Brett Halliday: Lady, Be Bad

“You don’t need to do that.”

Shayne reached for his wallet, but Gregory was less relaxed than he wanted to seem. “Keep your hands where I can see them!”

Ramon wheeled as he saw them coming, and exchanged a look with his employer. Gregory paid the check. They left the coffee shop in three sections of the revolving door, with Shayne in the middle.

The same man who had been driving the Volkswagen that morning was outside guarding a gray Cadillac. A fourth man came out of a drugstore doorway. Shayne, badly outnumbered, ended up between the two men in the rear seat, with Gregory in front beside the driver. The Cadillac moved out into the heavy noontime traffic, and was stopped immediately by a red light.

Gregory smiled at Shayne. “I like a man who knows when it’s time to be realistic. We’re going to get along great.”

“To clear up one thing, how long do you plan on holding Jackie and Rourke?”

“Only till your plane’s in the air. I’m not top worried about them. The minute you’re off the ground I’ll put in a phone call, and that’s a promise.”

“If anything happens to either of them I’ll come looking for you,” Shayne said mildly. “That’s a promise.”

“I know that, for God’s sake! It’s going to be smooth as silk.”

Shayne shrugged and asked for a drink. When Gregory nodded, Ramon opened the attache case and uncapped the cognac. Shayne drank from the bottle. He offered it around. When the others refused he drank again, deeply.

“But it’s out of proportion, Boots. You’ve got Judge Kendrick in the bag, and even if I felt that strongly about it, what could I do?”

“Not a damn thing,” Gregory said drily, “if you’re in Arizona. In Tallahassee you might think of something.” Shayne looked at the unfriendly faces on each side, shook his head humorously and drank again.

“Yeah,” he said, breathing out. “Nothing like good cognac. This is all going to be very painless. You may not realize, Boots, but I only have a token client. Senator Maslow was afraid I’d hurt the image. The News is paying me a lousy fifty bucks to bodyguard Tim Rourke. You could probably top that, but I suppose you’d ask yourself, could you trust me?”

“That’s the first question I’d ask myself.”

The three men in the back seat leaned over in unison as the Cadillac took a corner.

Shayne continued, “It must be a great feeling, having that much cash to spread around. It makes everything so simple. But Sam surprises me. In the last year or two he’s slowed way down.”

“He’s only got a limited time,” Gregory agreed cautiously.

“And here he is, kicking up his heels like a yearling. Maybe the doctors have been feeding him hormones.”

He drank again, and held the bottle to the light. He was nearing the bottom, and he got there with the next long pull. He handed the empty bottle to Ramon.

“Don’t want to attract attention throwing bottles. When Sam goes,” he went on, “and he could go any day, it’s going to leave a vacuum in Miami. We could have a small civil war on our hands. That’s bad for a town.”

“You’re so right,” Gregory said, studying him.

Shayne smiled amiably. “Boots, maybe you shouldn’t wait for a natural death. Maybe you ought to move before everybody else gets the same idea. Take the initiative. That’s the big thing. It’s a matter of indifference to me, except that a private detective does better when he’s on good terms with the people who run the town. You’ve got an organization and money. You’ve got the desire. I think I’d better stay downwind of you, Boots. Hell, why don’t we deal?”

“Not on this,” Gregory said briefly.

“Then let’s break into that other bottle.”

Again Gregory nodded, and Ramon went into the attache case for the second pint of cognac. Shayne tipped it almost straight up. Three pairs of eyes were watching him closely, and he caught the driver’s eyes in the mirror. He couldn’t fake it. He lowered the level by about a third in the next ten minutes, while the Cadillac worked its way jerkily out of town.

Shayne went on talking about the compromises a private detective has to make if he doesn’t want to end up discredited and broke. He could feel the men on either side begin to relax, but Gregory’s eyes were still alive with suspicion.

The Cadillac turned into the curving approach to the airport.

Shayne said, “Why don’t you change your mind, Boots? I hate to read about something like this in the paper afterward. You never get the real story.”

“Stop trying. I already paid for the plane.”

Shayne had another drink. “You’ll have to pour me on,” he mumbled, his tongue thick. “Been in the business a long time, never let anybody run me out of town. Not blaming you, you understand. My own damn fault, let you ambush me. Hell, this is the humane way. I shot that kid of yours in the chopper. You don’t hold it against me. What’s a little ride in an airplane? Not even very embarrassing.”

He gestured with the uncapped bottle, and drank again. He had to stop at exactly the right moment, before he was incapable of action. But his judgment was blurring.

“I want to thank you for your consideration,” he said with a drunken attempt at dignity. “Appreciate your restraint. Statesmanship. Move to Miami, Boots. I can get you a good buy in a co-op apartment. We’re going to be friends.”

They were out of the car. Shayne found that he still had the bottle in his hand. He told himself that it was time to move. The afternoon was splintering around him.

“Wait,” he commanded. “What happened? I’m drunk as a skunk.”

They were pressing him closely. He heard Gregory’s voice say gently, “Finish the bottle, Mike. You don’t want to waste good cognac.”

“Had enough,” Shayne said stupidly. “Christ-”

They had pulled into a little access road beyond the terminal. A jet blasted off, and he felt its smoky exhaust wash over him. The faces of Gregory and his three companions swam in and out through the warm murk. He felt a murderous impulse to smash the nearest face with the bottle. He knew he could do a certain amount of damage before they pounded him into unconsciousness and dragged him aboard the plane. But he also knew, with the remnants of intelligence that flickered somewhere on the far side of the haze, that his reflexes were far from normal, that orders starting in his brain would be blocked or rerouted before they could arrive at his muscles. He had to shorten the odds.

Gregory continued in the same soft tone, “I’ll be happier when the bottle’s empty, Mike. I’ll be able to relax.”

Something hard jabbed Shayne in the shoulderblade. “Drink up, Mike, or Ramon’s going to shoot you in the shoulder. Not in the gut, the shoulder. Then you get nothing but first-aid till the plane lands.”

“Don’t want that.”

There was movement at the fringe of Shayne’s vision; a taxi departed from in front of the terminal. Again the sundrenched expanse of asphalt was empty. He smiled foolishly at Gregory and tilted the bottle. He let his mouth overflow. “Sloppy drinker,” somebody said with a laugh.

Then the bottle was empty. He hurled it away, hearing it spatter, and exclaimed, “Full of vitamins. Boots, you’re one sweet guy, and I love you.”

He lurched toward Gregory, but the pavement tilted and he went down on his knees. He discovered from the pull on his wrist that he and Ramon were handcuffed together. Ramon pulled him erect, with a vicious obscenity.

“Easy,” Gregory said. “Easy. Mike’s going to introduce us to his friends when we get to Miami.”

“Boots, people say you’re a cheap punk,” Shayne said. “All wrong. Real power. The one thing I respect.”