Brett Halliday: Date with a Dead Man

“I’m mortal sure Jasper did everything he could for the poor boy,” Mrs. Groat said heatedly. “You would think they’d have had the decency to call up and thank him and ask about their boy. He brooded about it when they didn’t.”

“The Hawleys live in Miami?” Shayne asked Lucy.

She nodded. “They’re an old pioneer family. Rich as all get-out, I guess. Refused to even see a reporter this morning after Mr. Groat and Mr. Cunningham were landed and the whole story came out about the Hawley boy dying at sea.”

“And you have no idea where your husband went this evening, Mrs. Groat?”

“Not an inkling. He acted queer, like I say, and I didn’t ask him when he went out. Bitter and withdrawn, he acted. I know he made a long-distance phone call late this afternoon, but I don’t know who to. I came in from the kitchen just as he was telling the operator to charge the call. Then later he seemed to make up his mind to something and went out, saying he’d be back in an hour.” She tightened her lips and looked at a clock on the mantel. “That was almost three hours ago.”

Shayne leaned forward to grind out the butt of his cigarette in a china ash tray. “Did he drive his car?”

“We don’t have a car. With Jasper just home between trips we don’t have much need for one.”

Shayne shrugged and said, “I’ll check with the police.” He got up and looked around for a telephone.

Mrs. Groat rose swiftly, her plump face contorted with fear. “The police? Do you think…?”

Shayne said carefully, “I don’t think anything, Mrs. Groat. They’ll have a record of any accidents.”

He saw the telephone on a stand near the door and went to it. As he lifted it and dialed a number, Cunningham said abruptly, “I know something bad’s happened to him. I told Mrs. Groat so when Jasper didn’t show up for dinner. We’d planned it, you see. Night and day, on the raft, we planned what we’d eat the first night we got ashore. You tell the police that.”

Shayne nodded absently, and spoke into the mouthpiece. He asked for Sergeant Piper and gave Groat’s name and address. He listened gravely for a moment, then said, “Thanks, Sergeant. Do that.” He hung up and said, “There’s nothing reported yet. I assume he did have identification on him, Mrs. Groat?”

“Oh, yes. All kinds of cards in his wallet.”

“I guess I’ll be going.” Cunningham got up diffidently. “If you do hear from Jasper, Mrs. Groat, you tell him I couldn’t wait any longer to eat. And I’ll call tomorrow.” He walked across the rug toward the door, pausing to pick up a new brown fedora which he turned around and around in his hands absently. “I can’t help thinking maybe it’s got something to do with Jasper’s diary he kept all the time we were on the raft. One of those reporters got him all hepped up this morning about maybe printing the diary in a paper and paying him a lot of money. You think that might be it, Mrs. Groat?”

“I think he would’ve told me, if it was. He talked to me about the diary and how much the reporter might pay him for it… but he was kind of funny about that, too. Like as though maybe it wouldn’t be right to take money for something like that. Though I told him, for goodness’ sake, why not?”

“You think it’s worth much, Mrs. Groat?”

“How should I know? I didn’t read it. Seems to me he said he gave it to the reporter this morning. I read some of his other diaries years ago and I didn’t think they were so much.”

Cunningham said vaguely, “Unh-huh. I’ll be saying goodnight. Mr. Shayne and… Miss Hamilton.” He opened the door and slid out unobtrusively.

“What’s this about a reporter and his diary, Mrs. Groat?” Shayne asked the dumpy woman after the door closed behind the airlines steward.

“Land sakes, I don’t know much. Jasper was some excited when he first came home. Said they might print it in the paper and pay him for it. I think he was expecting the reporter to call him this afternoon, but he didn’t. Then it seemed like he lost interest in the diary when he got to brooding more and more about those Hawleys not even wanting to know about their boy.”

“What reporter was it, Mrs. Groat?”

“I don’t know. Daily News, I think he said.”

Shayne swung on Lucy. “Was the rescue story in the News by-lined?”

“I don’t think so, Michael.” Lucy puckered her smooth brow. “Why don’t you ask Tim Rourke?”

Shayne said, “I will.” He turned back to the telephone and dialed another number. After waiting for some time, he hung up, shaking his red head.

“I don’t know much more we can do tonight, Mrs. Groat. If you haven’t heard from your husband by tomorrow morning, call me at my office and I’ll do everything I can to help you locate him. Coming home, Lucy?”

“I… guess so.” The brown-haired girl hesitated. “Unless Mrs. Groat feels she wants me to stay.”

“Land sakes, no.” Mrs. Groat replaced her glasses on her nose and said firmly, “I’ve got the feeling now that all this is what you might call a tempest in a teapot. I shouldn’t have got upset, and Jasper won’t be any too happy if he knows the police have been called in and all. You run along and get a good sleep,” she urged Lucy, walking to the door with them, “and I do thank you, Mr. Shayne, for coming over and talking to me. Made me feel a mighty sight better somehow.”

Shayne said reassuringly, “I think tomorrow morning will be time enough to really get worried, Mrs. Groat. Just be thankful tonight that you have him back safely.”

He held Lucy’s arm firmly as they walked toward the elevators, and she glanced up into his rugged face and sighed. “Shouldn’t I have bothered you about it, Michael?”

He pushed a button to bring the elevator up, and said, “Of course, you should, angel.” He opened the door when the cage stopped on the fourth floor, and followed her inside. “Something funny about Cunningham’s attitude,” he added.

“He’s scared to death,” Lucy said flatly.

“How well do you know Jasper Groat?”

“Just to say hello to him. I’ve known Mrs. Groat casually for a couple of years… ever since they moved into this building. That’s why she called me tonight when she didn’t know what else to do.”

The elevator stopped at the bottom and they got out. As they approached the desk, the gray-haired operator at the switchboard swung about to look at them inquiringly.

Shayne stopped in front of the desk and put both palms down flat on top of it. He asked, “Do you keep a record of long-distance calls?”

“Outgoing… yes.” Her tired eyes questioned him.

He said briskly, “Police business,” opening his wallet and giving her a glimpse of his credentials as a private detective. “Mr. Groat in four-fourteen made a long-distance call this evening. Can you tell me who he called?”

She said, “The police? Well, I… just a moment.” She swiveled away from him and consulted a clipboard. “It was person-to-person to Mrs. Leon Wallace in Littleboro.”

Shayne leaned an elbow on the desk and lit a cigarette. He said, “I realize this isn’t a public telephone, but… could you put a call through to Mrs. Wallace and let me pay you for it?”

She said primly, “There’s a telephone booth in the corner over there.”

Shayne said, “Thank you,” and went to the booth. He dialed operator and told her what he wanted. She got information, and finally a Littleboro number for Mrs. Wallace, but the number did not answer after she rang it eight times. Shayne told her to cancel the call, and emerged from the booth tugging thoughtfully at his left ear lobe.

Lucy jumped up from a chair in which she had been waiting, and clung to his arm as he went out the door. “What has Mrs. Leon Wallace in Littleboro got to do with it, Michael?”