Blood on the Stars

Chapter Fourteen

As they pulled away from the curb in Shayne’s car, Rourke settled back in the seat beside the detective and said, “What’s this Mrs. Dustin like? What’s been going on, Mike? Those wires you sent back to the office-and the Rajah of something or other.”

Shayne said, “Celia Dustin was a beautiful gal. I’d better fill in some background, since it’ll all have to come into the open now.”

He guided the car around the traffic circle at 13th Street and headed across the Causeway to Miami Beach. “It won’t make me sore if you forget what I tell you about my secretary. Right after you left my apartment I went in the bedroom and found Lucy in there. She was on my bed dressed in a nightgown and robe, and she was unconscious. Dangerous brain concussion. She was unconscious-blood oozing from her scalp. I called Doc Price. He came and dressed the wound-”

Shayne hesitated a moment and Rourke said, “Go on. If you and your secretary want to play rough, it’s none of my affair.”

Shayne swiftly gave his friend a resume of what Lucy had been able to tell them during her brief period of consciousness, then added, “I called Mrs. Dustin at the Sunlux and her phone didn’t answer. Harry Jessup is the house dick there. He went up to check the suite for me. Found her missing and Dustin knocked cold with an overdose of sleeping-tablets. I got over there fast.”

He told Rourke what he had learned upon his arrival, and the story Dustin told after the doctor succeeded in arousing him.

Rourke said, “So Painter thinks she arranged the holdup.”

“I don’t know what Painter thinks by this time. Maybe her murder changes that-maybe not.”

“It could still add up the same way,” Rourke suggested. “If Mr. X was her accomplice and he got the idea she was calling you to double-cross him, she was practically inviting him to murder her.”

“Same way if he wasn’t her accomplice and guessed from what she said over the phone that she had a line on his identity,” Shayne argued.

“You’re sold on Mrs. Dustin?”

“I liked her.” Shayne hesitated, then went on slowly, “Remember telling me in my apartment that you’d been trying to reach both Randolph and Voorland without success?”

“Sure. I wanted some inside dope on the fabulous bracelet.”

“Earl Randolph claims he has been in all evening,” said Shayne quietly.

“I tried his phone half a dozen times. There was never any answer,” Rourke complained.

“Maybe it’s out of order. I found him in about an hour ago-going over old records and digging up the King and Kendrick thefts.”

“What connection is there?”

“From where I sit the only connection between the three men is Walter Voorland. He made all three star ruby deals.”

“And-?”

“And I think the Rajah of Hindupoor called him from the Miami Waldorf tonight and Voorland hurried out to see him using the name of Smith.”

They had reached the east end of the Causeway. Fifth Street was bare of traffic at this early hour before dawn, and Shayne sped on toward the ocean.

“All this Rajah stuff and the dope from Randolph is strictly under the hat,” he warned the reporter. “I’m playing it right down the line with you, as I always have.”

“Yeh, just as you always have,” said Rourke suspiciously. “What are you holding out this time?”

“Not a damned thing, Tim.” He swung left on Collins Avenue and sped northward past Lummus Park.

“Those boys who gave you the brass knucks-the ones called Blackie and the Kid. Didn’t you say Blackie was heavy-set and had a mustache? What kind of suit and hat did you say he was wearing?”

“I don’t think I said.” Shayne’s voice was deceptively mild.

“Maybe not. You seemed pretty sure they were in on the robbery.”

“Did I?”

“This Blackie, now. If he changed his mind and came around to apologize for slugging you-” Rourke left the sentence dangling.

Shayne said, “It seems practically certain that Mr. X was on the inside of the robbery, if that’s what you’re trying to say. Here we are.” He slowed as they approached the Sunlux Hotel, pulled off the pavement, and parked behind a police car at the south end of the building.

There were several police cars parked on both sides of the street, and all the floodlights were on at the ocean side, brightly illuminating the bathing-beach and pier.

A policeman guarded the street end of the concrete walk leading back, but he stepped aside to let them pass when he recognized the detective and reporter.

A group of men were gathered on the beach where the wooden pier jutted out into the water. They didn’t see Painter at once. Shayne accosted a homicide man who stood back on the fringe of the group. “What’s going on, Dirk?”

“It’s a dame named Mrs. Mark Dustin. She’s been missing since-”

“I know about that. Who found her body?”

“Petrillo and Johnny Miles. They were stationed here and just wandering around when suddenly they saw a foot sticking out from under the end of the pier. A dozen guys’d been all over every inch of it before and didn’t see anything.”

“What’s the story?” Rourke had a wad of copy paper out and was making notes.

“She’s dead. Busted on the back of the head, left side, with a baseball bat or bottle. Doc figures between twelve and twelve-thirty. Some fancy medical stuff gives him the idea she fell on the dry beach at the edge of the water and lay there ten or fifteen minutes before the tide came in and floated her down under the end of the pier where she lodged. That’s why nobody saw her at first.”

The group of detectives and policemen at the foot of the pier parted to let two ambulance attendants pass through bearing a stretcher with a sheet-covered body on it. Peter Painter followed the corpse, but stopped when he saw Shayne and Rourke.

“How do you explain this?” he asked Shayne aggressively.

“How about a statement from you?” Rourke asked eagerly.

“You can say I’m not at all satisfied with Shayne’s absurd story of somebody impersonating him over the telephone in his apartment and luring Mrs. Dustin down here to her death. I suspect him of prior knowledge of the murder and of giving out that yarn as a smoke-screen to cover himself when her body was discovered.”

“In other words,” said Shayne, “you’re publicly accusing me of murder as well as stealing the bracelet.”

“I’m accusing you of nothing-yet,” snapped the detective chief. “But I’m also not swallowing your hog-wash.” He turned and strutted through the sand toward the concrete walk.

A faint glow of dawn lighted the eastern horizon above the gray ocean. Rourke asked, as they followed Painter toward the hotel, “Want to come up with me and have a talk with Dustin?”

“Do your own ghouling,” said Shayne. “I’ve heard everything he has to say. I’ll be pushing along.”

Rourke gave him a quick, suspicious glance and asked, “Where to? If you’ve got some other angles-”

“Sleep appeals to me right now,” he said casually. “There’ll be plenty to keep us busy tomorrow morning.”

“You’re nuts. It’s tomorrow already.” Suspicion edged his voice. “Don’t run out on me, Mike. I’ve got a feeling things are going to break fast.”

“Go on and intrude on Mark Dustin’s private grief,” Shayne told him good-naturedly. “There’s nothing much we can do until we get answers to those telegrams.”

Shayne went on to his car and drove northward. He took it slow, making very certain that Painter had not put a tail on him, turning off Collins after a few blocks and winding around the palm-lined streets until he reached Sunset Drive. There was enough daylight now for him to see the house numbers, and he loitered along until he found the address the telephone operator had given him in Ben Corey’s office.

He drove past the house on the silent, deserted street, turned the corner and parked halfway down the block, got out and walked back. There was no sign of life in any of the dwellings on either side of the street, and the only sound to break the silence of dawn was a milk truck coming down the street, stopping in front of most of the houses while the driver hurried up the walk to deposit his full bottles on front porches and pick up the empties.

Shayne stopped in the deep shadows on the sidewalk opposite the big house he sought. He lit a cigarette and watched the driver stop across the street, get out and run up the walk.

Moving out of the shadows, he crossed the street to intercept the whitecoated deliveryman as he returned to the truck. His sudden and unexpected appearance startled the driver.

“What yuh wanta scare a guy like that for?” he demanded truculently. “If this is a stick-up-”

“It’s police business,” Shayne told him. “I’m interested in the house you just delivered to.”

“Police business? You don’t look like no cop to me. You tight?”

Shayne took a badge from his pocket and showed it to him. “Who lives there?”

“This house right here?” The driver scratched his head. “Bankhead. Feller by the name of Bankhead. That’s it. J. Donald Bankhead. I been deliverin’ here most a year now. What’s wrong? What you want-”

“Know anything about Bankhead?” Shayne interrupted. “What’s his business? How big a family?”

“Tell you the truth, I dunno much. You know how it is. These days a man hardly gets to know even his steady customers. I collect onct a week. Good pay. There’s a housekeeper pays off. I dunno ’bout any family. Six quarts a day regular an’ cream twict a week. Look-I got to cover my route and if I don’t get goin’ there’ll be complaints.”

Shayne said, “Go ahead. And keep your mouth buttoned up. This is a Secret Service investigation.”

“Secret Service? Jeez. Is he one of them communist spies or somethin’?”

“Something like that.” Shayne stepped back and waited until the milk truck had made one more stop, then turned the corner. When it was out of sight, he strolled forward and followed a wide gravel drive leading into a double garage about thirty feet to the right and at the rear of the house.

The double doors of the garage were padlocked. Shayne studied the locks in the reddening light of dawn, got out his keyring, and went to work on the simplest lock. It opened after a few trials, and he slid the door back enough to squeeze through. The door creaked on the metal runway, and he stepped inside the dark interior, stood there without moving for a full three minutes and listened intently.

When he heard no sound, he turned to the two cars inside the garage. On the right was a shiny Cadillac coupe. The other car was a black limousine. He struck a match to look at the license plate on the limousine, and wasn’t surprised to see a different set of numbers than those he had memorized in Mickey’s Garage. They would have been fools not to take the precaution of using stolen license plates for the job they had done the previous evening. He bent over and examined the bolts and nuts holding the plate. They were clean and not rusted, though the metal bar to which they were attached was streaked with mud.

He struck another match to examine the right front fender. It showed no sign of damage. The workmen in Mickey’s Garage knew their business.

He dropped the match on the concrete floor and stepped on it. Overhead lights flared, and an unpleasantly familiar voice said, “Looking for more trouble, shamus?”

Blackie was standing in the open portion of the doorway. He was bareheaded and his dark hair was tousled as though he had just awakened. He wore a sleeveless polo shirt, white trousers, and canvas sneakers. His bare arms were furred with thick black hair. He held a. 45 caliber revolver in his right hand and it was pointed at the exact center of Shayne’s belly.

Shayne said, “I didn’t mean to wake you up.” He stood very still beside the right front fender of the limousine.

“There’s a buzzer in my room upstairs.” Blackie scowled and took a step forward. “What you doing in here?”

“I heard you’d been trying to get in touch with me. I wasn’t sure I had the right address and was checking the car to make sure before I woke you.”

“I’ve been wanting to see you, for a fact.” Blackie’s scowl lightened, but the muzzle of his gun remained steady. “That was sort of a mistake tonight when I slugged you.”

“A bad mistake,” Shayne told him. He was relaxed, his right hand resting on the fender, inches from the automatic weighting his coat pocket.

“Yeh. No hard feelings, huh?”

“Is the bracelet for sale?”

“Look here-I didn’t say anything about a bracelet.” His scowl was replaced by a look of cunning. “You in the market for one?”

Shayne said, “I could be.” He kept his voice pleasant, and moved forward between the two cars toward Blackie. “That’s what you wanted to see me about, wasn’t it?”

“Maybe I did and maybe I didn’t. How’d you know to come snooping here?”

“Followed my nose.” Shayne was close to him now, ten feet away. The barrel of the. 45 was wavering. “You don’t have to keep that thing pointed at me. I don’t talk business over a gun barrel.”

Blackie looked down at the heavy weapon as though surprised to see it in his hand. Shayne’s thumbs were hooked inside his coat pockets. “I don’t figure you,” Blackie said in a worried tone. “If I’d got slugged like you did-”

“I never let a slugging interfere with profits.” Shayne was closer now. Six feet away. “Why did the Rajah change his mind about the bracelet after it was offered to him?”

Blackie looked up, surprised. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he muttered. “I think you better go in the house-”

“Let’s settle this right here. Just between you and me.” Shayne’s right hand crept deeper into his pocket. He stood poised on the balls of his feet. He asked, “Why did you have to kill Mrs. Dustin?”

The. 45 was a double-action, uncocked, but Blackie’s forefinger was tight on the trigger. At Shayne’s words, he swung it up with an oath, but the detective leaped forward and closed his big hand over the top of the firing-chamber as the hammer came back. It snapped forward harmlessly on the soft flesh between his thumb and forefinger at the same instant his right hand came out of his pocket and described a sweeping arc upward.

The flat side of Shayne’s automatic slammed against Blackie’s head and his knees gave way. The. 45 fell from his hand as he slid to the concrete floor.