Joe Darling, Gumshoe Book One

By David H Fears

Joe Darling is a private eye down on his luck in Portland, Oregon in 1947. He is handed what seems like a pedestrian case to find a missing husband, by a wealthy and stunning young woman, heiress to the Sinclair fortune in oil and perfumes. The case unwinds to possible blackmail, conspiracy to take over the perfume company, murder of a rapist, and powerful forces from a small town sheriff’s past. Joe falls into every quicksand laced with seduction and longings that would defeat most men. Along the way he discovers a woman with true worth that he slowly falls for, which requires rejecting other femme fatales. With help from an old cop pal and a female journalist, Joe winds his way to a startling conclusion in this mystery that holds up also as a romance. Adult situations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David H Fears
• Release date: Jul 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463491140

David H Fears

David was known by the handle “professor” as a boy (no doubt the thick black spectacles, Buddy Holly style), and has had a lifetime interest in Mark Twain. He has also written nearly one hundred short stories with about sixteen published, and is working on the 14th Mike Angel PI Mystery novel.Fears is a pretty handy name for horror stories, but he also has written mainstream nostalgic, literary, some fantasy/magical realism, as well as the PI novels. For the past decade he has devoted his full time to producing Mark Twain Day By Day, a four-volume annotated chronology in the life of Samuel L. Clemens. Two volumes are now available, and have been called, “The Ultimate Mark Twain Reference” by top Twain scholars. His aim for these books is “to provide a reference and starting-off place for the Twain scholar, as well as a readable book for the masses,” one that provides many “tastes” of Twain and perspective into his complex and fascinating life. He understands this is a work that will never be “finished” — in fact, he claims that no piece of writing is ever finished, only abandoned after a time. As a historian, David enjoys mixing historical aspects in his fiction.David recently taught literature and writing at DeVry University in Portland, his third college stint. His former lives enjoyed some success in real estate and computer business, sandwiched between undergraduate studies in the early 70s and his masters degree in education and composition, awarded in 2004.He was born and raised in Portland, Oregon, and has lived in New England, Southern California and Nevada. David is youthful looking and is the father of three girls, the grandfather of four and the great-grandfather of two; he’s written, “It all shows what you can do if you fool around when you’re very young.” David’s a card. How many of us think humor has a place in mystery tales or history tomes? He claims his calico cat Sophie helps him edit his stories while lying across his arm when he is composing, and sinking her claws in with any poorly drawn sentence. As a writer, a humorist, a cat lover and father of girls, he relates well to Clemens. Writing hardboiled PI novels is his way of saying "NUTS!" to politically correct fiction.UPDATE: Beloved Calico Sophie died on Apr 24, 2016 at 13 & 1/2 years. She is sorely missed.

Book preview

Chapter 1

It was one of those Friday afternoons in fall when you wonder how many seasons are left to you. You’re getting older. Winter’s on the way and you have no doubt it will bring suffering to many and maybe brush your doorstep as well. I’m a private eye, often called a gumshoe after the trick of wearing rubber soles to sneak up on a keyhole. Or a suspect. Peepers is another label thrown at private cops too lazy or too tarnished to work for the government. The best gumshoes like to think they work for the little guy against corrupt politicians, brain-dead judges, dirty cops and a government that takes no stock of the common man except to pry as many taxes from him as possible. Of course, a fair number of gumshoes are corrupt themselves. Such is the wallpaper in any big city.

I grew up in Fresno, where I did a short stint as a patrolman. Didn’t like it much. Too much payola and bad vibes. Since I took a pratfall off my bicycle on my paper route, I sometimes get images, flashes. Often they were a brief glimpse into the future though sometimes I never knew what they meant. Doctors could find no reason for the images except to say I must have suffered a concussion with possible brain damage. Still, there were no other symptoms. On a case in Portland I once caught a flash of a murder suspect. The face led me to the killer and the cops considered me somewhat of a savant. I let them think what they would. I hoped too that the images would eventually go away.

I hadn’t had a flash in nearly a year so hoped the handicap, if it was one, was gone. Then in a heated moment I saw a woman reclining in orgasmic ecstasy with a face I’d never forget. Like other flashes it was gone so quick I doubted what I’d seen.

My choice for the last few years was Portland, Oregon, not big not little, but a city on a river where all sorts of crime metastasized after the war against Hitler. It was the spring of 1947 that brought an unusual and mesmerizing case to me.

My office phone sat staring at me as if sullenly resigned to being forever useless. The instrument Alexander Bell cooked up seldom brought in dough, but what would a gumshoe be without one?

Trucks lumbered past below the grimy window. A few older folks with canes made painful tottering progress going nowhere. I supposed they too wondered how many seasons were left to them, realizing most of their years were behind them. In a few years, maybe before this year was out, many of those fogies would go on to their rewards, such as they might be, and I’d be next in line, still be staring out the window hoping for a case, no matter how petty, that might bring in enough dough for rent, coffee and booze.

I watched a woman in red pencil skirt with long legs and high square shoulders. Women were wearing silly hats in those years after the war, as if announcing their days of Rosie the riveter were over in favor of more feminine pursuits. She looked both ways and tentatively crossed Broadway to Madison Street. She was a dame who followed the rules having waited patiently for the light even though no car had passed in minutes.

She gracefully stepped into sunlight and up to the door of my building. I hoped, no — knew somehow — that she was headed to my office, being one of six on the third floor, others being tax accountants. Usually I’m not so psychic. Maybe I just wanted to be, for her. She looked strangely familiar.

I hadn’t had a decent case since last summer. In the fall I spent a week scraping the gutters for a lost daughter who’d gone down the sewer of drug addiction. What I fished out wasn’t pleasing to her single mother and I felt like backing up to the check she offered. The girl had been pretty once, a million years of drugs and abuses ago, but retained enough youthful flickers to tempt druggies and wastrels that skirted the Park Blocks which serve as a substitute campus for the city college. Those elm-lined blocks were ripe hunting grounds for pimps, thugs and all manner of undesirables. I believed the girl when she claimed she’d been kidnapped, but there was little proof, little to push the case on to Portland’s finest. I did contact my old buddy Jess Williams, now detective working mostly east side stuff. He bought me a beer and handed the same advice already tattooed inside my brain: move on, forget about such losers, fighting hopheads was a hopeless and feckless course.

The number who crossed the street was taller than she looked at first glance, slender with slender shoulders and slender hips. Like any beauty who walked past, she was my type, since my type is female. This butterfly however was definitely out of my league.

How do I describe her? Beyond the normal hair, eyes, face, etc., she was unclassifiable, as remote and clear as a mountain lake in summer, yet elusive. Something in the back of my brain said I knew her, though I had no knowledge of it. I catalogued details about her from my perch. Her silly bird’s nest of a hat matched the red of her skirt, a stop sign for my more lecherous thoughts. Such signs usually flash yellow for me, not steady red, but I have a habit of punching the gas pedal at the appearance of a yellow light.

My view of her from above through my window exaggerated her features, a straight, long and fearless nose like the prow of a destroyer, a cute chin and tiny ears. I couldn’t make out the color of her eyes but her hair was light ginger so I wanted them to be green. A redhead with green eyes — not a combination I’d met up with much, save in my fantasies. Something about redheads, even light hued redheads, says sultry spice. Did I say her legs were long and shapely? Well they were. At the shadow outside my pebble glass door I swung my feet to the floor and straightened my tie. My fortunes were about to change but I didn’t fathom how much until she tiptoed into my office.

The name is Rhonda Sinclair, she said flashing those orbs of wonder, not green but some darker color I couldn’t judge at first. Of the Sinclair Perfume Company. Such was the magic of her face that a guy could hardly focus on any one feature. The same face as in my flash a few moments before. I knew about the Sinclair outfit, moved up from Los Angeles. Hoity Toity, top drawer. But this couldn’t be the infamous chief exec of that firm. She was too young. I assumed it was her mother or aunt.

Mister Joseph Darling I presume?

She presumed right with a touch of English accent just enough to be sensual. Something about a woman with an accent always pulls me in for a closer look. Who says presume any more? Not since Stanley met Livingston.

I went around the desk and pulled out a chair, moving the week’s racing forms to the round file. If I’d known she was stopping by I would have put on my only good suit and splashed a dab of Yardley’s after shave. Or maybe my tweed jacket and Kaywoodie pipe. But as goods I was as-is like the many war surplus outlets in the suburbs. Take me as-is, honey, if you’re to take me at all. Please. Take me twice if you have time.

I paused to watch her backside glide gracefully into the chair, then took my beating heart to a safe distance behind my desk. I wanted to draw her hair to one side and plant a wet kiss on her neck. I’d been off balance the moment she crossed Broadway. Stunning from my window but seen up close she was almost paralyzing.

She didn’t wrinkle her nose at the wrinkles in my shirt or sneer at my unshaven mug or ratty office. Maybe she saw me as a natural Yank in the rough. A gumshoe in the mold of Sam Spade or Mike Hammer — you know, a tough guy with a heart of gold for fair damsels in distress? Sappy but half the population is into that tired plot. My heart’s a long way from gold. Brass is more like it.

She smoothed her skirt to a spot just above the knee then slowly removed long gray gloves I hadn’t noticed. She took them off with delicacy and the luscious timing of a professional strip tease artist, studying me all the time with luminous eyes that now looked a shade lighter than lavender. Even better. Those eyes went well with light auburn locks and were a shade I’d never seen outside of movie magazines. Liz Taylor was said to have lavender eyes. Liz never visited my office, however.

"How can I help you Miss Sinclair? I always ask a beauty that question because once a decade before, the answer proved to be a heavenly afternoon of tenderness.

"Mrs. And it’s a case I have, thank you."

My apologies to Mister Sinclair.

She failed to acknowledge my correction. Hopefully, Mister Sinclair was deceased.

A friend referred me to you. Said you weren’t a shrinking violet.

For good reason, I hope. Not sure just what flower I might be. More like a persistent weed.

Persistence I will gladly pay for, she said, as if from Mount Olympus on high.

I offered her a Lucky Strike smoke I keep in the top drawer for clients, but she took out her own brand, something between Persian Black and Russian Killers. When I leaned across with my Zippo she took my hand seductively and met the flame. She had lashes longer than any I’d ever seen, long enough to cast a shadow on her shoes.

She kept my hand in hers to steady the flame. The flame in me became quite unsteady and I could sense she made note of it. Women like Mrs. Sinclair like to create such waves in men; they depend on it for their image.

Her pearly nail polish on perfect fingers belonged in a museum dedicated to feminine perfection. She sat back in the chair and crossed her legs under the thin skirt giving me a careful look along an acre of white skin. She was cool and steady. Sizing me up while unfolding her sensuous weapons, I thought, like a surgeon arranging scalpels. She was in no hurry to get to the point of her visit.

She enjoyed my wonder and took her time. If such a number was uniquely expensive and startling to me, I realized the reverse was also likely. Old lines about a female being out of one’s league whispered in my ear as images of a dozen or more broads from old cases danced by contrasted with the elegance in front of me. Sinclair was no Suzy creamcheese or hooker with a tarnished heart of gold. Sinclair was money, high society. A specimen most men are never blessed to ogle up close. A faint aroma of gardenias met my nose, not usually a subtle fragrance, but one that matched her demure yet seductive image. Hidden power.

I was about to ask her to get to the point when she said, I want you to find my husband.

Tempted to ask if she’d looked under the bed I bit my tongue. I was also tempted to ask her if she’d join me for a gimlet or maybe even a belt of Jack Daniels I keep in my bottom drawer. Tempted but I didn’t fall for such a cliché. This number likely drank only Bollinger in crystal goblets served by an English butler at two in the afternoon. I pictured her with such a repast reclining on satin pillows of a shade that matched her matchless eyes, ruby lips slightly parted, egging me on, a nubile darkie servant fanning her with palm leaves. Yeah, I have a muscular imagination when stimulated by a woman who seeks a tough but over-used private eye. As a private investigator I’m no darling, though my surname often fools for a minute, no longer. Opening my trap ruins the slight effect of my name.

He’s missing?

She nodded and looked away as if bored by the stupid question. If he wasn’t missing then she wouldn’t be asking me to find him, would she? I’m so bright. Whenever a good looking babe talks to me my IQ goes down twenty points. Or more.

When was the last time you saw him? A better question. Now I was getting somewhere.

Yesterday morning.

Barely 24 hours. What makes you think he’s missing?

She reached into her pink handbag that was some sort of a snake or lizard skin number and lifted a folded blue note, handing it across.

It read: Goodbye forever. It hasn’t worked. I’m going missing. It wasn’t signed.

Forever. Seems abrupt, final. Seems he wanted to disappear. But to leave this heavenly vision meant he must be out of his skull. I didn’t point out the obvious.

Did you have a disagreement of any kind?

No. Harlow is mild mannered. He refuses even light argument. Would always give in to me, which, as strange as that sounds, I hated. He, on the other hand, hates my money, or perhaps resents is a better word. Sinclair oil, now perfume, mother’s inheritance and all that moldy money. Unlike his friend they call Ace. Last name Maloney; disgusting angular stringbean ninny with shifty eyes and a sick face. I don’t know his real first name, nor do I want to.

Any recognizable marks? Tattoos, scars? Anything unusual about his body? Harlow I mean, not Ace.

I know I should have kept one picture but I was so incensed. I don’t remember much besides the flashbulbs going off during his attack. She began to tear up reliving the horror of some awful event.

Did he cut the wedding cake improperly? Fart in front of your family and friends at the reception? Or, did he rifle through your underwear drawer and dangle your dainties for Ace?

I don’t care for your flippant tone.

That’s fine. I’m not selling tone.

It wouldn’t take much to offend this lily. But then I offend nearly everyone.

I let her recover and gestured for her to continue. Harlow took photos, you see — photos of Ace raping me.

I stared at her not knowing what to say. A minute went by. Evidently she didn’t know what to say either. How does a woman, especially a high toned woman, confess to rape? I could tell she was struggling with the memory. Finally I asked:

Think — did the photos show anything recognizable about your attacker?

One shot did, I’m afraid. I’m so embarrassed to tell you.

I patted her hand. It’s okay. I want to help.

Help myself to her trembling lips maybe.

She looked around and gave me a look as hard as marble. Then she took a drag off her exotic brown cigarillo fitted into a long slim older.

His … organ … uhm… She looked at the ceiling and blushed again. Strangely she smiled slightly, or maybe I just thought it was a smile. It could have been a grimace.

I waited, could see she wanted to say it.

It was quite … elongated. Freakishly so. And horse-thick.

Elongated, a strange word — a Brit word? Scrawny blackmailer with big dick. Hardly something I could use to identify him on the street. She softened again with tears. I handed her a tissue from my desk and waited again for her to recover. There’d be a lot of waiting for and around this vision. That was her style, making men wait.

A flame danced in her purplish eyes. There was anger there, and shame, and something else I couldn’t quite identify — maybe revenge. Rhonda Sinclair refused to be a total victim. She had, after all, the power of her place in society with all that dough and privilege behind her. Plus her mother, clearly a woman of power from her position.

And before that night, did you display your hatred toward your husband in any outward way? Fight? Give him any reason to skidaddle?

She took a drag of her exotic tobacco and laid it in a Gibson girl ashtray I keep on my desk. The Gibson number sported exaggerated breasts covered with but a transparent wrapper that showed nipples. She stared it at a moment, then said:

I don’t understand your terminology.

Skidaddle — split — vamoose — take off — leave — exit the premises.

No need to patronize me Mister Darling, she snapped. Yes. We fought a few times over his bringing Ace around. A creepy man who turned out to be my attacker. That’s all we ever fought over.

Not money? I asked trying to get a more rounded picture of her rat of a husband.

Harlow has a generous allowance, though he hates for me to call it that, but what could I do? I didn’t trust him further.

"Please, call me Joe, and don’t