I drove back towards downtown. I was headed to the county library and that didn’t seem the kind of place anyone smart would try anything, so I didn’t bother playing any games getting there.
It amazed me how much I could find at the library, and I had spent days amusing myself wandering through the stacks, following my curiosity. It shocked me how few people seemed to know about the place and how often I had much of it all to myself. As I passed the research desk, I nodded to Miss Rein, one of the librarians. She was a serious woman who favored brown wool suits and had a thin, droopy face framed by unruly hair. But she had a dry sense of humor and an encyclopedic knowledge of classical music. It was she who introduced me to the nocturnes of John Field and the piano music of Gabriel Fauré.
I made my way to the shelves that held Hanson’s Directory of California Businesses. Martin & Sons, the company Konstanidis said was the source of Benny’s dope, had offices downtown and a warehouse up near Pasadena. It had been around since 1922, importing specialty chemicals and licensing industrial methods and practices on which it held exclusive rights. In 1928, it added medicines and medical supplies to its products and the name was changed to Martin & Sons Industrial and Medical Chemicals. The only president the company had ever had was a man named Gilles Martin, who had been born in 1891, in Mons, Belgium, but I couldn’t find anything about any sons attached to the company. If I was reading between the lines of the financial summary correctly, the company was struggling. I pulled two more years of the directory– all there was on the shelf – and those summaries confirmed there had been a significant fall off in revenues in the past years. I hadn’t learned everything I wanted to know – I didn’t find the two things I wanted most to find – but I still managed a few pages of notes.
Finished with Hanson’s, I pulled the most recent copy of Who’s Who in America to see what they had on this Martin fellow, but there was nothing. Taking a chance, I looked at the 1928 edition and found an entry for him. He had earned a degree in chemical engineering from the Catholic University of Leuven in 1914, served briefly in the Belgian Army, and then worked for Solvay, S.A., in that company’s petrochemicals line. In 1922 he immigrated to the U.S. and became the president of Martin & Sons. I thought eight years in business seemed awfully fast for a guy to work his way up to president, but these things happen, I guess. He wasn’t married in 1928, and he had no sons either. At least, there was no mention of any in Who’s Who. I couldn’t tell if owned all the company, only some of it, or none of it. Comparing his entry with a few other businessmen with fancy titles suggested the lack of a mention meant he owned nothing, but I couldn’t be sure. I added another page to my notes.
Since I had the book in my hands, I took a quick glance at the entries for Blinder and Clayman but didn’t learn anything new I thought I needed to know. In 1928, Blinder was a junior partner in Isidore Dockweiler’s law firm. And Clayman was obviously already a successful businessman, active in oil, chemicals, and real estate. Clayman’s entry mentioned he was an officer in companies called Clayman Holdings and L. R. Enterprises.
My curiosity led me to look at Hayden Tinge’s entry from that year. He was listed as a writer, with two books to his credit, The Rational and the Revealed, and The Last Battle: Jerusalem and Athens. His entry also mentioned that the house he had built won some award from the Architectural Record in 1925. It pleased me to see the house described it as “a faux castle in the Spanish/ Moorish style with lake views that are said to be reminiscent of Bellagio.” The pretense of it all seemed made to order for Addison Blinder.
I drove back to my office and parked at my usual place. I took a convoluted path back to my office, stayed away from the front door of the building, and instead used the back service entrance. Ralph, the guard knew me, and never gave me any problems if I came in – or went out – that way. A pint of vodka every now and then kept our relationship warm and happy.
I went up to my office, threw my hat on my desk, and sat in my chair. I lit a cigarette, took my notes out of my pocket, pulled the phone to me, and dialed the number for Martin & Sons. A young woman answered. I passed myself off as Mr. Welch from a trade magazine I called Industrial Chemistry Today, and said I was working on an article on the experiences of American companies importing chemicals from Europe. That didn’t excite her much, but I asked if it would be possible to see Mr. Martin that afternoon. She said he had left for lunch, obviously thinking that would get rid of me. But I asked when he’d be back, and she told me, frostily, that he was always back by one. When I asked if I might see him then, she finally gave me the blow off by saying he would be very busy all afternoon – mumbling something about preparing for his monthly meeting with the company auditors – and wouldn’t have any time for anyone else. I said I understood, thanked her, and said I would try again in a few days.
I let one o’clock come and go before I shut up my office. I walked down the hall towards the elevator and saw Betty typing behind her desk in the reception room. Ed’s door was open. I stopped and asked, “Where’s the boss?” Embarrassment skulked across her face, and she looked as if she was going to say something she knew I wouldn’t like. “He’s at the club. Signing the new lease. He told me you knew.”
“Yeah. He told me. Have you seen the place?”
Her lips rose in a weak grin as she said, “It’s nice. Small, but new.” The grin faded quickly as she added, “It’s quite a bit further from my apartment and not very close to any direct interurban or bus line. Maybe I’ll have to move.”
“It’s on Wilshire, near Santa Monica?”
“Yes.”
I dragged my teeth across my bottom lip and said, “There are some decent places to live out that way. And not all of them cost an arm and a leg. I had a place near Crescent Heights and Santa Monica a few years ago. It was ok and I liked it well enough.”
She smiled weakly and asked, “Have you decided what you’re going to do?”
“No. I haven’t even thought about it. Maybe I should start.”
“Might be a good idea,” she scolded me gently. “Time goes fast.”
“That it does.”
I took the elevator down to the basement and left from the service entrance. I didn’t have far to walk, but I still played it safe to be sure I had no shade on me.
The offices of Martin & Sons weren’t anything to write home about. There wasn’t much around to show what they did, but there was plenty to show that things weren’t going well. Several desks had a dusty, unused look, with books and papers and boxes randomly stacked on them, and others were just empty, with nothing like pictures or ashtrays or coffee cups or anything personal to show that anyone was using them. Each empty desk spoke of an employee gone and business lost.
The only person in the room was a middle-aged woman sitting at a small desk near a window with an oak door behind her. She was smoking and shuffling through a stack of paper. Her hair was dark and badly died, parted severely down the middle, and tightly pulled. It looked as soft as a cast iron helmet. The door behind her was open, and through it I could see a gray-haired man with a fleshy face, bent over a big, green ledger book. He looked like the kind of man who ran the place and was the right age to be Gilles Martin.
I walked over to the woman. She put her cigarette in an ashtray, and its thin whisps of pale blue smoke drifted lazily towards the ceiling. She didn’t seem happy to see me and looked at me through sour eyes. I had the feeling few men called on Martin & Sons these days.
I took off my hat and said “Afternoon” in the good-natured voice of a realtor at an Elks’ convention. I reached into my coat, pulled out my wallet, flashed the buzzer at her – not giving her a chance to look at any too closely – and said, “I’m Frank Napson, from the Bureau of Narcotics, and I – if I could – would like to speak with Gilles Martin.” I pronounced both names the French way.
She looked at me with big eyes and said, sternly, “You don’t have an appointment.”
“No, ma’am.” I smiled at her broadly. “But all the same, I’d like to see Mr. Martin, if I could.”
The gray-haired man walked into the room, and she looked up at him and said, “Gil, this man wants to see you. He’s from ….”
“I heard,” he said. He looked at me, offered his hand, and added, “I’m Gil Martin.” He pronounced his names the American way, with a hard “g” and a voiced “n.” He asked, “What is this about?”
“I have a few questions about your company’s import license. Just routine. Won’t take much of your time.”
“Are you a policeman?”
“No. An investigator, like it says on the badge.” I flashed the buzzer at him faster than I had at his secretary.
“Investigator?”
“It’s a bit grand for what I do.” I gave him the least threatening smile I had and tried to sound small and unimposing. “Mostly, I review the paperwork to be sure it’s complete and up to date. To make sure it meets all our protocols, guidelines and requirements. I’ve just been assigned to your file and have a few questions.” I smiled again, looked at them both with as much sincerity as I could put on, and said, “I’m sorry to barge in, but, as they say, I was in the neighborhood….” I made a show of looking around the office. “I like to come out in the field. Get away from my desk and meet the people behind the paper.”
I don’t think either of them were ready to buy what I was selling, but he said, “Come into my office.”
He waved me through the door, followed me in, and closed the door behind him. I sat near the desk. He sat in a leather chair behind it and looked at me with cordial interest and politeness.
He said, “It’s been a long time since I’ve heard anyone pronounce my name that way.” In the distance, in certain vowels and a few consonants, his words carried an accent that wasn’t quite French but didn’t sound quite like anything else. His face was curious as he asked, “Vous parlez français, monsieur?”
“Pas vraiment. Ma mère est française. Elle est née à Paris. Sur la rue Contrescarpe. Et on parlait français quand j’étais jeune.”
“Vous parlez bien.”
“Vous êtes gentil. But I haven’t spoken much French with anyone in a long time – depuis longtemps.” It would probably be better if we spoke English. Je suis désolé.”
“You have no reason to apologize, Mr. Napson,” he said. “Your mother taught you well.”
“Thank you.”
He had been a handsome man in his youth, I thought. The lines were still there, just softened with age and hiding behind a few too many pounds. He had sharp grey eyes and a small grey moustache. When he smiled, one crooked tooth gave him the playful look of a young boy.
“You have questions about our license?”
“Nothing serious. It’s just been a while since your file has been reviewed. Some information seems to be quite old, and I can’t find a few things.”
“To be honest Mr. Napson, I rely on the company lawyer to complete the forms. I usually just sign what he puts in front of me.” He smiled a little. “But I’ll help if I can.”
“Thank you.” I pulled the notes I made at the library from my pocket and fiddled through them, as if I were using them to frame my questions. “In looking over your file, it just struck me – and I could be wrong – but your business is changing, isn’t it?”
“It’s been a hard few years. The last of our catalysis patents expired in 1946. We have a few process licenses that still make money, and we do supply a few refineries here in California with products that are manufactured for us in Europe, but that business will also end in a year or two. We’ve tried to move more heavily into medicines and medical supplies, but that’s a hard market, and I don’t know it that well. Not like I know the oil business.”
“But you’ve been importing medicines since 1928; isn’t that right? That’s the year of your first license.”
“It’s been a small part of the business for a long time. Ten or twenty thousand dollars each year. It’s steady, but not big.”
“How did you get into that line?”
“A local firm was looking for pharmaceutical grades of certain opiates – diamorphine hydrochloride mostly – and through family friends I had contacts at Bayer, so it was an easy deal to put together. We began supplying them, and as their needs grew, we kept finding European sources to fill them. Pleasing one customer is not hard. Finding new customers. That’s the difficult trick.”
“I see.” I rattled my notes a bit and asked, “And you’ve been with company since 1922?”
“Yes. That’s right.”
“And your sons?”
“There are no sons, Mr. Napson.” He smiled and explained, “Adding a few sons made a little company sound more substantial in its first years. And over time, I’ve grown fond them.” His smile got bigger.
I smiled back and considered the papers in my hand. “Am I correct in thinking you’re not the sole owner of the company?”
He looked at me, curious, and said, “No, I own nothing.” With a hint of unease, he said, “Surely the records are clear on that point.”
“I couldn’t find a statement of ownership for the company in the file,” I said, trying to sound confused. “Perhaps it’s been mislaid, or maybe I overlooked something.” I put on an apologetic little smile, aiming to appear as useless and as unconcerned as I could be. “After all, the file covers twenty years. There’s a lot of paper.”
There were still questions in his eyes, and his tone became more guarded. “We must have filed it.” With certainty, he added, “I’m sure each annual renewal of the license says there have been no changes.”
Wanting to dispel his suspicions, I said, “I must have overlooked it,” in the most indifferent tone I could manage.
But it didn’t work.
The distrust was obvious as he said, “Our lawyer doesn’t miss things like that.”
I took a chance and threw the dice. “Is this something I might take up with your lawyer?”
His face relaxed, he smiled, and said, “That might be best.”
I shuffled through my notes, as if I were looking for something in particular. “He’s in Silver Lake, right?”
Martin nodded.
“I’m sure I saw his name in the file,” and I kept playing with the pages. As absently as I could manage, I asked, “Is it Blender?”
“Blinder,” he corrected me. “Addison Blinder.”
Lettres d'un Inconnu 