What Really Happened

by Brett Halliday

  Shayne dropped the empty glass into a desk drawer, stood up, and shrugged into the coat, growling, “Just because some dame—”

  “She isn’t a dame. I said lady.” Her cool voice emphasized the final word. “And please try to pretend you’re a gentleman,” she added, walking around the desk to face him.

  “Money?” He resumed his seat and grinned up at her.

  “If clothes are an indication, yes.”

  The grin stayed on Shayne’s wide mouth. He sat up straight, combed his bristly red hair with blunt fingers, rubbed his palm over the damp shirt front where the ashes had fallen, and said, “Picture of an alert private investigator about to interview a client—with money. Send her in.”

  “Oh—you.” Lucy gestured impatiently, chuckled, and went to the door. She opened it wide, stepped out, and said, “Mr. Shayne will see you now, Mrs. Davis.”

  Shayne was halfway across the room when Lucy closed the door. One glance at the patrician beauty of the young woman corroborated his secretary’s impressions.

  A true brunette, Mrs. Davis was tall, slim, poised; and the simple elegance of her sheer black dress revealed, without accentuation, her perfect figure. The three-strand necklace of pearls hugging her throat seemed to reflect the warmth of her delicately tanned complexion. She looked under thirty, Shayne thought swiftly, except for her big dark eyes. Shadowed by the drooping brim of a black hat, they were wide and unblinking, desperate from fear or tragic despair. Her voice, though, was low and controlled when she said, “I’m Mrs. Davis, Mr. Shayne. I trust my coming at this hour is not an imposition.”

  “Not at all. Please sit down.” He slid a chromium-frame chair upholstered in blond plastic close to the desk, waited until she sat down, then went around to seat himself facing her. “Now, what can I do for you?” he said pleasantly.

  “I’ve come to you because of my own inadequacy—my utter failure to accomplish a delicate but terribly important mission,” she began with a forthrightness in keeping with her poised assurance. “I was given your name by friends before leaving Washington, on the chance that I might require the services of someone like you when I reached Miami. You are recommended as efficient and discreet and—trustworthy.”

  Shayne nodded gravely without speaking. Her eyes were fixed on his face as she sat gracefully erect with her gloved hands folded in her lap.

  “I have to trust someone,” she said simply. “After last night’s experience I feel quite incompetent and not a little frightened.”

  “What,” asked Michael Shayne, “frightened you last night?”

  “First, I must explain that I’m acting for a friend. A very dear friend whose name I trust I shall not have to reveal.”

  Shayne struck a match to the cigarette between his lips, and lowered lids momentarily hid his open disbelief. He leaned back and puffed smoke toward the ceiling as he swiftly recalled the many clients who had brought the intimate problems of “friends” to his office, or insisted upon setting forth “hypothetical” cases.

  He asked again, “What frightened you last night?”

  “An experience with my friend’s daughter, Julia,” said Mrs. Davis with a hint of a sigh. “A lovely girl. She’s a sophomore at Rollins College in Winter Park.”

  Again Shayne nodded and waited for her to continue.

  “During the spring vacation she has been visiting a college chum who lives in Palm Beach. That is, her parents have believed her to be visiting there. Actually, Julia has been here in Miami during the entire period.” She paused, and for the first time since the interview began she turned her eyes away from Shayne. She smoothed her lacy black gloves, and her lips tightened a little.

  Watching her narrowly, he couldn’t figure whether she was overcome by some inner emotion, or searching her mind for the right words to present her problem. He had deliberately refrained from helping her, but now the silence was becoming awkward. “Is visiting Miami so bad?” he asked casually.

  “Very bad,” she murmured, and her courage seemed restored when she looked up and added, “Julia has been dancing in a local night club—La Roma. From a few discreet inquiries I have learned that it is a place of ill repute.”

  Shayne’s bristly red brows lifted a trifle, and a muscle tightened in his cheek. He said, “I know the joint.”

  “Then you can understand,” she began eagerly, tensing forward, her eyes glowing; but she settled back at once and continued. “Forgive me. I must remain calm, Mr. Shayne. You see, Julia is only eighteen. She’s impetuous and willful, and she doesn’t realize what a terrible thing she is doing. I went to that place last night at her mother’s request to plead with her to return to school before there is any publicity.”

  “And?”

  “She refused to speak to me or recognize me.” There was no rancor in her voice; only a hint of sadness. “I sat alone at a table near the stage, and she saw me at once. I sent a note back to her, but the waiter returned with a message that she didn’t know me and had no desire to make my acquaintance.

  “I went backstage,” she resumed after a brief pause, “and asked a singer to show me Julia’s dressing-room. She refused.” Mrs. Davis took a handkerchief from her purse and caught the tears that stood like big raindrops in her eyes before they ran down her cheeks.

  “Perhaps Julia didn’t recognize you,” Shayne suggested.

  “I’ve known her all her life. Sally—her mother—is my dearest friend. Of course she knew me.”

  After a moment’s frowning thought Shayne said, “If she’s eighteen and has decided on a dancing career, I don’t know how anyone can stop her.”

  “A career? In night clubs like La Roma?” Horror sounded through her cultured tones. “Julia must be brought to a realization of the awful thing she is doing to her mother and father. If it becomes public, the judge will be ruined politically, and politics is his life, Mr. Shayne,” she ended significantly.

  “Her father doesn’t know yet?” Shayne asked.

  “Oh, no. That’s the one thing Sally fears most. That’s what you must prevent.”

  “How did her mother learn the girl was dancing at La Roma?”

  “She received an anonymous letter.” Mrs. Davis opened her purse and withdrew a four-by-six Manila envelope, pulled the flap back and extracted a glossy photograph and a folded sheet of paper. Her fingers were steady, but flags of scarlet sprang into her cheeks as she bent forward to hand the enclosures to Shayne. “These came in an envelope similar to this,” she explained, “addressed to her mother personally. I’m afraid the original was destroyed.”

  Shayne looked at the photograph first, his expression showing nothing more than professional interest.

  The girl was young and beautiful and nude. The picture had been snapped in the midst of her act onstage. Poised on her toes, the clean, taut lines of her body were breath-takingly lovely. Her face was lifted, wide mouth smiling, while her arms strained upward as if to pluck a star with the tips of her reaching fingers. There was an eager, questing look in her eyes, and it seemed to Shayne that the massed background of watching diners, and not the girl, was the offending note.

  Beyond her on the stage a six-piece orchestra was caught in action by the sensitive camera, and the painted legend on the bass drum was clearly readable. La Roma.

  Written slantingly in a bold hand across the glossy print was the name Dorinda.

  Shayne queried Mrs. Davis with quirked brows and repeated the name.

  “That’s the stage name Julia uses,” she explained. The blush was gone from her cheeks, leaving only a warm sun tan. “I tried to talk to the manager last night, but he was out,” she continued; and her voice grew intimate and appealing when she added, “I could find no one to talk to but one of the singers, and she told me that none of them knew anything about Dorinda except her dancing.”

  Shayne laid the photograph face down on the desk. He said absently, “They don’t know who she really is?”

  “I’m not quite certain, Mr. Shayne. She was
evasive, and—rude.”

  Shayne didn’t reply. He picked up the note and spread it out on the desk. The paper was cheap and the penciled print smudged from much handling. It read: Would this sort of publicity help Julia’s father? It was signed: A Friend.

  “Someone,” said Shayne after studying the note, “knows what Dorinda’s real name is.”

  “Yes,” she agreed quietly and with a hint of resignation. “The person who mailed that note to Sally’s home in Washington.”

  “And you’ve heard nothing further?”

  “Nothing. Sally called for me to come to her the moment she received the note. I agreed to come to Miami at once. She has been quite ill, and the shock resulted in a relapse.”

  Shayne tapped the note with a forefinger and said, “Do you think this is a threat? Or, is there a possibility that it’s a friendly gesture by someone who felt her parents should know the truth?”

  “Why—how can I judge, Mr. Shane? It could be either, I suppose.”

  Her perceptible hesitation indicated to the detective that his second suggestion had not actually occurred toó her before. He said, “If the girl refused to talk with you—refused to even recognize you—”

  “That’s what frightens me,” she broke in. “Why? Why would she do that to me?”

  “Because she’s eighteen.”

  “You don’t understand,” she persisted. “We’ve always been very close. I’ve tried to understand Julia, particularly during her teen-age years, and I was so sure I had gained her confidence. But now—” Her voice trailed off in a whisper, and she was smoothing her gloves again.

  Shayne rocked back in his swivel chair and studied her face intently. Her long black lashes were moist, but otherwise she maintained her composure.

  He said, after a short silence, “I don’t know how I can help you, Mrs. Davis. At eighteen, Julia has a legal right to live her life as she chooses.”

  “But we can’t consider the legality of her age,” she cried, and her eyes widened with terror. “The child must be under some horrible compulsion. It can’t be Julia’s choosing—this thing she’s doing. She knows what it would do to her father if it came out publicly.”

  Shayne lit a fresh cigarette before answering. “I know it’s difficult for parents when their children throw off all restraints. But it happens every day. This is probably just a phase with Julia—”

  “Just a phase!” Her voice cut in like a whiplash. “It’s preposterous to think of her dancing in the nude in that dreadful place—before those men! If you could have seen the lust on their faces last night—”

  “It’s her choice,” he said impatiently. “I wouldn’t interfere if I could see my way to do so. I think that would be the worst thing you could possibly do. She will come to her senses a lot faster if you stand back and let her work it out her own way.”

  Mrs. Davis stared at him in amazement for a long moment. Her tone was crisp and cold when she said, “I’m not a prude, Mr. Shayne. I realize that nude dancing in a night club, even in a place like La Roma, doesn’t necessarily mean that a girl’s life is ruined.” She lifted her dark head proudly, and the artistic droop of her wide-brimmed hat quivered with the sudden move. “I’ve watched Julia’s mind and character develop from childhood. I trust her instincts implicitly. If her own life were the only one involved, I assure you I could trust Julia to work out her own destiny without interference. Unfortunately, there is a great deal more involved than a young girl’s restless fling.”

  “Look, Mrs. Davis,” said Shayne, propelling his swivel chair forward and folding his arms on the desk, “if you think this girl’s fling may affect her father’s political ambitions or her mother’s social position you overestimate a scandal in the world of today.”

  “It’s because it is today’s world that it does matter,” she said earnestly. “Her father has a high position in the government. He is an uncompromising idealist who followed Franklin Roosevelt to Washington and who refused to alter his fundamental beliefs after Mr. Roosevelt’s death. Within the past two years he has been investigated by three Congressional committees seeking to unseat him.

  “Thus far, they have not succeeded,” she continued, warmth and pride rising in her voice. “You are acquainted with the witch hunts going on in Washington, Mr. Shayne, the badgering of liberals, the manner in which one after another of Mr. Roosevelt’s original appointees has been driven from public life.” She paused expectantly, breathlessly, her wide dark eyes level with Shayne’s.

  “So what?” he said amiably. “Julia loves dancing. Her father loves politics.”

  “Don’t be a fool,” she burst out angrily. “You’re taking advantage of my hesitancy in revealing the names of my friends. But I assure you that one breath of scandal would be enough to ruin the judge’s career. A tiny hint would start a whispering campaign, give columnists fuel for invectives. Julia knows this. She knows it would kill her father. Can’t you see why her mother and I are convinced that there is some hidden compulsion—something secret and evil that has forced her into this terrible thing against her will?”

  “Are you intimating that her father’s political enemies have plotted this thing to discredit him?” Shayne asked dryly.

  “I’m not intimating anything. I have given you facts. Do you still refuse to help me?”

  Shayne spread out his big hands in a gesture of futility. “What can I do?”

  “Find out the truth. Meet Julia and talk to her. Decide for yourself the sort of girl she is, and why she is doing this awful thing. You can talk to the manager of the club and learn who her associates are. You can discover the author of that anonymous note and find his motive.”

  Shayne drummed a two-fingered tattoo on the desk. He didn’t like it. The pattern was too familiar. Presently he took a pencil from a wire rack, drew a pad of paper toward him, and said quietly, “Before I can decide whether to take your case, I’ll have to know your real name.”

  Mrs. Davis bridled with resentment. “I’ve told you—”

  “I can’t act officially for an unnamed client,” Shayne interrupted sharply. “If you don’t trust me enough to give me your name, you certainly shouldn’t trust me in a matter as important as this. Frankly, I don’t relish interfering between a child and her parents. On the other hand, I have great sympathy for an honest liberal trying to buck the tide in national politics.”

  “I assure you I am Mrs. Davis,” she insisted with dignity. “I live in Washington.” She opened her purse and took out a card which she passed to him. “I am here on behalf of a very dear friend who was too ill to come herself. Won’t you—can’t you trust me? Believe that the situation is exactly as I have stated?”

  Shayne read: Mrs. Elbert H. Davis, dropped the card on the desk, and said, “I trust you just as far as you trust me. I can’t go into a thing like this without full information.”

  Her red mouth puckered nervously, and for a moment there was an expression of defeat in her eyes. “I—promised Sally,” she began, stopped, then met his gaze squarely and continued, “but I suppose you are right. Julia’s father is—Nigel Lansdowne. Now do you understand how important this is?”

  Judge Nigel Lansdowne! Shayne didn’t try to hide his surprise and his sudden interest. The whole pack of hysterical right-wingers had been yapping at the judge’s heels since Roosevelt’s death. Such a scandal would be headlined throughout the country.

  While he hesitated, Mrs. Davis reopened her purse and drew out a sheaf of bills.

  “The Lansdownes are not wealthy,” she told him. “Our democratic government doesn’t overpay its civil servants. The judge left a lucrative law practice to go to Washington in the early days of the New Deal, and has remained there at a great financial sacrifice.”

  She removed a rubber band from the bills and spread them out. “I have two thousand dollars here in hundreds. All that Sally had in her personal account. If more money is needed she will have to tell the judge the truth.” Her voice trembled a little, and her eye
s were moist.

  Shayne waved impatiently and said, “Put it back in your purse for the time being, Mrs. Davis. How can I get in touch with you?”

  “I’m at the Waldorf Towers. But I insist—and I’m sure Sally would insist—that you accept a retainer.” She separated four one-hundred dollar bills from the others and pushed them toward him. “Is that sufficient? You will take the case, and you’ll start at once? Tonight?” She was grateful, eager, and her voice rose and fell musically.

  “My secretary will give you a receipt,” Shayne told her, “on your way out. Leave the money with her.” He rocked back in his chair. “I’ll see Dorinda tonight and size things up as best I can.”

  She returned the money to her purse and stood up. There was a vibrant lilt in her voice when she said, “I know you will succeed, and I am grateful. I felt utterly hopeless when I came here, Mr. Shayne, but now I know I can trust you. I know you are good—and—”

  “Think nothing of it.” Shayne came to his feet, embarrassed over her effusive thanks. Other people had trusted him, but he couldn’t recall anyone ever having call him “good” before, and certainly not with so much enthusiasm. He took her arm and ushered her into the outer office.

  Shayne glanced casually at a man seated across the room, waiting, as he took Mrs. Davis to Lucy’s desk and said, “Give Mrs. Davis a receipt, and get her telephone number.”

  “Of course.” Lucy smiled at the woman and drew a receipt pad toward her, then said in a low voice, “This gentleman is anxious—”

  “He’ll have to wait until I make a telephone call,” Shayne interrupted. “Bring him in in five minutes.” He stalked back to his private office without turning his head.

  On the way to his desk he pulled off his coat and hung it up. His left hand reached for the telephone the moment he sat down, but he didn’t lift the receiver immediately. Instead, he flipped Dorinda’s picture over with his right hand and studied the nude young dancer with bleak eyes, his red head wagging slightly and moodily from side to side.

  He lifted the receiver slowly. When Lucy answered she said, “Michael, I think there’s been a mistake. Mrs. Davis insisted—”