Call for Michael Shayne [= Case of the Missing Twelve Days]

Chapter nine A Doctor Wonders

Shayne had much better luck getting acquainted with Thompson’s brandy than with his nurse. Miss Dort got the bottle from a medicine cabinet and handed it to him with stiff disapproval, then reseated herself at the desk and bent her head over her work.

Shayne poured a slug in his glass, lit a cigarette, and strolled over to close the door leading to the reception room where Painter was badgering the doctor with questions which he refused to answer.

Shayne sat down in the only other chair in the office and asked, “Who has a key to that back door?”

“I don’t know.” She didn’t lift her head and her voice was coolly disinterested. “It’s generally bolted on the inside.”

“What about keys to the front door?”

“I have my key. I don’t know about any others.”

“Do you always come to work so early?”

Miss Dort lifted her head and looked directly at him. “Are you really a detective?”

“Why do you ask that?” Shayne had a chance to study her face for the first time. Her skin was too white for a girl who lived in Miami all the time, and he decided she didn’t get enough sunshine. There was a becoming flush of rouge on her cheeks, and her lips were full and highly rouged.

“The policemen in there — particularly the small one — seemed very angry when they reached here and found you knocked out. He was sure you had been ransacking the files.”

“What did you think?” Shayne got up and sauntered over to her desk, eased one hip on a corner of it.

“I didn’t know what to think,” she told him crisply.

“Have you any idea what someone might have been looking for?”

A frown came between her eyes. She lifted one hand and pushed a cluster of hair back from her damp forehead. “I don’t understand any of it,” she told him. “I heard them talking about a murderer the doctor attended last night.”

“You don’t know Arthur Devlin?”

“I don’t remember him. Is he — is Doctor Thompson in trouble of some sort?”

Shayne shrugged and emptied his brandy glass. “No more than any man, I guess, whose best friend has just committed a murder. Do you know if Devlin ever visited here — had an opportunity to get hold of a key?”

“I’ve told you I don’t remember the name at all. I am only here during the day to take care of patients,” she added primly.

Shayne grinned at her. “Does Doctor Thompson do all his own cooking and housework?”

She lowered her head and eyes and began turning pages in an account book on the desk. “He has a woman who comes in every afternoon. I believe she prepares dinner before she leaves. I know very little about his private arrangements.”

The telephone on her desk rang. She lifted the receiver, spoke briskly and professionally into the mouthpiece. She made an eleven o’clock appointment for the patient and was entering it in a book when the door opened and Doctor Thompson came in. Will Gentry stood behind him in the doorway. “Coming along with us, Mike?”

Shayne glanced at the doctor and received a faint negative shake of his head. He said blandly, “I think not, Will. There’s still some brandy, and I haven’t got Miss Dort’s telephone number yet.”

Gentry said flatly, “I’ll be waiting for you in my office. Try to stay out of Painter’s hair until he cools off.” He turned and went toward the front door.

Doctor Thompson emitted a long sigh and said, “The police are through in my study, Miss Dort. You might start sorting things out — and try to find out if anything is missing.”

“And try, particularly,” said Shayne, “to make a note of the names of any patients the intruder may have been interested in. What did the police get?” he added to Thompson as the nurse went into the small anteroom and closed the door.

“From me?” snorted the doctor. “They seem to suspect Art of luring me away on a fake call so he could get in and go through my files. It’s absolutely ridiculous.” He stood with his plump hands on his hips studying Shayne shrewdly through his glasses. “Art is my friend. I don’t know whom he is supposed to have murdered last night nor where he is now nor what sort of jam he’s in. Can I talk to you in confidence?”

Shayne said, “Sure.” He followed the doctor out into the reception room and down a hallway leading past two bedrooms connected by a bath, into the kitchen. There Thompson began efficiently brewing a large pot of coffee, talking quietly as he moved about. “I’m going to lay all my cards in front of you, Shayne. I refused to tell the police this because I don’t know what to believe. Art Devlin told me a fantastic story when I went to his apartment early this morning. If it’s the truth, I’m afraid he’s the victim of some sort of plot so fantastic that it staggers the imagination. If he lied to me—”

Thompson paused, shaking his head doubtfully. “I still want to help him in any way I can,” he resumed. “The important thing, it seems to me, is to institute a quiet investigation to determine what the truth is.”

Shayne was seated in a kitchen chair beside a white enameled table. He asked, “What was the fantastic story he told you?”

The doctor set out coffee cups and cream and sugar. “I want your word that this won’t get to the police, Shayne.”

“I can’t promise to protect a murderer.”

“I don’t expect you to do that. I want your promise to make an unofficial investigation and report the results to me before you turn anything over to the police. If you find that Art is a murderer, I’ll go with you to the police and give them any help I can.”

Shayne said, “That’s fair enough. Give it to me.”

Thompson poured two cups of strong coffee, passed one to Shayne, set the pot back on a low flame, and sat down. He started to pass the cream and sugar to Shayne, but Shayne waved a big hand, said, “I take it black.” He then put three heaping teaspoonfuls of sugar in his own cup, poured in heavy cream, stirred it thoroughly, tasted it, and said:

“You can’t imagine how shocked I was when Art called me from his apartment when I was sure he was on the boat…” He related every detail of what had passed between Devlin and him early that morning, just as Devlin himself had told it to Shayne.

“Now I understand from the police that Art left his apartment soon after I talked to him,” he ended with a troubled frown. “Perhaps he did make that telephone call to me, then slipped in here to go through my files after I had gone out. But why? That’s the question that keeps tormenting me, Shayne.”

“How did the intruder enter your house?”

“According to the police, he must have used a key. I know the back door was bolted on the inside, and the front door locked automatically when I went out and closed it.”

“Would Devlin, by any chance, have a key?”

“I didn’t tell Gentry or Painter this, Shayne, but I’m afraid he has. You see, his apartment at the Clairmount was being redone some months ago. He was going to move to a hotel until it was finished, but I persuaded him to stay over here instead. He had a key at that time, but I hadn’t even given it a thought. If it was Art, I don’t understand why he would go out the back door and leave it open.”

“Whoever was in your study might have opened it after I started ringing the front door bell,” Shayne theorized. “As an invitation for me to walk into an ambush.”

“But wouldn’t it have been simpler to leave it bolted? Then you would have gone away without knowing he was inside.”

Shayne shrugged and admitted, “Guessing about things like that won’t do us much good. Let’s get back to Devlin’s amnesia story. Do I understand that as a medical man you are unable to believe that an accident — say in Cuba — could have caused a blank in his memory dating back to the night he left Miami?”

Doctor Thompson was silently thoughtful for a moment. “The weight of medical evidence is against such a possibility. But if it wasn’t Devlin on the ship, who was it? And what’s Art been doing these past two weeks? How did he wind up in that rooming-house with the body of a murdered man?”

“If we knew that, we’d have the case sewed up. And if we knew the last name of this Janet who wrote him the letter, a radiogram to her might clear up a whole lot of things.”

A queer expression settled on Thompson’s florid face. “That’s one point that worries me. I hate to say this, but I had a distinct impression that Art was stalling when he pretended he couldn’t remember Janet’s married name.”

“Indicating that he didn’t want to reach her by radiogram?” suggested Shayne. “Her ship will be here tomorrow.”

“I know.” Thompson fanned out his chubby fingers and flattened them against the white table. “You’ve got to find Art before the police do. His amnesia may have returned. I blame myself for leaving him. I should have insisted—”

“I think you did the best you could,” Shayne said, then asked abruptly, “Has Devlin ever taken dope to your knowledge?”

Thompson was lifting his coffee cup to his lips. He set it down with a clatter. “Dope? Of course not. Why on earth do you ask that?”

“The dead man is a punk named Skid Munroe,” Shayne told him. “Police record as long as your arm. He was one of Bert Masters’s strong-arm boys up to about a year ago,” he ended casually.

“Masters?” Thompson rubbed his short stubby mustache thoughtfully. “It was at Masters’s house that Art passed out the night of his bon voyage party.”

“And it was the death of Masters’s wife that actually sent Devlin on the cruise to meet her sister.”

“Do you think there’s a connection? Do you think Devlin was lying to me out of whole cloth — that Munroe’s death tonight was arranged somehow? Premeditated? Part of a pattern that goes back to Masters and his wife’s death by suicide?”

“It’s a thin link,” Shayne admitted. “According to rumors, Skid Munroe had a falling out with Masters a year ago and hasn’t worked for him since. The same rumors say,” he went on deliberately, “that Skid has been peddling dope since then in a small way. Until we know how he and Devlin came to be together in that room last night we don’t have much to go on.”

“From Art’s story it appears he went there to meet the man. Something the landlord said as he was leaving—”

Shayne nodded absently. “Devlin evidently went there about eleven o’clock and asked for Skid, who had registered that afternoon under the name of George Moore.”

“One of the things that worries me is how the police got on Art’s trail so fast. We both thought there’d be nothing to connect him with the murder until the story appeared in the afternoon paper and the taxi driver came forward with his story. Was there some other connection that led them to Art? They wouldn’t tell me a damned thing,” he ended bitterly.

Shayne grinned. “You didn’t exactly take them into your confidence,” he reminded the doctor. “No, the taxi driver was the tip-off. He heard the radio report on the short wave and called in with his story about taking a suspicious fare from right near that address to the Clairmount.”

“I see.” The doctor nodded slowly. “Then it has been reported on the radio. I’ve wondered. Of course you understand that this burglary of my house may have nothing whatever to do with the other thing. We have no proof at all—” His voice trailed off inconclusively.

“It’s a possibility,” Shayne conceded. “Yet — can you think of anything anyone else could have wanted from your files?”

“No more than I can imagine what Devlin could have wanted,” the doctor said helplessly, a deep frown between his eyes.

“How well do you know Bert Masters?”

“He has been my patient for several years.”

“What have you treated him for?”

“High blood pressure. An arthritic condition. There is nothing very secret about it.”

“Was Mrs. Masters your patient also?”

Doctor Thompson smiled wryly. “At one time. Lily was a confirmed neurotic and a hypochondriac. I told her so quite frankly two years ago and she transferred her imaginary ailments to another physician.”

“Then you weren’t surprised when she committed suicide?”

He hesitated briefly, then said, “Yes — I was surprised. Hypochondriacs seldom do, you know. They get too much enjoyment from their imagined ailments.”

Shayne didn’t pursue the subject further. He said, “I think my starting point will have to be that farewell party when Devlin passed out. Tell me what you recall of it.”

“A sort of stag free-for-all. Just a few of Art’s best friends. Joe Engals was there and stewed as an owl. Do you know Joe?”

“Slightly. Who else?”

“Some other insurance fellow. I don’t recall his name, though I had met him before. Thomas, a night-club operator, dropped in late for a few drinks. And Carter Harrison was there.”

“Who took Devlin to the dock from Masters’s house?” Shayne asked.

“I wish I could remember,” sighed Thompson. “I was hazy by that time myself. I have the impression that someone called a taxi — probably Bert Masters’s secretary — a little before midnight, but I also have a vague impression that Masters sent him down in one of his cars. I know I was pretty well on the ragged edge when I staggered in here about midnight,” he ended frankly.

“You say there was a discussion of Lily Masters’s death and of Devlin meeting her sister, Janet, on the ship?” Shayne prompted. “How many of you were in on that discussion?”

“All of us, I suppose. We were kidding Art about his romantic adventure. He halfway admitted his real reason for going was the feeling her letters had roused in him. A sort of tentative flirtation, I guess. None of us took her questions about Lily Masters’s death very seriously.”

“Did Bert Masters join the conversation about his wife’s death?”

Doctor Thompson got up to pour more coffee. “Bert never bothered to pretend that he regretted his wife’s death. They had been at swords’ points for a couple of years and neither of them bothered to conceal the fact.”

“Then any of the persons present may have learned that Devlin was meeting Lily Masters’s sister on the cruise ship to reopen the matter of her suicide?”

“I presume so.” Doctor Thompson rubbed his short bristly mustache thoughtfully. “Do you seriously think some one of us who was at the party may have prevented Art from going aboard just to keep him from meeting Mrs. Masters’s sister and discussing her suicide?”

“If he was prevented from going aboard it was by someone who knew enough about that old case to convince Janet he was Devlin,” Shayne said. “Hell, I’m not seriously thinking anything yet. I’m just making wild guesses. But while we’re on the subject, do you suppose you could tell me now whether your early morning intruder disturbed your files on the Masterses?”

“I’ve told you Lily wasn’t my patient when she died.”

“I can’t help that. Damn it,” said Shayne with irritation, “there must be some focal point — something back of all this. Do you mind checking?”

“Of course not.” He got up and went out and Shayne lit a cigarette. He was thoughtfully smoking when the doctor returned.

“Really, Shayne,” he said, “my nurse has hardly made a start in restoring the files to order. She tells me it may take several days — with her other duties — to determine whether anything is missing.”

Shayne got up, scowling bleakly. “Let me know as soon as you do find out. Your nurse seems a very efficient young lady.”

“Miss Dort is efficient.”

“Lucky for me she arrived so early this morning. Does she always come to work at the break of day?”

Thompson smiled genially. “It was hardly the break of day. Just her usual time.” He was escorting Shayne toward the front door.

Shayne stopped as though struck with a sudden recollection. “I forgot to get her telephone number after all,” he said. “Suppose you give it to me now.”

Thompson continued to smile, but some of the geniality dropped away. “I’m afraid I couldn’t do that without her permission.”

“Nothing personal about it,” Shayne reassured him. “I might need to consult her about the case.”

“I understand perfectly.” The doctor was holding the front door open. “You can reach her here during office hours for any information you require.”

Shayne grinned. “You win, Doc, but you can’t blame a guy for trying.”

He went out blithely and down the pathway to his car, wondering whether Miss Dort really had come to work that morning hours before any regular office nurse would be expected to arrive, or whether she hadn’t had to come to work to find him lying on the floor knocked out. Whether, in fact, a more intimate relationship existed between the two than that of doctor and nurse. It would be a practical arrangement, he decided thoughtfully.

Thinking of the nurse reminded him of the bandage she had put on his face. He ripped it off and tossed it aside, got in his car, and drove away, glancing in the small mirror to check on the injury. The swelling was negligible, and he decided that his assailant had had the good fortune to strike a vital spot to knock him out like that.