Brett Halliday - Violence Is Golden

“Yes, Mary. Now, if that’s all-’”

“It’s by no means all! They mentioned a ship, the S.S. Mansfield City. They mentioned a location, La Guaira. For your information, if you’re not up on your geography, that’s the port for Caracas, Venezuela. And they mentioned two names.”

“Mary?” Shayne said when she stopped.

For an instant he thought the connection had been broken. Then she cried, “What do you think you’re doing? Get out this instant or I’ll-”

There was a guttural exclamation. She squealed almost comically and the phone fell. An instant later a click sounded in Shayne’s ear.

Christa, sitting forward, questioned him with a look. He weighed the phone in one hand, then put it down.

“This may he the break I’ve been waiting for,” he said decisively. “ Don’t leave this room. When Tim Rourke phones, tell him to come here.”

“Mike, we decided-”

He thrust the thirty-eight into the side pocket of his jacket. “They had no way of knowing she was calling me. It’s a chance to get everything sorted out so we’ll know where we are tomorrow. But if I do get booby-trapped, the gold is scheduled to go out of La Guaira on a ship called the Mansfield City. Give it to the cops, and let’s have everybody picked up when they make the transfer.”

“Mike, be careful.” She added softly, “Come back to me.”

Shayne gave her a slanting grin and ran for the elevators. On the second floor he looked for Room 285. The door was locked, but a locked hotel door never delayed Shayne for long. He entered carefully, his gun out. After waiting a moment, he snapped on the overhead light.

One of the two beds was turned down for the night. The other was badly tangled. A crumpled pillow and a spilled box of chocolates lay on the floor. Shayne took in the scene in a fast glance. As he turned, he heard the loud blast of an automobile horn outside. After going on too long, it broke off abruptly.

Shayne went quickly to the window.

This room was on the blind side of the building. He looked down on a dimly lit expanse of parked cars. The horn sounded again, this time briefly. A flicker of movement near one of the mercury-vapor lamps drew his eye. Three figures, a woman and two men, were struggling in the front seat of a white convertible. The top came down and hid them from view.

Shayne moved fast.

He took the stairs to the mezzanine three at a time. Still moving quickly but without seeming to hurry, he descended the curving stairs to the lobby. Ward, the Negro clergyman, was in his path, talking to one of the older women from the tour. He nodded to Shayne and turned as though to stop him.

“Meeting a plane,” Shayne said, and brushed past.

As he approached the taxi stand to the right of the main entrance, an elderly Negro sprang to attention beside a battered Checker cab.

“Cab, sir?”

“Yeah, and I’m in a hurry.”

The driver slid behind the wheel. Shayne came into the front seat beside him. The driver wheeled the cab around, completing the turn just as the convertible shot out of the driveway leading into the parking area.

“There they are!” Shayne snapped. “My wife’s in that car.”

The driver, a small man with grizzled hair and gnarled hands, came down hard on the gas. “There won’t be any-altercation?”

“Nothing like that,” Shayne told him. “This is just to see where they go, to protect myself. She’s trying to hit me for heavy alimony. Don’t hang too close. Just don’t lose them.”

“Because,” the driver continued, shifting gears, “I wouldn’t want to become mixed up in somebody else’s domestic argument. I’m a peace-loving man.”

“So am I,” Shayne said, peering ahead.

The driver glanced across at him skeptically. “And that thing that’s dragging down the right-hand pocket of your coat could be a pipe, too, but I doubt it.”

Shayne sighed. “Why do I always pick a driver who notices things? I’m a detective. The lady’s not my wife. She’s my client’s wife.” He took out a twenty-dollar bill, held it up so the driver could see the denomination, and tucked it in his shirt pocket. “All right now?”

“Well-l-”

“How long’s this Checker been kicking around?”

“Nearly as long as I have. The difference is, everything’s been replaced a few times and I’m still running on the original parts. They made a good automobile. This about the interval you like?”

“Fine.”

The convertible they were following was a recent-model Pontiac. It twisted through the cobblestone streets of the Old Town. As it emerged into the countryside, Shayne told his driver to drop farther back. The road surface became rapidly worse. The Pontiac’s big double taillights danced crazily as the wheels went into potholes or over breaks in the asphalt. The high old Checker was less troubled by the road, but the motor labored as they began to climb. “You could use a valve job,” Shayne observed.

The driver chuckled. “Can’t the same be said for almost everybody? For another ten dollars I’d be willing to cut my lights through here. I know this road like a newspaper, and it’s easy with another vehicle to follow.”

Shayne paid him, and he slowed abruptly as the lights went off. Whenever the taillights ahead vanished from view, he put his own dims back on and speeded up till the road straightened and the taillights reappeared. They crossed an intersection and continued another few miles in silence.

“This is bad country around here,” he said nervously. “The people will pick the meat off your bones, if they catch you, and leave nothing of your automobile but the chassis. I can’t make out where this fellow is going.”

“Doesn’t the road go around the island?”

“Not this one.” He swung the wheel to avoid a bad hole. “He is driving too fast for conditions. He’ll lose the bottom out of his oilpan if he isn’t careful. No, the coast road is behind us. I can tell better in a few kilometers. There is a Y ahead. If he goes to the right, it is one thing.”

The road dipped and the taillights disappeared. When they came into view again, the driver murmured, “Now we see.” A moment later: “To the left. Now we can turn around and go back to town.”

“Where are we?”

“In a district known as La Esmerelda. The right fork comes down into a valley where there are cane plantations. The left fork goes nowhere. A ridge with a waterfall, a view of the ocean. A man from New York started to put up houses there, then he went away. That is how it is done, it seems. There is one house, only half finished. People say he will return when the banks give him more money.”

They reached the fork. He cut his wheels and began to turn.

“How far is the house?” Shayne said.

“A few minutes on foot. Also a few minutes by car-the road is bad. If you listen, you can hear the waterfall.”

“Pull over and wait for me.”

“No. As I told you, this is a bad part of the mountains, and so I think I will go back to the lights of the town. If you are getting out here, that will be five dollars.”

Shayne opened his wallet. “Fifty.”

The old man shook his head. “I do not interfere in anybody’s business. But when a man with a weapon in his pocket follows a woman in a modern automobile into the mountains, I know from history that shots will be fired. And the man with no connection with the affair is always the one struck by the bullets-that is the way it happens in St. Albans.”

“I’ll make it a hundred.”

“I am truly sorry, sir. Even a third-class funeral costs more than a hundred dollars.” The valves tapped loudly as the motor idled. “I am nervous to be standing here. Are you coming or staying?”