Brett Halliday - Michael Shayne’s Triple Mystery

“I didn’t turn you in to the cop, did I?” All expression had gone from her eyes. Only a dazed stare remained.

“No,” Shayne laughed sardonically. “Why not? I’ll tell you why.” He straightened up and leaned toward her, his mouth grim and his eyes cold. “Because you didn’t want me to talk. Because you thought a gun-crazy shamus could do it better and without so much publicity.”

She drained her glass and her head lolled back against the chair. “Red! Don’t say those things. Come over here and kiss me.”

“I’ll kiss you,” he said brutally. “But I’ll never know the truth.” He threw his cocktail glass across the room and stood up.

Belle staggered to her feet, leaving the pistol in the chair. She put both arms around his neck and pulled his face down to hers. When she stopped kissing him she giggled drunkenly. “Satisfied now?”

Shayne laughed shortly. “Satisfied?”

“That I’m not putting anything over on you.”

He said, “Hell, no.”

Fandella called from the doorway, “Dinner is ready, ma’am.”

Shayne scrubbed the lipstick from his mouth and steadied Belle with his arm around her as they went across the hall where the table was set for two.

The meal began with a slice of chilled honeydew melon, progressed through fried chicken, flaky boiled rice and cream gravy, hot biscuits, and broccoli. They talked little. Belle ate like a farm hand who had been plowing all day, heartily and with gusto that disdained all pretense.

Shayne liked that about her. She was an amazing woman in many ways. Less than an hour ago she had been told of her husband’s murder. She had reason to suspect the man across the table from her of the murder, or of having guilty knowledge of his death. She had not shed a tear. She seemed moody and preoccupied as she ate, but he thought that came from trying to fit him into the picture rather than from any grief over her husband’s death.

He remembered the man he had seen lying in the alley last night and tried to imagine what sort of life they had spent together. He wondered whether Walter Carson had loved her in the beginning. With her magnificent body and her complete disregard of convention, it was easy to conceive how a country banker had been tricked into marrying her.

Shayne brooded over the fact that he had learned so little about the man she called Whitey. Thus far, he knew only that Whitey had something on Walter Carson and that Carson had chosen to go to a private detective rather than the police. Yet she had made it very clear that Whitey himself was in some sort of danger from the law.

It was evident, too, that both men had some hold on the other, and Whitey was using Carson’s position of respectability to blackmail him. Carson had planned to go to a private detective who was reputed to have a ruthless gun for hire in lieu of turning Whitey over to the police and running the risk of having him talk. Belle had clearly implied that Carson had hoped to lure Whitey to Cheepwee where Michael Shayne could blast him down.

This made it plain that Whitey was outside the law and the killing could be made to look legal. Otherwise, Carson would have sought a regular killer for the job. Shayne was aware of his own reputation in this regard. Newspaper stories were always hinting that he enjoyed killing if it had the cover of legality.

He had never bothered to stop such rumors. He found them good for business. The newspaper clipping in Carson’s pocket when he died gave him reason to believe Michael Shayne would do the job for him.

Shayne ate slowly, relishing every morsel. Belle’s silence offered him an opportunity to mull over the meager facts he had learned so far. He was wondering whether Carson had actually gone to Whitey and threatened him with Michael Shayne, as Belle suspected, when the maid brought the dessert in.

The dessert proved to be fresh peach ice cream piled with whipped cream. To Shayne it was a rare treat. When he had finished he leaned back in his chair and grinned at Belle.

“I’m beginning to understand why you’ve stayed here-married to Carson.”

Belle said, “It hasn’t been so bad here except I thought I’d go crazy sometimes.”

“Didn’t you ever get away on a binge?”

“Not without Walter. He kept promising to sell out the bank and we’d travel, but he never did.” She sighed and got up abruptly. “Do you want a drink now?”

“I could stand a drink of brandy.”

“I’ll have Fandella bring some brandy into the living-room. I’m going upstairs a minute. I won’t be long.”

Shayne said, “Sure,” and went with her into the hall. She squeezed his hand tight before turning to the stairs.

He went on into the living-room. The pistol still lay on her chair. He picked it up. It was a .38. Carson had been shot with a .32. The .38 was loaded all around. He put it in his pocket.

Fandella came in with a tray containing a cut-glass decanter of brandy and a tall, flare-top glass beside the decanter. She set it on the table and went away.

He poured a couple of fingers of brandy into the glass, passed it under his nose. His nostrils widened and he made a grimace of distaste. He had been afraid of that. When you said brandy to a Southerner, they gave you a sweetened fruit concoction. This was peach brandy, a liqueur with sweet fruit juice added after distillation.

He closed his eyes and tossed it down without taking a breath, set the glass down on the table, and went over to the writing-desk from which Belle had taken the gun.

Swiftly he went through the pigeonholes containing household bills and personal letters addressed to Walter Carson. In a drawer he found a big, flat checkbook. The first stub was dated back more than four years ago, showing an initial deposit in Carson’s personal account of $1,000.

Leafing through the stubs casually, he found a meticulous notation naming the purpose for which each check was drawn. It was this precise attention to detail on Mr. Carson’s part that drew Shayne’s attention to a stub dated almost four months previously. It was for the sum of $500, and the check had been drawn to Sidney G. Jones.

Shayne’s gray eyes narrowed. Things were beginning to add up a little. He turned the stubs swiftly and came upon three other checks for the same amount issued to the same Sidney G. Jones at thirty-day intervals. The final stub in the book noted the check for $200 that Carson had mailed to Michael Shayne. On a designated line was the word retainer.

He hurriedly rummaged through the rest of the drawer, but found nothing of importance. He put the checkbook in the drawer, closed it, then dropped into a chair with a deep sigh of relief.

Why had Walter Carson suddenly begun paying Sidney Jones $500 a month shortly after Jones had been sent by Mrs. Barstow to Atlanta to dig into Belle’s past? It looked as though Jones had dug up something. Something so hot he figured Carson would pay more money to keep it quiet than Mrs. Barstow could afford to pay to have it revealed.

He sat for several minutes driving his thoughts into the possibilities of the case. Belle was taking a long time upstairs. He was torn between a desire to get back to New Orleans for an interview with Jones and the promise of heavy drinking with the voluptuous widow.

He got up and took another drink of the sweet brandy, cocking his head to listen intently. He could hear no sound in the house. Belle had seemed anxious to get back when she left him after dinner. He knew, with sudden certainty, that she was dangerous, and he felt trapped.

Setting the bottle down on the table, he went quietly out of the room. There was no one in the hallway. He went on tiptoe to the front door and eased out. Traces of daylight still lingered in the darkening sky. He stepped from the porch to the driveway and followed it to a triple garage in the rear.