“Before the deal went through,” Shayne continued glibly, conscious of twenty thousand dollars in his pocket of which Painter knew nothing, “Henderson proudly scrapes off the name of Robertson and shows us what is supposed to be Raphael’s signature. But,” Shayne chuckled, “Joyce wasn’t to be caught napping. He thought the signature looked phony and insisted on scraping below it. Henderson did, and found Robertson’s name underneath.”
“Holy smokes!” Painter ejaculated. “Then Henderson was trying to put one over?”
“I think not,” Pelham Joyce broke into the discussion. “Mr. Henderson’s reputation is unassailable. I believe Henderson was absolutely honest in judging it a Raphael. An error in judgment rather than dishonesty.”
Painter walked over to the picture and studied it with interest. “It’s already cost three lives-and it’s not worth a damn, eh?”
“No one seems to be particularly interested in it now.” Shayne shrugged and said to Joyce, “Suppose we take it along with us for a souvenir?”
“An excellent piece of work.” Pelham Joyce’s finger tips caressed the painting. His face lighted up. “There is a spot in my studio where I should love to hang it.”
The coroner came bustling in as Joyce lovingly rolled up the painting and wrapped it in its covering.
Shayne said to Joyce, “Let’s get out of here.” They went toward the door together, and Shayne said over his shoulder to Painter and the coroner, “We’ll both be on hand for the inquest.”
They went out through throngs of Miami Beach policemen and got in Shayne’s car. He groaned as he set the car in motion, and gripped his underlip hard between his teeth. His shoulder throbbed with excruciating pain. His head lolled back against the seat as the car stopped. He muttered to his startled companion, “Flag a car and send me to the hospital. You hang-onto-the-Raphael.”
CHAPTER 18
It was hours later when Shayne came back to consciousness in the emergency ward of the Jackson Memorial Hospital. He gritted his teeth, sat up, and asked what time it was. A doctor came hurrying to his bed and told him it was four o’clock and that he must take it easy and get some rest until his strength returned.
Shayne said, “Rest be damned. I’ve been here three hours already. Where are my clothes?”
It was the same doctor who had treated his wounds when he was brought in from the midnight shooting. He shrugged his shoulders and said, “All right. Be stubborn. I warned you to take care of yourself the other time. You’ll carry this cast around for an extra month just because you horsed around when you should have been in bed.”
Shayne chuckled and asked for a cigarette. Then he again demanded his clothes.
The doctor shook his head and called an orderly to bring Shayne’s clothes. “But, what’s your hurry?” he argued. “We were going to move you into a private room as soon as you woke up. A night here with fresh dressings in the morning would fix you up as good as new.”
“I’ve got a date,” Shayne informed him with a wide grin. He dressed with the orderly’s aid, and whistled expressively when he found the twenty thousand dollars intact.
“You’re an honest bunch,” he grunted.
The orderly gazed at the bills in respectful awe.
“God in heaven! Who are you? The Secretary of the Treasury?”
“Just a flatfoot trying to get along,” Shayne told him cheerfully. He put the money back in his pocket and his feet on the floor. A slight dizziness was the only discomfort he felt. “If you’ll whistle up a taxi, I’ll be set,” he announced.
The orderly complied, eying Shayne with unmitigated respect as he went out.
Shayne gave the driver his address and settled back comfortably. As they turned into Flagler he heard the newsboys shouting an extra. “All about the Brighton case! Three dead in final roundup!” Shayne had the driver pull up at the curb while he got a paper. He spread it out on his knees and chuckled while reading the lurid news account of the affair.
Peter Painter was the hero of the day. According to printed accounts, he had fearlessly entered the fray single-handed and come out with three dead, one wounded, and two prisoners.
Under questioning, the sick man in the upstairs room had confessed he was Julius Brighton, and that his brother Rufus had died in New York-insisting that he died a natural death, and admitting no regret over the attempted imposture which Montrose and Oscar, his former cell-mate, had helped engineer. The trunk containing Rufus’s embalmed body had been dug up on the beach. The bogus nurse had confessed nothing, but a ballistic test proved that her. 25 automatic had killed Charlotte Hunt.
The real Myrtle Godspeed had made a telephonic statement of her innocent entanglement in the affair, and arrangements had been made to bring her back from Cuba to confront the woman who had inveigled her into accepting an expense-paid vacation in Cuba.
That was about all. It was enough. Shayne’s name was mentioned only casually, and not at all in connection with the solving of the case. “Which,” he told himself as he got out at his hotel, “certainly justifies a payoff.”
He went in the side entrance and up to his apartment. A maid had cleaned up all the evidences of disorder left by Gordon when he searched the apartment.
Shayne went to the kitchen and crushed ice cubes into a pitcher which he filled with water. He set it on the table with a large glass and a wineglass. Then he opened a fresh bottle of Martell and set it beside the pitcher.
Drawing up a comfortable chair, he lit a cigarette and poured himself a drink. Sitting alone, he sipped the liquor and smoked meditatively while strength flowed back to his body.
The telephone rang as he finished a second glass. He answered it and heard Painter on the wire.
The chief of detectives’ voice was exultant. “Everything has worked out perfectly, Shayne. The reward will be paid to me personally. I’ll turn it over to you-privately-as soon as I receive it.”
“Two and a half G’s?” Shayne questioned laconically.
“That’s right. And thanks.”
Shayne said, “Money talks,” and hung up.
He went back to the table and finished his drink. He then took a sheet of paper out of the drawer and looked for a pencil. There wasn’t any. A lopsided grin spread over his face as he picked up the fountain pen which he had taken from the sickroom.
He sat down and wrote across the top of the sheet:
He nodded approvingly at the figures and poured himself another drink. Dusk was creeping in through the windows, but he didn’t turn on the lights. Suddenly he remembered something. He got up and went to the kitchen door. It was still bolted shut as he had left it the night of Charlotte’s visit. He unbolted it but left the night latch on. Then he went back to the living-room-to his cognac, his cigarettes, and his not unpleasant meditations. It grew darker in the room, then lighter as the street lamps came on. Shayne sat in a listening attitude.
He sat like that a long time before he heard the sound he was expecting. The faint click of a key in the lock on the kitchen door.
His back was toward the kitchen. He did not move except to reach out in the semidarkness and fold the sheet of paper upon which he had cast up his profits on the Brighton case. He heard the back door open softly, then light footsteps advancing hesitantly from the kitchen. He chose that moment to light a cigarette, still with his back turned, seemingly unaware of another presence in the room.
The intruder stole upon him as he blew out the match. Soft hands were clasped over his eyes, and a laughing voice exclaimed, “Guess who.”
Shayne did not move. He said lazily, “So it was you who stole the key to my kitchen door.”
Phyllis Brighton leaned her cheek down against his coarse red hair for just an instant. Then she took her hands from his eyes and came around from behind him.
“Pull the cord on the floor lamp,” Shayne suggested.
She did, and faced him accusingly in the soft light. “You’re not even surprised to see me.”
“Of course not. I expected you sooner. Sit down.” Shayne pointed to a chair and reached for his glass.
