tonight?”
Shayne took a drink and made a distasteful grimace before saying, “From what Betty Jackson told me, I assume it’s because you were afraid he was going ahead with the blackmail deal on his own without cutting you in on a share of the loot.” His voice was bitter and his gray eyes bleak.
Rourke looked at him in astonishment. “For God’s sake, Mike! You don’t believe I’d go into a thing like that!”
“I phoned you when Bert was with me,” Shayne reminded him. “You didn’t say no then.”
Rourke swallowed half of his drink, set the glass down, and rested both elbows on the table. “What did Betty tell you?” he inquired casually.
“A little about some incident on the News,” Shayne said, studying Rourke’s anxious face. “The way I got it, you pulled the same stunt Bert’s trying to pull, and Bert was in on it. You got him fired because he knew too much.”
“Betty has it all wrong, Mike,” Rourke told him gravely. “She’s been listening to Bert.”
“How was it?”
“Lay off me,” Rourke grated. “Damn it, Mike, if you feel that way-”
“How am I supposed to feel?” Shayne spread his right hand, palm up, showing the dark stain clearly. “Know what that is? It’s blood. Know where it came from?”
Rourke leaned forward and squinted at the detective’s palm. “Where?”
“From the back of the seat cushion in your car,” Shayne told him. “You say you were chasing Bert Jackson all over town tonight. You’d better level with me, Tim. Did you catch up with him?” He looked up and met Rourke’s eyes.
Rourke moved his head uneasily under Shayne’s hard stare. “What in the name of God have you got on your mind, Mike?”
“I don’t know,” he confessed wearily. “Betty Jackson was worried about what might happen if you and Bert met. I’m wondering if you did meet.”
“Why? Why was Betty worried?” The reporter’s eyes were feverishly bright again.
“Because of that thing on the News, I guess. Because she thinks you’re afraid Bert will bring it out into the open if anything happened while he was trying to pull the same stunt. For God’s sake, Tim!” Shayne exploded. “I can’t go on in the dark. Tell me where you stand and what this is all about. I keep thinking about the crack you made about Jackson in my office. Why pull that in front of Gentry?”
“Because it hit me all of a sudden,” said Rourke slowly. “Someone killed the elevator operator and tore your place up looking for something. Could be the guy Jackson planned to blackmail-if Bert didn’t get to him tonight.”
“Why would he tear up my place?” said Shayne. “I ran Jackson out-”
“I know, you told me that,” Rourke broke in irritably. “But I got to thinking.” He paused, raking his fingers through his sparse hair and drawing them down over his bony face.
“You got to thinking that I lied,” Shayne said in a fiat, toneless voice. “You decided that I threw in with Bert and that I lied to you to cut you out of your share of the blackmail. Damn it, Tim.”
“Get off your high horse,” Tim shouted hoarsely. “We’ll get nowhere suspecting each other this way. I didn’t think anything like that. I did think maybe you’d got the kid to leave his story with you, and that maybe you’d stall him like I asked you to over the phone.” He stopped talking long enough to drain his glass, then flung the accusation.
“That thing at your office looked exactly like what might happen if Bert had spilled everything. Now that he has disappeared, I wonder.”
Shayne looked at the liquor in his glass, and his mouth tightened with distaste. “It’s what might have happened if he had turned his dope over to me.” He stood up. “Lucy and I will have a mess to clean up in the morning.”
Rourke arose with him. “I’ll drive you over.” Neither of them spoke until Rourke drew up to the curb at the side entrance to Shayne’s hotel. The detective opened the door, got out, said, “Good night,” and turned away.
Rourke hesitated, hunched over the steering-wheel. His face showed intense strain. Then he jerked his door open and followed Shayne in, hurrying up the stairs behind him. Catching up with him on the top step, he panted, “I’ll be damned if I’ll let it break off this way, Mike. We’ve been friends too long to let a couple of punk kids come between us.”
Shayne shrugged and continued down the corridor. “You’re always welcome to a drink, but I don’t-”
He stopped abruptly as he reached the door of his apartment. It sagged open, and the marks of a jimmy scarred the doorframe. He reached inside to switch on the lights and began to curse deep in his throat when he saw the wreckage.
Chapter Four
Timothy Rourke whistled shrilly. “Somebody is certainly looking for something,” he said with conviction.
“That,” said Shayne grimly, “is the understatement of the year.”
There were fewer papers here to be scattered, but the same intensive search as of his office was evidenced. The desk drawers were pulled out and the contents dumped on the floor; chair and couch cushions had been removed and tossed aside.
Shayne stalked into the bedroom to find chests of drawers emptied and mattress and pillows from the bed piled on the floor. In the kitchen the same careful search had been made of cupboards and refrigerator. His gray eyes were bleak when he re-entered the living-room slowly, massaging his angular jaw.
He made a sudden, savage gesture and went to the liquor cabinet muttering, “The bastards were in too big a hurry to drink my liquor, anyway. Rye, Tim?”
Rourke, after quietly peeking into the bedroom, was straightening chairs and replacing cushions. He nodded assent, then said, “If Gentry wasn’t convinced by your ransacked office, this will be the clincher that you’ve got something someone wants badly and in a hell of a hurry.”
“Yeh. If Will saw it,” he agreed, moving toward his desk with two bottles and glasses. “I think I’ll keep this to myself.” He set the bottles and glasses down and gazed restlessly around the room. “I gave it to him straight, Tim. There’s not one damned thing in my office or apartment worth a dime to anyone. And no reason for anyone to believe there is. I’m not working on anything, and haven’t had a client for weeks.” He sat down heavily and creaked the swivel chair forward, poured two drinks, glanced at his watch, and noted that less than an hour had elapsed since Gentry’s call had wakened him, and went on absently. “They didn’t waste much time breaking in here after I left for the office.”
Rourke drew up a chair, sat down, reached for his drink, and suggested, “They probably had you tagged when you went out.”
Shayne scowled. “Do you know how the cops got onto my office so fast?”
The reporter moved his head slowly and negatively. “I just got a piece of it over my car radio. When they said it was your office I beat it down there, even though I knew our man at headquarters would cover the regular angles.”
Shayne took a long drink, thumped his glass down, and said, “See if you can get him on the phone and find out. I’ve a hunch it was a tip-off to drag me away so they could make a try here after they failed to get what they wanted at the office.” He leaned back with a look of fierce concentration on his rugged face while Rourke picked up the receiver and asked for a number.
After a moment Rourke contacted his fellow-reporter, asked a couple of questions, hung up, and reported. “Your hunch is probably right, Mike. The cops had an anonymous call at one-thirty saying a man had been killed during the burglary of your office. They beat it down there and found the operator dead inside his cage.”
“Knowing that I’d be called right away,” Shayne ruminated. “Which gave someone the opportunity to do this job in a hurry.” Again his angry gaze roamed over the wreckage. “In the name of God, why?”
