Brett Halliday - This Is It, Michael Shayne

“I-reckon-” the Negro boy stammered, rolling his eyes fearfully from Shayne to Garvin.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” Shayne said soothingly. “Just tell the truth and you’ll be all right.”

“I reckon he’s rightly the one what was heah not more’n a hour ago askin’ fo’ three-oh-nine,” he blurted out rapidly. “Didn’t stay but jes’ a li’l while.”

“I was a fool to think I could get away with it,” Garvin said miserably. “But when I looked in that room and saw him lying there, blood trickling out and gunpowder smelling in the room, I–I didn’t know what to do. I realized he’d killed himself,” he broke off hysterically.

The elevator buzzer was sounding frantically while the Negro boy’s eyes bulged with curiosity and fear, and his hands seemed paralyzed.

“Take it down,” Shayne ordered, and heard the door close as he walked toward the death room with Garvin. “Are you going to claim Morton was dead before you got here?”

“He was. I tell you he was lying there just like you saw him. The light was on, and when he didn’t answer my knock I tried the door. It was unlocked, so I opened it and looked in. I know I should have reported it, but I didn’t think of anything but getting out as fast as I could. I was frightened.”

“Why?” Shayne insisted.

“Because-Good Lord, Shayne. I didn’t want to be caught here with a man who’d just shot himself.”

They had reached 309 and Shayne glanced in at the homicide experts. “Suicide or murder?” he asked.

Riley looked up, shrugged, and spread out his hands significantly, then walked over to Shayne. “It could be either,” he said.

Garvin had removed the tight-fitting hat. He handed it to Riley without a word or a glance. Riley looked at Shayne with a grin, but Shayne was looking toward the elevator.

The door opened and Will Gentry stepped out, followed by Tim Rourke and Lieutenant Hastings, who was in charge of the homicide division. They stopped at the door, and Shayne answered the unspoken questions in Gentry’s eyes:

“Ralph Morton is dead and Miss Lally’s glasses are lying on the floor just inside the door-broken. This is Carl Garvin, who paid Morton a visit about the time it happened, but sneaked away without reporting it. Claims he thought Morton had shot himself.”

Garvin moved unsteadily and leaned against the wall. Shayne swung around and demanded, “What about Miss Lally? Did you see her here? Was it you who phoned her to meet you here?”

Garvin’s face was gray. He began to retch and clawed at his throat, reeling sideways and then sliding limply to the floor. He lay very still on his side and the smell of liquor from a sour stomach rose from the vomit oozing from his mouth.

Shayne looked at him for a moment, then said to Gentry, “He’s all yours,” and swung on his heel toward the elevator.

“Hold on, Mike,” Gentry called out “Where are you going?”

“To see what I can find out about Miss Lally,” he flung over his shoulder. He got out a five-dollar bill as he approached the boy, who now stood boldly outside the elevator, watching and listening.

“You hit the jackpot a moment ago,” Shayne told him. “How are you on ladies?”

“I dunno, suh.”

“About an hour ago,” Shayne interrupted. He swiftly described Miss Lally and her glasses, and added, “It may have been a little more or a little less than an hour ago.”

The boy shook his head, looking wistfully at the bill in Shayne’s hand. “I tell you how ’tis,” he confided. “We gets lotsa ladies goin’ in an’ out all hours. Don’t none of ’em hardly wears glasses, though.”

“This lady might not have had hers on,” Shayne said. “Think hard. It would have been around twelve-thirty.”

“Sho wish I could say, but I jest cain’t.”

Shayne heard a commotion in 309 and turned to see Rourke’s head peering through the door and beckoning to him frantically.

Thrusting the bill into the boy’s hand, Shayne broke into a trot. Rourke met him outside the door and said excitedly:

“It’s Beatrice, Mike! They found her locked in the closet. I’m afraid she’s dead, too.”

Shayne stepped past him to the doorway. Beatrice Lally was lying on the floor and one of the detectives was applying artificial respiration. She was as limp as a rag doll and looked pitifully helpless with her hair disheveled and her clothing torn. Streaks of dirt and tears mingled on her waxen white face.

Gentry got in front of Shayne and shoved him back as he started toward the girl. “Take it easy, Mike,” the chief advised gruffly. “She’s breathing. She’ll come out of it. But my God, she must have been locked in there with no air for an hour or more.”

Shayne thought swiftly of the dead, thick air in the room when he first entered with Garvin. He caught Gentry’s arm and growled, “Where’s Garvin?” after looking around the room and not seeing him.

“In the next room,” said Gentry sourly. “It’s empty and I shoved him in there when he pulled that faint-or a phony. Where’d you get him, Mike? Where does he fit in?”

“He’s the local manager for Miss Morton’s syndicate. He first denied knowing Morton’s address, but we got it from his office and came here. I caught him in a couple of lies and he finally admitted coming here after midnight to see Morton. Claims the room was unlocked and the light on and Morton was lying like that when he looked in. So he beat it.”

Shayne spoke swiftly and in a low voice, watching Beatrice Lally steadily. When she blinked her eyes and moaned, he elbowed Gentry aside and pushed forward to drop on his knees beside her. She moved her head restlessly and her eyes fluttered open, only to close quickly as though to shut out the painful light.

When she finally held them open long enough to see Shayne’s grimly concerned face, she smiled faintly and said:

“What happened?” Her voice was a whisper and her round, sooty eyes looked wonderingly into his. “I came here-like you said-and-and someone hit me.” She shivered and closed her eyes tightly.

Shayne realized then that the window was wide open and a cool, strong breeze was blowing in, but the gusty blasts of the impending storm has passed. “Better close that window,” he said. “She’s shivering with cold.”

Miss Lally was trying to sit up. Still on his knees, Shayne put his arm around her and lifted her to her feet as he came up. There was a dull reddish bruise high on her right cheekbone, just in front of the ear. Shayne kept his arm around her. She drew in a deep breath, moistened her lips, and looked around dazedly.

“Get her a glass of water,” Shayne ordered, and helped her to the only comfortable chair in the shabby room.

Gentry brought the water and she drank a few sips gratefully. “When you feel like talking-”

She puckered her near-sighted eyes at the chief and Shayne explained:

“This is Chief Will Gentry. But don’t talk until you feel like it.”

“I was unconscious for a time, I guess. Then I came to. Or, it seems I did. Perhaps I dreamed it. It’s like a horrible nightmare,” she went on, stopping to breathe deeply after each short sentence, while the men moved in closer to hear more clearly the words she spoke only slightly louder than a whisper. “It was all black and silent. Like being in a coffin. I screamed and pounded-and crawled around like an animal. I was so weak. Then everything faded. There wasn’t any-air-to breathe.”

“You were locked in the clothes closet over there,” Shayne explained gently. He looked at Gentry, who was bending close to her on the other side of the chair. “Do you think it’s wise to question her now, Will? Sometimes a case of shock has serious consequences.”