Brett Halliday: Blood on the Stars

The pseudo mining man groaned and said harshly, “I had to kill her. I didn’t want to. I’m glad it’s over. I believe I’d have confessed eventually, anyway. I don’t want to go on living without her. I loved her. Do you understand that? I loved her.”

“So you murdered her.”

“What else could I do? Like a fool, I’d once mentioned Voorland’s name to her in Denver. When we came here to Miami Beach I pretended I didn’t know him, and she remembered that after the robbery. She asked me about it after we came back from the hospital and I denied it, but I could see that she didn’t believe me. So I did pretend to go to sleep, and I heard her going through my briefcase.

“Then I remembered there was a letter in it from Voorland which I had neglected to destroy. I knew she must have found that letter when she telephoned you, and I–I went crazy, I guess. I couldn’t stand having her know the truth about me. I think that’s really why I killed her. I couldn’t stand it, I tell you.” He sank back on the couch. His face was suddenly the face of an old and tired man.

“It’s as good a motive as most husbands have,” Shayne told him sourly. He turned to Randolph and said, “Let’s get out of here and go where the air is cleaner.”

Peter Painter strutted to the telephone and called Beach headquarters. Timothy Rourke was rapidly making notes on a sheaf of papers. Walter Voorland sat erect with his hands on his knees, staring vacantly before him.

Earl Randolph got up and went out the door with Shayne. They went down in the elevator together and out to Shayne’s car. Neither of them said anything until they were headed across the causeway to the mainland. Then Randolph muttered awkwardly:

“I hope Miss Hamilton is recovering all right. As soon as she’s well enough I’d like an opportunity to apologize and explain how terribly sorry I am about her accident.”

Shayne said, “Let’s go up and see her now. I think she’d feel better knowing it was all a mistake and that you didn’t really try to murder her.”

“It’s a damned shame about losing that thirty thousand of the insurance reward,” Randolph mused. “The way everything has come out, you might just as well have had the entire thirty-six thousand. I’m sure you realize this proof of fraud on the part of the insured person relieves us of all responsibility for paying the policy-exactly the same as though the bracelet had been recovered.”

“I did take that into consideration,” Shayne said gravely, “when I planned to hang onto my six thousand. You don’t think your company will attempt to recover the missing thirty grand from me by charging negligence.”

“I’m sure they won’t attempt anything like that,” said Randolph warmly, “when I report exactly how I saw it disappear from your car after you had left it there in good faith. Actually they should consider the full sum well spent,” he continued, “because the way things have turned out now we will probably recover all or most of the money paid out on those two previous phony claims by suing Voorland and Dustin-or Kendrick-or King-whatever his real name is.”

They were nearing the lights of Biscayne Boulevard now. Shayne tooled the car along smoothly and spoke in a musing voice:

“You’re right, Earl. Thirty-six grand would really be a very moderate fee to pay for evidence on which they can sue for recovery of those other policies. Yet, knowing insurance companies as I do, I’ll bet you one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Suppose things had gone differently this afternoon and I had worked out all the angles before I tried to buy back the bracelet. Then I would have realized we didn’t need it for evidence and that whole sum of thirty-six grand might just as well be safe in my apartment right now. Just supposing that were so: I’ll bet you ten to one that your company would demand the thirty thousand back-insisting that a fee of six grand was plenty for my trouble.”

“I wouldn’t take the bet,” Randolph said, “even at odds of ten to one. They’ll forgive you for losing it as you did, but they would never agree to pay out a sum like that after the job was done.”

Shayne swung around the traffic circle and drove swiftly south on the Boulevard. “I’m glad,” he said gravely, “I had you along for a witness this afternoon when those crooks lifted the money from my car. Otherwise, there might always have been a nasty suspicion that I had just pretended it was lost.”

“That was lucky,” Randolph agreed warmly. They were swinging around Bayfront Park now, and a moment later Shayne parked in front of the side entrance to his hotel and they got out.

He knocked on the closed door of his apartment, and was surprised to hear Lucy’s voice telling them to come in.

She was seated alone in a big chair in the center of the room, wearing a coral dressing-gown and a neat bandage on her head which was almost concealed by skillfully fluffed brown hair. She smiled gaily when Shayne entered, and began breathlessly:

“Now, don’t scold me, Mike. I feel perfectly all right. I sent the nurse home-” She stopped abruptly when she saw Earl Randolph enter behind her employer.

Shayne said, “Earl has things to say to you. Don’t be too angry with him because he’s paying for all your medical attention and double your wages while you’re convalescing.” He crossed to her and touched her pale forehead caressingly with his finger tips for a moment, and then turned aside to let Randolph make his explanations.

He paused at the table to glance in the drawer and assure himself that the bulky envelope of twenty-dollar bills was still intact, and then hummed a little tune of contentment as he got down a cognac bottle and poured out two drinks.