Blood on Biscayne Bay

Chapter Five: ALIBI OR RUSE

Mrs. Morgan followed Shayne and Hudson at once, took in the situation at a glance and went directly to a lavatory opening off the library for a wet cloth and smelling salts.

Mr. Hudson lifted his wife in his arms and carried her to a couch. Kneeling beside her, he stroked her hair and called to Mrs. Morgan to hurry. She was back in a few seconds and they administered cold cloths to the unconscious girl’s face and held the salts to her nostrils.

Shayne picked up the receiver dangling from the cord. He called, “Hello-hello,” into the mouthpiece, but the connection had been broken from the other end. He swore softly, and was replacing the receiver as Painter came in.

“See here now-” Painter began, but no one paid any attention to him.

Shayne grinned and said, “I bet the whole bunch are guilty as hell. You can see this is just a dodge to avoid answering your questions.”

“I’ll ask for your advice when I want it,” Painter snapped. He strutted over to the trio and said, “What does she mean by a stunt like that?”

Hudson turned a strained and anxious face up to him as Christine stirred and moaned faintly. “I don’t understand this any more than you do. It isn’t like Christine at all. As soon as she comes around I’m sure she’ll explain. There, there, dear,” he went on to his wife. “Are you all right now?”

Christine opened her eyes and looked around wonderingly, her stark gaze going slowly from one face to the other. Color came slowly into her cheeks and she said, “Oh! I-don’t know what happened. Everything went black and I-” She caught her husband’s hand and held it tightly.

“Who was on the telephone?” Painter demanded. “What was said that caused you to faint?”

“Nothing.” She drew herself up to a sitting position, still clinging to Hudson’s hand. “I did come in to answer the phone, didn’t I? I remember now. I’d just picked up the receiver when a wave of sickness struck me.” She managed a wan smile and turned her face toward Mrs. Morgan. “Silly, wasn’t it?”

“Not at all,” the older woman told her. “You’ll come up to your room now and rest.” She gave Hudson a significant look and said, “We’d best have the doctor in to see her right away.”

“I’ll carry you up,” her husband said, and gathered her in his arms. Mrs. Morgan followed them from the room.

Painter called out, “I want all of you back here. And Mr. Hudson’s brother. Send him down at once.”

Leslie Hudson returned to the library in a very few minutes. There was a puzzled look in his eyes. He muttered, “I don’t understand. Do you suppose-can Mrs. Morgan be right?” He cut himself off abruptly, as though he suddenly realized he was speaking aloud thoughts that were not for strangers.

Shayne laughed and slapped him lightly on the back. “It does happen on the best of honeymoons,” he assured the worried man. “Nothing to worry about.”

“But she hadn’t told me. I didn’t know-”

“You’ve been married only a month,” Shayne reminded him. He turned on Painter and said harshly, “You’ve got to be careful what you say to a woman in her condition.”

Tiny beads of sweat were standing on Painter’s face. He mopped it away with a handkerchief and mumbled, “How was I to know? I’m through with her anyhow for the time being. What about this brother of yours, Hudson?”

“I doubt whether Floyd’s up yet. I imagine Mrs. Morgan will send him down. Here he is now,” Hudson added quickly. “Suppose we go back to the living-room.”

The four men moved into the larger room. Floyd Hudson stopped in the center of the room and waited.

Floyd Hudson was the man Shayne had seen at the Play-Mor Club with Natalie Briggs the preceding night.

He blinked owlishly at the little group and demanded, “What in hell’s the excitement, Les? Mrs. Morgan said I was wanted down here.”

“Just a formality, Floyd,” his brother assured him in a gentle voice. “This is Chief Painter of the Beach police force. They found Natalie’s body in the bay this morning, and there are some routine questions he has to ask.”

“Natalie? In the bay,” Floyd Hudson looked shocked. “Are you serious? Did she commit suicide?”

“I’ll ask the questions,” said Painter stiffly. “How well did you know the maid, Mr. Hudson?”

Floyd shrugged and muttered, “What do you mean by a question like that? Are you insinuating-?”

“I’m asking,” Painter said.

“How well would I know a maid?” the younger brother demanded truculently. He pressed stubby fingers against his forehead. “Natalie wasn’t any prize, you know.”

“When did you see her last?”

Floyd turned his head slightly and looked at Shayne for the first time since he entered the room. He narrowed his bloodshot eyes and appeared to be concentrating on something. “Wait a minute,” he muttered. “Let me get this straight. When did she do it?”

“Natalie Briggs was murdered some time last night,” Painter told him. “Right here in your back yard if I’m not mistaken. Pending an autopsy, the doctor’s first guess is around midnight.”

Floyd looked at Shayne again and asked, “Is this another cop?”

“I’m sorry,” the elder brother said. “Mr. Shayne, my brother. Mr. Shayne is an old friend of Christine’s,” he went on, “a private detective who is helping the police clear up Natalie’s death.”

Shayne stepped forward and took Floyd’s extended and unresponsive hand. “I believe we ran into each other last night at the Play-Mor Club.”

“Did we? Maybe so.” Floyd wet his lips and groaned. “My head. God, but it’s splitting. I suppose I might as well give it to you straight,” he said to Painter. “I took Natalie to the Play-Mor last night.” He saw his brother give a start of surprise and added defensively, “She’d been after me to take her some place like that ever since she’d been here. I didn’t see any harm in it.”

Painter was making notations in his book. “Was this the first time you’d taken her out, Mr. Hudson?”

“Of course. God, you don’t think I’d make a practice of it.” He closed his eyes and shuddered. “She got half-tight on a couple of drinks and insisted on gambling. After she’d dropped all her own money she wanted me to put up for her. I was sick of my bargain by that time, and I slipped away and left her there.”

“What time was that?”

“About ten o’clock.”

Painter looked at Shayne. “You say you saw him there with the maid?”

“I said I saw him at the Play-Mor. He was with a girl who answered Mr. Hudson’s description of the maid.”

“What time was that?”

“I saw them at the roulette table slightly before ten. I dropped forty bucks and went out for a few drinks and looked in again about ten-thirty. She was still there, but I didn’t see him.”

“That’s what I told you,” Floyd put in wearily. “I skipped out on her and went on and made a night of it by myself.”

“Where?” Painter asked incisively.

Floyd shook his head. “God only knows. I hit the Den first and tilted a few. And I think I was at the Yacht Club, and maybe the Tropical Tavern.” He managed a puffy-lipped smile. “Didn’t get in till about four-thirty.”

“You didn’t come back here in the meantime?”

“Hell, no. Home didn’t appeal to me right then.”

“How long were you at the Play-Mor?” Painter demanded of Shayne.

“I reached my apartment at eleven o’clock. I didn’t go back into the gambling room after I looked in at ten-thirty.”

“And the girl was there at that time?”

“She was at the roulette table when I went out and got a cab,” Shayne said steadily.

Mrs. Morgan entered the room unobtrusively. She touched Leslie Hudson’s arm and said, “I think you’d best go up to Mrs. Hudson, sir. She’s resting quietly, but she’d like to see you.”

“Of course” Hudson arose hastily. “You’ll excuse me.

“And I,” said Floyd, “have told you all I know about anything. Is there hot coffee, Mrs. Morgan?”

“On the stove. I’ll fix some-”

“You’ll stay right here,” Painter said sternly, “until you’ve answered a few questions.”

As she turned back looking flustered and unhappy, Floyd brushed past her, saying, “I’ll fix some myself. And don’t tell him any more than you have to.”

Mrs. Morgan sat down and folded her hands in her lap. She answered Painter’s questions steadily and clearly. She had helped rear Christine, and when Christine married she had been happy to come to Miami and take the position as housekeeper in the Hudson home. She hadn’t known Natalie Briggs until she came to work as a maid, and the girl had done her work competently. There had been no complaints. She knew nothing at all about the dead girl’s background or friends. She had had no callers during the few weeks she’d been employed at the Hudson house, and had received no letters to Mrs. Morgan’s knowledge.

She and the girl occupied adjoining rooms in the rear wing of the house, upstairs, and when she retired at midnight, Natalie was not in her room. She hadn’t tried to call her early this morning, supposing she was asleep, but had gone up after preparing breakfast and learned then that she had not returned during the night. She had heard no unusual sounds during the night, but she was a sound sleeper and would not have heard any noises had they occurred.

Peter Painter snapped his notebook shut with a snort of irritation after concluding his interrogation of Mrs. Morgan. He smoothed his thin black mustache with his thumbnail, shrugged, and strutted out the front door.

Shayne went out after saying good-by to Mrs. Morgan. He silently followed Painter around the side of the house to the rear, taking the same path he had watched Natalie take the preceding night.

A flagstone path led through the spacious lawn to stone steps going down into a boathouse built out from the breakwater into Biscayne Bay, large enough to house a thirty-foot motor launch. The roof of the boathouse was flat, and level with the top of the breakwater. A man was lying on his belly at the far end of the roof, looking down at the water.

He rolled over and sat up as Painter, with Shayne a few steps behind him, walked out on the roof toward him. “We got it just about figured out for you, Chief. Whatley is down there in a rowboat scraping off samples from the plank doors of the boathouse. Blood is what it is. Diluted with water and washed up there against the planking last night while she drifted away. Whatley and I figure she was bopped on the head when she come around back to get in last night, and then the guy carried her out here and slit her throat while he was holding her out over the edge so’s there wouldn’t be any bloodstains left. We figure-”

“Keep your figuring to yourself,” said Painter furiously. He turned on Shayne and said, “Keep out of my way. I’m warning you, just keep out of my way.”

Shayne grinned and nodded. He said, “Okay,” and turned and sauntered back across the lawn to the front.

A Buick roadster was pulled up behind his waiting cab, and behind that was Chief Painter’s official car. A Beach homicide sedan was parked behind it.

Shayne got in the cab and said to the driver, “Pull ahead a couple of blocks and then circle back where we can watch these cars without being seen. We may have a long wait.”

“Look, boss,” the driver remonstrated, “waitin’ around like this ain’t so good these days. A guy don’t put much on the meter standin’ still.”

Shayne gave him a five-dollar bill and asked, “Will that fix it?”

“Sure-you bet,” the driver said, and followed the instructions Shayne had given him.