Brett Halliday - Blood on Biscayne Bay

Painter was making notations in his book. “Was this the first time you’d taken her out, Mr. Hudson?”

“Of course. God, you don’t think I’d make a practice of it.” He closed his eyes and shuddered. “She got half-tight on a couple of drinks and insisted on gambling. After she’d dropped all her own money she wanted me to put up for her. I was sick of my bargain by that time, and I slipped away and left her there.”

“What time was that?”

“About ten o’clock.”

Painter looked at Shayne. “You say you saw him there with the maid?”

“I said I saw him at the Play-Mor. He was with a girl who answered Mr. Hudson’s description of the maid.”

“What time was that?”

“I saw them at the roulette table slightly before ten. I dropped forty bucks and went out for a few drinks and looked in again about ten-thirty. She was still there, but I didn’t see him.”

“That’s what I told you,” Floyd put in wearily. “I skipped out on her and went on and made a night of it by myself.”

“Where?” Painter asked incisively.

Floyd shook his head. “God only knows. I hit the Den first and tilted a few. And I think I was at the Yacht Club, and maybe the Tropical Tavern.” He managed a puffy-lipped smile. “Didn’t get in till about four-thirty.”

“You didn’t come back here in the meantime?”

“Hell, no. Home didn’t appeal to me right then.”

“How long were you at the Play-Mor?” Painter demanded of Shayne.

“I reached my apartment at eleven o’clock. I didn’t go back into the gambling room after I looked in at ten-thirty.”

“And the girl was there at that time?”

“She was at the roulette table when I went out and got a cab,” Shayne said steadily.

Mrs. Morgan entered the room unobtrusively. She touched Leslie Hudson’s arm and said, “I think you’d best go up to Mrs. Hudson, sir. She’s resting quietly, but she’d like to see you.”

“Of course” Hudson arose hastily. “You’ll excuse me.

“And I,” said Floyd, “have told you all I know about anything. Is there hot coffee, Mrs. Morgan?”

“On the stove. I’ll fix some-”

“You’ll stay right here,” Painter said sternly, “until you’ve answered a few questions.”

As she turned back looking flustered and unhappy, Floyd brushed past her, saying, “I’ll fix some myself. And don’t tell him any more than you have to.”

Mrs. Morgan sat down and folded her hands in her lap. She answered Painter’s questions steadily and clearly. She had helped rear Christine, and when Christine married she had been happy to come to Miami and take the position as housekeeper in the Hudson home. She hadn’t known Natalie Briggs until she came to work as a maid, and the girl had done her work competently. There had been no complaints. She knew nothing at all about the dead girl’s background or friends. She had had no callers during the few weeks she’d been employed at the Hudson house, and had received no letters to Mrs. Morgan’s knowledge.

She and the girl occupied adjoining rooms in the rear wing of the house, upstairs, and when she retired at midnight, Natalie was not in her room. She hadn’t tried to call her early this morning, supposing she was asleep, but had gone up after preparing breakfast and learned then that she had not returned during the night. She had heard no unusual sounds during the night, but she was a sound sleeper and would not have heard any noises had they occurred.

Peter Painter snapped his notebook shut with a snort of irritation after concluding his interrogation of Mrs. Morgan. He smoothed his thin black mustache with his thumbnail, shrugged, and strutted out the front door.

Shayne went out after saying good-by to Mrs. Morgan. He silently followed Painter around the side of the house to the rear, taking the same path he had watched Natalie take the preceding night.

A flagstone path led through the spacious lawn to stone steps going down into a boathouse built out from the breakwater into Biscayne Bay, large enough to house a thirty-foot motor launch. The roof of the boathouse was flat, and level with the top of the breakwater. A man was lying on his belly at the far end of the roof, looking down at the water.

He rolled over and sat up as Painter, with Shayne a few steps behind him, walked out on the roof toward him. “We got it just about figured out for you, Chief. Whatley is down there in a rowboat scraping off samples from the plank doors of the boathouse. Blood is what it is. Diluted with water and washed up there against the planking last night while she drifted away. Whatley and I figure she was bopped on the head when she come around back to get in last night, and then the guy carried her out here and slit her throat while he was holding her out over the edge so’s there wouldn’t be any bloodstains left. We figure-”

“Keep your figuring to yourself,” said Painter furiously. He turned on Shayne and said, “Keep out of my way. I’m warning you, just keep out of my way.”

Shayne grinned and nodded. He said, “Okay,” and turned and sauntered back across the lawn to the front.

A Buick roadster was pulled up behind his waiting cab, and behind that was Chief Painter’s official car. A Beach homicide sedan was parked behind it.

Shayne got in the cab and said to the driver, “Pull ahead a couple of blocks and then circle back where we can watch these cars without being seen. We may have a long wait.”

“Look, boss,” the driver remonstrated, “waitin’ around like this ain’t so good these days. A guy don’t put much on the meter standin’ still.”

Shayne gave him a five-dollar bill and asked, “Will that fix it?”

“Sure-you bet,” the driver said, and followed the instructions Shayne had given him.

Shayne had a long wait in the taxi. He had time to think things over, particularly with regard to his own unenviable position in the affair. Chief Painter would inevitably discover that he had ridden to the Hudson house in a taxi with Natalie Briggs. The doorman had ample opportunity to get a good look at him the preceding night, and the odd scene regarding the cab would cause him to remember vividly. As soon as the story and the dead girl’s picture appeared in the papers the taxi driver, too, would come forward with his story.

Shayne frowned and worried his left ear lobe. It looked now as though Natalie had walked around to the back of the house and met a waiting murderer at the moment Shayne was at the front door inquiring for Mrs. Hudson. The taxi driver had seen him follow the girl through the front gate, but couldn’t testify that she had hurried on to the rear while Shayne went up the front steps. The hibiscus hedge shut off his view. He would probably say that there had been sufficient time for Shayne to have done the job before he returned to the cab and was driven back to Miami.

There would be no point in catching the noon plane to New Orleans now, Shayne mused. Painter would jerk him back for questioning before he’d have time even to start investigating the Belton case. And it certainly wouldn’t do to make a clean breast of his part in the affair to Painter. There were too many implausible coincidences that couldn’t be explained. He was definitely behind the eight-ball, and the only way to get out was to turn up the real murderer in a hurry.

From his own predicament, his thoughts drifted to Christine. He realized he was more worried about that angle than about his own involvement. She hadn’t told him the truth. He recalled with a tinge of anger her reaction when he had tried to return the pearls to her. She had been very happy to get her IOU back until she learned he hadn’t hocked the necklace to pay off her debt What was it she had cried out just before her husband and Painter interrupted? He went over the scene in his mind. “Oh, God! You’ve ruined everything. Now I’ll never-”