Brett Halliday - Blood on the Stars

Lucy had a single room down the hall, and this afternoon she had come in with a bag of groceries, competently taken over the kitchenette in his apartment, and cooked a dinner for two which she served charmingly on a small table in the living-room.

She proved to be a splendid cook. She concocted what she called “Poor-girl steak,” consisting of beef ground twice with a small piece of bacon. To complete the meal she served baked yams, and biscuits of her own devising, with garlic-flavored gravy and black coffee. She wore a frilly blue and white apron over a white skirt and blue blouse, and was very domestic and matter-of-fact as she cleared the table and washed the dishes while Shayne settled himself comfortably with a noggin of cognac and a cigarette in the shabbily furnished living-room.

Shayne had a curious feeling deep inside him that the episode was more than a game. He had a fair idea of the way Lucy felt, and he respected her for it. Tonight for the first time since Phyllis’s death it didn’t seem wrong to have a woman in his apartment. He had tried to run away from Lucy but it hadn’t worked; and she had tried to run away from him by quitting her job and closing the New Orleans office in a fit of rage, but that hadn’t worked either. He had persuaded her, by long-distance telephone, to come to Miami for a vacation, and now they were here together.

Shayne took a sip of cognac and reflected upon the situation. A feeling of contentment and inertia possessed him. He had no cases on hand because he hadn’t yet decided whether to re-establish himself in Miami or return to New Orleans. He was thinking of calling to Lucy and telling her to hurry up and finish the dishes and come in to sit beside him when the phone rang. It was an old-fashioned wall phone, and its ringing had disrupted his plans so often in the past that he decided not to answer it. He slumped deeper in his chair, his angular face relaxed, his eyes half-closed, meditatively sipping Monnet and consigning all telephones to hell.

He wasn’t conscious of Lucy’s presence in the room until the phone stopped ringing. He looked up to see her putting the receiver to her ear. She said, crisply, “Michael Shayne’s office.”

She listened for a moment, turning her head sideways to look at Shayne. He looked back at her and tried not to scowl. She was still playing the game and getting such a kick out of it he hadn’t the heart to scold her.

“Yes,” she said, “he’s right here.” She held out the receiver. “He says it’s Chief Will Gentry.”

Shayne growled, got up and lounged across the room, took the receiver from her, and said, “Hello, Will.”

“Did I interrupt something important?” Gentry’s voice betrayed a lively and friendly interest in the feminine voice that had answered the telephone.

“Oh, no,” Shayne assured him. “That was just my maiden aunt from Peoria. You’ve heard me speak of Aunt Minnie.”

“Oh.” Chief Gentry hesitated a moment, then added, “Yeh. Rourke was telling me a couple of days ago about that pretty secretary of yours who just blew in from New Orleans.”

“Tim probably has her out tonight trying to seduce her,” Shayne said cheerfully. “The heel. What’s on your mind, Will?”

“What have you been doing all evening?” asked Gentry cautiously.

“Eating dinner right here. Aunt Minnie’s a hell of a cook. Get her liquored up on a fifth of gin and she can do the damnedest things with a dozen eggs, tomato ketchup, and a couple of bottles of beer.”

“For God’s sake, keep the recipe to yourself,” groaned Gentry. “I just finished dinner and it isn’t setting too well as it is. Sure you’ve been in all evening, Mike?”

“You can ask Aunt Minnie. I’ll call her to the phone and she’ll tell you-”

“That’s okay,” Gentry said hastily. “Then you haven’t been on the Beach lifting a couple of hundred grand in rubies?”

“Rubies?” Shayne scowled at the wall. “What’s up?”

“Some bird got beaten up and robbed of a bracelet about an hour ago. Painter just called up and he thinks you engineered the deal.”

“A ruby bracelet? Wait a minute, Will. Is the name-? Lucy,” he called, “what was the name of that cowherder we met in Voorland’s place buying a ruby bracelet last Monday?”

“Dustin?” Lucy appeared in the kitchen doorway with a plate and dishcloth in her hands.

“I thought,” said Gentry over the wire, “you said her name was Aunt Minnie.”

“Dustin,” Shayne growled. “Mark Dustin. Is that the bird?”

“So you do know about it,” said Gentry gravely. “Painter figures you’re the only one who knew about the bracelet and that Mrs. Dustin planned to wear it for the first time tonight.”

“So he puts the finger on me for snatching it?”

“You know Petey Painter,” Gentry said. “Even if he doesn’t actually think you pulled the job, you’ll do for a suspect until a better one comes along.”

“What does he want with me?”

“I think he’d appreciate it if you’d return the bracelet. I think you could make a deal with him if you played nice.”

Shayne said, “Nuts.”

“Sure it’s nuts,” Gentry agreed pleasantly, “but you’d better go over to the Sunlux and let Painter shake you down.”

“Let him come over here if he wants to ask me fool questions.”

“Wait a minute, Mike. He’s ready to swear out a warrant for you if you don’t lope over there pronto.”

“The hell he is.”

“I told him you were always glad to co-operate and I didn’t believe that would be necessary.” Gentry chuckled and added, “Is Aunt Minnie afraid to stay alone at night? Tim Rourke is hanging around the press room and I’ll get hold of him if you like and-”

“Leave Tim out of this,” said Shayne shortly. “I’ll go over and tell the twerp I gave up snatching rocks last week. The Sunlux?”

“Mark Dustin’s suite. Is there a bracelet worth a hundred and eighty grand, Mike?”

“That’s what Walter Voorland charged the sucker for it. It looked like junk to me, but if Earl Randolph okayed a policy on it, I could be wrong.”

Gentry said, “Give my regards to Aunt Minnie,” and hung up.

Shayne replaced the receiver and walked back to his chair, rubbing his angular chin thoughtfully. He poured a couple of ounces of cognac in his glass and held it up to the light.

Lucy came in from the kitchen. “What was it about the ruby bracelet, Michael?”

“It’s been snatched.”

“Stolen? Already?”

“About an hour ago.” Shayne scowled and let an ounce of cognac trickle down his throat.

“This must be the first time she’s worn it,” Lucy exclaimed. “Remember that day they were buying it? Mr. Dustin wanted it delivered by Friday for his wife to wear to a concert.”

Shayne nodded. “And this is Friday.”

“So they want you to recover it for them,” said Lucy happily. “That’s nice. You always feel better when you’re working. And there should be a big reward. Goodness! A hundred and eighty thousand dollars!”

“It isn’t quite as simple as that. Painter thinks I stole it.”

“Painter?”

“Peter Painter,” Shayne told her. “On the Beach. You’ve heard me speak of the little bastard often enough.”

“Oh, yes. But how on earth could he get such a crazy idea, Michael?”

“It isn’t difficult-not for Painter,” Shayne said morosely. “In this case it wasn’t difficult at all,” he added explosively. He held up his left hand with the five fingers extended and turned down one big-knuckled finger as he made each point:

“Here’s what he’s got: You wanted the bracelet for yourself. You said so right out loud and I admitted out loud I couldn’t afford it. We were there and heard Voorland’s sales talk and the price. We heard Dustin say his wife wanted it to wear tonight. Added to that, I’m an unscrupulous son-of-a-bitch who has been getting in Petey Painter’s hair for the past seven years, and it’s his theory that if you throw enough mud some of it is bound to stick.”