The vital thing missing was some sort of tie-up between the Allerdices, Jack Bristow, and the girl who had been strangled tonight. Thus far there were only the two tenuous things. Both Bristow and Allerdice were from New Orleans. And Mrs. Allerdice (if she was Mrs. Allerdice) had claimed her husband had told her to meet him in front of the rooming-house. The presence in the death room of the slip of paper containing Lucy’s address indicated, of course, that Jack Bristow was probably the man whom Gladys Smith was supposed to have secreted in her room for some weeks.
Shayne tugged at his ear lobe and looked up hopefully as Rourke returned carrying a heavy file of papers. “We’re in luck. Just got under the deadline before they clear the old ones out. Here’s your first story.”
He spread the New Orleans paper out under a bright light and began to read:
“‘Hugh Allerdice, youthful bank messenger for the City Trust Company, was being held by police late this afternoon on suspicion of theft in the disappearance of an eighty-thousand-dollar payroll being transported by the bank messenger to the Atlas Construction Company earlier today.’
“‘There are altogether too many unexplained discrepancies in this young man’s story,’ said Captain Allen P. Welles of the Theft Squad in a prepared statement handed to the press at four o’clock. ‘We are making no charge against him as yet, but will continue questioning him until we are satisfied.’”
Shayne grunted angrily. “I know their third-degree methods. Ten to one they beat a confession out of him by midnight.”
Rourke continued reading: “‘According to Allerdice’s story, he left the bank at ten o’clock this morning with the payroll in a leather bag locked to his wrist with a steel chain. Within half a block of the bank, he claims a large black sedan drew up beside him and two men leaped out and threw a heavy sack over his head, overpowering him and thrusting him into the back of the sedan which then moved away rapidly. Unfortunately for Allerdice, no witnesses have come forward to confirm this part of his story.’
“‘He was beaten unconscious, he claims, and when he came to slightly after noon, he was lying beside a country road outside the city limits and the moneybag was missing. He made his way to a telephone and reported the incident to police headquarters, and has stoutly maintained his innocence of any complicity in the affair throughout an afternoon of intensive questioning. Authorities refuse to specify what the alleged discrepancies are in his story, but Captain Welles appeared convinced it was wholly untrue.’”
“Wait a minute, Mike!” Rourke went on excitedly. “Here’s something: ‘A reporter who went to the small house in the Paradise section occupied by the Allerdices and a roomer, Mr. Jack Bristow, found no one at home in mid-afternoon, and was informed by neighbors that Mrs. Beatrice Allerdice, piquant and beautiful young wife of the accused bank messenger, is in a hospital where she recently underwent an operation for appendicitis. Neighbors further stated that the young couple appeared to have been in financial difficulties recently, and that Mr. Allerdice has been greatly worried about meeting the cost of his wife’s illness.’ That’s about all of any importance in this first story,” Rourke ended, turning to the following day’s paper.
Shayne was sitting very erect, his gray eyes gleaming with satisfaction. “So Allerdice snatched eighty grand, and Jack Bristow was rooming with him when it happened. Now this begins to add up. Keep going, Tim.”
Rourke had been scanning the second day’s story. “There’s a picture of the Allerdices here, and a small inset of Bristow. Take a look at her, Mike. She the one?”
Shayne got up eagerly to lean over and study the three pictures. He shook his head slowly after a time. “Could be. I wouldn’t swear to it either way. Look at the Bristow picture. You wouldn’t recognize him for sure, either. I see Captain Welles got his confession,” he added ironically.
“Yep. Which Allerdice repudiated the next morning and refused to sign. Said they put words in his mouth and he was so groggy by midnight he would have confessed murdering his wife to get them to lay off. But they charged him, all right, and claimed they had sufficient evidence to send him up without the confession. But here’s the interesting part, Mike. ‘Police who sought to interview Jack Bristow, roomer at the Allerdice ménage have been unable to discover any trace of him as we go to press. According to Allerdice, he packed his bags and departed abruptly the day preceding the theft without saying where he was going. He had been unemployed for some time and owed three weeks rent, and Allerdice admitted he had been nagging him about paying up and believes that may be the reason he went away. The police have no reason to believe he took any part in the robbery, but are seeking him as a possible material witness.’”
“And I’ll bet he never did turn up,” said Michael Shayne swiftly. “Neither he nor the missing eighty grand.”
“No,” conceded Rourke, turning pages rapidly and glancing at the few follow-up stories which had drifted from the front to inner pages. “You’re right, of course. He and the money disappeared, though the police never seemed to connect the two things.”
“If they had, they wouldn’t have publicized it. So, there it is, Tim. At least part of the picture is pretty clear. We have Bristow clearing out the day before the robbery and disappearing. A week or so later a girl named Gladys Smith turns up in Miami and rents a room for herself where she was hiding out a man. Hugh Allerdice is convicted of robbery in New Orleans and is either killed or escaped three days ago. Mrs. Allerdice arrives in Miami tonight to meet him in front of the rooming-house where Jack has been hiding. But Gladys Smith is strangled in her room, Jack is shot in the belly in the vicinity, and makes it to Lucy’s, where someone slips up the fire escape to knock him off. Later I get a phone call asking for the eighty grand Jack was supposed to have had on him. Those are the facts we know. How do they add up to you?”
“Do you think Jack engineered the robbery in New Orleans, knowing Allerdice would be carrying the money next morning? That Hugh didn’t suspect it at first, but later might have begun to? Then arranged to escape while being taken to prison, and followed him here to collect the dough?”
“Something like that seems indicated.” Shayne shrugged and got up. “Could be they were in cahoots on the New Orleans snatch, and Allerdice turned the money over to him to hold for a split after he was released. But he got convicted instead, and Jack felt safe in hiding out and hanging on to all of it. One thing we’ve got to be certain of first,” he went on grimly, “is whether the woman who drowned in the back trunk of the gray sedan was Mrs. Allerdice or someone else.”
“If we had someone who could definitely identify her—” said Rourke doubtfully.
“There’s one chance. Not for a positive identification, but quite possible for a negative answer.”
“How?”
“Remember the first story of the robbery? It said Mrs. Allerdice had just been operated for appendicitis and intimated her husband might have stolen the money to pay for it?”
“Sure, but—”
“So we go to the morgue fast and take a look at her.”
“But you already looked at her when she was alive, and so did I, but we couldn’t identify the newspaper picture.”
“We didn’t see her with her clothes off,” Shayne reminded him bluntly. “If she has a recent scar from an operation she may well be Mrs. Allerdice. But if she hasn’t got such a scar, we’ll know damned well she isn’t. Come on if you want to stay with me on this.”
“You know I do.” Rourke trotted after him as Shayne hurried out with long-legged strides. “You’re not going to Gentry with all this?”