racketeering crept in.

  That was when Huntsman’s lawyer, Vincent Callendar, started to sweat nights. He figured that the way things were going Huntsman would wind up not only with a kitty sadly depleted but a bad name as well. He figured it was time he called in some guy who could do some undercover work with regard to Troy’s connection with one, Danny Hester.

  It looked like I was the guy.

  This Danny Hester. His was a new name to me. Callendar had already told me Hester was regarded as a coming man, the youthful czar of a dozen flourishing rackets along the West Coast—including that of taking over control of the liquor supply to Huntsman’s Santa Rosa club and a big percentage of the take from Huntsman’s gaming tables.

  “He could be on Jacob Troy’s payroll,” Callendar told me. “But I doubt it. Whenever Troy wants to employ undercover men, he picks on unknown guys. Big as he is he can’t afford to have his name linked with anything downright shady.”

  I looked at him. “Are you kidding?”

  “I never kid,” said Callendar, “about guys who have as much power as Jacob Troy.”

  The bar had been designed to represent a Spanish galleon, with one wall painted like a brown sail and another bearing a mural depicting a lot of guys pulling oars like they weren’t enjoying their work. The waiters were tricked out in costumes supposed to be those worn by Spanish sailors at the time galleons were around. They were plenty hot and uncomfortable.

  I said, “How crazy can you get?”

  Callendar shrugged. “This is Hollywood.”

  We sat on stools at the bar. The bartender looked normal enough except that he was wearing a tasseled cap with a skull and crossbones painted on the front.

  “Scotch on the rocks,” I told him.

  Callendar had a martini.

  When the bartender told me what the score was I nodded and said, “You’re sure wearing the right hat, buddy.”

  He scowled at me and went his way.

  We sipped our drinks.

  Callendar said, “I’ll have you talk with Huntsman tomorrow.”

  “Make it tonight,” I told him. “I don’t want to advertise my contacts in daylight. Say, how long has the blonde been Mrs. Troy?”

  “About six months.”

  “What cradle did he snatch her out of?”

  “She was in movies,” said Callendar, a smooth dark guy who was getting too fat for his own good. He wore a look of worry on his pan like it belonged there. “Genevieve never quite made the big time, but with her stunning looks and that figure, she didn’t lack for work. The story is she came to the coast after working as a model in some mid-western town.” He shrugged. “What the hell. This is one place on the globe where it’s almost impossible to find out where a dame started and how. You know how it is?” He bought more drinks. “The story is that Genevieve made a play for old Troy at some Convention. Sounds unlikely, because Troy’s not the kind of guy goes to Conventions. However—she must have met him some place and there can be no doubt that she made a play for him, whatever the circumstances. So, in the words of the old song, they got married.”

  “Any folks?”

  “Brother,” said Callendar, “that guy must be eighty.”

  “I mean does Troy have any family?”

  “Oh sure, there’s quite a bunch of kin in the background. But Troy won’t have anything to do with them. With all the dough he’s got they stick around. Hi s brother’s Willard Troy, who made a lot of money twenty years back, supplying bum electric light tubes to movie studies—or some such. Whatever it was, he went broke the way he always has done. He lives out at Beverly Hills and I guess he just makes it—on his wits.”

  I was half-turned on my stool watching the guys and dames making to and fro.

  “Brother Willard never married, but Jacob Troy’s sister did. That’s Mildred Delamore, who was married to A. K. Delamore.” He paused expectantly.

  I said, “So what?”

  “I thought you wanted to know,” he said in a pained voice. He took a sip of his drink then pulled a wry face. “One of these days I’m going to lay off this stuff. You know something, Larry, a guy’s nuts to drink in this climate.”

  “Too tropical?” I hazarded.

  He said, “You ought to remember A. K. Delamore. He was the guy floated a couple of the biggest movie productions ever—an independent. However, he started fooling around with real estate and that’s when he ran into trouble.” He took another sip. “One thing Jacob Troy doesn’t like and that is guys moving in on his territories. He proceeded to make mincemeat out of his brother-in-law, A. K. Delamore. Delamore wound up running his car over a cliff at Lucinda Beach.”

  “Nice family.”

  “Yeah,” said Callendar. “They don’t come any ruggeder. Mildred’s quite a dame. I met her two, three times. One of these tall, hard old bats, with a face like a rock and a heart dug out the same quarry. Her daughter’s Angel Delamore.”

  I looked at him.

  “Say,” he complained. “You’re way down on local history.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I never did get round to reading those movie handouts. I take it she’s something in Hollywood?”

  “Sure is,” said Callendar with satisfaction. “Angel’s a dish, a little peacherino! She’s also an awfully bum actress, but I guess she’ll get there just the same. Mildred has a son, too, the well-known Rod. He’s a lush.” He stopped talking and I saw a wary look close in on his pan.

  I waited.

  He went on, “You don’t have to talk of the devil around here—it’s always happening.” He swung back to face the bar and murmured, “The Mouse just came in.”

  I saw a small, slender dame with orange-colored hair standing just inside the door. She was looking around expectantly.

  I said, “One of these dyed mouses?”

  “Her name’s Dodo King,” said Callendar staring at the drink in his hand. “She also happens to be Rod Delamore’s doll.”

  “Does she act in movies, too?”

  “She doesn’t have to,” said Callendar. “She was married once to a guy back in Pennsylvania and she peeled off a quarter-million in settlement when they divorced.”

  “Why, hello, Vincent,” said a high clear voice right behind us.

  We turned and there was the Mouse. She was smiling. “You guys gonna buy me a drink, or do I die of thirst right here in the middle of the desert?”

  The Mouse was perched on the stool between us. She smiled at me.

  Then she said to Callendar, “Who’s the big, handsome boyfriend, Vincent?”

  Callendar introduced us. Then he said, “If you’ll excuse me just a moment I’ll go and make a phone call.”

  I looked at him.

  He said deliberately, “I better fix that appointment for you tonight, Larry.”

  “Sure,” I said. “You’re excused.”

  He went away.

  The Mouse ordered a gin and Indian tonic. I’d noticed that she was small; her eyes were big and baby-blue. She had a wide mouth and dimples. She had a trick of leaving her mouth open a little when she’d finished saying something, and resting the tip of her tongue on her lower lip, like she was all set to say something else, but couldn’t quite make it.

  I said, “Why the hair?”

  “You like it?”

  I shrugged. “It’s different.”

  “That’s the main thing,” said the Mouse. “In this world, Mr. Larry Kent, you’ve just got to be different or you’re dead.”

  I drank some more of my Scotch.

  She wriggled a little closer to me. In a confiding whisper she said, “I hate having my hair this color really, but I guess my hairdresser talked me into it. You see, last month I was brunette but I was awful tired of that. It had always been sort of murky blonde before that, and when I went dark I used to scare myself every time I looked in the mirror.”

  I said, “How about now? Have you quit looking in mirrors?”

  She laughed, staring at me. Then she said, “Cute.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Have yourself another drink.”

  “Oh, no, I want to keep stone-cold sober—for Rod.”

  “Uh-huh?”

  “He’s my boyfriend, and he should be here, but of course he isn’t. He never is. Not when I want him. You know Rod Delamore?”

  I shook my head, took out cigarettes.

  She took one from my pack and I lighted it and then my own.

  “Rod’s sweet, a doll really, but he just doesn’t know when to stop once he starts with that liquor.”

  “Tough.”

  “Specially for me,” sighed the Mouse. Then her face brightened. “Maybe he’s just caught in some crap-game some place.”

  “Sure,” I said. “There’s always a sunny side.”

  She looked at me. “Are you one of these wise guys?”

  “No,” I told her, “I’m just over here for my health.”

  She had some of her drink. The hard light shone on her orange hair.

  I said, “You been around Hollywood long?”

  “Too long, I sometimes think. This place is dead after New York.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “If it wasn’t for Rod I guess I’d go someplace else, but—” She sighed again. “I think I might marry him, settle down and have a family.” She shot me a sidelong glance. “How’m I doing, Larry?”

  “Great,” I told her. “You sure know the dialogue.”

  She laughed, showing a pink tongue. “You know, if Rod should come in he’d probably get jealous as hell.”

  “Too bad.”

  “But I guess it might do him good to get jealous once in a while. He sort of takes me for granted.” For the first time a genuinely pensive look came into her eyes. Then she glanced down at her hands and said, “He’s a heel, but he’s all I’ve got.”

  I said to the bartender, “Another Scotch and another poisoned tonic-water.”

  We were halfway through it when a hand suddenly fell on my shoulder, all but thrusting me off the stool.

  “Excuse me,” said a voice thickly. “You’re crowding my girl.”

  I looked up. He was big, he could have been well muscled only he didn’t have any muscles any more. His face, his whole body, seemed to have spilled over as if the liquor had made him run over at the sides. He was young, but there were bags under his eyes like portmanteaus and his mouth was blubbery.

  The Mouse was on her feet. She said, “Rod! What’s the big idea coming in, pushing people around?”

  “I’m pushing nobody,” said Delamore. He looked at me. He added belligerently, “Am I punk?”

  I said nothing.

  The Mouse twittered. “You know you shouldn’t do things like that. You don’t know your own strength, Rod Delamore.”

  He snickered, then he stooped and kissed her on the bare shoulder. “Missed me, honey?”

  “Please Rod—”

  “Look, I’m sorry I’m late. I got kinda held up. I’ve got a table round at Delmonico’s. We can go round right away and have ourselves some supper.”

  “Well, I don’t know—”

  “I do,” said Delamore. “Say, is that your purse?” He reached out to the bar, but his hand didn’t make it. I had his wrist clamped in my right hand.

  He turned his head slowly and his mouth was a little open in surprise. He said thickly, “What you think you’re doing, buddy? Committing suicide?”

  I got off the stool, still holding his wrist. I said, “You don’t know your own strength.” I pulled him close to me, so the other customers wouldn’t see me hit him. I hit him. It was a short one right into the belly.

  He folded.

  I pushed him away and he fell on his backside and then his head. He thumped on the tiled floor.

  The Mouse gave a little scream, then quickly covered her mouth with her hand.

 

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