Brett Halliday - Dolls Are Deadly

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“Bobo.”

“So?”

“I’m looking for someone, Harley. Dan Milford. Is he there?”

“How would I know? They’re all Joe Doakses to me, you know what I mean? That’s what they write on their phony checks.”

“Don’t give me that, Harley. You know all of them. You have to, to stay in business. Is Dan Milford there?”

“Look, Shayne, I wouldn’t stay in business ten minutes if I handed out names to every cop, wife or private eye who asked me. You know that.”

“All I know,” Shayne said angrily, “is I’m coming over there and if Dan Milford isn’t there because you tipped him that I’m coming, the annual cleanup week will hit you and your police department contact so hard you’ll both be out of business-for good!”

“Now wait a minute, shamus. How you going to know if Dan Milford was here or wasn’t here if he’s gone?”

“I won’t. I’ll just assume he was and you tipped him. So if he isn’t there, go get him. He’s in one or another of the floating games, if there’s any more left besides yours. I’ll be over in fifteen minutes.”

Shayne slammed down the receiver, strode out and got in his car and started moving. Harley’s place was in an old warehouse on Southwest Fourth Avenue. As the redhead turned south toward the river his thoughts seethed. The gray Buick and the green sedan were still with him. Assume for the moment that Peter Painter had not put a police tail on him. The loan-shark boss, De Luca, had ways of keeping in touch with that part of the Miami world which could affect him. If De Luca knew that Henny Henlein had come to Shayne’s office yesterday, De Luca would be worried today. So one of these tails could be his. And if the other had been hired by the three vacationists on Sylvester’s boat, it would seem to indicate either that the hoodlum’s murder and the murder of Sylvester were unconnected, or that one half of the vengeful group did not know what the other half was doing.

While this speculation was a subterfuge to keep from thinking about Sylvester, agonized thoughts of the little man kept breaking through. He must have been knifed only minutes before Shayne had arrived at the dock. Slim, and any of the others who might have been with him, could have sighted Shayne maneuvering for a parking space in the lot at the head of the slip. They’d have had time to drop Sylvester’s body over the side with the anchor weight, then leave while Slim grabbed the grouper from the ice box and began to clean it over the place on the wharf already soaked by Sylvester’s blood.

Still, why had they killed Sylvester? Mrs. Santos said Sylvester had been looking for Shayne last night. Had Sylvester known something at that time-something the others couldn’t risk having him tell? Or had Shayne’s presence on the boat yesterday alarmed them unduly? They might have reasoned that Sylvester had motivated it and that the little man knew something damaging to them which, actually, he didn’t. Then too, if they had been suspicious because of Shayne’s presence on the boat yesterday, their suspicions of Shayne, and Sylvester, must have zoomed into high when Ed met Shayne at the seance last night, assuming that Ed’s presence there was more than coincidental.

If they had felt themselves so imperiled that they had killed Sylvester, wouldn’t Shayne now be marked out for early slaughter?

The tailing cars, and the apparently innocuous seance last night, were taking on a more sinister character. Even Henlein’s murder, distant as it seemed from the three fishermen, might be interrelated some way. And Clarissa Milford. Where did she fit in this melange of murder?

Shayne stopped the car, strode across the sidewalk and moved out of sight between two weather-beaten buildings, sagging in the sun. A narrow warehouse door opened in one of them and a short, unshaven man in shirtsleeves, chewing the stump of a cold cigar, stepped out.

“All right, Harley. Where is he?”

The man removed the cigar from his mouth, spat on the sandy ground, put the cigar back and motioned over one shoulder with his thumb. “Inside.”

As Shayne moved toward the door, Harley added, “Wait a minute, shamus. I never done this before. I got a favor to ask you.”

“What is it?”

“Just don’t tell him I was in on this, see? If it got around it could ruin me.”

“All right.” Shayne turned impatiently. “Your reputation, such as it is, is safe with me.”

“To tell the truth, I’ll be glad when he’s out. He’s losin’ his shirt.”

“I thought that was how you made your living.”

“Only when they pay,” Harley said sourly. He took the cigar stump out of his mouth and spat again. “This guy gives paper no bank knows.”

At a sign from Harley to a suspicious face that had been peering at them through a sliding panel, the door opened and Shayne stepped inside.

“I’m not coming with you,” Harley muttered. “You understand?”

“How’ll I know Milford?”

“Guy in the blue shirt. At the poker table.”

Shayne lounged across the room casually, stopping at the craps table, and stood listening to the jumbled groans, chuckles and exhortations as the dice rolled. It was a game of high stakes, as most of these continuous games were, and the tension of it showed in the lined faces, sweating brows and tired eyes of the gamblers. Only the stickmen seemed unperturbed.

After a moment, the redhead wandered on to the poker table, stopping behind the chair of the man in the blue shirt.

“Move, fella, will you?” Milford said petulantly. “You’ll jinx me.”

“You’re already jinxed.” Shayne eyed the small stack of white chips. “Get yourself dealt out. I want to talk to you.”

Milford turned to look squarely at Shayne. He was heavily built, with a sad, ruddy face and pale blue eyes, a big sheep-dog of a man, neither the prototype of a murderer, nor the great lover Clarissa had led Shayne to expect.

He shook his head almost helplessly and sighed. “Deal me out, Gus.”

Leaving the few white chips lying on the table, he pushed back his chair and stood up clumsily. He was over six feet tall, his eyes on a level with Shayne’s. Like a man sleep-walking, he moved to a worn mohair davenport flanked by standing ash trays and spittoons, sat down without speaking and buried his face in his hands, the picture of a man in utter dejection and total defeat.

After a moment he raised his head slightly and looked through his fingers at Shayne. “What are you waiting for? Let’s get going.”

“Where?”

“Out to the alley. Or to the car. Or wherever you plan on doing it.”

Shayne said, “I have no plans. Who do you think I am?”

“You’re from D. L. I know.”

“No, I’m not. I came on my own to help you, or maybe to get you to help me. Someone has threatened to kill your wife.”

Milford stared. It took an instant for the words to penetrate. Shayne watched in cynical dispassion as fear and anger in slow succession, and lastly something that might have been remorse, filled the pale and red-veined eyes. Finally big tears squeezed from between his lids and rolled untended down his face.

“Oh, God!” Milford said.

10

Shayne sat down on the davenport as Milford rose and towered above him, clenching his big fists and beating them futilely against his thighs. “The bastards! I’ll kill them first!”

“One has been killed,” Shayne said evenly. “Henny Henlein.”

“Henny’s not enough. Kenny’s nothing. It’s the big ones-” Milford stopped suddenly, fighting for control.

“Did you kill Henlein?”

“No.” Sanity seemed to be returning. Milford blinked fiercely at the redhead, asking, “Who are you?”

“Mike Shayne. How long have you been sitting in this game?”

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