Shoot the Works

Chapter six

Sunlight was slanting in the north window when Michael Shayne wakened the next morning. He judged it was close to nine o’clock. He reached for a cigarette on the table beside him, lit it and drew in a deep lungful of smoke.

He wondered, wryly, if Kitty Heffner had come out of her coma and left the apartment, or whether she was still in the other room, stretched out on the sofa. He hoped to God she had waked up and departed decently. It would be awkward if she was still there. She wouldn’t look so good in the bright light of morning and nursing a hangover, and she would be conscious of the fact.

While he lay quietly and smoked his first cigarette, he went over what she had told him about Jim Wallace and his amorous tendencies. It didn’t add up to the picture he’d gotten of Wallace from Lucy and Mrs. Wallace, but then a lot of things often didn’t add up in a murder case. It was hard to determine exactly how much truth there had been in Kitty’s words, but he felt there doubtless was a certain amount.

Of course, it didn’t have to mean very much when a man in his fifties tried to recapture some of the thrills of youth by pawing other women after a few drinks. It was accepted trade practice in the circles in which the Wallaces and Martins moved. Few men of that social status and age would be aroused to a murderous pitch even if they were aware their wives were being actively unfaithful. Certainly, on the surface Rutherford Martin did not appear to be the type to avenge his honor with a gun.

The fact that Kitty had seen him going back into his bedroom fully clothed two hours after he had ostensibly retired was not at all conclusive. With a female bridge party in the front room, it was definitely conceivable that Martin had excused himself with a plea that he was sleepy, and had merely gone back to the bedroom to relax with a drink. He might well have been returning from the kitchen or the bathroom when Kitty saw him.

On the other hand, it was a lead that would have to be followed up. How could it square with the two airline tickets in Wallace’s wallet? They were almost conclusive evidence that Wallace had planned to skip out to South America this morning with some companion. Certainly not with Mrs. Martin, Shayne thought. And that was the only possibility that could have led Martin to murder. Indeed, if it were true that Wallace and his wife were having an affair and Martin was aware of it, he should have been pleased rather than angered to discover that Wallace was skipping with someone else.

Shayne frowned and stretched out a long arm to mash out his cigarette. Of course, there was the possibility that, if Martin had known about the affair and had discovered Wallace’s plan, he might have jumped to the conclusion that Ella planned to go with Wallace and therefore felt it was his husbandly duty to stop them.

Because a husband, Shayne told himself, didn’t see his wife exactly as other men saw her. At least, the detective assumed he didn’t. It was more likely, Shayne thought, that, in middle-age, a husband probably still thought of his wife more as the lovely young girl he had married than as the dowdy woman she had become over the years. Thus, he would be much more liable to jealousy, much more liable to suspect another man of planning to elope with her than an outsider would be.

Shayne sighed and swung his leg out from under the covers and stood up in his wrinkled seersucker pajamas. He hated to open the door into the living room for fear he’d find Kitty Heffner there, but he couldn’t stay in bed all day. He got a bathrobe and slippers from a closet and put them on, then slowly opened the door as quietly as he could.

The sofa was vacant. The tray with its bottle and three glasses still stood on the table in front, and on the floor lay the empty wine-glass that had dropped from Kitty’s lax fingers just before she passed out.

Shayne stepped out cautiously and a swift glance around the room assured him she was not there. The bathroom and kitchen were also happily empty. He put on water to boil for coffee, filled the top of the dripolator, got out bacon and eggs and a heavy frying pan. He crisped four slices of bacon and laid them out on a sheet of paper towel to drain, poured boiling water in the top of the dripolator and dropped two slices of bread in the toaster. Then he poured off most of the bacon grease and broke four eggs into the hot pan, let the whites set a trifle before stirring them with a fork.

The toast was brown and the coffee had dripped through when he transferred the mess of eggs to a plate and arranged the bacon around the edge. He poured coffee and buttered the toast, put his breakfast on a tray and carried it in to the center table in the living room.

A sheet of white paper with penciled words on it lay on the table. He stood very still and read the words, holding the tray in both hands.

“I’ll always be sorry I don’t know what happened.”

There was no signature. Shayne sighed and set the tray down on top of the paper. He wondered when Kitty had awakened, how much she had actually remembered about the previous night. He knew exactly when she had passed out physically, but he also knew that drunken people often had mental blackouts that preceded the physical manifestation.

She must have felt like hell when she woke up in the strange room and found herself lying there alone on the sofa, fully dressed but with her clothing somewhat disarranged.

But Kitty was old enough to take it in her stride. He refused to brood about her as he ate the excellent breakfast with gusto, and went back into the kitchen for a second cup of coffee which he heated to boiling and then laced with brandy from the bottle by the sofa.

He had just sat down to enjoy it comfortably with a cigarette when his telephone rang.

He supposed it would be Lucy as he reached for it, but a man’s voice came over the wire. “Mr. Shayne. Bob Pearce. I just drove Lucy over to the office and I want to see you at once.”

“Come up here,” Shayne suggested, “and have some coffee with me.”

“Thanks. I’ll be there in a few minutes. And Lucy would like to speak to you.” Her voice followed immediately, “Any news, Michael?”

“Not much. Not really. How was it last night?”

“Pretty bad. Helen went all to pieces and we had a doctor in to give her a sedative, but Mrs. Wallace was wonderful. I hate to think what it might do to Helen if she finds out about those airplane tickets, Michael. You’ve just got to keep them quiet.”

He said, “They’re still in my pocket, angel. Any cops bother you?”

“Not really. Though I know one followed us home and watched the house last night. He’s still there this morning. Will Gentry is crazy, Michael, to even suspect Mrs. Wallace had anything to do with it.”

Shayne said, “U-m-m,” and took a sip of coffee royal. “Hold down the fort and I’ll be in later.”

He had shaved and dressed, and reheated the remaining coffee to the boiling point when his door buzzer sounded. He turned out the gas flame under the coffee and went to the door, opened it to admit Bob Pearce who smiled wanly as he walked in and dragged off his hat. “Nice of you to let me barge in so early, Mr. Shayne. And I’ll never be able to thank you enough for agreeing to keep quiet about those airplane tickets Mother found in Jim’s wallet.”

Pearce was inches shorter than the redhead, a well-fleshed young man in his middle twenties, with a smooth light complexion and crew-cut blond hair that made him look younger than he was.

Shayne said sardonically, “Think nothing of it. Lucy made it very clear that I’d be minus a secretary this morning if I didn’t play along. How did your wife take the news?”

“Very well. Considering everything.” Pearce pursed his lips nervously and thrust both hands deep into the pockets of his well-pressed slacks. “Neither Mother nor Lucy gave her any inkling about the indications that Jim was planning to leave town before Mother arrived today. Do you believe it, Mr. Shayne?” he burst out impetuously. “Isn’t there any other possible answer? It’s just fantastic to think that about Jim after all these years.”

Shayne shrugged and said, “There are always a lot of possible answers, Bob. Cup of coffee?”

“Thanks.” Pearce wandered across the room after him as the detective long-legged it to the kitchen. He stopped near the center table and stood there, looking young and helpless and worried while Shayne poured out two cups of coffee, calling in from the kitchen: “Cream, sugar… or cognac?”

“Nothing,” Pearce told him.

Shayne came back with two steaming cups and set them on the table, added brandy to his. Behind his back, Pearce burst out nervously, “There’s something I’ve got to tell you, Mr. Shayne. I don’t know whether it means anything or not, and I wouldn’t breathe a word of it to another soul, but I know I can trust you to keep it confidential.”

Shayne sat down and lit a cigarette. He looked at the younger man steadily through a cloud of blue smoke.

He said, “Don’t make any mistakes, Bob. Nothing is confidential in a murder case. I’ll make my own decision about anything you tell me that has any bearing on Wallace’s murder.”

“I guess I didn’t mean that exactly.” Pearce sat down unhappily and stared across the room past Shayne. “I’ve got to tell you, and I know you’ll keep it quiet, if you can. It probably doesn’t mean anything,” he went on rapidly. “But I keep thinking it may have some bearing on what happened last night.” He lifted his coffee cup in a shaking hand, set it down hastily as the black liquid burned his lips.

“I just don’t understand it about Jim. He was just about like a father to me, Mr. Shayne. I admired him tremendously. I always thought he and Mother Wallace had one of the finest marriages I’ve ever known. I still think so,” he added defiantly. “No matter how anything looks. And I would never say a word if you hadn’t played ball with Mother last night and kept still about the airplane tickets.”

Shayne silently sipped his coffee, partially cooled by the addition of cognac, and waited for the young man to unburden himself.

“It was about a week ago,” Pearce said unhappily. “I dropped in to the brokerage office at twelve-thirty, hoping I’d find Jim free to have lunch with me. I had a favor to ask him… as a matter of fact, I needed a little loan to tide us over. He’s always urged me to let him know if we ever needed financial help, and so, I… well, I just thought I’d take him up on it.

“But he’d already left for lunch when I got there. I’d counted on seeing him, because I was in a sort of jam for cash and I asked his secretary if she knew where he was. She had heard him making a date over the telephone to meet someone for a drink at Callahan’s Bar on First Street at twelve-thirty, but she told me she’d heard him expressly say it would just be a quick drink and that was all. She was sure he wasn’t having lunch with whomever he was meeting. So I went down to Callahan’s, thinking I might find him alone and could ask him for a loan.”

He lifted his cup again and sipped from it this time. “I swear I wasn’t trying to meddle or anything. I didn’t have any idea… as I told you, Jim has been like a father to me and he’s the last man in the world I’d ever suspect of doing anything… you know…” The youth put down his cup and made a helpless gesture, and his guileless blue eyes pleaded with Shayne to believe him. “I never would have walked in on him, if I’d known… but his secretary did tell me where he was, and so…”

“I went in to Callahan’s and it was pretty crowded at the bar, but there were some empty tables in the back and I walked down the row of booths… and suddenly I saw Jim.”

Bob Pearce paused to gnaw at the tight knuckles of his right hand, closed into a fist.

“He was sitting in a booth, with his back to me, across from a woman I’d never seen before. She was young and, well, she was beautiful, I guess. I don’t know how to describe it. She looked up at me in a casual way as I started to pause and there was something about her that churned up my insides. You know how some women are? It was pure, unadulterated sex appeal. You look at a woman like that and you know the kind of woman she is. Not a whore. It goes way beyond that. Just a completely sexy woman with a roving eye for any male in the neighborhood. She was something!

“Well, it was a hell of a shock to see her sitting there with Jim Wallace and I realized I’d walked into a situation I should’ve steered clear of. Jim was leaning across the table talking to her and they both had drinks in front of them and he didn’t look up at me, so I kept right on going and the next booth was vacant and I slid into it, to get out of sight, because I didn’t want to embarrass Jim by having him see me.”

He paused, frowning, as though trying to recollect his thoughts. “I didn’t know what to think. It just hit me like a sledge-hammer. If it had been anybody but Jim! But there was just something clandestine and unhealthy about it and I wished to God I wasn’t there and had never seen her. And all I could think was to hope Jim would never know I had been there and seen him.”

“Weren’t you taking a lot for granted with very little to go on?” asked Shayne harshly. “How do you know she wasn’t a client?”

“You didn’t see her, Mr. Shayne. You don’t know… well, wait until I tell you the rest of it. I felt like a stinking eavesdropper and hated myself when I could hear some of what they were saying from the other booth, but I was afraid if I got up that Jim would see me, and by that time I would have died if he had. Because from what I could overhear he was telling her off, Mr. Shayne. Warning her to stay away from him, and I think he was offering her money to get out of town, and she laughed at him and said she’d do what she damned well pleased.”

Pearce miserably gulped down the last of his coffee. “You can imagine how I felt. I heard him tell her goodbye and he hoped it was the last time he’d see her, and then he went out. Jim Wallace! Mr. Shayne. Can you see how it hit me? My own father-in-law, whom I’ve always admired and respected. Playing around with a floosie like that! I couldn’t believe it. It just knocked the props from under me. And then a waiter came to take my order, and I told him I’d changed my mind and guessed I wouldn’t have lunch after all… and I got up to go out.”

Bob Pearce paused and lowered his eyes. “I meant to get out of there. I swear I did. But she was still sitting in the booth with her drink in front of her and she looked up at me and said, ‘Hi, you,’ and it suddenly came to me that maybe I owed it to Jim to find out more about her and what it was all about. I swear that’s what I thought when I sat down. At least, I think it is. I don’t think it was anything else. I didn’t then, anyhow. But now, I don’t know. Maybe I did have some other idea when I sat down across from her in the seat Jim had just left.

“Anyhow,” he went on bitterly, “I sat down and ordered a drink and tried to pump her about Jim. Pretending I was worried that he might come back and be jealous to find me sitting there with her. And she laughed and said he wouldn’t be back, and that he was an old fuddy-duddy who didn’t interest her anyhow, because she liked younger men and why didn’t we talk about different things? Which to her meant sex, of course. Mr. Shayne,” said Bob Pearce hoarsely, “you must have known women like that. I never had much experience with them and she frightened me, but, I kept thinking, if I could get her to drink enough, she’d tell me the truth about Jim and, if he was in some kind of jam with her, maybe I could help him out. Because the longer I stayed there with her, the more I understood how Jim might be in a jam with her, even if he was past fifty and Helen’s father and one of the swellest guys I ever knew.”

Bob Pearce hesitated and drew in a deep unhappy breath, and then met Shayne’s gaze squarely. “When I came up here I swore I was going to tell you everything and not make any excuses. We had a lot of drinks and things got fuzzy. I forgot all about Jim and I admit it. She said let’s go to her room and I… went. We took a taxi to her apartment out on Flagler and I was half passed-out and spent the rest of the afternoon. And that’s the last time I saw her and I hope I never see her again, but I had to tell you, no matter how disgusting it is, because, after last night, I got to thinking it might be important.”

Shayne dropped his cigarette butt into the dregs in his coffee cup and said, “I’m not passing any moral judgments, Bob. What is the woman’s name?”

“I don’t know. If she told me, I’ve forgotten. I’m not used to drinking much, and, by the time I left Callahan’s, I was pretty tight. She was about twenty-five. With a sort of broad face and high cheekbones. I don’t know how to describe her. Not conventionally beautiful, but alluring as hell. I guess that’s the right word. Alluring. She had long black hair that hung to her shoulders and curled up at the ends, and sensuous dark eyes that promise a man everything in the world he wants from a woman the first time she looks at you.

“I guess I sound sophomoric as the devil,” he went on shamefacedly. “But Helen is the only girl I ever touched in my life, and I was just bowled over by her. I do know her apartment was Three-A and it’s the only apartment building on the north side of Flagler between Thirtieth and Thirty-First.”

Shayne leaned back and lit another cigarette. “You never mentioned this to Jim Wallace?”

Pearce shuddered. “How could I? What could I have said? That I had seduced his mistress? I couldn’t bear to look him in the eye afterward. I’ve felt like cutting my throat ever since.”

Shayne grinned reassuringly at the younger man. “That, too, will pass,” he prophesied. “You deserve a lot of credit for telling me and I’ll check on her.”

The telephone rang as he jotted down the information about the girl’s address that Pearce had given him.

He said, “Hello,” and a worried voice asked, “Is that Michael Shayne?”

“Speaking.”

“Rutherford Martin, Mr. Shayne. Could you meet Mr. Tompkins and me in your office at once? It’s extremely important.”

“Something about Wallace?”

“Yes. We have some very important and highly confidential information that may shed an entirely new light on his death.”

Everyone connected with the case, Shayne thought morosely, seemed to have important and confidential information about Jim Wallace. Aloud, he temporized, “I’ll try to make it within an hour.”

“Please, Mr. Shayne. We expect you here at once. We wish to retain your services.”

Shayne said coldly, “I’ve already been retained by Mrs. Wallace.”

“This assignment needn’t conflict at all. In fact, it’s very probable that it will be the greatest assistance to you in solving the case. We’ll pay any retainer you ask.”

“In that case,” said Shayne, “I’ll be right over.” He hung up and rose, telling Pearce, “Go on home to your wife and mother-in-law, and salve your conscience by taking care of them now while they need you. I’ll be in touch with you.”