Brett Halliday: Heads You Lose

Gentry stopped with his clawed fingers reaching for the phone. He turned slowly, chewing on his thick underlip. “Damn you, Mike, what do you think you’re pulling?”

Shayne struggled to a sitting position. Blood smeared his chin from a cut lip. He grinned cheerfully. “Protecting the sanctity of the press.”

“Do you realize the Herald will print everything that went on here?” Gentry roared.

“Why not? It’s still a free country.”

“Goddamn it, I was just trying to protect you, Mike. You and Carlton. What will your lives be worth when the killers read that you refused to give out what Clem Wilson told you… and that Mr. Carlton stands ready to identify them?”

“If you weren’t so thickheaded you’d see that’s the only way to smoke ’em out. When that story’s printed they’ll have to get me and Carlton. We’re your bait. They’ll show their hands by coming after us.”

Mr. Carlton shuddered and his face turned a shade paler. “That’s deliberately inviting death, Mr. Shayne.”

Shayne said, “Gentry will give you a body guard. Better make it two, Will.” His tone was one of disgust.

“Take the cuffs off him,” Gentry ordered Grayson wearily. “It’s not a bad idea. But, damn it, Mike, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t give out whatever dope you got from Wilson before he was gunned.”

With the handcuffs off, Shayne got up slowly. “There’s one hell of a good reason, Will. As long as I’m the only one who knows, the killers can protect themselves by bumping me. But as soon as I tell you or anyone else, my death is no longer of any great importance.”

“That’s all right for a public announcement. But privately…”

Shayne said doggedly, “Not privately either. You’re a cop, Will. No matter how hard you tried, you’d find yourself taking some action on my information. That would tip our hand and I’d no longer be important.”

He took out a handkerchief, wiped the blood from his chin, and went back to Mrs. Wilson.

When Mrs. Wilson went into the bedroom and closed the door, Shayne leaned against the inner threshold of the door from the outside office listening to Gentry and his men snapping pictures and going over the death room with microscopic thoroughness.

The room before him was a combined sitting room, dining room and kitchen. Worn and grease-smeared linoleum covered the floor, a sink and cupboard occupied one corner, and there was a gas range and an old-fashioned icebox beside it. A kitchen table covered with faded oil cloth was pushed back against the wall with an unpainted kitchen chair at either end. A shabby sofa stood against the opposite wall, with a floor lamp at one end and a smoking stand drawn up close. Clem Wilson’s blackened briar pipe lay on the smoking stand and the Miami News lay on the floor beside it.

Beyond the other closed door, Shayne could hear Mrs. Wilson moving about in the bedroom, getting dressed and packing a few things to take with her.

Shayne reached in the slanting pocket of his trench coat and took out the bottle of cognac he had snatched up as he ran from his office-apartment. His eyes were narrowed as he twisted the cork out and put the bottle to his lips. He could hear Gentry giving gruff orders about removing the body, and presently there was silence in the outer room.

His gaze wandered around the little room as he recorked the bottle. He had become intimately acquainted with every detail of the scene during long and pleasant visits with Clem Wilson. Though uneducated and poor, Wilson had been a philosopher of sorts and they had had some good talks here in the back room when Shayne occasionally stopped to have his tank filled. Wilson had been proud of his two sons in the service. On the wall where he could lift his eyes to it while seated, hung a framed picture of the boys together.

Shayne sank wearily on the sofa and looked up at the picture. He frowned and drew in his breath sharply. The ten-cent-store frame was still there against the soot-stained wallpaper, but only one pair of eyes looked down at him. This was Joe Wilson, a grave-faced youth proudly wearing the uniform of a sailor. Joe Wilson, who had gone down with his torpedoed ship in the Solomons two months ago.

Shayne slid the cognac bottle back into his pocket and got up, walked over to look more closely at the frame. He was not mistaken. This was only half of the picture which had originally been in the frame. The Wilson boys had posed for it together while Joe was home on leave and Bob had just enlisted in the Army. Joe, the elder brother, had had his arm loosely around the shoulders of his grinning brother, Bob.

Shayne fumbled for a cigarette and stuck it between his lips with his eyes fixed on the picture. He could see clearly that the figure of Bob had been cut out of the double photograph. Joe’s left arm was cut off just beyond the shoulder. The single figure had been moved to the center of the frame, leaving a strip of blank cardboard background on either side.

It didn’t make sense. He knew that Clem and his wife had been as proud of Bob as of Joe. Bob was the baby, their favorite, if, indeed, people like Mr. and Mrs. Wilson had a favorite. Bob had been a little wild, a laughing youngster who refused to consider life a serious business. Bob had been the instrument, in fact, which had brought Shayne and Clem Wilson together. He had been in trouble the previous year, and Shayne had arrested him in the company of older men in an attempted drugstore robbery.

Because of his youth and inexperience, and believing he recognized a basic honesty which had been led astray, the detective had not booked Bob Wilson with his older companions, but had brought him home to his father to be punished.

Shayne remembered that punishment. He still winced when he recalled the thrashing Clem Wilson had administered to his erring son. And Clem had been grateful for the consideration shown. Thus they had drifted into a close friendship founded on mutual respect.

No. It certainly did not make sense. Perhaps because of that one mistake, or because he recognized an intrinsic weakness in his younger son’s character, Clem Wilson had been a proud and happy father the day Bob enlisted in the Army. To him it signified that Bob had become a responsible citizen and a son of whom he could justly be proud.

The doorknob of the bedroom turned and Shayne hastily walked away from the framed picture. He struck light to a cigarette and tossed the match into the ashtray as Mrs. Wilson came out wearing a neat black dress and carrying a rattan suitcase. He took the bag from her withered hand, and asked briskly, “Are you sure you have everything you need?”

“I reckon I have, Mr. Shayne,” she answered tonelessly. “I’ll be going to Joe’s wife. She’s expecting come two months, and it’s just as good I should be with her. Sarah’s like my own girl, and we’ll make out. She’s got Joe’s insurance you know, for her and the baby.” The ghost of a smile moved her thin lips. She gave Shayne the address in the southern suburbs of the city, and followed him apathetically into the office.

Chalk lines and a pool of blood near the door were the only indication that a dead man had recently lain there. Shayne led her out to his car and put the suitcase in the back, helped her in, and drove down the Trail with dimmed lights.

Bright moonlight outlined the Buick coupe and the police car which were still parked off the pavement. Shayne stopped when he came abreast of the radio car, got out, muttering to Mrs. Wilson, “I’ll only be a minute.”

The policeman was lounging in the front seat of his car smoking a cigarette. Mr. Carlton was on his knees beside the Buick tightening the lugs of his spare wheel on the right rear axle.