Phony Shakedown – Four Stories of Dan Turner – Hollywood Detective by Robert Leslie Bellem

Book Details

Phony Shakedown is a collection of four stories from the casebook of Dan Turner. Turner was a hard-boiled gumshoe who worked the mean streets and back lots of the film studios of Hollywood, encountering murderers, blackmailers, greedy producers, seductive starlets, desperate has-beens and immoral grifters. Turner was always ready with his “roscoe” to save some “dame” or “frail” from becoming “dead as a smoked herring” or “as dead as vaudeville.” Here are four stories from the casebook of Dan Turner by Robert Leslie Bellem (1902-1968).

Phony Shakedown (1943) – At first, Dan thought the girl had shot at him and it didn’t make him any the less mad because she had missed. But before he could make her talk, another bullet closed her mouth. That sort of interference in Dan’s business was the last straw! Somebody was going to pay—and plenty.

Beyond Justice (1935) –  Dan didn’t like this beauty contest, even though he was a judge. He liked it even less when the winning beauty was knifed. Was the dead girl’s murder an act of vengeance—or a legacy of love?

Monster’s Malice (1943) –  It was a screwy assignment. The bogey-man thought he was going crazy! “I want you to save me from myself, Mr. Turner,” he said. “I’m turning into a werewolf. And I want you to keep me from hurting my wife . . .”

Half-Size Homicide (1943) –  Dan wasn’t even working for the movie star when she slapped his face and fired him in the most public way possible! To make matters worse, the whole thing was right under the nose of the gabbiest gossip columnist in Hollywood.

Phony Shakedown – Four Stories of Dan Turner Hollywood Detective has 11 illustrations.

Files:

1. RLBellem-PhonyShakedown.epub

Excerpt: Half-Size Homicide

THE JANE was too tall and angular to suit my taste, but she was dressed like a millionaire’s dream. She had wavy brown hair, unplucked eyebrows, and a bony map that made up in character what it lacked in beauty. She came striding toward my solitary supper table in Ciro’s, moving grimly as if she had a nasty task to do and craved to get it finished in a hurry.

“Mr. Turner?” she asked me in an undertone.

I said: “Yeah,” and started to stand up.

Before I could come out of my chair, she raised her voice to a shrill pitch that everybody in the crowded eatery could catch on the first bounce. “You’re fired. I wouldn’t let you work for me if you were the last detective in Hollywood!”

And slapped me a stinger across the chops.

The open-handed smack caught me unawares; nearly bowled me over. I wasn’t working for the tall tomato, didn’t even know her; so how could she discharge me? As I massaged my dislocated complexion I fastened the flabbergasted focus on her. “Hey, listen, sister—”

“Quiet!” she snapped. Then she tossed two crumpled hunks of green paper on my table, spun around and ankled out of the cafe with her chin tilted and her dukes clenched.

The entire joint was buzzing by that time. Anger commenced to rise in me when I realized the spot I was in. Before morning the gossip would be all over town: Dan Turner publicly fired by a client and pasted on the puss for good measure! My hard-earned rep as a private hawkshaw would fade like a puff of smoke in a cyclone.

For an instant I considered charging after the angular jessie, dragging her back by the scruff of the neck and compelling her to confess the whole scene was either a rib or a mistake. I actually took three steps in pursuit; and then somebody stopped me.

THE guy who barred my path was Harry Moon, movie columnist for the Daily Record and radio tattler on a coast to coast hook up. “Hold it, Philo. I smell a news item.”

“You mean you smell, period,” I growled. This Moon bozo was a sawed-off little squirt, crammed with arrogance and wearing a supercilious smile under his wispy black mustache. Everybody in the galloping snapshots pretended to be his friend but secretly hated his guts because of the venomous power he packed as a purveyor of publicity. Those who kow-towed to him got rave notices in his column and on his weekly broadcast; those who didn’t got smeared.

He dished me a knowing leer. “Don’t be a sourball, Sherlock. Slip me the low-down on why Emily McClennan used your map for a xylophone solo.”

“Emily McClennan?” I did a double-take as I heard the name. It stood for one of the saddest tragedies that ever happened in the screen colony. “Was she—?”

“Sure. Don’t tell me you didn’t know.”

I looked him full in the glims. “Believe it or not, I never met her before in my life. Now step aside while I go fasten the arm on her and find out what caused the fireworks.”

“Fireworks is right,” he chortled. “She certainly tied the can on you, didn’t she, pal?” Then he lowered his tone confidentially. “Just between the two of us, what kind of case were you working on for her?”

I rasped: “No case, and kindly keep your beak out of my business. I’m not acquainted with the dame.”

“Her dough calls you a liar, gumshoe.”

I followed the direction of his glance; lamped the two mussed hunks of green paper the tall tessie had tossed on my table. When I picked them up I saw they were century notes; which made the puzzle that much screwier. Why should a strange cupcake pay me two hundred hermans for the privilege of whapping me on the whiskers?

IT didn’t add up right, didn’t make sense; but I promised myself to unravel the riddle before the night was over. I shoved the geetus in my pocket, favored Harry Moon with a vinegar sneer. “Look, small fry. I don’t know the answers; and even if I did, I wouldn’t talk for publication at this stage of the game. Now powder while you’re all in one piece.”

He refused to budge. “That’s no way to act, flatfoot. Or do you forget the influence of the press?”

“Stew the press,” I snarled. “Maybe you can scare movie stars by threatening to dish the dirt on them, but I’m not a star. I’m just a shamus with a strong back and a weak mind, and I don’t allow insignificant jerks like you to worry me.”

“Meaning you don’t care what I print?”

I said: “Not at all, bub. In fact, let’s see you print this.” And I spooned him a helping of knuckle tonic; dumped him floundering. Then I beckoned a waiter, paid my bill, and scrammed.”

Excerpt From: Robert Leslie Bellem. “Phoney Shakedown.”