Бретт Холлидей - Death Has Three Lives

“You have got the woman who was drowned in Biscayne Bay tonight?” Shayne asked.

“Oh, yeh. She’s the only fresh un. You boys come down to identify her?”

“To take a look and see if we can.”

“Have tuh put your names down right here.” The attendant produced two cards and picked up a pen. “You know the rules good as I do. Lemme see, now—” He made a pretext of scratching his bald head in perplexity, glancing up slyly at the redhead.

“Seems like I had oughtta remember your name from somewheres. Seen your picture in the papers, maybe?”

Shayne said good-naturedly, “President Eisenhower and the mayor of New York. That’ll look good in your records. Which box is she in?”

“Number four, Mr. President,” said the little man gleefully. “I knew I’d seen that mug of yours somewheres.”

Shayne shrugged and he and Rourke went down a passageway to a heavy door opening onto a flight of stairs leading down into the concrete-lined coldroom. Neither of them spoke as they went down. The attendant had been using the same routine for ten years and seemed to think it was as funny now as when he first thought it up.

The air in the small square room was dank and very chill. Although it was pure and air-conditioned, it never seemed to lose the indefinable odor of the countless corpses that had come and gone during the years. There were two white enamel tables in the center of the room, a bank of white, oversize filing cabinets along one wall. Each cabinet had three drawers, six feet long and about three feet square, with consecutive numbers neatly stenciled on the front of each.

Shayne drew in a deep breath and seized the handle of the top drawer in the second row and pulled it out. A white cloth covered the naked body of the woman he had last seen in Rourke’s company at the tourist cabin when she hesitantly disavowed recognition of Jack Bristow.

The thin features were horribly contorted in death. Lips drawn far back in a grimace to show bloodless gums and sharp teeth, eyeballs bulging from their sockets, flesh showing the typical color that comes from death by strangulation.

Neither man wasted more than one glance at the face. In the bright overhead light, a welt on her stomach showed clearly. Both had seen the scars left by an operation for appendicitis, and to their nonprofessional eyes, this looked typical and had the appearance of being rather recent.

Shayne pulled the cloth over her body and shoved the drawer shut. “So that really doesn’t prove anything except that we can’t say she isn’t Mrs. Allerdice. Doc Martin will have made a preliminary investigation. We can ask him how long ago the operation was, but it’s my guess it was about the right time.”

“Mine, too,” agreed Rourke as they turned back to climb the stairs. “What’s our next move?”

This was decided for them before Shayne had an opportunity to reply. When they re-entered the anteroom, they saw Chief Will Gentry and Doc Martin, ranking police surgeon of Miami, standing in front of the desk in conversation with the bald man.

Gentry rocked back on his heels and regarded them balefully as they approached, demanding angrily of Shayne, “Where’s Lucy Hamilton, Mike? I want her down here.”

“Lucy Hamilton?” Shayne didn’t have to simulate the surprise in his voice. “In bed, I guess. What you want her for?”

“I think you know, Mike.” Gentry’s voice was uncompromising. “And she isn’t at home. At least, she doesn’t answer her phone.”

Shayne stiffened. He said, “I don’t know, Will. Tim and I left her there half an hour ago, and I told her to get some sleep.”

“Damn it, Mike! Don’t give me a runaround.” Gentry’s face was choleric, his voice heavy with suppressed anger. “If you’re hiding her out so she can’t come down here to tell us whether or not this woman is Arlene Bristow, I swear to God in heaven it’ll mean your license.”

“Arlene Bristow?” Again, Shayne’s astonishment was genuine. “What on earth gave you that idea? So far as I know, Miss Bristow is in New Orleans.”

“Then why were you and Tim looking at her?” demanded Gentry. “I’ve had enough lies out of you tonight, Mike. You’re going to start coming clean.”

“Hold it, Will.” Shayne’s voice was even, but it became hard to match the chief’s accusation. “I haven’t lied to you. Certainly not about Lucy. If she isn’t at home I’m more worried about her than you are.”

“You haven’t answered me,” Gentry pounded at him. “Why did you and Tim make a trip down here unless it was to see if she answered Lucy’s description of Jack Bristow’s sister?”

“Because we wondered if she might be someone else.” Shayne looked past Gentry to the police surgeon. “You notice that scar on her tummy, doc?”

“What? Oh, the appendectomy. What of it?”

“How recent would you say it was?”

Dr. Martin shrugged. “Within the last six months at least. I wasn’t aware it was relevant when I examined her.”

“Will you swear she isn’t Arlene Bristow?” demanded Gentry.

“Why no. I never saw Miss Bristow.”

“But Lucy could swear to it?”

“I presume so. I believe she knew the girl fairly well a few years back. See here, Will, what the devil are you getting at? What possible reason have you for thinking she might be Arlene?”

“From now on, you’re going to be answering questions instead of asking them,” was the police chief’s uncompromising reply. He turned back to the man behind the desk. “You were just about to tell us about some other parties who have been in tonight to see her.”

“You bet, chief. Like I said, I’ve had two customers before Shayne and Rourke.” He nervously shuffled some cards on the desk, read aloud: “‘Albert Jenkins. Eleven twenty-six Twelfth Street, Miami.’ And then there was a young lady. She came in just as I was bringing him back up. No luck for him. Or, maybe it was luck for him. He’d feared it was his daughter. Didn’t get the young lady’s name. Friend of Mr. Jenkins, I gathered, and come here for the same reason. She was standing here waiting to register, and soon’s he saw her he went to her fast and grabbed her arm and said something like: ‘No need for you to go through the ordeal of looking at her, my dear. Thank God, it isn’t Helen.’ Or something like that. Then he just hurried her out the door an’ that’s the last I saw of them.”

Shayne was breathing heavily when he finished. He leaned forward with his palms flat on the desk and said harshly, “Describe the young lady.”

“Well, I— She was right pretty, I noticed. Pert-lookin’. Maybe twenty-five. Brown hair, I guess. She wasn’t wearing any hat. Brown eyes, maybe. You know how it is.” He extended both his palms. “Just saw her that one little minute before she went out.”

“What was she wearing?” demanded Shayne hoarsely.

He held his breath while the attendant haltingly described the dark wool suit Shayne had last seen Lucy wearing, and a light wrap he immediately recognized as hers.

Will Gentry tried to break in impatiently by demanding to know why he cared to know what some woman had been wearing, but Shayne silenced him with a savage gesture.

“This Jenkins! What did he look like?”

“Nothing particular. Sort of heavy-built and fiftyish. Wearing a gray suit and gray hat pulled down so you couldn’t see his face so good. Almighty worried, he was, about seeing whether she was his girl or not.”

“Wait a minute, Will.” Shayne’s voice was like a whiplash as he prevented the chief from speaking again. “Tell me this one thing. Any report from Miami Beach tonight about a man that might have been picked up on the Causeway after the car went over the edge?”