Tickets for Death

by Brett Halliday

  Matrix said, “I guess you’re right. I haven’t been very fair to Midge. But—hell, a man gets to thinking—” His voice was wooden, without inflection. He handed the clipping to the girl and leaned back against her arm. He closed his eyes while she opened the clipping with exaggerated care and stared at the picture, then swiftly read the text.

  It fluttered from her fingers when she finished and both her arms tightened around Matrix’s neck. “Is that all it is?” she demanded. “Why, that was a long time ago. What do I care? It’s nothing—nothing! Every man makes mistakes. Everybody does.”

  Gil Matrix sat up straight and disengaged her arms from around his neck. “No, that isn’t all. You don’t understand, honey.” He turned to Shayne. “How did you figure all this out?”

  “It was easy—once I got on the right track. I expect I got my real clue from the same place Hardeman got his. That deed made out to Gil Matrix by Theodore Ross. It doesn’t take a handwriting expert to see the similarity in the signatures. As a director of the bank, Hardeman inspected the papers when you applied for your loan.”

  Matrix said, “Yes. I guess that was it. I wondered—how he had found out. I’ve suspected he knew for some time but I was never sure until I intercepted that anonymous note he sent you tonight. As soon as I read it I knew it must be from him.”

  “Mayme and Ben Edwards were already dead,” Shayne mused. “You thought they were the only ones who knew. It must have been a great shock to learn that their deaths hadn’t helped any—to know Hardeman also had you dead to rights on the counterfeiting deal.”

  “I don’t know why he didn’t present the evidence against me sooner,” Matrix said helplessly. “He must have suspected me from the beginning. Anyone would,” he ended savagely.

  “Your background made you the obvious suspect,” Shayne agreed tranquilly. “Taken in conjunction with Ben’s camera, which provided a means of keeping yourself informed of the changes made in the tickets each day, no jury would require much time to deliberate your guilt. You tried hard enough to steer me toward MacFarlane,” he added parenthetically.

  “Sure I did. I knew if you nosed around long enough you’d start turning up the dope against me. That’s why I used all my influence to get you called on the case—because I figured you’d go after MacFarlane. God knows, Boyle wouldn’t take any action in that direction. I didn’t know, though, that Mac would be fool enough to send his boys after you the first thing. That was the tip-off.”

  “I haven’t thanked you yet,” said Shayne, “for the picture you sent up to my wife’s room. We’ll frame it—as a fitting souvenir of one of the damnedest cases I ever worked on.”

  A caustic smile illumined Matrix’s features. “I had to get to Jake and smash that plate. It leaves you in the clear to go on after MacFarlane—no matter what.”

  “No matter what,” Shayne agreed gravely. His eyes stared dreamily at the whitewashed wall of the little cabin as his body relaxed in the wicker chair.

  Midge had been listening in silence, pressed close to Matrix. Now she moved and asked nervously, “What picture? Do you mean—?”

  “Yes, honey. That’s the one we mean. It wasn’t your fault,” Matrix went on swiftly, “that MacFarlane used you to get a lever on Shayne. You didn’t know the ins of it—the spot I was in unless Shayne hung the counterfeiting rap on MacFarlane in a hurry. That was my fault for keeping the truth from you.”

  “But I still don’t understand,” Midge interposed. She frowned. “You weren’t counterfeiting the tickets, were you?”

  Matrix said, “No,” hoarsely.

  “Then what’s all this talk about you being in trouble? Why does Mr. Shayne look so grim and why were we packing up to leave in the middle of the night? Why did you threaten him with that gun when he came in?”

  “Ask him.”

  “Why, Mr. Shayne? Do you think Gil was printing the forged tickets?”

  Shayne said, “No, Midge. I’m certain he wasn’t,” in a flat even voice.

  Her face brightened and she was young again. “Then why—?”

  Automobile brakes ground on the pebbled street and the trio instinctively turned their faces toward the door and listened. A car door slammed. Matrix’s eyes dilated. He glanced down at the pistol and his fingers curled toward it.

  Shayne said, “No,” and shook his head as light footsteps sounded on the porch. He lounged to his feet when a knock sounded, saying, “That will be my wife.”

  He opened the door and Phyllis entered the room hesitantly, her dark eyes softening as she looked past Shayne at the tableau on the couch. Midge clung to Gil’s right arm, pressing her cheek against his shoulder.

  Shayne said, “You’ve both met my wife.” He looked directly at Matrix and added, “She has come to stay with Midge while you go to the police station with me.”

  Midge uttered a little cry of terror. She threw herself across Matrix’s chest and clutched him tightly around the neck as though she would never let him go.

  Phyllis turned tear-filled eyes away from them. She was trembling as she searched her husband’s gaunt face for some hint that it was not true.

  His lined features were implacable. He waggled his head from side to side, looking straight into his wife’s eyes, then moved past her to stand in front of the pair strained together in an agonized embrace.

  Shayne spoke in a curt tone that brought a smothered cry from Midge:

  “Hand me that gun from the floor, Matrix, and let’s go”

  Matrix put Midge from him. She fell back against the couch sobbing wildly, her eyes staring. Phyllis came to her and put both arms around the weeping girl and tried to comfort her. She gave her husband a quick I’ll-hate-you-forever-for-this look and did not glance at him again.

  Shayne stood his ground with only the lines on his face deepening to give a hint of his true feelings. He said, “It’s now or never, Gil. If you love Midge the only thing you can do for her is to come along without a fuss.”

  Matrix’s too-big shoulders were hunched forward, his round eyes staring bleakly down at the revolver on the floor. He reached to pick it up and Shayne made no move to interfere with his actions. Matrix got hold of the weapon with lax fingers, then stood up and handed it to the detective without a word.

  Shayne took it and dropped it into his coat pocket. He swung on his heel and went out the door.

  Gil Matrix joined him on the porch. They stood there for a moment and the sullen roar of the sea made a dirge-like background for the sobbing of the girl inside the cabin.

  Matrix raised one hand in a savage gesture of renunciation. He muttered thickly, “What are we waiting for?” and plunged down the steps.

  Shayne followed, saying, “We’d better take my car,” and Matrix went to it and got in without another word.

  Sliding under the wheel, Shayne backed away. He drove to the business section and as he neared the hotel, Matrix said, “The police station is down this street half a block.”

  Shayne turned a corner and drove half a block. A lot of cars lined the curb in front of the small police station. He parked beyond them and he and Matrix walked back together.

  Shayne looked up to see Timothy Rourke lounging in the open doorway. “Hi, Mike,” he called out. “You’re holding up the proceedings.”

  Shayne grinned and shook hands with Tim, introduced Matrix with a wave of his hand, “Mr. Matrix, editor of the Cocopalm Voice. Rourke from the Miami News.”

  “What the hell?” Rourke demanded as he shook hands with the local editor. “I thought you had this story on ice for me.”

  “Matrix is pretty much on the inside,” Shayne explained. “I couldn’t very well cut him out just to give you an exclusive story. But, where is everybody?” he added with a glance inside the front office, empty except for a uniformed man regarding them uneasily from behind a scarred pine desk.

  “I haven’t been able to get past the sentinel in blue.” Tim Rourke ruefully jerked his thumb toward the local policeman. “The big
shots are in back somewhere and my press card isn’t worth a damn up here.”

  Shayne said, “Come on. Get hold of my coattail and we’ll crash the conference.”

  He started toward the rear with Matrix and Rourke directly behind him. The policeman got up hastily, saying, “You can’t go back there. Chief Boyle said I wasn’t to let no one in his private office.”

  “Two negatives,” Shayne pointed out, “make an affirmative. In his ungrammatical way, Boyle actually meant you were to admit anyone.” He kept moving and the policeman stood aside helplessly, knowing in his slow-acting brain that he was being circumvented, but not quite sure how much authority Shayne possessed.

  A closed door at the rear had neat gold lettering on it: Chief of Police. Shayne turned the knob and walked into a smoke-filled private office and a confused murmur of voices. The voices stopped suddenly as he entered. Shayne nodded curtly to Chief Boyle, who sat behind an oak desk with a typewritten sheet of paper in his hands. He stood aside to let Tim Rourke and Matrix file in behind him, then closed the door in the midst of complete silence.

  Chapter Twenty: TWO NEGATIVES MAKE AN AFFIRMATIVE

  THREE OTHER MEN WERE SEATED in the private office with Chief Boyle. At the chief’s right, Will Gentry held a burning stogie six inches from his mouth while he studied Shayne with a look of frank perplexity on his stolid face. Shayne caught his eye and quirked a bushy red brow at his old friend, but Gentry did not respond. Behind the look of perplexity there was a hint of grim resolution that refused to be easily diverted.

  Albert Payson was uneasily huddled in a chair directly in front of Boyle’s desk. The village banker appeared shriveled, and his normally ruddy countenance held an expression of shocked horror, of inner disbelief that struggled unsuccessfully against outward acceptance.

  Only Grant MacFarlane appeared wholly at ease and happy about the whole thing. He lounged in a chair tilted back against the wall, still wearing his well-cut evening clothes and a look of insolent approval on his finely chiseled features.

  Chief Boyle spoke first. He no longer appeared blusteringly aware of his own unimportance and incompetence. Here, in his private office behind his own desk, he was in full command of the situation, and he immediately made it clear that he intended to retain command. He said, “I don’t think we need you any more, Shayne. Everything is cleared up.”

  Shayne said, “That’s fine.” He glanced out of the corner of his eye at Timothy Rourke and that veteran of many such conferences sidled away unobtrusively, settling himself in a corner with copy paper on his knee, where he could listen and not be noticed.

  Shayne took the editor’s arm and led him closer to the desk. “I’ve been having a talk with Mr. Matrix,” he explained mildly, “and I think you may be interested in what I’ve learned.”

  Chief Boyle cleared his throat and rattled the typewritten sheet in his hands. “I’m afraid you’re a little late,” he said tolerantly. “I don’t know where you’ve been this last half hour, but you evidently don’t know what has happened.”

  “That’s right.” Mr. Payson spoke up squeakily. “It looks as though the case has solved itself, Mr. Shayne. I fear you won’t be able to take the credit, and—”

  “And won’t be able to collect my fee?” Shayne finished for him sardonically. “I’m afraid I’ll have to disagree with you. I figure I’ve got the whole thing in the palm of my hand.” He glanced from Payson to Gentry, met that same disapproving, unyielding glance.

  “I doubt it, Shayne.” Chief Boyle was not to be denied. He laid the paper down in front of him and thumped it loudly with his fist. “I guess you don’t know, for instance, that Mr. Hardeman has just committed suicide.”

  Shayne echoed, “Suicide?” in a loud unbelieving tone to cover a gasp of astonishment from Matrix by his side. His fingers tightened warningly on the editor’s arm. He frowned and shook his head. “Why, that’s unbelievable. That—changes everything.”

  “Exactly.” Chief Boyle’s voice held the exultant ring of triumph.

  “Look here,” Shayne growled. “That’s too damn many suicides to swallow in one gulp. Don’t forget that Mayme Martin and Ben Edwards were both murdered and fixed up to look like suicides. How do you know?”

  “Hardeman’s death is definitely suicide,” Boyle snapped. “Mr. Gentry and I made a thorough investigation.”

  “Is that so?” Shayne glanced at Will Gentry.

  The Miami detective chief nodded soberly. “There doesn’t seem to be any doubt. Shot with his own gun—and I checked it for prints myself. Hardeman’s are all over it—no one else has handled it.”

  “And he left a note,” Boyle put in, tapping the sheet in front of him. “It explains everything.”

  Gil Matrix cleared his throat. He moved back a step, his eyes warily darting from one of the group to another.

  Shayne shrugged his big shoulders. “All right. If you gentlemen are certain Hardeman committed suicide, that’s enough for me. But it doesn’t change things any. Matrix has a confession to make.”

  The little editor drew himself up to his full height as five pairs of eyes turned to him.

  Mr. Payson leaned forward in his chair, shaking his head. “A confession?” he breathed. “But I don’t understand. Mr. Hardeman left a full and complete confession.”

  “One thing at a time,” Shayne growled. He turned to address Chief Boyle directly. “Florida has a state law providing that any man with a prison record must register with the authorities as an ex-felon when he settles here. Mr. Matrix—or Theodore Ross, to be more exact—neglected that detail when he came to Cocopalm.”

  Albert Payson wet his lips and spread his hands out in a distracted gesture. “Ross?” he muttered. “Then, it is true—”

  “He’s ready to take his medicine,” Shayne said shortly. “Ben Edwards was guilty of the same mistake, but he’s already paid a heavier penalty than will be assessed against Matrix.”

  The thud of Grant MacFarlane’s front chair legs striking the floor was loud in the office. He lounged to his feet and spoke to Boyle: “I don’t know why I have to be here. Everything seems to be all cleared up.”

  “Sit down,” Shayne ordered. “You’re not in the clear by a long shot.” He waited while MacFarlane slowly sank back into his chair, then went on harshly: “Don’t bank on that picture Jake Liverdink took of me tonight. There won’t be any prints made of it.” He turned his attention back to Chief Boyle. “You say Hardeman made a confession?”

  “He certainly did. Just before he shot himself.” Boyle rustled the sheet of paper. “The damnedest thing you ever read.”

  “Wait a minute.” Shayne held up one hand and eased a hip down on the corner of Boyle’s desk so he directly faced Gentry and Payson. “I’m about to be gypped out of my fee,” he protested. “I was hired on a contingent basis to solve this counterfeiting case. Now, you birds are trying to prove it solved itself—just because Hardeman was a weakling who couldn’t stand the gaff when I put the pressure on. That’s not fair to me. Hell, I had it all tied up in a knot before Hardeman killed himself. How about it, Will? Won’t you help me get a square deal?”

  Will Gentry sighed through pursed lips. His eyes rested on Shayne’s gaunt face, narrowed and speculative. He nodded slowly in response to his friend’s appeal. “I imagine Mr. Payson will be fair about it. If you can prove you actually had the solution and were ready to crack down, I’d say the track is legally responsible for your fee. Don’t you agree, Payson?”

  “Well—er—yes, I would say so. If Mr. Shayne can prove to us that he was in possession of the salient facts.”

  “I’ll do better than that,” Shayne boasted. “I’ll undertake to tell you just what was in Hardeman’s confession, though you all know I haven’t read a word of it.”

  He lit a cigarette, glancing across at Tim Rourke, who was furiously taking notes. Rourke grinned and nodded encouragement. Shayne glanced from him to Matrix, who still stood aside awkwardly, his shoulders hunched in a def
ensive attitude, his gaze flickering suspiciously about as though he refused to believe anything he heard. “Take the weight off your feet, Gil,” Shayne advised, “while I try to earn seventeen thousand bucks. That’s the correct amount, isn’t it, Payson?”

  “Approximately, yes. Since it appears the track will sustain no further loss after tonight.”

  “All right,” Shayne began slowly, “here’s the story. Just for the record, let me say that I first began to suspect Mr. Hardeman at seven o’clock tonight.”

  He paused, glancing at MacFarlane with an ironic grin. “Though I did also think you might easily be mixed up in the deal. That’s what you get for harboring crooks out at the Rendezvous.”

  “At seven o’clock?” Gentry asked. “You mean that shooting in Hardeman’s hotel room?”

  “Yep. It stank,” Shayne asserted cheerily. “In the first place, I don’t believe those birds intended to kill me. They didn’t have their guns out when I barged in—else I wouldn’t have come out of it alive. If they just planned to slug me—what object would be accomplished? No one would be fool enough to think I’d scare off a case that easy.

  “That was the first thing that looked phony,” Shayne went on, taking a deep drag on his cigarette. “Then there was Hardeman all tied up in the clothes closet. But the closet door had been left ajar so he wouldn’t smother in there. Why? Why were they being careful of Hardeman’s health—unless he was the one who had hired them to pull the attack on me?”

  “By God,” Boyle broke in excitedly, “Hardeman mentions that right here. He realized leaving the closet door cracked was a mistake.”

  “The only reason I could see for any of it was that Hardeman had fixed that scene to put himself wholly in the clear before the investigation started. By faking an attack on himself he hoped to divert suspicion from himself entirely. His own guilty conscience made him do it, of course, and it served to point suspicion at him instead.”

  “Why didn’t you say something right then?” Payson interpolated with genuine regret. “Ben Edwards might still be alive if you had.”