Brett Halliday - The Corpse Came Calling

She faced him in the doorway, put both her hands on his arm while her eyes searched him. “You won’t let me down,” she said simply, “I know you won’t.” She lifted herself on tiptoe and swiftly pressed her lips against his mouth, then turned out the door and hurried toward the stairway.

Shayne turned back into the room slowly. There was the lingering scent of heliotrope perfume in the air. He went into the bathroom and rubbed a trace of rouge from his mouth, then came back tweaking the lobe of his left ear.

He went out after a moment’s hesitation, walked to the end of the corridor and down the stairs to the ground floor and a private side entrance.

He let himself out onto the sidewalk, strode briskly to the front of the building. Two police cars and an ambulance were parked in front. One of the police cars was from Miami’s sister city across the bay, Miami Beach.

Shayne stalked into the lobby, whistling cheerily. The desk clerk tried to signal for his attention, but Shayne waved to him and went on to the elevators.

The elevator boy’s eyes bugged at him when he stepped into the car. He breathed, “Gee, Mr. Shayne, what d’yuh think? The cops’ve been lookin’ all over for you.”

Shayne grinned and said, “That’s nothing new, Henry.” He got out and strode down the hall toward the open door of his office.

Two harness cops stood outside. He frowned and asked them, “What the hell’s going on?”

One of the uniformed men said, “It’s Mr. Shayne himself,” and jerked his thumb toward the open door, muttering, “Watch your step, Mike. It’s Peter Painter inside and he’s on the warpath for sure.”

Shayne winked at him and strode in. He stopped just inside the door, staring down at the corpse of Jim Lacy which lay just where it had fallen.

In a pained voice, he asked, “Why doesn’t someone tell me these things?” He looked up and saw Phyllis pushing forward between a couple of Miami detectives, and he stepped over the body to gather her into his arms.

“What’s this all about, angel?” Shayne had his arms tightly about Phyllis’s shaking shoulders. “Who’s the stiff messing up my office? Did you blast him? For God’s sake, Phyl, what is this?”

She relaxed against him, sobbing, pressing her face against his chest. He looked over the top of her head wonderingly at a group of detectives from the homicide squad, at the medical examiner who sat lazily in a deep chair with his physician’s bag beside him, and lastly at a slim, erect figure who strutted forward with an unpleasant gleam of triumph in his snapping black eyes.

This was Peter Painter, chief of detectives from Miami Beach, and Michael Shayne’s pet aversion in the form of a law-enforcement officer.

Painter stopped in front of the detective with both hands thrust deep into the slash pockets of a belted sport coat. The threadlike black mustache on his upper lip quivered exultantly as he said:

“It’s up to you to do the explaining this time, Shayne. You can’t kill a man and then just duck out-”

“Wait a minute.” Shayne carefully kept his voice to a normal level. He looked past Painter to a Miami detective and asked, “Where’s Will Gentry?”

“Gentry was out when the call came in. I left word for him to come up.”

Shayne growled, “What’s Painter horning in for?” continuing to ignore the spruce detective chief. “This isn’t his territory.”

The homicide man from Gentry’s office spread out his hands placatingly. “But it looks like it’s pretty much his case, Mike. He was in the office getting out a local pickup on the corpse when your wife phoned in.”

Shayne transferred his gaze to Painter. “You wanted this guy?” He jerked his head toward the corpse.

“For the FBI,” Painter told him with malicious relish. “I have a wire from J. Edgar Hoover saying that it’s a matter of supreme importance to detain him for questioning for a special agent who’s flying down from Washington.”

Shayne looked down at Jim Lacy with no show of recognition. He demanded, “Who the devil is he? What’s he doing here? Who shot him full of holes?”

“Those,” said Peter Painter precisely, “are the same questions we’ve been asking your wife. She has yet to give us a satisfactory explanation.”

Shayne drew in a deep breath. He held Phyllis away from him and looked into her eyes. “Give it to me, Phyl. The truth. I’ve got to know where I stand.”

Her eyes were frightened but she held her voice steady. “I’ve told them the truth, Michael. I was sitting here at my desk-” She stopped speaking as another man entered the room. It was Will Gentry, chief of the Miami Detective Bureau and a long-time warm friend of Shayne’s.

Gentry was a big, stolid man with a beefy face which concealed a keen intelligence. He glanced at the corpse casually, then at Shayne and the others. “I came up as soon as I got the report. What is this, Mike?”

“You know as much about it as I do. I just got here myself. Phyllis was starting to tell me about it. Go ahead, angel.”

“I was sitting here at my desk,” she began again, “when the door opened and this man stepped inside. He had his coat hugged about him and he looked-awful. Like a walking dead man, if you know what I mean. He-took one step and then fell to the floor.” She paused to shudder, then went on valiantly. “I unbuttoned his coat and vest and saw the blood. I knew-he was dead. So I called the police.”

Shayne said, “That’s all we need right now.” He steered her back to a seat on the day bed, gave her shoulder a pat, and said, “Sit tight while I straighten things out.”

As he turned back to the others, Painter was explaining to Will Gentry, “It simply doesn’t read the way she tells it. He has three wounds in his chest, and any one of them would be fatal. No man could walk around with those holes in him.”

Shayne stepped forward angrily. “If Phyllis said he did, then, by God, he did.”

Gentry shook his head soothingly at the redhead. “Keep out of it, Mike.” He asked Painter, “What’s your interest?”

“The FBI wanted this man for questioning,” Painter told him. “I was on the verge of picking him up when he was killed here in Shayne’s office.”

Shayne thrust his lean jaw out and started forward again, but Gentry interposed, “Let’s hear what the M.E. has to say about it. What’s your opinion, doc?” to the professional man who sat comfortably in his chair.

“Each of the three wounds would probably be fatal. They are small-caliber, not more than a. 32. If you want a snap opinion, I don’t believe any man could walk a hundred feet with those three holes in his chest.”

“There you are,” Painter said. “And I’ve talked to the help here. Neither the clerk nor the elevator operator saw any sign of a wound when he came up.”

Shayne jutted his lean jaw at the doctor. “I’m not an M.E., but I have had a speaking acquaintance with gunshot wounds. I’ve known guys carrying enough lead to sink a battleship who stayed on their feet for half an hour before keeling over.”

The doctor nodded. “It will require a P.M. to pass definite judgment.” He explained to Gentry, “A lot of factors enter into it-the exact course of the bullets after they entered the body, what vital organs were touched or missed. There have been some remarkable cases of auto-anesthesia in which mortally wounded men have even remained unaware of their own wounds.” He shrugged. “On that score, I can only say this is one for the record if yon cadaver ambled into this hotel and up here under his own power.”

Painter began, “You see, Gentry,” but Shayne cut him off savagely.

“Even the doc admits it could be possible. What are you trying to prove, Painter?”