When Dorinda Dances

Chapter XI

“That,” said Timothy Rourke, “is what I’ve been waiting to hear. The dead man is Hiram Godfrey, of course.”

“You’re nuts, Tim,” Shayne said impatiently.

“I don’t think so.” The reporter bent forward and tapped the bottle of hair dye. “This is the clue you’re neglecting. You pointed it out yourself at the plant. A man like Brewer isn’t the type to use a cheap article and apply it himself. He would have a professional job.”

“So?”

“So, what was this bottle doing in the lavatory unless Brewer used it to dye his partner’s hair black after killing him in the boat yesterday afternoon?”

Gentry grunted, and Shayne started to offer an argument, but Rourke held up his hand and said, “Wait — let me tell it my way, all of it. Don’t you realize how peculiar it was for Brewer to go out in the boat with Godfrey — alone? We know he was deathly afraid his partner was planning to murder him. Yet he makes this trip on the bay the day before Godfrey is due to leave for New York. Why?” His eyes glittered in their deep sockets as he flashed them from Shayne to Gentry. He stood up and began pacing the floor.

“I’ll tell you why,” he continued. “I’m guessing that Brewer planned to get the jump on Godfrey when he went for the boat ride. He provides himself with a bottle of hair dye that can be applied instantly, and an outfit of his own clothes. You told me yourself, Mike, that Brewer said he and his partner were about the same build.

“When they’re out on the bay, Brewer simply pulls a switch — gets his lick in first. After killing Godfrey, probably in the same manner as he described Godfrey’s attack on himself, he wet his partner’s head with salt water, applied the dye, stripped off his clothes, and dressed him in the suit he had brought along. He then put his own wallet and other identification in the pockets, smashed up Godfrey’s face beyond recognition, and even took the precaution of mangling the fingertips to destroy any possibility of prints. After that — splash — and Godfrey’s body is in the water, and he hightails it to your office to give you that cock-and-bull story.”

There was a faint smile on Shayne’s wide mouth. “It makes a pretty story, Tim, but I still don’t get the basic angle.”

“It’s perfectly logical,” Rourke contended. “Here’s this situation between the partners coming to a climax. Brewer realizes he will be the best suspect if Godfrey is found murdered. So he figures out the plan I’ve outlined. It won’t be Godfrey who is found murdered. It will be Brewer. He will disappear, and no one will bother to look for Brewer, because he will be dead and buried.”

“What good would all that hocus pocus do him in the long run?” Gentry demanded. “He can’t ever reappear to get his share of the business.”

“Brewer happens to be a married man,” Rourke reminded him. “His estate will go to his wife eventually. All he has to do is stay out of sight, and have her meet him later in South America or some place with the money — and a new name.”

“You’re forgetting another thing in your fantastic theory,” said Shayne bluntly. “Brewer’s wife was in love with Godfrey, according to his story.”

“Sure. According to Brewer’s story,” gibed Rourke. “You have only his word for it, and who is there to deny it? He knew Godfrey couldn’t. Godfrey was dead before Brewer came to your office.”

Shayne quirked a ragged red brow at Will Gentry. “Does any of this make sense to you?”

“When did Tim Rourke ever make sense?” rumbled Gentry. “You stick to writing fairy tales in your newspaper,” he added to Rourke.

“Wait a minute,” Shayne interposed abruptly. “Let Tim go on with it. Why did Brewer come to my office with that story if he’d done what you suggest?”

“Because he had to establish the fact that the corpse is his and not Godfrey’s,” Rourke told him in the patient tone of one explaining a simple problem to a mental deficient. “He can’t afford to have both partners disappear after that boat trip. He’d be afraid there would be an element of doubt as to which body it was, and a more thorough investigation would be made, ending in the positive identification of Godfrey.

“To forestall that, he hires a private detective who will swear that Godfrey got on the plane for New York this morning. That leaves only Brewer missing — and a body is washed up wearing Brewer’s clothes and hair dyed black. Ergo. It is accepted as Brewer with no questions asked.”

“But Godfrey is immediately our best suspect,” Gentry argued. “So we jerk him off his plane — the man Brewer has hired to impersonate Godfrey — and bring him back on a murder charge. The man obviously wouldn’t be Godfrey, and couldn’t pass for him in Miami for a minute. So the whole plot falls flat on its face.”

“But you didn’t drag Godfrey off the plane,” Rourke pointed out wearily, “because he had an unimpeachable alibi — cleverly provided by Brewer. Don’t you get it? That was the essence of his plan. He had to fix things so Godfrey couldn’t possibly be suspected — at least until the man impersonating him had a chance to reach New York and drop out of sight.”

Gentry had been jotting notes on a pad. He pushed it away, took out a handkerchief and mopped perspiration from his beefy face, and said, “It’s getting too damned complicated for me. You pick some holes in it, Mike.”

“There are a few things,” Shayne said absently. “How, for instance, did the bottle of hair dye get back in Brewer’s office laboratory if he used it out on the bay to dye Godfrey’s hair after murdering him?”

“Might be a dozen explanations,” said Rourke promptly. “This could be a bottle he bought beforehand to try it out on himself. Or maybe he forgot to take it along, and had to pick up another bottle on the way to the boat.”

“Could be,” Shayne agreed. There was an expression of searching concentration on his lean face. “But what about Hank Black’s seeing a picture of Godfrey in the papers and swearing he was not the man he tailed all night?”

“Not much chance of that,” said Rourke. “On a job like that, Hank wouldn’t get too close. Besides, in a news photo you don’t get coloring — hair, eyes, and so on. Of course,” he continued thoughtfully, “Black is a pretty smart cookie, and he might catch on. But don’t forget, Brewer didn’t pick out a really smart operator like Hank for the job. That was accidental. Because you already had a client and couldn’t take him on. What he did was go to a dumb Irish Shamus named Mike Shayne — who doesn’t recognize a murder solution when it’s handed to him on a silver platter.”

Shayne grinned. “Might be something in that.” He turned to Gentry with a frown. “Crazy as this sounds, Will, it can’t hurt anything to have the New York cops pick up Hiram Godfrey — or the man who’s impersonating him.”

“I can do better than that,” growled Gentry. “After listening to Gibson this morning I thought it might be smart to check on Godfrey. I arranged with New York to have a couple of men on his tail at La Guardia when his plane lands.”

Shayne nodded agreement. “One sure way of checking Tim’s theory is to show Black a picture of Godfrey. Think you’ve got one in the morgue, Tim?”

“Should have several. Both Brewer and Godfrey were pretty well known in business circles. Let’s go see.”

Shayne stood up and suggested to Gentry, “Why not get hold of Black and have him meet us in the Daily News morgue?”

“Sure. Right away, Mike.”