him. Without loss of speed he zoomed around it on a curve, his thumb on the hornbutton, trusting that if anybody was coming toward him they would have the sense to get out of his way. It was a chance he might not have taken before those knocks on the head. He was glad to see that his reflexes were working. When headlights flashed in front of him he slid back into his own lane without using his brakes.
At Normandy Drive he ran through a red light. The pain behind his eyes made it hard for him to see. The approaching headlights seemed much too bright and came straight at him, forcing him farther and farther toward the edge of the road.
It was better on the causeway. He built up his speed until he was doing seventy. The causeway straightened crossing Treasure Island and his speed kept climbing. Slower cars flashed past on his right, but he didn’t break his concentration. He was concerned with gauging gaps and distances. If one of the cars he was passing was a gray Dodge, he would find it out when he was across the bay.
He passed three cars in a bunch, cut back and touched his brakes as the lights of the mainland approached. At the end of the causeway he pulled over to let the cars behind him pass. He knew the odds were against him. He might have taken too long to get started. They might, after all, have had a reason for going into Miami Beach. And would he know the car when he saw it? The town was full of gray sedans.
At that moment it went by, one of the clump of three he had passed in his last reckless rush. There were only two men in it, one at the wheel and one in the back seat.
The man in back glanced at him as they passed. The eye Shayne had knuckled was red and swollen. The man was smiling happily, but the smile froze as he recognized Shayne.
Shayne blinked his directional signal and fell back into line, the second car behind the Dodge. His lips were drawn back in a savage grin. This was his town. His Buick had just come out of the garage with new valves and points, and everything tinkered up into racing condition. Unless the Dodge had a specially souped-up motor, he knew he had them.
They tried to hang him up on a red light at Biscayne Boulevard, but he bulled through, his horn going. When they took the curving ramp up to the North-South Express way, the Dodge leaned more than it should; probably there was something wrong with the front suspension. It came off the ramp too fast and barely recovered.
The big man shattered the rear window with a gun butt. Shayne dropped back, letting another car slip in ahead of him. He was watching for the buggy-whip aerial and markings of a police car. There were usually two or three patrolling this stretch. When he saw one across the divider, traveling north, he swung into the left-hand lane, honking his horn and snapping his headlights. They saw him, but they would have to go on a few miles, to the 79th Street connection, before they could turn. The Dodge was cutting in and out, doing eighty. Shayne stayed one or two cars back. The big man waited, on his knees behind the broken window, hoping for a shot.
When the lanes began to separate for the great 39th Street cloverleaf, one stream heading for the Julia Tuttle Causeway to Miami Beach, the other to the Airport Expressway, Shayne was not surprised to see the Dodge lean to the right, toward the airport. Shayne let it pull ahead, knowing he could come up with it again on the straightaway. He lost it for a moment. When he saw it again it had drifted to the left. The lean became more and more pronounced as the cloverleaf sharpened. The brake lights came on, too late, and the brakes grabbed unevenly. One wheel hit the low curb.
The Dodge stopped fighting the curve and plunged over a low embankment to another level, into a stream of traffic going the opposite way. Brakes and tires shrieked. Then came the inevitable rending crash.
Shayne was well past. He left his Buick on the approach to the 12th Avenue ramp, lights blinking, and worked his way back on foot along the divider, to see if there were any survivors. A siren screamed above on the Expressway. A crowd was beginning to gather when Shayne reached the wreck. By some miracle, it was only a one-car accident. The Dodge had rammed a concrete pillar, folding shut on the two men trapped inside. At some point the big man in the back seat had been jolted part way out the broken window, and the impact with the pillar had dragged him back in. He was beyond help. The concrete was slick with blood.
Shayne looked in at the driver. He was a boy in his early twenties, with a blotched complexion. He was skewered on the broken steering post.
Shayne went for his Buick. By the time he circled back to the scene the cops had arrived, including one he knew, a red-faced veteran named Squire. The redhead nodded to him.
“Anybody live through it?”
“God, no,” Squire said. “The one in front we’re going to have to take out with a can opener.”
“I suppose it’s a stolen car?” Shayne said casually.
Squire’s eyebrows rose. “Yeah. My partner spotted it right away. He’s a memory nut, thinks if he recovers enough stolen cars they’ll make him detective. Little does he know.” He fished out a cigarette. “You have anything to do with this, Mike?”
“I walked in on something out on the bay. I don’t know what, except that they didn’t want to be bothered. They got away from me there but I picked them up again on the causeway. Believe it or not, that’s all I know.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t believe you,” Squire told him. “As soon as we get an identification, if we do, we’d better talk about it some more.”
“Sure,” Shayne said. “I’ll call in.”
Squire started to say something, then nodded. “Make it tonight, though, will you? Don’t let it go till morning.”
3
On Normandy Isle, beach police were stopping traffic on Bay Drive and sending it around the golf course. Shayne wanted to find out what had been done with the unconscious Negro, but it would have to wait. Because of the unreasoning enmity of his old antagonist, Chief of Detectives Peter Painter, he had as few dealings as possible with the cops on this side of the bay.
He followed the directions of the red flashlights without objecting. A few minutes later he pulled into Harry Bass’ gravel driveway on the bay side of the island.
The house was lighted up. As he went up the front steps he heard a typewriter clacking busily inside. A chime sounded when he rang the bell. The typewriter stopped. In a moment a girl came to the door.
Harry had been married twice, and his second divorce had just become final. He had always had good taste in girls, and on the evidence of this one it seemed to be getting even better. She was blonde, probably in her late twenties, though Shayne was no longer much of a judge of women’s ages. She was wearing horn-rimmed glasses. A pencil with a large eraser was stuck in her hair and a light cashmere sweater was thrown carelessly over her shoulders. All Harry’s women had been sexy-looking. She was no exception, but she also looked interested and intelligent. That was new.
“You’re Michael Shayne,” she said, opening the screen door. “I’m Mr. Bass’s secretary, Theo Moore.” She looked at a small wristwatch. “He’ll be back in a minute. I’m supposed to find you a drink and make myself agreeable.”
She smiled at him when he stayed where he was. “Come in, Mr. Shayne. I won’t bite.”
“Does Harry still drive that Ferrari?” Shayne asked.,
She laughed. “No, these days he’s much more sober and sedate and respectable. They sold him a Cadillac, no less, with backseat television and a refrigerator. I was afraid it might change his personality, but he still seems to be the same man.”
Shayne said grimly, “Was anybody with him?”
She reacted immediately to his tone. “Yes, a man named Billy Wallace. Is anything wrong?”
“If Billy Wallace is colored,” Shayne said, “wearing a white cap and a gun, yeah, something’s wrong. Somebody slugged Billy and set the Cadillac on fire.”
She took a quick breath. “On fire! I heard the siren but it never occurred to me-Mr. Shayne, wasn’t Harry there?”
“No. It looks as though he’s been jumped. Do you know where he was going?”
She shook her head too quickly. “I really don’t.”
“I don’t want to waste time going up blind alleys,” Shayne said roughly. “You must have some idea.”
