When Dorinda Dances

by Brett Halliday

Shayne hurried to the desk and shoved a pad and pencil across. The chief wrote down a number, said, “Thanks … ring the number please. It’s person-to-person for Mrs. Lansdowne.” He then handed the instrument to Shayne and went back to his chair.

  After the usual preliminaries a shocked voice said, “For Mrs. Lansdowne? Oh, that’s impossible. She’s much too ill to be disturbed.”

  “This is important,” Shayne said swiftly. “This is the police in Miami—calling about Mrs. Lansdowne’s daughter.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s positive orders from the doctor. What about Miss Julia?”

  Before Shayne could reply the operator broke in. “Do you wish this party to accept the call, sir?”

  “Yes, by all means. Who is this speaking?”

  “The housekeeper. Has anything happened to Julia?”

  “Do you know where she is?”

  “Why—at school in Florida,” the woman faltered. “If anything has happened—”

  “We don’t know yet,” Shayne said bluntly. “If I could speak to her mother for a moment.”

  “But she can’t be disturbed. She’s very ill. The telephone has been disconnected in her room, and the nurse would not allow you to speak to her anyway.” The woman’s voice trembled with anxiety.

  “All right,” said Shayne grimly. “Put Judge Lansdowne on.”

  “The judge is out of town for the night. We expect him back tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Do you know where I can reach him tonight?”

  “No. I think he’s in Boston. His office would know. You could call there at nine o’clock.” She gave him a telephone number, and Shayne scribbled it on a pad.

  “One thing more. Do you happen to know if Mrs. Lansdowne has a very close friend in Washington named Mrs. Davis?”

  “Mrs. Davis?” There was a moment’s silence. Then she said emphatically, “No, sir. I don’t. Please tell me about Miss Julia. If there’s been an accident—”

  “It’s probably not the same girl,” Shayne soothed her. “We were merely trying to check an identity. I’ll be in touch with the judge tomorrow.”

  He hung up and swung around with an angry frown. “That was the housekeeper. Mrs. Lansdowne is too ill to take a call. That corroborates one thing the girl told me—without any prompting—about her mother’s illness. And Julia Lansdowne is supposed to be in school here in Florida. We’ve got to find her, Will.”

  “Sure. Whether she’s the Lansdowne girl or not she’s a witness in Moran’s death. I’ll put it on the radio.” Gentry picked up the photograph and glanced at it, dropped it, and said gruffly, “How was she dressed?” on the way to the phone.

  “White dress with short puffed sleeves and high neck. About five-feet-four or five—slim, short, blond hair and big violet eyes. And just put out a call for Dorinda, Will.”

  Gentry grunted and arranged for the radio pickup.

  Shayne had his hat on. He handed Gentry his and urged him toward the door, saying, “There’s one other chance. Let’s get to that address in Coconut Grove fast. If some pal of Moran’s did pick her up, he might have taken her there. Neither she nor Moran knew I trailed them home from La Roma.”

  “We’ll probably find her there, all right,” rumbled Gentry, “asleep in her own little bed. Ten to one she went straight back there after failing to make time with you.”

  “Cut it, Will. She’s just a kid.” Shayne yanked the door shut, and they went down the corridor to the elevator. In the lobby he stopped long enough to tell the clerk to try to get a message from anyone who called him, then hurried out to join Gentry in his car.

  “Out Brickell will be fastest,” he muttered, repeating the address he had memorized earlier. He sank back against the cushion and occupied himself with unwelcome imaginings as Gentry sent the heavy sedan swiftly across the Miami River into the fresh radiance of a new day.

  They parked in front of the building under the fronds of leaning coco palms and went into a small foyer with a double row of mailboxes.

  “She went into an apartment on the second floor, front and right,” Shayne muttered.

  “Two-B,” Gentry said, after checking, “is Moran’s. Two-A is marked ‘Dorinda.’ Looks like she did tell the truth about separate apartments.” He started to push the button.

  “Wait,” said Shayne hastily. “If someone is holding her up there, I’d like to break in on them.” He went to the inner door and tried it. It was locked. He turned back, frowning thoughtfully. He took a well-filled key ring from his pocket, but Gentry said firmly, “That leaves the manager.” He found the button and pressed it until the door swung open.

  A heavy-set, dark-featured man confronted them, wearing green-and-white-striped pajama tops, an angry scowl, a growth of stubbly black beard, and a pair of trousers which he was buckling as he growled, “What the hell—”

  “Police,” Gentry said, showing a badge. “Two-B and Two-A. What about them?”

  “Moran and his dancer. What about ’em?” The manager’s first belligerence changed to righteous indignation.

  “Are they in?”

  “How should I know? I don’t stay up till three-four in the mornin’ checkin’ my tenants in.”

  “You haven’t seen them tonight?” Gentry persisted. “Either in or out?”

  “Not for days,” he answered sullenly. “They stay pretty close and don’t make no trouble.”

  “Get a passkey and take us up,” ordered Gentry.

  The manager slouched away, grumbling under his breath. He returned with a brass key dangling from a metal ring, led the way up a flight of stairs complaining. “Don’t blame me if there’s something goin’ on between them two. I rent out my apartments and got no call to see they sleep in their own beds.”

  Shayne said, “Keep it quiet, and try the girl’s door first.”

  When the door was unlocked Shayne motioned the man aside, opened it quietly, reached in, and turned on the light. A naked hundred-watt bulb in the ceiling revealed a small, one-room apartment with a studio couch. Two inner doors stood open, and he stalked first into a tiny bathroom, then into a kitchenette.

  Dorinda was not there.

  When he returned to the hallway Gentry and the manager were at the door of 2-B. It was a replica of the girl’s apartment. The day bed was opened out and made up for sleeping, but had not been slept in. Crumpled newspapers and cigarette butts littered the table and chests of drawers. A half-empty whisky bottle stood on the floor beside the one comfortable chair, and dirty dishes were piled in the sink.

  “That’s all,” said Gentry, dismissing the surly manager. “We’ll look around up here and then seal this room for a day or two. Moran won’t be back. He’s at the morgue right now, and after I’m through here I’ll take you down to identify the body.” He closed the door firmly in the man’s gaping face. He asked Shayne, “You want to take this chance to look for anything?”

  “Just enough to see if we can get any sort of line on Moran,” said Shayne, opening the closet door and pushing half a dozen suits back on their hangers. He came out with two suitcases, and added, “The girl’s room, too. If we can find something there to prove she’s Julia Lansdowne we’ll be that much ahead.”

  One of Moran’s suitcases was empty. The other contained a frayed scrapbook filled with theatrical clippings from five years back, which indicated that he was exactly what the girl had claimed, a small-time booking agent for talent in second-rate night clubs.

  Dorinda’s apartment yielded nothing to prove or disprove the story she had told. There was no scrap of paper with her name, nothing whatever to reveal her identity. Except for a few simple summer frocks, her clothing consisted of underthings that looked expensive to the men. A smart traveling bag with matching hatbox, and her toilet articles, seemed more expensive than a protégé of Ricky Moran’s was likely to possess. These were the only indications that she had been telling the truth about her background, and they were not conclusive.

  Shayne rode back to the city with Gentry and
the apartment house manager. He got off at his hotel, and Gentry promised to let him know the moment anything turned up on the girl.

  He stopped at the desk to inquire for messages, and Dick said, “Not a single call. Gee, Mr. Shayne, did you really blast that guy? He pulled a gun, huh? Was the girl still there? Was that it? I thought he was trouble when he came in offering me money to give him your number without announcing him. But I wouldn’t do that.”

  “That’s right, Dick.” Shayne grinned and took some bills from his wallet. “It was forty bucks you turned down, wasn’t it?” He laid two twenties on the desk.

  A fair-haired young man and an ardent worshiper of the detective, Dick colored to the roots of his hair. “Golly, no, Mr. Shayne. I didn’t mean—”

  “You earned it, Dick. Comes off the expense account.” He swung away and went up to his apartment.

  It was a little after six o’clock, and he was groggy from lack of sleep. He couldn’t get through to Judge Lansdowne’s Washington office until nine o’clock, so he set the alarm for that hour, kicked off his shoes, and dropped onto the bed.

  CHAPTER VIII

  The alarm woke Shayne from druglike sleep at nine. A glance at his fully clothed body brought swift realization that the alarm had been set for a purpose. He dragged himself up and padded into the living-room where he put through a call to Washington. It netted only the information that Judge Lansdowne was expected back sometime before noon. He left his number with an urgent request that the judge call him collect the moment he came in.

  He then called Lucy Hamilton and said, “You may as well go to the office and take any calls. I’ll be in and out—in touch with Will Gentry most likely, and maybe Tim Rourke.”

  Returning to the bedroom he stripped off his clothes as he went, bathed and shaved, and by nine-thirty had disposed of three scrambled eggs, four slices of bacon, and three slices of toast. He was smoking a cigarette and working on his third cup of coffee when someone knocked on the door. He answered it, and was surprised to see Henry Black.

  There was a stubble of dark beard on his sallow face and his brown eyes were bleared with sleepiness. He shambled into the living-room with his shoulders drooping wearily and asked, “Got another cup of that Java?”

  “Sure. Sit down. You want a stick in it, Hank?”

  “Not this morning. I better stay sober.” He sank into a chair, stretched his legs out, and closed his eyes.

  Shayne went into the kitchen and returned with cream, sugar, and an extra cup and saucer. He filled the cup from the pot on the coffee table, passed it to Black, and resumed his seat on the couch.

  Henry Black declined the offer of cream and sugar. After a long drink of coffee he asked quietly, “You hiding Brewer out, Mike?”

  Shayne didn’t try to hide his surprise. “No. What happened?”

  “He seems to have disappeared.” Black’s voice was toneless. “Would he duck out just to avoid paying me two hundred fish—and expenses?” he added wryly.

  After a moment’s thought, Shayne said, “I don’t think so, Hank. Did you pull off last night’s job okay?”

  “Nothing to it. Mathews and I picked up Godfrey at the plant when he came out the front door and got in his car. If the guy had murder on his mind, I spent the night trying to rape the mayor’s wife. We didn’t lose him for an instant, not until he boarded the eight-o’clock plane. And we watched it take off.”

  “Sleep with him?”

  “Practically.” Black yawned widely and emptied his coffee cup. “Except I didn’t sleep. So I’m waiting at the office for this Brewer character to show up at nine o’clock and pay off,” he continued in an aggrieved voice. “The help says he’s always prompt. But he doesn’t show. At nine-twenty I call his house. A woman answers—housekeeper, I guess—and snaps that Brewer hasn’t been home all night and hangs up. So then I wonder.” Black shrugged his thin shoulders. “I remember the lawyer you mentioned, so I call his office. He’s not in, and the gal sounds funny. Won’t tell me where he is or when he’ll be back. But when I mentioned it was in connection with Mr. Brewer she got excited and said I’d better talk to the police. I got the idea maybe lawyer Gibson is at headquarters. So I wondered what the angles were. Thought you might know something, Mike. So I came here before I walked into something down there.”

  Shayne massaged his lean jaw, then spread out his hands. “I gave you everything I know last night. I never saw Brewer until he walked into my office about five-fifteen, and haven’t seen or heard from him since.”

  “You think he really thought his partner was out to bump him last night?”

  “That’s the way he told it to me, and he acted plenty worried.” Shayne leaned back and tugged abstractedly at his left ear lobe.

  “Reason I asked, near as I could tell this Godfrey didn’t have a thing on his mind last night except getting a good dinner and going to bed early.”

  Shayne said, “Suppose I check with Will Gentry.”

  “Suppose you do,” Black agreed.

  Shayne crossed the room to the telephone, gave the hotel operator a number, and waited. The police chief’s gruff voice answered almost immediately.

  “Mike Shayne, Will. I’m trying to locate an attorney named Gibson—Elliott Gibson. I’ve got a hunch he’s around headquarters. Could you find out?”

  “He’s raising hell here in my office right now,” Gentry told him. “Why do you want him?”

  “In connection with a client of his,” said Shayne cautiously. “A man named Brewer.”

  There was a brief silence, then a long, audible sigh at the other end of the line. “You’d better come down here, Mike. Right away.” Gentry hung up with a bang.

  Shayne turned to Black. “It’s something, all right. Gentry wants us right away.”

  Miami’s chief of police rolled his rumpled eyelids far up and looked at Shayne curiously when he entered the office followed by Henry Black. Another man was pacing nervously up and down before Gentry’s desk. He paused in midsentence as the two private detectives came in.

  Gibson was younger than Shayne had expected Brewer’s attorney to be—not more than thirty—with indefinable signs of weakness about his eyes and mouth. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and ruddy-faced, yet there was the impression of flabby muscles rather than physical well-being. He had the smooth, bland sort of good looks that some men and many women would probably consider charming, and Shayne had a hunch that the attorney was accustomed to coast along in his profession on the strength of his charm rather than on intelligence or ability.

  He nodded curtly, without speaking, when Gentry introduced him to Shayne and Black as Gibson, and when they seated themselves at the chief’s invitation, the lawyer burst out impatiently.

  “I warn you, Chief, that I shall hold you strictly accountable for wasting time this way. I don’t see what information two private detectives can possibly have about this affair. Even though one of them happens to be the ubiquitous Michael Shayne,” he added with an ironic note that brought the redhead’s ragged brows up in a questioning scowl at Gentry.

  The chief said, “Mr. Gibson is insisting that I wire ahead and have his client’s partner removed from the New York plane and brought back in irons.”

  “On what charge?” asked Shayne.

  “Suspicion of murder,” said Gentry easily. “Though as a lawyer, he should be able to realize it’s difficult to make a charge like that stick when we have no evidence of murder.”

  “You haven’t looked for such evidence,” Gibson said angrily. “You’ve sat here chewing on that stale cigar and done exactly nothing. Mr. Brewer is missing, isn’t he? He hasn’t been seen since going out on the bay with Hiram Godfrey in his boat yesterday afternoon. I’ve repeatedly explained that Mr. Brewer was in deathly fear of his partner, that he often told me Godfrey would be his murderer if he ever came to a violent end. And Godfrey ducked out on the early plane this morning.”

  Gentry lifted a big hand to silence Gibson, then rumbled at Shayne, �
�You said over the phone you wanted to see Gibson in connection with Brewer. What connection, Mike?”

  “Wait a minute.” Shayne looked at the attorney and asked, “Are you saying that Brewer didn’t reach your office last night?”

  “He did not. I haven’t seen him for several days. What makes you think—”

  “How long did you wait for him?” Shayne cut in.

  “What do you mean? How long did I wait for whom?”

  “Brewer,” said Shayne patiently. “How late did you stay in your office last night?”

  “Until shortly past six.”

  “Weren’t you worried when he didn’t show up?”

  “Why should I have been worried?” Gibson looked honestly puzzled. “I wasn’t expecting him last evening. I had no reason to be worried until this morning when his office called to say he hadn’t come in, and apparently hadn’t been home all night. As soon as I made some inquiries and learned that he had gone out in Godfrey’s boat yesterday and no one had seen him return from that trip, I came to the obvious conclusion. Which seems borne out, I must say, by Godfrey’s hurried departure this morning.”

  Shayne shook his red head slowly. “Do you deny that Brewer telephoned your office after returning from the boat trip, asking you to wait there for him?”

  “Certainly, I deny it. If I had expected him and he didn’t appear, I should have started a search for him much sooner. Why do you ask that question?”

  “Because he told me, in my office, at about five-thirty yesterday afternoon that you were expecting him in your office just a couple of blocks up the street. And that’s where he was going when he left a few minutes later.”

  Gibson stared with openmouthed amazement. “You saw Brewer late yesterday? You can swear he did return safely from that boat trip with Godfrey?”

  “He claimed that Godfrey tried to kill him while they were alone on the bay,” said Shayne, “but lost his nerve at the last moment. He was afraid the attempt on his life would be repeated last night, and came to me for protection.”

  “Then Godfrey must have done it later—instead of in the afternoon as I suspected,” said Gibson excitedly. “Now that you have Shayne’s confirmation,” he added, turning to Gentry, “do you still refuse to arrest Godfrey for murder?”