Million Dollar Handle

Chapter 13

Shayne looked up the address of the Fanchon Towers, where Ricardo Sanchez had been living since making the acquaintance of Charlotte Geary. After finding a parking place, he unlocked the trunk of the Buick, then unlocked a metal box welded to the floor, and picked out a small transistorized unit three quarters the size of a cigarette package. It came equipped with suction cups, and contained a microphone and transmitter, capable of broadcasting at good fidelity an eighth of a mile.

The building, a new one, was still renting; according to the small print at the bottom of the vacancy notice, it was a Harry Zell venture. It was wedged onto a sliver of land at the edge of Little River Canal, and it was clearly outside the financial range of anyone trying to live on a Surfside salary. There was a vestibule, a locked inner door. Shayne picked his way through. Upstairs, he rang the bell, and getting no response, began working on the simple lock.

He stepped in and felt for the light switch. The light came on before he found it. Mrs. Geary was already there, and like so many other people in the last day and a half, she was pointing a gun at him.

“It’s you,” she said. “He’s not here. You’ll have to beat him up some other time.”

Shayne closed the door. “I don’t want to beat him up. I want to ask him how he can afford to pay the rent here.”

“I pay three quarters of it. That’s fair.”

Shayne turned on another light. It was a one-room apartment with a small kitchen alcove, a smaller terrace and a splintered view of the Bay and the lights of Miami Beach. The carpet had probably come with the apartment, but there wasn’t much furniture, and little to show that anyone lived here. A low lamp table at the end of a convertible sofa was the logical place for his microphone.

He turned. He had studied Mrs. Geary’s face through field glasses the night before, and she had looked drawn and strained. She couldn’t have slept much since, and her eyes were red, as though she might have been crying. But she was slender and moved well, and without the marks of fatigue she would have been a good-looking woman.

“If you aren’t going to shoot me with that, put it away,” Shayne said. “This isn’t that kind of problem.”

“I’m not so sure. There was shooting last night, some of it done by you, I understand. The animals are fighting over the meat.”

“Does he keep any booze here?”

“He doesn’t drink much, only to celebrate something. This has been good for me because I was beginning to need those martinis.”

Shayne sat down within reach of the lamp table. He waved at her, but she stayed on her feet, the gun pointed at the floor.

“Don’t make yourself too comfortable. Have you talked to Linda?”

“Briefly, on the phone.”

“Didn’t she tell you you’ve been discharged?”

“She was never my client.”

Mrs. Geary looked surprised. He explained, “Before I take on a client, we have a clear agreement on what I’m expected to do, and how I’m going to be paid. Linda assumed she hired me, but she walked away before I said yes or no. I’m not too interested in rearranging your private life. If it works, great. But you don’t look as though you’ve been enjoying it much lately.”

“Oh, God.” Dropping the gun into her purse, she sat down facing him, squinting slightly, her knees tightly together. “If you aren’t working for my loving daughter, what are you doing breaking into Ricardo’s apartment?”

“I’m working for myself. Maybe you can help me.”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“So I’ll lose interest and quit. I don’t want any more trouble. Last night was close enough. I didn’t understand that at the time, and I still don’t. I don’t know who’s going to be pointing a gun at me next. You, for Christ’s sake. Why do you even own a gun?”

“It was Max’s. All right, instead of shooting, let’s talk. You begin.”

“First you wanted to sell. Then you didn’t. Now you do, Linda tells me.”

“I seem to be rather changeable.”

“You must have reasons, Mrs. Geary. What were they this time?”

“Because I’m scared! I want a comfortable, uneventful life.”

“Does Ricardo know about the latest switch?”

“Not yet.”

“Is that why you brought a gun?”

“No! Mr. Shayne, if you want to ask any factual questions, go ahead, but leave my feelings out of it. I felt something about Max, maybe not grief, but definitely something. I’m not over it. Why don’t you ask about money? That’s what you’re really interested in.”

“I didn’t know it showed. O.K. It’s your track now, and you have a right to sell it. But you can see why the people on Max’s slush list, including me, aren’t too happy about that. We won’t get any grease out of a hotel on the site. Somebody will, but different people. Let me negotiate for you. I’ll get you a better deal than Max had. There’s money there, Mrs. Geary. How much, I don’t even like to guess. Why don’t you forget about being honest and poor, keep the track open, give Ricardo a promotion to kennelmaster, and see how much we can squeeze together? Try it for a year.”

“I was actually thinking of doing just that. Mr. Shayne, although I don’t see why I would need your assistance. I would find it too strenuous, I’m afraid.”

“You wouldn’t have to go near the track. I’ll bring you a suitcase of money a couple of times a month.”

“Surfside’s a gold mine, I suppose! Do you really think that? After all those huge payoffs, there was nothing left for the owners. Really-you’re talking to the secretary-treasurer.”

“So Max never told you how he was doing it?”

She laughed. “In the first place, I don’t believe he was doing anything illegal. If he was, I didn’t see any of the money. Can I persuade you to go now, please? Ricardo has a very low flash point. I want you to be gone by the time he gets here.”

“I’d like to meet him.”

“There’s no point in that! Honestly. He can’t tell you anything about Max’s secrets, if he had any. Ricardo is down at the working level, the dog level. And there’s nothing you or anybody else can say or do to make me change. It’s too late. It’s done!”

“That still leaves a lot of loose ends. What do you think of the suggestion that your husband’s death may have been murder?”

“I don’t know what to think! I know so little-” She looked down at her clenched hands. “But I hope it isn’t true. I want it to be Max’s own fault. He always claimed he could drive better after a fifth of whiskey, and I hate that kind of masculine bragging! He deserved it. I know that kind of drinking is a way of committing suicide-but I don’t want to discuss it. You’re trying to confuse me. Isn’t there some way I can appeal to you? Ricardo has a lot of the old-fashioned Cuban ideas. I don’t want anything to go wrong with this. I’m all-keyed up. I’ll say something I shouldn’t-”

“About what, Mrs. Geary?”

“I don’t know why I said that. I wash my hands! I am no longer the majority owner of a stupid dog track, providing the working class with low-cost excitement in the open air, except for those eccentrics who prefer to stay inside and watch television. Very soon I will receive a check from Mr. Harry Zell, and I have no intention of staying in Miami, the city my late husband did so much to shape. Good-bye, all of you.”

The doorbell rang.

“That’s-” She looked at her watch. “No, it’s too early.”

Shayne had the transmitter out of his sling by the time she reached the door. She checked through the peephole.

“Oh, dear.”

Hurrying, Shayne couldn’t make the suction cups grip on the underside of the lamp table. The door opened. A Miami plainclothes detective was standing outside.

“This where you had the break-in?”

His chin was drawn down, and he seemed very angry about something. She turned swiftly, and Shayne straightened. The transmitter stayed in place for an instant, but fell silently to the carpet.

“I dialed the emergency number when you-”

The cop had some kind of grievance to work off; he was mad at everybody tonight. Mrs. Geary retreated, more and more agitated.

“You see, I heard a noise at the door, I wasn’t expecting anybody-”

“Which one of you is Sanchez?”

She looked helplessly at Shayne, who came forward and said angrily, “I’ll take care of this clown. Hold it right there. Nobody invited you inside.”

“All I want is an explanation. What were you doing upstairs? What’s wrong with the intercom? And don’t give me that tough-guy shit, because I am fed up with this goddamn job and with this goddamn city. I’ve had it!”

“It’s really nothing to get worked up about,” Mrs. Geary was trying to say, but Shayne rode her down.

“You can’t go halfway with these guys, or they’ll settle in and drink your liquor and expect a ten-dollar tip when they leave. I know the type, believe me. Out,” he said to the cop, with a gesture. “I don’t like your manner. You’re on the public payroll, goddamn it. We pay your salary. The tax payers. Now pick up and get out of here.”

He put a little head fake on the cop. The cop went with it, and Shayne slapped his shoulder with the heel of his hand.

The response was automatic. He was crowding the cop, and the cop had to crowd him back, bringing his hand up between them to push Shayne off. Shayne’s heel caught and he crashed to the floor, taking the lamp table with him. The lamp blinked out as it hit the floor.

Mrs. Geary ran between them. “That’s enough! I’m waiting for Mr. Sanchez. I have a key, I’m a friend of his. This is Mike Shayne, the detective-”

“Oh, Shayne, is it?” the cop said.

Shayne yelled from the floor, “Goddamned if I let anybody get away with that. These rednecks are getting worse by the mouth. Don’t even know how to ask a civil question.”

“I’ll ask a few when I get you to the station,” the cop said.

“You’re going to bust me? Fine. I know a lawyer who specializes in false arrest. He’s gotten some very nice settlements.”

He had the transmitter in the palm of his hand. He moistened his fingertips, and rubbed the moisture onto the suction cups. When he set the table upright, he left the transmitter adhering to its underside.

“That’s it, break up the furniture. What do we need with hurricanes when we’ve got the police force? Where did they find you, boy, up in the piney woods? If I had the use of both arms-”

“Let’s go, private detective.”

They continued to trade remarks down the corridor and into the elevator. There Shayne’s manner changed.

“You did me a favor,” he said with a laugh. “That woman had me pinned down. She wanted me to spend the night and I’ve got other plans. Thanks.”

The cop was still making twitching and brushing movements with his hands. “Second thoughts? It isn’t that easy. I’m going to write you up and you’ll have the rest of the night to sober up and cool off.”

“If you want an apology, I apologize.”

“I want blood,” the cop said, shaking. “You don’t hit a police officer on duty and then say, ‘Oops, sorry, I take it back.’ I don’t care who you know.”

“I’m working,” Shayne said reasonably. “I’ll stop in tomorrow and explain it to you.”

“Like hell. I’m setting this schedule.”

Without shifting his weight, Shayne clipped him on the side of the jaw, hitting him again as he started his slide. When the elevator door opened, Shayne levered him onto one hip and ran him outside. Finding the parked police car, he slid the cop behind the wheel and walked away, coming back after a few steps because the cop’s upper body had fallen against the horn. After rearranging him, Shayne went to his own car, which was parked on the opposite side of the street, a block and a half away.

He turned on the radio receiver and put on the headset.

The reception was fine. He heard the woman in Sanchez’s apartment moving about restlessly. Once, very close to the transmitter, she said aloud, “Damn, damn, damn. Ricardo, my dear, what am I going to do about you?”

She made one phone call, to a friend or a relative. She was sorry, she said, but she couldn’t accept the invitation. There was too much going on here. After much shuffling and vacillation, she had decided to sell the track. She couldn’t trust anybody to run it for her-they all seemed to be thieves. Some shady dealings of Max’s had come to light. It was a tense and difficult time.

The police car’s headlights came on. Shayne slid down so his silhouette wouldn’t show against the windshield.

When the car went past, he checked with Rourke, then with Dave, Bobby Nash’s technician. Dave had everything and was ready to move as soon as Surfside turned off the lights.

A badly bruised green sedan turned into the tenant’s parking area. As it passed under an overhead light, Shayne saw that the driver was Sanchez. He watched for the car of the Cuban detective and blinked his lights when he saw it. The Cuban double-parked and came in beside him.

“Nothing much,” he told Shayne. “I think he’s using chemistry on the dogs. Mrs. Charlotte Geary rented this apartment. He’s a serious, hard-working kid, and he wants to make money.”

“I’ve got a transmitter up there,” Shayne said. “There’s an interesting conversation coming up, but I can’t stay for it. I want to switch cars.”

He explained the equipment. The recorder was tied into the receiver; it was voice-actuated and needed no attention. But he wanted the Cuban to use the earphones, and Shayne would call him at intervals to get a summary.

He heard Ricardo’s voice.

“Oh, Charley, it went so smooth. So easy. I only touched three dogs but they did what I told them.”

Mrs. Geary, muffled but still distinct: “How much did you make?”

“Eighty-five hundred in three hours of racing. Of course we’ll have minus nights, too, but they’ll average out. You’ve got to keep telling me one thing, honey: Don’t get greedy.”

One boot hit the carpet, then the other. He blew like a horse.

“I better grab a shower. That sixth race, I sweated a pint.”

“I’ll do that, you don’t have to. You smell fine. Ricardo, baby-”

A moment later, it began. Shayne passed the headset to the Cuban, and switched off the tape recorder.

“Let’s respect their privacy. Don’t forget to turn it back on when they start talking.”

“What I predict,” the Cuban said, putting on the earphones, “he’s going to do it quick the first time, because he’s twenty-two years of age and he just won a couple of bets, and he’s going to do it again, and take a goddamn hour. And I’m going to sit here listening to all the slurping and groaning. What a job. Watch my car on the fast curves, Mike. She has a tendency to chatter.”