The Monet Murders by Terry Mort Read Free Book Online Page A

interested. Don’t worry. I won’t say anything.”
    That seemed unlikely. I’d heard he was famous for taking notes during a conversation—a habit that irritated almost everyone he met. But I figured I owed him something, and besides the gin had made me a little incautious—that, plus I was still miffed about the studio’s moving Myrtle out; so I gave him the broad outlines of the Manny Stairs story, mentioning no names. I suppose he could put two and two together if he wanted to. Truth to tell, I didn’t care.
    â€œInteresting,” he said, when I finished. “The woman was an exact double. Yes. Very interesting.”
    â€œI’d appreciate it if you didn’t do a treatment on it and shop it around.”
    â€œNo, no. Of course not. But it might make a good basis for a novel some day.”
    Well, that was all right. Novels take a while to write and by the time he finished, if he ever did, I’d most likely be on to something new.

    Catherine Moore had been a secretary in an insurance office in Santa Monica. Manny Stairs had given me the address, and even though his studio cops had checked the place and turned up nothing, I figured it was at least worth double-checking. The office was in a five-story commercial building on Santa Monica Boulevard, not far from the pier. The exterior of the building had a crack running up the side from the first floorto the second, maybe the result of the last earthquake. Based on that, I didn’t like taking the elevator, but I did anyway, to the third floor.
    The elevator operator was an ancient character with a nasty squint. He wore a shiny maroon uniform topped off with a bellman’s cap. The brass buttons had lost their shine back during the Spanish-American War. He smelled strongly of cigars and misanthropy. Well, I couldn’t blame him much; what kind of life would it be, spending all day in that windowless cell, going nowhere but up and down—a metaphor that even the meanest intelligence would appreciate? I mean, when you think about it, you have to wonder how some people, most people, probably, manage to make it through the day. Who was it that said most people live lives of quiet desperation? Thoreau? Yes. Well, he had it right. And wouldn’t my old English teacher, Granny Graves, be proud of me. Truth is, though, I didn’t care much for Thoreau. I like a little style with my philosophy.
    I got off on the third floor after giving the elevator operator a quarter. The office was halfway down the hall. The door was one of those half-wood, half-frosted-glass standard office doors. The letters on the frosted glass said HARVEY MILES, LIFE INSURANCE AGENT TO THE STARS . That was not surprising. Everyone was something to the stars in this town—wiener maker to the stars, trash collector to the stars, periodontist, undertaker, toupee maker, you name it. Even my card said that Bruno Feldspar was private detective to the stars. They have a similar thing in England where every purveyor of anything wants to get a royal warrant. “By appointment to His Royal Highness, chamber-pot maker.” Well, the stars in Hollywood are this country’s royalty—everyone knows that,and in my view they’re lots more useful; they entertain and they can’t start wars, two things that put them ahead of any king and his family.
    Of course, most of the stars are preening dimwits and worse, but that just makes them less dangerous. Just think what might happen if they got involved in politics. I remembered Manny’s comment about most of them being Reds, but I put that down to fashion and the herd instinct, which I guess are essentially the same thing. They were all for the masses because they didn’t have to associate with them.
    The receptionist looked up and smiled when I walked in, which you would think should be standard procedure, but I’ve walked into plenty of offices where they don’t pay any