appeared to be thinking hard. Presently he said, “I’ve got friends up north. The NUWJ will have a lawyer down here tomorrow. They can’t get away with… with murder and torture.”
“This,” said Shayne harshly, “is Centerville.” He stopped, feeling a sense of shock at the three words from his own lips. All of a sudden they had a fatalistic sound. Heretofore, he had only thought them strange, somewhat fascinating, ominous or dangerous, perhaps, but for the first time he realized their real meaning. He swiftly went over his experiences since arriving in the village, added them to the information Lucy Hamilton had told him, and he felt sorry as hell for George Brand.
He put a hand on Brand’s arm and said, “I don’t think a Yankee lawyer will get very far in this town… even with a habeas corpus, or anything else. My bet is that this is the only chance you’ll have to do any talking. To me. Right now.”
“Maybe you’re right.” Brand’s voice was heavy, thick.
“Maybe the name Michael Shayne means more to you than John Smith,” he said.
“Maybe… it… does.” Brand was standing erect, his arms folded across his chest, his head high, his chin jutting.
Shayne straightened his long lanky body and looked down a couple of inches into Brand’s eyes. He said, “If you didn’t kill Roche you’re a fool not to give me anything that will help prove it.”
Brand met his gaze levelly in the dim light. “I’ve got the proof when the right time comes. I’ll talk to my lawyer. You understand how it is,” he went on strongly, swiftly, completely sure of himself. “With my alibi shot, I’ve got one ace in the hole. Maybe you’re all right, but I’m not taking any chance with my life.”
Shayne turned away abruptly and said, “I’ve wasted a night in this stinking jail for nothing,” and was making his way toward the cell block when he heard the outer door opening.
“John Smith. Front and center,” a voice called out.
“Coming,” Shayne said gruffly, and went toward the rectangle of light.
Gantry stood in the doorway. He looked fresh and clean and ready for a night of excitement in Centerville. The hunchbacked jailor, dirty and smelling of fresh beer, stood aside, the big key hanging on the chain around his waist.
Shayne’s rugged red brows lifted quizzically when Gantry said in a curiously servile voice, “This way. There’s a lady waiting to see you.”
Shayne followed him. He tried to stir up a feeling of animosity toward Lucy Hamilton for interfering when he had specifically told her not to try to get him out of jail until tomorrow.
He followed Gantry’s youthful and springy steps, and wished he could be thirty again, but he forgot Gantry when they entered the room and Elsa Roche was standing there, holding out both her hands to greet him.
10
Her small dark face was strained, her gray-green eyes, red-rimmed and swollen, were intent upon his face. She looked sober and frightened. She caught both of his hands and gripped them with surprising strength. Her short upper lip quivered when she tried to speak. “I… had to… see you,” she managed to say.
“I didn’t expect you to be here,” Shayne said. “How the devil did you find out I was here?”
They were alone in a small private office. Shayne released her hands when Gantry came through the doorway and said, “I’ll get your stuff, Mr. Smith,” then retreated down the corridor.
Elsa Roche took a compact from her purse, opened it, and turned aside to peer into the mirror. “It was difficult to find you.” She had control of her voice now, and it was almost flippant. “I called around at the different hotels and learned you were registered at the Moderne but weren’t in yet. Then I called the police station to ask them to watch out for you around town and have you call me at once. I talked to Sergeant Gantry, and when I described you he laughed and said he’d just booked a man named John Smith who answered your description. I thought it might be you, so I came down to see.”
They heard Gantry’s footsteps coming toward them in the corridor. He came in and handed Shayne a sealed envelope.
Shayne opened it and examined the contents, nodded and said, “Thanks, sergeant,” gravely. “Do I just walk out of here?”
Gantry smiled thinly and glanced at Mrs. Roche. “Suppose we say you’re paroled in her custody. That what you want, Mrs. Roche?”
She snapped her compact shut. “It was all a stupid mistake in the first place,” she said arrogantly. “You can see for yourself Mr. Smith isn’t drunk.”
“I admit he’s sobered up fast,” Gantry agreed.
“So just cross off that ridiculous charge against him.” She stepped forward and took Shayne’s arm confidently. “My car is outside the main entrance.”
Gantry preceded them down the wide hallway and opened a door leading out onto the front entrance of the city hall. The Buick which Shayne had seen at the Roche house stood at the bottom of a flight of wide concrete steps. Elsa clung to Shayne’s arm as they descended. He opened the left-hand door for her to get in. She started the motor and waited for him to get in, then put the car in gear and drove to Centerville’s main street without speaking.
Shayne lounged back on the cushions, lit a cigarette, and waited for her to start talking. She drove competently and with grave intensity, turning left on the main street and following it through the outskirts of town onto the eastward highway. When they were beyond the city limits she said, “I hope you don’t mind being kidnaped.”
“Have you ever visited the city jail?” Shayne countered.
“No.”
“If you had, you’d know that being kidnaped is a pleasure.”
“Jimmy and Seth discussed you thoroughly after you left tonight,” she confided. “They seemed to think you were quite notorious in your profession.”
“I’ve got a good publicity man.”
They had left the village far behind. The highway was dark and deserted, winding through a wooded valley, the headlights glowing upon a stream on one side and a mountain slope on the other. Elsa drove purposefully, sitting erect and watching the road carefully. Presently she slowed and turned off onto a dirt road leading down a gentle incline to a flat wooded grove in a bend of the river. She parked between two overspreading trees on the bank of the stream, cut off the motor and headlights and leaned forward with both hands clasped on the steering wheel.
Shayne meditatively puffed on his cigarette and listened to the sound of the river and the chirping crickets and wondered how Lucy was getting along with her two Kentucky cavaliers.
“Did you see George in jail?” Elsa asked suddenly.
“Didn’t you guess that was why I got myself locked up?”
“Yes. I guessed that.”
“I talked to him,” Shayne said quietly.
“How is he?”
Shayne thought he detected eagerness or anxiety in her tone. He turned quickly to look at her. She was leaning farther forward, her chin on her hands, her eyes staring straight ahead. He said, “Seems well enough. Quite cheerful, in fact. He’s not worrying about the murder charge. I got the impression he has a couple of aces up his sleeve.”
“Does he know… about the men he was trusting to give him an alibi?” Anxiety was definitely in her voice now.
“I told him that angle was shot. It didn’t seem to perturb him very much. He’s…” Shayne paused, groping for the right words to describe George Brand’s attitude. “… very sure of himself. Not vain, but with the certitude of a man who knows exactly the odds against him and how to beat them.”
She said, “I know,” in a stifled voice. She raised her head suddenly and beat one doubled fist against the steering wheel. “I’m frightened, Mr. Shayne. I don’t know what to do. I had to talk to someone. From the things
