Stetson Taylor Private Eye: A Noir Series

Monday morning.

A regular day that starts a week that requires at least four cups of hot jo to get my eyes open. At least I remembered to change my clothes. Drinking hard like I did the past couple of nights can leave blanks and unanswered questions from the weekend.

She walked in the door and all I could see were legs. They were legs that started at the floor and reached up to the tops of her big, blue eyes.

She was a dame.

A dame alright, but not just a dame, the kind of dame teenage boys hang posters of on their walls and dream of becoming man enough to even speak to. And there she was in my office with her designer handbag and the sweetest smelling perfume a guy could sniff. I took a drag. It was the rich stuff alright.

“Yeah” I asked?

“You Stetson? Stetson Taylor” she inquired?

“That all depends” I said. “You buyin’, sellin’, or collectin’?”

“My friend Mrs. Thompson said you could help me.”

I thought hard for a few seconds, but the only Mrs. Thompson I knew was the old lady who feeds the cats behind the boarding house next door to my flat.

I gave her another once-over and I liked what I saw. Usually the broads that come in off the street are seeking safety from their pimps. This dame had no pimp. Not at all. She had class. The kind of class school kids run to be on time for. And if she was teaching, gimme a pencil, ‘cause I’m taking notes.

“I have a job for you Mr. Stetson. It’s going to require the utmost privacy and consideration. Are you up to that?”

She walked around the office, pushing off the dust on, well everything and examining me as much as I examined her.

“What is it you need? Miss… “

She seemed startled, as though I should have already known who she was.

“You mean you don’t know?”

“”Look Blondie” I shot back as I tapped out the ash at the end of the Cuban I’d been nursing since the morning’s corn muffin disappeared. There was only one left. “I’m not much into the talkies and the gossip pages aint my thing. So either spill it, or I have Walter Winchell to catch.”

As she looked up at the laundry draped over the rafters and flicked her manicured nails through the files on the desk she summed it up.

“My husband” she started, “my husband is a very important man.”

I snickered as though she was telling me something I didn’t already know.

“They all are, Honey” I answered.

“Hmm, how droll? Yes, perhaps, but my husband is, well, he’s Philip McGee.”

I nearly dropped my cigar and choked on the drag.

“Flippy McGee? The gang- I mean gambler?”

She nodded ever so slightly, reinforcing the secrecy she expected.

“Whadya want with me” I asked?

“He’s cheating on me. I know he is, but I can’t prove it. Lipstick on his collar he explains away as excitement at the track when people win. And hints of perfume smothered under his expensive after shave.”

She stared at me as though making certain I was paying attention.

“I even found a single high heal lady’s leather boot in the back seat of his car. That’s not even the worst. The boot was nicer than the ones I wear.”

She took an introspective breath and blew it out as though cleansing herself of all      her sins.

 I want you to find proof. Otherwise if I ask for a divorce I’ll walk away with nothing and have to go back to slinging booze at the Kitty Cat Club.”

She turned and snapped her head.

“Have you ever been to The Kitty Cat Club Mr. Taylor? Do you know how horrible they treat the women who work there? No, I cannot go back to that. Not now. Not after all I’ve gone through with Philip.”

I checked out her legs again, realizing now why they looked familiar.

“Mr. Taylor,” her eyes dragged the floor. “Stetson, will you help me? The truth is, I do love my husband, but not like this. Not with secrets and betrayals.”

I leaned back in my chair until it made that long, drawn out squeak that I used to emphasize I was in deep thought, even though I was still stuck on those legs.

“I don’t know” I blurted out even without a thought I had nothin’ to do the rest of the day but organize my marbles for the shoot out at Burly’s Bar this weekend.  Getting involved with this did offer some compromises.

With that she reached into the bottom of her expensive purse and put on the desk a brick of dough.

“I think $500 up front to get you started should suffice. You’ll let me know when you need more. I have a lot of it.”

“I don’t know” I responded.

Then she said what I was hoping to hear.

“A lot more.”

“Alright Mrs. McGee, you got yourself a Dic.”

 It was now night and even the crickets were tired. The city felt like a wet rag hung over the whole sky. It was warm and balmy, the way you sweat just from breathing, and the streets were empty tonight like everyone had moved out and forgotten to invite me to come along for the ride.

But there it was. McGee’s Town Car parked outside The Pogo Stick Club. At first I didn’t think much of it. After all, thugs like McGee often associate with other reptiles like himself.  So I waited. Lucky for me Jack Benny was on the radio to keep me amused, and I had the issue of Dic Tracy to read.

Night 2.