“No,” Christine shook her head. “I didn’t.”
“How about you?” Shayne swung on Floyd Hudson. “You reached home just as I was leaving at four.”
“I poured myself a few drinks,” Floyd told him
“After making yourself so objectionable your sister-in-law locked herself up?”
“See here, Shayne,” said Leslie Hudson angrily. “I don’t like your tone or your insinuations.”
“The hell you don’t,” Shayne snapped. “If you don’t know your brother has been making life miserable for your wife it’s time you were told.” Shayne turned quickly to Mrs. Hudson. “You did go upstairs to get away from him, didn’t you Christine?”
“Yes,” she answered, her cheeks flushing.
“Why?” Shayne swung on Floyd again. “Was it because you expected Angus Browne and didn’t want any witnesses to the meeting? Had you already planned to kill him and throw his body in the bay?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t know Browne,” he said sullenly.
“But you were here. Downstairs by yourself between four and four-thirty.”
“Mrs. Morgan was around,” he said uncertainly.
Shayne asked Leslie Hudson, “Where were you during that half hour?”
“Driving home from the office. I was pretty much upset and left for home early.”
“When did you arrive?”
“About a quarter of five,” he answered, glancing at his wife for confirmation.
Christine nodded and said, “He came upstairs about ten minutes of five.”
“What difference do a few minutes make?” Leslie asked impatiently.
“A few minutes is all it takes to commit murder,” Shayne told him, and turned his attention to Victor Morrison.
“Have you an alibi for that period?”
“This is preposterous,” protested the financier. He looked angrily at Painter. “Are you going to let this fellow keep on with this all night?”
Chief Painter said incisively, “I agree with Mr. Morrison. You’re making a grandstand play without getting anywhere at all.”
“I’ll get somewhere,” said Shayne grimly, “if I can find a single positive alibi in this entire bunch. You went for another ride in your boat this afternoon,” he reminded Morrison. “It seems to be a habit of yours to be out alone in your boat while murders are being committed across the bay.”
“I did go out for a spin about four o’clock,” he conceded. “Do you think I met this private detective in the middle of the bay and killed him?”
“You could have come over here and met him on shore, then carried him out a ways and dumped him.”
“In half an hour?” asked Morrison contemptuously. “My son can testify I wasn’t out more than that. He was waiting for me when I returned, and had timed me. It would require at least an hour to reach this side and return. You can take the boat and check it if you wish.”
Shayne said quietly, “That’s what I was doing this afternoon when I discovered Browne’s body. At that time I thought you might have slipped over here to kill the maid last night.”
Shayne was turning to question Hampstead again when the telephone rang. He whirled about and stalked toward the library to answer it
He met Mrs. Morgan in the doorway. Her eyes were wide and frightened and she twisted her hands as though panic-stricken.
Shayne pushed past her and grabbed up the receiver. Painter hurried after him, warning loudly, “No you don’t Shayne. I’ll take that call.”
Shayne was saying, “Browne speaking.”
The operator said, “We have a call for you from New York, Mr. Browne. Go ahead, please.”
A gruff voice said, “Browne? Turnbull speaking.”
“I’ve been waiting for your call.”
“Yes. My girl told me you haven’t received my report on the Morrison affair. I don’t understand-”
“Skip it,” said Shayne impatiently. “I need the salient points fast. Can you give them to me?”
“I haven’t the newspaper clippings, of course. They were mailed to you. However, I have my notations here. Uh-Mrs. Morrison died in a hit-run accident on January 20, 1943. She was forty-two, mother of a twelve-year-old son and wife of Victor Morrison who was a wealthy broker. The accident occurred at night with only one witness and the driver was never apprehended.
“There were a couple of curious angles. At eight o’clock her maid said she received a call from some woman. She heard Mrs. Morrison agree to meet her at nine o’clock sharp, and when she hung up she appeared nervous and worried. She left the house at eight-forty without telling the maid where she was going, and she was struck at an intersection about fifteen blocks away at exactly nine o’clock-having walked there to keep her appointment, apparently.
“The hit-run car was a big black limousine, and according to the testimony of the witness was parked less than a block away just prior to the accident and was traveling at high speed when it struck Mrs. Morrison.”
“Intentional?” Shayne asked.
“I said there were some curious angles. Mr. Morrison owned such a limousine and had driven it to his club earlier that evening. The inquiry was naturally discreet, but there was no one to swear he was at the club at nine o’clock. However, he was there when the police called a little later, and no proof he had been away.”
“Did the police suspect him?”
“I talked to the officer who had charge of the investigation and he recalled it vividly. This is strictly off the record, but he assured me that if they could have turned up a shred of a motive he would have arrested Morrison on a charge of murder. But there was no motive. No money involved, and all the evidence pointed to a happy marriage.
“About nine months after his wife’s death, Morrison quietly married Estelle Davoe in Connecticut. She had once been his private secretary but had resigned in December. A thorough investigation at the time of the marriage failed to turn up the slightest indication that they had had an affair before his wife’s death.
“That’s the complete sketch, Browne. I’m sure you’ll receive-”
“Thanks,” Shayne said. “That’s all I need right now. Add this call to your bill.”
He hung up and said to Painter, “Come on. You’re about to solve a couple of murders in spite of yourself.”
Victor Morrison and Chief Gentry were seated side by side. Shayne moved in and stood between the two chairs, slightly in front of the two men.
He said, “This is in your back yard, after all, Will. If Morrison was out in his boat only half an hour this afternoon, Browne must have been killed on your side of the bay. You can hold him on that, though I’ve a hunch New York will put in a prior claim once those letters to his ex-secretary are made public.”
Chapter Twenty-Two: MURDER WILL OUT
“What sort of damnable trick is this?” demanded Morrison.
Shayne ignored him. He went on to Gentry, “In fact I’m pretty sure Browne was killed on the mainland before he was dumped into the boat. He wasn’t dumb enough to go calmly for a boat ride with the man he planned to blackmail.”
“But Browne’s body was found on this side of the bay,” Painter objected. “If Mr. Morrison can prove he was out only half an hour he couldn’t possibly have brought the body over here and dumped it.”
“I recovered the body about five-thirty,” Shayne reminded him. “There was a strong easterly wind blowing. Strong enough to float a body from the middle of the bay to the place where it was found.”
He turned to Estelle Morrison and said, “Your big mistake was turning those letters of yours over to Browne to plant on Mrs. Hudson as divorce evidence. You should have known Browne would figure they’d actually been written to you and would look for more blackmail evidence.”
Estelle Morrison was slumped in her chair. Sheer fright contorted her face into ugliness. “I told him they had been written to Christine. I told him she’d returned them to Victor when she married Hudson. I int
ercepted them-”
“Estelle!” Morrison’s voice rang out harshly. He stood up and glared across the room at her, then sank wearily back into his chair. “I admit I wrote those notes to Christine. I was frantic at the thought of losing her when she told me she was going to marry Hudson. I knew Estelle was cheating on me, but she was too infernally clever in New York to be caught. By establishing residence here and taking advantage of Florida’s divorce laws I felt sure I could divorce her, and that’s why I begged Christine to wait.
“I was a fool,” he added with ponderous dignity, “but I am not a murderer.”
“It won’t work, Morrison,” said Shayne, turning cold gray eyes back to the financier. “There are scientific tests that will prove conclusively that those letters were written three years ago instead of two months. I’m surprised you didn’t get some such report from your handwriting experts,” he went on, addressing Hampstead. “Though such tests aren’t necessarily part of their job, most of the good ones are thoroughly familiar with the tests for determining the approximate age of writing.”
Hampstead’s lips were clamped in a straight line. He hesitated a moment before admitting, “One of them did suggest the possibility that the letters hadn’t been written recently. But I had no reason, otherwise, to suspect I was present when they were discovered here and had no intimation they were a plant.”
Shayne turned again, anxiously, to Leslie and Christine. Leslie had relaxed from his rigid position and held one of her hands in his. He said, “If you had had the originals instead of photostats, Christine, Bernard Holloway would have put his finger on the truth at once. But with only a photostat he had no way of determining how old they were.”
Christine turned her head, lifting her face from her husband’s arm, and nodded wearily.
“I know,” said Shayne with a wry smile, “that some of you haven’t seen the letters in question and don’t know what is in them. They were written to Morrison’s ex-secretary, declaring his love for her and discussing plans for getting rid of his wife so they could marry. But that was three years ago. Right after you went to work for Morrison,” he went on, nodding to Christine. “If you had bothered to mention to me that the present Mrs. Morrison was formerly his private secretary, I might have guessed the truth at once.”
Christine sat up straight on the love seat. “I do remember the peculiar circumstances under which his former wife was killed, but I never heard a hint around the office about his being in love with Estelle when his wife died.”
As Shayne looked on, Leslie wriggled an arm around his wife and drew her close, and her head dropped against his shoulder. He said grimly, “That was their one protection against having a murder charge laid against them both. The New York police may not be able to prove it was you, Estelle, who made the telephone call that summoned the former Mrs. Morrison to her death, but those letters you saved for three years are going to be damned good evidence that you helped plan the job.”
“She did,” Morrison declared gruffly. He had risen from his chair and stood pointing an accusing finger at her. “She was responsible for the whole thing. She drove me to it. Before I met her I was content with my life-my wife and my son. She taunted me about living a drab life and worked me up to a state of-” He stopped and backed away, his hands covering his face, and again dropped into his chair.
Shayne said to Morrison, “About those letters, now-”
Morrison mopped sweat from his forehead and said, “She kept them and held them over me. She should have known she couldn’t use them without implicating herself, but she made my life miserable by reminding me of their existence.”
Shayne said, “And when she found out you were going to divorce her she saw a way to use them and planted them on Mrs. Hudson, not knowing that both you and she had employed the same scoundrel to get evidence on both sides. And you, Morrison, would have sacrificed an innocent girl to save your own hide.”
Estelle Morrison suddenly sat erect and said, “It looked like a cinch,” in a husky voice, her eyes yellow and venomous. “How the hell did I know Browne wouldn’t be satisfied with what I paid him? I thought he believed me when I told him the letters were written to Christine and I wanted to turn the tables on her and put them back in her possession.”
“He probably did until both of you retained him. It was too great a strain on Browne’s ethics. Business had been bad for him lately,” Shayne told her.
“Damn Browne,” Estelle said, and closed her long lashes over her eyes.
Shayne looked at her for a moment, then turned to Hampstead and said, “That’s when Browne pulled the wool over your eyes-with his story about promising Rourke a set of photostats in exchange for a scoop. That was just a dodge to get your permission to have them made and give him a chance to get hold of a second set. Then he began to smell a rat and checked with the New York police on Morrison.”
“Looks like you’re right,” he admitted.
Shayne then asked Morrison, “Did he have the contents of the envelope from the Turnbull Agency in New York with him when you killed him this afternoon?”
Morrison nodded. His face was gray and withered. “A complete report from the police files.” The vigor and strength Shayne had seen in him earlier in the day was gone. He bent his chin on his chest bone and continued in a weak voice, “I always had a feeling they suspected me and needed only some such evidence as my letters to her to make a case against us both.
“When Browne came to me this afternoon with his proof I knew I had to kill him. I couldn’t forget what you had told me earlier-about the utter impossibility of hushing up a thing by paying blackmail. I kept hearing your words while Browne was talking: ‘Even your millions won’t be enough. In the end you’ll be ruined, and the threat of exposure will still hang over your head.’ I kept thinking about my boy, and I knew you were right. I knew there was only one way to deal with a man like Browne.”
Shayne stood staring at Morrison’s bowed head and wished to God he had taken the plane when he was supposed to, but when he glanced at Christine and Leslie Hudson, clasped in each other’s arms, he sighed deeply.
He said gently, “Browne deserved to be killed. It’s a cinch he murdered Natalie Briggs because she wanted money to keep her quiet about planting the letters for him.”
“Yes. He confessed killing her after I struck him once and demanded to know. He had a gun in his pocket. He threatened me with the same he’d given the Briggs girl, and tried to use it. It was self-defense,” he ended hopelessly.
“But your first wife’s murder wasn’t-your son’s mother,” Shayne said grimly.
Shayne said to Gentry, “Have you heard enough?”
“I don’t get all the background,” Gentry rumbled, “but we have a number of witnesses to an oral confession by Morrison. That should be sufficient to hold both of them for a while.”
Peter Painter got up and strutted forward. “Right,” he snapped. “They’re your babies now.” He glanced at Timothy Rourke who had a notebook in his lap with a pencil poised above it. He paused at the back of the reporter’s chair and asked, “Got it all down?”
Rourke said, “You bet,” as Painter went to the door and waited.
Estelle Morrison got up and walked over to Shayne. She said, “If I hadn’t passed out this afternoon-”
“I would have made a fee on this damned case,” Shayne interrupted her harshly.
Gentry arose ponderously from his chair, said, “Come with me,” to Victor and Estelle Morrison.
“Crissakes!” Rourke exclaimed. “I’m sitting on top of the biggest story of the year. I’ve got to get a line through to New York.” He jumped up and hurried after the others.
Floyd had unobtrusively disappeared from the room when Shayne looked around. Mrs. Morgan, too, was gone, but Leslie Hudson and his wife were clutched in a close embrace and Christine was whispering in his ear.
Hudson released his wife and said with boyish embarrassment, “I’ll be glad to write you a check for
any amount you name. You’ve earned anything we can afford to pay you.”
Shayne shook his red head and said seriously, “For once in my life let me do something for nothing. Let’s say-Phyllis would want it that way-for Christine’s sake.” He looked at his watch and added, “I’d like to use your telephone, and if there’s a seat on the midnight plane I’d appreciate a drive to the airport.”
“Anything at all,” Hudson said heartily, “that we can do for you will be a pleasure.”
Shayne said, “Thanks,” and hurried into the library and called the airport. He was told that there was a vacancy on the plane to New Orleans.
When he returned to the living-room Christine was waiting with a light coat over her arm. In her hands she held a square jewel box and she went to him, pressed a little gold button which snapped the box open. Inside, coiled on a velvet cushion lay a string of pearls. She said, “Leslie and I want you to have these.”
Shayne protested, “I can’t take these. They’re worth a fortune.”
Christine laughed and linked her arm in his. “I told you they’d fool even an expert,” she said. “I’ve told Leslie everything,” she went on breathlessly, “and he agrees that we have no further use for this string now. Aren’t they lovely?” She raised her dark eyes to his and added softly, “Michael?”
Shayne thought of Lucy Hamilton. Maybe a gift like this would persuade her to forgive him for all the trouble and anxiety he had caused her. He said, “Thanks, Christine. I know a girl-but we’ve got to get going if I am to catch that plane.”
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