driving Abe Kolmar into town for a preview. The visitors gathered that Ryan did not approve of this.
They partook of their host’s hospitality nonetheless, endured his curses, and waited for Dean’s return. He came back about nine, accompanied by Estrellita Juarez, a minor player in the film.
What happened during the next two hours came in four separate versions: Polly Foster’s story, Trent’s account, and the evidence of Joe Dean and Miss Juarez. Put them all together and it spelled something like this.
Ryan took a drink. Then he fired Joe Dean. Ryan took another drink. Then he called Estrellita Juarez a dirty greaser and told her to get the hell out of there. Ryan took another drink. He punched Tom Trent on the jaw. Ryan took another drink. He pitched Polly Foster bodily from the trailer and told her to take her goddam blubbering someplace else because he was expecting company.
Joe Dean said he left right away and he didn’t see any muggles being smoked. Estrellita Juarez said she left right away and she didn’t see any muggles being smoked. Tom Trent said he left right away and he didn’t see any muggles being smoked. Polly Foster said—
Anyway, they all left. None of them knew about marijuana. None of them came back. Dean took his car and drove Estrellita to a motel. Trent went home and let his doctor work on his black eye. Polly Foster drove back to town herself.
And that’s all there was to it. Employees on the ranch noted that Ryan’s trailer lights were out by eleven. Nobody woke up during the middle of the night to see or hear anything.
But in the morning, Ryan was dead. Dead as a doornail, if you can picture a six foot two doornail with one bullet in its head and another in its hips.
That’s the way it went, according to the newspaper reports of the testimony at the inquest. But there was a little bit more to it.
The reefer butts, for instance. There were four or five of them, lying on the floor and in the ashtrays. Homicide found them right away, and it seemed odd none of the guests knew anything about the matter.
Then there was the little business of Joe Dean getting fired. Did he or did he not threaten his employer? Nobody seemed to recall that he did, but the police wondered vaguely, inasmuch as their records disclosed that Joe Dean had once been a naughty boy back in Detroit. Some years ago he’d enjoyed a reputation as a strong-arm artist, and the authorities thought he might not have taken his dismissal so lightly.
And this incident of Ryan punching Tom Trent on the jaw. That was all right, as far as it went, but how could a mere punch on the jaw produce a black eye, plus a broken chair, two broken glasses, and a ripped shirt? The police wondered, not quite so vaguely, if there hadn’t been a bit more of a fight than was first mentioned. And if Tom Trent couldn’t have left the trailer in a rather unpleasant mood.
They also speculated on just how Miss Juarez might have reacted to being called a dirty greaser (the more so because dirty greasers are notoriously hot-tempered) and how Polly Foster felt about being tossed out of the trailer.
But nobody could help them there, it seems. Everybody stuck to the story, everybody had an alibi, everybody suggested hopefully that since Ryan said he was “expecting somebody later” he was,
“Somebody later” smoked the reefers, of course. “Somebody later” smashed the furniture. It all added up. Added up to the “death at the hands of a person or persons unknown” verdict which was reluctantly delivered and even more reluctantly received.
There the matter rested. But not for long. The follow-up stories began to appear: stories about Ryan and his previous escapades; stories about the reefer parties he’d held with other well-known cinematic celebrities, where everybody got stark, staring stoned.
A couple of columnists sniffed pay dirt and began to excavate for golden nuggets of gossip. They came up with a series of
And the authorities, chasing down lead after lead, let a few hints slip about a narcotics ring. That was enough. The press took up the “Ryan murder scandal” all over the nation.
Took it up, and then dropped it with a dull thud.
Seven full columns in three papers on April 24th. Not a line on April 25th. Or thereafter. Three full weeks of sound and fury, and then the nothingness.
And, a few minutes after I satisfied myself about the newspapers, so was I. I stopped in at Clifton’s for a bite to eat and a chance to chew over what I’d learned. There was no time at present to digest it.
Still indulging in mental mastication, I stopped back at the office long enough to check the mail. Two letters. Tilden took a story and Browne bounced one. I made a note to call my clients later. Right now I had a thousand dollars’ retainer on a case and ten thousand riding. Right now I’d better go to the bank and make a deposit before two o’clock closing. Right now—
The phone rang.
I picked it up. “Hello?”
“Clayburn?” I didn’t recognize the voice, but it recognized me.
“Yes. What can I do for you?”
“You can lay off.”
“What’s that?”
“Lay off, Clayburn. Lay off the Ryan case.”
“Who is this?”
“A friend, Clayburn. But you’d better lay off if you want to keep me friendly.”
“But—”
He hung up.
I held the phone in my hand for a moment, then dropped it in its cradle.
There it was. This morning I’d been feeling sorry for myself. I thought I didn’t have a friend in the world. But I’d been wrong.
I had a friend, after all. A friend who seemed to have my best interests at heart. Somebody who would rather see me dead than get into trouble.
It was something to think about. I thought about it all the way downtown. And by the time I walked into Al Thompson’s office, my mind was made up.
Al Thompson used to be on the Vice Squad until he lost his hair. In his younger days he looked a good deal like Stewart Granger and specialized in jobs around Pershing Square. When he started to get bald, they transferred him to Homicide, and he’s been there ever since.
I once asked him how he liked the change. “Just fine,” he told me. “You meet a much better class of people in Homicide.”
If I remember rightly, I quoted the remark in one of the true-detective articles I worked on with a client. That’s how I met Thompson originally: I went to him for material. Since that time I’d got into the habit of calling on him whenever I needed help along the article line.
And now...
Thompson was sitting at his desk, going over some post office pinups when I came in. He looked up and nodded, thus acknowledging my presence and indicating that I should sit down. I took a chair and waited. After a minute or so he pushed the stack of pictures aside.
“Hi, Clayburn. What can I do for you? Another yarn?”
I smiled. I didn’t really want to smile. I didn’t really want him to think it was another yarn. But that was the way to play it.
“That’s right. I was thinking of doing a piece on the Ryan murder.”
“Dick Ryan?”
“Seems like a good idea,” I told him. “Unsolved mystery angle.”
“But we’re still working on it.” Thompson hesitated. “A story like that doesn’t do the Department any
