Brett Halliday: The Body Came Back

“So, Al goes calling.” Shayne stopped and frowned. “Thus far it all fits together. He’s on the lam and hiding out from the law. Probably broke. He could expect Carla to give him a stake in order to keep him out of her hair and see that the wedding isn’t disrupted.

“But things go wrong at the Encanto, and he walks in on Vicky before her mother gets here from Hollywood… and he ends up with a row of Twenty-Five bullets in his belly.

“All this makes sense, Tim. But what about the telephone call Carla got? What in hell did Al have in his possession that someone else now thinks is worth ten grand to Carla?”

“Hasn’t she any idea?”

Shayne shook his head. “She says not.” He glanced at his watch. “That’s what I intend to find out in about ten minutes when I’m due to meet the guy.”

“Whereabouts, Mike?”

Without rancor, Shayne said, “None of your goddamned business, Tim. I can handle it without the Press being present.” He got up slowly, a preoccupied expression on his face, ragged red eyebrows drawing low beneath his ridged forehead.

“I don’t know how things will work out, Tim. But I suggest you remain partially sober, and I may dump a front-page story in your lap. Be in the lobby of the Encanto Hotel thirty minutes from now,” he said flatly.

“Just be there, Tim. I don’t know how things will work out. Wait in the lobby for half an hour, and if I don’t show up you come back and go to bed like a good little boy. Forget all this stuff tonight.”

Shayne got up for the second time and moved decisively toward the door.

“Okay?”

In a troubled voice, Rourke said, “Okay. But, Mike. Do you know what you’re walking into?”

With his hand on the doorknob, Michael Shayne turned his head and grinned delightedly at his old friend. “Hell, no! What would be the fun of living, if you knew what was going to happen? Be seeing you… some time.” He went out and pulled the door firmly shut behind him.

The moon and the stars were bright in the tropical sky as Michael Shayne drove north on Biscayne Boulevard to keep his rendezvous with George Duclos. He wasn’t exactly acquainted with 64th Terrace, but knew it must be one of the short streets between the boulevard and the bay, either north or south of 64th Street. The section was not closely built-up, and at this time of night the dead-end street should be completely deserted, a perfect spot for the meeting that had been arranged.

As he drove, Shayne went over and over in his mind the information that he had just picked up from the News reporter. It didn’t give him much clue as to what to expect when he met Duclos who expected him to turn over ten thousand in cash for something which had belonged to the dead man. Again, he wondered if Duclos was aware that Al was dead. About the only way he could know that was for him to have discovered the body of his brother-in-law in the trunk of his car.

Would Duclos have remained quiet if he had made that discovery? Certainly, he would have got rid of it fast. In that case the real object of Shayne’s trip to 64th Terrace was probably worthless. If the body was already safely disposed of, there was no need to bother further with Duclos or his Ford. At this point, Shayne wasn’t particularly worried about Duclos going to the police. Not if he had already found the body and gotten rid of it. That put him in just as deep as Shayne.

On the other hand, Duclos might not have the slightest idea what had happened to the bank robber and simply be taking a chance on picking up a wad of cash by selling something that belonged to Al. If he did know about the Alabama deal and how badly Al was wanted, he might guess that Al had just started running when something went wrong at the Encanto and his meeting with his wife, and reason that he might as well cash in on it if he could.

Shayne sighed and shrugged and put all those questions out of his mind as he neared 64th. All he could do was to play it by ear, as he had so often played his hunches in the past. One thing in his favor was that Duclos wouldn’t be expecting Mike Shayne to bring the money. He was looking for a Mr. Jones, and wouldn’t be anticipating trouble.

Shayne slowed his car and got over into the right lane and watched the street signs. 64th Terrace was a narrow strip of blacktop leading toward the bay with a thick, trimmed hedge of hibiscus on the left bordering a large estate, and with scrub palmettos on the right. There were no street lights east of the boulevard. There was a small house on the corner as Shayne turned into the lane, and his headlights picked out another house two hundred feet ahead on the right. Both were dark and silent.

He drove past them and switched on his bright lights to disclose a guard railing across the top of the bluff where the road ended, with a turning place in front of it for cars. There was no Ford parked there, no car or human being in sight. He made a circle in front of the railing, stopped his car on the right-hand side against the hedge headed out for a quick getaway if necessary, then switched off his motor and lights.

He lit a cigarette and looked at his watch in the match flame and saw it had been exactly forty-seven minutes since he had talked to Duclos on the telephone.

The man was two minutes late.

Shayne unlatched the door on his side so that it remained closed but swung free, made himself relax behind the steering wheel and drag deeply on his cigarette.

A lot of things might have delayed Duclos a few minutes. Or he might be cagily parked back on the boulevard watching the intersection to make sure that only one car with one man in it turned in and parked at the dead-end. That would be a sensible precaution for the man to take under the circumstances even if he didn’t anticipate any trouble from Mr. Jones.

Sitting in the front seat with his car facing out, Shayne watched each infrequent car approach the intersection from both north and south, wondering which one would slow down, which one would make the turn in toward him.

He finished his cigarette and continued to wait, and no car slowed or turned in. His belly muscles were beginning to tighten as though a giant hand was gripping his guts, and he thought about Duclos having an accident on his way to the rendezvous, of the Ford getting a flat tire and pulling off the road to change it and a ubiquitous police cruiser drawing up behind to politely offer assistance.

Beads of sweat broke out on his corrugated forehead although the night breeze was cool, and he lit another cigarette and checked his watch again.

He had been waiting nine minutes. Parked here like a sitting duck if a police car were to suddenly turn into the narrow lane in front of him.

He’d finish this last cigarette, he decided. Smoke it down to a short butt. If Duclos hadn’t showed by that time…

He heard a rustling in the hibiscus hedge at his right. He turned his head slowly and saw the bulky figure of a man coming through the shrubbery. He drew deeply on his cigarette to make a little pinpoint of light in the night, and waited.

The man stopped six feet from the car and asked cautiously, “Is that Jones?”

It was George Duclos’s voice.

Shayne said, “Yeh. How’d you slip up on me like that?”

The bastard, he thought angrily. Where’s the Ford? He’s parked it some place and come up on foot. I’ve got to find that Ford.

He had the brim of his Panama hat pulled low over his face and he sat very still as Duclos circled the car to come up on the left side. The man had seen him only once, at the police station, and fleetingly. Shayne felt he had a good chance to pass unrecognized if he stayed in the car and out of the moonlight.

Duclos chuckled hoarsely as he came up close to the open window. “I wanted to make sure you came alone and weren’t going to try any tricks. You got the money?”