“Do your worst — or rather, your best,” I told him. And when he was done, I had to admit that I looked presentable, at least to those who didn’t know me. And my plan was to meet someone who had never seen me before.
After leaving the barbershop, I went to a small-job printing operation on Madison Avenue that we had patronized in the past. The owner, Larry Berg, greeted me as I walked into his shop. “Archie Goodwin, of all people! You haven’t been around for many moons. Let me guess: You want business cards that make you a... what? Stock broker? Used car salesman? Crane operator? Black jack dealer?”
“Nice try, Larry. Over the years, your cards have made me into a number of other people, and in my work, those cards have come in handy. Today, here is what I want...”
I left the print shop less than a half hour later with a batch of handsomely printed and authentic-looking business cards. I was setting out on a new career, if only briefly.
My next stop was in the theater district, specifically “Broadway Costumery & Small Props,” a windowless street-level shop on West Forty-Fourth Street next door to a playhouse that was staging a first-run musical. I stepped in to the sound of a tinkling bell over the door.
“Yes, sir, may I help you?” asked a small and slender man with slicked-down hair and wearing a yellow ascot and a bright blue sports coat. “My name is Will, as in Shakespeare.”
“I’m looking for some eyeglasses,” I told him.
“With plain lenses, of course,” he replied.
“Of course. Is this a popular request?”
“Oh my, yes. Some, shall we say... older performers of my vintage tend to sport faux glasses because they cover what we might describe as facial imperfections.”
“Such as wrinkles or bags under the eyes, you mean?”
“Well, that’s true, although I try to avoid using those words when dealing with my customers. Of course, there are other reasons for wearing glasses while onstage. Perhaps a performer is playing the role of a college professor or a scientist. Or in the case of a woman, a schoolteacher. Glasses can provide what we refer to as ‘gravitas.’”
“Gravitas is important,” I said. “I’m looking for a pair that will make me appear serious.”
“Are you currently performing?”
“No, at least not in the theater.”
“So, I gather you are not a member of Actors’ Equity,” the proprietor said. When I shook my head, he added, “I always ask, because we give Equity members a five percent discount on any purchases. I didn’t think you were an actor in the classical sense. You seem to me more like a private investigator or possibly someone in the repossession business.”
I replied with a smile, nothing more, and after an awkward silence, the shop’s owner, if that’s what he was, turned to shelves behind him and pulled out several trays, which he laid on the counter. “Here is our selection,” he said with pride.
They were all sizes and colors — old-lady glasses, sunglasses of many hues, horned rims, monocles, rimless models, pince-nez that clipped to the nose. “I think this is exactly what I’m looking for,” I told the man, pointing to a pair of the horned rims.
“Good choice,” he said like a good salesman. “Put them on and take a look in the mirror.”
I looked different, neither better or worse than before, just different. “Would you like to try on some others?” Will asked.
“No, these should do nicely.”
He quoted me a price and I handed him the cash. When I turned to go, the man behind the counter said, “Whatever line you are in, be sure to tell your friends and colleagues about us. We are here for everyone, whatever their profession, and we of course have a wide variety of clothes, hats, even shoes.”
I told him that I would spread the word, and as I started to leave, a thirtyish platinum blonde woman, hair stacked high atop her head and with a heavily made-up face and plenty of curves, entered and rewarded me with a wink for holding the door for her. I winked back, wondering who she was playing and what she needed in the way of a costume to enhance her role. I would never know.
When I returned to the brownstone, I put on the glasses and walked into the kitchen. “How do I look?” I asked Fritz.
He looked up from stirring something in a pan and blinked. “I did not realize you need glasses, Archie.”
“I don’t, I’m going undercover.” That brought a frown from Fritz, who already had expressed his concern over what had happened to me earlier.
“What will Mr. Wolfe say when he sees you?”
“We’ll find out at eleven. I have become a new man, Fritz.”
“No, you’re the same old Archie,” he said, turning back to his stirring.
“Thanks a lot,” I said, returning to the office.
Chapter 30
I was reading the just-delivered Gazette when Wolfe, fresh from the plant rooms, strode into the office. I looked up at him and smiled.
“So, you have done it,” he said as he sat at his desk.
“Yep, what do you think? Do I look professional?”
“You look... different.”
“Well, that’s the idea, isn’t it?” I said, swiveling to face him. “Between the glasses and the shorter hair, I hope to seem like a different person with, of course, a different name.” I tossed one of my new business cards onto his desk.
He looked at it with a frown. “5 Boroughs Magazine. Who conceived that title?”
“I did, who else? A great name for a new local publication, don’t you think?”
His response was to begin going through the mail I had stacked on his blotter.
After lunch, undaunted by Wolfe’s lukewarm reaction to my transformation, and my new “employer,” I left the brownstone with a reporter’s notebook I had cadged from Lon Cohen years ago. My destination: The North River.
The National Export Lines dock was quiet when I stepped onto it. One ship, with a Swedish name and blue-and-yellow flags, was moored, but nothing seemed to be going on.
“Can I help you, mate?” a bearded longshoreman asked.
“I am looking for Mr. Douglas Halliwell,” I told him.
“In his office, halfway toward the river,” he said, pointing in a westerly direction.
The small office, which looked a lot like Charlie King’s over at the Cabot & Sons pier, was cluttered with stacks of papers. At a small desk amid the clutter, a muscled man with a crew cut was hunched over, writing in what appeared to be a logbook or a ledger. “Mr. Halliwell?” I asked.
“Yeah, whaddya want?” he said, looking up at me through bloodshot eyes.
“My name is Stuart Moore, and I’m a writer for a brand-new local publication, 5 Boroughs Magazine,” I told him, placing my card, complete with the periodical’s artistic logo designed by me and Larry Berg, in front of him. “For our very first issue, we are doing profiles of some of the people who make this great city work. Your name was one of the first suggested to us, and of course New York’s role as a great port must be represented in our article.”
“Who suggested me?’
“Someone from the Port Authority, I forget his name. But he told us that you run one of the biggest and best operations along the North River.”
“That so?” Halliwell said, his unshaven face creased with a smile. “Well, I’ve been at it for a long time, and I guess you could say that I know my way around this river and this harbor.”
“Do you mind if I take a few minutes of your valuable time?”
“Uh, okay... sure. What can I tell you for your story?” Halliwell’s mood had quickly gone from sour to downright amiable. I could see that what had been told about his having a big ego worked in my favor.
“First off, because this is a profile, our readers will be anxious to know how you got into this business in the first place.”