“Neither did I,” said Shayne slowly.
Naylor settled back with his cigar and highball as Marsh re-entered the living-room. “Here you are, Mike.” He handed a brimming glass to Shayne. “Lots of rye and not much soda.”
Shayne nodded and reached for the glass. “Naylor tells me you’re putting your tail between your legs, Marsh.”
Marsh shot his campaign manager a disapproving glance. He set his thin lips in a tight line and went back to a deep chair where his drink and pipe awaited him. “It looks utterly hopeless to me,” he said with finality. “I’ve been getting discouraging reports for weeks, and if the trend continues I’ll be a laughingstock when the votes are counted.”
“You’re crazy,” Naylor fumed. “Hell, I’m in close touch with every precinct worker. We’ll roll up a two-to-one majority day after tomorrow.”
“I’m afraid you’re fooling yourself. I believe in looking facts in the face. As I see it, I have two choices. I can go on and take a terrific beating and lose all my prestige, or I can make the manly gesture of withdrawing tomorrow and conceding the election to Stallings.”
“Manly gesture?” snorted Naylor. “What about all of us who have worked so hard for you, and all the poor devils who have bet heavy odds in your favor?”
“All my campaign workers have been well paid,” Marsh retorted sharply. “I’ve done nothing but hand out money since the campaign started. As for the men who have bet on me—they stand to lose in any event.”
“You talk about losing prestige,” Naylor argued. “You flatter yourself if you think the public will remember for very long that you were defeated. But if you back down—take your name off the ticket because you’re afraid of defeat—well, they’ll never forget that.” Naylor turned to Shayne and pleaded, “Can’t you do something with him, Shayne?”
The detective was sitting laxly, staring into his glass. He lifted it and drank deeply, then moved his head slowly from side to side. “Why should I bother? A yellow-bellied mayor won’t do Miami Beach much good.”
“That’s not a fair attitude,” Marsh protested. “You can’t censure me—neither of you—for using my own best judgment and acting accordingly.”
Shayne’s laugh was short and ugly. He touched his bruised cheek and lips lightly with his finger tips. “And I took this for you. Talk about someone being laughed out of town! Where will I be if you withdraw?”
“We’ve tried hard,” Marsh insisted, avoiding the eyes of his visitors. “There’s no shame in fighting the good fight and losing.”
“That’s what I pointed out,” Naylor interposed hastily. “Lose if you must—but quit?”
Shayne finished his drink. He hurled the glass across the room and shattered it against the wall. He said bitterly,
“Thank God I haven’t got any prestige to lose. You’re not running out on me, Marsh. Not by a damn sight. You’re going to stay in this election and win whether you like it or not.”
Marsh set his lips stubbornly. “Further discussion is useless. My mind is made up.”
“Then you’re going to unmake it.” Shayne got to his feet. He strode forward and stopped in front of Marsh on widespread legs. “No man is going to pull a fade-out on me. I always finish what I start.”
“It can’t matter particularly to you,” Marsh protested. “You have no money invested in my campaign. I’m the loser.”
Shayne studied him out of bleak gray eyes. Marsh’s wiry energy appeared completely dissipated. Except for the grim set of his thin jaw and the sullen determination of his elongated eyes, he was a picture of defeatism.
“I’ve got something invested in this election that means the same thing as money,” Shayne said harshly. “My reputation for knowing my way around. Do you think I’ll let a weak-livered punk take that away from me?”
“I refuse to be intimidated. It’s my decision and nothing can change it.”
“I’ll see about that.” Shayne turned on his heel and went to the telephone, dialed a number.
He said, “Hello, Joe? Mike Shayne talking. Are you making book on the local election? Fine! I’ve got a little two-to-one money on Marsh.”
Out of the corner of his eye Shayne saw Jim Marsh’s face go ashen. The man jumped to his feet, ejaculating in a choked voice, “You mustn’t do that, Shayne. I warn you not to.”
Disregarding him, Shayne said, “Is that so, Joe? You’ve got so much Stallings money that the odds have dropped to even money? So much the better. Mark me down for a couple of grand.”
Marsh made a gesture of resignation and sank back into his chair.
Shayne listened a moment, frowning, then said, “No, Joe. I hadn’t heard that rumor. Sure. My bet stands on that basis. Two grand. And you’ll get a certified check in the morning.” He cradled the phone and turned casually to Naylor.
“You’d better grab some of that even money, too. Looks like a good thing to me.”
Turning his attention to Marsh, Shayne said, “There’s the pay-off. Now I have got money invested. The Stallings crowd is insisting that all bets will have to be paid even if you decide to withdraw for any reason. So I’m out on a limb on you for two grand. Saw it off if you’ve got the guts.”
He stalked out of the apartment. Naylor was behind him when he opened the elevator door. A triumphant smile wreathed his dark face, and he mopped sweat from it with a shaking hand.
“That was fast work, Shayne. By God, that was wonderful.”
Shayne shrugged off the compliment. He growled, “I still think he’s got better than an even chance to win. He must have let it slip that he was thinking of backing out and that’s brought a rush of Stallings money to knock the odds down.”
Shayne pushed a button, and they descended. “I don’t know what’s come over him,” Naylor complained. “I knew he was getting jittery about losing, but I’ve tried all along to tell him it’s in the bag.”
“He acts,” Shayne mused, “like a man that’s scared half out of his wits,” as the elevator reached the ground floor and they stepped into the foyer.
“That’s it. That’s exactly the impression I got,” Naylor agreed excitedly. He stretched his legs to keep pace with Shayne’s strides. “Do you suppose he has had some threat—something he hasn’t told us about?”
“I don’t know. Anyhow, I’ve bet two grand he’ll stay in line. Now it’s up to you to do your stuff.”
“You can depend on me,” Naylor assured him when they stood for a moment outside the apartment house. “I’ll have it tied up in a knot tomorrow night.”
Shayne nodded and crossed the sidewalk to his car. He got in and headed back across the County Causeway over Biscayne Bay, scowling angrily at the bright paths of moonlight on the rippling gray waters, cursing himself for letting anger get the best of him in Marsh’s apartment.
Making that bet had been a damn-fool trick. Why hadn’t he washed his hands of Marsh and let him quit? That would have fixed everything. He could have caught that midnight train for New York—and Phyllis.
No. He had to be a stubborn ass and stick his neck out and bray into a telephone. There couldn’t be any backing out now. Not with two thousand dollars on the line.
Even as he cursed himself, Shayne was conscious of a faint inward glow of satisfaction. The pressure was on, and that’s the way he worked best. A girl had been murdered in his apartment and a kidnap note sent implicating him. Painter and Stallings had promised him until noon tomorrow to see that Helen Stallings was returned. He had that much time in which to clear up the murder and the mystery surrounding it. And he didn’t even know where the body was.
He pressed down the accelerator and stuck his head out the window to let the cool bay breeze blow the muggles from his mind. His thoughts revolved around Arch Bugler, around the hot-lipped maid at the Stallings residence, around the young man whose name was Marlow, and the mysteriously missing body of a strangled young girl.
A few vagrant pieces of the larger puzzle—and none of them appeared to fit toget
her. He had only a few hours in which to find enough more pieces to form some design. He forgot the discomfort of his swollen lips and puckered them to whistle a carefree tune. Inside him was a driving eagerness to begin the search for some of those missing pieces.
Arriving at his hotel, the clerk beckoned to him when he entered the lobby. “Telephone message, Mr. Shayne. A Mr. Rourke called from the Parkview Hotel. He’s waiting for you there and wants you to join him at once.” The clerk stopped abruptly, his eyes fixed on Shayne’s face. “Gosh,” he breathed, “what does the other fellow look like?”
“Better than I do,” Shayne admitted ruefully. “But I’m going to try out a pair of knucks next time I meet him. No other messages—or visitors?”
“Nothing else. Gee, I’ll bet it was a whale of a fight.”
“Practically a butchering.” Shayne grinned. “The Parkview?”
“Yes, sir.”
Shayne returned to his car and drove north through the center of town. Rourke, he mused, had worked fast and with luck to locate Marlow’s hotel so soon. Shayne wasn’t at all sure that it would be any help, but it was a good omen. If his Irish luck started working, things were bound to begin straightening out.
He passed the Thirteenth Street entrance to the causeway and continued north along the boulevard. There was little traffic. A heavy car which had loitered behind him for several blocks suddenly darted ahead with a full-throated roar of sixteen cylinders.
Subconsciously he stiffened when the big car whirled into a U turn at a street intersection a few blocks ahead and roared back at high speed. Shayne couldn’t remember whether the Parkview Hotel was in that block or the next, and turned his eyes to search for a sign. When he looked back at the street the heavy, speeding car swerved as it came abreast of him. Then it was a lunging projectile of steel that smashed his aged car as though it was made of papier-mâché, lifting and twisting it in the air, driving it sideways against a lamppost that crackled at the base under the terrific impact.
Shayne was thrown free. He crashed into a low Australian-pine hedge on the other side of the sidewalk.
The big car careened over the curb on screaming tires, bounced back into the street, miraculously retaining an upright position. It shuddered to a standstill and a figure leaped out, ran to Shayne’s smashed car carrying a burden in his arms. The figure darted back to the waiting car and it sped away as Shayne shook himself and got groggily to his feet.
Staggering to the wreckage of his car, he stopped to stare stupidly down at the pallid face of a girl who lay crumpled against the curb as though she, too, had been thrown from his car.
Shaken and unnerved, he dropped to his knees beside her. Her flesh was cold to his touch, and in the illusive moonlight he saw that it was the body of Helen Stallings.
An approaching car was slowing, edging in cautiously toward the wreck.
He was going to have a hell of a time making anyone believe that the cold corpse had not been a passenger in his car when it was wrecked.
SEVEN
THE CAR WAS A BLOCK AWAY. Shayne’s emergency reflexes were swift and adequate. Before the headlights were upon him he gathered the stiff corpse in his arms, holding it vertically against his body, and darted across the sidewalk to the thick hedge against which he had been thrown. Lifting the corpse over the hedge, he held on to the dress until the legs touched the ground, then let it fall to the grass with a soft thud.
He scuttled crabwise to the curb beside his wrecked car and staggered to his feet as the first car arrived and an excited young couple jumped out.
Other cars began converging upon the scene and curious householders hurried out of near-by homes, attracted by the crash.
Shayne didn’t have to do much talking. Everyone else was doing it for him. He kept insisting that he was all right, and when a police car arrived he gave a terse report of the wreck, grimly insisting that it had not been an accidental crash.
“I was loafing along when this car swerved and rammed me.” He did not mention the significant fact that the limousine had been trailing him along the boulevard before it darted ahead and doubled back to get a good run at him.
“A black limousine, I think.” He gave the best description possible. “Looked as big as a fire truck and must have been just about as heavy to do this job to my car and get away under its own power.
“Hell, no. I didn’t get the license number,” he snapped in answer to the uniformed man who was taking notes. “I was busy getting my door open and trying to make a leap for it. It was all over before I knew it was happening. You’ll have to look for a black limousine with a smashed left fender and radiator grill.” He edged away from the officers and curious onlookers crowding the sidewalk, managing a disinterested glance at the hedge to see that the girl’s body was not in evidence.
He breathed a deep sigh of relief that the hedge was thick and matted, the fine soft needles of the pines forming a solid mass from the ground up to the level, clipped top.
Pushing through the throng, Shayne ambled up the street mopping his face with a handkerchief. The accident had been contrived with fiendish and perfect timing. If he had been injured or knocked unconscious for half a minute, no one would ever have believed his fantastic story—even with Rourke to back him up. Against them there would be Chief Gentry’s positive evidence that the girl was alive in his apartment at six o’clock. It would tie in with the kidnaping note, a perfect chain of circumstantial evidence with a noose dangling at the end of it.
He had seen other innocent men writhing ineffectually in the coils of circumstantial evidence, had helped some of them beat the rap. There was no one to help him. If he didn’t get the answer quickly—or if Helen Stallings’s corpse was discovered—
Perspiration streamed from his face. His handkerchief was soggy with sweat as he went over the setup. The Parkview Hotel was a block and a half beyond where his car had been wrecked, but Shayne felt that he had walked miles from the scene before reaching it.
He swung into the lobby and saw Timothy Rourke seated comfortably in a corner talking with the house detective. Rourke’s eyes brightened as he took in Shayne’s appearance. House Detective Cassidy removed the frayed butt of a cigar from his mouth and rumbled, “Looks like you’ve been in a rough game of tag, young fella.”
Shayne stopped in front of them and glared at their complacent faces. “I could die a block away and neither of you’d stir off your rumps to say a prayer for me,” he complained.
Rourke sighed. “Praying for you would wear out a rosary a week. I might’ve known it was you when we heard the crash down the street. I’ve been waiting for you to wreck that jalopy ever since you took out junk insurance on it.”
Shayne sank down in a leather chair. He growled, “Phyllis will be happy about it. She’s been after me to buy a new one ever since we were married.”
“What’d you hit, a milk truck?” Rourke asked. “Sounded like two milk trucks.”
“It was a black sedan and it wasn’t an accident. They had something they wanted to unload on me, and it wasn’t milk.”
Rourke’s lean body twitched with apprehension. The grin faded from his face. “You don’t mean—”
“Yep.” Shayne forestalled further revelations in the presence of Cassidy. “I managed to ditch it for the time being,” he added cryptically. “We’ll have to attend to it later. How about Marlow? Did you locate him here?”
Rourke nodded. He looked wholly unhappy but he didn’t pursue the subject. “Whit Marlow,” he amplified. “Checked in from New York shortly after noon.”
“What have you got on Marlow?” Cassidy interposed. “Anything I ought to know, Mike?”
“I don’t know yet. Is he in his room?” Shayne looked at his watch. How long would it take the police to finish a report on the wreck and leave the scene?
Cassidy said, “Marlow went out right after he checked in and hasn’t showed again.”
“How about checking his room?”
“All right,
if you say so. I’ll tell the clerk so he can ring us if Marlow pops up while we’re working.” Cassidy got up and lumbered to the desk.
Rourke leaned toward Shayne and whispered tensely, “What happened up the street? Do you mean we got her back?”
“I hope so.” Shayne groaned audibly. “This car smashed me and dumped her to make it look like she was riding with me. Come on, let’s check this lead and see what turns up.”
Cassidy was waiting for them at the elevator. As they got in, he warned the elevator boy, “We’re going into two-fourteen. Fellow named Marlow. If the clerk gives you the high sign, stall on bringing Marlow up till we can get clear.”
The operator nodded. Cassidy led the way to 214 and opened the door with a master key. They entered a bedroom which showed little sign of occupancy—an opened Gladstone on the bed, a closed leather grip in one corner.
Shayne went to the bed and began going through the Gladstone, laying articles of clothing out in a neat pile. The bag contained only the normal articles which a man might pack for a trip. Replacing the contents neatly, he went to the closed grip and unbuckled leather straps.
The grip, which was unlocked, was fitted with medium-priced toilet articles. There were shoes, a wad of soiled clothing and, among other things, a small flat scrapbook which Shayne seized upon eagerly. He rocked back on his heels and flipped the pages open, studied press clippings relating to the engagements of one Beany Baxter’s Band at various dance places and second-rate hotels throughout the New England states.
With Rourke and Cassidy peering over his shoulder Shayne pointed out a thin-faced boyish figure in a picture of Beany Baxter’s Swing Band. “That’s Marlow,” he said. “First saxophone.”
Disappointed, Cassidy declared, “There ain’t no law against tooting a sax that I know of. Hell, Mike, I don’t see anything wrong.”
“Neither do I,” Shayne said, and continued to turn the pages.
The last pasted entry was dated two months previous, from Northampton, Massachusetts. It was a brief item stating that the band had arrived to play a two weeks’ engagement at the Pavilion Royale in that city.
Bodies Are Where You Find Them Page 7
