Michael Shayne's Long Chance (16 page)

Shayne went on up the steps cautiously, sidled down the hall to the partly opened door and stepped quickly past it. At the right rear he stopped and looked at a square of white cardboard thumbtacked to a closed door. In neat script, he read,
Miss Celia Gaston.

He bent down to inspect the lock, then took out a ring of keys and carefully selected one. It went in but would not turn the bolt. He tried another. The lock clicked and he stepped into a dark, musty room. He closed the door quietly, then went across to double windows and raised the shades a foot from the bottom. Enough light came in to reveal a primly ordered living-room. The furnishings were scant and worn. A long dark table against the wall was centered with a small reading lamp and decorated with painted sea shells and other bric-a-brac.

He looked around for an ash tray, but could find nothing to indicate that the occupant of the small apartment was a smoker. He took one of the larger sea shells, and after pushing the others about in careless disorder, carried it over and set it on the floor beside one of the chairs. He dumped the handful of cigarette stubs into it and crushed several of them against the clean pink sides, lit a cigarette and puffed steadily.

While he waited for ashes to form, he lit half a dozen matches, letting each one burn down about halfway before dropping them into the shell. He shook ashes in on top of the mess and continued to smoke furiously as he walked around and moved small things out of place. In the kitchenette he took a glass from an immaculate cabinet, ran water into it, emptied the water into the sink and turned the glass down on the drainboard.

Back in the living-room he crushed out his cigarette in the shell and lit another. He went through an open door into a small bedroom which was as neat and precisely arranged as the living-room had been. He lay down on the silken comforter, wriggled around and dragged out a pillow which he bunched up under his head. He let a few cigarette ashes fall on the comforter, then got up and went to the clothes closet.

He grinned when he found a large, empty cardboard hat-box on a shelf. He took it down, went to the bureau and rummaged through one of the long drawers and found an old newspaper which was used for a lining on the rough bottom of the drawer.

He wrapped the newspaper around the empty hatbox and with the package prominently showing in his arm went to the front door and inched it open cautiously. The Negro cleaning woman was singing in a deep resonant voice, but the words were indistinct.

He opened the door wider and thrust his head out to look down the hall. It was empty. The singing was coming from the interior of the second apartment to the left.

An ornate bridge lamp standing near the door caught his eye, one of the modern indirect lamps with a heavy glass reflector and a three-way bulb. He left the door standing open and backed up against the lamp, gave it a violent shove, and it fell to the floor with a shattering crash.

He heard a shriek from the second apartment to the left as he ran out and down the hall. The Negress burst out to confront him, her eyes rolling. She raised the dustmop threateningly and exclaimed, “Fo’ de Lawd’s sake, whut—” Shayne ran past her, hugging the package tightly in his arm, his free hand doubled into a swinging fist. The Negress shrank back against the wall moaning.

A shrill voice called from the hall below, “What’s the matter up there, Mandy?”

“Hit’s a thief, Miz Bradley. Stop him, Miz Bradley!” Shayne lunged down the stairway and bowled into a matron who stood transfixed at the foot of the stairs. He slammed out onto the porch pursued by two voices screaming for him to stop.

The cabbie had the taxi door open and the motor racing. When Shayne leaped in, he sped away just as the matron and the Negress reached the sidewalk, waving their arms and shouting, “Stop thief!”

Shayne sank back against the cushion and drew in a deep breath of relief. The driver raced around a corner into Bourbon Street, slowed, and turned to look at his passenger with a scowl of uncertainty and doubt.

“I don’t like this, Mister. Sure you’re a detective?”

“Of course I am.”

“Where’s your badge? Look, I don’t want to get in no trouble.”

“You don’t have to,” Shayne promised him. He took out a second five-dollar bill and said gruffly, “You earned this. Stop and let me out anywhere. And if you want to stay in the clear, go ahead and report the whole thing to the police right away.”

“Gee, I dunno.” He pulled up to the curb. “What you got in that box?”

Shayne grinned and said, “What I went after.” He slid out and walked rapidly up the street.

Around the first corner he disposed of the empty hatbox in a trash barrel and kept on walking back to Esplanade Avenue.

The area had a different appearance in the daytime, but he finally came to a high iron fence around a substantial old house surrounded with spacious grounds. A side driveway leading in had a sign reading
Club Daphne
over the arched entrance. He went on to the front gate and down a path between neatly clipped box hedges on either side to massive white columns guarding the front door.

He rang the bell and waited for a long time. He had his finger on the bell a second time when a narrow slot opened in the door at shoulder level and a pair of eyes peered out at him. He said, “I want to see Rudy,” and added, “Captain Denton sent me.”

The eyes disappeared after scrutinizing Shayne, and the slot closed. The double doors opened with creaking reluctance, and Shayne pushed past a wizened little man who blinked watery blue eyes at him. “I dunno whether I’d ought to,” he grumbled. “You sure Cap’n Denton sent you?”

“You know Rudy wouldn’t want me kept waiting. Where is he?”

“Upstairs in his office, I reckon.”

Shayne said, “I’ve been there before.” He went up a magnificent curving staircase, his feet sinking into thick carpeting with each step. At the top he heard voices at the end of a narrow hall leading into the left wing. Following the sound, he walked into the office where he had been an unwilling guest the foregoing night.

Bart sat in a chair tilted against the wall. He was eating peanuts from a paper bag, smacking his lips and crunching loudly. Rudy Soule sat behind the desk and stopped talking in the middle of a sentence as Shayne walked in.

Bart’s chair dropped forward with a thud when he saw Shayne. He wiped his mouth with the back of a hairy hand and got up slowly, smiling with simple pleasure. “Look who’s here, Boss. The redhead, come back for more.”

Rudy Soule put both hands flat on his desk and half rose from his chair. His upper lip twitched impatiently and his low-lidded eyes looked dangerously sleepy. “What do you want here?”

“To talk to you.” Shayne sauntered in without glancing at Bart who was tugging at a blackjack in his hip pocket.

“You want I should sock him, Boss?”

Soule said, “Sit down and eat your peanuts, Bart.” He sank back into his chair. “I’ve heard you were a stubborn son of a bitch, Shayne.”

Shayne sat down in a chair beside Soule’s desk. He grinned and said, “I guess I’m sort of slap-happy.”

Soule chuckled evilly. “I guess maybe you are at that.” He leaned forward and picked up a glossy unmounted print about four by five, flipped it over to Shayne. “I hear the
Item
is going to run that on the front page if you’re still around town this evening.”

Shayne turned the photograph over. Lucile had instinctively thrown her arms about both bare breasts as the flash went off, making it a perfect picture for newspaper reproduction. Shayne’s left arm was protectively about her shoulders. There was a look of abject terror on her face, while Shayne was snarling at the camera.

“Along with a transcript of this morning’s court record,” Soule told him, “it’ll make a juicy story even for New Orleans.”

Shayne nodded. “Mind if I keep this?”

“Hell, no,” Soule said generously. “We can get plenty just like it.”

Shayne pocketed the print, leaned back, and lit a cigarette. “If you’re smart you’ll pull away from Denton. He’s just about washed up in this town.”

“Not as long as he can come out on top with something like that picture.”

“That wasn’t a bad frame,” Shayne confessed. “But it wasn’t good enough.”

“You’re not going to make him use it?”

“I hope not.” Shayne spoke very carefully, choosing each word. “I don’t want to make him use it. There’s no sense in both of us dragging the other one down.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m warning Denton,” said Shayne, “that he walked into something last night. He pulled a boner.”

“That raid you got caught in?” Soule looked incredulous. He shook his head. “Don’t worry about Denton. He knows every angle.”

“I’m not talking about the raid. His mistake was hanging the Margo Macon murder on Evalyn Jordan.”

“I don’t get you,” Soule said.

Shayne looked surprised. “Hell, maybe you don’t, at that. Did Denton tell
you
the girl confessed?”

“I haven’t had much chance to talk with him.” Soule looked perplexed. “What are you trying to pull?”

“Nothing. I’m trying to give Denton an out before the blowoff comes. He’s got his neck away out on that confession.”

“You’re trying to give
him
an out? I thought you two hated each other.”

“I hate his guts,” Shayne responded promptly. “I’d give plenty to hang one around his neck and see him go down the third time. But hell, he’s got this on me.” Shayne patted his pocket holding the picture. “I’d be a fool to force him to use it.”

“Why don’t you talk plain language?”

“All right. Denton lies when he says Evalyn Jordan confessed to him that she killed Margo Macon.”

When Soule didn’t reply, Shayne went on. “He’s just dumb enough to think it was smart. The girl is dead and can’t deny it. Her suicide looked like an admission of guilt. She even had sort of a motive. It looked perfect—to take the heat off Henri, to make it easy on me to get out of town without quitting, to keep this place out of the headlines if the investigation went on and Drake was forced to use the Daphne for an alibi.”

Soule said thoughtfully, “I don’t know. If it was a plant it looks like a hell of a good one to me. How can you prove anything?”

“The fault with you and Denton is that neither of you know anything about this case. I was working on it before the murder. As soon as Quinlan let me go, I contacted the two girls who had dinner with Margo and got their stories. I’ve got a couple of important contacts here in New Orleans—undercover men. I’ve had a tail on the Jordan girl every minute. A sort of specialist, you might call him.” Shayne paused and his upper lip came back from his teeth as he contemplated the tip of his cigarette.

“What the devil are you getting at?” Soule demanded angrily.

Shayne leaned forward. “Just this. There was a Dictaphone planted next door to the Jordan girl’s apartment. I’ve got a record of every word that was said in that apartment from ten o’clock last night until this morning.” He leaned back and took a long drag on his cigarette.

“It sounds like a lot of bull to me. If you’ve got such a record and it proves the girl didn’t confess like Denton says, why come to me? Hell, you could ruin him.”

“Sure I could—and can. But if I hit him with that, don’t you know he’ll hit back? We both go down—and I’m not fool enough to take it on the chin just to get Denton.”

Soule tapped the tips of his fingers delicately on the desk. “I can see that. But if you’re telling the truth why don’t you go to him? What have I got to do with it?”

“Plenty. I think you’re smart. Denton’s bull-headed. Ten to one he wouldn’t listen to me. But you’re mixed up in this, too. If you’re as smart as I think you are, you’ll persuade Denton to take the out I’m going to offer him before it’s too late.”

Soule shifted his position. “Keep on talking.”

“Here’s the way it is: I’m going to pin that murder on the guilty person this afternoon. If Denton doesn’t make a retraction before then, he’s done. And that means I get to see my picture in the paper.” Shayne grinned humorlessly.

“Go on.”

“That Dictaphone record doesn’t have to be used as evidence,” Shayne said slowly. “I don’t need it to prove my case. No one knows I’ve got it—except my assistant—and I can guarantee no one ever will know if you can get Denton to use his head.”

“How?”

“I’ve figured it all out. Denton was the only witness when the girl died. He can come out with a statement saying that he’s been thinking it over and he may have jumped to a hasty conclusion. He can say the girl was hysterical, that she kept muttering Margo’s name and saying she was to blame, that she didn’t want to keep on living because Margo was dead. So he naturally thought she was confessing the murder.”

“Is that what
did
happen?”

“Ask Denton,” Shayne grinned. “One sure way to find out is for something to happen to me. I’ve got it fixed so Inspector Quinlan will hear that Dictaphone record if I don’t show up after lunch at his office.”

Soule snapped, “It sounds like a lot of hooey to me,” disgustedly. “Dictaphone records! That’s storybook stuff.”

“Maybe—but I think it’s a damned good idea. Anyhow, I’m telling you this flat: I’m arresting the real murderer this afternoon in Quinlan’s office. If Denton hasn’t played smart and fixed up a retraction by that time, it’ll be too late.” He stood up.

“Wait a minute.” Rudy Soule drummed on his desk, his half-closed, sleepy eyes staring. He asked, “Is it Henri?” without looking up.

“It doesn’t really matter to you who it is,” Shayne told him angrily, “but it isn’t the girl Denton framed.”

“How will Denton know you won’t spring the record after he changes his story—if he does decide to?”

“What good would that do me? And hell, he’s still got the picture and the court record.”

“They won’t be worth a damn in a few days. The papers would smell a rat if he held it out and then used it.”

“Same way with the Dictaphone record,” Shayne argued. “Denton can kill the effect of it by coming out first and changing his story.”

“I’ve got a hunch you’re bluffing,” Soule said slowly. “I don’t believe you had any Dictaphone planted there. It sounds like something you dreamed up.”