“Such as?”
“Such as that one of the characters in the poker game is Big Ed Bradley from Chicago. I don’t think that all a top Syndicate man has to do is sneeze, and every hoodlum in the country blows his nose. But I’m going to be taking Big Ed’s dough, and he won’t like that. When money changes hands, he wants to be on the taking end. Without blowing it up too big, he has connections, and I want to be in another country before he gets on the phone. Miami is going to be very warm for me. That’s why tomorrow has to be the day.”
“Darling.” Miriam came out of the chair in one fluid motion and threw herself on the bed beside him, one arm across his chest. “Don’t postpone it. Give it up.”
“Give it up?” he said in amazement.
“Don’t I mean anything to you?”
He said carefully, “Not that much.”
“Clayt, listen to me. I told you we’d decide about our future when we had the money. But I think these last three weeks have been the most exciting in my life, because I’ve shared them with you. I’m in love with you, you big lunkhead. God help me, I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything. I want you to be happy. If I thought this wild thing would make you happy, I wouldn’t try to stop you. I’d help you. But you’ve been carrying this bitterness around for a long time, and you can’t get rid of it just by pulling a trigger.”
“I can try.”
“You know it’s crazy, don’t you?”
“Sometimes I have a sneaking suspicion.”
“But how will it change anything?” she said desperately. “Did it change anything to put you in prison for thirteen years? What good will it do to shoot Shayne? Will it get you back any of that time?”
“It may get me back a little self-respect.”
She put her face against his shoulder and whispered, “Clayt, I want to marry you, if that’s what you want, if you don’t, anything else is fine with me. You’re what I’ve been looking for and waiting for.”
“No,” he said.
“Darling, it’s your decision. If you go ahead with it, I couldn’t ever feel I could count on you again. That may not mean much to you. But I want you to realize what you’re giving up.”
He moved restlessly. “No,” he said again.
“I’ll change the split. I’ll give you another five percent.”
“You’re increasing your offer,” he said roughly. “First marriage, then another five percent. I think I’ll hold out for six.”
“Clayt, you damn fool. Won’t you miss it at all?”
“I’ll miss it,” he said, “but I think I’d wake up to find a note on the pillow in a couple of weeks anyway. I doubt if you’d settle for being Mrs. Bram Clayton. The trouble with me is, I don’t really mind living in furnished rooms.”
She came down to him and kissed him hard. His arms tightened around her.
“Damn you,” she said fiercely.
To her own surprise, her eyes had filled with tears. They seemed to surprise Clayton too, for he kissed her more gently. The gentleness passed at once, and a roaring began in Miriam’s blood, rising until it became a heavy continuous roll of thunder. He was deranged on one important subject. In many ways she didn’t really like him. He was right—as soon as she had the money she would say a quick goodbye to Bram Clayton.
But meanwhile, here he was, with his arms around her and his mouth on hers.
11
Clayton slept after a time, but Miriam lay awake in the darkness, watching the reflections cross the ceiling.
After perhaps an hour she got up, wearing only her crumpled pajama tops. She found an aspirin bottle in her purse and swallowed three tablets, washing them down with whiskey. She poured more whiskey into the glass and took it back to the bed with her. She sat on the edge of the bed with the glass between her knees, thinking.
Now and then she checked her wristwatch. At three she lay back, at three-thirty she got up again for more aspirin. She had used all her weapons to shake Clayton’s obsession, and none of them had worked. She felt worn out and disgusted, with herself and with Clayton. For an instant she thought wildly of denouncing him to the police for the boy’s murder. The son of a bitch ought to be punished for what he was putting her through. But that would be as senseless as his own desire to revenge himself on Shayne.
She fell asleep at last, as the first daylight came into the room.
She was awakened by a loud knocking at the door, in the staccato shave-and-a-haircut rhythm that identified Fran. She sat bolt upright, feeling a terrible pain behind her eyes. Her mouth was thick, and she found that she couldn’t swallow.
Clayton was at the dresser, crouching so he could see into the mirror to brush his hair. He turned at the knock.
“Wait a minute,” Miriam gasped.
As she swung her legs out of bed, she felt the room turn a complete somersault. She reached for her wrapper, which had been tossed across the foot-board. The sleeves were inside-out, and for a moment she thought she could never succeed in getting them untangled. Somehow she managed to get it on. Clayton threw her his hairbrush, and stood by impatiently while she ran it through her tangled hair.
“I haven’t got all day,” he said.
The knock at the door was repeated, and Smith’s voice called, “Aren’t you up in there, Actor? Big day!”
Miriam tried to find her lipstick, scrabbling among the jumbled articles on the bedside table. Clayton, unable to wait any longer, threw open the door. Fran Smith came in, carrying a long parcel like a bundle of laundry, wrapped in brown paper.
“You told me to be on the dot, for Christ’s sake,” he said irritably. “Well, here I am.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Clayton said. “What time have you got? I wanted to get some coffee.”
“Hell with that,” Smith said. “Let’s get going.”
He moved excitedly around the room, cradling his package in his arms. Clayton picked up the whiskey bottle from the floor where it had rolled during the night. He uncorked it and helped himself to a long drink, and then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He turned back to the mirror and touched the birth-mark he had fixed to one cheekbone. Miriam noticed for the first time that he had made other changes in his appearance. His hair was parted in the middle, which made him look much younger. One front tooth seemed to be missing. His pants were too loose, and the shirt was too large for him.
“Actor,” Smith said scornfully, “one of these days I’m going to put you in for the Academy Award.”
“I wish to God you’d do something about that puss of yours,” Clayton said.
“Aah I couldn’t improve on it,” Smith said. “What do you think, kid?” he asked Miriam.
She was lighting a cigarette shakily, and didn’t answer.
“No,” Smith went on, “why should I worry and get gray hair? Nobody’s picked me out of a line-up yet. There’s something about me nobody likes to remember—but don’t agree with me, goddam you, or I’ll bat you one. You’re not paying attention, kid. I like the dolls to pay attention. What have you got on underneath, nothing?”
He took her by surprise, pulling her wrapper apart before she could stop him. She twitched away angrily and tightened the belt.
“Keep your hands to yourself, will you?”
He was pretending to be awe-struck. “Baby, why didn’t anybody tell me? I always thought you wore a built-up bra.”
“That’s enough,” Clayton said.
Smith looked at him innocently. “Don’t you like it when I pay your babe a compliment? All I did was look.”
“Lay off, Fran. What about the car?”
“Downstairs, and she’s in nice shape. A last year’s Chevy, black, with a hand-shift. The first one I snagged was a little low on the jump-off, so I switched. This Chevy feels almost as nice as your doll. No, I’m not supposed to say things like that, am I?”
“Is that the Thompson?” Clayton said, nodding at the paper-wrapped parcel.
“That’s the old meat-chopper,” Smith
said. “I didn’t like to leave her downstairs. The price has gone up on them lately, and who knows what a cop would say if he found a tommy in the front seat of a hot car?”
He aimed the parcel around the room, making no sound but vibrating all over as though from the recoil. He ended up aiming at Miriam on the bed. He aimed first at her face, then her body, his arms shaking violently, and sprayed her thoroughly with imaginary bullets. She could feel her stomach muscles contracting, as though for protection. He ended with his eerie laugh.
“Kid, I’d like to do something to you,” he said. “Maybe not this, but something.”
“How was your night?” she inquired coldly. “Get plenty of sleep?”
A quick change came over the boy. His eyes paled and narrowed, and his whole face became ugly. Miriam froze. If he had actually had his finger on a trigger at that moment, she knew he would have fired.
“What are you trying to do, ride me?” he demanded, his voice rising. “What do you think, I can’t make it with a babe?”
“Fran, for God’s sake,” Clayton said.
“You heard what she said,” Smith almost screamed. “She implied—”
“Nobody’s implying anything, and who gives a damn anyway?” Clayton said.
He buckled on his shoulder harness, after checking the heavy automatic, then put on a loose sports jacket, shrugging the shoulders and smoothing it down over the bulge. He looked into the mirror again.
Smith’s fury passed as quickly as it had come. “You’re beautiful,” he told Clayton wearily. “Spray on some deodorant and let’s go, or the guy’s going to get away from us again.”
“Yeah,” Clayton said, and threw at Miriam, “Watch the store, baby.”
“And don’t let the Fuller Brush man in while we’re gone,” Smith added.
They went out, leaving Miriam alone.
She stubbed out her half-smoked cigarette. Her brain was heavy. She had a terrible feeling of foreboding and failure. For three weeks she had watched her plan go forward without any hitch, and had congratulated herself on her choice of Clayton. It still seemed inconceivable to her that all that time he had been working on a plan of his own, a plan that was all too likely to make the robbery impossible. And the horrible thing was that there was no way to stop him.
She dressed slowly, putting on a pink blouse and a tight black skirt, her fingers fumbling and unsure. She had a hard time with zippers and catches. When she leaned over to put on her shoes she suddenly felt dizzy, and nearly fell. Her headache continued to open up new areas of pain.
She completed her make-up at last, sitting on the side of the bed. She was too sick and exhausted to stand. She had to do something. The whiskey bottle, on the bureau where Clayton had put it, offered a kind of solace, and finally she reached out and poured herself a large medicinal dose.
She hated to drink in the morning. It was a form of surrender—she had a firm belief that before-breakfast drinking would be the first step toward loss of her looks and eventual collapse. But today was an exception to every rule she had ever made. The whiskey blazed a path down her throat, and soon she began to recover.
She could walk, she found. She saw one of Clayton’s shoes on the rug, and gave it a vicious kick that sent it spinning under the bed. What she would really like to do, she told herself, would be to go to the nearest police station and tell the desk sergeant that a man she knew was lying in wait for Michael Shayne in front of such-and-such a hotel. She had never been able to understand revenge as a motive for irrational action, as she had seen it in Clayton and others. But she understood it now. She could actually see herself walking up the steps of the police station. It would ruin everything for her, but it would give her a wonderful feeling of release.
Then she stood still. Clayton and his stupid friend were walking into a trap! Now that it was too late, she had the one argument that would have stopped them. But was it too late? She brushed her hand through her hair.
What was the name of Shayne’s hotel? She thought back in a frenzy.
Snatching up her purse, she ran out. The phone was on the wall at the foot of the front stairs, with the Miami phone book dangling from a nail beside it. Miriam seized the phone book, trying to remember the name of the Daily News reporter who was believed to have the inside track with Mike Shayne. It was an Irish name, she knew, and her mind skipped frantically from one name to another—Malone, O’Shaughnessy, O’Rourke. And then she had it. Rourke, Timothy Rourke. Her finger flew up and down the columns. She found the number of the Daily News just as her landlady came out of the kitchen.
Miriam started. “Good morning. Just looking up an address.”
She hurried out to the street and along it to the corner, where she remembered having seen an open glass phone booth. She had to look up the number again. But would Rourke be at work this early? Probably not, she decided. She flipped over the pages till she found his home number, then shut herself into the booth, dropped a dime into the slot and dialled the number. She brushed back her hair again with the back of her hand. She felt scattered and badly disorganized. She would have to think up a story as she went along.
A man’s voice answered sleepily after the sixth ring.
“Mr. Rourke?” she said breathlessly.
“That’s right. Who’s calling me at such an ungodly hour?”
“I’m—Agatha Wiley,” Miriam said. “You wouldn’t know me. I’m in the most dreadful jam, and I have to find out—”
“Hold on,” Rourke said. “Put yourself in my shoes, I mean in my pajamas. No, you probably wouldn’t want to put yourself in my pajamas, they wouldn’t fit. I’m not sure what I’m saying. You woke me up out of a sound sleep, and I’m in no condition to make very good sense. Let me light a cigarette.”
She heard a scrabbling sound, the scratching of a match. The reporter breathed out luxuriously. “First today. Now where were we? Let me get one thing straight. You sound like a good-looking babe. Is this correct?”
“Well, I don’t get many complaints, but—”
“Blonde? Brunette?”
“I’m blonde, actually. Please, Mr. Rourke—”
“Would you care to trust me with your measurements? As a newspaper reporter, I like to get the facts straight.”
“Mr. Rourke, if you don’t stop talking nonsense I’m going to hang up this minute. It’s something awful, and I need advice and help, not a lot of silly chatter. I have to see Michael Shayne, and I thought you’d be able to—”
“Mike isn’t too crazy about blondes,” the reporter said easily, “which is one of the ways he differs from me. How far away are you? Give me a couple of minutes to get some clothes on, or don’t give me a couple of minutes to get some clothes on, as the case may be, and come on over. I give better advice in person than on the telephone.”
“I don’t have time!” she cried. “I have to find out where Mr. Shayne lives so I can talk to him. I’m in danger.”
The reporter’s voice became a shade more serious. “I grant you—you’d be in worse danger if you came to see me. With blondes, I have very little self control. Well, you might be able to catch Mike at his office later in the morning. He usually gets in around ten. You’ll find the address in the book. But he’ll be busy today, as you know if you’ve seen the morning paper.”
Suddenly Miriam had an inspiration. “That’s just it, Mr. Rourke. It’s connected with that same matter, or I think it must be. I had dinner at the Seafarer last night—but I can’t tell you about it on the phone.” She concluded desperately, “You have to believe me.”
There was an instant’s silence, then Rourke said, “I’ll take a chance. Agatha what? Wiley? Let’s see, its ten of nine now. He’d still be home. I’ll give him a ring and tell him to wait till you get there.”
He gave her an address which she recognized as a block on the north side of the Miami River, not far from the bay.
“And I’m a reporter, don’t forget,” he said. “Give me a hint.”
“Oh,
this is not for publication!” she said, alarmed. “Bless you, Mr. Rourke. Maybe,” she added shyly, “maybe we will meet one day, who knows?”
She hung up with an exclamation of disgust. Men were such fools.
She waved down a cruising taxi and told the driver to take her to the north end of the Miami River drawbridge. She looked through her purse to be sure she had enough cash for the fare. Yes. How much time would she have? Rourke would tell Shayne that a woman named Agatha Wiley was on her way to see him with an important piece of information. While Shayne waited in his room, Miriam would be able to talk Smith and Clayton out of using their guns. When they heard what she had to say, they would put it off; they would have to.
The effect of the whiskey, which had carried her this far, had worn away. Her headache was back in full force. Her stomach was queasy. She closed her eyes and breathed in quick shallow gulps, her hand to her lips.
The taxi slowed. “This all right, lady?” the driver asked.
“Yes, yes,” she said faintly, and thrust the money at him.
She felt a little better when her feet were again on solid ground. She crossed the avenue with the light, wishing that bars were open this early in the morning. One more drink was all she needed, but she needed it badly.
She looked for a Chevy with two men in it, and saw it almost at once. It was parked at the curb with a fire hydrant in front of it, so its driver could pull out in a hurry.
Smith, alone in the back seat, was reading the story about the explosion in the morning paper, a grin contorting his pale features. The paper-wrapped parcel was on his lap. Clayton, a cigarette smoldering unnoticed in his mouth, leaned forward with his arms folded over the steering wheel. She followed his look, and saw a large square apartment-hotel. The Chevy was parked where it commanded a view of both front and side entrances.
Miriam bit down hard. There could be only one possible explanation for this parked car, with the two men sitting in it in just those positions. Even the most casual passerby, she thought, would instantly realize that they were waiting here to kill somebody.
Target_Mike Shayne Page 10
