Brett Halliday - Dolls Are Deadly

“What did he go for?”

“There’s a boat he wanted to look at.”

“How come?”

“I think he’s considering a trade.”

“What’s the matter with this boat? You boys just put a new engine in her, didn’t you?”

“Turned out to be a dog.”

“Since yesterday?”

Slim shrugged and went on scraping his fish with the thoroughness of a good Dutch housewife.

“I thought the engine sounded pretty good,” Shayne persisted.

“Doesn’t develop the speed it ought to. Sylvester said his old one was faster. Sylvester’s hell for speed.”

“How’d he know? You boys never let him let it out?”

“He did, I guess. When we weren’t with him.”

“Yesterday he was telling me how good it was.”

“That was yesterday. Today he didn’t like it. You know how these Portuguese are.”

“He’s not Portuguese. He’s Cuban.”

“Same difference.”

Shayne was silent. The only sound was the rasping of Slim’s heavy knife against the fish scales. Without looking up, Slim said, “This is that grouper you caught yesterday. Hope you don’t mind.”

“I don’t mind.”

“Want a piece of him?”

“No.”

“Got to thinking-” Slim seemed to feel it necessary to explain-“it’s kind of silly to be down here in the world’s fishing paradise and never eat any fish. So I came down this morning to get this one. I’ll clean it up and have the chef at the hotel cook it for me.”

“It’s a pretty big fish.”

“I’ll need it. Some of the boys are coming in to play poker this afternoon. Fish and beer and poker-that ought to be a good combo, hull?”

“Pretty good.” Shayne frowned down at the bloody mess on the wharf planks. “You know, they’d clean it for you at the hotel as well as cook it, if you asked them.”

“Yeah, but I’ve got a thing about fish. I got to know they’re cleaned good. Never eat ’em unless I clean ’em myself.”

“That’s a lot of blood from one fish.”

“It’s a big fish.”

“It’s still a lot of blood.”

Slim shrugged, still not looking up. “I wouldn’t know. I heard groupers are running bloody this season.”

“Hogwash! A grouper’s a grouper, this season or any other.”

“Maybe you’re right.” The knife kept scraping. The scales spattered.

Shayne shot his half-smoked cigarette irritably into the water. A black depression was growing within him. “I think I’ll go aboard for a minute.”

Slim looked up for almost the first time since the redhead had come. “O.K. Help yourself.”

Shayne stepped across and prowled around the cockpit, cabin and deck. It was the same as last night; everything was in place. He leaped from the gunnel back to the dock and then, looking back, he noticed that the coil of rope on the deck forward had no anchor attached to it.

“Where’s the anchor?”

Slim had finished cleaning the fish and was lowering a bucket on a rope over the side of the dock to get water to sluice away the blood and fish offal that was already attracting flies. “Anchor ring needed a weld. Somebody picked it up for the fix after we came in last night.”

Had the anchor been there when he looked over the boat last night? Shayne couldn’t be sure.

As Slim moved in from the dock edge with the bucket of water, Shayne stepped in ahead of him, took off his hat and mopped his forehead. The handkerchief slipped from his hand and landed in the fish blood.

“Too bad,” Slim drawled as Shayne bent to pick it up. “Better throw it away. It’ll smell like hell of fish.”

“It’ll wash out.” Shayne folded the handkerchief so the blood was inside and returned it to his pocket.

Slim tossed the water forcefully from the bucket onto the bloody planks and turned back to dip up some more.

“Funny how things go,” Shayne said. “I ran into Ed last night.”

“Yeah? Where?”

“Seance. At Madame Swoboda’s.”

Slim laughed shortly. “Yeah, his wife goes for that stuff. Sometimes she drags him along.”

“You ever go?”

“Once, for kicks. There weren’t any.”

“You staying at Ed’s hotel?”

“Yeah. Blue Grotto.”

“What about Vince?”

“He’s at the Mirador.”

“What’s his last name?”

“Becker.” Slim gave him a probing look. “Why you so interested all of a sudden?”

“I’m not sure I am, yet.” Shayne turned abruptly and started walking back to his car. “See you around.”

“O.K.” Slim sloshed more water on the wharf.

Before starting the motor Shayne sat staring off over the water, his gray eyes bleak, his face deeply trenched. His feeling of depression had not abated, and now a slow fury grew within him. He thought of Sylvester’s neat cabin and of his love for the boat and a lump choked his throat. Still… there was nothing rational to go on yet.

He gunned the engine and moved out into the traffic stream headed for the Causeway to Miami. His two tails stayed with him, but they were the least of his worries now. On Biscayne he slammed on the brakes in front of a just-opened bar, parked and went in. He ordered a Hennessy from a pale and disinterested-looking bartender, downed it in one gulp, strode to a phone booth in the rear and scanned the yellow pages of the directory. Only a few blocks away, he found a medical laboratory run by a William Fox.

He heeled out to the car, slid behind the wheel and drove the short distance, stopping in front of a modern white stone and glass building. The tails drove past, averting their eyes with elaborate casualness.

The day was growing hotter. Sweat seeped down inside the redhead’s collar, wetting his shirt. It felt icy. He got out of the car and stalked up the walk into the building, went down the hall and through a door marked William Fox, Laboratories.

The blond receptionist, startled by his peremptory entrance, looked up from a roll and a paper container of coffee.

“I’d like this blood analyzed.” Shayne took the wadded handkerchief from his hip pocket.

“Certainly, sir. But no one’s in yet.”

“Get someone in! This is urgent!”

Shayne’s inner tension and barely-leashed fury, communicated itself to the girl. She stared hypnotized into his stark eyes and her own face whitened. Her fingers tightened on the paper coffee container and she half rose. “I think I just heard Mr. Fox come in. There’s a door to the laboratory from the other side.”

Before she could protest, Shayne strode past her, thrust open the door behind her desk and entered the laboratory. A stout, graying man, just struggling into a white coat, eyed him with acute disfavor.

“No one’s allowed back here. Please wait outside.”

Shayne dropped the wadded handkerchief on a bare, white table top. “I’ve no time for formalities. Analyze this blood.” While the man stammered, Shayne added, “I’m investigating a murder.”

The technician’s eyes bulged. “Are you from the police?”

“What difference does it make? No, I’m not. I’m a private detective.”

“I only asked.” Fox picked up the handkerchief gingerly and carried it to a laboratory table in front of a window, looking back uneasily. “I don’t want to get in any trouble.”

Shayne’s hands clenched. “What trouble could you get in? If I were the murderer I’d know whether my victim was a man or a fish. And that’s all I want you to tell me-whether that’s human or fish blood.”

Fox turned to the table and began working with tubes, liquids and eyedroppers.

Shayne lit a cigarette and blew smoke in a blue cloud toward the window. After working silently for a few minutes, Fox looked around. “There’s more than a trace of human blood mixed with the fish blood,” he said.