“Where you going?” Rourke demanded.
“I’ve got a date with a couple of guys who may put me on the right track.”
Shayne got as far as the door before turning back to say, “Why don’t you and Voorland meet me in Dustin’s suite at the Sunlux at three o’clock. Invite Peter Painter to come, too. That’ll make quite a quorum to wind this thing up-if I’m lucky.”
“What about Randolph?” Rourke protested. “I’ve had a feeling all along-”
“Don’t worry about Earl Randolph,” Shayne told him grimly. “He’ll be there with me for the kill.”
He went down to his car and drove hurriedly to his hotel. It was just two o’clock when he went down the corridor to his apartment. Randolph was waiting outside the door, and greeted him nervously. “You said you’d be here at two o’clock to meet me,” Randolph complained. “That nurse wouldn’t let me in.”
“It’s exactly two o’clock,” said Shayne cheerfully, holding out his watch. He unlocked the door and went in humming to himself.
Miss Naylor stood just inside the door with the gun in her hand. She said, “Oh, it’s you, Mr. Shayne.” There were dark circles around her eyes, but her eyes were bright with interest and excitement.
“I thought you were to be relieved at noon,” said Shayne.
“The nurse Dr. Price found-the only one available-was too young,” she explained crisply. “I was afraid she wouldn’t know how to use a gun.” She smiled and added, “Besides, I heard you say you’d be back at two.” Then she chuckled. “A nurse doesn’t often have the chance to get in on-well, this detecting business.”
Shayne grinned and asked, “How’s our patient?”
“Sound asleep. Coming along fine.” Miss Naylor looked from Shayne to Randolph, hesitated, then went back to the bedroom.
Shayne noticed that the door was left open a crack. He went over and closed it quietly and firmly. He said to Randolph, “All set?”
The insurance man nodded. He took a bulky envelope from his coat pocket and said, “Fifteen hundred twenties in here.” From his inside coat pocket he drew a thinner envelope. “And sixteen bills in here, just as you wanted it.”
Shayne took the two envelopes. “Wait for me down in the lobby while I make some final arrangements.” When Randolph hesitated, he said, “The less you know about this telephone call the better off you’ll be if Painter puts you on the witness stand.”
Randolph nodded mutely. His distended eyes were murky and weary, and his shoulders slumped as he turned and went out the door.
Shayne opened the thick envelope and counted the twenty-dollar bills swiftly and carefully. He then opened the drawer of the table in the center of the room, took out a thick sheaf of pieces of paper cut the same size as the bills. He placed the sheaf of papers and the stack of bills side by side, pressed them down to more accurately gauge their depth, then lifted off enough of the paper to make it the same thickness as the bills. He placed the paper in the envelope Randolph had given him.
He then opened the other envelope and took out sixteen crisp thousand-dollar bills. Six of them went on top of the thirty thousand in twenties on the table, the other ten he returned to the original envelope, and put them in his inside coat pocket. He stuffed the thirty-six thousand dollars of reward money carelessly in the drawer, closed it, and went out with Randolph’s envelope in his hand.
Randolph was waiting for him in the lobby. Shayne nodded and said, “Everything is fixed. We’re due on the other side of the bay in fifteen minutes.”
They went out to his car and he drove swiftly across the bay, turned sharply south at the end of the Causeway, following a winding street along the bay front for several blocks, thence left half a block, where he pulled up to the curb and cut off the ignition.
“End of the line,” he told Randolph, thrusting the bulky envelope of paper clippings down behind the seat cushion so that only one corner of it protruded.
As Randolph got out, he said doubtfully, “I’m always afraid one of these things will misfire. That’s a lot of money to leave in an unlocked car.”
Shayne shrugged, leading the way back toward the bay front and a small bar on the corner. “Honor among thieves,” he reminded Randolph ironically. “We’ve got to trust them to leave the bracelet in place of the envelope if we hope to get it back at all.” He looked at his watch as they entered the bar. It was exactly 2:28. They sat in a booth against the wall and Shayne ordered a double cognac while Randolph contented himself with a beer.
“My throat feels as though it had been dried out with an electric wire,” he explained. “The cold beer might relieve it.”
They sat in the booth for twenty-two minutes, making desultory conversation and sipping their drinks. There were a few fishermen at the bar, a scattering of tourists, and occasionally a clerk or workman from the neighborhood would slip in for a quick snort and then dart out again.
At 2:50, Shayne gulped down the last of his brandy and said, “Let’s go.”
Randolph paid the bill and they went out. Shayne’s car was just where he had left it.
They reached the car together, and Randolph jerked the door open. The envelope lay on the front seat and clippings were scattered all over the seat and the floorboard. He stared at them disbelievingly, picked up a couple and let them flutter away in the breeze. “I don’t understand this, Shayne,” he exclaimed nervously. “These slips of paper! Cut to look like bills. The bracelet isn’t here! Did you try to pull a fast one by substituting this damned paper-”
Shayne shoved Randolph aside and stuck his red head in the door. “Wait a minute,” he said roughly. “That’s what they want you to think. It looks as though they had a bundle of this stuff made up, brought it along, and left it lying here to give you the idea I’d done it. An excuse for not returning the bracelet.”
“Goddamn it to hell, Shayne!” There were tears of rage and of disappointment in Randolph’s bulging and murky eyes. “I trusted you to arrange this. I gave my personal word of honor to the main office that this wasn’t a gyp game and that we’d get the bracelet back.”
“Stop your yapping.” Shayne moved back and said, “Get in,” and went around to get under the steering-wheel. He slammed the door, started the motor, and roared away eastward.
Randolph slumped beside him, flaccid, unnerved and inert. All life seemed to have flowed out of his body.
Chapter Twenty-Two
When Michael Shaynepushed the button of the Mark Dustin suite at the Sunlux Hotel, Peter Painter opened the door at once and demanded officiously, “What’s this all about, Shayne?”
Shayne looked over the immaculate little man’s head. Mark Dustin was the only other occupant of the large living-room. He sat in a deep chair near the open east window, his face bandaged and his right hand in a plaster cast. He was hollow-eyed and wan, his torso caved-in, and it was as though the death of his beautiful young wife had been more than even his splendid physique could endure.
“Timothy Rourke said I was to meet you here at three,” Painter snapped irritably. “Where is he?”
Shayne moved past Painter, saying, “I imagine Tim will be along. Have you got anything more on the jewel theft?”
Randolph followed Shayne into the room, his shoulders slumped and his eyes bewildered.
Painter said, “Nothing definite,” strutting along beside them. “We’re following out several leads.” He touched the insurance man’s coat sleeve and asked, “Anything from your end, Randolph?”
“Not a thing,” said Shayne swiftly, forestalling an answer from Randolph.
The buzzer sounded again, and Shayne swung around, stalked to the door and opened it. “Oh, here you are, Tim-and Voorland. Come in.”
Painter whirled and went back to meet the newly arrived guests. He said, “You wanted me here, Rourke,” impatiently. “What for?”
Timothy Rourke looked around the room, his eyes burning and his nostrils twitching. “It was Mike’s idea,” he said, and grinned.