Now You See It: A Toby Peters Mystery by Stuart M. Kaminsky Read Free Book Online Page B

onstage.

Chapter 5
     
             Hand half a pack of playing cards to two people with the cards faced down after you have dealt out two piles. Have each person take a card from his or her deck, look at it, and place it in the other person’s pile. Have each person shuffle the half deck he or she has. Place on pile on top of the other. Look at the cards. Pull out two. Lay them facedown. Have the two people turn over the cards. It will be the two cards they have selected. Put the packs together, shuffle them, and then spread them out to show that it is a regular deck. How it’s done: Take a normal pack of cards. Alternate a red card with a black card. When you deal out the two packs, one will be all black and the other all red. When each person puts the card he or she has chosen into the other pack, there will be one red card in the black pack and one black card in the red. Look through the pack and pick the two cards .
— From the Blackstone, The Magic Detective radio show
     
    A THIRD COP I HADN ’ T SEEN was stationed at the stage door. I knew the routine. No one in, no one out, till the detectives came and said otherwise.
    “I need Gwen Knight’s address fast,” I told Peter Bouton, looking down at the cop at the door and hearing the other two cops going into the dressing room where Phil was waiting with Cunningham’s body.
    The cop at the door was familiar to me. I didn’t remember his name. He had been transferred to the Wilshire District when the Hollywood force had been juggled after a hush-hush about uniforms on the take from bookies that hung around Columbia Pictures studio. He looked up at me. Recognition.
    “Downstairs,” said Bouton.
    I followed him down the wobbling metal steps and into a small office lined with rusting file cabinets surrounding a small banged-up wooden desk.
    “I leave my stuff in my briefcase whenever we …” Pete began as he shuffled through a pile of papers reaching behind the desk. “Here.”
    He pulled a battered briefcase from behind the small desk and opened it. He found the sheet he was looking for.
    “Not what I thought,” he said. “The other girls are staying at the Arlington Arms. Gwen is staying with someone … her sister … on Beverly, the Bluedorn Apartments.”
    He found a pencil and a small pad of paper and wrote the sister’s name, address, and phone number on it. He handed it to me. I glanced at it, pocketed the sheet and said, “Thanks.”
    I left the small office, ignoring the eyes of the cop at the door, and headed for the stage. Blackstone was pointing a wand at some black enamel boxes. The buzz saw trick was over. I could only see the sides. I moved behind the curtains and down the stairs into the audience. People were looking at me. I glanced back. Blackstone saw me and said with a wave of his hand, “Ladies and gentleman. The man who was cut in half by the buzz saw.”
    The audience applauded. I bowed as I went up the aisle.
    “Uncle Toby,” Nate called out.
    I waved at my nephews, grinned at the audience, hurried through the doors and into the lobby. No cops on guard. I almost bumped into Calvin Ott, who was entering the theater. He was dark-blue suited and grinning.
    “Mr. Peters,” he said. “How is the show?”
    “You missed the best part,” I said.
    He looked at my uniform and shook his head.
    “Welcome to show business,” he said.
    He moved around me and went inside. I wondered what the hell he was doing there, but I didn’t have time to ask. I went around the corner to my car and squeezed in.
    Changing out of the Chocolate Soldier costume would have been nice, but I didn’t have the time. I made it to the address on Beverly in eleven minutes. It was an apartment building, The Blue-dorn, six stories, white brick, nice bushes and front lawn, slightly on the classy side, which meant there was a doorman.
    He was lean, blue uniformed, no cap, thin white hair brushed against his scalp to the right.
    “I’m here to see Gwen