Brett Halliday: The blonde cried murder

Shayne didn't look back at her, and Pete was grinning widely. "Sure got 'em fighting over you tonight, Mr. Shayne. Now if that there one was to push up to me like that-"

"Is the one up in my room anything like her?" Shayne interrupted impatiently.

"Not a bit of it. Well, she's pretty all right, but you couldn't tell much about her, she was so scared." He lowered his voice and looked past Shayne. "This'n came in a few minutes ago, and she wanted to go up to your room to wait for you. But I wouldn't tell her the number no matter what kind of eye she gave me. Didn't tell her you already had one client waiting up there."

"Fine," said Shayne impatiently. "Don't give her my number." He turned to the elevator where there was a car waiting, and lengthened his stride when he saw her start moving toward him again.

Her running heels clacked loudly behind him as he strode in past the grinning operator and snapped, "Shut the door fast."

The operator got it shut before she reached the car. Shayne mopped sweat from his forehead with his sleeve and answered the operator's grin with one of his own. He said, "Up, Jack. And no matter what methods of persuasion that doll tries to use, don't bring her up to my floot. You got that?"

"You bet, Mr. Shayne. Might be fun at that-her trying to persuade a guy."

Shayne grunted noncommittally and got off to go down the corridor to his suite.

Shayne's first impression of the girl who cowered away from him at the other end of his sitting room was that she was quite young and pretty, a honey-blonde, and practically frightened to death by his abrupt entrance.

Her face was dead white, her eyes as round as two marbles, her mouth slack and quivering as she shrank back against the wall staring at him.

She straightened herself, still tremulous as he closed the door firmly behind him, and asked quaveringly, "Are you Mr. Shayne?"

"Of course I'm Shayne," he said irritably. "You came here asking for me, didn't you? This is my room. Who did you think would be coming in?"

"I didn't know. I've been so horribly frightened waiting. I thought he might have followed me here somehow."

Shayne said, "He?" She still stood flat against the wall as though she were afraid she couldn't stand up without some support, and her whole body trembled as though gripped by an uncontrollable ague. He moved toward her slowly, with a feeling that any sudden movement on his part might frighten her into complete hysteria.

"The man who-killed my brother," she gasped out. "That is, I guess he did. I know he must have. If-if my brother is really dead. But he is. He must be. I saw him, I tell you. You'll believe me, won't you, Mr. Shayne? You won't think I'm crazy when I tell you?"

Shayne was close to her now. Close" enough to stretch out a long arm and take hold of one of her wrists and pull her gently away from the wall. He held her wrist very tightly as he guided her to a deep chair and pressed her down into it. He made his voice calm and soothing as he said, "Of course I'll listen to you. Just take it easy now. What you need is a drink first. Close your eyes and relax. Stop worrying about anyone getting to you in here."

He let go her wrist and turned to the wall liquor cabinet near the kitchen. "Brandy or sherry?"

"A little sherry, please." Her voice had lost its hysterical shrillness, was low and faltering. "You've just got to believe me."

Shayne didn't reply. He got down a bottle of cocktail sherry and one of cognac, went into the small kitchen and reappeared a few minutes later with a tray holding wine glasses and a tumbler of ice water. He moved a small table close to the girl's chair, put the tray on it and poured her a glass of sherry.

"Drink that first-all of it-before you say anything else." He filled his own glass with cognac and took a pleased sip of it, regretfully remembering the untouched glass he'd left in Lucy's apartment just to come over here and listen to some sort of loony story about a hysterical girl's brother who must be dead but maybe wasn't after all. He pulled another chair around so that it faced her, sat in it and waited patiently until she had completely emptied her sherry glass.

"Now," he said. "Tell me about your brother. You say he's been murdered?"

"Yes. I tell you I saw him. Lying there dead, right in front of my eyes. But he wasn't there when I came back. He was gone. Just vanished," She shuddered violently and flung out both hands. "But he couldn't be. Dead men can't just get up and walk away, can they?"

"None of them I've met," Shayne agreed absently. "You'd better start at the beginning and give me all of it."

"Yes. Of course." She nodded vehemently and brightly, as though she thought Shayne was just wonderful to have thought of that.

"It began tonight, really. Well, 'way back before tonight, I guess you could say. With my brother being weak and foolish about girls, I mean. And I've always sort of looked after him. Ever since father died four years ago. He's two years older than I am, actually, but, well-he always needed looking after, sort of."

She paused, biting her underlip fiercely, her light brown eyes looking past Shayne as though they gazed at something far-away or long-ago.

"Let's get back to tonight," suggested Shayne.

"Of course." She gave her head a little jerk and smiled timidly. "Well, we're at the Roney Plaza. For the past two weeks. And I've been seeing the signs. I knew he had some girl on the string and I'd have to be taking a hand soon, but- Well, tonight, about nine o'clock he called me and he was terribly worried and frightened. He said I had to come over right away. To the Hibiscus Hotel here in Miami. To room three-sixteen. I made him repeat it and I wrote it down so there wouldn't be any mistake. So I got a taxi to the Hibiscus at once." She paused to swallow hard, and Shayne leaned forward to pour more sherry inj her glass. She appeared not to notice him.

"So I went right up to the third floor," she continued in a strained voice, "and to room three-sixteen. Light came through the transom, but no one answered when I knocked on the door. I–I knocked three times and called out his name, and then I tried the knob. It wasn't locked. It opened right up. And the first thing I saw was my brother lying on the bed right across the room. He was in his shirt sleeves and his coat was rolled up under his head and there was b-blood. There was a big jagged hole in his throat. I–I knew he was dead. He had to be, Mr. Shayne. His eyes were open and glazed." She put her face down suddenly into her hands and began sobbing.

Shayne let her cry it out. He lighted a cigarette and drank half his cognac and took a sip of ice water, and her shoulders began to stop shaking.

He said quietly, "The sooner you get on with it, the sooner I may be able to do something."

"I know. Of course." She lifted a tear-wet face and swallowed hard. "I didn't even go into the room. I didn't have to. I knew he was dead. I thought of using the phone in the room, but then thought of spoiling fingerprints on it- if they might be clues, you know, and I remembered that when I got off the elevator I'd noticed a door to a lighted room standing open. So I flew down there to ask them to report it, and the door was still open but no one was inside. So I grabbed up that phone and called down to the switchboard and told them. Then I went back. I couldn't have been gone more than two minutes. I know I couldn't. But the door to three-sixteen was shut when I got there- and I know I'd left it open. But the light was still on, and when I tried the knob it opened just as it had before. But he wasn't there any more. He just wasn't. And there was no sign of anything wrong. No coat. No blood. Nothing."

"Sure it was the right room?"

"Of course I'm sure. I'd checked the number as soon as I found the door closed. So I ran inside and looked in the bathroom and the only closet and I even peeked under the bed. I felt as though I'd gone through the looking glass. Like Alice, you know. And I ran out into the hall and he jumped at me." She stopped, her mouth open and breathing hard as she relived the horror of the moment.