The Body Came Back

by Brett Halliday

  “He was dead when I met him.” Shayne got out somewhat reluctantly, though he realized he could also stand a drink at this point.

  They went inside the noisy bar which was still crowded this late on Saturday night and had a jukebox in one corner that added to the drunken din of voices.

  They found a vacant booth at the extreme end of the room where they couldn’t possibly be overheard, and waited until drinks were put in front of them by a hard-faced, big-breasted waitress who was in a hurry to get back to a conversation she was having at the bar with two men who took turns patting her butt while she leaned between them.

  “Al Donlin,” Shayne said after he took the first sip of his drink. “That’s his name. Ring a bell?”

  Rourke shook his head. “Mrs. Duclos didn’t mention his last name. No, it doesn’t, Mike. Could be he was using an alias… if he’s got a record.”

  “Yeh. It could be. Carla evidently didn’t know anything about that… him being mixed up in something recently and being wanted. Maybe she would have reacted differently, if she had known. But I guess not. It wouldn’t really have changed anything. He was dead… and her daughter had shot her own father.” He made a grimace. “Where do we go from here? Where in hell is Duclos?”

  “Let’s put ourselves in his place. Assume that Al did confide in him that he was in trouble and on the lam and needed money desperately, and was headed for the Encanto Hotel to brace his wife for some… that’s what he was after, I suppose?”

  “She doesn’t know, of course. Remember, she didn’t even see him alive. He pushed in on the girl, completely unknown to her, demanded her mother, and said, ‘You must be Vicky.’ Naturally, she didn’t know what it was about. They had a struggle and she grabbed up a pistol that fell out of her suitcase and shot him. He probably did go there for money, though.”

  “Wait a minute. If he just hit town today… and they’ve been out of touch for years… and you say she just flew in from Hollywood tonight… how in hell did he know to go straight to her suite at the Encanto?”

  “Carla wondered about that, too. But I found a newspaper clipping in his pocket torn out of yesterday’s News, with a picture of the daughter and a story about her wedding and the statement that her mother was flying in today… or yesterday, that is,” he added with a look at his watch. “It was a hell of a coincidence, but he must have figured God was being good to him.”

  “All right. Back to Duclos. We’re assuming that he let Al take his car to go to the Encanto to try and get hold of some dough. An hour or so later, the police call to ask about the Ford registered in his name. He figures there’s been trouble, and quick says his car has been stolen. He still doesn’t know what has happened when he gets to the police station and discovers that a private detective has been picked up driving his car. No sign of Al. No word about him at all. What in hell can the guy do? He can’t ask questions without getting involved. He must be in a hell of a dither right now wondering where the devil Al is… what happened at the Encanto… and particularly, how come Mike Shayne ended up driving his Ford. So, what does he do? Go home and to bed?”

  “Well, we know he didn’t do that.” Shayne morosely drained his glass and began making moisture rings with it on the formica table top.

  “None of this makes any real difference to my problem,” he pointed out impatiently. “That body is still floating around town wrapped up in a blanket from the Encanto Hotel… in a car the police know I was driving earlier. I’ve still got to get my hands on that corpse, Tim.”

  “I know. Sure.” Timothy Rourke lit a cigarette and frowned thoughtfully through the blue smoke across the table at his friend. “If we knew what Al was mixed up in it might help. Maybe he has known associates in Miami. Maybe Duclos knows about them and is trying to contact them… hoping to find Al or learn what became of him.” He looked down at his empty glass. “Maybe another drink will help.”

  Shayne shook his head and growled, “We’d better both go slow on the drinks until we find out where we stand. How about you going back to the office and checking crime stories for the last few days? Won’t you find it that way?”

  “Probably.” Rourke pushed the empty glass away reluctantly. “I hate to admit my memory is slipping. I always said I never forgot a face that had news value.”

  “You’re getting older,” Shayne chided him. “You pointed that out to me very forcibly tonight Why not go to the office and give your jaded memory an assist?”

  He left two bills on the table and they went out of the noisy tavern into the quiet of the night.

  With Rourke behind the wheel, Shayne suggested, “Let’s make one last swing back by the Duclos house. Maybe George has finally showed up.”

  But another drive past the house on 77th Street showed it still lighted as before and no Ford yet in evidence.

  Rourke speeded up after they passed, turned up to 79th and swung back east to the Boulevard.

  They drove south in brooding silence for a time, each busy with his own thoughts and secure in the knowledge that communication between the two of them did not require words at this point.

  Shayne roused himself from his reverie when Rourke began to slow for the turn off the Boulevard that would take him to the newspaper office.

  “Keep on going,” he directed. “I think you’d better drop me off, Tim.”

  “You sure? If I’m lucky it won’t take me very long to get all the dope on Al. I know it’s right there, Mike.”

  Shayne said, “I’d better get back to my place. It occurs to me that Duclos may be trying desperately to get hold of me right now… and God knows I’d like to reach him.”

  “That’s supposing he knows it was Al who had his car tonight, and he’s worried about what happened.”

  “Yeh. And it also crossed my mind that even if Al didn’t confide in his brother-in-law it’s possible he has other friends here who knew he was stealing that car to drive to the Encanto. Maybe they were waiting for him to come back with some dough. So they’ll be worried and wondering, and maybe try to reach me.”

  “How would they know you had anything to do with Al’s disappearance?”

  “There was that one o’clock newscast,” Shayne reminded him. “Private dick caught driving automobile stolen from George Duclos. Anyone who knew Al was supposed to be using that car would start wondering when he heard that”

  “I guess so.” Rourke continued on south past Flagler Street, and turned off to pull up in front of Shayne’s hotel. “Can I get you here as soon as I dig up that information?”

  “I’ll call you at the office if anything comes up before you call.” Shayne got out and went in to the empty lobby of the small hotel while Rourke pulled away behind him.

  Pete, the night clerk was on duty. He was a longtime employee of the hotel, a confidant of the detective, and the sharer of many of the redhead’s secrets.

  He grinned widely from behind the desk as Shayne approached, and assumed a conspiratorial manner. “Hi, Mr. Shayne. After that one o’clock newscast I wondered did they have you under the jail or what. That’s what I told the dame when she came looking for you. I says to her, ‘Well, it’s okay for you to go up and wait for Mr. Shayne in his room because he always told me I wasn’t to say no to any female if she was under seventy and still had her own teeth. Make yourself at home,’ I told her, ‘but I sure can’t guarantee when he’ll be back.’ And she said she’d take a chance on that, and I sent her on up with a boy to unlock your door.”

  Shayne leaned on the counter and lifted ragged red eyebrows in astonishment. “A dame, Pete?”

  “Yeh. And she’s plenty under seventy and they sure look like her own teeth. She acted scared stiff and mighty anxious to see you. You in real trouble with the law this time?”

  Shayne said, “No more than usual, Pete. They’re yapping at my heels, sort of. I guess I can handle it.”

  “I bet you can,” said Pete worshipfully. “Why’d any cop be dumb enough to think you’d steal a car?”
<
br />   Shayne grinned and told him cheerfully, “I’ll call you for a character witness.”

  He left the desk and went to the open elevator where a colored boy dozed on the bench inside, tapped him on the shoulder to waken him and was taken up to the second floor.

  The door to his apartment was closed, but light from inside showed through the transom.

  Shayne unlocked the door and opened it, and said without too much surprise to the woman who leaped up and stood staring at him, “Hello, Carla. What’s wrong?”

  12.

  “Oh my God, Mike!” She trotted toward him, both hands outstretched, seeming to go all to pieces at the mere sight of him standing there.

  He caught her tightly by the elbows and she leaned her weight against him, her face buried against his shoulder, sobbing brokenly.

  He held her tightly for a moment, his brooding gaze looking over her head at the two liquor bottles he and Rourke had left sitting on the center table. He wasn’t sure, but he had a feeling the level of bourbon was about two inches lower than it had been when they went out.

  He turned her away from him after a moment, put an arm about her supple and firm waist, and half-propelled her back to the chair in which she had been sitting.

  “This is no time to go to pieces, Carla. How is Vicky?”

  “Oh, Vicky is all right. She’s fine.” She sank down into the chair and smiled waveringly up at him. “She’s sound asleep in bed with a couple of pills… convinced that everything is just fine and the sun will shine again tomorrow like always. These kids nowadays. My God,” she added wonderingly. “The way they take things in their stride…”

  “She didn’t ask too many questions?”

  “Hardly any. I didn’t really have a chance to tell her the story I’d worked out so carefully. She just wanted to put it away from her… out of her mind. She was hysterical at first, but when she calmed down and realized that a miracle had happened… you being the miracle, Mike… and that there wasn’t any body lying there in the bedroom… well, I think it began to seem like just a bad dream to her. When she wakes up in the morning I have a feeling she won’t be sure whether it actually happened or not.”

  Shayne said strongly, “That’s fine. That’s wonderful.” His hand strayed out to the cognac bottle to pour a drink and he glanced in her direction and saw that her eyes were following his hand avidly.

  “Maybe I better keep you company with a little bit of bourbon.”

  He said shortly, “Make it a very little bit, Carla. We may not be all the way out of the woods yet.”

  “You’re telling me!” She obediently poured a small drink in the glass Timothy Rourke had left on the table. “What did happen, Mike? I’m all confused and scared stiff. I had to come here and talk to you. I didn’t know what else to do… with Vicky asleep in the other room.”

  Shayne frowned uncomfortably at his glass and took a sip from it. “Well, I mislaid the body. That’s all. If I can locate that Ford and get it back again before anybody else finds it, we should still be in the clear.”

  “You… mislaid the body?” Her voice rose tremendously and she looked utterly aghast. “How could you do that?”

  “It took some doing,” he admitted with a grimace. “But trust Mike Shayne to work out the small details. I thought you’d have guessed that much,” he went on. “If you heard the newscast…”

  “What newscast?”

  “At one o’clock. I assumed that’s what frightened you… why you were here.”

  “I didn’t hear any newscast, Mike. I had a telephone call. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to think. Some man wanting ten thousand dollars. I tried to stall him the best I could. I didn’t know what to do. I was feeling so relaxed and wonderful. Vicky was back safely and I’d just gotten her to sleep with a couple of my pills, and I thought the nightmare was over. And then the phone rang. I thought of course it was you calling to say everything was all right, and I grabbed the phone fast before its ringing in the bedroom wakened Vicky. And a strange man answered.”

  “Exactly what did he say?” Shayne’s face and voice were grim.

  “I… can’t repeat his exact words,” she faltered. “I was so utterly surprised and taken aback… and terribly frightened, of course. He asked, ‘What have you and that damned private dick done with Al?’ And then he began abusing me, saying I’d be sorry I called you in on it, and I’d better get some money together quick because he had to have it tonight. Ten thousand dollars, he said, because he had what I was after. That Al had given it to him for safekeeping before he came to see me, and if I didn’t dig up ten thousand dollars tonight the deal was all off and I’d never see or hear from it again.”

  “What is it?” Shayne asked blankly.

  “That’s what I asked him,” she cried out wildly. “I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about and he just sneered and said he thought I could guess all right.

  “And I told him I didn’t have any sum like ten thousand dollars and he said I’d better dig it up in cash in the next couple of hours. And then he said something like, ‘Get your private eye pal to help you raise the money. He’s got connections in town. He’s into this right up to his neck with you, and he knows what I’ve got is worth a lot more than that.’”

  Shayne’s face expressed complete puzzlement. “It couldn’t have been Duclos,” he muttered. “Talking about the body. You’re sure he said it was something Al had given him for safe-keeping before he came to see you?”

  “That’s what he said. And he seemed positive I knew what he was talking about. Of course, after he hung up I realized he couldn’t know that I hadn’t even talked to Al. He was assuming that I had and that I knew all about it.”

  “How did you leave things?” demanded Shayne.

  “I told him to give me an hour or so to see if I could raise the money. I told him I’d have to go out, and I gave him this telephone number and your extension and told him to call me here after an hour or so. I didn’t know what else to tell him, Mike. I was afraid he’d come there and waken Vicky. Or that the phone might waken her. And I thought maybe you could help me raise the money. I’ve got a little over a thousand in my purse, Mike. I’ll give you an IOU for the rest. I can get it Monday with a wire to my bank in L.A.” The words tumbled excitedly out of her mouth. “You will help me, won’t you? There must be places you can go in Miami even at this time of night to get some cash.”

  “But what for?” demanded Shayne. “What are we buying for ten grand?”

  “I don’t know what he’s talking about, but the way I see it I’m buying Vicky’s peace of mind and her future happiness. Whoever he is and whatever he’s got that belonged to Al, it’s perfectly clear that he knows Al came to see me tonight, and if we don’t pay him off everything will have to come out in the papers. And that’ll be bad for you, too, Mike. He knows you’re in it with me somehow. That’s one of the first things he said. So it’s to your advantage, too, to pay him off and shut him up. But I just want to borrow the money for a couple of days. I can well afford to pay. I don’t want you to use your money. You’ve done enough already.”

  Shayne moved restlessly in his chair and tugged at his earlobe. “I don’t want to see you paying ten thousand bucks for a pig in a poke,” he growled. “Let’s get this as straight as we can. From what this man said, there was nothing to indicate that he knows Al is already dead?”

  “N-no. I don’t think so,” she faltered. “I don’t remember exactly how he said it. He asked what we’d done to Al, I think. Or what we’d done with him? I got the impression he didn’t know what had happened.”

  “But he has something that belongs to Al which he’s willing to sell to you,” pondered Shayne. “That seems to indicate he doesn’t expect Al to come around and claim his property.”

  “You mean… he knows Al is dead and that’s why he feels safe in selling whatever it is to me?”

  “It might be the answer. In that case, if he got the money he’d proba
bly be more than willing to keep his mouth shut about Al going to the Encanto tonight.”

  “And that’s all we want, isn’t it?” Her eyes were beginning to shine again and there was a look of fresh hope on her face. “We don’t care what it is that belonged to Al. We just want him not to tell the police that Al came to see me tonight.”

  “Which makes it pure and simple blackmail,” Shayne pointed out angrily.

  “What do we care what it is? I’m willing to pay… anything.”

  “If it will do us any real good. We’ve still got the problem of the missing body. I haven’t told you about that, Carla. We’re still on thin ice even if this man can be shut up. You see, Al’s body is riding around town right now, locked up in the trunk of a Ford belonging to Al’s brother-in-law and still wrapped in the hotel blanket. The police know I was driving the car tonight, and as soon as the body is discovered they’re going to be on my neck.”

  “Did you say Al’s brother-in-law?”

  “Yes. Did you know he had a sister living in Miami?”

  “I knew there were a couple of sisters, but I didn’t know them or where they lived.”

  “One bit of information I picked up tonight that might have some bearing on the picture is that Al has recently been mixed up in some sort of crime and is probably wanted by the police. You don’t know anything about that, I suppose?”

  “How could I? I told you I haven’t heard a word about him for years.”

  Shayne muttered, “I know you told me that. It just occurred to me you might be holding something back. Don’t do it, Carla. If I’m going to go on helping you I’ve got to know exactly where I stand.”