Brett Halliday - Heads You Lose

Shayne waited for her to go on. He was certain, now, that she was on the level.

“That was more than I could stand,” she went on after a little while. “I decided to leave him. I had threatened to before, and he always got mad and said he’d beat me if I did. It was the draft, you see. I stayed on because I felt guilty too, but after we got in the war I didn’t feel the way I did before. But Eddie figured he was safe as long as he had a wife and baby. If I left him he was afraid they’d put him in one-A.

“Well, after I got him to bed last night I was determined to find out what I could, so I went through his pockets. He had a lot of money… over two hundred dollars. I took exactly half. There wasn’t any gun in his pockets, but I found a list of names written on a typewriter.” She paused, shivered violently, and looked at Shayne.

Shayne’s gray eyes were soft and sympathetic. He asked, “Would you like another sip of wine?”

“Could I? Just a little. It makes me feel… stronger.”

Shayne took her glass and poured a small portion of the sweet liquor into it. He sat down as he handed it to her, asked, “What about the list of names?”

“I don’t know anything about business, of course,” she said. “Some of the names had a checkmark in pencil and some weren’t marked at all. Two of them had a pencil line drawn through them.” Her voice trembled and slid into silence. She took a sip from her glass. She lowered her eyes to her lap, but no tears came out.

“Then you’ve left Eddie… left home?” Shayne prompted.

“No… well, I didn’t leave then. The baby was sick and I didn’t want to take her out at night. But… I hid my half of Eddie’s money and I wired my folks I’d be home today. They live up at Sebring.”

Shayne looked at his watch when she stopped talking. It was five-thirty. He took the jar from his pocket and rubbed some more salve on his lips. His upper lip was feeling almost normal again.

Mrs. Seeney roused and said, “I couldn’t sleep all night. Jessica… that’s the baby… kept waking up and crying. She had a little fever and I was busy with her. When the Herald came I read about the murder last night and I remembered that one of the names crossed out on Eddie’s list was the same as the man who was murdered… Clem Wilson.” She had drunk the small portion of Cointreau Shayne had poured. The glass sagged in her right hand, resting against the cushion of the chair. She stared at him with big dark eyes that seemed empty of emotion.

Shayne frowned. “Now let’s get this straight. You saw a typewritten list of names with two of them crossed out. One of those was Clem Wilson.”

She nodded mutely.

“What was the other name?”

“I don’t know. I can’t remember. As soon as I read about the rationing racket and all I began remembering all those things about Eddie’s new job… the amount of gas he has and his new tires. I remembered the gun… and then that list.” She shuddered and slumped in the chair.

Shayne stood up and caught her bony shoulders in his big hands. “All this is very important,” he said. “What did you do then?”

She wriggled, pulled her foot from under her and planted it solidly on the floor beside the other. She appeared to have gained control of her fear and her emotions. She said, “I didn’t know what to do. I kept thinking about the baby. I couldn’t stand to think of calling the police and telling them about Eddie.” Her voice broke, but she straightened her shoulders and went on:

“The more I thought about it the more I knew I had to see you. It was bad enough for me having a slacker for a husband, but thinking of Jessica having a father who was a murderer… a traitor… like the paper said, and I couldn’t stand that. So I packed up and got ready to go. I left the baby with a friend and came over here to see you.”

Shayne looked at his watch again and asked, “When does your train leave?”

“At six-thirty. Do you think…?”

“You’ve done the right thing,” Shayne interrupted hastily, “and your husband has a lot of explaining to do.” Shayne got up and took a pencil and a sheet of paper from a drawer. “Give me a description of your husband… everything about him.” He had the pencil poised, ready to write.

“Well… Eddie is twenty-four years old. His hair is brown like his eyes, and he is dark. Sort of good-looking. He’s not very tall…”

“Know of any places he might go nights when he doesn’t come home?” Shayne asked.

“He goes to the Heigh-Ho club sometimes… somewhere on Seventy-ninth… beyond Little River.”

“Have you got a picture of him?”

“Oh, yes. It’s hanging on the wall in our apartment.” She gave him the number of an apartment in the northwest section.

“What’s his license number on the Chevrolet?”

“I never noticed,” she admitted.

Shayne jotted down the information, then said, “The best thing for you is to take Jessica and go home to your mother. Give me your address there and I’ll let you know how things turn out.”

She gave him the address of her parents in Sebring and stood up shakily.

Shayne went to the door with her and asked, “Do you have to go back to your apartment? Where’s your baby?”

“I’ve got my things checked at the depot,” she told him. “And Mrs. Jones… the friend I left the baby with… lives in an apartment here in town.”

Shayne said, “That’s fine.” He patted her shoulder and said, “Try not to worry about things. A clean break with Eddie will be the best thing that can happen to you.”

She appeared to have matured in the short time during which she had poured out her troubles to Shayne. She looked up at him with dry eyes and said, “I think you’re right, Mr. Shayne, and I’m thankful to you.”

Shayne went back into his apartment and telephoned Will Gentry. He gave the chief of detectives a succinct resume of Mrs. Seeney’s damning information against her husband, a complete description of Eddie and the address of the apartment. “His car was bought here about a month ago, Will,” he said, “and you can look up the number. I’d put a man at his apartment if I were you, and get out a pick-up on Eddie.”

“You think he’s the one, Mike? Does he fit with the dope you got from Wilson?”

“I’m pretty sure Seeney can tell us a lot of things we need,” Shayne told him grimly. “I’d like to know the minute you pick him up and have a chance to sit in while he’s being grilled.”

“Damn it, Mike,” Gentry complained, “I don’t believe you know a hell of a lot more than I do about this case. Sounds to me like you’re fumbling in the dark.”

“I’m finding things out,” Shayne reminded him. “That’s more than you’re doing.” He hung up and grinned.

It was almost six o’clock.

Shayne went into the bathroom and inspected his lips, washed them carefully with soap to get the salve off, then took a quick shave before keeping his cocktail date with Edna Taylor, vice-president of the Motorist Protective Association.

The address Edna Taylor had given him took him to a winding street on the bayfront east of Brickwell Avenue, a section taken over, for the most part, by rambling estates of the very wealthy. Miss Taylor’s bungalow was a small house of weathered rock tucked in between forbidding walled-in estates on either side, charmingly rustic and appealing in its setting of green lawns and cocopalms.

The cottage was situated on the edge of the bay at the end of a hundred-foot strip of ground leading down from the street. Red and purple bougainvillea intermingled with bright orange flamevine, having outgrown the slender trellises, ran rampant over the south side and upward to partially cover the roof.