Brett Halliday: Murder Is My Business

“So you expect her to welcome you with open arms?”

Shayne grinned crookedly. “I’d like to see what the years have done to Carmela Towne,” he assented. “And to her father. He was on his way up ten years ago, rough and ruthless and domineering. Now he seems to be at the top of the heap, local magnate and mayoralty candidate.” He scowled at his glass. “He must have changed a great deal since I knew him — though I didn’t think Jeff Towne could ever change.”

“What made you ask for an autopsy on the soldier?” Lucy asked him. “I read the letter and the clipping before you saw Mrs. Delray, and I don’t see why you think it wasn’t just a traffic accident.”

Shayne looked at her in surprise. “I’ve just been telling you.”

“You’ve been mooning about a half-blooded Spanish girl whom you hope to find frustrated and beautiful,” she reminded him bitterly.

Shayne shook his head and complained, “Sometimes I fear you’ll never make a detective, Lucy. Call the airport and see about the plane.”

The plane set Michael Shayne down at the El Paso municipal airport early the next morning, and a taxi took him to the old yet still magnificent Paso Del Norte Hotel, where he had reserved a room by wire the preceding evening. He went up for a shave and a quick shower, and then down to the coffee shop for breakfast, picking up a copy of the evening Free Press as he went by the newsstand.

He settled himself at a table in a corner of the uncrowded coffee shop and spread the paper out before him. A glance at the front page left no reader in any doubt as to whom the Free Press was championing in the mayoralty election. A black headline proclaimed: Towne Released to Kill Again.

Shayne ordered coffee and scrambled eggs and settled back to read the story. Stripped of innuendo and inflammatory accusations, it told how Jefferson Towne at dusk the preceding evening had run down and killed a young recruit from nearby Fort Bliss who had been identified as James Brown of Cleveland, Ohio. The opposition paper made much of the fact that Towne had been released by Chief Dyer on his own recognizance to (as the Free Press stated it) go forth and kill again, and it broadly hinted that the entire police department had joined in a conspiracy to cover up Towne’s crime.

The news story concluded with a brief paragraph that caused a slow grin to spread over Shayne’s rugged face:

The citizens of El Paso are warned that no effort or expense will be spared by Jefferson Towne to whitewash his criminal negligence in this matter. As we go to press, the Free Press learns from a reliable source that a private detective of unsavory reputation from New Orleans has been retained to aid in confusing the electorate on this issue and to hide the full truth from our citizens.

For an interesting commentary on this desperate expedient of Candidate Towne, be sure to read the editorial by our Crime Reporter, Neil Cochrane, on this page.

A waitress brought Shayne’s coffee and eggs. He took a sip of coffee and scowled across the room. He remembered Neil Cochrane from ten years ago. Neil had been a friend of Lance Bayliss — and of Carmela Towne. A thin, waspish, eager lad, with a head too big for his undersized body, and a sharp, incisive intellect. Shayne had an idea that Neil, too, had fancied himself in love with Carmela in those days, though he must have known there could be no one but Lance in her life. Now Neil Cochrane was a reporter on the Free Press, violently opposing the election of Carmela’s father.

Shayne folded the paper and read a boxed editorial near the center of the page. It was starkly titled, WARNING!

Jeff Towne is a two-fisted fighting man. Those of us in El Paso who have followed his career with interest during the past decade know this to be true. He is a man accustomed to ride roughshod over his enemies, crushing and casting aside those who oppose him, surging upward through sheer aggressiveness to a position of industrial and financial leadership in this community.

Now, looking for more worlds to conquer, Jeff Towne has acquired political ambitions, and he brings to the political arena those same ruthless characteristics that have not failed him in the past. Jeff Towne is determined to be the next mayor of El Paso!

Yesterday a young soldier died beneath the wheels of Jeff Towne’s speeding limousine in the streets of this city. Crushed, as other men have been crushed when they stood in Jeff Towne’s way.

Fearful of a public reaction which will smash his political aspirations beneath a landslide of votes for Honest John Carter, Jeff Towne is fighting back!

With a vast fortune at his disposal, Towne has retained the services of a notorious private detective to fly here from New Orleans in a desperate attempt to cover up the true facts in this case.

Some of us in El Paso know Michael Shayne personally, and most of us know of him through newspaper accounts of his past exploits in cleverly circumventing the Law and disproving the guilt of wealthy clients.

The citizens of El Paso are solemnly warned to expect subtle trickery and distortion of facts by this detective when he takes over the case against Jeff Towne. An indication of his methods is his telephonic demand of yesterday upon Chief Dyer that an autopsy be immediately performed upon the body of Towne’s victim for the ostensible purpose of ascertaining the cause of death.

An autopsy on a traffic victim!

Yet we learn from Chief Dyer himself that he has weakly acceded to this ridiculous demand and that an autopsy has been ordered.

We await the result of this farcical proceeding with indignation and with interest, and we warn our readers to accept with a grain of salt any medical testimony which attempts to shift the blame for the death of Private James Brown from the shoulders of Candidate Towne where it belongs.

The boxed editorial was signed by Neil Cochrane.

Shayne drank his cup of coffee and ate his scrambled eggs. He got a second cup of coffee and leisurely smoked a cigarette while he drank it. It was 9:30 when he left the hotel and strolled down the street to police headquarters.

Chief Dyer looked up from his desk with a tired smile when a sergeant ushered Shayne into his private office. He shoved aside some papers and leaned forward to shake Shayne’s hand heartily, saying, “You didn’t waste any time getting here.”

“I flew in.” Shayne pulled up a chair and sat down.

Chief Dyer was bald, and a complete absence of eyebrows gave his face a naked look. He had a sharp nose with vertical creases on each side leading down to the corners of his mouth. His chin was pointed and jutted forward aggressively. He smoked cigarettes in a long holder, and had a way of never looking at a man when he talked to him. “I don’t get this,” he complained. “When you telephoned yesterday I assumed you were acting for Towne, but after the Free Press appeared last night Towne came storming in and swore he hadn’t retained you.”

Shayne said, “I just finished reading the Free Press.”

“Towne’s plenty sore,” Dyer told him. “He figures it won’t do him a damned bit of good to have someone like you jump to his defense.”

Shayne looked surprised. “He ought to be glad to have an autopsy. If we can find a few shreds of evidence pointing to a bad heart, or to a prior attack of some sort-”

“That’s exactly what he doesn’t want,” Dyer exploded. “Don’t you see the position he’s in, Shayne, with the Free Press riding him, and warning people to expect you to pull a fast one? If the autopsy does show anything like that, no one will believe it. Towne figures it would be a lot better to let it ride as a straight traffic accident. He’s legally in the clear on it that way. All the evidence indicates that he was driving slowly and the soldier either fell or threw himself under his car. He stopped immediately and gave first aid and reported the accident.”