The Uncomplaining Corpses

Chapter Sixteen: A MAN SAYS THINGS

There were police all over the place. A thick-necked sergeant recognized Shayne as he crossed the lobby, and he stepped forward to intercept him. He took Shayne by the arm and said gruffly:

“What you wanta pop up here for, Mike? We got a pickup on you for the Beach in case you don’t know.”

Shayne said, “I know, Shannon. Is the chief upstairs?”

“Yeh. Three-o-six.” They moved toward the elevator together. “You could duck out the back way right now,” Shannon muttered. “I’ll see that the boys stay clammed up.”

A frightened Negro operator was waiting to take them up in the elevator. He rolled his eyes at the burly sergeant with the redheaded detective, clanged the door shut, and went up to the third floor without waiting for an order.

A couple of cops outside 306 were holding back an excited and morbidly curious group of chattering tenants. They stepped aside to let Shannon push Shayne through.

A police photographer had his tripod set up and was shooting pictures of the interior of Mona Tabor’s apartment with the body of Carl Meldrum lying in the center of the floor. His forehead was smashed and there were dried trickles of blood on his heavy cheek. His mouth gaped open, showing bloodless gums. He didn’t look much like a dashing Don Juan. There was a bloody cognac bottle on the floor beside him.

Two men were methodically getting fingerprints from objects in the room, and the sound of subdued voices came out through the open bedroom door.

Shayne and the sergeant walked around the body to the door. Buell Renslow was sitting upright on the unmade bed, and Will Gentry stood solidly in front of him. Two detectives lounged in the background. Renslow’s wrists were handcuffed in front of him. His clothes were mussed and there was a bruise and a small cut under his right eye. Haunted eyes stared out of his ashen face and his lips twitched back from his teeth.

Gentry was saying, “That sort of story isn’t going to get you anywhere. Nobody else saw any girl. You’re the only outsider the elevator boy brought up tonight. You might as well come clean and get it off your mind.”

Renslow looked past him and his eyes lighted up when they saw Michael Shayne in the doorway. He croaked, “There’s Shayne. He’ll tell you when I left the Tally-Ho. He’ll tell you I couldn’t have got here in time to kill him.” His eyes appealed to Shayne, then his lids batted down several times in quick succession, as if he tried to send a secret message.

Gentry turned slowly. He said, “Hello, Mike. I’ve been wondering when you would turn up.”

Shayne nodded and stepped forward with hands in his coat pockets. He avoided meeting the frantic petition in Renslow’s eyes. He asked, “What goes here?”

Will Gentry gestured disgustedly toward the prisoner. “We walked in on this bird red-handed and he gives us a nutty story about getting here after it happened. He swears he doesn’t know a damned thing about it. Says you’ll alibi him.”

“What about some girl?”

“That’s the craziest part of his story,” Gentry snorted. His back was to Renslow and he dropped his right eyelid in a slow, significant wink for Shayne. “He claims this girl was in there with the corpse when he opened the door. She threw down on him with a. 25 automatic and he jumped her. He says they wrestled over the pistol and he finally got it, but she sprinted out and did a neat disappearing act.”

“That’s the way it happened,” Renslow said hoarsely. “She must have slipped down the stairs while you were coming up the elevator. If you’ll just look for her-”

“We’ve got the description you gave us on the radio,” Gentry said patiently over his shoulder, then went on to Shayne: “This guy’s a quick thinker all right. He had a description of the girl on tap. If he’s telling the truth maybe you’ll recognize her-maybe you’ve run into her with your fooling around on the Thrip case. Here’s what he says she looked like…” He described Phyllis in, detail, while holding the detective’s gaze fixedly.

Shayne’s frown became deeper and his expression more perplexed as Gentry finished He shook his head and said placidly, “Why, no, Will. I’m pretty sure there’s no one like that mixed up in this case. Just grabbing for an out, I guess.”

“That’s what I thought,” Gentry told him briskly. “Just for the record, you might bust the alibi he claims you can give him.”

“When did you fellows get here?” Shayne asked guardedly.

“Eleven-fifty-five. We got a riot call from the landlady at eleven-fifty. She screamed murder in apartment three-o-six and a radio car was here in five minutes.”

Shayne hunched his shoulders up and shook his head. “I’m afraid I can’t alibi him. He left the Tally-Ho at eleven-thirty-eight-I looked at my watch. It’s an easy ten-minute drive.”

An animal snarl came from deep in Renslow’s throat and twisted on his lips. “You dirty bastard! You dirty double-crossing cop. You’re all alike. Putting me on the spot, damn your soul to hell. Not me! Not this time!”

He came to his feet with a rush, swinging his manacled arms high.

Gentry and Shayne grabbed him and pushed him down on the bed. His features were fearfully contorted and he wheezed loudly between tight lips.

Gentry said sharply to his two men, “Watch him, you lugs,” then turned to Shayne. “Maybe you know how he figures in this, Mike. The dead man is the Carl Meldrum you were talking about this morning in connection with the Thrip killing. And this is Mona Tabor’s apartment. Is there any tie-up, or is this something different?”

“I’ve told you I don’t know anything about the other,” Renslow panted from behind them. “I just came to see Mona and I walked into a murder.”

Gentry disregarded the ex-convict’s outburst, regarding Shayne gravely. “How about it, Mike?”

Shayne’s eyebrows were drawn down and there were three deep creases flaring out from between his eyes. He asked gently, “Do you know who you’ve got handcuffed, Will?”

“No. He’s got no identification on him and he refuses to tell his name.”

“His name,” said private detective Michael Shayne with a faint note of pity, “is Buell Renslow. He just happens to be Leora Thrip’s brother-an ex-convict who did a stretch in Colorado for murder. Is that answer enough, Will?”

Curses were frothing out of Renslow’s mouth in a deadly monotone.

Will Gentry nodded briskly. “I’d say that was plenty. Do you think he was hooked up in his sister’s death?”

Shayne didn’t answer at once. He was tugging at the lobe of his left ear and he looked perplexed. The two detectives were holding Renslow while he cursed Shayne and Gentry impartially.

At last Shayne said, “To tell the absolute truth, Will, I’m pretty sure I have positive evidence that Renslow murdered Mrs. Thrip last night-that he killed Meldrum to keep him from talking.”

“Shut up,” Renslow raged. “Are you forgetting that million I promised-”

“Good for you, Mike,” Gentry exulted. “Damned if you don’t always pull one out of the bag when you need it the worst.” He moved away from the bed, adding over his shoulder, “Take this mug down and book him on suspicion of murder.”

Shayne drew back with Gentry, keeping a placidly unconcerned countenance when Renslow broke into rasping sobs as he was led away.

Gentry followed them into the outer room and conferred briefly with his homicide experts, then came back and closed the bedroom door.

Shayne had sunk into a rocking-chair near the window and had a cigarette going. His head was tilted back and he watched whorls of blue smoke eddy up toward the ceiling.

Gentry sat down heavily and lit a cigar. The silence became oppressive. Gentry twisted uneasily and finally asked, “How about it, Mike?”

“How about what?”

“Well-you know, damn it. Your wife, mostly.”

Shayne got up. He turned his back on the chief of Miami detectives and took two short strides to the opposite wall. He stopped, facing it, and his voice was muffled.

“What about Phyllis?”

“Better talk it out right now,” Gentry advised. “There’ll never be a better time. I had to put her description on the radio.”

Shayne whirled on the older man. “Why did you have to? You could have stalled it. I thought you were my friend. Hell!”

Gentry said, “Don’t, Mike.”

“Why not?” Shayne’s nostrils were widely flared, his eyes crazy. He leaned his shoulders against the wall and put his hands deep in the slash pockets of his belted trench coat. “Why shouldn’t I say it out loud? I trusted you, like a damned fool. I told you Phyl had gone to Meldrum to help me out. Your damned flatfeet are out hunting her now. They’ll drag her in off the street and throw her in the can with a lot of whores. And you ask me what about my wife!”

Will Gentry had let his cigar go out. He looked old and wearied, dismayed. He said, “You know I’ll do what I can.”

“I’ll bury my own dead after this. I don’t want any help from you.”

Will Gentry stood up. His blunt jaw was thrust out, but there was pity in his eyes. “Don’t say things you’ll regret, Mike. We’ve been through some tough spots together.”

“To hell with that stuff.” Shayne made a savage gesture. “When it comes to a showdown you let me down flat. On the word of an ex-convict you send out a pickup for my wife.”

“I didn’t know he was an ex-con. And if I had, I still would have had to play it that way. I don’t believe his story, Mike. I didn’t believe it from the first.”

“Then why didn’t you wait to send out Phyl’s description?”

“Be reasonable,” Gentry begged. He mopped sweat from his forehead. “You know the police business. If you’d put yourself in my place-”

Shayne strode to a chair and dropped into it. He rubbed the palm of his hand down over his eyes and face and chin. “Yeh, I–I guess I am going off half cocked.”

Gentry watched him hopefully. He pulled out the fingers of his left hand, cracked each big knuckle with intent concentration. He blew out a deep sigh of relief and sat down to relight his cigar.

Shayne asked, “Where’s the pistol Renslow said he took from Phyl?”

“Right here.” Gentry drew a. 25 automatic from his coat pocket. “No prints on it and that’s a funny thing if they wrestled over it like he said.”

Shayne took the tiny flat gun and turned it over and over in his hands. “Renslow probably got panicky and rubbed them off.” He lifted the pistol to his nose and sniffed the muzzle.

“It’s been shot-once,” Gentry told him.

Shayne looked straight into his eyes. “Was Meldrum shot with it?”

“Doc Evans couldn’t find a wound,” Gentry hedged. “He said, though, that there might be a slug in his head with the wound covered by the blow he received. He’ll check in the post-mortem.”

Shayne’s eyes brooded over the little gun in his hand. Without looking at Gentry he asked, “How do you figure it this far?”

“I can’t do much figuring with no more to go on,” Gentry complained. “Did Renslow know Phyllis?”

“No. He had never seen her.”

“Then she must have been here,” Gentry pointed out wearily. “He couldn’t have described her otherwise.”

“How do you know he was describing Phyl?” Shayne flared. “Hell! his description could fit a hundred women in Miami just as well.”

“Not women who are known to have spent the day with Meldrum. You told me yourself-”

“Forget what I told you. That’s when I thought I could trust you.”

“Look, Mike. This isn’t getting you anywhere. The clerk at the hotel-a lot of people must know Phyllis was with Meldrum. Let’s look at it that way. Maybe she came here with him. Maybe he-maybe she had to shoot him to protect herself.”

“And then busted his head open with a brandy bottle?” Shayne asked angrily.

“Well, a twenty-five bullet in the head might not stop him,” Gentry argued. “Depend where it went in and what bone it hit. Suppose it did happen that way? Phyllis will be in the clear. With Meldrum’s reputation-”

Shayne stood up. “Damn you,” he said thickly, “you’re twisting it around to fit Renslow’s story. I’m not admitting Phyl was here at all.”

Gentry didn’t say anything. He held out his hand for the automatic. After a moment’s hesitation, Shayne dropped it into his palm. Gentry slipped it into his pocket and his expression hardened. He stood up to face the man who had been his friend for ten years.

He said, “I won’t take much more of that, Mike. I’ve pulled your chestnuts out of the fire plenty of times but I’ve always done it because I believed you were on the level. I won’t go along any other way.”

“You’ll take whatever I want to hand out,” Shayne muttered.

“No.” Will Gentry shook his head. “You’re not yourself. You’re drunk and you’re crazy mad and worried about Phyllis, Mike.”

For a long moment Shayne stared down into Gentry’s face. The chief stared back patiently. Shayne nodded and his laugh was ugly. “Okay. If that’s the way you want it.”

“That’s the way it has to be. This gun can be traced.” Gentry patted his pocket. “If it belongs to you or your wife, she’ll have to explain how it got here.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Shayne challenged.

Gentry shrugged. “Then we’ll check on the owner, of course.” He paused to rub his chin, then burst out suddenly:

“Come clean with me, Mike! How can I help you if you won’t let me? You said you had evidence that Renslow killed his sister, and had to kill Meldrum to stay clean. What is your evidence? Turn it over to me and if it’s good enough to stand up, why, the whole thing will be ended.”

“I was talking through my hat,” Shayne muttered. “When I realized Phyllis had been here and he was trying to pin the killing on her I talked fast to get you to put him away.”

“I don’t like that,” Gentry said. “You didn’t have to lie to me.”

“Maybe it wasn’t a lie. Maybe I’ll pop up with the evidence yet.”

“Be damned sure it’s not faked,” Gentry warned him.

“Have you ever caught me framing an innocent man?” Swift anger crackled in Shayne’s voice.

“No. Nobody has ever caught you, Mike. Personally, I’ve never believed you’d do it. But I believe you’re in a mood right now to frame anybody to clear Phyllis in this mess.”

“Maybe I won’t have to pull a frame. Maybe you’ll decide it wasn’t Phyllis after you check up on that pistol,”

Gentry studied him in open bewilderment. “Are you playing another one of your little games for cash? Won’t Renslow come into a batch of Mrs. Thrip’s money if he isn’t booked for murdering her?”

“A few million,” Shayne admitted placidly.

“You weren’t lying when you first mentioned the evidence against him,” Gentry charged. “I know when a man’s telling the truth. You were worried about your wife and blurted it out. Later you got to thinking how much it might be worth to keep that evidence hidden, and I’ll be eternally damned if I don’t believe you’d leave Phyllis in jeopardy for a million bucks.”

Michael Shayne grinned a crooked grin. Cords stood out on either side of his jaw. “That’s a pretty hard thing to say about a man.”

“And I’m sorry you made me say it. But what else did Renslow mean when he mentioned the million you were throwing away? By God, it makes me want to vomit.”

“Go on and vomit,” Shayne advised him coldly. He was composed now, with an iron grip on himself. The smile on his mouth was sardonic. “A man can get a lot of women for a million dollars. I almost fooled you with my act about Phyllis, didn’t I?”

Will Gentry backed away from him, shaking his head. “I’ve always stood up for you, Mike. I’ve always said there was a streak of decency buried under your toughness. But now-I don’t know.”

“How touching.” Shayne’s voice was acid. “Why don’t you preach me a sermon on the sanctity of marriage and a husband’s duty to cleave to his wife even though she is a murderess? That’s what you think, isn’t it?”

“Shut up, Mike. You’re talking like a fool,” Gentry snapped.

“I’m saying what you’re thinking. To hell with it.” He stalked toward the door angrily.

Gentry followed after him. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Out.” Shayne kept moving.

“There’s a Miami Beach warrant for you.”

“Somebody’ll get killed if they try to serve it.” Shayne kept on going.

Gentry stopped and moodily watched him go into the living-room. Meldrum’s body had been taken away but there was still a group of policemen in the room.

They started to intercept Shayne but behind them Gentry shook his head and said, “No.”

Shayne went out to the elevator. He rang for a car and waited. There was no color in his cheeks, no expression on his face. He got in the car and went down, strode through the lobby without looking to right or left.

Most of the police cars were gone from in front of the building and the crowd had been dispersed. He got in his roadster and drove away slowly, keeping a careful watch behind him and making very certain that he was not being tailed.

He switched his radio to short wave and began picking up police calls when he hit the boulevard and turned south toward the city. After a couple of routine stolen car announcements, the police announcer droned:

“Supplementing description of woman wanted for questioning in murder as broadcast at twelve-three; supplementing description of woman murder suspect: This woman has been tentatively identified as Mrs. Michael Shayne-Mrs. Michael Shayne-wife of the private detective also being sought. Cover all known places frequented by this couple; cover the Shayne home address and any friends or relatives with whom either might communicate. Arrest either Mr. or Mrs. Michael Shayne. That is all.”

Michael Shayne lifted one sweaty hand and then the other from the steering-wheel and wiped them dry on his coat. He stared straight ahead down the almost deserted boulevard and his body jerked with craving for a drink.

The police announcement was Will Gentry’s answer to the scene in Mona Tabor’s apartment. A part of Shayne did not blame Gentry. He had a police job to do, and Shayne had made it tough on him.

But deep down inside a sick anger throbbed through Shayne’s body like the gnawing of a cancer. Will Gentry should have trusted him. Wasn’t there enough between them for that? He’d never let Gentry down in the past. Wasn’t that enough?

Evidently not. Sure, he had gone off his kazip and said some things he didn’t mean up there in the apartment. That shouldn’t have mattered either. A man says things he doesn’t mean Shayne felt wholly alone for the first time in his life. It wasn’t a good feeling. He had played a lone game in the past but there had always been that good inward feeling that he had one friend who was backing him to the limit and beyond. Well, he knew where Gentry stood now. That was something. Mike Shayne had never been one to sugar-coat distasteful facts. Part of his lone wolf tactics in the past had been the result of pride. There had been a savage thrill in playing fast and loose against every conventional morality and coming out on top against tremendous odds. That thrill was gone now. He was up against something different.

He wondered where in God’s name Phyllis was.

Despite the warmth of the Miami night he shivered. Wanting Phyllis was a physical pain that stabbed through the whole length of him. What had actually happened up in that apartment before the police came? He had lied about the time Renslow left the Tally-Ho. He didn’t know what time it was. He hadn’t looked at his watch. It had been an instinctive lie to gain a little time to think things out.

Had Renslow reached the apartment after murder was done? The pistol had been fired only once. He couldn’t be sure, of course, but it looked exactly like the automatic Dora had brought to his apartment to kill him with-the pistol that had disappeared from the desk drawer coincident with Phyllis’s departure.

Dora had fired one bullet from that pistol into the ceiling. Let them trace it to her If Phyl had gone to the apartment with Meldrum for his midnight interview and then been forced to resist an attack with the empty cognac bottle, why had she ducked out? That wasn’t like Phyllis.

Still, Shayne had seen too much killing to figure it that way. The reaction to violent death causes people to do all sorts of crazy, impulsive things.

Why in hell hadn’t he laid his cards on the table before Gentry? Those scraps of paper in his pocket were plenty to convict Buell Renslow of two murders. Was it because suppression of that evidence was worth a million dollars to Renslow? Was that the subconscious motivation that had prompted him to keep his mouth shut?

He didn’t know. Mike Shayne had always tried to be honest with himself. He tried now, but it was no go. He discovered that no man can honestly say what impulse motivates a certain action. Maybe he was willing to throw Phyllis over for a million dollars. Gentry thought so. Maybe Gentry knew him better than Shayne knew himself.

He was nearing the lights of downtown Miami and he slowed to get a grip on himself. He couldn’t go to his hotel. He hoped Phyllis would know she had been recognized and wouldn’t go there.

He turned off the boulevard at Third Street, and parked his roadster in an all-night parking-lot. On foot, he made his way to an obscure side-street hotel where he kept his hat pulled low over his eyes and signed the register as Horatio Ramsey. The sleepy-eyed clerk assured him it would be possible to get a bottle of cognac when Shayne shoved a five-dollar bill across the desk, and the detective went up to a second-floor room where he jerked windows open to let a night breeze drive out the musty air.

He then went to a wall telephone and called his apartment hotel. The switchboard operator was off duty after midnight and the night clerk took the call. Shayne got a funny gurgle over the wire when he said, “Mike Shayne talking.”

The clerk said nervously, “I see. Just a minute while I step inside and look that up for you.”

Shayne waited, frowning at the cracked and yellow plaster in front of him. After a couple of minutes the clerk’s voice came cautiously:

“Mr. Shayne, I was afraid to talk to you out there. The lobby-it’s full of cops and-”

“I know. They’re looking for me. What about Mrs. Shayne? Has she showed up or called?”

“Y-yes. That’s what I wanted to tell you. They just arrested her. They’ve been waiting all evening and they grabbed her when she came in. Some of them are staying in the hope that you’ll show up.”

Shayne said, “They’ll have a long wait. Thanks. Forget this call.” He hung up, scowling darkly.

There was a knock at his door and he opened it cautiously. A boy stood there with a package. Shayne took it, closed the door, and worried the cork of a cognac bottle with his teeth. He held it tipped to his mouth for a long time, then moved across to the bed and sat down heavily.

His mouth wasn’t dry any longer. At least he knew where Phyllis was. And, no matter what he had said to Gentry in anger, he knew the Miami police would make it as easy on her as they could.

He tilted the bottle again. He wasn’t cold any more. A fevered glow was spreading out from the pit of his stomach. His brain was beginning to work again. He wasn’t whipped yet-he still held a few trumps. Played right, he might start raking in a few tricks for a change.

Another drink would help him think things out. He took one, and it did.