Brett Halliday: The Body Came Back

“By that time the bank alarm was sounding off and citizens were running for guns, and the two deserted bandits grabbed a parked car and took off in the same direction as the money car on the highway leading to Montgomery, about twenty miles away.

“By that time a deputy sheriff had got himself organized and took off after them on an eighty-mile-an-hour chase that lasted about five miles until the lead car failed to straighten out on a curve leading to a bridge over the Eureka River, went through the guard rail and about forty feet down into the flood-swollen stream. There was at least ten feet of fast water, and by the time the deputy got stopped and back to the scene the car was out of sight. They recovered it later that evening a few hundred feet downstream with nobody inside.

“Nobody that saw it believes either of the robbers could have survived, and it’s generally expected that their bodies will be found miles away from the scene.”

“But one of them, at least, didn’t drown.” Shayne gestured toward the picture.

“That’s right. And you and I are the only ones who know that, Mike. He’s Al Newman, by the way. His partner in the robbery hasn’t been identified. Al was recognized in the bank as a character who had been shacked up in a motel on the outside of town for a week with the woman who drove the getaway car. They found that picture of him in the motel room. They were both complete strangers in town, apparently spent a week casing the bank job before pulling it off.”

“What about the money and the bank teller?”

“Poor Harvey Giles. He was picked up on a lonely side road about dark that same night, all bruised up and practically incoherent. As that paper went to press he had told a garbled story about the woman holding a gun on him while she drove away like a bat out of hell, circling off the main highway onto side roads, and finally stopping to tie him up and leave him miles from anywhere. He managed to get loose and make it to the road where he was found.

“The car was found late that night on the outskirts of Montgomery, but the woman and the money had vanished. They’re still vanished, so far as any report we’ve had here shows.” Rourke stopped talking and took a long drink from his highball, his sunken eyes glittering and bright.

“So where does that leave us, Mike?”

“I’ll be goddamned if I know at this point. I think I will have a drink after all.” Shayne got up and poured bourbon into the glass on the table, carried it out to Rourke’s kitchenette to get ice and add some water to it. He came back, sipping it and grimacing.

Studying his face carefully, Rourke asked, “Does any of this throw any light on the story you haven’t told me about tonight?”

“I don’t see how it does,” Shayne told him moodily. “It all seems to fit in, more or less. Al Newman’s real name is probably Al Donlin… for whatever that’s worth. An ex-con who’s been in and out of trouble all his life. It explains why he turned up in Miami desperate for money and went to his sister’s house. If you didn’t run his picture in the local paper it’s perfectly possible that Mr. and Mrs. Duclos didn’t know anything about his present trouble. Or he may have told Duclos… at least hinted he was hot. That would explain why Duclos didn’t want to admit loaning him his car… if he did loan it to him to drive to the Encanto.”

“What about your… friend? Carla, you said her name is.”

“Brett’s friend,” Shayne corrected him. “No reason for her to know about this either, I guess.” He paused, sipping his drink and pondering the problem.

“There’s been another development since I saw you. She was waiting at my place when I got home. Frightened half out of her wits. She had a telephone call… soon after that newscast which she hadn’t even heard. Some guy who was a complete stranger, but appeared to know that Al had been to see her tonight. He demanded to know what she and I had done with Al, and then demanded ten thousand bucks… in cash… tonight… for which he offered to sell her something which he claimed Al had given him for safe-keeping before he went to see her.”

“What kind of a something?”

“She insists she hasn’t any idea what he was talking about. Can’t even guess. But he is in a position to put her and her daughter on the spot in connection with Al’s death, and she’s frantic to pay him the money to keep his mouth shut.”

He looked at his watch and added grimly, “I’m on my way to make the pay-off in about twenty minutes.”

“You’re passing over ten grand?” asked Rourke incredulously.

Shayne grinned wolfishly. “Not quite that much. She had only a thousand in cash that she’d brought from California for expenses. She gave me that, and her IOU for the balance. I’m supposed to be picking it up from you right now.”

“What do you intend to do?”

“I’m not sure,” Shayne said cautiously. “I want to talk to the guy… try to find out what Al left with him for safe-keeping that he thinks is worth ten thousand.”

“Do you think it could be the other guy in the bank robbery?” asked Rourke eagerly. “If Al wasn’t drowned in the river, maybe the other one wasn’t either.”

Shayne said doubtfully, “Could be.” He tossed off the rest of his drink with a grimace.

Rourke’s telephone rang. The reporter reached out a long arm and scooped it up. He said, “Rourke,” and listened, twisting his head to nestle the receiver between his ear and shoulder while he got notebook and pencil from his pocket and began jotting down notes, mumbling, “Yeh,” and “I got it,” now and then.

Finally he said, “Thanks for calling me, Joe. It may be damned important.” He hung up and shook his head at the detective who had gotten up and was preparing to leave.

“You got to hear this, Mike. A follow-up on the Alabama bank robbery. Just came over the wire and one of the boys at the office knew I was checking on it tonight, and called me. Remember the bank teller they took for a hostage? Harvey Giles. He’s been murdered.”

Shayne sank back into his chair and said, “Give it to me fast.”

“Body was discovered in his rooming house tonight. He’d been dead at least twelve hours. Beaten to death… after being brutally tortured from all available evidence. A real professional job.” Rourke glanced down at his notes, compressing his lips. “Several fingernails torn out by the roots. Cigarette burns around his eyes and in his ears.”

“Do they tie it in with the bank robbery?”

“Only by guess and by inference. No other motive known. Seems that Harvey Giles was a pretty innocuous sort. Young bachelor. Model citizen. Pillar of the church and the community. Teller of the bank at twenty-six, and probably drawing a fat salary of three thousand bucks a year.”

“Let’s see… what was the time-table? On the robbery and then this killing.”

“Well, the bank job was pulled Thursday afternoon. Giles turned up Thursday night a little the worse for wear.” Rourke glanced at his notes again. “He came to work at the bank Friday morning, and they sent him home at noon… told him to take a long week-end rest and come back to work Monday morning. Quite a local hero, I guess. He lived alone apparently. Yesterday was Saturday, and no one missed him. Until along in the evening when his landlady realized he hadn’t shown up all day and went to his room and knocked on the door without getting any response. They broke the door down finally, and found him there.”

“Dead for twelve hours or more,” muttered Shayne. “That means the job was done on him some time Friday night.”

“That’s right. What do you make of it, Mike?”

“Right now, I don’t know enough to make anything out of it,” Shayne confessed wryly. “The woman driver of the getaway car vanished with the bank loot Thursday afternoon after ditching him in a deserted spot. Al Newman and a pal disappear in a river Thursday afternoon, supposedly drowned… and we have Al turning up in Miami Saturday and holing up at his sister’s house… discovering from a story on the society page of your paper that his wife and daughter are in town at the Encanto Hotel. For the first time, perhaps, he discovers that his wife whom he deserted long ago is a Hollywood script writer with money in the bank… and the daughter whom he has never seen is engaged to marry a recently elected State Senator.