Brett Halliday - Murder by Proxy

“I can write in some curves around them,” he agreed. “Do you have the license number and description of the car she rented?” Shayne asked.

“It’s here… since we were putting it on her hotel bill.” Merrill went to a file behind his desk and took out a very slim cardboard folder. He opened it and extracted a typewritten notation which he put on the desk.

“Put that in, Tim.” Shayne lit a cigarette and sucked on it, tugging at his left earlobe while Rourke copied the information. “Right now, finding that car seems our best lead. Of course, the cops are looking for it already, but maybe you can prove the power of the press, Tim, by having one of your readers come up with it under the cops’ noses. Is Harris in the hotel, Bob?”

“Right now? I don’t know. We gave him another room… right across the hall from his wife’s… when it kind of gave him the jimmies to stay in her room. At no charge, of course,” he added hastily. “You want me to check?”

“I wish you would. If he’s in, I think you should talk to him, Tim. Sort of slant your story the way you feel it after sizing the guy up yourself.”

Merrill had lifted the phone on his desk, and he spoke into it. He listened a moment and then said, “Mr. Harris? Mr. Shayne would like a word with you.” He passed the instrument to the detective.

Shayne said, “Harris? I haven’t got anything definite yet, but I do have a couple of leads. In my office earlier, I mentioned getting a story in the News as a possible help. I have their top reporter downstairs with me right now and I’d like to have you talk to him. Timothy Rourke. He’s not only a fine reporter, but he also happens to be a hell of a decent guy and one of my closest friends. Don’t be afraid to tell him anything… and trust him to write the kind of story you’d like to see printed.”

“Of course, Shayne. I’ll be happy to see him. Have you… do you… my God, Shayne! what have you found out?”

“Nothing definite.” Michael Shayne grimaced as he made his voice sound cheerful and optimistic, neither of which he felt at the moment. “Just hold on tight and give us a few hours. In the meantime, Mr. Rourke will be right up.”

He shook his head as he put the phone down and said, “Poor devil. What can you say in a case like this?”

“You can hang up the phone,” said Rourke cynically. “I have to go up and face him… knowing what I do.”

“You’re a reporter,” Shayne reminded him. “You make your living out of the tragedies in the lives of other people. Thanks for everything, Bob.” He swung toward the door.

“Where are you off to?” demanded Rourke.

Shayne paused with his hand on the knob. “Nothing for your story, Tim. Willy Arentz is manager of the Gray Gull, and he owes me a couple of favors. He just might be in his office this time of the afternoon. Then I think I’d better drop in on Petey Painter and see if I can stir him up a little by letting him know he can’t sit on this indefinitely. In the meantime, Bob. I don’t want it now, but maybe later. Get me up a complete dossier on your desk clerk… Lawford, was it… and your athletic young Bill Thompson.”

“Good God, Mike! You don’t suspect either of them?”

Shayne said, “I don’t suspect anyone. On the other hand, all we have at this point is their unsupported word about what happened last Monday. The more I look at Ellen Harris’ picture and hear about the way she was tossing her sex around last Monday, the more I think I’d like to check both of them.” He went out and closed the door quietly behind him.

The Gray Gull was several miles northward on the beach, well beyond the concentration of luxury hotels. It did not open for business until the dinner hour, but there were six or eight cars in the parking lot when Shayne turned in, and the front doors stood open.

He went through them into a wide, empty hallway that separated the bar from the big dining room on the right where he could hear voices and the clatter of silverware. No one showed up to stop him as he climbed the wide stairway to the gaming room on the second floor and stopped in front of an unmarked door.

He heard voices inside the room, and turned the knob and the door swung open. The air conditioner was going, and two men in their shirtsleeves were bent over a desk littered with papers. The man seated behind the desk was Willy Arentz, slender and dapper, with a small, blond mustache and very cold, blue eyes. He had a reputation around town for being a square shooter-insofar as a man in his business can be and remain successful, and Shayne’s previous dealings with him had given the detective no reason to think otherwise. Leaning over his shoulder and making penciled notations on a sheet of paper covered with figures was a young man wearing glasses and a green eyeshade.

Arentz looked up with an expression of annoyance when he heard the door open, which changed to one of pleasant though restrained welcome when he recognized the redhead. He said, “Mike Shayne,” with practically no inflection. “Just a minute, huh, while I check this?”

Shayne said, “Sure,” and wandered past the desk to stand in front of a window looking down on the ocean and light a cigarette.

There was the low murmur of voices behind him, and finally the creak of Arentz’s chair, and his voice saying, “All right, Henry. We’ll do it that way if you’re sure it’s okay.” Shayne turned from the window to see the young man gather up some papers and go through a side door which he closed behind him. Arentz swung around and said affably, “Take the load off your feet, Mike.” He gestured toward a chair at the end of the desk. “Trade that cigarette in for a cigar? Stand a drink?”

“Neither, thanks.” Shayne settled his rangy body in the chair and crossed his long legs. “I’m looking for some information, Willy.”

“If I’ve got it, it’s yours.”

“First off… have you ever seen this woman in your place?” Shayne took Ellen Harris’ picture from his pocket and put it in front of the gambler. Arentz studied it appreciatively, pursing his lips and touching the tip of his left forefinger to his mustache. “Can’t say that I have, right off. But she’ll be welcome any time she wants to come. A real looker.”

“One you’d be likely to remember if she had been in?” Shayne prompted him.

“You know how it is… there’s hundreds in and out every night. Not in her class, I’ll agree, but it’s hard to say. Actually, Mike, I have a feeling she does ring a bell. But that’s as far as I can go. Can you place her any better?”

“Maybe. Do you have a shill working here named Gene?”

“We don’t have any shills working here, Mike. I like to feel people come to my place because they want to gamble and know they’ll get a fair run for their money… not lambs being led to the slaughter like some other places I could name. On the other hand,” he went on, and a faint twinkle warmed his eyes, “we do have a sort of percentage arrangement with a few people who sometimes steer a customer here instead of some other joint where they’ll really get rooked. Would that be Gene Blake you’re asking about?”

“I don’t know his last name. About thirty, with brown hair and a lean, well-tanned face. Dresses quietly and well. Has a way with women.” Shayne frowned as he repeated Tiny’s description of the man last seen with Ellen Harris.

“That fits Blake to a T.” Arentz leaned back and made a tent of his fingers, his eyes hooded and speculative. “Has Gene stepped out of line?”

“I don’t know. What sort of character reference does he get from you?”

“I couldn’t say personally. Everything I’ve heard about him is okay… for a guy that makes his living that way. Let’s just say I don’t know anything bad about him, but you already know that, Mike. He wouldn’t be coming here if I did.”