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

amiably.
    “I had a patient,” Shelly said. “You get nut calls all the time. How am I supposed to know what’s a threat and who’s a nut? I got to go.” Someone entered the outer office and Shelly left, closing the door behind him. I searched the top of my desk for the message from Alex. I found it sticking to a letter from Hollywood Tennis and Golf Shop promising me a great discount on restringing my racket.
    The note from Shelly didn’t help much. I could make out the name “Alex” and the words “Stay up” or “Stay out.”
    I spent the next twenty minutes trying to find John Wayne and listening to the groans from one of Shelly’s patients over Shelly’s off-key singing of “I’ve Got a Gal in Kalamazoo.” I finally got through to Wayne at the Allegheny Hotel through a tip from a guy in the security office at Republic Pictures.
    “Hello,” came Wayne’s voice, a little boozy or sleepy.
    “It’s me, Toby Peters,” I said. “We’ve got to talk about cleaning up after the party last night.”
    “I thought the party was all cleaned up.”
    “Not quite. Can you talk?”
    “I can talk.” He sighed. “I’ve got a friend here but he’s all right.”
    “Vance’s body is missing. Teddy the clerk shot Straight-Ahead with my gun and got away with ten thousand dollars. There’s also reason to believe that Teddy is working with some guy named Alex, who may have a grudge against you.”
    “You and your friend really cleaned things up,” he said with reasonable exasperation.
    “It happens like that sometimes. I’ve talked to the police, and a cop named Cawelti who’s a fan of yours is working with me to find Teddy and Alex. I just want to be sure nothing happens to you. If I tracked you down, Alex might be able to, too.”
    “I’m going on a fishing trip with a couple of friends this afternoon,” Wayne said. “We won’t tell anyone but my manager where we are and I’ll tell him not to tell anyone. I’ll be gone about a week.”
    “Your friends are …” I started.
    “Their names are Wardell Bond and Grant Whithers. They drink too much, can’t shoot straight, and are damned ugly, but they are friends. And before you ask it, I don’t remember anyone named Alex who might not like my face. In my business you make friends and enemies without knowing it. Any more questions?”
    “None I can think of,” I said.
    “Good, I’ll send you a check for fifty dollars this week and another fifty next week for finding this guy. Will that cover things?”
    “It’s a little less than I usually get,” I said.
    “Amigo,” Wayne said with a sigh. “I’m generous to a fault but my business manager has me on a hundred-dollar-a-week budget. He hopes to make me a millionaire. I just signed a hundred-thousand-dollar-a-picture deal with Republic, so maybe I can get Bo to cough up something more reasonable. Hell, if your friend Alex gets me, there won’t be any money for anyone, me, my soon-to-be-ex wife, and all four of my kids.”
    I wished him good fishing, told him my address, and said I’d get messages to him, if there were any, through his agent, whose name and phone number he gave me.
    With Wayne officially my client, I felt a lot better. I also felt hungry. The next step was something to eat and a trip to wherever Teddy Spaghetti dwelled, but first I had to get past the horror chamber of Dr. Faustus.
    “I’m going, Shel,” I said, glancing over the hunched shoulders of Dr. Minck and the twitching legs of a woman.
    “The ads,” Shelly grunted in farewell.
    On the stairway going down I encountered Jeremy Butler. Jeremy was mopping his way downward step by step. He wore double-extra-large shirts but they didn’t completely cover his almost three hundred pounds of flesh. At first glance Jeremy looked a bit fat, but after an encounter, the unwary realized that he was a sensitive pile of muscle.
    “Toby, I was hoping to meet you today.”
    “How are things, Jeremy?” I asked.
    “The battle