Brett Halliday - Michael Shayne’s Triple Mystery

Michael Shayne’s rangy body was comfortably settled on his living-room couch on a brisk day in March, 1945. A glass of cognac and a tumbler of ice water were within easy reach on the end table. He was reading an early edition of the tabloid Morning Tribune which he had picked up on his way home. His telephone rang.

He scowled at the instrument, ran knobby fingers through his unruly red hair, and wriggled to the other end of the couch to answer it.

The voice of Lucy Hamilton, his secretary, came over the wire. “Michael! Come over to my apartment right away. And no wise-cracks. There’s a woman here who needs you desperately.”

“Fine time to be dragging a man out of bed,” he growled.

Lucy said, “I’ll expect you in fifteen minutes,” and hung up.

In twelve minutes Shayne strode into the small office of the apartment building on North Rampart Street bordering the French Quarter. A middle-aged woman sat near the switchboard, placidly knitting. She looked up at him incuriously as he went past her to the self-service elevator in the rear.

Lucy Hamilton was waiting for him outside her door on the third floor when he stepped from the elevator. She hurried to meet him and clutched his arm. “It’s Mrs. Groat from across the hall,” she said rapidly. “She’s terribly worried about her husband, Michael. You’ve got to help her.”

Shayne looked down at her flushed face and her dark, anxious eyes. She wore a chenille robe of blue, belted tightly about her slim waist. Her brown hair fell in soft curls around her shoulders.

He gave her a crooked grin. “So, my clients are coming to you, eh? Why didn’t you tell her to come to my office tomorrow?”

“And spend a terrifying night wondering what’s become of her husband? She’s in an awful state, Michael.” Lucy urged him toward her open door and into the small living room.

A plump, middle-aged woman sagged against a pillow on the couch. Her hair was grayish and she wore a gray dress of snug-fitting design. She gazed up at Shayne mutely with washed blue eyes. Tears streaked her rouged cheeks and her rouge-smeared lips trembled as she dragged her body to a straight position.

“This is Mr. Shayne, my boss, Mrs. Groat,” said Lucy. “I know he’ll help you.”

Shayne gravely pressed her limp hand and turned to look at a swarthy man who had risen from his chair when Shayne entered the room.

“This is Mr. Cunningham, Michael,” Lucy said. “He’s a shipmate of Mr. Groat’s, and he’s awfully worried, too.”

Cunningham was of medium height, stocky, and thirtyish. His face was deeply bronzed, his hair a short black stubble, and he wore bell-bottomed blue serge trousers with a wide, tight waistband. He held out a small, stubby hand covered with black hairs and took Shayne’s in an iron grip. “Pleased to meetcha, Mr. Shayne,” he said, and showed incredibly large white teeth in a thick-lipped smile.

Shayne nodded. As Cunningham took his hand away, Shayne saw a purple and yellow anchor tattooed on it.

“Suppose you tell me about everything,” he said to Lucy. “You know what’s important and what isn’t.” He motioned her to sit beside Mrs. Groat on the couch.

“Well, Mr. Groat went out at eight o’clock, telling his wife he’d be gone not more than an hour. He didn’t tell her where he was going. By eleven o’clock she was becoming worried, and then Mr. Cunningham called to ask for her husband. He had had an appointment to meet him at nine o’clock and had been waiting for two hours. She asked Mr. Cunningham to come up to the apartment, and after they talked it over, she came across the hall to ask my advice. You see, she knows I work for you, and — well, she thought I’d know what to do.”

Shayne turned to Cunningham. “You say you and Groat are shipmates?”

“In the Merchant Marine. If you noticed yesterday’s papers—”

“Don’t you remember that feature story on the front page, Michael?” Lucy interrupted eagerly. “About the two seamen who were rescued from a lifeboat after their ship had been torpedoed near the Panama Canal?”

“Leslie Cunningham,” Shayne muttered, “and Jasper Groat. You’re an able seaman and he—”

“Was the third engineer,” Cunningham supplied. “This was our first trip together and I didn’t know Jasper well until the ship was torpedoed, but I got to know him mighty well during the two weeks we were in a lifeboat together. You sure get to know a guy when a thing like that happens.”

Shayne said, “Two weeks in a lifeboat. You don’t look any the worse for it.”

“It wasn’t too bad. The boat was stocked with grub and water. The sun was the worst thing — and not knowing when—” He broke off with a shrug. “I reckon it was Jasper’s faith pulled us through.”

Mrs. Groat began to sob. “Jasper was always a pious man. But he was changed this time, Mr. Shayne. He was moody and worried. He wouldn’t talk to me about any of it. Something was bothering him. He kept saying that maybe we’d have a lot of money right soon, but he wouldn’t tell me how or why.”

“I reckon he meant his diary,” Cunningham said, looking down at his short, stubby feet. “Jasper kept a diary all the time we were afloat. Yesterday morning when the reporters were interviewing us, one of them asked him about publishing it. In a lot of newspapers, y’know. He told Jasper it might be valuable and said he’d see him about it later.”

“Wasn’t there another man in the lifeboat with you?” Lucy asked.

Cunningham lifted his head slowly to look at her. He wet his pudgy, cracked lips. “At first there was. A soldier off the troopship, name of Albert Hawley. He was hurt in the explosion and we pulled him out of the water. He lived four or five days. Jasper nursed him the best he could but it wasn’t any use. He died with Jasper holding him in his arms at night and we buried him at sea next morning.”

“Jasper talked about him a lot,” Mrs. Groat said. “He lived right here in New Orleans. His mother is that rich Mrs. Hawley. Jasper expected them to call him up after the newspaper story came out. He didn’t know whether he ought to call them or not. Seemed as though that was partly what troubled him.”

“You have no idea where he went tonight?” Shayne asked.

She shook her head despairingly. “But I know he made a telephone call when I was out this afternoon. He was just hanging up when I came back. He acted strange about it. He denied making any call and got mad when I insisted I’d heard him as I came in. I heard him say, ‘I’ll expect you first thing in the morning,’ and then he hung up.”

Shayne asked, “What about some friends he might have gone to see? He may have changed his mind after he went out.”

“No. He would’ve told me.” She wiped her eyes with a rouge-mottled handkerchief. “You see, we were going out to dinner to celebrate when he came back. We always do when he comes in from a voyage.” She began to sob, and moaned. “Oh, I know something awful has happened to him. I just know it.”

“She’s right,” Cunningham said soberly. “The dinner was going to be on me. We planned it all in the lifeboat. He called me up about eight o’clock to remind me of it. I know he wouldn’t run out on me.”

Shayne said, “There’s not much I can do tonight. Have you called the police?”

Faintly Mrs. Groat echoed, “The police?” Her eyes, dried of tears, stared tragically at Shayne.

“Of course,” he said. He went to the phone and dialed. After a brief conversation with the desk sergeant, he hung up and went toward the door, saying, “The police haven’t heard anything so far. They’ll call you if they do. I’ll have a look into things tomorrow.”