Brett Halliday - This Is It, Michael Shayne

“Neither of us mentioned it the next morning. We both tried to pretend nothing had happened. We always passed off little spats that way. I tried to forget what she was going to do, and tried to tell myself it just proved she was human, after all. I blamed it a lot on Edwin Paisly,” she said, suddenly vicious at the mention of his name. “He had an unwholesome influence on her. She’s been so different these last few months.”

Shayne took the blackmail letter Harsh had given him from his pocket and handed it to Gentry. “Here, Will, take a look at this and compare the signature with the one she wrote me just before she died.”

Gentry spread the two notes on his desk and examined the signatures closely. Shayne got up and leaned across to compare them. After a long moment Gentry said:

“I’m not a handwriting expert, but they look the same to me.”

“And to me,” Shayne agreed morosely. He picked up both notes, folded them, and thrust them in his pocket. He sat down again, and Gentry asked:

“Anything else significant occur yesterday?”

“There were two things,” Beatrice said diffidently. “Ralph Morton called me in the morning and said he wanted to see his wife. I hung up on him.” Her lips rolled out in a sour grimace.

“Did he tell you where he was staying?” Gentry asked sharply.

“No. I got the impression he had just arrived in town.”

“What was the second thing?”

“She had a visitor late in the afternoon. I thought it was Ralph. But as I told Mr. Shayne, I didn’t go in to see. Both bathroom doors were closed and I couldn’t hear anything but a muttering of voices.”

Gentry dropped a soggy cigar butt in the trash basket beside his chair, took out a fresh one and turned it around to examine the wrapper. He bit off the end deliberately, took his time about lighting it, then squeaked his swivel chair back.

“Now we come to the telephone call,” he rumbled, “and your hurried trip to the Ricardo Hotel at twelve-thirty. Are you positive you didn’t see anything in that room before the light went out and you were knocked unconscious?”

“Not a thing. It all happened so fast-”

“And you don’t even know who the occupant of that room is?” he broke in casually.

“No. I went there to meet Mr. Shayne. I thought it was his room. Isn’t it?” Her round eyes held a moist question when she puckered them at Shayne.

“I have an apartment on the river,” he told her.

She was widening her eyes in surprised wonderment when Gentry hunched forward and asked abruptly:

“Have you ever seen this before?” His tone was a harsh growl.

Miss Lally jerked her head around and saw a pearl-handled. 25 automatic in Gentry’s square palm and not more than two feet from her naked, near-sighted eyes. She squinted at it worriedly, a perpendicular frown in her smooth white forehead. She leaned closer to examine it.

“Why-it looks like-I think-it’s one Miss Morton used to have,” she faltered. “I can’t be sure, of course, unless I check the serial number with her permit. But it’s the same kind hers is-was.”

“One she had, Miss Lally?” Gentry probed.

“Yes. Up until about a year ago. It was stolen. She always thought Ralph took it. He always took anything of hers he wanted and could get hold of. Where-where did you get it? I understood Miss Morton was stabbed.”

“She was. But a bullet from this gun killed Ralph Morton in room three-oh-nine at the Ricardo Hotel around twelve-thirty tonight.”

“Ralph Morton-dead? At the Ricardo where I–I-went tonight?” She drew away as far as the back of the straight chair permitted, staring at the pistol with hypnotic fascination.

“He is. And if his body hadn’t been discovered in that room by Shayne when it was,” he said grimly, “it is more than likely you would be dead, too. Suffocated in that closet.”

She gasped, looking slowly from Gentry to Shayne, her white skin suddenly suffused with a yellowish pallor. “Then you-found me?” she murmured.

“And lucky for you. Now you know why I asked if the voice over the phone sounded like Ralph Morton’s,” Shayne said.

“How horrible!” she burst out “Was he-murdered-too?”

“We think he was,” said Gentry flatly. He chewed the cigar, dead since the first puffs, across to the other side of his mouth, then resumed:

“It appears he hadn’t just arrived in Miami, but has been at the Ricardo several days and is the one who sent Miss Morton the threatening letters trying to force her to leave Miami before she completed her residence requirements for a divorce.”

“Ralph-sent those letters? Then he’s the one who killed her. But-” she included Timothy Rourke in her round of questioning glances now-“but who killed him? And who phoned me to go to that room? I don’t believe it was Ralph.”

“We’re fairly certain Ralph Morton didn’t phone you,” Gentry told her. “But it had to be someone who knew Morton’s room number-and who also knew Shayne had left you with Miss Hamilton. When we find that man-”

He was interrupted by a knock on the door and Riley opened it to report:

“We’ve got Mr. Harsh out here, Chief. He wants to phone a lawyer.”

“He can have all the lawyers he wants after we charge him with something,” rumbled Gentry. “I’ll be ready for him in a few minutes. Keep him away from Garvin.”

The door closed and Gentry asked, “Anything you want to ask Miss Lally, Mike?”

“There’s one thing I want very much to ask her. About Miss Morton’s watch, Miss Lally-was it any good?”

“Why, yes. It was a very expensive watch.”

“But did it keep time? Did she have it repaired often?”

“It always kept perfect time,” she declared. The puzzled expression in her eyes cleared, and she said, “Oh-you mean about it being an hour slow, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“That was one of her idiosyncrasies. She refused to ever change to daylight-saving time. She kept it on Standard the year ’round.”

“Didn’t that cause certain difficulties?”

“Oh, no. She was so used to it she always made a mental correction when she was where daylight saving was in effect.”

“As it is here right now,” Shayne muttered. “I guess that tears it, Will. Even if her watch did say seven-thirty when she wrote me the note she would have typed the correct time.” His bushy brows met over a scowl and he rubbed his lean jaw reflectively.

“Then none of the men involved has an alibi,” Gentry said heavily. “You’ve been most helpful and cooperative,” he told Miss Lally. “I may need more from you later, but right now I can’t think of anything else.”

“Then may I go back to the hotel? My eyes are terribly strained from going so long without my glasses. I have an emergency pair at the hotel.”

“Wait a minute,” said Shayne. “They should be bringing Paisly in soon, and I’d like to ask him a couple of questions in your presence.”

“Do you think it’s important?” She sounded tired and disappointed.

“Why do we need her, Mike?” Gentry demurred.

“I want her to listen carefully to his voice, for one thing, and see if she can recognize it as the voice that lured her to Ralph Morton’s hotel room.”

“But I’ve heard his voice often,” she argued. “The man on the telephone didn’t sound a bit like him.”

Shayne looked across at Timothy Rourke, who had gradually slumped in the straight chair until his vertebrae rested on the seat. His chin rested on his chest and his eyes were closed.

“Tim-wake up,” Shayne yelled,

Rourke’s eyes popped open. “I’m not asleep,” he said crossly. “And don’t yell at me.”

“Look, Tim, you told me Paisly used to be an actor. You know what kind? Was he an impressionist?”