Brett Halliday: Counterfeit Wife

He sauntered back to the entrance of the Fun Club, pulled a screen door open and went in.

The room was not large, and the tawdry murals of cavorting nudes against dark green backgrounds on the walls, the low ceiling dotted with pale yellow lights, and the tables crowding the tiny dance floor diminished its size. The air was smoke-laden, and stuffy with the stench of liquor. There was a short bar, accommodating only six stools, on the other side of a small square left bare for dancing.

One couple was dancing languidly to muted music from a juke-box-a shapeless, skinny girl wearing a backless playsuit, and her slender partner, shirt hanging out, who held her in a vise-like grip, his sleek black head pressed against her pale blonde hair. Five of the tables were occupied by couples who had reached a mellow stage in their search for gaiety, or escape, via the alcoholic route.

Shayne quickly spotted the couple he had followed from the airport. They were seated at a table near the short bar. He went over and sat on one of the empty stools.

Fred Gurney wore a tan sports coat and had a Panama hat tipped back on his head. He was leaning forward talking to Mrs. Dawson, who sat solidly in her chair, filling it but not overflowing the edges; she did not spread as most large women do when they sit down. Their table was on his left, and Shayne could observe them without looking directly at them. The woman’s braids looked the color of tarnished gold in the murky yellow light, and there was an expression of determined placidity on her face.

Pulling his hat brim a little lower on that side, Shayne hunched an angular shoulder upward farther to conceal his profile, though he thought it unlikely that Gurney would recognize him. He watched with interest while the thin-faced bartender placed a drink order on a metal tray at the end of the bar. The drinks consisted of a double shot of rye with a glass of root beer for a chaser, two double shots of dry gin in separate glasses, a bottle of beer, and an empty goblet into which the bartender put four ice cubes.

A very dark-complexioned waiter with black hair greased against his scalp and wearing a dirty white jacket came lazily to the bar, took the tray and carried it to the table where Gurney and Mrs. Dawson were seated. Shayne watched him set the rye and root beer in front of Gurney and the two double shots of gin, the beer, and the ice goblet before the gray-suited blonde.

Shayne turned to see the bartender watching him curiously. He grinned and jerked his head toward the table and said, “That’s quite a mess they’re drinking. Got any cognac?”

“Enough to make a drinking man sick to his stomach,” he said, his upper lip curling. “Hennessy?”

Shayne repeated, “Hennessy. Two ponies in a snifter with plain water on the side.”

The bartender turned his back. Shayne saw Mrs. Dawson pour one of the glasses of gin on top of the ice in the goblet. She then filled it with beer and thrust a plump, tapering forefinger in the mixture to stir the floating ice.

Fred Gurney tasted his rye, wriggled his long thin nose, twisted the bloodless gash that was his mouth into a sour grimace, and took a quick sip of root beer.

Gurney had been a handsome man once. That was years ago, long before Shayne had known him except through having studied his police record and pictures. Now, at the age of forty, he was no longer handsome. His face had a wax-like pallor and the flesh was thinned away from nose and chin, leaving them starkly pointed and too close together. His eyes were sunken between graying brows and they glittered oddly in the light that filtered downward through the pall of smoke. His hair was thin and grayish. There was something repellent about him, particularly now as he sat across the table from the full-blooded and lush vitality of Mrs. Dawson.

Shayne watched the two of them from the corner of his eye and wondered about a lot of things.

The bartender set a big round glass bowl in front of Shayne and emptied two ponies of Hennessy into it. He filled a glass with ice water and turned away. The jukebox ended one record and began another. The couple on the dance floor was still hugged tightly together, feet scarcely moving, eyes nearly closed. There was nothing of ecstasy or even enjoyment on their faces. Shayne thought, with a wide grin, that they might have been a couple of somnambulists who, having met, were unable to pass each other and decided to lock arms and go round and round together.

Turning back toward the bar, Shayne lifted the big snifter in both hands and pretended to inhale the fumes filling the bowl. Actually, he considered this a very silly way to drink cognac, but tonight the big bowl hid his face from view while he sipped and sniffed in the approved manner.

Still listening to Gurney, Mrs. Dawson took her dripping forefinger from the goblet and stuck it in her mouth to lick off the wetness. She picked up the goblet in both hands, bracing her elbows on the table, and drank the entire glassful of gin and beer without removing it from her lips. Her Adam’s apple moved almost imperceptibly beneath the well-fleshed contour of her chin as she drank. She set the empty glass down, emptied the second portion of her drink, and again mixed it with her forefinger.

Thus far, Shayne had not seen her speak a word to her companion, though Fred Gurney paused now and again with a questioning scowl, as though he expected an answer and was becoming extremely irritated.

Now she leaned forward and said something to him. He shook his head angrily in disagreement, then shrugged and got up and walked to a telephone booth at the rear of the room.

Shayne sloshed the cognac around in his bowl, slid from the stool and walked over to sit down in the chair Gurney had vacated.

The big blonde had lifted her glass with both hands embracing it. She looked at Shayne over the rim of the goblet; her brows lifted slightly.

Shayne said, “Only thing lacking in that mixture is a couple of ounces of laudanum.”

She lowered the full glass far enough to say, “They don’t keep it in stock here.”

“That makes it tough.” He intended his remark to be sarcastic, but she only nodded agreement and said, “It takes a lot more to do the job drinking it straight like this.” She put the goblet to her mouth and emptied it in even, unhurried swallows.

“But you’re getting it done,” Shayne suggested amiably.

“I didn’t hear anybody ask your opinion,” she said in a husky drawl. “But if it’s anything to you, nosy, you don’t taste this stuff but once when you pour it down like that.”

Shayne grinned and said, “I had a big blonde for a nurse when I was a baby, and I’ve had a yen for them ever since.”

Mrs. Dawson sucked in her breath and her lower lip. Her blue eyes glowed with an unnatural brightness as she began a slow appraisal of Shayne, beginning with the brim of his hat and continuing over his wide shoulders downward until the table blocked her view. She nodded and said, “Come around some time, big boy, and bring your laudanum.”

“What’s the matter with tonight?”

She shook her head slowly from side to side, her eyes momentarily dull and troubled, looking past him to the rear of the room. He turned and saw Fred Gurney coming out of the telephone booth.

“We can ditch him,” he told her.

She said, “I’ve got more important things on my mind tonight.”

“You can forget Mr. Dawson, too,” Shayne told her.

She stiffened at his words. Again he saw the hot blue flame in her eyes that he’d seen earlier. Gurney was approaching the table. Shayne didn’t care much now whether Gurney recognized him or not. He was beginning to be bored with the whole setup. He wished he’d taken that plane to New Orleans and Lucy Hamilton.