Brett Halliday - Shoot to Kill

“What did you think when you got there and found out what had happened?”

“I didn’t know what to think. I was so sure Ralph had stabbed him. No man in his right mind would come back and openly shoot a dead man. And then I thought maybe he wasn’t in his right mind. That he’d gone nuts and didn’t know what he was doing the second time.”

“What makes you so sure Ralph stabbed him?”

“But he must have. Who else was there? He was the only one who’d been in the study.”

“Did you pull the paper-knife out of Ames… and bolt the back door?” Shayne asked evenly.

“I didn’t touch anything. I didn’t see any paper-knife. He was just leaning back in his chair grinning sort of. With blood on the front of him.”

“Didn’t you notice that the back door was bolted on the inside?” demanded Shayne.

“No. It couldn’t have been. Ralph went out that way.” Victor Conroy looked at him aghast.

“It was bolted on the inside half an hour later when Ralph ran in the front door of the study and shot him.”

“I don’t see how… you’re making that up to trick me. I didn’t kill Wesley Ames.”

“Ralph Larson couldn’t possibly have done it and left that door bolted behind him,” Shayne told him coldly. “That leaves somebody inside the house after Ralph left. Five of you altogether, counting the houseman. You’re the one who had most to gain. You knew Sutter had twenty-five grand he was prepared to hand over for the Murchinson file. You admit you were in the room and stole the file. We’ve got you dead to rights on that. What did you do with the knife, Conroy?”

“I didn’t kill him,” cried out Conroy, beating his fist on his knee in frustration and anger. “I didn’t see any knife. I grabbed the papers on the spur of the moment. They weren’t any good to any one else. Damn it! If Ralph Larson didn’t kill him, take a look at some of the others in the house. Ask Mark Ames why he was there tonight. I happen to know it was to demand that Wesley give Helena a divorce. Ask her. God knows she had plenty of motive to kill the son-of-a-bitch. How about that New York lawyer? He was plenty sore and half drunk. He had plenty of chance to slip in and do it. And I wouldn’t put it past Alfred either. God, the way Wesley treated that man like dirt. A knife is a Spick’s weapon. Any of the others had a motive and opportunity.” He was practically shouting as he completed his diatribe, and the drugged woman on the bed stirred and muttered something and turned on her side.

Shayne got up to go over to her, telling Conroy as he did so, “But you’re the one we can place in the death room just about the time it happened.” He leaned over the bed and placed a firm hand on Dorothy Larson’s shoulder and shook her gently.

“Better try to wake up,” he said soothingly. “It’s all right. Everything’s okay. Wake up and I’ll take you home.”

She turned slowly to open her eyes and stare up into his face, blankly and uncomprehendingly at first, and then with troubled recognition.

“You’re… the detective,” she mumbled. “Ralph? What’s happened to Ralph?” Then she sat up suddenly and stared with distended eyes at Conroy who was approaching the bed hesitantly. “Victor said he killed Wesley,” she cried out. “Did he? Did Ralph do that?”

Shayne said heavily, “Right now, Mrs. Larson, your husband is in jail charged with shooting Wesley Ames to death. But I think that charge is going to be withdrawn before long. Just lie back and relax. After I make a telephone call you can tell me exactly what happened in your apartment tonight.”

He lifted the telephone from the bedside stand and gave the number for police headquarters, and put his hand over the mouthpiece and told Conroy coldly. “Stay away from her. Sit down and keep your mouth shut.”

He lifted his hand and spoke into the telephone, “Mike Shayne speaking. I’m at number twenty-five in the Biscay Rest Motel on Biscayne Boulevard and I’ve got a suspect here in the Ames killing. Have a car stop by to pick him up. And if you can get hold of Sergeant Griggs, tell him he can stop looking for Mrs. Larson. I’ve got her, too.”

He hung up and looked down compassionately at Dorothy Larson who had rolled over and buried her face in her hands and was weeping violently. For her husband… or for her lover, he wondered. It didn’t seem to much matter. Nothing was going to be the same for her again.

This time there was evidently a car cruising very near-by because it was not more than three minutes before one pulled into the courtyard silently with a flashing red light and eased up behind the taxi parked in front of No. 25.

Shayne opened the door as two burly, uniformed men got purposefully out of the radio car. “This way,” he called cheerfully, and was pleased to recognize the one in the lead as an officer whom he knew slightly.

He held the door open and stood aside and said, “Hi, Thompson. That was quick work.”

“They said Mike Shayne over the radio,” Thompson said guardedly, peering inside the motel room. “What’s going on here? Vice charge?”

“I’ve got a murder suspect for Sergeant Griggs on the Ames killing,” Shayne told him. “That’s Victor Conroy. Take him in, Tommy, and hold him on an open charge until I get there. I have to take Mrs. Larson home and I’ll be right in. If Griggs is at headquarters tell him to stay put until I get there.”

Conroy went with the two officers silently and sullenly. He had kept his eyes averted from Dorothy Larson and had not exchanged a word with her since she had waked up. She, in turn, appeared too stunned and shocked to comprehend exactly what was going on, and after the patrol car drove away with her lover, Shayne took her arm to draw her up from the bed and said gently, “I’ve got a taxi outside, Mrs. Larson. I’ll take you home now.”

“Yes,” she agreed falteringly, clinging to him. “It’s like a bad dream. Ralph running in to get his gun, and then I telephoned you, didn’t I? And then Victor came and said… that Ralph had murdered Wesley Ames…” Her voice trailed off uncertainly and Shayne helped her into the back seat and got under the wheel and drove out of the courtyard.

“Just sit back and relax now,” he said over his shoulder. “Ralph did fire a bullet into Ames, but it now develops that he was dead before the shot was fired.”

“Then… he didn’t actually murder him?” she asked wonderingly. “I’m glad. It would be my fault if he had.”

Shayne said, “Don’t think about it now. When we get to your place I want you to tell me briefly just what you remember. If you confirm Conroy’s story… well, we’ll see.”

When they climbed the stairway to her apartment Shayne fully expected to see a policeman guarding her door. But the hallway was empty and the door opened when he turned the knob. He was surprised to find Griggs standing in the center of the room talking to his driver, and from the expression on the sergeant’s face when he saw Shayne and Dorothy, he realized that Griggs knew nothing about her being found or Conroy’s arrest.

He held her arm and said, “This is Dorothy Larson, Sergeant Griggs. The sergeant is in charge of the case,” he explained to her, and went on to Griggs, “She’s been through a lot tonight. I think she’s eager to make a brief statement that will clarify a lot of things. Why don’t you get that first and then we can leave her alone and I’ll fill you in with the rest of it.”

Griggs nodded and gestured toward a comfortable chair. “Sit down, Mrs. Larson. You had us pretty badly worried about you… with blood all over and you mysteriously missing.”

She sank into the chair and smiled wanly, her face very white and strained, but in control of herself. “I didn’t know… what to do. I was so upset and frightened when Ralph ran out with his gun saying he was going to kill Mr. Ames. And then Victor came and told me Ralph had killed him…” She paused, twisting her hands together in her lap and blinking back tears.