BALDY AND THE STRIP-TEASE MURDER

By JACK KOFOED

Popular Detective , August 1946
   
When it comes to being killed, a girl like Choo Choo deserves the best!

MISTER BALDY SIMMONS is not in the habit of visiting burlesque theaters, because the jokes are at least thirty years old and the chorus girls sometimes even older. However, there is a strip-tease character named Choo Choo Wallace, whose figure makes even the Venus de Milo look like an old bag.
It is unfair to Mr. Simmons to say he goes to the Bijou just because of Choo Choo's figure, though thousands of other people do exactly this.
Miss Wallace is the daughter of a fellow Baldy is acquainted with from 'way back when Rum Row is better known than the Stork Club. He is Light Fingers Wallace, one of the best liquor dealers of his time. Light Fingers, however, has the misfortune to spend all his money hiring lawyers to keep him out of the sneezer during prohibition days, so when Choo Choo gets into the dough, she has to keep pappy as well as herself.
Choo Choo is not too cheerful about this situation, because she finds it necessary to spend plenty of potatoes on such things as diamonds, sables, and a Park Avenue penthouse. To make it more complicated, Light Fingers is unhappy if he is unable to bet a sizable wad on the horses and he is one of the worst pickers in the entire world. This combination keeps the Wallace bankroll in a tired and frazzled condition.
As a matter of fact, just this very afternoon Choo Choo calls Baldy and speaks in this manner: “It is up to you to sell a bill of goods to the old goat I am unfortunate enough to have for a pater. He loses more dough on the horses than Nick the Greek is able to win at dice, and I am getting sick and tired of paying off bookmakers. Unless he stops playing the ponies, I cut him off my payroll and let him break his heart by going to work.”