“It won’t leak. What have you got?”
“They’ve found out that all those bets spread over the country on Banjo Boy originated right here in Miami from one source as yet unidentified. On the Q-T, the commission is pretty well convinced that our friend Elliot Thomas sent those bets out, though they haven’t proved it yet and may not be able to.”
Shayne nodded happily.
“Birdies are coming home to roost. John Marco used to donate heavily through the mutuels, but he seems to have quit two years ago when he opened his casino. Ever hear of a confirmed plunger getting off the horses?”
Rourke leaned back with new interest lighting his eyes.
“A man running a gambling place would hate to be known as a sucker at his own game. There’s other ways of placing bets than through the mutuels.”
“That’s it. With no one being the wiser. How can I find out whether Marco has been dealing through the bookies since he discontinued his public betting at the tracks?”
“That’s a tough one,” Rourke conceded.
He gently rubbed an old knife scar on his square, bony chin.
“Samuelson, down in the Flagler Arcade, handles most of the illegal heavy sugar. He and Marco used to be friendly. Ten will get you a hundred Marco places bets through him if he hasn’t been weaned yet.”
“Let’s call Samuelson and find out.”
“Won’t work. Bookies don’t hand out that kind of information. Not Sammy Samuelson.”
“Call Marco,” Shayne suggested. “Tell him you’re Samuelson. You ought to know Sammy’s voice. Maybe Marco’ll give something away.”
Rourke started to protest, then caught the intense gleam in Shayne’s eyes. “Okay. It’s your party. But I’m afraid my Yiddish accent isn’t what it ought to be.”
He scooped up the phone and got a connection with John Marco on the beach.
Shayne leaned close, and the reporter held the receiver so that both could hear while he squelched the faint brogue in his voice and slurred, “Hi-yuh, John. Sammy.”
“All right, all right,” came John Marco’s impatient voice. “You’d think I didn’t pay off like a slot machine, the way you jump me every time I hit a losing streak. I’ll have the dough over by a messenger this afternoon. Twenty- six hundred is the way I figure they ran for me yesterday. I got to get me a new handicapper or you’ll be owning this joint.”
He paused for the bookie to make some reply, and Shayne nodded to Rourke to hang up.
“That’ll give him something to think about,” Shayne chuckled.
“How about you giving me something to think about now,” Rourke complained.
“All right. I’m set.” Shayne leaned back, hugging one knee with laced fingers. “How’d you like to write a headline for your two-thirty edition on something that’ll be breaking when your papers hit the streets?”
“Swell.”
Rourke swung around in front of his typewriter and rolled a fresh sheet of paper in. Poising his forefinger over the keys, he waited.
Shayne said softly, “Here’s your headline: Elliot Thomas Grilled in Drowning of Beach Debutante.” Timothy Rourke had mechanically started pecking as Shayne spoke. He got as far as the second “l” in “grilled” before the detective finished. He stopped and yelled, “Good Lord! Are you nuts?”
“I’m just coming out of a fog,” Shayne explained. “Finish your typing chore, my man, and I’ll dictate the story that runs under it.”
“I can’t do it,” Rourke protested. “Do you expect me to set this up and print it at one o’clock when I’ve only got your word for it that it’s going to happen an hour or so later?”
“Hasn’t my word always been good enough for you, Tim?”
Rourke stared into his eyes for fifteen seconds, then said, “Okay, Mike. Tim Rourke has been kicked off better jobs for less cause.”
He completed the headline, then began pounding out copy as Shayne dictated it.
When it was finished he leaned back with feverish excitement in his Gaelic eyes.
“What a yarn! But they’ll never print it on my say-so, Mike. Not until they’ve got some proof.”
“How’ll some nice pictures to go along with it do?” Shayne asked easily.
A dazed look came into Tim Rourke’s eyes. He rubbed his brow with unsteady fingers.
“Pics? Of something that’s maybe going to happen?”
“No maybe’s about it. Can you give me a good cameraman that’ll keep his mouth buttoned?”
“Hell, I’ll do it myself. I was one of the best in the business until I turned softie and started writing stories instead of shooting them.”
“We’ll get some pictures that’ll be all the proof your editor will ask for,” Shayne promised. “Now, roll in a clean sheet of paper and I’ll give you the dope on an extra you can have ready to rush on the streets after you’ve sold out your regular edition. You can have them loaded in trucks waiting for the word go.”
Rourke turned resignedly to his typewriter again. “All right, miracle man. For centuries the Rourkes have been noted for their lack of brains. I’m a sucker for your fairy tales.”
Despite his attempt at nonchalant composure, the veteran newspaperman was shaking with a nervous ague when his trained forefinger finished tapping out the story Shayne gave him for an extra.
“If this hits, we’ll make newspaper history in a town that’s made it before.”
“It’s in the bag, Tim.” Shayne stood up, grinding a cigarette butt beneath his toe. “Meet me on the dock where Thomas’s yacht is tied up, at twelve-thirty. Bring along a candid camera that won’t attract too much notice. Keep all this under your hat until you get back with the pics to stick under the disbelieving nose of your editor. It’s up to you to make them print the story. It’s going to be worth-maybe some money to me, and for a cinch getting out from under a first-degree murder charge.”
“I’ll be there at twelve-thirty. I hope you realize just how goddam’ hot this is. The paper could get burned to a crisp on a libel suit if-”
“If me no ifs. I know what I’m doing-now.” Shayne went out briskly, and Rourke muttered after him:
“I hope to God you do, Mike. I hope-you-do.”
Chapter Eighteen: TWO KINDS OF FORGERY
Shayne stopped outside his hotel and rummaged in the side pocket of his car and got out the light silk jacket and felt toque he had gotten from Marsha Marco’s room. He slid them into his coat pocket and went inside.
The clerk motioned to him as he passed through the lobby.
“Mr. Gentry has been calling. He says it’s important.” Shayne said, “Get him on the line. I’ll take it in my apartment.”
He went up the elevator and to his room. The phone rang as he closed the door.
“That you, Mike?” Gentry sounded plenty worried. “Painter called not long ago to ask me to have my expert go over your pistol. It seems that the beach ballistics man was suddenly taken sick this morning and can’t officiate.”
“Did you stall him?”
“The best I could. I told him my man was out to lunch. He’ll be here about one with that damned gun.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Shayne said absently, “Let your man make the test. Win, lose or draw, I’ll be under the wire and the finding on the gun won’t change anything either way.”
“What have you got up your sleeve?”
“Nothing you won’t be better off without knowing. Sit tight for the blow-off.”
Shayne hung up and went to the table where he cleared away the litter of glasses, bottles, coffee cup and pot, then laid Marsha’s hat and jacket out on the table.
From an inner pocket he drew out the folded note Marsha had left behind her, and spread it out in front of him.
It had been dashed off with a soft lead pencil on a sheet of plain white notepaper.
He found a soft pencil and took out several sheets of plain white notepaper. Sitting in a straight chair, he
