Brett Halliday: The Body Came Back

The long corridor was empty, and he stood there for a moment, looking up and down the length of it and tugging gently at his left ear-lobe. It ended in a doorway on his right about twenty feet away, plainly lettered EXIT. That would be the stairway. Eight flights of stairs down. He grimaced and turned to the left, strode down the hall and around the corner to the bank of passenger elevators.

The car was empty when it stopped for him. It went down to the lobby without stopping and he stepped out into the large, brightly-lighted room still busy with the coming and going of guests even at this late hour.

Shayne moved among them and made a careful circuit of the room, glancing casually at the face of every man he encountered who was standing or sitting alone, and worked his way around to the entrance to the cocktail lounge without seeing a familiar countenance.

The bar stools were half-filled and most of the small tables were occupied, with two white-coated waiters serving drinks, and Shayne moved slowly toward the unoccupied portion of the bar, blinking his eyes to accustom them to the dim light in such strong contrast to the lobby.

One man sat alone at the extreme end of the bar nursing a tall glass of beer. There were at least a dozen empty stools between him and the next customer, and Shayne paused only a moment before moving over and sliding onto the stool beside him.

He was a stocky man with regular, good-natured features, wearing a dark suit, white shirt and black bow-tie. He glanced aside curiously as the rangy redhead sat beside him, and a smile spread over his big face and he said heartily, “Mike Shayne, himself. Buy you a drink?”

He lifted a finger to beckon the bartender before Shayne could reply, and told him genially, “Set out a bottle of cognac for my friend, Jack. It’s on the house. What are you drinking these days, Mike? Is it still Martel?”

“Martel is fine,” Shayne agreed. “Cordon Bleu, if it’s handy.”

“Well, now,” said John Russco, pretending to hesitate and be taken aback. “I did say it was on the house, but that stuff runs into money. Okay, Jack,” he ended resignedly to the waiting bartender. “Nothing is too good for Mike Shayne.”

“Call it a bribe, John,” Shayne told him in a low voice. “I may be just about to do you and the hotel a hell of a big favor.”

“Like what?” Russco’s voice matched his so that their words couldn’t be heard more than three stools away.

Shayne waited until an open bottle of Cordon Bleu and a pot-bellied brandy snifter stood in front of him and the bartender had gone back to his other customers. He poured the glass half-full and held it between his two big hands for a moment, and then said, “Like maybe you’re careless about leaving corpses scattered around in your hotel rooms. Bad publicity.” He lifted the glass and drank deeply. “One less for the cops to find wouldn’t hurt, I guess?”

“God, no,” the security officer breathed fervently. “You mean to say we got that kind of trouble?”

“The less you know about it the better it’ll be all the way around. Let’s keep this discussion purely hypothetical, huh?”

“You bet, Mike. Hypothetical as hell.”

“On that basis,” said Shayne, “and knowing your way around the joint as you do, how would you go about getting a body down from one of the upper floors and away from the hotel without any fuss or muss?”

“Simple enough,” John Russco told him. “There’s a service elevator that’s hardly ever used this time of night. It goes down to the basement, mostly for refuse removal, into an empty room with a door opening directly out into the alley. Park a car just outside…” He paused, watching Shayne expectantly.

Shayne nodded, drinking again. “Sounds good. Show me, huh?”

“You bet. Want a little more of that melted gold out of the bottle first? We’re picking up the tab,” he reminded him generously.

Shayne shook his head and drained the snifter. “Another time, John. Right now, let’s explore the basement.”

They both slid off their stools and Russco led the way back through the lounge and past the rest rooms to a corridor with a closed wooden door at the end. He opened it with a key and pushed a wall switch to light a concrete stairway leading down. The big hotel boiler-room was at the bottom of the stairway, steamy and warm, with overhead pipes leading in all directions. Russco led the way past hissing valves to a narrow, white-painted hallway and down it past closed doors on both sides to a small square room lined with empty refuse cans.

He turned on the overhead light and indicated a small self-service elevator with sliding doors standing open. “This goes all the way up, Mike. Just push the button for any floor you want. What number did you say it was?”

“I didn’t say. We’re keeping this hypothetical,” Shayne reminded him with a grin. “This the door to the alley?” He nodded to a closed door across from the elevator.

“Yeh.” John Russco went to the door and pulled it open, showing four brick stairs leading up to ground level. “It automatically locks behind you,” he warned as he went out into the warm, Miami night air.

Shayne followed him, leaving the door ajar. There was a narrow alley with a two-story building on the other side of it. There was a street light some sixty feet away, and Russco pointed to it. “That’s the street at the back of the hotel. None of the stores are open there at this time of night. A car driving out of the alley that way wouldn’t be noticed.”

“Unless a cop happened to be cruising by,” Shayne grunted.

“That’s right. But you could park a car right here in the dark and be pretty safe.”

Shayne nodded and agreed, “It looks good, John.” He went back down the stairs and across to the open elevator and stepped inside. “How does this thing operate?”

“Just like any self-service elevator.” Russco followed him in and pointed to the bank of buttons.

“They’re numbered for each floor. And see this one marked HOLD. See, it’s pushed in now. That holds the cage at any floor with the doors open until someone steps inside and presses another button. Otherwise the doors will close behind you and it can be taken away by anyone pushing a button on any floor. Not likely this time of night, but don’t forget the HOLD button if you want it to stay in one place. As soon as you get inside and push another button no one can stop you from where you want to go.”

“All right.” Shayne stepped out and got the dead man’s parking stub from his pocket. He held it out to the hotel dick with a grin. “Here’s your part in this hypothetical maneuver. Get this car out of your parking lot. You can do it easier than I… and no questions asked. Drive it around here in the alley and leave it outside the door with the lights off. Unlock and open the trunk and leave the keys in the ignition. Now. How much likelihood that someone will drop in here and be in the way if I should come down in the elevator with a hypothetical corpse?”

“Almost none.” Russco accepted the ticket with a frown. “However, if you want I can hang around and send anyone packing if they do happen to show.”

Shayne said, “Thanks.” He looked at his watch. “How long to get the car set outside?”

“Ten minutes.” Russco looked at his watch.

“Get going then. If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, drive the car down the street and park it some place where it won’t be noticed until morning. Then get back and forget you saw me tonight.”

“All right, Mike.” Russco started to say something else, but checked himself and headed back for the boiler-room with a wave of his hand.

He was disappearing from view when Shayne remembered the pair of stockings in his pocket. He called, “Wait, John,” and went toward him.