Shayne hung up. He looked in the directory and found that the Park Plaza was on Bourbon Street between St. Louis and Toulouse. He hurried outside and got into a waiting taxi.
“Park Plaza on Bourbon,” he said, as the cab pulled away.
The Park Plaza was a new brick building squeezed in between a restaurant and a curio shop. Shayne entered a small lobby with a glass-enclosed office near the elevator.
The girl seated at the small open window was slim and straight with coppery hair falling in soft curls around her shoulders. When Shayne came up she smiled and said, “Yes?”
“I’m a detective,” Shayne told her. “I’m trying to get a line on one of your guests.”
The girl’s eyes were the same color as her hair. She widened them at Shayne and asked, “Do you mean one of our guests is in trouble?”
“Not necessarily. A man was murdered last night. We know he made a call from the St. Charles to this number at seven-sixteen last night. It might help us a lot to know whom he called here because that person may have been the last one who talked to him before he was killed.”
Her eyes grew still wider, and she shook her head regretfully. “I don’t see how I can help you. We don’t keep a record of incoming calls.”
“Could you check and see if any of your tenants called the St. Charles between four-thirty yesterday and two this morning?”
“That won’t be difficult.” She turned to a large ruled daybook, flipped a few pages, and began running her index finger down the entries.
Shayne lighted a cigarette while he waited. It was half smoked when she closed the book and said, “No calls to the St. Charles Hotel.”
Shayne frowned. “What sort of people live here? Could you give me a list of their names and some sort of description of them?”
“I’m afraid what I could give you won’t help,” she said hesitantly. “You see, all but two of our tenants are middle-aged couples who have lived here for years and years. Miss Etta Hobson in 1-F, and Mr. Sidney G. Jones in 2-A—”
“Do you know anything about either of them?”
“Well, Miss Hobson looks about thirty, but she dyes her hair. She’s a saleslady, but has more money than most salesladies.” She lowered her voice and added, “She tries to slip empty gin bottles out of her room and she flirts with some of the men around here.”
“What about Mr. Sidney Jones?”
The girl made a grimace of distaste with her full red lips. “He’s thin — and he has halitosis. I guess he’s about thirty. He tried to date me the very first day he came and has been trying ever since. I don’t know what he does. He has only been here about four months. Elaine — that’s the night operator — told me he never comes in until two or three in the morning.”
Shayne said, “Thanks very much,” and went out.
He took a cab and went directly to his office. His car was still parked in front of the building and he didn’t see anyone around who appeared to be watching it.
Lucy Hamilton looked at him with searching interest when he walked into the reception hall and stalked through to his private office. After about five minutes he summoned her to his desk.
Lucy sat down opposite him, her smooth brow rumpled, her brown eyes wide and questioning. She said, “I hope you know what you’re doing, Michael.”
He looked at her, surprised. “Getting jumpy?”
“It’s that Captain Denton,” she said angrily. “He frightens me. You know very well he’s had it in for you ever since the Margo Macon case when you made him look like an idiot.”
“Which he is. And don’t forget he framed you on a disorderly conduct rap,” Shayne reminded her teasingly. “I wonder if he’s still got a print of that picture of us. I kept my print. I look at it sometimes and think how lucky I was. I got a perfect secretary out of that case — besides a sizable fee.”
“Michael!” she cried, “Don’t joke about it. He hates you.”
Shayne grinned and said, “Here’s what I want you to do. Call the Park Plaza and ask for Mr. Sidney G. Jones. Tell him you’re Mrs. Carson from Cheepwee, and that you’re worried about your husband. Listen carefully to what he says, and use your woman’s intuition of what he doesn’t say.”
“Tell him I’m Mrs. — ” Lucy began.
“Then call the girl who’ll be on duty at the switchboard at the Park Plaza and find out where Miss Etta Hobson is employed as a saleslady.”
Shayne got up and reached for his hat, jammed it down over his unruly red hair, and started out.
“Where are you going now?” Lucy asked with deep concern.
“To see Inspector Quinlan,” he said. “Start making those telephone calls right away.”
Chapter three:
A Drummer for Death
Inspector Quinlan was sitting behind his desk slowly rolling a pencil between his palms when Shayne walked in.
“How are you and Denton hitting it off, Shayne?” he queried.
“Not too well.” Shayne pulled up a chair and sat down. “He searched my office this morning.”
“I advised him against it, but Denton is stubborn,” Quinlan told him in his crisp, quiet voice. “He thinks you’re holding out on him and he’s hell-bent on proving it.”
Shayne scowled. “What have you got on the dead man thus far?”
“All I know is what I hear rumored around the corridors.”
Shayne looked at him with incredulity and asked, “Aren’t you handling it?”
“It’s Denton’s baby.”
“Hell! You’re still head of Homicide, aren’t you?”
“Theoretically. But Denton got a special dispensation from the Police Commissioner to take over last night’s job. It was in his precinct.”
“And he’s looking for a chance to throw the hooks into me,” Shayne growled.
“That’s right. He wants revenge for the time you made a fool out of him on the Macon case. Better watch your step. He’s carefully laying the groundwork for a malpractice charge.”
“He didn’t find anything in my office this morning. Can you give me anything at all?”
Quinlan studied him musingly for a moment, then said, “Determined to stick your neck out?”
“You wouldn’t mind having the case tied up in a bundle and handed to you while he’s running around in circles.”
“No — I wouldn’t mind that at all,” Quinlan agreed quietly. “But don’t do it, Shayne. If you told the truth last night and don’t know the man, his murder doesn’t mean anything to you.”
“He was a prospective client,” Shayne said, “and somebody beat me out of a possible fee when he was gunned. I can’t sit back and let people kill off my clients before they can get to me.”
“You’ll sit back on this one if you’re smart.”
“I’m not smart.”
“You’re as stubborn as Denton.”
“He asked for this,” Shayne said angrily. “Dragging me out of bed last night with the idiotic idea of tricking me into some sort of admission, then pulling a search warrant on me this morning.”
“Pushing you out on a limb,” Quinlan agreed placidly.
“All right. So I’m out on a limb. What killed the man?”
“A slug from a thirty-two. One of those short-barreled S and W’s.”
“A Banker’s Special,” Shayne mused. “Very appropriate. Sure it wasn’t suicide?”
“What do you mean by appropriate?” Quinlan looked at him sharply with his cold blue eyes. “What suggests suicide to you?”
“Just shooting off my mouth,” Shayne assured him hastily. “Go ahead. So it wasn’t suicide?”
“Hardly. The direct course of the bullet into his heart from close up precludes that. Patrolman Moran heard the shot at one-twenty while on his beat. It took him about four minutes to get to the scene. A car pulled away fast as he came up on St. Louis. The man had died instantly and the body had been searched — evidently in great haste — since the appointment book wasn’t taken.”