Pay-Off in Blood (15 page)

Shayne said, “Maybe I can rectify that.”

“Wait a minute, now. The management frowns on what you and I might consider good, old-fashioned fun. But rest your feet, Mike,” he urged hospitably.
“Drink?”
He leaned forward to pull open a drawer, but Shayne forestalled him.

“Not right now, Parson. You’ve got a guest in Suite Three-twenty. Jess Hayden. Ring a bell?”

“Not… right off the bat.” Smith turned to his left where there was a large panel covered with an intricate arrangement of numbered dials and different colored arrows that looked to Shayne like the control board of a machine shop.

He twisted one arrow to point to a 3, used his forefinger to dial another number below the arrow, and relaxed proudly. There was a whirring noise from the back of the panel, and a moment later a white card popped up out of a slot in the desk in front of him. He picked it up delicately between thumb and forefinger, explaining with a grin, “Just a simple little system of electronics, Mike. Only cost a couple of hundred thousand to install and doesn’t get fouled up more than a dozen times a day. Let’s see what we have here.” He frowned and read from the card: “Three-twenty. Richard
Dirkson
. Three-Seven-One East Fifty-fourth Street, New York City. No luggage. Overnight bill paid in cash advance.”

Shayne said, “That’s my man. I’m going up there, Par-son.

“Expecting trouble?”

Shayne said, “There’ll be trouble if Mr.
Dirkson
is at home.”

“I’ll go along,” Smith said promptly.

“No.” Michael Shayne shook his red head and his eyes were hot. “What facilities have you got for a quiet arrest and out the back way to the hoosegow?”

“I’ve got six good men on duty, Mike. It’s my job to keep a thing like this quiet.”

Shayne said, “I know what your job is. Come along up behind me with a couple of men. But stay outside Three-twenty until I’ve had my time at bat.” His blunt forefingers strayed up to touch the lumps on his head that were now subsiding. “This is sort of personal.”

The Parson said, “I’ll give you two minutes.”

Shayne said happily, “Make it three.” He got up and strode out of the office without a backward glance.

An elevator was loading as he crossed the lobby. He got in and stood close to the door and said, “Three.”

His floor was the first stop and he got out alone. He glanced at arrows on the wall with numbers underneath them, and went swiftly to the right in search of 320. He knew Smith wouldn’t give him much more than his allotted three minutes.

He pressed the bell at 320 and stood flat-footed in front of the door waiting.

It opened and Jud stood there. He had a highball glass in his left hand, and his mouth sagged open slackly when he recognized the detective. Shayne saw Phil rising from a chair behind him with a sudden pleased look on his face.

Jud stepped back a pace and said, “Look who’s here!” He glanced over his shoulder at Phil who was coming forward, cat-footed. “Who
d’yuh
think
we got for company, Phil?”

Phil’s hand snaked his big revolver from a shoulder holster and he held it laxly at his side, pointing downward. He said, “I see him, Jud. I guess he likes the kind of games we play.”

“Sure,” Jud agreed happily. “I bet he’s one of them
mas-so-kists
.”

“What do you want here?” Phil paused close beside Jud, their shoulders touching, the two of them directly facing Shayne on the other side of the threshold about two feet away.

He took one fast step forward and his two big hands swung up simultaneously on opposite sides of the two heads with palms wide open.

Their two heads made a sharp cracking sound as they came together with terrific force. They crumpled to the floor like two rag dolls, and Phil’s gun dropped from his hand.

Shayne pulled the door shut and scooped the gun up. He stooped over Jud and got his revolver from its shoulder harness. He heard a faint sound across the room as he straightened up, and he faced the Boss, standing in the doorway of an inner room.

His thinning hair was disarranged so that the bald spot showed through, and he was in his undershirt and wearing black felt slippers.

He spoke gratingly, “What do you want, Shayne?”

Shayne said, “You.” He started slowly across the sitting room toward him.

“You’ve got nothing on me,” Jess Hayden said
placatingly
. “Maybe that was a mistake last night. Mistakes can be paid for.”

Shayne said, “That’s right. And you’re going to pay for yours right now.”

Hayden backed away from him inside the bedroom, and Shayne stopped in the doorway and saw the room was empty. He moved inside and tossed both revolvers contemptuously on the bed, and laughed deep in his throat when Hayden dived desperately aside, scrabbling to get his hands on one of them.

He cuffed the man back, so he stumbled to the floor beside the wall, then got him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him back into the sitting room, where Jud was beginning to stir and trying to sit up.

Very deliberately, Shayne held Jess Hayden erect with the tips of the toes just touching the floor, his left hand tight around the neck, and smashed his fist into the man’s face.

Blood splattered wetly and his features got all flat and disorganized. Shayne tossed him aside and strode toward the door, where Jud had waveringly got up on his hands and knees.

There was a loud, authoritative knock on the door just at the moment that Shayne drew back his right foot and kicked Jud with all his strength in the side. He scowled at the door and said “Just a minute,” and turned to Phil, who still lay supine, and methodically kicked in half-a-dozen of his ribs, also.

He heard a key in the outer lock, and the door was suddenly thrust open and Parson Smith stood on the threshold with two men close behind him. He looked at the two men on the floor, appalled, and breathed out, “My God, Mike!”

Shayne said, “I’m just giving you a nice package… all wrapped up and ready to go.” He walked back
springily
to the Boss, who lay flat on his back with his face smashed in, deliberately placed the sole of his big foot on the bloody pulp and twisted hard.

Then he told Smith, “Get them down to Headquarters and I’ll sign a complaint. And you can send me a bill for cleaning the blood off your rug.”

His shoulders slumped suddenly as all the anger went out of him, and he felt tired and a little bit disgusted with himself.

He walked to the door, adding gruffly, “They had it coming, goddamn it, but right now I wish you’d opened that door thirty seconds sooner.” He went out, scowling.

Shayne stopped downstairs in the crowded lobby to call his office. Lucy Hamilton told him, “Two calls, Michael. Abe Lincoln, the probation officer. At first look, he’s pretty sure Fritz Harlan is in the clear. He’s checking further. One thing he thought might interest you: Harlan was once a patient of Dr. Ambrose’s… and recognized him at the
Seacliff
last night. He’ll call again as soon as he has something more definite.

“Your buxom nurse on the Beach is the other one,” Lucy went on chattily and almost cattily, although Lucy didn’t have it in her to really be catty. “She wants you to come see her at once. She refused to confide in a mere
secretary
why she wants to see you, but dropped some mysterious hints intended to make me believe it’s something more important than your virile sex appeal… which I somehow doubt.”

Shayne said, “I’ll get over there as fast as I can… in the hope your hunch is right. In the meantime, Angel: Call Will Gentry and alert him to the fact that the house dick from the
Splendide
Hotel is bringing three mugs in for booking. Tell him to hold them until I can get in to make charges… which are going to start with assault with intent to kill, and go on from there. Explain to him that they got roughed up a little by resisting arrest.”

“Michael! Are you all right?” There was instant alarm in Lucy’s voice.

“I’m wonderful.” Shayne grinned reassuringly at the mouthpiece. “Feel better than I have since I got my ribs kicked in last midnight. Take care.”

He hung up and walked out of the lobby briskly. He did feel wonderful, by God! The mood of depression, that had momentarily possessed him in the hotel room upstairs, had vanished. The three of them deserved everything they’d got. God knows how many poor suckers they had manhandled in the past while collecting legally uncollectable racing bets.

Twenty minutes later he walked
springily
up the walk to the Ambrose house and pressed the doorbell. The door was opened almost immediately by Belle Jackson, wearing her white nurse’s uniform and with a warning finger pressed against her lips. “I hoped it would be you,” she told him in a conspiratorially low tone. “Celia is resting in the bedroom. I don’t
think
she’s in any condition to be aroused, but you never can tell about… well, you know?”

“Drunk?” Shayne asked bluntly, stepping inside and keeping his voice low.

“Well,” said Belle delicately, “she’s been
nipping
anyhow. And now I hope she’s asleep.” Belle moved close to him, so she could keep her voice low. “I called your secretary, Mr. Shayne, because I made what I think is an important discovery and I wanted to tell you instead of that stupid policeman, who came to the office last night.”

Shayne grinned at her characterization of Peter Painter. “What is it, Belle?”

“I want to show you in a minute. It’s in the bedroom and that’s why I hope Celia stays asleep. But tell me this one thing first:
was
it Doctor’s own gun that was used to murder him? This morning you said you hadn’t got the official report yet.”

“Yes. It was his gun all right. And a careful chemical analysis of the glove compartment of his car gave no indication at all that it had been carried there recently.”

“I wondered about that,” she said sibilantly. “Whether they would be able to tell for sure where a gun had been. How do they know?”

Shayne shrugged. “I don’t know anything about that end of the business. Ultra-violet rays, I guess. Stuff like that. Why are you so interested in the gun, Belle?”

“You’ll see.” She linked her big, solid arm closely with his and led him across the carpeted floor, moving with that same soundless grace he had observed in her before.

He followed her example by keeping on the balls of his feet, and she guided him to the right, down a hallway off the living room and into a large bedroom that was cool and dim with heavy draperies carefully drawn at the windows. There were twin beds in the room, and one of them was occupied by Celia Ambrose.

The bed was made up, and she lay on her back on top of the silk spread, fully clothed, as Shayne had seen her earlier.

Her eyes were closed and her mouth was open, and small, wheezing sounds came out of it with her breathing. There was a faint smell of alcohol in the room, and an overturned highball glass lay on the rug beside the bed just underneath the trailing fingers of her left hand.

An open door on the left led into a large bathroom, and beyond that was another closed door.

Shayne let Belle lead him quietly across the room to the closed door, which she opened. This was a smaller bedroom with a three-quarter sized bed, and with masculine appointments. The draperies were tightly drawn here, too, and Belle drew the connecting door shut behind them before switching on an overhead light.

Then she crossed to a chest of drawers and leaned down to open the bottom one. She straightened up and stepped aside and said triumphantly, “There it is. I don’t think we should touch it until they can come and make their chemical tests or whatever.”

Shayne squatted down in front of the open drawer. It contained several pairs of folded pajamas on the right side. On the left side there was a neatly folded hand towel in a rectangle about six inches by twelve. A fully loaded clip from a .32 automatic pistol lay at one end of the folded towel. In the center of the rectangle was a faint yellowish stain. Shayne leaned close to it and sniffed the unmistakable smell of gun-oil.

He rocked back on his heels and looked up at Belle, who stood with both hands on her hips.

“Did I guess right?” she asked in a low, urgent voice. “I don’t know anything about pistols, but isn’t that thing part of one?”

Shayne nodded and got to his feet, his eyes bleak. “It’s a spare clip that generally comes with an automatic. How did you come to find it?”

“I looked for it. I just opened the drawers, and there it was. Remember, I told you this morning that I
knew
Doctor didn’t keep any pistol in the office… and I didn’t think he had one in his car. So, when you said you thought he was shot with his own gun… well, I wondered… how anybody could have got hold of it. So I looked here in his room, after Celia lay down to rest.”

Shayne tugged at his ear-lobe thoughtfully, looking down at the open drawer. “I don’t know whether the scientific boys can tell how long ago a gun was there. I don’t suppose there’ll be an actual
proof
that it was in that drawer as late as last night.”

Belle Jackson drew in a deep breath and let it out in a sibilant sigh. “If they could prove that…?”

Shayne said gently, “It still wouldn’t be proof that Celia used the gun last night. If she was passed out when it happened… as she is now… anyone could have come in here without her knowing it and got the gun.”

“How do you know she was passed out when it happened?” demanded Belle. “I know that’s what the detective told me last night, and he seemed to think it gave poor, dear Celia a perfect alibi. I don’t think that holds true at all. Maybe she did have most of a bottle of vodka in her when the police doctor finally got here. What was to prevent her drinking it and passing out after she shot Doctor?”

Shayne said, “Nothing… really. What motive did she have, Belle?”

“I don’t know. I’m not accusing her, for heaven’s sake,” said Belle virtuously. “I’m just guessing how it could have happened.”

Shayne said abruptly, “Let’s go back into the living room and talk about it. I don’t believe you’re telling the whole truth, Belle. I think you knew a lot more about the doctor and his business and private affairs than you’re admitting. Without some motive for the murder, this evidence is useless.”