Burglars Can't Be Choosers by Lawrence Block Page A

one call. Evidently the people at WOR were used to getting nutty calls from movie buffs, and since such buffs constituted the greater portion of their audience they were prepared to cater to them. But it seemed that the cast list which accompanied the film only concerned itself with featured performers. Our Typical New York Cabdriver,with his half-dozen typical lines, did not come under that heading.
    They kept Ruth on the phone for a long time anyway because the fellow she talked to was certain that an associate of his would be sure to know who played the cabdriver in Man in the Middle. The associate in question was evidently a goldmine of such information. But this associate was out grabbing a sandwich, and Ruth was understandably reluctant to supply a callback number, and so they chatted and killed time until the guy came back and got on the line. Of course he didn’t remember who played the cabdriver, although he did remember some bit taking place in a cab, and then Ruth tried to describe the pear-shaped man, which I felt was slightly nervy, since she’d never seen him, either live or on film. But she echoed my description accurately enough and the conversation went on for a bit and she thanked him very much and hung up.
    “He says he knows exactly who I mean,” she reported, “but he can’t remember his name.”
    “Sensational.”
    “But he found out the film was a Paramount release.”
    “So?”
    Los Angeles Information gave her the number for Paramount Pictures. It was three hours earlier out there so that people were still at their desks,except for the ones who hadn’t come back from lunch yet. Ruth went through channels until she found somebody who told her that the cast list for a picture more than ten years old would be in the inactive files. So Paramount referred her to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and L.A. Information came through with the number, and Ruth placed the call. Someone at the Academy told her the information was on file and she was welcome to drive over and look it up for herself, which would have been a time-consuming process, the drive amounting to some three thousand miles. They gave her a hard time until she mentioned that she was David Merrick’s secretary. I guess that was a good name to mention.
    “He’s looking it up,” she told me, covering the mouthpiece with her hand.
    “I thought you never lie.”
    “I occasionally tell an expeditious untruth.”
    “How does that differ from a barefaced lie?”
    “It’s a subtle distinction.” She started to add something to that but someone on the other side of the continent began talking and she said things like yes and uh-huh and scribbled furiously on the cover of the phone book. Then she conveyed Mr. Merrick’s thanks and replaced the receiver.
    To me she said, “Which cabdriver?”
    “Huh?”
    “There are two cabdrivers listed in the completecast list. There’s one called Cabby and another called Second Cabby.” She looked at the notes she had made. “Paul Couhig is Cabby and Wesley Brill is Second Cabby. Which one do you suppose we want?”
    “Wesley Brill.”
    “You recognize the name?”
    “No, but he was the last cabby in the picture. That would put him second rather than first, wouldn’t it?”
    “Unless when you saw him he was coming back for an encore.”
    I grabbed the directory. There were no Couhigs in Manhattan, Paul or otherwise. There were plenty of Brills but no Wesley.
    “It could be a stage name,” she suggested.
    “Would a bit player bother with a stage name?”
    “Nobody sets out to be a bit player, not at the beginning of a career. Anyway, there might have been another actor with his real name and he would have had to pick out something else for himself.”
    “Or he might have an unlisted phone. Or live in Queens, or—”
    “We’re wasting time.” She picked up the phone again. “SAG’ll have addresses for both of them. Couhig and Brill.” She asked the Information