“The captain was no fool. He took only as much of the phony as he could pass at one time. Then he sold what he bought with it, and gave the cash he collected to the St. Francis Foundling Home. If the money had been good he could have found ways to get it to them with less trouble. And knowing it was probably counterfeit told me what you were really after. The plates. Are the plates aboard the K-Three Forty-One too, Hugo? Was that part of some cute Nazi scheme to set up headquarters in South America and flood the world with fake United States money? What do you figure those plates are worth to you now, if you can get them? Twenty million? Fifty?”
“A hundred million, perhaps. Who knows?” The plump man shrugged. “My friend, you are smart enough to be a German.”
“I suppose that’s meant to be a compliment,” Shayne grunted. “Tell me, Hugo, were you in German Intelligence?”
“German Naval Intelligence,” Mollison said. “Yes, I’ve been hunting for a clue to the whereabouts of the Three Forty-One ever since the war ended. I knew the counterfeit was turning up, and I knew the submarine went down somewhere off Florida. I finally became attracted to the curious pattern of Captain Tolliver’s life, and realized my search was ended.
“I hired Sandra, for a pretty girl can often persuade a man, even an old man, to do something he might not do for another man. Naturally, I was gratified to have Tolliver co-operate with me willingly, but equally naturally, I had him watched at all times. It was Pete Ruggles’s brother who was watching the captain last night, and who rescued him from Whitey and Shorty, not knowing you were also on the same errand.
“Pete’s brother was one of the two who died in the helicopter this morning. I promised Pete he could have the pleasure of killing you, but I see I must break my promise — you are too dangerous to take chances with. So, my friend—”
Deliberately Hugo Mollison withdrew a snubnosed automatic from his coat pocket and leveled it at Shayne’s stomach. The detective took another drag on his cigarette — and flipped the flaming tip straight at Hugo Mollison’s eyes.
Instinctively the plump man ducked and Shayne’s hand came down jarringly on Hugo’s right wrist. The gun fell to the deck. Mollison brought his head up with a butting motion and caught Shayne’s chin with it. Jarred by the impact, the detective fell backward against the cabin wall, dragging the smaller man with him.
“Pete!” Hugo Mollison shouted hoarsely, then Shayne’s hands went around his throat. He squeezed, and felt Hugo going limp in his grasp like a mechanical doll running down.
But Pete, abandoning the wheel, was charging for him, a glitter of steel in his hands. The smooth, schoolboy face was contorted with hatred, and the way Pete held the knife proved he knew how to use it.
Michael Shayne picked up the struggling Hugo and threw him at Pete. Pete put up his hands to ward off the hurtling figure, dropped the knife, and managed to break the force of the blow by deflecting Hugo to the side. Hugo wasn’t so lucky. His body crashed to the rail, he screamed once as if his back had broken, then he whipped over the side and disappeared into the dark, foaming water.
Pete hesitated an instant as his horrified gaze followed the disappearing figure of Hugo Mollison. Shayne charged him. Pete, holding the rail for support, brought up his foot and drove it into Shayne’s chest. The redhead grunted as his breath was violently expelled, and went backward onto the deck as the cruiser, with no one at the wheel, swung broadside and heeled violently to a wave.
The same movement of the deck that made Shayne lose his balance, caught Pete as he tried to follow up the kick. With the deck slanting away behind him, Pete began running backward to keep his balance. Shayne found himself rolled against the rail. By the time he untangled himself and got to his feet, hanging onto the rail as the craft still rolled wildly, Pete was gone. Shayne guessed that he had just kept running until he brought up against the after rail, and momentum had carried him on over it into the ocean.
He pulled himself to the wheel, grabbed it, and got the boat’s bow into the wind. Then he swung her around in a great circle. He made two more circles without spotting anyone in the water. Then he straightened out and turned north again.
In one of the cabins, Sandra Ames was still asleep.
11
Michael Shayne eased the boat into the ranks of craft moored in the basin of some private yacht club. He didn’t know which one it was and didn’t care. He spotted an empty mooring buoy, managed to catch it and secure the boat. Then he went to wake up the girl.
Sandra stumbled on deck, rubbing her eyes. “Why, we’re back,” she said sleepily. “Where’s Hugo?”
“He got off at the last stop,” Shayne said. “He had urgent business with some fish.”
“What?” She gazed at him blankly. “I don’t understand.”
Shayne jerked his thumb. “Back there,” he said. “Hugo is showing the barracuda how tough he is.”
Her eyes mirrored shock. “Hugo dead!” she whispered. “And Pete? Where’s Pete?”
“Pete couldn’t bear to leave Hugo. No, I didn’t kill them. They just abandoned ship. After trying to kill me.”
“They tried to kill you?”
“They tried. It didn’t work. You should be glad. Because after they killed me they were going to kill you.”
“No!” Her voice was taut. “No, Hugo wouldn’t have killed me! I was working with him!”
“Hugo had Whitey and Shorty killed last night. He had Captain Tolliver killed this morning, and the idea was to kill you and me at the same time and wipe the slate clean. A very efficient fellow, Hugo. That’s what comes of being in the Engineers and Intelligence, both.”
She shook her head, dazedly. “He was some kind of crook,” she said unsteadily. “I knew he was a confidence man of some kind. But I didn’t know he was a killer.”
“He was a pretty good killer. For a hundred million dollars he’d have killed everyone in Miami if he needed to, and could manage it.”
She took a deep breath. She adjusted fast. “You — knew he wasn’t what he pretended?”
“Not at first. I knew some fancy lying was going on, but I didn’t guess the truth until we abandoned ship this morning, and Hugo picked us up.”
“I–I don’t understand.”
“Convenient little miracles Hugo worked — first finding us, then finding the spot where the sub lay. You made that possible with the signaling devices Hugo gave you. I figured your overnight case was awfully heavy when we took to the raft.”
“Hugo told me it was just a precaution,” Sandra Ames said desperately. “Believe me, Mike! He said it would help in case Captain Tolliver changed his mind. There were two settings. I switched to the second setting when the captain brought up the money. That meant we’d located the wreck.”
“And also meant our little party could be dispensed with,” the redhead told her. “You gave the signal to get yourself killed, baby.”
She shook her head from side to side. “Mike,” she said, “Mike, believe me, I didn’t know any of this. That Hugo wasn’t what he seemed, yes. It was he who stumbled onto the captain’s trail, and hired me to help out. I haven’t any money. I never have had. I’m just a pretty girl with no talents. But I thought he really was going to pay the captain, and everything would be legitimate. I swear I did.”
Michael Shayne shrugged and started to turn. She caught his arm.