Brett Halliday - The Corpse Came Calling
Здесь есть возможность читать онлайн «Brett Halliday - The Corpse Came Calling» весь текст электронной книги совершенно бесплатно (целиком полную версию без сокращений). В некоторых случаях можно слушать аудио, скачать через торрент в формате fb2 и присутствует краткое содержание. Жанр: Криминальный детектив, на английском языке. Описание произведения, (предисловие) а так же отзывы посетителей доступны на портале библиотеки ЛибКат.
- Название:The Corpse Came Calling
- Автор:
- Жанр:
- Год:неизвестен
- ISBN:нет данных
- Рейтинг книги:4 / 5. Голосов: 1
-
Избранное:Добавить в избранное
- Отзывы:
-
Ваша оценка:
- 80
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
The Corpse Came Calling: краткое содержание, описание и аннотация
Предлагаем к чтению аннотацию, описание, краткое содержание или предисловие (зависит от того, что написал сам автор книги «The Corpse Came Calling»). Если вы не нашли необходимую информацию о книге — напишите в комментариях, мы постараемся отыскать её.
The Corpse Came Calling — читать онлайн бесплатно полную книгу (весь текст) целиком
Ниже представлен текст книги, разбитый по страницам. Система сохранения места последней прочитанной страницы, позволяет с удобством читать онлайн бесплатно книгу «The Corpse Came Calling», без необходимости каждый раз заново искать на чём Вы остановились. Поставьте закладку, и сможете в любой момент перейти на страницу, на которой закончили чтение.
Интервал:
Закладка:
Her hands stopped twisting the handkerchief in her lap. They started again after lying quiet for a moment. “What about him?” she asked with seeming casualness, but Shayne was aware of a note of caution in her voice.
“Is he here-ready to co-operate with us?” Shayne asked.
“I don’t know anything about him.”
“You weren’t going to lie to me,” Shayne reminded her once more.
“I’m not lying. I’ve told you all I know.”
“Who killed Lacy?”
“I don’t know that either. Houseman, I suppose. Or he had it done. He wanted to horn in and take all the profits.” She drained her glass and got up. “I’d better be going.”
Shayne stayed in his chair. “Where?”
“To my apartment.”
“The local law,” Shayne warned her, “will likely have that joint covered by this time. They’re going to ask you a lot of questions if they find you.”
She hesitated. Her lips trembled piteously and her eyes were downcast. “I suppose-you don’t want me to stay here?”
“And have you found here-after I’m supposed to have killed your husband tonight? Some women,” said Shayne wearily, “have the damnedest ideas.”
“I guess it would look-funny.”
“Have you got any money?”
“A little.” She clutched her bag nervously.
“Better go to a hotel under an assumed name. The Tidewater is right down the street. Clean rooms at three bucks a throw. Register as-Ann Adams,” Shayne directed. “And stay in your room. I’ve got enough to do without worrying about you. I’ll get in touch with you as soon as anything breaks.”
She sidled up to him as he sat in his chair. She timidly touched his shoulder. “Don’t forget what I told you about bluffing Houseman. He’ll pay plenty if you make him. And when he does, don’t forget who put you wise.”
Shayne said, “Beat it to the Tidewater. I won’t forget. If you’ve got anything coming after this is all over, you can trust me to see that you get it.”
“I’ll have to trust you. I feel that I can trust you now. You’re the first man I ever felt that way about.”
Shayne grunted. “Swell. I’m all puffed up with pride over your opinion of me.” He continued to sit in his chair without looking at the girl, and after waiting a moment she went to the door and let herself out quietly.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
After Helen had left the apartment Shayne sat in the same position for a long time. Then he got up and went over to Rourke. The reporter was still breathing with the even cadence of the unconscious.
Shayne sighed and lifted the limp body in his arms. He carried Rourke into the bedroom and stretched him out on the bed, got a roll of adhesive tape from the bathroom, and taped his mouth shut firmly. He then bound his wrists tightly to his sides, fastened his feet together to one of the bed posts, and carefully moved the telephone table away from the bed as far as the cord allowed.
When the job was completed to his satisfaction, Shayne took a belted trench coat from the closet, tugged a hat down over his unruly red hair, and went out of the apartment.
He walked down one flight of stairs and unlocked the door of his office. Everything was in order, as he and Phyllis had left it that afternoon.
He closed the door and went to his wife’s desk, lifted a corner of the typewriter pad. The piece of claim check lay where he had placed it.
He picked it up and studied it with furrowed brow. Torn irregularly on both sides, this was the center portion of a baggage receipt. But he saw, now, that it was no more than half of a center portion. If it had been torn into three pieces as Pearson said, Lacy’s third should have been twice as long as this piece.
Still, he saw at once this was the most important half. It had been torn directly below the row of identifying figures making up the serial number which was the only means by which a piece of baggage could be claimed by its owner.
He closed his eyes for a moment, bringing back into focus that first scene in his office which had started the case off with a bang. He had withdrawn Lacy’s left hand from his coat pocket, discovered this small piece of cardboard tightly clenched in the dead man’s fingers. No portion of it had showed until he spread Lacy’s fingers apart.
Shayne nodded his head with satisfaction. That doubtless explained the missing bottom part, and explained, too, why Leroy and Joe had permitted Lacy to escape from them on the causeway without getting what they were after. They must have snatched the strip from Lacy’s fingers, but only succeeded in tearing off the bottom half. In their hurry, they did not realize that Lacy had retained the portion with the all-important serial numbers, and allowed him to drive on-thinking he was so badly wounded he would surely die before he got very far.
That was guesswork, but it fitted the facts as Shayne knew them. And it cleared up a point that had been puzzling him all evening-why a pair of tough killers like Leroy and Joe had let Lacy remain alive without finishing their obvious assignment.
He put the piece of cardboard back where it had been. That seemed as good a hiding-place as any for the moment.
Outside, Shayne rolled both front windows of his car down when he got behind the wheel. The air of the new-born day was soothing, almost soporific, as he rolled slowly north through the deserted business section of the city. It swept the maggots of worry from his mind, pleasantly eased the tension inside him. Even the fact that Phyllis was helpless in the hands of ruthless killers seemed not nearly so oppressive as it had a couple of hours previously. He was beginning to get his finger on the pulse of the baffling case and there was no action he could take until he received the answer to his advertisement in the morning Herald.
He lolled back against the cushion and welcomed the feeling of relaxation, yet at the same time he sensed an inner revolt against it. It was dangerous, this lulling of a man’s faculties. It was an insidious component of the drowsy tropical night, a virus that got into a man’s blood if he was long exposed to the deadly surface placidity of life in the resort city.
Shayne knew it was an unhealthy state of mind, yet he was as guilty as any of the other residents who refused to face the reality of war. Tonight, while listening to Pearson’s story of spies and secret weapons, it had all seemed a little absurd and fantastic. Rourke’s impassioned pleading that he forget the danger to Phyllis and serve a larger cause had left him untouched.
Shayne didn’t enjoy admitting that accusation against himself, but he could not deny it was true. It was the lethargic state of mind that the semitropics induced in a man, he told himself, and he was no better than the others who came to bask in the sun and the sea and escape the grim responsibilities of citizenship.
He was scowling darkly when he parked in front of the News Tower on Biscayne Boulevard. It was up to him, now, to justify the course of action he had chosen for himself in the face of terrific pressure from Will Gentry and Tim Rourke.
Nominally an evening paper, the News put out a noon edition, and when Shayne got off the elevator on the floor housing the city desk and editorial staff, it was already beginning to hum with a new day’s activity.
He sauntered in and nodded to a couple of rewrite men, was nearing an arched doorway marked Library when an irritated voice hailed him from behind. “Hey. Mike! Shayne.”
He turned and lifted a hand in greeting to a dyspeptic-looking man in his shirt sleeves. He said, “Hi, Grange,” and went toward the desk in response to a beckoning finger.
Grange wore a perpetual scowl that was the dual derivative of chronic indigestion and having to depend upon irresponsible reporters to help him get the paper out. His scowl was more pronounced than usual when Shayne rested an elbow on his belittered desk and inquired solicitously, “Something you et, Grange?”
Читать дальшеИнтервал:
Закладка:
Похожие книги на «The Corpse Came Calling»
Представляем Вашему вниманию похожие книги на «The Corpse Came Calling» списком для выбора. Мы отобрали схожую по названию и смыслу литературу в надежде предоставить читателям больше вариантов отыскать новые, интересные, ещё непрочитанные произведения.
Обсуждение, отзывы о книге «The Corpse Came Calling» и просто собственные мнения читателей. Оставьте ваши комментарии, напишите, что Вы думаете о произведении, его смысле или главных героях. Укажите что конкретно понравилось, а что нет, и почему Вы так считаете.