She was a woman in her mid-thirties, Carella guessed, wearing the mink hat at a rakish tilt that gave her a somewhat saucy look. Dark hair showed around the edges of the silky brown hat. Darker eyes flashed at Carella for a moment. 'Nice to meet you,' she said, and turned away.
'Mr Zimmer,' Carella said, 'do you know a woman named Cynthia Keating?'
'I do.'
'Do you know she's Andrew Male's daughter?'
'I do.'
'Did she recently sign some papers for you?'
'Yes, she did.'
'Assigning some rights to you?'
'Why should a business deal we made with Cynthia Keating. . . ?'
'We?' Brown asked.
'Yes. Connie and I are co-producing Jenny's Room.'
'I see.'
Threatened him how?
Told Mr Hale he 'd be sorry. Said they 'd get what they wanted one way or another.
They? Was that the word he used? They?
Pardon?
They 'd get what they wanted?
Yes. I'm pretty sure he said they.
So now we've got two producers, Brown thought, and they are doing this show here. The rights to which they finally got from a woman whose dear old dad got killed a month ago. My, my, what a tiny little world we live in.
'The newspaper said you worked very hard acquiring the rights to this show,' he said.
'Yes, we did.'
'Original copyright holders all dead . . .'
'I'm sorry, but this is really none of your. . .'
'Had to track down whoever'd succeeded to ownet-ship, isn't that correct?'
'Wow, it is fucking cold out there!' a voice from the door said, and a short, dark man wearing ear muffs, a camel-hair coat, and blue jeans stuffed into the tops of unbuckled galoshes—though it wasn't snowing outside— burst into the room like a rocket. 'Sorry I'm late,' he said, 'there's construction on Farrell Avenue.'
'There's always construction on Farrell Avenue,' Connie said, and opened her handbag. Removing a package of cigarettes from it, she lighted one, blew out a stream of smoke, and said, 'Excuse me, Norm, but there are some things we ought to discuss before . . .'
'This won't take a minute more,' Zimmer said.
'One of the owners in London,' Brown said. 'Another in Tel Aviv.'
'Is that some kind of code?' the man in the camel-hair coat asked. He swung a tote bag off his shoulder, took off the ear muffs, carefully folded them into their own spring mechanism, unzipped the tote, and dropped them inside it. Tossing his coat carelessly over Connie's mink, he said, 'Are we reading truck drivers today?'
Brown guessed he and Carella were the truck drivers in question. 'Mr Zimmer,' he said, 'when did you learn that Andrew Hale's daughter owned these rights you needed?'
'Why should our business affairs be of any interest to you?' Connie asked suddenly and quite sharply.
'Ma'am?' Brown said.
'Don't 'ma'am' me, mister,' she snapped. 'I'myoung enough to be your daughter.' She turned abruptly to Carella, effectively dismissing Brown. Puzzled, he gave her a closer look. He figured her to be thirty-two, thirty- three, what the hell did she mean, old enough to be her father? Or did she find it difficult to judge a black man's age? Was he dealing with a closet racist here?
'If your visit has anything at all to do with our show,' she told Carella, 'perhaps our lawyers . . .'
'You won't be needing lawyers just yet, Miss Lindstrom,' he said.
'Is that some sort of threat?' Zimmer asked.
'Sir?'
'The 'just yet'? Are you indicating we might be needing lawyers sometimes in the future?'
'Anytime you want one, that's your legal right, sir,' Carella said.
'Oh, look, the new police politeness,' the man in the unbuckled galoshes said, and rolled his eyes.
'You are?' Brown asked.
'Rowland Chapp. I'm supposed to be directing this show. If ever I get a chance to cast the damn thing.'
'Mr Zimmer,' Carella said, 'these rights you bought from Cynthia Keating. Did she inherit them from her father?'
'If you need information regarding the acquisition of rights, you'll have to talk to my attorney. Meanwhile, you've wasted enough of my time. Goodbye.'
'Does that answer your question?' Chapp said, and nodded. 'Good, we have work to do here, so do curtsy and go home.' He sat abruptly on one of the folding chairs, took off the galoshes, removed from his tote bag a pair of soft leather loafers, and slipped into them. 'Where's Naomi?' he asked. Rising abruptly—he was a man of swift, decisive movements, Brown noticed—he clapped his hands like a
schoolmarm calling together an unruly class, said, 'Ten after ten, kiddies, no more questions!'
Ignoring him, Brown asked, 'Is that why you went to see Hale? To talk about the rights to Jenny's RoomT
'Yes,' Zimmer said.
'Where the hell is NaomiT Chapp shouted.
The door opened. A blond, blue-eyed woman wearing a black parka, a black cowboy hat, and black jeans came in and walked swiftly toward the tables.
'Right on cue,' Chapp said.
Naomi—if that was her name—smiled quizzically at the detectives, pulled a face that asked Who the hell are these people, unzipped the parka, and said, 'Sorry I'm late.'
'Construction on Farrell,' Connie said.
'Got it,' Naomi said, aiming a finger at her and pulling an imaginary trigger. Under the parka, she was wearing a long black sweater pulled low over the jeans. She did not take off the black hat.
'Are you a cattle rustler?' Chapp asked her.
'Yes, Ro,' she said.
Connie was lighting another cigarette from the stub of the first one.
'You don't plan to smoke while people are singing in here, do you?' Naomi asked, appalled.
'Sorry,' Connie said, and stubbed it out at once.
The door to the waiting room burst open. The bespectacled young man who'd earlier asked Carella if he'd need sides popped his head in.
'The piano player's here,' he said.
'Good,' Chapp said. 'What's that in the corner there, Charlie?'
'A piano?' Charlie said cautiously.
'Good. Introduce it to the piano player. Who's our ten o'clock?'
'Girl named Stephanie Beers.'
'Send her right in.'
'You heard him,' Zimmer told the detectives.
'Just one more question,' Carella said.
'Just.'
'How'd Hale acquire those rights?'
'I have no time to go into that just now.'
'When will you have time?' Carella asked.
'You said just one more question,' Chapp reminded him.
The door opened again.
'Morning, morning!'
