The Homicidal Virgin (6 page)

Right at the moment Shayne didn’t know which woman he had the more faith in. Connected as they both were with utter improbabilities, it was almost impossible to believe that both of them had been speaking the whole truth and nothing but the truth all the way through.

When Shayne entered his office the next morning, the anteroom was empty and Lucy Hamilton was not at her desk beyond the railing. But the door to the redhead’s inner office stood open, and through it he heard the lilting sound of Lucy’s laughter.

He tossed his hat on a hook near the door and crossed toward the sound, halting on the threshold and lifting red eyebrows at the couple in his office.

Neither of them noticed him for a long moment. Lucy was perched on one corner of the big desk in the center of the room, with one knee drawn up, leaning forward and hugging it with both forearms. She looked awfully young and vibrantly interested, Shayne thought, as she laughed delightedly again and said, “I don’t believe a single word of it.”

“I swear it’s just the way it happened.” The man who was slouched back comfortably in one of the client’s chairs beside the desk had a pleasantly deep-timbered voice with more than a trace of a southern drawl in it. He was smooth-faced, with strong features, and had a well-padded figure that was artfully concealed by an extremely well-tailored suit of light gray. He looked very much at home in the detective’s office as he smiled up at Lucy, gesturing with a straight-stemmed pipe that gave off an aromatic fragrance.

“I’ll tell you another thing, too, Miss Lucy.” He leaned closer, and as he did so he caught a glimpse out of the corner of his eye of Shayne standing in the doorway. He straightened back slowly in the chair, turning full toward the detective, and Lucy turned her own head, following his gaze.

Unaccountably, she blushed. She dropped her knee and slid off the corner of the desk and said in some confusion, “Here’s Mr. Shayne now. I didn’t hear you come in, Michael.”

He said, “In the future I’ll knock before entering.”

“Don’t be silly.” Lucy smoothed down her dress self-consciously. “This is Mr. Waring of Southern Mutual. Remember, I told you last night… ?”

Shayne said, “I remember.” He moved forward and the insurance executive stood up and held out a well-fleshed hand that gripped Shayne’s firmly. “Glad to meet you, Shayne. Though I must say your charming secretary makes waiting a pleasure.”

Shayne said, “I’m glad to hear that,” though he didn’t sound glad at all and was faintly irritated because he realized he didn’t.

Lucy hesitated demurely as he moved around to the swivel chair behind his desk, and said, “When you talk to Mr. Waring, Michael, remember what I told you the other day. If you don’t get something for me to do around here…”

She let her voice trail off warningly, and then turned and marched out of the office with her head held high. Waring turned in his chair and his admiring gaze followed her supple, slender figure out.

“A real jewel you’ve got there, Shayne. If she ever does decide to look for another job, I’ve told her where to come.”

Shayne said, “That’s real big of you,” and knew that he sounded stiff and sarcastic.

But Waring settled back and threw him a cheery smile and said briskly, “All a lot of nonsense of course. The way she went on about you last night I’m sure she’s absolutely devoted to her work.”

Shayne got out a cigarette. He asked, “Did you come here to discuss my secretary or a business proposition?” He struck a match and drew in a deep breath of smoke, exhaled it slowly and avoided looking at the other man.

Waring picked up his mood instantly and said, “My company would like to have you represent us throughout the south, Mr. Shayne. In a consultant capacity on a retainer basis. Miss Hamilton gave me to understand last night that you have sufficient free time that it shouldn’t interfere with your private practice.”

Shayne drummed blunt fingertips on his desk and made no further effort to conceal his irritation. “Since you and Miss Hamilton are agreed that it’s a good idea, I suggest you settle the details directly with her.”

He settled back in his chair and glared down at the burning cigarette between the first two fingers of his right hand.

There followed a dozen seconds of awkward silence, and then Waring said genially, “That’s fine. Just fine. My company will be proud to have you associated with us, Mr. Shayne.”

Shayne kept his brooding gaze lowered and didn’t say anything. He knew he was acting like an adolescent, and somehow was obscurely pleased by the knowledge. He was aware that Waring was getting up, and he forced himself to rise also and offer his hand a second time.

Waring hesitated and then nodded briefly, turned and walked purposefully out without speaking further. Shayne stood very still behind his desk and watched the door close firmly behind him. Then he sat down and angrily mashed out the cigarette butt in a clean ash tray. His anger evaporated as swiftly as it had come, and he grinned ruefully across the room. Why shouldn’t Lucy use her wiles to drum up business for him? He had no doubt that she would extract a higher retainer from the insurance company than he would have asked. What he should do, he told himself, was to give Lucy a percentage of the take. Hell! if she was going to prostitute herself to entice clients into his office, she deserved a fair cut. Like any streetwalker bringing her earnings back to her pimp.

He shook his red head suddenly and hated himself for his thoughts. Just because the girl had accepted a perfectly innocuous dinner invitation last night and had proved an enjoyable companion was no reason for him to get into a tizzy about it.

He knew, of course, that his anger wasn’t really directed at Lucy. He was striking out at her because he hated himself this morning. Lucy was just a symbol. It was Jane Smith who was really in his thoughts. Lucy could take care of herself. Jane Smith couldn’t. If ever a man had been offered an opportunity to help a fellow human being, he had been given that chance last night. And he had muffed it completely. How goddamned self-righteous he must have sounded to the frightened girl when he spouted off to her. How utterly alone she must have felt when he walked out of the room leaving her with her problem!

A frightened kid who wasn’t yet twenty and had never faced the realities of life before. She had bared her heart and her soul to him, and what had he given her in return? A lecture, by God!

He shoved back his chair and stood up, strode to the window overlooking Flagler Street. He’d been a fool to hope she would take the fatuous advice of Mike Wayne and turn to a private detective for help. Instead, he had done exactly what Timothy Rourke accused him of doing. He had driven her on in the quest for some other killer to do the job he had refused to do.

What would be his position, he asked himself now angrily, if Saul Henderson did turn up murdered in the near future? He, Mike Shayne, would be the only one to know the truth. Would he remain silent, or would he speak out against Henderson’s already pitiably ruined stepdaughter?

He could warn Henderson in advance of course. But every decent instinct inside him rose up and shouted that he couldn’t do that. God knew the man deserved no warning, no mercy.

If he could only get hold of the girl—talk to her again before it was too late. Before she put murderous forces in motion that could not be halted. But he didn’t even know Jane Smith’s real name. True, he could find out easily enough. The stepdaughter of a prominent man like Saul Henderson shouldn’t be difficult to trace.

Shayne turned decisively away from the window, strode to the door and pulled it open. David Waring had pulled a straight chair across the anteroom and was seated in it close to the low railing and was in an animated huddle with Lucy Hamilton, who sat at her desk with paper in her typewriter taking direct dictation from him with her fingers flying over the keys. Both his voice and her typing stopped abruptly when Shayne opened the door. Her brown eyes looking past Waring implored him to be sensible as she said, “We’re working out the rough draft of an agreement, Michael. Have you time to check a couple of points?”

Shayne went on toward the outer door, reaching for his hat. “I told Waring you had full authority to set it up any way you want. I’ll sign whatever you have typed when I get back.” He went out and pulled the door shut with unnecessary violence behind him.

Downstairs, he went to the
Herald
morgue for the information he wanted, instead of the
News.
He might run into Rourke at the latter newspaper office, and he wasn’t ready to explain to Tim the reason for his sudden interest in Henderson. Knowing Shayne as well as he did, the reporter had a disconcerting habit of reading the redhead’s mind before Shayne himself knew what was in it. Like last night. His casual, parting reference to Henderson’s stepdaughter as “utterly charming” and a “nice” girl—quoting Shayne’s own descriptive words for Jane Smith right back at him—were indication enough that the reporter suspected the truth.

In the back files of the
Herald,
Shayne found everything he needed. The folder on Saul Henderson was thin, but it went back three years when Mr. and Mrs. Saul Henderson of New York purchased a $60,000 home on Miami Beach and announced their intention of settling in as year-round residents. There wasn’t much background on the couple, just that Mr. Henderson was “well-known in New York financial circles” and Mrs. Henderson was identified as the former socialite wife of Ralph Graham. A daughter of her first marriage was mentioned.
Muriel Graham, who will attend the exclusive finishing school on Miami Beach conducted by Miss Overholzer.

Next, a few months later, was the announcement that Saul Henderson had purchased a partnership in the local brokerage firm of Wallach & Dutton, and a few brief items following which indicated that Mr. Henderson was establishing himself solidly as a progressive and civic-minded citizen of Miami Beach, first as a member of various committees and local charity drives, and then as chairman of other, more important committees.

There was quite a long obituary for Mrs. Henderson when she died in her home several months before. She was described as an invalid and as having succumbed to a lingering illness, though cancer was not specifically mentioned. Her daughter by a former marriage, Muriel Graham, was listed as the only survivor along with her husband.

That was the last item in the newspaper file on the Hendersons before the final news story dated some weeks previously. This was a front-page feature story covering a banquet at one of the most exclusive and expensive hotels on the Beach which had been televised on a national network because one of the country’s top television personalities had been honored as the “Beach Booster of the Year” and presented with a key to the city by Mr. Saul Henderson,
President of the Miami Beach 100-Club and prominently mentioned in local political circles as the Reform Candidate for mayor of Miami Beach in the forthcoming election.

There was a picture of Saul Henderson beamingly presenting the key to the television comedian while three cameras recorded the event for the edification of viewers throughout the country, and Shayne studied the photograph carefully and with increasing aversion as he recalled the story the man’s stepdaughter had told him the preceding evening.

Without that knowledge of the man’s true character, Shayne was honest enough to admit to himself that in the picture Henderson looked very much like a right guy. In his mid-forties, with lean features that appeared almost ascetic, yet with a certain air of boyish bravado, Shayne could see how the man might easily capture the imagination of enough voters to become the next mayor of the beach city.

Yet, with what he knew about the man, Shayne was able to see that the piercing black eyes were a little too close together so that there was something predatory about them, the lips were too thin and too tightly compressed, the chin was pointed rather than prominent, the little tight curls of hair on each side of his high forehead resembled horns rather than carrying out the slightly boyish effect they gave at first glance.

After passing on from the photograph, Shayne glanced through the story which contained nothing new about Henderson, and then closed the file and returned it to the
Herald
librarian.

Lucy Hamilton was alone in the office when he returned. She stood up determinedly from her typewriter when he breezed in, and said, “Michael. I want to talk to you.”

He said, “Sure, angel. Any time. But first, look up the phone number for Saul Henderson on the Beach. Call it and try to find out how to contact a stepdaughter named Muriel Graham. She’s nineteen years old,” he went on, “and been living on the beach about three years going to Miss Overholzer’s School. Her mother died of cancer a few months ago. Take it from there and think of some good reason for getting her present address if you can’t reach her at home.”

Lucy bit her underlip hard, and then released it. In a taut voice, she asked, “You mean I’m not to mention your name?”

“That’s right, angel.” Shayne seemed completely unaware of the tension gripping his secretary. “Be an old school-friend or something. Maybe you knew Muriel in New York before her mother married Henderson and they moved down here. Use your imagination.”

He stalked into his own office, blandly disregarding the fact that Lucy was blinking violently to hold back angry tears, and there he crossed directly to a filing cabinet behind his desk and took a bottle of cognac from the second drawer. He uncorked it and turned to the water cooler where he nested two paper cups together and filled the inner one nearly to the brim with cognac. With a companion cup of water for a chaser, he settled himself at his desk and took an appreciative sip of liquor just as Lucy came in.

She said with heightened color and dangerous calm, “Maybe I don’t possess enough imagination to do this job right. After that outrageous scene of yours earlier, I guess maybe you’ve got a monopoly on the imagination around here.”

Shayne grinned irritatingly and raised ragged red eyebrows. “Is that a prelude to admitting you failed to get Miss Graham’s address?”

“I talked to a housekeeper,” said Lucy flatly. “She says that Muriel is visiting friends in New York. She doesn’t know how she can be reached there… or simply isn’t telling. But now I’m telling you something, Mr. Michael Shayne,” she went on fiercely. “If you ever… if you
ever…
act the way you did this morning again, I’m through. Do you hear me? That’s spelled t-h-r-o-u-g-h period. Get yourself another secretary. In fact, get another one right now so far as I’m concerned.”