Brett Halliday - The Private Practice of Michael Shayne

He went to the cabinet and got down his bottle of cognac, brought it back and poured out a drink.

“Painter,” said Gentry, “wants to ask you some questions.”

“He’s always asking somebody fool questions.” Shayne slumped down in a chair and indicated the bottle he had just set down. “If he isn’t in a drinking mood, Will, I won’t hold out my private stock on you.”

“When you get through horsing around,” said Painter distantly, “I have some matters to take up with you.”

“Take them up, by all means.”

“When I questioned you about Grange’s death last night, why didn’t you tell me of the connection your friend Kincaid had with the dead man?”

“Because I didn’t consider it any of your damned business,” Shayne responded blandly.

Painter’s neat black mustache trembled slightly. “Suppression of evidence in a homicide is a felony in this state.”

“I don’t admit that Larry Kincaid’s connection with Grange had anything to do with homicide.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t because you had agreed to act as intermediary for Kincaid? Because you met Grange out on that lonely stretch of beach to obtain the evidence he was holding out on Elliot Thomas?”

Shayne’s blunt finger tips drummed irritably on the table.

“Are you still trying to hang that murder on me? I thought we settled that last night.”

“When I released you, I wasn’t in possession of the facts set forth in an affidavit sworn to by Mr. Elliot Thomas who came in voluntarily this afternoon.”

“All right,” Shayne snapped. “Now that you’re in possession of that affidavit-what are you going to do?”

Painter’s eyes glinted happily.

“I think I’m going to place a charge of first-degree murder against you.”

“You’ll wish you hadn’t,” Shayne warned. “Besides, I need another twelve hours free of interference and I’ll dump this whole thing in your lap. Hell! you haven’t even found the murder gun yet. Do you think I swallowed it after I shot Grange?”

Painter was fidgeting with the knob of the table drawer. He purred, “I’m quite sure we have found the death gun, Shayne. An embarrassing discovery for you.”

He pulled the drawer open and pointed to the two. 32 automatics lying in plain sight.

“Very careless of you, Shayne. Not to have even cleaned and reloaded the pistol.”

Gentry had been sitting back sipping a drink, making no visible show of his interest. Now, he sat up, studied Shayne intently, a puzzled frown gathering on his broad, genial face.

Shayne laughed and asked, “Have you checked the bullet that killed Grange with that pistol?”

“Not yet. We discovered the guns by accident while we were waiting for you. But Grange was killed with a thirty-two automatic.”

“And ten to one, that’s the gun that did it.”

Shayne leaned forward and pointed to the pistol he had taken from Marsha Marco’s room-now fitted with the barrel taken out of his own pistol.

“While you’ve been getting affidavits on my guilt,” he said drily, “I’ve been collecting evidence for you. I found that gun this afternoon-where the killer threw it after shooting Grange.”

Will Gentry relaxed again and emptied his glass while Painter snorted, “Naturally, you would cover up with some such story.”

“I’ve got an affidavit, too. From a substantial citizen who witnessed my finding of the gun.”

“That only proves you threw it there yourself last night,” Painter snarled.

Shayne shrugged and lifted heavy red brows at Will Gentry. The semblance of a smile formed around his eyes and crinkled his heavy cheek muscles.

“Why don’t you instruct your playmate in the rudiments of sleuthing, Will? This pistol with the nick in the butt belongs to me. It’s registered in my name and I’ve got a permit to carry it. If he wasn’t so damned interested in hanging something on me, he’d take the number off that other gun and find out who it belongs to.”

Peter Painter was quivering with wrath.

“I don’t need you to teach me my job, Shayne. That’s exactly what I’ve done. Gentry phoned the numbers in-and we’re waiting for a call from headquarters.”

“And you thought about that all by yourself?” Shayne looked upon him admiringly. “My, my. Stick around with me, little man, and you’ll learn to recognize a clue when you see one.”

Gentry turned his face away and put a huge hand to his mouth while Shayne blandly leaned forward and filled the two glasses with cognac.

The telephone rang while Painter was choking over a reply. He snapped, “I’ll answer,” and hopped up importantly.

Shayne lifted his glass to Gentry with a grin, said, “Here’s mud in your eye, Will,” while Painter lifted the receiver and carried on a brief conversation.

Gentry waggled his big head sidewise and said in a low tone, “Before God, Mike, I thought Petey had you when he found that gun in your drawer. Is that story of finding it straight?”

“Want to see my affidavit?”

Painter slammed up the receiver as Gentry smilingly said, “Not if you’ve got it, Mike.”

Painter came back to the table and rapped out, “That was your office, Gentry. They have only one thirty-two automatic registered in Shayne’s name. The number corresponds with the one that hasn’t been fired. They have no record of the other number. It’s probably one he stole on one of his jobs.”

Shayne came slowly and ominously to his feet. In a soft, terrible voice, he said, “That’s about the last crack of that sort I’m taking from you, Painter. Get out of here, or so help me God-”

The phone rang again. Painter backed toward it nervously.

Gentry put his hand on Shayne’s arm and said soothingly, “Don’t let him get your goat, Mike. You’ve got to admit that story Thomas told makes it look pretty bad.”

“I don’t admit a goddamned thing,” Shayne growled. “I don’t even know what lies Thomas told. Maybe he killed Grange. He’s so damned interested. Maybe he’s just trying to hang it on me.”

Again Painter replaced the receiver after a brief colloquy. Returning, a look of uncertainty clouded his dark, finely chiseled face. Addressing Gentry, he wet his lips and said, “Of course, we have only Shayne’s word for where he found the other pistol. We haven’t checked it with the death bullet yet.”

“You’re going to,” Shayne told him sharply. “Just because you found out who belongs to that pistol is not going to keep you from checking on it.”

Painter moved around Shayne and sank into a chair. He was perspiring freely, and dabbed at his forehead close to the edge of his smooth black hair. When the handkerchief was fastidiously restored to his outer coat pocket, he said to Gentry:

“That was my office. The pistol is registered under John Marco’s name.”

Shayne snorted like a mad bull, then lifted his glass and drank deeply.

“Councilman John Marco, eh? Another one of the mugs who’s been running around swearing out affidavits against me. Now that gives you something to cogitate on, my fine-feathered friend. It does me. But you can do your cogitating out of my sight.”

Painter touched the tip of a shaking forefinger to his mustache.

“I’m taking the pistol with me,” he warned.

“Hell, yes,” Shayne agreed. “I’m as interested in the ballistics test as you are. If you still don’t know who killed Harry Grange, I’ll see if I can dig up some more evidence. But I’m too damned sleepy right now to do any more detecting for you.”

He waited while Painter got a silk handkerchief from his hip pocket and picked up the Marco pistol.

Will Gentry pulled himself heavily from the chair, and Shayne accompanied them to the door and shut it firmly behind them.