She corrected course slightly. Shayne was running at full tilt, his emergency glands pumping. He faked one way; and when she took the fake and her headlights twitched in that direction, he dug in and cut.
The plunging car missed him by feet. He fell awkwardly.
He was up again at once, his gun in his hand. The Chevrolet was coming around, tires squealing. When it straightened, he could probably get a tire; but she could still knock him down driving on the rim. The only effective thing he could do was kill the driver, and first he wanted to know why she was doing this.
The parked Ford was the nearest stationary object, and Shayne ran for it. She was on a shorter slant this time, too short to build up full power. Shayne wheeled to face the oncoming car. He fired and blew out a tire. The Chevrolet swerved, and Shayne jumped. He slammed down on the hood and began to slide but stayed on by grabbing a windshield wiper. The Chevrolet, out of control, rammed the parked Ford. The wiper blade came loose and Shayne was thrown free.
Evie had jammed the shift into reverse and was trying to back off. Shayne slapped her with the flat of the gun through the open window. Reaching in, he killed the laboring motor.
She had strapped herself in. He waited for her to turn her head to look at him. When she did, he told her to get out.
She freed herself. When she stepped out, she fell on her hands and knees.
He didn’t kick her, but he gave her no help. She shook her head, looking at the ground, and then gathered herself and managed to stand.
“We’ll talk in my car,” Shayne said.
“I don’t know if I can… she said weakly. “I feel… drained.”
“I’m expecting a call. Move.”
She took a few steps. Then she swayed toward him, almost falling again, and took his arm. He stood still until she released him.
“Do it all by yourself.”
When they reached his Buick, he put her inside and went around to get behind the wheel.
“It’s the first time anybody’s tried that in years,” he said. “You didn’t miss me by much.”
“What are you going to do to me?”
“Let’s leave that open.”
He snapped on the overhead light and told her to look at him. Except for false eyelashes, she was without makeup; and the gun had knocked one set of lashes askew. She was still a very good looking woman, with the wide-set eyes and sweet mouth that had gone with the roles she had played on the screen. She had come out in a hurry, in a sweater and skirt, her feet in sandals.
“I don’t suppose there’s any point in apologizing,” she said. “You can’t apologize for trying to run over somebody in a car.”
“Do you have much Consolidated stock in your own name?”
“You don’t think I’d do that for anything so stupid as money?”
“People who don’t have money don’t think it’s stupid,” Shayne said and snapped off the light. “All right, a small explanation. I’ve been working for you people for seven hours, and I’ve nearly been killed three times.”
“Mr. Shayne…” she said miserably.
“You must think I’ve found out something that can damage you. Or that can damage your husband, if you have that kind of marriage. I use a tape recorder. Three or four people know everything I do; and frankly, it isn’t a hell of a lot. But it’s beginning to come. I learn more from what people do than from what they tell me. Where’s Marcus?”
“I don’t know.”
“Tim Rourke knows you came to meet me. If you’d connected with me a minute ago, how were you going to explain the dent in your left front fender?”
“This isn’t a chess problem! I didn’t think it out ten moves ahead.”
He turned on the light for another look. “Or did you miss me on purpose, to make me think your husband has something important to hide?”
“No! I saw you walking toward me, and I was scared, and I had to do something…”
She made a broken gesture. He turned off the light.
“When you say you don’t know where Marcus is, do you really not know; or is it just that you don’t want to tell me?”
“I really don’t know. And I really am scared, Mr. Shayne. I can’t get what happened to Kate out of my head.”
Shayne lit a cigarette. “Kate is a good place to start. Who do you think was nice enough to make her a present of her favorite brand of bourbon?”
“I know nothing about it. Really. I really don’t.”
“Then you must think Marcus knows something.”
“Marcus? Mr. Shayne, I’ve lived with Marcus for eleven years, and I know a little about him. Marcus is incapable of killing anybody.”
“You sound as though you don’t approve.”
“Nonsense. I’m talking about his psychological makeup. There are things he’s capable of. Certain… meannesses, tricks. Murder’s not one of them.”
“Sometimes wives aren’t the best judges of their husbands’ character. I understand you’re the one who found Keko Brannon.”
She filled her lungs and looked at him in the darkness. “Keko. So that’s what this is all about.”
“That’s where it starts. How did it happen that you were the one? Was she a friend of yours?”
“She didn’t have friends. Do you really want that story again? I’ve told it millions of times.”
“I don’t mean that story; I mean the real one. Did she send for you, or did you happen to drop in? Did you think you’d find Marcus with her?”
“That old rumor.”
“Yeah. But was it a true rumor or a false rumor?”
“Don’t push me! I’ll tell you. You can’t realize what it’s like for a person like Marcus… to have so much power of that kind. A thousand women think that all he has to do is nod in their direction, and they will automatically become rich and famous. Of course it isn’t true! He has to get everything approved by that show-business wizard, Larry Zion. And anything Marcus really wants, Larry takes a fiendish pleasure in seeing that he doesn’t get. But the women keep trying. Marcus wouldn’t be human if he didn’t succumb occasionally. In spite of what you may have heard, he’s definitely human. I haven’t let it worry me. Usually it’s a trip to New York or an hour in somebody’s guest room at a party. Keko was the only one who managed to reach him. She reached him; and if she’d lived, she would have cut him up into little strips, like bacon. How much do you need to know about this?”
“That may be about enough. Get to the day she died.”
“I told the police she’d asked me for a drink, but that wasn’t true. She wanted to be found by the cleaning woman the next morning. Kate was supposed to be away, but she came back early. She called me. She never came into the publicity at all. She was very clever about it until — well — until tonight, of course.”
“Did she know Marcus had been there?”
“I think she’d been watching the house. She knew Keko as well as anybody could, and Keko wasn’t the kind of person who kept things to herself. Kate had been through some really monumental bouts with her. She knew it was building up to some kind of climax. So she was there, in a position to do the studio a big favor. After the dust settled, she asked for a test for Keko’s part; and naturally, she got it.”
“If Marcus had been tied in, would it really have hurt him? People have been telling me she had sex with ninety percent of the males in Los Angeles County.”
“It wasn’t just sex. It wasn’t just that he was there a few hours before she died. There was some… movie footage. Just take my word for it that if the police had found it, Marcus couldn’t have stayed in that particular job, in this particular industry. I’m telling you this in the wrong order. Marcus wasn’t the only one. Keko was a classic case of woman as a sexual object. She had a long, long history of being hurt and used and exploited. I don’t think poor Marcus could have done anything too horrible to her, but that’s not important if Keko thought it was horrible. And along with everything else, she was a very tough girl. It would have been inconvenient for us all if her plan had worked; but as a matter of fact, I think I admire her a little for that. I couldn’t ever do anything like that.”