Brett Halliday - She Woke to Darkness

“But that’s impossible! You took her home that night, practically passed out, and… well damn it, maybe you never did know this, Lew. I don’t suppose the police told you at the time. No reason why they should. They were damned decent about not giving it to the papers, and Lucy never did find out. But I know she had nothing to do with Green because I was in her apartment with her all the time.”

“I didn’t know that.” Watching Lew Recker carefully through the half-open side door, Shayne was convinced the writer hadn’t known this fact. He made a hopeful gesture, now, and said, “All you have to do then is to remind the police of that and convince them they’re barking up the wrong tree.”

“But how did they get started on this line?” demanded Jensen’s voice in a tone of genuine puzzlement. “They’ve got your testimony and mine in the old records.”

“Don’t ask me why any cops thinks what he thinks or does what he does. There’s something,” went on Recker unwillingly, “about a telephone call Elsie is supposed to have made that night.”

“A telephone call?”

Recker nodded, tight-lipped. “I don’t know where the idea came from but they’re trying to prove she went to some barroom near her place that night and telephoned Elbert Green to come and pick her up outside the place.”

“But that’s impossible! She didn’t go out to any barroom while I was with her. And I don’t believe she had time to do it before I got there.”

“I don’t believe it either,” said Recker nervously. “I’m just telling you what the police are saying.”

“Where could they have got hold of that idea?” The smooth baritone voice was lower now, with an ominous note concealed beneath the outward suavity. The visitor was moving forward into the room.

“How do I know?” burst out Recker defensively. “It’s the first I ever heard of it.”

“Are you sure of that, Lew? Sure you didn’t hand them that bit of gratuitous information?”

“How could I when I didn’t even know about it? Damn it, Dave! Are you suggesting she did make such a call?”

“I’m suggesting nothing.” Jensen’s voice was soft again. It came from a position near Recker, just beyond Shayne’s line of vision. “It occurred to me it was the sort of thing you might have dreamed up to save your own skin. After all, we know that you and I both perjured ourselves to save Elsie’s skin that night. We both know she had no idea in the world where she was or what happened after she left the party.”

Lew Recker wet his lips and cast an anxious, sidelong glance at Shayne beyond the door.

“I don’t know any such thing. No matter what you did, I didn’t perjure myself.”

“Come off it, Lew. Just between us girls, I know all about her turning up at Estelle’s place at four o’clock after being passed out cold for several hours. You didn’t tell the cops that.”

“N-no,” Recker stammered. “I didn’t see any reason to. I felt sorry for her.”

“Yeh?” David Jenson jeered. His voice cold and thick with jealous hatred. “It also gave you a hold over her, didn’t it? You know damn well she despised you after the first time you took advantage of her when she was tight, and that hurt your lousy ego. So you made a deal with her. You’d help alibi her for Green’s death if she’d let you into her bed when you demanded entry.”

“No! It wasn’t like that.” Beads of sweat were appearing on Lew Recker’s forehead. Close beside him, Michael Shayne felt Estelle trembling violently. His fingers tightened warningly on her arm. He wanted nothing to interrupt the conversation that was taking place in the other room.

Unfortunately, an interruption did occur at that moment. Lew Recker’s telephone began ringing, and with an apologetic, sidelong glance toward the redheaded detective, the writer moved forward to answer it.

Shayne heard him lift the receiver and say, “Hello?” and after a brief moment his voice came more loudly, “Michael Shayne? Wait just a moment. I don’t know… “

With an exclamation of angry impatience, Shayne released his grip on Estelle’s arm and strode forward into the living room. David Jenson whirled about in the center of the rug to stare at him in utter consternation, and Shayne had a momentary glimpse of a big blond man with a smoothly boyish face and light blue eyes that were round and big and seemed to stand out from the flesh.

Shayne tramped past him without a second glance, to Lew Recker who held the telephone out to him wordlessly. Shayne took it and snapped, “Yes?” into the instrument, heard Ed Radin’s voice come over clearly:

“Mike! We’re at the hospital and Brett will pull through. X-rays show no fracture. He won’t be conscious for twelve hours or so, but is otherwise okay.”

“Swell. You want to come down here for the windup?”

“You mean that, Mike?” Radin’s voice was eager. “Lieutenant Hogan is with me. He’s been wondering what the devil you’re up to?”

“Just tell the Lieutenant,” said Shayne happily, “that I’m about to make one of my famous passes and give him Elsie Murray’s murderer. After that, he can go home and get some sleep.”

“Yeh?” Ed Radin sounded doubtful. “You mean it, Mike?”

“I mean it. Come on down to Lew Recker’s place. You know the address?”

“On Madison. Sure. In about ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes will be fine.” Shayne replaced the receiver and turned slowly to survey the room.

Estelle Stevens had come in behind him, and she and Recker stood close together near the side door, their arms tightly around each other’s waist.

In front of them, standing solid and spread-legged on the rug with an angry scowl on his face was David Jenson. The man whom Elsie had called “Dirk” in her script. He wore fawn-colored slacks and a light tan sport jacket and looked like a sophomore football tackle.

He whirled about to face Michael Shayne and demanded, “What kind of hocus-pocus is this? Who are you to be eavesdropping on a private conversation?”

“The name is Shayne. Michael Shayne. A friend of Brett Halliday from Miami, if that’s news to you.”

“And who the hell is Brett Halliday?” blustered Jenson.

“I thought you were a member of the mystery writers too.”

“Oh? That Halliday? I’ve heard his name though I don’t believe I ever met him.”

“Perhaps not socially,” said Shayne. “Weren’t you at the banquet last night?”

“No.” Jensen’s voice was harsher than seemed necessary. “I never attend those affairs.”

Shayne shrugged. “Who told you Elsie Murray was taking Halliday home with her?”

“No one.” Jensen’s attitude became wary. “Not that I would have cared.”

“No? Not even if you’d known she intended to show him the unfinished manuscript she was writing?”

“Not even if I’d known that,” gibed Jenson. “Why should I have minded?”

“Because,” said Shayne savagely, “once any intelligent person read her script and tied it into the Elbert Green murder case and started checking back, you were definitely left out on a limb without the trace of an alibi.”

“Nuts! What makes you think I needed an alibi?”

“Elsie’s script made me think so.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I don’t think you do either.”

“He doesn’t, Dave,” put in Lew Recker eagerly. “He’s just a private Shamus from Miami who’s horning in here in a last-ditch attempt to save Brett Halliday’s neck. Only God knows what he thinks he means by referring to a manuscript of Elsie’s. Personally, I don’t believe there ever was such a thing.”

“Don’t you, Lew?” Shayne asked the question quietly.