“A blackmailer in the exact dictionary-sense of the word. He accepted money and exacted political favors in return for suppressing derogatory information. He didn’t go to Grover’s party out of any compulsion to play the intelligence agent, or to expose the machinations of wicked Miami Beach gamblers. He was taking pictures, and he would have sold them for money and support.”
“Can you prove that?” Shayne said.
“I think so, to the satisfaction of any reasonable man. I have friends among the newspapermen, and if it comes to a crunch they will take guidance from me. But it would be bad for the party, bad for the public’s view of the democratic process. I hope the senator’s blackmailing proclivities will not be publicly aired. We’re going to talk it over here, the three of us, and see if we can reach a determination.”
“If the medical findings stand up you’re in the clear,” Shayne said.
“Not quite. The party was organized by my son, and I can’t hope to come out of this without tarnish unless I can get your cooperation. What do you want, Shayne? I’ll be happy to break Grady Turner to the rank of gas-station attendant.”
“Go on talking about Maslow.”
Kendrick touched his lips to his coffee. “He has known for some years that I had him ticketed. He could move on up the political escalator only if he succeeded in discrediting me or neutralizing my opposition. There is a law in politics-when you know a man is your enemy, find out as much as you can about him. The clerk of Maslow’s Investigations Subcommittee is indebted to me for his appointment. That’s why Maslow hired his own investigators. But the tips, the flow of anonymous information that is the lifeblood of his sort of investigation, still came through official channels, and I was able to keep track of what happened. If the information pointed at someone who could be milked for money, nothing further was heard of it.”
“I don’t know about Mike,” Jackie said, “but you’ll have to document that if you want me to believe you.”
“Here’s an example which will interest Shayne, if it’s true that a man named Frank Gregory was behind that kidnapping attempt yesterday morning. ‘Boots Gregory,’ he is called in the newspapers.”
“Yeah, I’m interested,” Shayne said.
“Gregory operates in Maslow’s district. Maslow has attacked him for years, promising to run him out of St. Petersburg. A tip about Gregory came in from St. Albans, from a prisoner there. Maslow flew out immediately to interview him. Soon afterward, by a coincidence, he stopped attacking Gregory. This looked like the kind of thing I’d been waiting for. I sent Grover to St. Albans, but by that time-another coincidence-the prisoner had been killed, knifed mysteriously in the shower.”
“Judge Kendrick, if that’s a sample of what you regard as evidence,” Jackie said, “it’s awfully thin.”
“I doubt if Shayne thinks so.”
“Now that you know he can’t contradict you,” Shayne said, “tell me again why you hit him with your stick.”
“He had a Xerox copy of a page of figures purporting to prove a payment of forty thousand dollars to my son from Phil Noonan’s Savings and Loan Association.”
“From Noonan?” Shayne said, surprised.
“He told me he intended to publish it unless I backed him for governor. Fortunately I followed my instincts and hit him. The paper was faked. It’s a rather clever forgery, and under different circumstances Maslow might have succeeded with it. I confronted Noonan this afternoon. He showed me the actual ledger entries.”
Jackie said, “They obviously had time to juggle the books and cover it up.”
“It doesn’t matter a hell of a lot,” Shayne said. “Judge Kendrick has agreed to vote against the bill, and to put the word around that he wants it beaten.”
She looked puzzled. “That’s wonderful, Mike, but how did you manage to-”
He grinned at her. “Blackmail.”
The phone rang. Kendrick said one more thing before picking it up.
“And if you publicize that tape, Shayne, in any way, shape or form, if you even drop a hint to your newspaper friends that it exists-”
“Why would I do that?”
“To increase your fee,” Kendrick said coldly. “If I hear any reference to that tape, however remote, I’ll turn the full committee staff loose on Maslow’s files and his bank accounts, I’ll subpoena his private detectives, I’ll use every bit of influence I possess-”
“I get the idea,” Shayne said. “Answer the phone.” Kendrick broke into the third ring and put the phone to his ear.
“Judge Kendrick,” he said, his anger carrying over.
The phone was equipped with an amplifying device because of the judge’s deafness, and the voice at the other end came over clearly, in an ugly rasp.
“I’m calling to tell you to vote against the Dade County casinos. And I mean it, you’d better believe me.”
Shayne, leaning forward, was listening intently. The voice had been roughened deliberately, but he knew he had heard it before. The vowels were flat, the diction a little too guarded, as though the speaker might be fighting a tendency to stammer. Shayne snapped his fingers soundlessly, thinking. On the sofa, Jackie had gone very still.
“You’re opposed to the casinos,” Judge Kendrick said ironically. “Thank you for favoring me with your opinion. Are you a constituent of mine?”
“Never mind that. I know how much they paid you, and you’d better not mash the wrong voting-button or I’ll get you laughed out of public life.”
The judge’s face suffused with blood. “I’ll tell you what you can do with your threats, my friend, whoever you are.”
Shayne waved his hand. Moving his lips soundlessly, he said, “Keep him talking.”
Kendrick nodded.
“I’ve been threatened by people who thought they were experts,” he said into the phone, “and they usually send word to me afterward that they wish they’d been told. You’ll laugh me out of public life? Try it. There’s an outside chance it might work. I’ve heard of people who fell in a sausage machine and lived.”
“You think you’re tough,” the voice said with a sneer.
“I’m tough enough for most purposes.”
“Too bad you don’t want to believe me, because-”
“I’m seventy-two years old,” the judge said. “I fought in two wars. I broke into politics at a time when people who could be frightened easily wound up running errands. I believe you thought all you had to do was call me in the middle of the night and breathe into the phone and I’d break out in a cold sweat. Go to hell!”
He slammed down the phone. In a quick reflex, Shayne snatched it up again, saving the connection, and covered the mouthpiece.
“Unless you want Grover to go to jail, keep this guy on the line and find out what he wants.”
He handed the phone back. Kendrick’s eyes were sparking.
Shayne gestured with his fist, and Kendrick said slowly, “Now that I’ve got that off my chest, what do you have in mind?”
The voice sneered, “You blow up easy, Dad. But when you’re in a corner you’ve got to deal. Here’s both sides of the proposition, the good and the bad. I figure your vote is worth twelve G’s. I’ll send you six in the morning by Western Union, six more when I see your number light up. I’m doing it this way because I want to, not because I have to. Now for the bad part. You think I can’t finish you in politics? Maybe you’re right. You know the ins and outs better than me. But what I can do is finish you, period.”
“What do you mean, finish me?”
“Finish you. Wind you up. You’re dead in a week.”
“Should I worry about that?”
“If you’ve got any brains at all. But you don’t know me, and maybe I’m bullshitting. When you get the six grand by messenger, you’ll know I’m serious about that part. About the other, here’s the convincer.”
Kendrick, his face darkening again, started to speak, but Shayne clamped his hand over the mouthpiece.
The voice grated, “That’s your Lincoln out in the parking lot.”
“What about it?”
“Can you see it from your window? For laughs.”
