The Homicidal Virgin ms-38

by Brett Halliday

  “No.”

  “Do you want to force me to take it to Painter after all? He would really make headlines out of it.”

  Shayne said, “You won’t take it to Painter.”

  “How do you know I won’t?” Rourke was beginning to seethe with anger. “You set yourself up like a little tin god to decide what is proper for Tim Rourke to know and what isn’t. To hell with that attitude. Even Painter would be more co-operative.”

  “But you’re not going to take it to him,” Shayne stated positively.

  “And I ask you again… why shouldn’t I?”

  “Because I’ve asked you not to.”

  “Nuts! I’m telling you… oh, hell, Mike. I’m not going to try and blackmail you. But you might give me some hint…”

  “Not even a hint, Tim.” Shayne’s voice was very firm. “This gal is sitting on the edge of a volcano with her feet dangling over the edge. The slightest nudge might destroy her.”

  “She certainly seems to have impressed you,” grunted Rourke sourly.

  “She did.”

  There was a long period of silence between the two old friends who knew each other and each other’s moods so well. Timothy Rourke sucked contemplatively on his highball while Shayne stretched out his long legs and closed his eyes, willing the telephone to ring.

  It didn’t.

  Rourke’s voice came to his ears from a seemingly great distance.

  “I gather you turned her down flatly. If she’s so desperate, won’t she go to someone else with the same proposition? Someone who isn’t quite so conscientious as you. Fifty thousand dollars is a nice round sum for a simple killing. Hundreds have been arranged for a hundredth of that.”

  “I’m afraid she will. That’s why I’m waiting for the goddamned telephone to ring.”

  “Hoping it will be Jane Smith calling on the great Michael Shayne for help?”

  “Hoping she will take Mike Wayne’s advice and give up her silly idea of arranging a murder.”

  “Why should she? She barely knows the guy. Only met him tonight.”

  “And he let her down,” agreed Shayne tonelessly. “But they did establish a certain rapport. She trusted him utterly for a few minutes.”

  “But suppose she doesn’t call you?” argued Rourke. “What then? Are you going to do nothing to prevent her from going ahead with her murderous ideas?”

  “I don’t see why I should.” Shayne spoke slowly, evidently arguing with himself. “If her story is true, a simple killing is much too good for the guy. Who am I to sit in judgment?”

  “Who, indeed?” agreed Rourke. “But isn’t that just what you did this evening?”

  “Hell, no! I simply gave her some good advice.”

  “According to your standards. But what about hers?”

  Shayne sighed and said, “Stop needling me, Tim.” He morosely lifted his glass and drained it.

  “Okay. Let’s change the subject. You got any hot cases on the fire?”

  “Nor any cold ones either.”

  “That’s what Lucy says. In fact, she told me in confidence just yesterday that if you kept on turning down cases offered to you, she was going to quit you cold.”

  “She’s always threatening to quit.”

  “One day she’s going to do it. You don’t know how that girl looks up to you, Mike. She feels you’re wasting your talents…”

  The telephone shrilled between them.

  Shayne’s big hand shot out to grasp it. He saw Rourke grinning at him, and controlled his impatience, lifting it slowly and saying, “Michael Shayne speaking,” in an impersonal tone.

  A frown of disappointment furrowed his brow when Lucy Hamilton’s voice lilted over the wire, “I hope you weren’t asleep or busy, Michael.”

  “I was neither. Tim Rourke is here sopping up my liquor.”

  “Oh. Well, I called because something came up this afternoon after you left the office. A Mr. David Waring of the Southern Mutual Insurance Company came in to talk about putting you on an annual retainer. I told him you aren’t terribly tied up right now, and I ended up going out to dinner with him. He just dropped me off home, and I did a terrific selling job on you.”

  “It was a long dinner,” said Shayne crossly.

  “Michael!” Her amused voice made three distinct syllables out of his name. “I do believe you’re jealous.”

  “Of course I’m not jealous.”

  “Well, he’s fat and a lot of fun.”

  “Good clean fun, I’ll bet. All right, angel. Put him on the phone and I’ll talk to him.”

  “You are jealous,” she said wonderingly. “And you’re trying to trick me. He isn’t here, silly. I told you he dropped me off.”

  “I know what you told me. Okay, Lucy. I’m waiting for an important telephone call. Get your beauty sleep and I’ll see you in the morning.”

  He hung up and stared bleakly at Rourke, then sighed and dragged the telephone directory closer and looked up the number of the Palms Terrace hotel on Miami Beach.

  He gave the number to Pete who also handled the switchboard at night, and when he got the hotel, he said, “Jane Smith, please. Suite four twenty-six.”

  There was a moment of waiting, and then the girl said, “I will give you the desk.” A man’s brisk voice came over the wire a few seconds later. “The desk. May I help you?”

  “I’m trying to reach Miss Jane Smith in four twenty-six.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. Miss Smith checked out about an hour ago.”

  “Did she leave a forwarding address?”

  “No, sir. She left in quite a rush.”

  Shayne said, “Thank you,” and hung up. He looked across at Rourke and said tonelessly, “She checked out of the hotel right after I left her.”

  Rourke lifted his glass and said, “So that disposes of Jane Smith. If she keeps trying, she’ll find plenty of guys to do the job for her.” He emptied his glass with a flourish. “Okay, Mike. Send a bill to the News for your expenses. It was a good try.”

  “There won’t be any bill,” Shayne told him harshly. “I won more money playing poker the last two nights than I spent on the project.” He chuckled mirthlessly. “Three hot-shots are sitting around a stud table right now, chewing their fingernails and wondering why in hell I haven’t shown up for the kill they had planned.”

  Rourke stood up and yawned. “Well, if you don’t mind,” he said politely, “I guess I’ll drift along. Thanks for the drink.”

  Very formally, Shayne said, “You’re always welcome.”

  He waited until Rourke had his hand on the doorknob and then asked, “Does the name Saul Henderson mean anything to you, Tim?”

  “Saul Henderson?” The reporter turned slowly, speculative interest in his eyes. “What about him?”

  “That’s what I’m asking you,” said Shayne patiently. “Do you know anything about him?”

  “Sure. What connection has a guy like Henderson got with Jane Smith or this thing tonight?”

  “I didn’t say he had any connection.”

  “I know you didn’t.” Rourke released the doorknob and turned back into the room. “All the same it made me wonder… in view of the fact that Henderson has a stepdaughter about nineteen years old. Utterly charming, I’d say, and what a guy like you might well call a ‘nice girl.’”

  Shayne said, “So what? I didn’t ask you about Henderson’s stepdaughter.”

  “I know you didn’t.” For a brief moment their glances interlocked. Rourke’s gaze, keen and challenging; Shayne’s, cool and unperturbed. Then Rourke sighed and shrugged his shoulders. “All right, Mike. Saul Henderson. A thumbnail sketch. He’s been a resident of the Beach for a few years, running a small brokerage house, I think. Dabbled in public affairs and been on a few committees. I think his wife died recently, and there’ve been rumors that he inherited a million or so. Whether that’s true or not, he’s being groomed to run for mayor of Miami Beach in the next election as the reform candidate. His candidacy isn’t off
icial, but it’s pretty well in the bag, I guess.”

  “What sort of man is he personally?”

  “I met him once at some civic dinner. Bland, easygoing type. Pleasing personality.”

  Shayne said harshly, “I’d like the opportunity to size him up for myself.”

  “Easiest thing in the world. He’s been tossing some parties since his wife’s death. I’ll get you and Lucy an invite.”

  “Why Lucy?” Despite himself, Shayne was unable to keep a note of venom out of his voice.

  If Rourke detected it he gave no indication. “I’d say Saul Henderson has got a roving eye for a pretty gal. Lucy’s more likely to make time with him than you are.”

  Shayne said, “All right. Maybe I can concentrate on the stepdaughter. Don’t forget it-the sooner the better.”

  Rourke said, “I’ll ask around in the right places tomorrow.” He half turned back to the door, hesitated, and asked, “You still determined to clam up on Jane Smith?”

  “I have to, Tim.”

  The telephone rang and Shayne grabbed for it. Rourke paused to listen, halfway out the door.

  The desk clerk’s voice said conspiratorially, “There’s a doll here to see you, Mr. Shayne. A real doll.”

  He said, “Send her on up, Pete.”

  “Sure. I would’ve, but I thought maybe you’d like a chance to get rid of that reporter first… for one like this here.”

  Shayne said, “Tim Rourke is on his way out.” He hung up and stood up, moved toward the door telling Rourke pleasantly, “You are, you know. Down the stairs, Tim.”

  He took his arm firmly and led him past the elevator. “You don’t need to give me the bum’s rush,” Rourke protested. “Is it Jane Smith?”

  “I don’t know, but I’m hoping. Down the stairs with you, pal, and no peeking when I meet the elevator.” He heard it stopping behind him and gave the reporter a little shove down the stairs, then turned and strode back along the corridor as the elevator door opened.

  A woman got out and paused uncertainly. She wore a low-necked ruby-red dress with a short-sleeved Angora jacket, and Harlequin glasses that were tinted a light blue.

  7

  She turned toward him as she heard his approaching footsteps, and smiled tentatively when she recognized him. Shayne stopped beside her and took her arm. She was taller than he had realized in the Crystal Room, the top of her head just level with his eyes. She said, “I am pleased to see you again, Mr. Shayne. I am in great trouble.”

  Shayne said, “It’s an unexpected pleasure.” He turned her toward his open door and she walked beside him with a lithe, free-swinging stride, matching her steps exactly with his. Inside his sitting room, he closed the door while she moved across to the sofa against the wall and sat down. “I took the chance of coming directly to you without telephoning because I did not know what I could say over the telephone. How was I to explain that I… tried to pick you up in a bar earlier tonight and had you taken away from me by a prettier and younger girl?”

  “Younger, certainly. I can probably whip up a better stinger than they gave you in the bar.”

  “That would be nice.” She spoke with gravity and the same faint trace of a foreign accent which he had discerned in her voice earlier.

  He picked up the cognac bottle from the center table, paused beyond the end of the sofa to reach for a squat bottle of white creme de menthe from a wall cabinet. In the small kitchen he half filled a quart measuring pitcher with ice cubes, poured in a brimming cup of cognac and a careful three ounces of the sweet liqueur. Stirring it leisurely with a tablespoon, he carried the pitcher back to the table and got two cocktail glasses from the cabinet. He filled both of them and crossed to hand her one, then returned to lounge into his chair by the table. She took a sip and nodded, “Yours is better, Mr. Shayne.”

  He said, “You have the advantage of me.”

  “My name is Hilda Gleason. Mrs. Harry Gleason. I was sure I recognized the famous private detective even when you said your name was Wayne and the pretty girl called you that.”

  Shayne asked, “Is that why you came to my table tonight?”

  “Yes. I sat at the bar, distraught and frightened and so alone. And I recognized you from pictures in the papers, and the thought came to me that Michael Shayne was the one person in the whole world who might be able to help me. So I got up my nerve to approach you, and then… pouf! You were otherwise occupied.”

  “What sort of help do you need, Mrs. Gleason?”

  “To find my husband before… before there comes a tragedy and it is too late to prevent it. He is in Miami and I cannot find him.” She was sitting very erect, taking short compulsive sips from her cocktail glass and staring at him over the rim from behind the blue-tinted glasses.

  He said, “Relax and tell me about it. And for God’s sake, can’t you take off those glasses? I’ve got a hunch you’re hiding a pair of beautiful eyes behind them and it seems a silly thing to do.”

  Dutifully she removed her Harlequin glasses. Her eyes were soft brown and luminous. Without her glasses, Shayne decided she must be in her late thirties.

  “Harry came to Miami a week ago from our home in Illinois near Chicago. For some reason that he refused to tell me, but I sensed it had danger for him. Something to do with getting a large sum of money. He made big promises with hints about this and that, you understand, though I begged him to do nothing foolish. But he has become a changed man in the last two months. Silent and brooding much of the time, and with wild fits of anger against the unjustness of life that we have so little when others less deserving have so much. And it angered him when I said we were comfortable with his salary and mine, and that I could be happy with so little, and this thing grew and festered in his mind while he formed some plan for getting money which I think is dangerous.”

  “This is all pretty ambiguous, Mrs. Gleason. Tell me more about your husband as a person. What does he do for a living?”

  “He’s a bartender. He is a fine man,” she went on in a rush of words. “We have been married ten years with great happiness.”

  “And now you’re afraid he’s embarked on some criminal enterprise in the hopes of getting a big wad of money fast?”

  “That is what I fear, yes.”

  “But you have no idea what sort of plan he has in mind?”

  “No. He does not tell me this. Only in a note, that he is leaving for Miami and when he returns in a week or two we will have much money. I must find him in this city, but I do not know where to look. So when I see you in the bar tonight I think this is Providence. Michael Shayne is the man who will know. And now you sit so far across the room from me, and so cold. It is difficult to say things.” She smiled tremulously and, Shayne thought, seductively.

  He emptied his glass and crossed to the sofa to sit close beside her. “How do you think I can find your husband? Do you have any ideas? Does he have any friends here?”

  “Nothing. There is no one.” Her right hand, lying on the sofa between them, lifted to grip his forearm, softly at first and then with surprising strength. “I am a woman alone, Mr. Shayne. I must find Harry soon. If I can talk to him, I know I can make him see he must not do this thing he plans. I have not much money, but… I beg you will find him for me.” She was leaning close to him and her moist red lips were parted, her eyes humidly brilliant and imploring.

  He said, “I don’t know what I can do.”

  “But they say this is your city, Mr. Shayne. That you know the secret places and have ways of getting information that is not known even to the police. Without your help it is hopeless.”

  “Unless you can give me some sort of lead it’s still hopeless. If you had any idea what he’s up to… what sort of contacts he has here…”

  “There is that girl,” she said convulsively. “I know she is evil. That she has led Harry to this.” Her brown eyes became round and more luminous, staring into his. Her fingers hurt the hard flesh of his arm.

  “What girl?”
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br />   “The one who spoke to you tonight. Who called you ‘Mike Wayne’ at the table. Whom you walked out with and went up in the elevator with. What did she tell you? What did she want of you? Did she say the name of Harry Gleason?”

  “Jane Smith?” ejaculated Shayne in complete surprise. “What do you know about her?”

  “That she is young and beautiful. That she can twist men around her little finger to do her bidding. As she twisted Harry and, as I have no doubt, she tried to twist you tonight. For what purpose, Mr. Shayne? Why did she take you to her room? To offer her young body in exchange for what?” She was against him suddenly, the cocktail glass dropping to the floor, sobbing in terrible anguish, burying her face against his shoulder, and he felt the seeping warmth of saliva from her open mouth and the wetness of tears through his shirt.

  He put his arm tightly about her shoulders and held her until the paroxysm of weeping subsided, then released her gently and pressed her back against the cushion. He stooped to pick up her glass and carried it across the table for a refill. He said cheerfully, “Drink that and then tell me about the girl. Everything you know about her.”

  She took the glass from him, touching her eyes with a handkerchief. He deliberately turned his back on her while he poured another drink for himself and drank it, and then sank back into his chair and grinned across at her. “I’ll be able to listen better with a little distance between us.”

  She said formally, “I am sorry that I gave way to emotion.”

  “I’m not. It was damned pleasant while it lasted. Now, this Jane Smith. What do you know about her?”

  “That is her name? Jane Smith?”

  “That’s the name she gave me.”

  “I did not know.” Hilda sipped her drink reflectively. “She came once to the town of Algonquin where we live. It was a week or two weeks after Harry first started to change and be angry about life and money. There was a long-distance call from a town near Chicago, fifty miles south from us. Denton, Illinois. It was for Harry and he listened and grunted yes and no, and I went to the kitchen, and at the end he said in a low voice, ‘I quit work at twelve at the Elite Bar. I’ll talk to you then.’ And he hung up and did not mention the conversation to me afterward.