Murder & the Married Virgin

by Brett Halliday

  “Call up the Dragoon Hotel and get Drinkley on the phone,” he directed. “When he answers make your voice husky and talk fast. Tell him it’s Lana and to come to your apartment quick. The back way—same as he used last night. Hang up as soon as you’ve told him that.”

  “Lana? Who’s she?” Her brown eyes narrowed with suspicion. “What are you up to now?”

  “I’m going to check on a hunch and have a showdown with Drinkley. Go ahead and make that call.” Shayne put his coat over his arm and picked up his hat.

  Lucy was mumbling some words. She wrinkled her nose and rehearsed aloud, looking at Shayne for approval before dialing.

  “That’s it—and call him Ted,” Shayne said, standing on widespread legs while he waited.

  When she finished the call her hand shook when she replaced the receiver, and her face was pale. “I—did it—”

  “Swell job,” Shayne said. “I’ll get you a Hollywood contract. If Gabby Lane comes have him wait here for me.”

  “All right.… But I still don’t believe—”

  Shayne didn’t wait to hear what she didn’t believe. He went down to his car, drove to the Armentieres Apartments and parked near the alley at a point where he could watch the outside stairway leading up to the rear entrance of Lana’s fourth-floor apartment.

  He sat hunched behind the wheel dragging on a cigarette while he waited. Maybe it wouldn’t work. Maybe it hadn’t been Drinkley who had socked him last night. His head ached with a steady, dull pain, and he was tired of too much thinking.

  He threw the cigarette away when he saw a figure coming furtively down the alley wearing a khaki overcoat and a cap pulled low down over his forehead. The figure went hurriedly up the stairs and stopped at the fourth floor.

  Shayne waited until he went in the door, then followed. The door leading from the balcony into the bedroom was open and he stepped inside to hear angry voices in the front room.

  “I didn’t telephone you,” Lana was declaring vehemently. “You’re acting crazy, Ted. I covered up for you this morning—”

  “That’s right—and in a big way,” Shayne said pleasantly, strolling forward to stand in the doorway.

  Lieutenant Drinkley let go of Lana’s wrists and whirled to face him. His thin face was pinched and white and his eyes were hot with fear. He took a wavering step backward and muttered, “Shayne.”

  Shayne said, “Don’t blame Lana for this. She even committed a neat bit of perjury this morning to keep you in the clear.” To Lana he said, “Sit down. We’ll all talk this over.”

  Lana tossed her head angrily. “Nothing would suit me better.” She pushed a chair close to the couch and sat down.

  Shayne sat on the couch and Drinkley brought a light occasional chair and placed it to form a semicircle.

  “You’re both in this pretty deep,” Shayne warned them. “It wasn’t smart to bop me last night, Drinkley. What were you afraid I was going to learn?”

  Drinkley’s hands trembled and he bit his bloodless bottom lip. “I didn’t—I don’t know—what you mean,” he stammered.

  Shayne said mildly, “I don’t mind the beating so much, but I hate being framed for murder. That’s what your perjured denial of my alibi did this morning, Lana.”

  Lana gave Drinkley a quick calculating glance, shook her tawny head from side to side and said, “If you mean that crazy story you dreamed up about getting attacked here, you’re nuts.”

  Shayne touched his injury lightly. “For a dream, it hurts like hell.” He shrugged and said, “All right. This is off the record. I talked myself out of the murder frame for the time being. Now I want to get some things straight.”

  He eyed Drinkley angrily. “How deeply are you involved with Lana?”

  “I’m not. It’s all over. I swear it is. It’s been over since I met Katrin. Ask Lana. She’ll tell you.” Drinkley jerked in a breath between each statement and wet his dry lips when he finished.

  Lana’s smile was contemptuous. “She’s dead now, Ted. You don’t have to keep on pretending you loved her.”

  “But I did. You know I did. I told you I loved Katrin. My God, Lana, if I thought—”

  “You do think it,” Shayne said harshly. “That’s what’s eating your guts, isn’t it, Drinkley? You think Lana told Katrin about you two. You’re afraid that’s why Katrin committed suicide.”

  Drinkley winced as though a sharp whip struck him, but he said nothing.

  “What kind of evidence did Lana have on you? A tape recording or something?” Shayne’s words lashed at the young lieutenant.

  “Yes—that damned recording.” Drinkley cowered back. “She got me drunk up here once and I made a recording with her. And she wouldn’t give it back to me.”

  “So you destroyed all the recordings last night?”

  “I guess so,” he said wearily. “I destroyed all I could find. Katrin was terribly sensitive, Mr. Shayne. If she ever heard that awful recording—knew I’d been drunk—there’s no telling how she’d take it.” He covered his face with his hands.

  Lana’s hands were folded in her lap and her tawny eyes were full of contempt for Drinkley. She said quietly to Shayne, “I didn’t believe he’d go through with it. I still don’t believe he would have. He was just infatuated with her.”

  “You lied about getting in Thursday morning,” Shayne said to Drinkley. “You spent the night with Lana, didn’t you?”

  Drinkley jerked himself from his slumped position and exclaimed, “No! That’s a lie! I was up here, all right—early in the evening. She wrote me that I had to see her before Thursday. I came to beg her to let Katrin and me have our happiness. I begged her to return the recording to me. She refused.”

  “So you were here—in New Orleans—while Katrin was dying alone in her locked room,” said Shayne thoughtfully.

  “Yes. That’s why it’s so terrible. I believe Lana did it to her, Mr. Shayne. And that makes it my fault. I believe Lana called her after I left here that night…”

  “You fool!” Lana burst out. “I told you I wouldn’t lift a finger to keep you if you insisted on going through with it. I think your conscience is hurting you. Didn’t you call Katrin that night? Didn’t you finally realize you couldn’t live without me?”

  Drinkley jumped up, his face livid and his fists doubled.

  Shayne hastily intercepted him and pushed him back in his chair. “Stop accusing each other,” he growled. “None of this stuff can turn murder into suicide.”

  Both of them stared at him fixedly.

  “Don’t try to look shocked or surprised,” Shayne snapped. “I said last night Katrin was murdered. That’s when you couldn’t stand any more and hit me,” he told Drinkley. “Were you afraid of what I was going to find out?”

  “I—don’t know,” he answered meekly. “I guess I went crazy when I heard you say Katrin—was murdered. Lana had called me from the Laurel Club and said she was going to bring you up here. I didn’t know what she would tell you.”

  “And you didn’t want me to find out you had lied about the time you reached New Orleans.” Shayne’s angular jaw was set, his tone grim.

  “I didn’t know what to think. I was—scared.”

  “And you left me knocked out cold on the floor. Thought I was dead.”

  “No. I knew you were all right. I was panic-stricken after I hit you. And then Lana kept on drinking until she passed out. She wouldn’t tell me anything.” Drinkley paused in his weak-voiced recital, then whispered, “It’s all like a terrible nightmare. I don’t know what to do.”

  Shayne asked abruptly, “Did you know Katrin had been married before?”

  The lieutenant was too stricken to look startled. He said, “She hadn’t been—of course.”

  “She had a wedding ring,” Shayne told him curtly. “It fitted her finger and it had been worn quite a lot.”

  Drinkley shuddered violently. “I don’t believe it. Not Katrin. She was pure—and innocent.”

  Lana made a loud dispa
raging noise with pursed lips.

  Shayne got up. He said dispassionately, “You’ve been a damned fool, Drinkley. You shouldn’t have come to me with half-truths. Katrin Moe was murdered. I don’t think you did it because I don’t see how you could have—yet. But if I can pin it on you I’m going to.”

  He went out the front door and down to his car, drove directly to the Lomax mansion.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  GOING PAST THE CURVE in the driveway leading to the front of the house Shayne drove on toward the double garage and parked on the solid concrete foundation in front of one of the closed garage doors.

  Perfect quiet pervaded the Lomax house and grounds. He wondered, suddenly remembering the early hour of the morning which had started hours ago for him, whether the family would be up and around.

  He sat for a long moment in thoughtful contemplation, then got out and walked to the rear basement door through which Eddie had taken him yesterday.

  As he hesitated with his hand on the knob he heard the sound of pounding inside and went in and down the steps.

  The basement was dark except for daylight coming through the windows of the workroom, and the other doors were closed. He sauntered toward the door which Eddie had pointed out as the furnace room. The pounding had stopped for the moment. He opened the door quietly, went in and closed it.

  Stopping on the threshold, he looked around. A big squatty furnace occupied the center of the square room. It had just received a new suit of the asbestos insulating material Neal was working with the previous day. Behind it was a large boxlike structure of galvanized iron housing the electric fan and filters of the air-conditioning plant. A dozen or more big pipes rose like grotesque arms from the top of the furnace, twisting along the ceiling and disappearing upward to carry warm, washed air to each room. Some of these pipes wore the new insulating wrapping, while others were dingy and in their original uncovered state.

  Neal Jordan was standing near the end of the room fitting a strip of insulation around one of the pipes over his head. He was stripped to the waist and his naked torso glistened with sweat in the warm room. Back and shoulder muscles writhed beneath the smooth skin as he stretched on tiptoe. He worked slowly and carefully, and was apparently absorbed in his work.

  Shayne said, “Still dressing them up?” He walked toward Jordan.

  Neal turned lithely on the balls of his feet, smiled recognition and said, “Just a minute until I get this wire fastened.”

  He twisted a length of wire around the wrapping, pounded the twist flat with a hammer and turned to Shayne with a grimace. “I didn’t hire out to be a man-of-all-work, but it’s so hard to get anything done nowadays. I’m pinch-hitting,” he explained. “I hope you won’t report me to the union,” he added, smiling.

  “I suppose you have a lot of time on your hands.” Shayne gave Neal a cigarette and lit one for himself at the same time, watching the chauffeur’s gaze flicker curiously over his face, but he didn’t mention the lump on Shayne’s head.

  Shayne dragged smoke deep into his lungs and said, “I’ve thought of a couple of things. You’re the man to clear them up for me.”

  Neal nodded, but said nothing.

  “I’ve been wondering about the gas system in a house like this. I’m still thinking about Katrin Moe—trying to get away from the suicide theory. I’ve started wondering what happens if all the gas is turned off.”

  The chauffeur listened attentively, shook his head and said, “I’m afraid I don’t understand what you’re getting at.”

  “Suppose her grate had been burning in the night,” Shayne explained, “after she dropped off to sleep. I know the damned thing couldn’t blow out accidentally, but if something happened to the gas supply—if it went off long enough for the grate to go out, and then came back on again.” He paused thoughtfully, then asked, “As the room gradually filled with gas, might a sleeping person not wake up—at all?”

  Neal frowned and looked thoughtfully at the furnace and up at the pipes, saying slowly, “I see what you mean. It’s a good theory but I’m afraid it wouldn’t work. Not in this house at least. Here’s what I mean.” He led Shayne under a maze of overhead pipes to the two-inch gas main entering through the wall. He pointed to a gadget bolted between two joints.

  “That’s a safety cut-off to take care of just such a case,” he explained. “It closes automatically if the supply fails and no gas will flow again until this seal has been broken and it’s been turned on by hand.” He touched the metallic seal on the cut-off.

  Shayne said, “That knocks the accidental theory to hell and gone.” His eyes followed the gas main along the wall. “I suppose there’s a main valve this side of the cut-off.”

  “It’s right here.” Neal went before Shayne along the pipe to a point where one lead branched off to the furnace and the other went up through the ceiling, showed him a big brass valve in front of the tee connection.

  Shayne studied it dubiously, rubbing his chin. “That cuts off everything,” he reasoned. “The furnace and all. I suppose a pilot light burns in the furnace all the time.”

  Neal said it did, and added, “There are pilot lights in the kitchen range and the water heater, also. If this valve was ever shut they’d all go out and have to be relit as soon as the valve was opened again. That is, if you’re wondering whether this valve might have been closed some time during the night while Katrin’s grate was burning—and then turned on again—which would mean someone had murdered her,” he ended quietly.

  Shayne’s eyes were bleak and a puzzled frown trenched his forehead. “I was thinking that,” he said. “I know it’s a simple matter to relight the pilot lights on a range or a hot water heater, but I don’t know anything about gas furnaces. Isn’t it more complicated to relight a furnace pilot light?”

  “Not at all. It’s very simple, but dangerous if you don’t follow instructions.” Neal went around to the front of the furnace, leaned down and opened a narrow door and pointed to a flicker of light. “That’s the pilot light. The furnace is controlled by a thermostat upstairs that automatically kicks it on when the temperature drops below a certain setting. All you ever light by hand is the pilot light, and the only thing you have to be careful about is having the main valve shut off when you light it.”

  Shayne said, “Show me,” in a preoccupied tone.

  Neal showed him a large valve in the one-inch pipe leading into the furnace. “That’s the main valve. This small line down here feeds the pilot light and has its own valve. If I shut it the pilot goes out.” He demonstrated by closing the small valve. The flicker of light vanished.

  “Now it’s all out,” Neal explained, “as it would be if that big main valve by the wall had been closed. To relight it you first shut off this large valve here.” He closed the one-inch line and reached down to pick up a length of flexible tube with a metal tip, connected to the small pilot feed-line with a valve of its own above the pilot shut-off.

  “This is just a convenient torch for reaching inside and lighting the pilot,” Neal explained. “You could do the same thing with a stick or a twist of paper.” He turned gas into the flexible tube and struck a match to it. A flame flared and burned steadily. Thrusting the flame through the furnace door, he opened the pilot valve. The pilot light flared and he withdrew the tube and turned off its flow of gas. He then opened the main valve feeding gas to the furnace and turned to Shayne with a smile. “It isn’t nearly as complicated as most people think,” he said.

  Shayne had watched every movement with tense concentration. He said slowly, “N-o-o. But I wonder how many people in this house know how to relight it if it ever goes out.

  “Mr. Lomax does. And Eddie, I presume.” Neal shrugged his bare broad shoulders. “Women seldom bother to learn about gas furnaces unless they have to.”

  “I suppose not,” said Shayne absently. “Thanks for the demonstration. It cleared up one or two things I’ve been wondering about.”

  “Glad to be of any assistance I
can,” Neal Jordan said, and went back to his work when Shayne went out.

  At the front door Shayne rang and Rosie answered, widening her black eyes in recognition and shaking her head. “I don’t think Mr. Lomax—”

  “How about the others?” Shayne interrupted.

  “Mrs. Lomax is upstairs, and Miss Clarice and Mr. Eddie—”

  “You needn’t bother to tell them I’m here.” Shayne pushed past the maid and went directly up the stairway. The door to the sitting-room was open and he walked into what appeared to be a family squabble.

  Eddie was sprawled in a chair with his hands thrust deep in his pants pockets and a heavy scowl on his face. Mrs. Lomax sat erect in a straight chair across from him, and anger or weariness made her look older than she appeared when Shayne first saw her. Clarice was striding back and forth in front of the fireplace with her arms folded and her lips compressed.

  It was she who first saw Shayne standing in the doorway. She stopped to glare at him and said angrily, “What are you snooping around here for?”

  Mrs. Lomax and Eddie looked around with a start. Eddie’s scowl deepened and his mother’s thin features stiffened. She said, “Well, Mr. Shayne—do you make a practice of sneaking in like this?”

  Shayne lounged forward, saying pleasantly, “I don’t like formalities,” but his eyes were coldly appraising as he glanced from one to another of the trio. “Did I interrupt an argument?”

  Clarice started to answer. Mrs. Lomax interrupted her: “I’m sure our private conversations are no affair of yours.”

  Shayne said, “I’m not so sure of that.”

  “Are you still dodging the police?” Eddie asked, leaving his mouth open and drawing his overhanging brows farther over his pale blue eyes. “The paper said you had a fight with Dan Trueman last night.”

  Shayne ignored him. He asked Mrs. Lomax, “Did Katrin Moe have any telephone conversations the evening before she died?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know. You might ask Mrs. Brown.”

  “Or Clarice,” Eddie growled. “She dashes to the phone every time it rings.”