Shayne said, “I certainly don’t despise you, Kitty. Do you think Ella’s carrying on had anything to do with tonight’s murder?”
“I don’t know. That’s for you to decide. But it does give you an insight into his character, doesn’t it? Kissing her and squeezing her fat breasts right there in her own house. I saw them all right. And more than once. But I didn’t think Rutherford ever suspected. And I didn’t really think anything about it when I saw him slipping back into his room tonight. Not until I found out about the murder. And then I began putting two and two together. Suppose he did know how Ella had been carrying on. That could be a motive, couldn’t it?”
“For Martin’s shooting his partner?”
“Well, couldn’t it?” Kitty twisted toward him on the sofa, her eyes very bright in the subdued light. She drew up one nylon-sheathed knee so it pressed hard against Shayne’s thigh, leaned forward to clasp his right hand tightly. Her fingers no longer felt cold. They were burning against his flesh as she flexed them convulsively.
“I didn’t breathe a word of this to the police, Mike. But about ten-thirty, when I was dummy, I left the bridge table to go to the bathroom. It’s down the hall next to their bedroom. And when I stepped into the hall I saw Rutherford just slipping back inside his room. And he was fully dressed, though it had been at least two hours since he told us all good-night and went back to go to bed!”
She seemed unconscious of her fingers that were squeezing and loosening on his hand, unconscious of the steady pressure she was exerting to pull his hand forward so it finally rested on the silken-covered flesh above her knee. She wasn’t as bony as she appeared. The flesh was unexpectedly soft yet resilient beneath his palm, which she pressed down hard with her own feverish hand.
“What do you think of that? There’s a rear door out the kitchen, you know.”
Shayne said, “I know. I went out that way tonight.” He emptied his glass and set it down decisively. “Are you suggesting that Mr. Martin slipped out and killed his partner after trying to set up an alibi by pretending to go to bed?”
“He could have, couldn’t he?” She lifted her hand away from his and straightened up a trifle to empty her glass a second time. Shayne let his hand remain quietly on her thigh and resisted an impulse to knead the flesh.
He said slowly, “I suppose he could have.”
“Isn’t it important, Mike? Don’t you think maybe it’s important?” Kitty’s voice was very low and yearning. “Tell me you think it’s important enough to justify my coming here. Then I won’t feel so … so depraved.”
“Don’t you like feeling depraved?”
“Of course I do,” she said with unexpected vigor. “You know, don’t you? I knew it as soon as I saw you there tonight. Something happened that hasn’t happened to me for a long time, Mike. Such a goddamned long time,” she moaned, and then she shuddered violently. She turned away from him to reach for the bottle and pour her own drink. Liquor splashed to the top of the glass and overflowed the rim. She lifted it in both hands and drank from it greedily, then dropped the empty glass to the floor. Her arms went out to him imploringly.
“Kiss me, darling. Oh, God, kiss me.”
Her left hand tangled in his hair and she pulled him toward her fiercely, with surprising strength. She forced her open mouth against his and pushed her bosom against his chest.
Her scent was surprisingly fragrant.
Shayne’s arm went around her shoulders and her weight pressed him back on the sofa, so she was half on top of him. Guttural sounds came from her throat, indistinct and muffled by the long kiss, her limbs writhed and then her entire body stiffened spasmodically.
She went wholly lax, without warning, and was suddenly a dead weight on him.
Her lips fell away from his and her head lolled back. She breathed naturally and easily, through slightly parted lips, and her eyes were closed. Her face was almost beautiful in its rapt relaxion.
Shayne twisted from beneath and sat up, rubbing sweat from his drawn face. He said, “Kitty,” and then repeated her name more loudly.
She did not stir or open her eyes, and Shayne knew that Kitty Heffner had passed out cold from that last drink.
He exhaled a deep breath and got up, moodily, stood looking down at her for a moment. He felt weary and dejected as he turned away. He told himself firmly that he should be glad that she had passed out when she did, but he wasn’t.
He went into the bathroom, and when he emerged he heard an unmistakable snore from the sofa. Then he grinned. At himself and at life, and at the illusions men cling to.
He entered his bedroom and closed the door firmly behind him, leaving the lamp burning, so Kitty wouldn’t be too upset or frightened if she woke up before it was daylight.
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 se
ersucker 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.”
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