Brett Halliday - Marked for Murder

He let his head rest against the back of the sofa and closed his eyes. Despite his stubborn intentions, he caught himself drowsily thinking that she was intrinsically a pretty swell person. Under other circumstances, married to another man, Muriel could certainly have been a happy and contented wife. It wasn’t her fault that she had the soul of a courtesan. She had a curious lack of morals that was attractively simple and childlike.

Lazily, he turned to an analysis of himself. How much of his crusading fervor was attributable to genuine indignation, and how much to other factors? Such as his dislike for Walter Bronson and a desire to put something over on him? What about his dislike of Peter Painter? Did that date back to the times when Mike Shayne ferreted out killers under Painter’s incapable nose and turned over front-page stories to him for a scoop? Was his desire to stir up a stink merely to give him a feeling of importance?

Hell, if a man went honestly digging into his own soul for motives he was likely to come up with some pretty painful results.

He could smell the rich aroma of coffee from the kitchen and hear the sizzle of frying bacon. He let himself relax and stop thinking altogether. He was hungry as a bitch suckling 16 pups, and it was pleasant to have a beautiful woman in the kitchen preparing food for him.

He was half-asleep when Muriel called cheerfully, “Come and get it,” from the breakfast nook. She had a big plate of bacon and scrambled eggs, delicately browned buttered toast, and a cup of strong coffee ready for him, with only a cup of black coffee for herself. She looked youthful and attractive as she sat across the small table from him with her cheeks flushed and her eyes alight.

Leaning forward with her elbows on the table and her chin cupped in her palms, she asked, “Are you still angry with me for coming here, Tim?”

“Not after tasting this food.” He took a swig of coffee and wondered why the devil he couldn’t make it taste right. “If your husband catches you here I’ll tell him I’m giving you a tryout for a job as my cook.”

She frowned and her eyes were grave for a moment. Then she laughed and said, “He can’t possibly know I’m here. I waited until he went back to the office, and I parked my car on the side street and came up the back stairway. No one saw me.”

Rourke scraped up the last of his eggs and pushed the plate back with a satisfied sigh. “Bronson is the least of my worries,” he said. “Just so you’ve got his gun safe. Is there more coffee?”

“Plenty.” She took his cup into the kitchen for a refill, came back, and said tenderly, “I’ll take it in the living-room where you can be more comfortable.” She preceded him through the archway, drew up a small table beside the couch for him, then went back to gather up the dishes and put them in the sink.

Rourke rolled a cigarette and enjoyed his second cup of coffee. Muriel came back and sat on the floor beside him, looked up into his eyes, and said, “I love you, Tim. I wish you wouldn’t doubt that.”

The white line of her throat was as smooth and clean as a young girl’s. He put his knuckles against her cheek and laughed. “Up from your position of adoration, woman. Is this a proposal?”

“It could be,” she said quietly. She sprang up and went lithely toward the bathroom, holding herself proudly erect.

Watching her, he thought that life was sometimes funny as hell.

Lucy Hamilton looked up from her typewriter when Michael Shayne stalked into the reception room of his office in downtown New Orleans. She was smiling and her red lips formed to call a cheery greeting.

Instead, she pushed her chair back, half-arose, and cried, “What on earth, Michael? Why are you looking like that?”

Shayne’s face was set in harsh and strained lines. His gray eyes were cold with a blank, unseeing expression. A folded newspaper was crushed in his big right hand. He advanced to the wooden railing separating Lucy’s desk from the rest of the reception room and ordered curtly, “Get the airport. See about a plane to Miami.”

“What’s happened? What is it?” she asked, her right hand reaching into the top desk drawer and bringing out the telephone directory. She rapidly thumbed through the pages for the number and picked up the receiver. Dialing, she asked, “When shall I say you’re going, Michael?”

“On the very first plane that can take me,” Shayne told her. “Tell them it’s police business.”

When the airport answered and Lucy made an urgent plea for a seat on the first plane leaving, she kept her anxious brown eyes upon her employer’s grim face.

Shayne relaxed his fingers on the newspaper and smoothed it out. His gaze brooded down on the small headline on the second page: Crusading Reporter Near Death. The paragraph below was a wire service item datelined Miami, Florida.

Lucy sighed and cradled the receiver. “Not a chance this week. They’re booked solidly.”

“Try the railroad.” Shayne’s voice was flat and even, warding off further questions and stifling her sympathy.

Lucy bit her lip and swallowed the words she was going to say. She looked up another number, dialed it, while Shayne stood flat-footed before her, waiting, reading the words of the short item over and over, though he already knew them by heart.

Lucy talked a little longer over the telephone this time, but when she hung up she said, “Nothing for at least two weeks unless there happens to be a last-minute cancellation. Do you want me to-?”

“When does the next train leave?”

“There’s one in twenty minutes, but you can’t possibly get a reservation. I even asked about the day coach. They doubt whether there’ll be a seat.”

Shayne said, “I’ll take my chance on that. Twenty minutes? I won’t have time to pack anything.”

Lucy stood up, her tall slim body very straight, her eyes soberly studying the detective. She said severely, “You’re not going to dash off to Miami like that. You can’t do it. Mrs. Caruthers is waiting in your office. She had a nine o’clock appointment. And you’re to see Mr. Heinz today about that theft. And there’s the Erskine case-” Her voice trailed off when she realized that he wasn’t listening to her, that he was looking through her as though he didn’t know she was there. He had walled himself off from everything in the world except the newspaper in his hand.

Shayne shifted the folded paper to his left hand and worried his left ear lobe between right thumb and forefinger. “You take care of things here, Lucy,” he said absently. “What time does that train reach Miami?”

“Six-thirty tomorrow evening. But I can’t take care of things. You know you’ve-”

“Take a wire,” Shayne snapped. Chief of police Will Gentry, Miami, Florida. Arriving six-thirty tomorrow evening. Have all dope on Rourke ready. Mike Shayne. “Got that?”

“All dope on Rourke?” Lucy looked up from her notebook questioningly.

He spelled the name for her and added in a strangely gentle voice, “You remember Timothy Rourke. The reporter who flew that stuff here on the Margo Macon case.”

“Of course I remember. Is he-?”

Shayne nodded. “Shot last night. He isn’t expected to live.” He looked down at the newspaper as if for confirmation.

“Oh-I’m sorry. But do you have to dash off like this? Can’t the Miami police-?”

The door opened unceremoniously and a telegraph boy entered. He said, “Telegram for Michael Shayne.”

Shayne took the message and tore it open. He read: Crime popping Miami Beach. Three murders. Can you take over. Urgent. Tim Rourke.

Shayne uttered a sharp oath and crushed the message in his hand. He said to Lucy, “It’s a message from Tim-evidently sent before he was shot in his apartment on Miami Beach. I’ve just about got time to get a taxi to the depot. Get that wire off to Gentry right away.”