so the trip will not be dull for you.” Shayne shook his head.
“I don’t have that much time.”
“That was the way Jules outlined it.”
“That was yesterday. Things have changed. Do you have any bugging equipment with you?”
“To overhear conversations? A button mike and a receiver. Very short range. Perhaps one kilometer.”
“That’s good enough.”
The stewardess was working the aisle with a coffee cart. She served the Negro clergyman, then turned her smile on Christa and Shayne.
“Coffee?”
“I’ll have a drink,” Shayne said. “Cognac, if you have it.”
“We don’t serve liquor on this flight, sir,” the girl said nicely. “We’ll be in St. Albans in twenty minutes.”
“When you want a drink,” Shayne said abrasively, “twenty minutes can be a long time.”
Reaching across, he tweaked her blouse out of the skirt of her trim blue uniform. He could feel her quiver. Her breasts rose and fell quickly.
“Humor me,” he said. “It’s always easier.”
“I’ll just finish with the coffee.”
He sat back. “No, get it for me now. In the interests of peace and quiet.”
“Very well, Mr. Shayne,” she said coldly. “Cognac.”
She said it as though she planned to serve rat poison in it. Christa had been watching Shayne speculatively.
“Is there a point to this?”
“Yeah. I’m a hard-drinking private detective, and I want a drink. Don’t you think it’s hot in this plane?”
He pulled off his jacket and half stood to wad it into the hand-luggage rack. His thirty-eight slipped out of the side pocket, clanked against the coffee cart and bounced into the aisle. Shayne swore. As he retrieved the gun, he was watched by half the eyes in the plane. He heard the Negro clergyman across the aisle say softly, “My word.”
Shayne threw the gun angrily into his attache case and slammed the lid. Christa reserved comment until after the stewardess brought the cognac. The girl gave Shayne a hostile but appraising glance. He grinned at her, gestured with the drink, and she moved on.
“You’re right, I suppose,” Christa said in a low voice. “There really wasn’t much chance of being mousy and unobtrusive, was there? So we might as well attract even more attention and make a virtue of it. You want to stand out in the open and draw their fire.”
“Something like that.”
“Mike, you’re taking a fearful chance. The next time, you know, they may not miss. Do you plan to do anything definite? I don’t want to be taken too much by surprise.”
“I don’t have enough information to make plans,” Shayne rumbled. “All I can do is throw a little weight around and see if I can start a panic. The more people we’re up against, the more chance there is that somebody’ll get jumpy too soon.”
“I still don’t see why we can’t let them make the first move.”
“Jules is dead,” Shayne said.
Her coffee went flying. The stewardess ran up with a towel and helped her dry herself off. When they were alone again, Christa said through set lips, “How did it happen?”
Shayne told her.
“God. God.”
“I asked at the desk for his room number. Most of the hotel people know me by sight. I may have been spotted at the airport. That means the cops will be looking for me. One cop especially, and he’s the worst kind-he never lets anybody else finish a sentence. With luck, I have about twenty-four hours.”
“I see that, yes.” With a visible effort, she made herself relax. “This-desolates me, Mike. Did he tell you he planned to retire in two months? He was always so careless when he was working. He took stupefying chances. But I wish-I wish he could have lasted out those two months.”
They were silent for a time. When a man passed down the aisle, she remarked without change of expression, “George Savage, the husband.”
Shayne tossed off the cognac. “Let’s see if I can jolt him a little.”
He stood up. Everyone in the cabin was watching him, to see what gauche and outlandish thing he would do next.
CHAPTER 6
Sticking a cigarette in his mouth, Shayne swung out into the aisle.
The women outnumbered the men by nearly two to one. He saw a few plainly dressed elderly couples, but the tone of the group was set by the women traveling alone. Most of them looked like schoolteachers or librarians.
One man glanced up from a travel guide. Like Shayne himself, he looked like the kind of man who would need a good reason to go on this kind of tour. He was lean, leathery, with pale, hopped-up blue eyes.
The Savages were sitting together in the last seat before the galley. George was a handsome, meaty man, some years younger than his wife. His hair was long and fair, with a noticeable wave. He wore a heavy ring on each hand, a thin platinum watch.
Shayne looked down at him amiably. “You must be George Savage. My name’s Shayne.”
He put out his hand. Savage gave it a brief shake without getting up.
“Glad to have you with us.”
“Are you?” Shayne said. “Better wait till you hear why I came. Now I want to chat with your wife.”
“Go right ahead.”
“In private,” Shayne said. “She said we should feel free to ask questions, and I’ve got a couple. It might take a few minutes. OK?”
Savage glanced inquiringly at his wife. She gave an almost imperceptible nod. He got up and went off toward the front of the cabin.
Shayne sat down in the vacated seat. “Why anybody in his right mind would take a job like this-”
“As a matter of fact, it’s quite interesting,” she said crisply. “I like people, and I like to travel. So does my husband. So there’s no mystery about it, is there? You said you have some questions.”
“Well, not really. What I want is money.”
“Money!”
Shayne laughed and put his big hand on her knee. “It’s not a four-letter word. Do you mind if I call you Naomi? I like to be friendly.”
She said stiffly, “Perhaps you’ll be good enough to explain.”
“Why not? Usually I beat around the bush a little first, but you can’t be long-winded in a jet-there isn’t that much time. You’ve probably heard that I can be rough if I have to be. But I don’t start off being rough.”
“I don’t even know who you are! I certainly don’t know what you’re driving at.”
“Think it over, Naomi,” Shayne said, lighting his cigarette. “All I want is a reasonable percentage.”
Her husband came back with the captain, a graying, once-handsome man with heavy pouches under his eyes. He looked vaguely familiar to Shayne.
“Mike Shayne!” he exclaimed. “I’ll be damned. What are you doing with all these-” He glanced at Mrs. Savage and checked abruptly. “You remember me. I used to work out of Miami when I flew for Pan Am.”
“Joe Lassiter.”
“Older,” Lassiter said. “Ten pounds heavier. Not much wiser. Mike, I never really thanked you for covering up for me that time. Above and beyond the call of duty and what have you. Of course, they canned me anyway, but it wasn’t your fault. I’ll buy you a drink when we get in.”
“Sure.”
