Brett Halliday - The Corpse That Never Was

“Did she love him?”

“Love?” Eli Armbruster’s voice sneered at the word. “I’m not at all sure that Elsa was capable of love. You see, as I told you at the beginning of this interview, I knew my own daughter, Shayne. For years, I have had no illusions about Elsa. Love? I simply don’t know. She wanted Paul Nathan as a husband. She bought him. She was prepared to pay a high price for keeping him. This is one of the reasons why it is so difficult for me to accept the premise that she had fallen head over heels with some stranger named Robert Lambert… was visiting him in that dingy apartment on the sly… and had got in so deep that she was prepared to take her own life for the sake of… love? No. There is some other answer. One of the things you should know, for instance, is that Nathan asked her for a divorce some months ago, having the effrontery to demand a cash settlement of a quarter of a million dollars to remove himself from her life. Being Elsa, she refused… although I advised her to rid herself of the fellow even on those terms.

“Thus, she was fully aware that if she ever gave him grounds for divorce, he would sue immediately. There are many cases in which Florida courts have awarded alimony or substantial cash settlements to impecunious husbands who have proved adultery against their wives in a divorce court. If for no other reason in the world, Elsa would never have laid herself open to such charges which could be proved.”

Shayne said, “People do all sorts of irrational things when driven by love… or sex… whichever you prefer to call it.”

“People, yes,” agreed Armbruster. “But not Elsa. I tell you, Shayne…”

“I know,” said Shayne, holding up a big hand to cut the man off. “You’ve made your point. Don’t try to over-sell it. At this point, I have an open mind about your daughter. I’ll want differing viewpoints from yours to round out my picture of her.”

Armbruster said stiffly, “Of course. You know your business best and I’m sure you have your own methods. Bear in mind, however, that my offer stands. A retainer of ten thousand for you to handle the case. An additional fifty thousand the day Paul Nathan is convicted of my daughter’s murder.”

“I shan’t forget,” Shayne told him easily. “I’ll have my secretary draw up a brief memorandum on that basis, and will mail it to you for your signature.”

“Do that, Shayne.” Eli Armbruster arose to his feet with the agility of a middle-aged athlete. “In the meantime, I will leave my check at her desk on my way out.”

“There’s no need for that,” Shayne protested arising behind his desk. “You can pay me when…”

“I wish to make the initial payment now, if you don’t mind. I want you to be thoroughly convinced that it is in no way contingent upon what you discover. I am buying only an honest and thorough investigation. Please report to me as soon as you have learned anything of interest.” With that, he turned his back and marched out of Michael Shayne’s office.

The detective sank back into his swivel chair and lit a cigarette, scowling morosely. He liked the old man, and he didn’t like the case one little bit. For that kind of money, he didn’t have to like the case, he reminded himself. He wondered what sort of woman Elsa Armbruster had been in life, what kind of unpleasant truths concerning his daughter Armbruster was destined to hear before Shayne had earned his fee.

He was puffing on his cigarette and still scowling when Lucy tripped in lightly through the open door, her face beaming while she waved a slip of green paper in the air.

“Shame on you, Michael,” she exclaimed in a voice that completely belied her words. “What did you tell the old boy to hypnotize him into this? Ten thousand whole dollars! He didn’t even say what it was for. Just got a blank check out of his wallet and wrote it out… then tossed it over to me as though he were buying a couple of movie tickets, and walked out.”

Shayne said, “That’s a down payment on my integrity, Angel.”

She looked at him blankly and said, “Oh?”

“That’s right. There’s fifty grand more if I can conjure up evidence to convict his son-in-law of murder.”

“You mean… last night? But you said that was suicide, Michael.”

“It is… officially.” Shayne shrugged and said, “Sit down and take a letter of agreement. If Paul Nathan is the louse Armbruster thinks he is, maybe I will hang a murder rap on him.”

“Whether he’s guilty or not?” Lucy asked matter-of-factly as she sat down across the desk from him and opened her shorthand pad.

“Hell,” said Shayne harshly, “we know he isn’t guilty. Start it out: Mr. Eli Armbruster, and get his address on the Beach. Dear Sir: Confirming our conversation of this morning…”

When Michael Shayne entered Will Gentry’s private office at police headquarters a short time later, the Miami Chief of Police was seated behind his desk with the well-chewed stub of a black cigar in his mouth, studying some typed reports in front of him. He was a burly, red-faced man, and he lifted a beefy hand to welcome the redhead, muttering absently, “Just a minute, Mike, while I finish this.”

He continued to scowl down at the sheet in front of him, working his lips to move the soggy cigar from one side of his mouth to the other.

Shayne pulled a straight chair a little closer to his desk and eased his rangy body down into it. He got out a cigarette and lit it in silence, leaned back comfortably to let thin, grayish smoke roil slowly out of both nostrils.

Will Gentry grunted and pushed the paper aside. “I see you were Johnny-On-The-Spot again last night, Mike. How the hell do you manage it?”

“I know the right people. Go visiting them at the right time.”

“Yeh,” snorted Gentry. “That apartment house of Lucy’s! What’s she got that attracts violence?”

Shayne grinned and said, “Don’t blame her. She doesn’t even know the guy.”

“Neither does anyone else it seems.” Gentry slammed the flat of a big hand down on the papers in front of him. “A name, that’s all we’ve got.”

Shayne looked at him alertly. “You haven’t been able to trace Robert Lambert at all?”

“Nary a trace. No wallet. No identification. No papers. Every stitch of clothes in the apartment is practically new, without a laundry mark or dry cleaner’s tag.”

“Fingerprints?”

“Nothing on file here. We’ve sent them to Washington… should have a preliminary report this afternoon. No Robert Lambert listed in the directories here and none in Jacksonville where he gave a phony street address when he rented the apartment.”

“And no bereaved wife turned up to claim the body?”

“That’s what we’re waiting for… if Lambert is his name. You interested, Mike?” Gentry asked the question casually, removing the cigar from his mouth and studying it intently as though he didn’t know how it had got there.

Shayne said, “I’m interested. To the extent of a whopping retainer.”

“Old Eli, huh? He threw his weight around here and threatened, by God, if the police force couldn’t do anything he’d go to the one man in Miami who could.” Gentry permitted himself a sour smile. “So it’s your headache, Mike.”

“The old man is dead-set on making out a case against his son-in-law.”

“He’s dead-set on hanging a frame around the poor guy’s neck,” Gentry retorted angrily. “You going to do his dirty work?”

Shayne leaned back and stretched his long legs out in front of him, tugging thoughtfully at his earlobe. “I’m in business for hire, Will. Right now I’ve been retained by Eli Armbruster to make a thorough, complete and unbiased investigation of the circumstances in which his daughter met her death last night. Any objection to that?” His voice was slightly edged, challenging.