Бретт Холлидей - Murder in Haste

“Mike! I didn’t want to leave the house before you called, but Father gets nervous if I’m not on time.”

“How is he?”

“Just the same. But one of these days I know he’s going to say hello when I walk in. He keeps trying.”

“Is there a place there where we can talk?” Shayne said. “I want to go over a few things.”

“I’m sure we can find a place, Mike. If there’s anybody in the waiting room we can go outside.”

Shayne told her to expect him in half an hour. He spilled a handful of dimes on the shelf, opened a little black book and began to dial. The day bartender of a Miami Beach bar answered. Shayne gave his name and asked several questions. He hung up and tried another number. In the next ten minutes, he used up his dimes and went back into the drugstore to change another dollar.

In Shayne’s early years as a detective, when he could work on several cases at once, getting up early, driving hard all day, never going to bed till the bars were closed, he had picked up a wide acquaintance in that twilight world where people live by their brains and their connections, working desperately hard at not working in the ordinary daytime sense. Gamblers, promoters, finders, ten-percenters, they looked on a nine-to-five job with as much distaste as a stretch in jail. The two things they had in common was that they needed money and they kept up with the news that doesn’t get in the newspapers. They spent most of their waking hours in public places, their ears open.

Many were still friends of Shayne, though he no longer saw much of them since he started spending evenings with Lucy Hamilton, and many owed him small favors. He had no power or control over them, as cops usually have over their stool pigeons, and there were only two reasons why they gave him information — they liked him, and if it was useful to him he paid well for it.

His fifteenth or sixteenth call was to a man named Kinky Kincaid, a stag-party talent agent. The ringing of the phone interrupted Kinky’s afternoon nap in a three-dollar-a-day hotel. He had trouble understanding who was on the line.

“Spain?” he said blurrily. “Shayne . Mike, how are you, boy? If this is a business call, I hope I can help you because I’d like to get my wrist-watch out of hock. What time is it, anyway?”

Shayne told him. He said more alertly, “You want to know about Painter?”

“Damn right,” Shayne said, surprised. “Do you have anything?”

“I’m so broke these days I can’t even buy my own paper, but I read about it over somebody’s shoulder and I said to myself, ‘Uh-oh.’”

“Why did you say that, Kinky?” Shayne said patiently.

“Wait till I get a cigarette. I’m hung-over from here all the way to Key West. Where are you, Mike? Maybe you could give me a piggy-back ride to the neighborhood saloon and buy me some medicine.”

“Sorry, Kinky. I’ve got a date at the other end of town. I have to do this by phone. Get your cigarette.”

A moment later Kincaid’s voice continued, “That’s better. It’s still not good. You’re really interested in what happened to the bum? I didn’t think you cared.”

“I’m on a case,” Shayne said briefly. “It seems they’re connected.”

“He never gave me no personal trouble, but when a cop gets in a jam it gives me a warm feeling inside, like I just had my first shot of the day, you know how it is, Mike?”

“I know just exactly how it is. Where is he, Kinky?”

“Did I say I know where he is? I’m not that kind of source, Mike, and you know it better than I do. I give you these little items, and you put them together with the other little items you get from other people, and you end up with a big fee and your name in the papers, and more power to you. Only this time maybe my item’s not so little. I was debating about taking it to the cops, and then I thought what did they ever do for me?”

“Kinky,” Shayne said. “Just give me the news.”

“Okay, sure. I was on the Beach last night. I don’t know when, in the neighborhood of nine but I can’t be sure because I had to raise some quick dough and I’m without a timepiece at the moment. I was trying to promote a party later on in the week with some Midwest guys I happen to know. And here’s where the thing comes in. I know these guys, whenever they’re in town they look me up, and it seems funny they didn’t get in touch with me before. Too busy, maybe? They’re at the St. A. this time, and I see them in the lobby.”

“The St. Albans?” Shayne said quickly.

“Nothing but the best. Big Jack Klipstone and Mac something, I don’t know his last name, and they’re with two others. But they’ve got no time for their old contact Kincaid. Strictly. Every other time they’ve been in town, they always had plenty of time for me and the broads. They tell me ‘Later, later,’ and they walk past like big business men on the way to a board meeting.”

“Yeah?” Shayne said when he paused.

“Just taking a drag. What would you do in my shoes, Mike? I always like to know about these things because you never know when they might come in handy. I fake a quarterback sneak for the elevators, but I drift out the side door instead and I get around front in a hurry. I see my party of four get in a new Drive-Urself Chevy and head north. I get in my own Chevy, twelve years old, and I head north. After a while they park out in motel country. I park. And I’m very, very careful, Mike, I don’t have to tell you , because these guys I don’t want to know I’m up to any monkey business. The minutes go slow because I’m so nervous. My stomach starts to ache.

“I’m beginning to think this wasn’t a hell of a good idea and I ought to stick to my own racket when one of those big police department Caddies comes up Collins like a bat out of hell, the siren on full blast, nearly busted my ear drums. When I say it was going fast, Mike, I mean fast. I didn’t get much of a look at who was driving. He didn’t have no hat on, and he was kind of low in the seat, but it wouldn’t surprise me one damn bit if it was your friend and mine, Peter Painter.”

Shayne absently put a cigarette in his mouth. “What about the Chevy?”

“They took off after him, Mike, the four of them. They were running some chances, too, getting off from a standing start that way. They really goosed that buggy. They were over the double line half the time, and where they went from there I don’t know. This was too rich for my blood. My Chevy was outclassed, even if I wanted to get into competition, which I didn’t. So I came home. Is this worth anything?”

“Seventy-five bucks,” Shayne said promptly.

“Hey!” Kincaid said. “Where are you, Mike? I’ll come over on my hands and knees and pick it up in my teeth.”

“Stay where you are, I’ll send it over. That name was Jack Klipsjone? And Mac something? What are they doing at the St. Albans? Are they delegates to the Truckers convention?”

“Not exactly delegates, Mike. They’re part of Harry Plato’s circus.”

“Are you sure of that, Kinky?” Shayne said sharply. “They work directly for Plato?”

“You won’t quote me, I hope, I hope,” Kincaid said, suddenly cautious. “The other two I never saw before, but the word is that there’s a lot of beef in town because there’s some kind of hassle in the union, and that’s what they looked like. Hard boys.”

“You said from the Midwest. Where in the Midwest?”

“St. Louis, maybe? I never ask that type too many questions because they might think I’m trying to get personal.”

“This helps, Kinky. I’ve got a few questions about something else, and maybe you can pick up some more change. Put your mind back to the big bank job three years ago, the one they’re executing Sam Harris for. I wish I knew what happened to the take. That was a big score, according to all the publicity, but not much of it was found. Did any gossip about that come your way?”