Contents

  COPYRIGHT INFORMATION 2

  CHAPTER ONE 3

  CHAPTER TWO 14

  CHAPTER THREE 25

  CHAPTER FOUR 36

  COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

  “Pay Up Or Die” was originally published in Black Mask Detective, May 1951. Copyright © 1951, renewed 1979 by the Estate of Richard Deming. All rights reserved.

  Published by Wildside Press LLC

  wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

  CHAPTER ONE

  I am not so accustomed to glamorous stage stars sending me tête-à-tête invitations that I can afford to be blasé about it. But there were two reasons I failed to generate a glow of happiness when Marty Shaefer appeared at my apartment and informed me in a conspiratorial tone that Lydia Montgomery, star of “Miss Pigtails,” which opened at the State Theater that evening, wanted to see me alone in her dressing room after the show.

  In the first place Marty was the great lady’s press agent, which left me reasonably sure whatever she wanted was Marty’s idea, and had to do with getting Lydia’s name in the papers.

  In the second place Fausta Moreni was a witness to Marty’s conspiratorial tone, being my guest for after-dinner drinks at the time. Though Fausta is beautiful to look at and has a disposition ordinarily as sunny as the land from which she hails, she grows fangs like a rattlesnake when other women command my attention. It did not help any that Lydia Montgomery, since her divorce from the notorious Joe Venner, mid western king of the numbers racket, had developed the reputation of being a man-eater. And unfortunately I was scheduled to take Fausta to the opening of “Miss Pigtails” as soon as she finished her after-dinner-liqueur.

  Under ordinary circumstances I would have pinned Marty Shaefer down as to just what Lydia wanted before getting involved in something that was probably a publicity stunt. But the light of jealousy in Fausta’s eyes warned me discretion was the better part of valor. Attempting a tone which would convince Marty I was enthusiastic about meeting his client, and would convince Fausta the whole matter bored me, I hustled the fat little press agent out before he could do further damage. I don’t know whether or not I convinced Marty, but I definitely failed to convince Fausta.

  As soon as the door closed, Fausta narrowed her brown eyes at me and said, “That woman has half the men in town at her feet. She does not need one more.” Her voice contained a faint touch of the Roman accent she was trying to break, a sure sign that her fangs were beginning to develop.

  I looked at her admiringly. “You know you’re beautiful in green, Fausta. Notice during dinner how many envious looks you were getting from other women?”

  “Do not change the subject, Mr. Manny Moon,” she said coldly. “For three hours you have been looking at this same gown, which I had made specially for you. But you did not even notice it until you wanted an excuse to beat around a bush.”

  “Of course I noticed it,” I protested. “I’ve just been stricken dumb with admiration.”

  “Pooh. You were so busy at dinner ogling the bare shoulders of the floor show, you had no time to ogle my bare shoulders.”

  I took time out to ogle Fausta’s shoulders, which were definitely worth an ogle. Her skin was the creamy tan of Northern Italy, and its sleek browness was accentuated by the blazing blondeness of her hair—a natural blondeness, incidentally.

  “I will go with you to her dressing room when you see that woman,” Fausta announced.

  “It’s probably business. You’d only be bored.”

  “I will not be bored. But you will, Manny Moon, if I do not go. With a stiletto.”

  If Marty Schaefer had been willing to let matters ride after delivering the invitation, both Fausta and I would have been saved a lot of trouble. But he had to hunt me up in the lobby during second-act intermission and repeat himself in a tone loud enough to turn every head within a dozen yard radius. By then the show was obviously a hit, and mention of Lydia Montgomery’s name hushed everyone within earshot.

  In the sudden silence Fausta’s husky voice carried distinctly. “If that middle-aged actress makes a pass at my Manny, she will never reach old age.”

  “Middle-aged!” Marty said in a shocked voice. Lydia was all of twenty-eight, about a year older than Fausta.

  “Middle-aged,” Fausta repeated firmly. “You tell your Lydia I will have my eye on her all the time she talks to Manny, and if she so much as flutters the eyelids once, she is a dead tomato.”

  Emitting a hearty laugh which cracked slightly, I said. “Isn’t she a card?” and slapped Marty’s fat shoulder a terrific blow, with the purpose of leaving a scar.

  He staggered and nearly fell, but he got the point and went away. Bystanders were still watching us curiously when the lights flashed a signal that the last act was about to begin.

  What made the whole situation that later developed so annoying to me was that Fausta’s jealousy is largely a matter of acting. Not that she isn’t sincerely fond of me for some reason I have never quite deciphered, for back when we were both considerably younger and she still had a comic opera Italian accent, we were engaged to be married, and though we long ago called off any plans for a relationship closer than friendship, neither of us has ever succeeded in developing the same glow for anyone else which we once had for each other. Although she sometimes gets pretty convincing, I suspect her attitude toward other women in my life is actually little more than a game she likes to play in order to get under my skin.

  Unfortunately casual witnesses didn’t know the rules of the game.

  At the end of the show, after the house lights went up and Lydia Montgomery had taken four curtain calls, I said brightly, “I’ll make this fast, Fausta. Meet you in the lobby in ten minutes.”

  Her hand came toward me and something pointed jabbed my ribs.

  “Hey!” I said, jerking back.

  Grinning, Fausta exhibited the crimson fingernail she had jabbed into my side. “I do not really own a stiletto. Just your guilty conscious makes you jump. Go see your famous lady, and get lipstick all over your collar for all I care. I will give you seven minutes. Then I will come and scratch her eyes out.”

  “Seven minutes,” I promised with relief.

  But never before having been back-stage at the State, more than seven minutes passed before I even found the correct floor. Assuming that dressing rooms were on the same level as the stage, I blundered up and down halls until a kind stage hand informed me Lydia could be found in the basement.

  Once I found my way to the proper level, the star’s dressing room was easy to spot, for the hallway in front of it was packed solid with those of the audience privileged enough to get back-stage. It took me another five minutes to wriggle through the crowd of well-wishers close enough to see Marty Schaefer backed against a door imprinted with a large star. Over the laughter and conversational hum of the good-natured assemblage, the fat press agent was trying to explain that Miss Montgomery would not be available yet.

  When he saw me, he called, “Make way, please! Let Mr. Moon through.”

  When no one moved, he added, “The sooner Miss Montgomery completes her business with Mr. Moon, the sooner you’ll all get to see her.”

  Reluctantly the crowd parted enough to allow me to run a gantlet of curious and appraising eyes. Though probably not a soul in the crowd had ever seen or heard of me before, for the moment I was the center of attention. You could almost feel the general curiosity in the air as to why I was so important I could keep the star of “Miss Pigtails” from her worshipping public on the evening of her success.

  “What’s the pitch?” I grunted at Marty. “This a hired claque?”

  “It’s always like this on opening nights,” he smirked, running a hand across his perspiring forehead. “Snap it up in there, will you, Manny? It’s work holding these fans at bay.”

  “Sure,” I said. “What’s the lady want?”

  Marty shook his head. “Beats me, brother. This is one gag I didn’t arrange. She’s closer than a clam about it.”

  At that moment a gun roared inside the dressing room, seeming to shake every wall of the building.

  For an instant every person in the hallway was frozen to stillness. Marty, who had just removed his back from the door and had one hand on the knob, continued to grip the knob and gape blankly at the star painted on the top panel. Jerking him out of the way, I flung open the door.

  Teetering precariously on a chair in the center of the room stood a woman who was all entangled in her own clothing. Half in and half out of an ankle-length dress, which apparently she was in the act of pulling off over her head when the gun went off, she seemed to be on the verge of losing her balance.

  I got a glimpse of slim, well-formed legs encased to below the knees in ruffled pantalets of the Victorian period. A stayed corset of the same period came into view as she managed to wriggle the rest of the way out of the dress. Then, blowing a wisp of chestnut hair out of her eyes, she turned a face flushed by exertion in my direction, and I recognized the gamin-like features of Lydia Montgomery.

  Then my favorite actress uttered the first words I ever heard her speak off the stage.

  “Close the door, you stupid jerk!” she shouted, wadding the dress she had just removed into a ball and slamming it in my face.

  By the time I had untangled myself from its folds, dropped it to the floor, and had shut the door against the enthralled faces outside, she had jumped down from the chair. She showed no perturbation at receiving a stranger in what could only be described as her underwear, partly no doubt because the Theater breeds a certain amount of unconventionality, but probably mostly because in Victorian undergarments she still had on more clothing than a fully dressed modern woman would wear in a snow storm.

  With fists balled against her lips, she demanded, “What was that noise? It almost broke my eardrums.”

  Diffidently I pointed beyond her to the figure I had just noticed sprawled on a wooden bench in the corner. “I’d hazard a guess it was somebody shooting that fellow with all the blood on him.”

  She spun around, took one look and screamed. “Charlie!”

  Then she fainted.

  Opening the door a crack, I said to Marty Shaefer, “A guy in here has been hurt. Get rid of this mob, get a doctor here fast, and call the police.”

  His face was pale clear up to the middle of his bald head. “Is Lydia all right?”

  “Sure. You saw her, didn’t you? And listen, Marty. Scoot out to the lobby and tell Fausta to take a cab home. Tell her what happened, though, or she’ll suspect the worst and be back here after Lydia’s blood.”

  He said, “All right,” and I closed the door again.

  Lydia’s pulse seemed strong and her breathing was even. She wasn’t even pale. Hefting her under the arms, I lifted her to the same chair on which she had been standing when I entered the room, and bent her head forward between her knees. In a moment or two she snorted twice and sat up groggily. Finding a glass on her dressing table, I filled it at a small sink in one corner and handed it to her. Then I left her to her own devices while I examined the man she called by the name of Charlie.

  One cursory look told me instructing Marty to call a doctor had been wasted motion. Charlie had caught a slug square in the throat and it had traveled down to emerge from the middle of his back. He was sprawled sidewise, both feet still touching the floor, but with his chest and one cheek pressed against the bench. In his twisted position, both the entry and exit wounds were visible.

  Charlie had not been a bad-looking man. He had dark regular features and coal-black hair worn in a crew cut. His mouth, open in death, disclosed even white teeth. Black, horn-rimmed glasses still affixed to his nose added an incongruous air of studiousness to the dead face.

  Quickly I glanced about the dressing room. Except for the chair now containing Lydia, the small room contained no furnishings aside from a dressing table and the wooden bench upon which the corpse rested. A waste basket half full of face tissues stood next to the dressing table, and near the sink a metal clothes bar, hinged so that it would swing straight out, was bolted to the wall. A flowered robe and Lydia’s street clothes hung from the bar.

  The door I had entered was the only one, and the single window, painted over, was latched on the inside.

  Lydia, looking unaccountably youthful in her anachronistic undergarments, finished the water I had handed her and rested the glass on her knee.

  “Why did you shoot him?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Why did you shoot him? And where’s the gun?”

  She looked at me from narrowed eyes. “Are you Manville Moon?”

  I admitted I was.

  “If you had gotten here more promptly, this might not have happened,” she said. “It was just what I was trying to prevent.”

  I raised one eyebrow. “You could have prevented it easily. Next time just refrain from pulling the trigger.”

  “What are you talking about?” she demanded.

  I pointed at the door. “No one went out there after the shot.” I pointed at the window. “That’s locked from the inside.” I spread both hands. “No one was here but you and the corpse, and he hasn’t got a gun. So why did you shoot him?”

  She threw the empty-water tumbler at my head. I ducked and it burst against the wall over Charlie, sprinkling his corpse with shards of glass.

  “You dull jerk,” she said. “The shot came from over my head.”

  Raising my eyes to the ceiling, I stared thoughtfully at a foot-square hole between Lydia and the door. It seemed to be a floor ventilator for the room above, but there was no grill covering it and I could look straight up into darkness.

  “What’s over this room?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know.” Glancing fearfully at the hole, she rose from her chair and moved to the corner farthest from the dead man. “I was the one they meant to kill. They missed and got poor Charlie.”

  “At that range?” I asked. I tossed her the flowered robe that was hanging from the clothes bar. “Better get this on before the cops arrive. They’re not as cosmopolitan as I am.”

  As she slipped into the garment, I jerked a thumb at Charlie. “Who was the guy?”

  “Charlie? He was an old friend of mine. Charlie Sheridan. He’s a booking agent.”

  “Yours?”

  She shook her head. “He would have liked to be. For some time he’s been trying to wean me away from Larry Jackson. That’s why he was here tonight, I think.” She looked at the dead man with an expression approaching sorrow. “I’ve known Charlie ever since I was a kid, and he was banking on our friendship to swing me over as his client. But Larry Jackson is the hottest agent in the business, and I don’t let friendship interfere with dollars.”

  I said, “One of the first questions the cops are going to ask is what I am doing here. What am I?”

  “Why, I sent for you,” she said, surprised. “Didn’t Marty tell you?”

  I tried it another way. “What did you want with me?”

  From what seemed to be force of habit, she started to let a seductive look creep into her eyes. Then she glanced at the sprawling corpse and changed her mind.

  “I wanted to hire you as a bodyguard. You are a professional bodyguard, aren’t you?”

  I said, “Well, not exactly. I’m a private investigator. Guarding bodies is one of the chores I’ve been hired for on occasion.”

  “Marty Shaefer recommended you,” she explained. “He doesn’t know why I wanted you, but I told him I wanted someone tough enough to scare people. He said he didn’t know how tough you were, but you were ugly enough to scare people.” She examined my face interestedly. “I don’t think you’re so ugly. I’ll bet you had a cute face before the steam-roller ran over it.”

  I have never quite understood why women are so fascinated by what I use in lieu of a face. Early in my career, before I learned to fight just as dirty as the next guy, I walked into a set of brass knuckles which left me with a slightly bent nose and one eyelid that droops lower than the other. Generally people make a point of ignoring physical disfigurements for fear the disfiguree might have his feelings hurt, but in my case women often comment on my battered appearance. Maybe they sense I’m not sensitive.

  I said, “I was like a Greek God. Get on with your story.”

  Warily circling the hole in the ceiling, Lydia went to her dressing table, picked up a leather handbag and drew from it a sheet of paper. She handed it to me without comment.

  It was a plain sheet of typing paper, folded twice as though to fit in a legal sized envelope. Crude block letters printed in pencil read:

  TODAY IS YOUR LAST CHANCE. YOU AND THE DOUGH BE AT THE PLACE WE SAID OR YOU WILL NEVER LEAVE THE THEATER ALIVE TONIGHT.

  I raised my eyebrows questioningly.

  “That was slipped under my hotel door this morning. I got two previous ones the same way, each a week apart. The first demanded ten thousand dollars to prevent myself from being killed, said instructions would follow and warned I would be killed immediately if I called the police. That was two weeks ago. Then last week the instructions came. I was to wrap one hundred ten-dollar bills in newspaper, go to the drug store at Eighth and Allen and wait by the center phone booth. The phone would ring at exactly noon. I was to answer it and get further instructions. The note said I would be under observation the whole time, and if any police were watching, I would be killed.”

  I asked, “Why didn’t you call the police when you received the first note?”

  “I was afraid to.”

 

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