he drove back down the beach to the street on which the Edwards house was located.
As he approached from the east he saw that only one automobile now stood in front of the lighted house. It was a bright blue sedan. Two men lolled back against the cushion of the front seat.
Shayne drove past without slacking speed, swerved into the curb in the middle of the next block, and got out. Phyllis moved her lips to question him as he said:
“Take the car on back to the hotel. Park it in front and leave the key with the clerk.” His voice was harsh, and Phyllis saw that all at once his lips were tight.
She slid obediently under the wheel. “Well, you needn’t snap my head off,” she told him, half seriously. “Why are you getting out here?”
“Sorry, angel.” He patted her hand, then jerked his thumb toward the blue sedan. “I’m going back to see Mrs. Edwards. If you see Will Gentry or Chief Boyle around the hotel you might ask one of them to drive by and pick me up presently.”
“But I could wait for you, Michael. Honestly, I don’t mind waiting at all.”
He waggled a long forefinger at her. “Remember, you agreed to take orders when I’m working. Get going.”
Disappointment came into her face, but she drove slowly away. He waited to be sure she didn’t turn back, then thrust his hands deep in his pockets and strolled back to the palm-shaded sidewalk, whistling. Curiously enough, the tune was his own off-key version of “The Campbells Are Coming.”
He saw the flare of a match from the front seat of the sedan as he approached. He groped in his pocket for a cigarette and stuck it between his lips, then stepped to the curb side of the sedan and asked, “Got a match?”
Melvin’s young round face twitched. He half turned to Hymie, who sat under the wheel, and his hand dived toward Hymie’s left armpit.
Hymie knocked his hand away. “You wanta give him my rod too?” he growled.
Shayne laughed softly. “Why don’t you tell him a fairy story to keep him quiet?”
Melvin began to curse the detective in a high-pitched voice while tears of anger and mortification came into his eyes.
“Lay off him,” Hymie demanded. “Sweet mother, what’s it get you to keep him riled up? We’re not bothering you.”
Shayne said, “I get a kick out of making him cry.” He swung around and opened the gate leading onto the yard walk.
Mrs. Ben Edwards answered the door. Her eyes were red but she was not weeping. Her plump face was stiffly set in tragic lines of acceptance and Shayne divined that she was through with waiting; glad, perhaps, that the time of waiting was ended.
She nodded and said, “Come in, Mr. Shayne,” exactly as though he had kept an appointment.
He went into the living-room and said, “Hello,” to Mr. Max Samuelson, whose bald head glowed as smooth as a buttered billiard ball. He was seated in the chair which Tommy had occupied earlier in the evening.
The lawyer nodded without speaking. He was a greasily fat little man with a dimpled jaw nestling among many chins. His cheeks had the appearance of never needing a shave and his jowls were as soft and pink as a baby’s behind. Ridiculously tiny feet barely reached the floor, though he sat near the edge of the chair, and rings were embedded in the soft flesh of his fingers, which were playing with a heavy gold watch chain suspended across his front. His belly shivered gently, like a protuberant bowl of jelly, each time he breathed. He breathed heavily now, glowering up at Shayne.
Shayne waited until Mrs. Edwards re-entered the room and took her seat on the couch. He said, “I’m sorry about your husband, but I know your friends have said that better than I.” He hesitated, glancing at Samuelson, whose eyes steadily watched him with reptilian intentness beneath ugly mottled lids.
“I really stopped by because I saw Max’s car outside. I want to spike whatever plans he has for your husband’s invention.”
“There is no reason for such an attitude, Shayne. If we could speak privately-” Max’s breath hissed out and he spoke with a perceptible thickening of his s’s.
“We’ll do our talking here in front of Mrs. Edwards. What sort of an offer has he made?” Shayne put the question to the widow point blank.
She stirred wearily. “He offered me a hundred dollars to sign a release on all rights to the camera-to turn the model and plans over to him.” She spoke softly, her eyes turning anxiously toward a rear door in the living- room.
“Nice going, Maxie,” Shayne jeered. “If she refuses your generous offer I suppose you’re prepared to give your mugs the go-ahead to steal the plans and model.”
“That is no nice thing to say,” Samuelson protested. “I take a chance when I offer a dollar of good money. The camera may be no good. There may be other patents. No one can say until the proper investigation is made.” He spread out his fat hands and diamonds flashed in the lamplight.
“Please-don’t talk loud enough to wake up the boy,” Mrs. Edwards pleaded. “He has cried himself to sleep.”
“Your pardon,” Shayne murmured. He kept his voice low and scathing when he turned to Samuelson again. “Why did you hurry up here with a couple of bodyguards after hearing what Mayme Martin had to say about the invention?”
A wary look crept into Max Samuelson’s hard black eyes. He put up both hands in protest. “I think that is a matter we should not discuss in front of Mrs. Edwards.”
“Why not? Don’t you want her to hear what Mayme told you?”
The lawyer’s multiple chins shook with agitation. He sat forward and the tips of his polished little shoes touched the rug. “Do you want me to say out loud what I found at the Red Rose Apartment when I arrived after you left?”
“Sure. Go ahead and say it.”
“The lady was dead.” Mr. Samuelson shuddered. “A shocking sight. Blood spilled on the bathroom floor.”
Mrs. Edwards uttered a low moan. She slumped sideways limply.
Shayne jumped to his feet and supported her. He said, “That’s a lousy choice of words before a lady who’s just been told her husband has been killed,” in a low, angry voice.
“It was the truth,” the lawyer insisted stubbornly. “I have told no one yet. And I expect you to tell no one she railed me and requested that I come to her apartment just before she died.”
Shayne was anxiously fanning the limp woman with his hat. Her face was stricken and flaccid, wrinkled lids were lowered protectingly over her eyes. Her lips began to move and Shayne put his ear close to hear her almost inaudible words. They were a faint sigh, scarcely formed, like words welling up from the subconscious with such agony that the lips were forced to form them.
“Mayme-and Ben-Gil. Gil-is he-next? Oh, God-did Gil-?”
“What is she saying?” Max Samuelson had crossed the worn carpet silently and was bending over the couch anxiously, straining to hear the woman’s words.
Shayne growled, “Nothing you’d be interested in. Nothing about the invention.” He shouldered the lawyer aside.
Mrs. Edwards’s eyelids flickered and faint signs of color began to creep into her cheeks. Shayne straightened up from her and stepped in front of Samuelson, backing him away inexorably.
“You’re through here, Maxie. As far as Edwards’s invention is concerned, you’re through altogether.” He backed the fat little lawyer toward the doorway, continuing in the same cold, hard tone:
“That doesn’t mean I’m believing your story about Mayme Martin. You wouldn’t have wasted much time getting to her after she phoned. I’m not sure she was dead when you got there. The bathroom looked a lot like Hymie’s idea of a good way to get rid of her.”
“No,” Samuelson breathed. His face was the color of putty. “I swear to you-”
“Don’t waste your breath. There’s also the little matter of Ben Edwards’s murder. A widow is easier to deal with, Max. What the hell were you doing out there on the road in your car when he was killed? You had gone to the track half an hour previously. Where were you in the meantime? A phone call took Ben to his appointment with death. Who made that call?”
“How do I know? How should I guess?” Samuelson backed through the door onto the porch before Shayne’s
