Murder and the Wanton Bride

18

Though it was a large corner office it seemed crowded by the six men who gaped at Shayne as he walked through the door. Harvey Barstow was slumped in a chair at the rear; his hair unkempt and a bruise on his sullenly boyish face, and close to him stood a uniformed member of the Denham police force. Chief Painter sat behind the big desk in the center of the room, and on his left were ranged two plainclothes detectives supporting Jeffery Walsh between them.

Painter arose slowly from his swivel chair as Shayne walked up to the desk and laid the bill in front of him. His black eyes glittered with animosity and his slender frame quivered as he said thinly:

“I gave you credit for more sense, Shayne. My God, do you realize the list of charges I’ve got piled up against you since last night?”

“I’ve got a vague idea,” Shayne told him unsmilingly. He put the tip of his forefinger on the bill and pushed it toward Painter. “Pay off on your bet, damn it.”

“Arrest him. Logan,” Painter grated at one of the detectives holding onto Walsh’s arm. “Take him out of here, and by God we’ll see he wishes he had taken it on the run.”

Shayne shook his head reprovingly at the detective who released Walsh’s left arm and started toward him. He said, “Don’t make your boss out a bigger fool than he really is, Logan. If you arrest me now Painter never will solve the Carson killing.”

“Hah!” snorted Painter happily. “Despite all the run-around you tried to give me, Shayne, that’s marked off as a closed case. You probably never even heard of an escaped convict named Whitey Buford... but he’s known to be hiding out in Miami and as soon as we pick him up we’ll prove he killed Carson.”

Shayne said, “Then you’ll appreciate the fact that Doc Crandal is working on Buford right now to see if he can keep him alive.”

“Doc... Crandal?” Painter’s voice thinned still more and the thumb-nail that was caressing his tiny black mustache became suddenly still.

“In his emergency room.” Shayne jerked his thumb casually over his shoulder. “Tim Rourke and I just brought Buford in for you. I had to shoot him in the guts when he pulled this gun on me, but the doc thinks he’ll make it.” He reached in his coat pocket as he spoke and lifted out the .38 automatic that he had taken from Buford’s lax fingers in front of Conway’s Grill.

“What’s he talking about, Rourke?” demanded Painter fiercely of the reporter who had stopped beside Shayne. In a stricken tone, he added, “There must be some mistake. He can’t mean Whitey Buford. The convict that escaped from the Georgia penitentiary a few days ago. The one that kidnapped the Barnett boy...” His voice trailed off and Rourke shrugged and said:

“I can’t identify him positively, but he sure as hell looks like the picture that was in yesterday’s News.”

“I don’t see...” sputtered Painter. “How in the living hell, Shayne? Well, so you were lucky and reached Buford through your underworld connections. But don’t get the idea that takes you off the hook,” he went on shrilly. “I don’t care how many ex-cons you bring in dead or alive. Don’t forget I had the Carson case solved before you made your grandstand play... in spite of all the obstructions you placed in my path. Do you deny assaulting Mr. Barstow in Denham tonight?”

Shayne glanced at the bank teller’s twitching face and said mildly, “I don’t deny socking him in the bank after he pulled a gun on me and threatened to have me pinched. Hell, Petey,” he went on earnestly, “for that you should give me a medal. How would you ever have got a line on my pal, Walsh, here...” He nodded sardonically at the private detective who was still being half-supported by one of the officers, “... if I’d stuck around Denham to let the cops pick me up? Who in hell do you think phoned in the pick-up on Walsh?”

“We know you made that phone call,” conceded Painter. “After slapping him around and knocking him out cold. And he’s admitted blackmailing Carson by keeping quiet about his wife having committed bigamy, but that’s no by God reason for you...”

“She didn’t,” Shayne interrupted dispassionately.

“Who didn’t? What?” shrilled Painter.

“Belle Carson didn’t commit bigamy when she married Carson.” Shayne lowered one hip to a corner of Painter’s desk and got out a cigarette which he shoved between his lips. “Walsh is not only a stinking blackmailer,” he went on disgustedly, “but he’s also a lousy detective to boot.”

“I swear she never got a divorce from Richard Watson,” Walsh said angrily, straightening himself and glaring at Shayne. “I checked her out all the way. It was bigamy, all right, and I don’t think it’s legally blackmail if there’s a gentleman’s agreement to keep quiet about a thing like that. I want to consult a lawyer,” he ended on a whining note.

“If she didn’t commit bigamy, why did her husband make a monthly pay-off to Walsh?” demanded Painter.

“Because he couldn’t afford to have anyone dig deeper into his past and what went on back in Atlanta. When you said awhile ago that you could prove Whitey Buford killed Carson, what were you basing it on? What connection do you see between Buford and Carson?”

“Carson’s wife is the connection. She was formerly married to a man named Richard Watson in Atlanta... who was the pay-off man in a kidnapping engineered by Buford. Buford has always sworn he never got the money, and I figure Belle Carson was afraid he would be coming after her for revenge when she heard he’d broken jail. So she told her husband the whole story, and he came to Miami intending to see you and hire you to take care of Buford for him. But I also figure he was fool enough to contact Buford last night and threaten him with your gun. How else would Buford have known where to find him at eleven o’clock?”

“I don’t think Buford did know. I doubt that he would have killed Carson if he had known. Because he wanted that fifty-thousand Carson had held out on him years ago.”

“You mean Watson, don’t you?”

“Haven’t you got the set-up yet?” asked Shayne impatiently. “I told you Belle didn’t commit bigamy. Carson was Watson. Buford knew it, and he was out to collect the money. He had no motive for killing Carson.”

“Who did, then?” asked Painter uncertainly.

“I thought you’d like Walsh for it. He had both motive and opportunity. He admitted to me that Carson phoned him last evening and said he was having dinner at Chez Dumont and would be leaving at eleven to walk the few blocks to Walsh’s place.”

“He’s twisting it all up,” whined Walsh. “Sure he had a date to come to my apartment, but it was to talk over a big pay-off. I didn’t want him dead.”

“That’s what you say,” snarled Painter. “How do we know he wasn’t tired of playing blackmail and had threatened to expose you if you didn’t lay off? After all, you are the only man in Miami who could place him with certainty at that place and that time. He was killed with a thirty-two. What caliber gun you got a license for? And where is it?”

“A thirty-two,” Walsh admited. “But I haven’t even got it now. I pawned it six months ago for eating money when things were tough all over.”

“You’ll have to prove it,” Painter said uncompromisingly. “But don’t think any of this takes you off the hook, Shayne. I’ve got about a dozen charges against you, starting with obstruction of justice and ending up with a charge of assault that Mr. Barstow has already sworn out against you.”

“He pulled a gun on me before I hit him,” Shayne said mildly.

“Strictly in line of duty,” Peter Painter told him happily. “You were trespassing, had forced your way into the bank, and he knew you were a fugitive with a warrant out for your arrest. As an officer of the bank, he has a permit for the gun you claim he ‘pulled’ on you, and he was doing his duty as a citizen when he attempted to hold you there while he called the police. You’re going to have one hell of a time wriggling out of that.”

Shayne grinned wryly and said, “Maybe. On the other hand, I figured it was a pretty good way to get him here in Miami tonight.”

He reached in his pocket and pulled out the second gun... the short-barreled .32 he had taken from Barstow in the bank. He laid it on the desk beside Buford’s automatic. “This the one he claims to have a permit for?”

“Is it, Mr. Barstow?” Painter turned encouragingly to the bank teller and he said, “I guess so. One just like that anyway. There were three of them that belonged to the bank. I haven’t a list of the serial numbers, but they’re on file.”

“I’m certainly not denying that this is the one I took away from Barstow. But before you put me in your jail, Petey, I suggest you do one thing. Have Ballistics check the bullet you took out of Carson with this gun.”

“You mean the bank’s thirty-two?” asked Painter incredulously, staring at both guns with narrowed eyes.

“Carson was shot with a thirty-two, wasn’t he?”

“Yes, but... are you implying...?”

“I’m not implying anything,” said Shayne flatly. “I’m telling you that Harvey Barstow killed Carson last night with that gun. Or one of the other similar guns in the bank that he had access to.”

“Barstow? But...”

“That’s crazy!” Barstow surged to his feet angrily. “I wasn’t even in Miami last night. I was at home in bed. I had no reason to kill Mr. Carson.”

“Belle Carson tells it differently,” growled Shayne. “You knew Carson was coming in to consult a private detective, but you didn’t know why. You admit you typed the letter making the appointment with me.”

“But I didn’t know why. He didn’t tell me...”

“That’s exactly it,” agreed Shayne. “You knew nothing about Whitey Buford or any of the Atlanta background. So your guilty conscience led you to believe Carson suspected your affair with his wife and that he was hiring me to get the evidence. So you followed him in to the city and gunned him on the street before he could keep his appointment with me this morning.”

“But I didn’t. You said yourself it had to be someone who knew where he’d be at eleven o’clock last night. How could I possibly have known?”

“You also typed the letter making the hotel reservation. You knew where he would be staying.”

“But I can prove by a dozen witnesses that I was in Denham up to some time after nine o’clock last night,” said Barstow excitedly. “I was at home alone after that because my family was away for the night, but I certainly wasn’t in here trailing Mr. Carson around the streets of Miami Beach all evening. Can’t you see how preposterous his charge is, Chief Painter?”

Peter Painter hesitated, pursing his thin lips doubtfully while his black eyes studied Shayne’s placid features with more than a little foreboding. Had it been anyone other than Michael Shayne making the accusation... were it not for the fact that too many times in the past the gaunt-faced redhead had turned the tables at the very last and emerged unscathed by proving just such a preposterous accusation as this, Painter would have gleefully leaped to the young man’s defense.

But as it was, he said slowly, “How are you going to get around that, Shamus? Even if you can prove what you say about Barstow having an affair with Mrs. Carson and that he suspected Carson was seeing you to break it up... even if you can prove all that for a motive what are you going to do about the witnesses who can place Barstow definitely in Denham up to nine o’clock last night?”

Shayne said carelessly, “It isn’t more than a two-hour drive. Plenty of time for him to get here and be waiting for Carson on that street corner at eleven o’clock.”

“But how could he place him there at that time? You concede that Carson didn’t make the appointment with Walsh until after he reached the city. Even the most perceptive of secretaries could not have known about that appointment in advance.”

“But he did know that Mr. Carson had a dinner reservation at Chez Dumont at nine o’clock because it was also made in advance by a letter he typed. Knowing his employer’s methodical and routine habits he could figure he’d be leaving the restaurant about eleven. So he was waiting for him.”

Shayne shrugged and went on impatiently, “Run a Ballistic check on the gun. That’s all you need to tie it up. And check back in Denham to find out what car Barstow used last night. You’ll find his wife had his car, so he must have borrowed or rented one. For God’s sake, do I have to tie all the knots for you... or can you manage one or two of them without my help.”

Peter Painter swallowed hard. He said thinly, “We’ll check, all right. If Mrs. Carson corroborates what she told you about having an affair with him...”

“She won’t!” burst out from Barstow’s lips. “He’s lying about Belle. I talked to her this afternoon and she swore she never told him a word. He’s making every bit of it up.” He lunged forward wildly toward Shayne, spread-eagling across the desk in a desperate grab for one of the guns lying there.

The Denham policeman and one of Painter’s detectives leaped in fast to pull him back before he could get hold of a gun, and Painter strutted forward and barked orders for the teller to be locked up and charged with Carson’s murder.

The telephone on Painter’s desk rang as they were dragging Barstow away, and Painter scooped it up and said hello.

He listened briefly, drumming the fingers of his right hand on the desk-top and swivelling his eyes around to Shayne who slid his hip off the desk and stood up casually.

“He happens to be right here in my office,” Painter said thickly and with remarkable restraint. “Your secretary, Shayne.” He thrust the instrument toward the redhead who eased his hip down to the wood again and took it.

“Hi, angel. How’d you guess where to reach me this time of night?”

“I’ve been calling everywhere, Michael.” Lucy Hamilton’s voice was tearful. “I can’t even find Tim Rourke, and I’ve been hearing the most awful reports over the radio. I’ve got Lawyer Prentice standing by, Michael... with a bondsman. How... bad is it?”

“Not bad at all, angel,” Shayne reassured her. “Forget all about the lawyer and the bondsman. That is...” He hesitated, lifting a quizzical eyebrow at Peter Painter. “... I guess you can.”

“Go on,” said Painter, thin-lipped. “But if Whitey Buford dies you’ll face a manslaughter charge.”

“For capturing an escaped convict who murdered a prison guard?” asked Shayne incredulously. “Nuts.” Into the mouthpiece he said, “Get on your prettiest bib and tucker, Lucy. I’ve got a two hundred and fifty dollar retainer that I just earned... and it’s begging to be spent on champagne and caviar... with a modicum of brandy on the side to wash the taste of Painter’s jail out of my mouth.”