“Maybe twenty, and some of those are pretty marginal. You’ll want to look at the physical layout. There’s no copying machine in that part of the building, for one thing. That washes out two or three possible suspects. Another was on the Coast when the transfer probably took place. And so on. I’d say it just about comes down to the people who are here this weekend.”
“So it’s not only Begley you’re hoping to break.”
“That’s right. Even if we can’t keep the United States paint off the market, we’d like to find out how it happened so it won’t happen again. A strong minority on the board is opposed to the present management, by which I mean my father. T-239 is Dad’s creation, but if he hadn’t been so damn slow and conservative, if he hadn’t insisted on that last test series, we’d be out with it now. So that’s a point against him. On the other hand, if my Uncle Jose or anybody in the opposition group had anything to do with the leak, hoping to use it to discredit him, Dad can wipe up the floor with them. If he can prove it! I wish it was simpler, but that’s why we’re paying you ten thousand dollars, I guess.”
“What’s the explanation of the time lag? Why didn’t you bring me in a couple of months ago? This isn’t a job you can do on a weekend.”
“We wanted to handle it inside the firm, if possible. This wasn’t just my idea; everybody agreed. If there had to be publicity, we wanted to be able to control it.”
“So right from the start,” Shayne pointed out, “you expected to find you’d been sold out by one of your top men.”
Forbes nodded. “Not necessarily for money. You know more about Begley than I do, but I understand he’s been known to use blackmail.”
“Sure. It’s risky as hell, but cheaper in the short run.”
“So the police had to be ruled out from the start. This is just not a police matter. And how many private investigators are smart enough to find out anything, and how many of those can you trust? Don’t be offended,” he said with his sudden grin.
Shayne returned the grin, beginning to like him a little better. “I see your problem. If Begley’s been blackmailing one of your people, you don’t want some slob of a private eye to get hold of it.”
“Well, you must admit, Mr. Shayne, your profession isn’t known for its high ethical standards. But Dad was talking to somebody at Pittsburgh Plate Glass last week, and your name came up. Apparently there’s no love lost between you and Begley.”
“You can say that again.”
“The Pittsburgh man said that was the first time Begley had ever been beaten. Dad thought we could count on you to give it a little extra effort.”
Shayne shook his head shortly. “I didn’t beat him. I collected a fee. The client was satisfied, but I wasn’t. Begley’s still in business.”
“Now wait,” Forbes said. “Hold on a minute. We don’t want to tie our hands. The only practical outcome I can foresee is a deal, under which Begley agrees to provide us with the name of his contact in return for an agreement from us not to take any legal action. We don’t want your personal feelings to stand in the way if that kind of deal is the best we can get. Begley as an individual isn’t all that important.”
“He is to me,” Shayne said evenly. “He’s in a funny business. He can win and lose at the same time. He’s been using that Pittsburgh Plate Glass affair for advertising. It showed that, when he goes after information, he gets it, and he doesn’t care what methods he uses so long as they get results. Good advertising for him is bad advertising for me. I didn’t understand I was being hired to handle a deal. Maybe you’d better look for somebody else.”
“Time’s too short!” Forbes exclaimed. “You can grind Begley up and eat him in a bun for all I care. But to us, that isn’t the main thing. See what you think this weekend.”
Shayne waited a moment. “Who’s been handling the investigation?”
“I have. Forbes Hallam, Jr., junior executive. I thought it might be more interesting than what I was doing, which was one step above emptying the wastebaskets. I didn’t know what I was getting into. I thought the culprit would turn out to be a technician or white-collar worker with a grudge against Dad. If Dad had ever gone to business school, he would have flunked his human relations, I’m afraid. One of his favorite sayings is that he doesn’t care about being popular, he cares about the quarterly dividend. This is old-fashioned enough to have a certain charm, especially if you happen to be a stockholder, but there are people in the company who-well, who hate him. Unfortunately, I couldn’t come up with anybody who hated him and also had access to the report. It’s beginning to look as though I stole the damn thing. I mean it. I did the actual writing on it, under Walter Langhorne’s supervision. I tried to put the technical stuff into English. After Walter edited it, I did the proofreading. There was even one day when I got fed up with Miss Phoebe McGonigle and I didn’t turn in the proof sheets. As soon as you start asking questions, Mr. Shayne, you’ll find out that I’m not the typical eager-to-please trainee. I’m a trainee as a last resort, and I kicked and screamed all the time they were fastening on my button-down shirt and pulling up my executive-length socks.”
He grinned again, making one of his abrupt shifts. “But the junior-executive racket isn’t as bad as I expected. I’ve always wanted to be a writer. Dad gave me a year after college and I wrote a bunch of short stories. I sold a few. If you make the mistake of looking mildly interested, I’ll press copies on you. Maybe some day I’ll write about what goes on in the Despard administration building. The public would be amazed!”
“How long have you worked there, Forbes?”
“Two years. In my own opinion, I’m underpaid. I’m also not very good about making out personal budgets and crap like that, so I frequently find myself short of funds. I didn’t steal any formulas, however. Formulae. I know that for a fact, even if nobody else does, so I haven’t wasted any time investigating myself.”
He took a sip of coffee. “I’ve picked up a certain amount of gossip, which I hope I can use if I ever get around to writing that novel. I didn’t go hunting for it; it just drifted in. One of the first things I learned was that Hal Begley Associates isn’t listed in the Yellow Pages as a spy firm. Ostensibly they’re a chi-chi employment agency, handling nobody earning less than twenty thousand a year. Probably they even do some legitimate business along those lines, I don’t know.”
“Why not?” Shayne said. “That’s the easiest way to pick up industrial secrets-hire somebody who can carry them out in his head.”
“I hadn’t thought of it that way. What I’m getting around to, slowly, is that Walter Langhorne and the girl from the Begley firm were seen together at an art auction in Palm Beach.”
Shayne considered. “Has Langhorne said anything about changing jobs?”
“Mr. Shayne,” Forbes said anxiously, “I feel like a fink! He’s not only talked about changing jobs, he said something about tying up with United States Chemical, damn it! Naturally he told me in confidence, so if you use this, would you mind disguising where you got it? He’s a friend of mine. He’s easily the brightest man in the place.”
“And he’s still working there, which might mean that Candida tried and didn’t get him.”
“It might, or it might mean that he’s taking a postdated check. He cares what his friends think, and he wouldn’t want them to think he’s a thief. But I can’t believe it, Mr. Shayne. It’s perfectly true that he doesn’t think he owes his main loyalty to E. J. Despard and Co. But he’s one of the few people I know with any moral standards at all. There are more important things in Walter’s life than the quarterly dividends.”
A shotgun went off in the blind to their right. Glancing up, Shayne saw a single mallard almost directly overhead, climbing. He would have had a shot a second earlier, but it was too late now.
“And at that point,” Forbes said, “I decided I was no longer running this investigation. The last thing I could do is go up to Walter Langhorne and ask him to explain what he was doing in Palm Beach with the sinister Candida Morse.”
There was a hoarse, urgent shout. Shayne and Forbes looked at each other for an instant. Then Shayne whirled and stepped up out of the blind.
The senior Hallam burst from the adjoining blind, his crest of gray hair blowing in the wind. He had his tan hunting cap in his hand. He crunched it violently, threw it down in the reeds and banged his thigh with his fist.
Shayne splashed toward him. Hearing the sound, Hallam turned and waited. He was a short, plump man whose usual position was straight up and down, to get the maximum mileage out of his limited stature. He had a tight mouth, sharp, unfriendly eyes. Everything about his bearing showed that he wasn’t in the habit of losing, and if he did lose occasionally, he would do it without grace. Now he had suddenly changed roles. He was breathing as
