Free The Man Who Shot Lewis Vance by Stuart M. Kaminsky Page A

dishes and coffee cups. For almost a month after a dental association inspection, Shelly had kept the place reasonably clean, but old habits, like old house detectives, die hard. I turned the handle to slow down the dripping water and noticed that the door to my office was open slightly.
    My office off Shelly’s was slightly larger than a toilet stall at Union Station. There was a very small desk with a chair and one window behind it. There were also two chairs across the desk, which could be squeezed into comfortably by normal-size people. The chairs needed replacing, as did the plaster on the ceiling. The walls were dirty white and undecorated except for my dusty framed private investigator’s license and a photograph from when I was a kid. The photo showed me, my dad, and my brother, Phil, plus our dog Kaiser Wilhelm. It wasn’t much, but it was home, except when I had a client. I did my best to keep clients away from Shelly and my office.
    Shelly, who was seated behind my desk, didn’t seem surprised or embarrassed by my entrance. He was writing something with one of my pencils, leaning close to the paper, peering with myopic eyes through his thick glasses. His ever-present cigar was shifting from side to side in his mouth, and tiny beads of sweat were dancing on his brow.
    “Toby, advertising is the key to the future. I’m convinced of it,” he said, removing his cigar to point its wet end at me.
    “What are you doing in my office, Sheldon?” I said, leaving the door open behind me.
    “I’m writing,” he said, pointing at the paper. “I’m working on our futures, both of our futures. Translucent teeth.” Then he read: ‘“A size for every face. A size for every case. A shade for every complexion.’ How do you like that?”
    “I’ve heard it somewhere,” I said. “I’ve got work to do Shel.”
    He waved my work away with a free left hand and then wiped the hand on his unclean white smock.
    “Listen.” He read again: “‘Toby Peters, Investigations. You may know but can you prove it? True facts secured and submitted in confidential reports. Local and national investigations. Missing persons our specialty.’”
    “Our specialty?” I asked, still standing. “There’s only me. And I haven’t got money for ads. I can’t pay for my gas as it is and if you don’t get out from behind there and let me work I may have trouble coming up with my rent for this place.”
    Shelly got up with a sigh and looked at me as if I were a pathetic child.
    “You don’t understand,” he said. “You’ve got to invest to earn.”
    I came around the desk, looked out the window, vowed to clean it, and sat down, easing Shelly out of the way. “Did Mildred give you the money for your ad campaign?”
    “Not yet,” he admitted, “but I’m working on her, got tickets for Life with Father at the Music Box. Dorothy Gish and Louis Calhern. Might try to talk to Gish. Her teeth—”
    “Any messages for me, Shel,” I asked, handing him the sheet of scrawling he had left on my desk.
    “I’m talking about your future here, Toby,” he said. “You’re not getting any younger.”
    “Thank God one of us isn’t,” I said, shuffling through the junk mail. “Messages?”
    Shelly put the cigar back in his mouth, adjusted his slipping glasses, and slapped his sides.
    “Yeah, you got messages. Let’s see. I wrote them down somewhere. Your landlady called. Something about a photograph she found. Hy called—”
    “Which …?”
    “The one from Hy of Hy’s Clothes for Him on Hollywood,” said Shelly. “He says you owe him eight dollars and something.”
    “That it?” I asked, hearing the door to the outer office open.
    “No, some guy called. Said his name was Alex. Said something nuts like stay out of it or away from it if you don’t want what Lance got.”
    “Lance? You mean Vance?”
    “Vance, Lance.” Shelly shrugged.
    “You think you might have passed on this death threat a little earlier,” I asked