“Where are you now?”
“At my office.”
“Good,” said Rourke. “Miss Lally and I will wait in the cocktail lounge.”
Shayne pressed a button to break the connection and swiftly dialed another number, setting his jaw and frowning as he waited. Timothy Rourke was an old friend, and Shayne knew he was not easily upset. What the devil was a reporter from the Miami News doing-?
He snapped his fingers, suddenly remembering Sara Morton. Lucy’s spelling of the first name had thrown him off, and he had been too absorbed with the get-out-of-town notes to identify her immediately when he saw the printed name on the message. Rourke had done a human interest story on her in the Sunday News- her exploits in crime-reporting on the national scene. There were pictures of a slender and vitally beautiful woman-thirty-five, perhaps, with sharp, intelligent eyes and distinctive features. Sara Morton was practically a legend, a roving reporter for a national syndicate who was feared by the underworld and criminals in high places.
Lucy Hamilton’s eager voice cut his recollections short. “Hello.”
“Lucy-I just got in and I-”
“Michael! Where on earth were you all day?”
“I wasn’t,” he said, grinning briefly. “I was on water. But never mind that now,” he went on soberly. “This Sara Morton-didn’t she tell you anything about what she wanted?”
“Not a thing-except it was terribly urgent. I kept telling her you’d be in or phone any minute and I’d have you call her-until the last time. Then I had to confess I hadn’t the faintest idea how to reach you,” she said in a small, hurt voice; then went on crisply, as she had begun: “She didn’t say much, but I had a feeling she was quite upset, because she insisted that you call her, no matter what time you came in. If you’re going to have an office and keep a secretary you might at least-”
“Save it for tomorrow, angel,” he interrupted. “I’m on my way to the Tidehaven right now.” He replaced the receiver slowly, heard her say, “Good night, Michael,” faintly, before it clicked.
His sense of drowsy relaxation had vanished, the polo shirt and faded dungarees forgotten. His gaze was cold and remote, flickering over Lucy’s memos, the cut squares of paper with their threatening warnings, and, finally, the special-delivery note.
A single phrase leaped out at him: I have given up hope. She had waited for his call until six-thirty, and-
He wadded the memo sheet into a ball and thrust it into a side pocket, replaced the note and enclosures in the envelope, and went out and down to his car.
The Tidehaven Hotel faced Biscayne Bay and was only a short distance, but from habit he drove the three blocks and parked in the inner lane of the Boulevard opposite the marquee.
The doorman raised his brows and drew them together disapprovingly when Shayne approached, his eyes sliding from the redhead’s tousled hair to the soiled canvas sandals, but he hastily opened the door and Shayne strode through without a glance at the immaculate uniform.
He slowed when he saw Rourke and Miss Lally in the cocktail lounge just off the sumptuous lobby. They sat in the center of a horseshoe booth with leather-cushioned seats. Rourke’s sharp and emaciated profile was toward Shayne as he bent close to the girl with feverish intensity.
Shayne paused a moment to study Miss Lally while the patrons observed him with expressions befitting their various stages of inebriety.
His general impression of her was one of roundness, and of white skin rarely seen in Miami. She was chubby rather than fat, and her face missed being round by a chin that was firm and slightly pointed. Her eyes were round and sooty with dark lashes and brows contrasting severely with her short blond hair worn plain on top and curling at the ends. She wore a silvery gray skirt and a short-sleeved Eton jacket, and the round blue collar of her blouse hugged her white neck girlishly. She was nibbling on an arm of her tortoise-shell glasses frame dangling in her hand as she gazed wide-eyed at Rourke, looking more like a rapt, chubby child than the secretary of crime-reporter Sara Morton.
Shayne moved on and was standing at their table before they saw him.
“Mike-sit down,” said Rourke. “We’re worried about Miss Morton, Bea and I.” His tone was amorous on the last three words, but he made the introductions with precise and semi-intoxicated formality.
Shayne shook his head at a hovering waiter and sat down. “Have you found out where Sara Morton is?” he asked, glancing from one to the other when they straightened around facing the table.
“Not a word, Mr. Shayne,” said Miss Lally in the low, full voice he had heard over the phone. “Did I understand you to say you had not contacted her?” She slid the arms of her tortoise-shell glasses behind her ears.
The transformation was instantaneous and shocking. She was efficient and late twenty-ish, stout instead of chubby.
Trying not to stare, Shayne said, “That’s right. I’ve been fishing all day. What did she want?”
“There was-it was a private matter. That’s why she didn’t want to call in the police. I-don’t understand. Now that she’s gone out I don’t know what to think.” The effort to keep her voice steady was apparent and the faltering uncertainty seemed to be more from worry than fright.
“The hell of it is,” Rourke interjected, “I had an appointment with la Morton here in the cocktail lounge at six. Miss Lally kept it instead. You tell him, Bea,” he ended, turning his slaty, feverish eyes toward her.
A perpendicular frown came between her eyes and flitted away, leaving smooth, white skin. “I went to her room a few minutes before six to remind her she was to meet Mr. Rourke. She didn’t unlock the door when I knocked. She sounded terribly upset-or frightened. I’ve never known her to be afraid. She isn’t the type.”
“Sara Morton is the type to play fair by giving a man-eating tiger the first two bites,” Rourke interrupted grimly. “She’s the gal who broke into the big time years ago by becoming the moll of one of Capone’s original mob to get an exclusive.”
Shayne said, “I read your Sunday story, Tim. What did she say when you knocked on her door, Miss Lally?”
“Just that she was expecting a very important telephone call and had to wait for it if it took all night.”
“From me?” Shayne asked.
“She didn’t say, Mr. Shayne. At the time I didn’t realize she hadn’t been able to reach you today. She told me not to bother about her but to go down and tell Mr. Rourke-” She paused abruptly, and a pink flush washed up in her neck and face, and the tips of her ears were red.
“To tell Tim what?” Shayne prompted gravely.
Miss Lally took off her glasses and her eyes, large and round and sooty again, were lowered. “She told me to-tell him to try-making passes at me for a change because she didn’t believe he had another-another-”
“Another what?” Rourke demanded indignantly.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, polished her glasses carefully, and put them on again. “I never quote Miss Morton verbatim — when she’s vulgar.” She spoke primly, and her face was white again when she resumed her low-voiced recital:
“The reason I’m so worried about her right now is because she appears to have gone out before you called her-after telling me emphatically she was going to stay there all night if necessary.”
“Maybe it wasn’t my call she was waiting for,” Shayne suggested.
“I think it was. You see, she hasn’t received any call since I talked to her at six o’clock. I checked with the switchboard operator after I talked to you. Do you think we should-do anything?” The frown came and stayed longer now, accentuating the worried tone in her voice.
Shayne didn’t answer immediately. He stared down at the table, rolling his ear lobe between thumb and forefinger, acutely conscious of the threatening messages and the note in his pocket. He didn’t want to discuss them in the presence of Rourke. Not yet. Miss Lally wouldn’t want to, either.
He pushed his chair back and stood up. “I think we might go up and see if she’s in her room. She may have fallen asleep.”
Miss Lally finished her stale drink and stood beside Shayne, the top of her head even with his shoulder, while Rourke took out his billfold and laid some money on the table. When he joined them they went into the lobby and across to a bank of elevators and. up to the fourteenth floor.
Miss Lally led the two men down a corridor, around a corner, and past several doors to number 1422. With her hand on the knob she turned a strained and frightened face up to Shayne. “See,” she whispered, pointing to the
