The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Original)

by Unknown

  “We won’t be no good to you that way,” Blackie protested, “if they’re hid out along the road to pick you off.”

  “They’ll just pick all three of us off if you guys are in sight, too,” Shayne argued reasonably. “I don’t think they’ll try anything till we get there, and I want them to think I came alone so they’ll be off guard. Get down and stay down until the shooting starts or until I yell or give you some signal. Then come out like a couple of firecrackers.”

  The two gunsels got down in the back. Shayne drove along at a moderate pace, watching his speedometer. It was lonely and quiet on this desolate road leading to the coast. There were no habitations, and no other cars on the road. It was a perfect setting for murder.

  CHAPTER SIX

  LAST ROUND ON THE HOUSE

  narrower and less-used road turned off to the right at the end of exactly two miles. A wooden arrow that had once been painted white pointed west, and dingy black letters said, LODGE.

  Shayne turned westward and slowed his car still more as it bumped along the uneven ruts. Sunlight lay hot and white on the narrow lane between tall pines, and the smell of the sea told him he was approaching close to one of the saltwater inlets.

  The car panted over a little rise, and he saw the weathered rock walls of John Grossman’s fishing lodge through the pines on the left. It was a low, sprawling structure, and a pair of ruts turned off abruptly to lead up to it.

  Two men stepped into the middle of the lane to block his way when he was fifty feet from the building. This was so exactly what Shayne had expected that he cut his motor and braked to an easy stop with the front bumper almost against the men. He leaned out and asked, “This John Grossman’s place?” then opened the door and stepped out quickly to show he was unarmed and to prevent them from coming to the side of the car, where they might look in the back.

  One of the men was very tall and thin, with cadaverous features and deep hollows for eye sockets. He wore a beautifully tailored suit of silk pongee with a tan shirt and shoes and a light tan snap-brimmed felt hat. He had his arms folded across his thin chest with his right hand inside the lapel of his unbuttoned coat close to a bulge just below his left shoulder. His face was darkly sun-tanned and he showed white teeth in a saturnine smile as he stood in the middle of the road without moving.

  His companion was a head shorter than Slim. He had a broad, pugnacious face with a flat nose spread over a lot of it. He was hatless and coatless, wearing a shirt with loud yellow stripes, with elastic armbands making tucks in the full sleeves. He stood flat-footed with his hand openly gripping the butt of a revolver thrust down behind the waistband of his trousers.

  Shayne stood beside the car and surveyed them coolly. He said: “I don’t think we’ve met formally. I’m Shayne.”

  Pug said: “Yeah. We know. This here’s Slim.” He jerked the thumb of his left hand toward his tall companion.

  Shayne said: “I thought this was a social call. Where’s Grossman?”

  “He sent us out to see you were clean before you come in.” Slim’s lips barely moved to utter the words. He sauntered around the front of the car toward Shayne, keeping his hand inside his coat. His deep-set eyes were cold and glittered like polished agate. His head was thrust forward on a long thin neck.

  Shayne took two backward steps. He said: “I’m clean. I came out to talk business. This is a hell of a way to greet a guy.”

  Pug moved behind Slim. He was obviously the slower-witted and the less dangerous of the pair. He blinked in the bright sunlight and said: “Why don’t we let ’im have it here?”

  Slim said: “We do.” His lips began to smile and Shayne knew he was a man who enjoyed watching his victims die.

  Shayne pretended he didn’t hear or didn’t understand the byplay between the two killers. They had both moved to the side of the car now, and were circling slowly toward him.

  He said: “I brought along some cold beer. It’s here in the back.” He reached for the handle of the rear door and turned it steadily until the latch was free. He flung himself to the ground, jerking the door wide open as he did so.

  Slim’s gun flashed in the sunlight at the same instant that fire blazed from the back seat. Slim staggered back and dropped to one knee, steadying his gun to return the fire.

  Shayne lay flat on the ground and saw Pug spun around by the impact of a .45 slug in his thick shoulder. He stayed on his feet and his own gun rained bullets into the tonneau.

  Slim fired twice before a bullet smashed the saturnine grin back into his mouth. He crumpled slowly forward onto the sunlighted pine needles and lay very still.

  Pug went down at almost the same instant with a look of complete bewilderment on his broad face. He dropped his revolver and put both hands over his belly, lacing his stubby fingers together tightly. He sank to a sitting position with his legs doubled under him, and swayed there for a moment before toppling over on his side.

  There was no more shooting. And there was no sound from the back of the car.

  Shayne got up stiffly and began dusting the dirt off his clothes. He heard shouts and looked up to see excited men filtering through the trees and coming from behind the lodge to converge on the car. He went around to the right-hand side and opened the back door to peer inside.

  Both Blackie and Lennie were quite dead. Blackie lay with his body sprawled half out on the running board, his gun hand trailing in the dirt. Blood was trickling through two holes in his yellow polo shirt. His mouth was open.

  Lennie was crouched down on the floor behind him and there was a gaping hole where his right eye had been. His thin features were composed and he looked more at peace with the world than Shayne had ever seen him look before.

  Will Gentry came puffing up behind Shayne, his red face suffused and perspiring. A tall, black-mustached man, wearing the clothes of a farmer and carrying a rifle, was close behind him. Other men were dressed like farmers, and Shayne recognized half a dozen of Gentry’s plainclothes detectives among them. He saw Tim Rourke’s grinning face and had time to give the reporter a quick nod of recognition before Gentry caught his arm and pulled him about angrily, demanding: “What the bloody blazes are you pulling off here, Mike?”

  “I? Nothing.” Shayne arched his red eyebrows sardonically at the chief of detectives. “Can I help it if some damned hoods choose this place to settle one of their feuds?” He stepped back and waved toward the rear of the car. “Couple of hitch-hikers I picked up. Why don’t you ask them why they started shooting?”

  “They’re both dead,” Gentry asserted angrily after a quick survey. “And the other two?” He started around the car.

  “This one’s still alive,” Rourke called out cheerfully, kneeling beside Pug. “But I don’t think he will be long.”

  Shayne sauntered around behind Gentry. Blood was seeping between Pug’s fingers laced together in front of him, but his eyes were open and when Gentry shook him and demanded to know where Grossman was, he muttered thickly: “Inside. Cellar.”

  “You. Yancy and Marks,” Gentry directed two of his men. “Stay here and get a statement from him. Find out what this shooting is about. Everything. The rest of you fan out and surround the house. Take it careful and be ready to shoot. The real criminal is in there.”

  Shayne took Gentry’s place beside Pug as Gentry moved away to direct the placing of his men around the house. He leaned close to the dying man and asked: “Where’s the girl, Pug? The girl. Where is she?”

  “Inside.”

  Shayne got to his feet. Rourke got up beside him and grabbed his arm. “Sweet Jesus, Mike! I don’t know what any of this is about, but it’s some Caesarian.”

  Shayne pulled away from him and started stalking toward the fishing lodge. Rourke hurried after him, expostulating: “Hold it, Mike. Don’t try to go in there. Didn’t you hear the guy? Grossman’s inside. Let Gentry and the sheriff chase him out in the open.”

  Shayne didn’t pay any attention to him. Unarmed, he strode on toward the
sprawling stone house, his face set and hard.

  Gentry was spacing his men about to cover all exits. He saw Shayne’s intention and called out gruffly: “Don’t, Mike. No need for anybody to get hurt now. We’ll smoke him out.”

  Shayne went on without hesitation. He mounted the wide stone steps, his heels pounding loud in the sudden stillness, and went on to a sagging screen door. He pulled it open and went in, blinking his eyes against the dimness.

  The interior of the house had a stale, long-unused smell. It was cool and quiet inside the thick rock walls. A wide arched opening led into a big room on the right.

  Shayne went in and saw Myrna Hastings sitting upright in a heavy chair fashioned of twisted mangrove roots. Her legs and arms were bound tightly to the chair and her mouth was sealed with adhesive tape. Her eyes rolled up at him wildly as he strode across the room, getting out his knife.

  He slashed the cords binding her arms and legs, pulled her upright and put his left arm about her shoulders. “This is going to hurt,” he warned. “Set your lips and mouth tightly.”

  She nodded and her eyes told him she understood. He ripped the adhesive loose in one jerk and put his other arm around her. She clung to him, crying softly.

  He looked around the room and gave a grunt of satisfaction when he saw a square of water-soaked canvas on the floor with a pile of straw and bottles on top of it. An empty bottle lay on its side and another stood open.

  Shayne drew her forward gently, instructing her: “Try to walk. Use your arms and legs and they’ll limber up.”

  She said, through her tears: “I’m trying. I’m all right. I knew you’d come, Mike.”

  She drew away from him as he leaned down to pick up the open bottle. He studied the water-soaked label and his eyes glinted. It was Monnet cognac, vintage of 1926. The bottle was half-full. He drew in a long gulping breath of the bouquet, then put the bottle in Myrna’s hands. “Take a good drink. Everything’s all right now.”

  She obediently tilted the bottle to her lips. A flush came to her cheeks as she swallowed. Shayne laughed and took it away from her. “It’s my turn.” He drank from it and then led her over to a dusty rattan couch.

  She sat down limply and he got out two cigarettes. He put one between her lips and the other in his mouth, thumb-nailed a match and lit them both.

  She started violently when Gentry’s voice bellowed at him from outside. “Shayne! What’s happening in there?”

  Shayne called back: “A lady and I are having a drink. Leave us alone.” He laughed down at Myrna’s bewildered face. “We’re surrounded by a posse of detectives and deputy sheriffs. They’re summoning their nerve to storm the place.”

  “What happened?” she asked tensely. “All that shooting. They were laying a trap for you, weren’t they? I heard them talking before they went out. They were going to kill you because they thought you’d read the log-book. I told them you hadn’t but they wouldn’t believe me. I was so frightened when I heard the shooting. I was sure you’d walked right into the trap.” She began to tremble violently.

  Shayne patted her hand reassuringly. “I practically never walk into a trap.”

  hey heard cautious shuffling footsteps on the porch outside, and Gentry’s voice lowered to a rumble. “Mike. Where are you?”

  “In here,” Shayne called blithely. He put the bottle to his swollen lips and sucked on it greedily. He lowered it and grinned as Gentry tiptoed in with drawn gun, followed closely by the mustached sheriff with his rifle cocked and ready.

  “You look,” Shayne chuckled, “like the last two of the Mohicans.”

  Gentry straightened his bulky body and glared across the dim room at Shayne and the girl. “What the devil’s going on? Who’s that and how did she get here?”

  Shayne said: “You met Miss Hastings last night, Will. Why don’t you and Leatherstockings run along down to the cellar and look for Grossman? That’s where Pug said he was.”

  Other men began to file cautiously into the hallway behind their leaders. Gentry turned to them and growled: “Find the cellar stairs. And take it careful. Grossman isn’t the kind to be taken alive.” He crossed the room heavily. “And you can start talking, Mike. What are you and this girl up to?”

  “Nothing immoral—with so many people around.”

  Gentry stopped in front of him on widespread legs. “What kind of a run-around am I getting?”

  Shayne said: “You’re giving it to yourself, whatever it is. I didn’t invite you out here.”

  “No. Thought you were pulling a fast one. Covering up for a murderer to get a rake-off on a bunch of smuggled liquor. By God, Shayne, you can’t wiggle out of that one.”

  Shayne took a pull from the bottle. “It’s mighty good liquor. Next time you send a stool to cover the switchboard on my hotel don’t use a guy with d-i-c-k written all over him.”

  Gentry gulped back his anger. “I wondered who sent Tim Rourke to me with a tip there’d be fireworks. You can’t deny you brought along a couple of gunsels to wipe out Grossman and his gang and keep the stuff for yourself. If I hadn’t overheard the call and beat it out here you might have pulled it off.”

  Shayne laughed and sank down on the couch beside Myrna. “How much of the deal do you know?”

  “Plenty. I always suspected Captain Samuels was running stuff for Grossman when he lost his boat in ’30. That’s why Grossman killed him last night. Fighting over division of the liquor that was cached here when Grossman was sent up.”

  “You’re fairly close,” Shayne admitted. “When you find Grossman—”

  “He’ll talk,” Gentry promised.

  “Want to bet on it?” Shayne’s eyes were very bright.

  “I never bet with you. With your damned shenanigans … What’s this girl got to do with it?” Gentry pointed a stern finger at Myrna. “One of Grossman’s little friends?”

  “She wanted to see a detective in action,” Shayne replied.

  Shayne set the bottle on the floor and sat up straighter when a detective trotted in and reported excitedly: “We’ve searched the cellar and the whole house, Chief. Not another soul here.”

  Gentry began to curse luridly. Shayne got up and interrupted him. “I don’t think your men knew where to look in the cellar. Let’s take a look.”

  He went out to the hallway and found Rourke coming up the cellar stairs with a flashlight in his hand.

  “No soap,” Rourke reported to Shayne. “He must have made his getaway when we left the house uncovered to see what the shooting was about.”

  “Your fault,” Gentry said bitterly behind Shayne. “If we don’t pick him up I’m slapping a charge of obstructing justice on you.”

  Shayne took the flashlight from Rourke. He led the way down into a small dank furnace room with a dirt floor. He flashed the light around, then walked over to a small rectangular area where the ground showed signs of having been recently disturbed. “Try digging here, but don’t blame me if Grossman doesn’t tell you the whole story when you find him.”

  “There?” Gentry gagged over the word. “You mean he’s dead?”

  “Unless he’s a Yogi or some damned thing.” Shayne shrugged and handed the flashlight back to Rourke. “Hell, he had to be dead, Will. Nothing else made any sense.”

  “You mean nothing makes sense,” Gentry said perplexedly.

  Shayne sighed and said: “I’ll draw you pictures. One question first, though. Did Guildford make a phone call between the time you checked for Miss Hastings at the Crestwood last night and before you came to my place looking for her?”

  “Guildford?” Gentry’s tone mirrored his bewilderment. “The lawyer? What the hell has that got to do with it?”

  “Did he?”

  “Well, yes, I think he did, come to think of it. He called his home from the public booth in the Crestwood after we learned the girl wasn’t in. I suggested that we see you and he didn’t want his wife to worry if he got home later than she expected.”

  Shayne nodded. “
He said he called his wife. But you didn’t go in the booth with him and listen in on his conversation?”

  “Of course not,” Gentry sputtered.

  Shayne took his time about lighting a cigarette, then continued. “If you had, you would have heard him calling Pug or Slim at Chunky’s joint and telling them to hang around the Crestwood until Myrna Hastings came in—and then grab her. He was covering every angle,” Shayne went on earnestly, “after he discovered that empty hiding place in the captain’s bedroom. He knew the captain knew the location of the liquor cache after Samuels brought in a case and sold it for a hundred bucks to make a payment on the mortgage. And when the poor old guy died while he was torturing him, he must have been frantic for fear he’d never find the stuff.”

  “Are you talking about Mr. Guildford? The attorney?”

  Shayne nodded. “Leroy P. Guildford. Once a junior member of the firm of Leland and Parker, which specialized in criminal practice and defended John Grossman in 1930. He must have known of the existence of the liquor cache all the time, but it wasn’t worth much until the recent liquor shortage, and Captain Samuels wouldn’t play ball with him. After he killed Grossman, Samuels was his only chance to learn where the liquor was hidden.”

  “Are you saying Guildford killed Grossman?”

  “Sure. Or had Pug and Slim do the job for him. He brought Grossman out here last Tuesday, then went to Samuels and told him what had happened, and suggested that with Grossman dead they might as well split the liquor.”

  “But Grossman talked to you over the phone just this morning,” Gentry argued.

  Shayne shook his head. “I knew that couldn’t be Grossman. He had to be dead. The only other person it could be was Guildford, disguising his voice to lure me out here so he could get rid of the only two people who knew about the log-book and the liquor.”

  “Why,” asked Gentry with forced calm, “did Grossman have to be dead?”

  “Nothing else made sense.” Shayne spread out his big hands. “Captain Samuels knew where the liquor was all the time and he was practically starving, yet he never touched it. Why? Because he was an honorable man and it didn’t belong to him. Why, then, would he suddenly forget his scruples and sell a case? Because Grossman was dead and it no longer belonged to anybody.”