“I’m all right,” she mumbled, her head flopping against his shoulder. “Thank you for everything. I don’t mean for stopping me. For everything else.”
“What floor?” he said.
She smiled and murmured something, her eyes closing. He put her back on the bench and returned to the outer lobby to get her apartment number. By speaking loudly and forcefully, he penetrated the fog that was closing in around her and made her walk beside him into the elevator. She stayed on her feet, but she was nearly asleep. She lived on the ninth floor. He supported her down the hall and opened her bag to get the keys.
She was as unresisting as a doll. He found the light inside the door. Giving up the attempt to keep her in motion, he picked her up and carried her into the bedroom. Her arm was around his neck. As he put her on the bed her grip tightened and she pulled him down with her.
“Oh, Mike,” she said without opening her eyes. “If everything wasn’t such a mess-”
Shayne freed himself. “Go to sleep, Theo. I’ll call in the morning.”
“Mike-”
It trailed off. He removed her glasses and shoes. That was all he had time for. He covered her with a light thermal blanket and left the bedroom quietly.
Using the phone in her living room, he called Rourke. The reporter’s voice was somber.
“More bad news, Mike. The cop Harry hit died in the hospital.”
Shayne had an unlighted cigarette between his lips. He bit it in two, and threw it across the room. “They don’t want to give the poor bastard any breaks, do they? Is he still on the run?”
“Yeah, and the cops’ car hasn’t turned up yet. I don’t know about on the run-he was in no shape for a long drive. They think they’ll find him conked out in it somewhere. I have Steve Bass and the girl here. She’s not my number-one pick of the three at the party, but she has her points, all of them nicely rounded. I’m rationing the booze, Mike. The wire services are bugging the paper, needless to say, and the paper’s bugging me-I’m the guy who’s supposed to be the expert on what Mike Shayne is up to, after all. Don’t you think it’s time we got together?”
“Just about. I’m going to Harry’s house on Normandy Isle. Doc Waters was there the last I knew, and I want to see him before the cops do. Meet me there, and bring Steve and the girl.”
“Are you still working, Mike? I thought it was out of your hands.”
“It will be as soon as they catch up with Harry.”
After breaking the connection, Shayne called several people Harry might get in touch with, in the unlikely event that he succeeded in making it back to Miami. He asked them to pass on a simple message to Harry: do nothing until he talked to Michael Shayne.
He looked into the bedroom before leaving. Theo was sleeping under the openwork blanket, her face serene and untroubled.
La Gorce Island, where he had left his Buick, was only ten minutes away, but he had a strong feeling that his time was running out. The taxi took him to Normandy Isle.
Only one light was on in Harry Bass’s house, in a bedroom upstairs.
“Hold your flag,” Shayne told the driver. “I may not be staying.”
He looked in the garage window. Doc Waters’ Thunderbird was still there. He went around the house and up on the back terrace, where he tapped lightly on the sliding-glass door.
“Doc, are you in there?”
There was no answer, but there was a quality to the silence which long experience in entering silent houses had taught him to distrust. He stepped inside. Using his lighter, he found the light switch. The overhead light flashed on. The rifle Doc had threatened him with, its hammer crushed against the stock, lay across a low table. Ashtrays around the room were choked with cigarette stubs. Shayne checked the level in the whiskey bottle. If Doc Waters was the only one who had been drinking from it, he had put away most of a fifth. The little plastic pill container had tipped over, spilling tranquillizers across the table.
“Doc?” he called again.
He went into the hall. He felt a sudden prickling at the nape of his neck, but the warning came too late. He swung around. Something small and hard was thrust against his stomach from the side.
“Hold it, Mike.”
The light came on. Harry Bass was facing him, but it was a Harry Bass he had never before seen, haggard and wild-eyed. He seemed smaller, thinner and many years older. The head bandage, which capped the whole top of his head above the ears, had slipped to one side, which gave him a dissolute look. His tie was gone and there was blood on the front of his Madras jacket.
He took a backward step and showed Shayne a. 45, so heavy he had to support his right wrist with his left hand. “And I’ll use it, Mike. I’m not kidding.”
“I believe you,” Shayne said. “Have you already used it on Doc?”
“Not yet.” Harry opened a coat closet. “Come out slow, Doc.”
Waters staggered out, his face bloody and battered. He peered at Shayne through a bloody haze.
“He’s gone crazy!” he said appealingly. “You tell him I had nothing to do with it.”
Harry’s upper lip lifted. He moved the. 45 in a short arc between the two men.
“Do this my way, Mike. Don’t try to jump me or I’ll kill you. All three of us are going to the front door together and you’re going to get rid of the cab.”
“Sure, Harry. I’ve got a few things to tell you, and some of them may surprise you.”
“Everybody move slow,” Harry said, swinging the gun. “No tricks.”
“No tricks,” Shayne agreed.
They moved down the hall. At the screen door Shayne called to the taxi driver, “You don’t need to wait. Will ten bucks cover it?”
He looked at Harry for permission and stepped out on the porch. Harry watched him through the screen, the gun at his side. Shayne wrapped a ten dollar bill around a fifty cent piece and pitched it down the steps to the driver as he came out of his cab. The driver caught it neatly and waved.
“Now inside, Mike,” Harry said. “No more interruptions.”
“Whose plane did you use?” Shayne said.
“From the old days,” Harry grunted. “Now put it in writing, Doc.”
“Honest to God!” Waters protested. “You know I wouldn’t frame you. If you weren’t out of your skull you’d see it doesn’t add up.”
While he talked, he was following the orders the. 45 was giving him. In the living room, Harry collapsed into an upholstered chair, the gun on his knees.
“There’s the pad. Start writing.”
Suddenly his face turned into a mask of pain. His eyes squeezed tight. Waters twitched toward him.
Shayne said, “You know better than that, Doc.”
Harry’s eyes opened and he straightened the gun. Waters stared at him for a moment, then sat down at the dropleaf desk. A ruled yellow pad was waiting for him. He turned toward the redheaded detective for one more appeal.
“Shayne! He’s got this crazy idea I planted H in his coat and tipped off the New York cops. And if I don’t put it in writing and sign it he’s going to murder me. I didn’t think he would at first, but look at him. He’s just nuts enough, even in front of a witness.”
Harry’s head was wobbling. A muscle jumped badly in his cheek. His eyes crossed for a minute. With a visible effort, he forced them back into focus.
“The cop died, Harry,” Shayne said softly.
The jumping muscle in Harry’s cheek was joined by others. “So the luck went sour. In one day. OK. But nobody’s going to send me up on a drug rap. Start writing.”
“What do you think heroin is?” Waters demanded. “The atom bomb? Anybody can get hold of it if you want to put out the dough. I’ll write it down if you say so, Harry, because Jesus, I don’t like the looks of that end of a. 45. But wouldn’t you rather have the truth, for God’s sake?”
“You’ve been handling it,” Harry said.
“I handled one shipment! I was busted, I had an opportunity offered to me and I jumped at it. I know your rules. But this was absolutely open and shut. No risk attached to it at all. Why not talk to the guy who brought me
