Neither man said a word.
“Are you with it, Mr. Shayne?”
The voice came from his right and the detective twisted his head. The long dark object wasn’t a couch. It was a polished wood desk. And braced against the front of the desk, arms folded across his chest, was a medium-statured man of forty who might have stepped from a Playboy fashion ad. Everything about him, including a Van Dyke beard, reeked of modem wealth and comfort.
“Well?” he said. On another night, under different circumstances, his tone might have been considered pleasant.
Shayne shook his head. These boys sending a rookie like Bird out to find a stolen corpse? It didn’t figure.
“What does that mean?” asked the man at the desk.
“It means, pal, I’m not with it.” Shayne started to get up but a hand slammed against his shoulder from behind and plopped him back against the carpeting.
“Please, Mr. Shayne,” said the man at the desk without stirring, “remain as you are. Perhaps the carpeting is not the most comfortable seat in the house, but then I’m in no mood for providing comfort. You say you have in your possession a dead man. I want that dead man, Mr. Shayne.”
“I told you that, huh.”
The man at the desk sighed. “Nick.”
The butt of the carbine sliced in an uppercut against the back of Shayne’s skull, triggering flashing lights inside his brain and driving him obliquely forward.
He struggled to remain conscious. He bit down hard on his lower lip, seeking new pain that would dull that in his head. But there was no feeling in his lip and all he was conscious of was the ringing in his ears. Then fingers clawed his hair and yanked his head up.
“All you have to do, Mr. Shayne, is take me to the body and there will be no more pain.”
The man at the desk was still mouthing the words. He hadn’t moved an inch. Surprisingly, Shayne found the man to remain in sharp focus.
“We have all night,” the man said. “We have all day tomorrow, the next day, if you wish to prolong this. Nick and Jack don’t care. But I do think you’re going to get terribly tired of sitting there on that little piece of carpeting. And I know you’re going to grow weary of being bruised.”
“Okay, so show me my ten grand,” Shayne managed to growl.
“I beg your pardon?”
The man at the desk showed his first flicker of emotion. He looked mildly surprised and then he stood straight and shot glances at the two men behind Shayne.
“I told your punk messenger boy ten thousand and I produce. But first you show me cash,” Shayne said.
“Ten thousand dollars in cash in exchange for the body is what you’re asking?”
“Now who’s dilly-dallying, pal?”
“Nick.”
The gun butt slammed into Shayne’s kidney. He straightened with a grunt. Then he spun on his buttocks and lashed out with an arm. But Nick was nimble. He danced out of the path of the slash, brought the carbine down in a chop against the detective’s shoulder. Pain shot like electric currents out through Shayne’s body. The carbine came around, grazed his ear. He scrambled with an oath. The toe of a gold shoe came up against his chest, lifted him. He limply pitched forward and his nose crashed into a driving knee.
Then he was down, nose buried in the carpeting, fingers clawing. He was groggy. He wanted air. Fresh air. He sucked harshly. Fresh air would help clear his scrambled brain. But there was none. And he knew there would be none. He remembered that he was in a windowless den.
He was yanked into a sitting position. A flat hand cracked back and forth across his face. He caught the flashes of the diamond ring as his head whipped.
The he suddenly was free again, sitting by himself, no one working on him. But the gold shoes were nearby and when he looked up he saw the diamond ring still within striking distance.
The man at the desk wore a frown now. He tugged at his beard in silent speculation, eyes narrowed down as he stared at something unseen. Finally he said, “I think you are confused, Mr. Shayne. I think you are under the impression that you already have talked to some of my people, been made a cash offer. Neither is true. Who were you dealing with?”
Shayne didn’t have the answer to that question. But he had the smell of an answer to something else. It was shaping that this foxy dude and the three gunsels who had died out along South Dixie had not been pals. The three guns and the kid, Bird, were tied, but this foxy dude probably was on one side of a fence with Bird and his boss on the other.
More important, however, Foxy had shown Shayne possessed the stolen corpse. And if he wasn’t tied to Bird, it had to mean he’d gotten his information from Palm Acres Funeral Home.
Odd. A funeral home passing along that kind of info.
“Mr. Shayne?” Foxy said politely.
The detective squinted up. He had a bad headache now, and this dude was responsible for it. Shayne wanted to get his fingers in the Van Dyke only once.
“You’ve obviously made a deal,” said Foxy. “With whom?”
The detective clamped his jaws.
“I want names named,” said Foxy.
Shayne remained silent.
“I want to know exactly what your deal is. When you are to deliver, and where.”
The redhead wished he could work up enough saliva in his cotton-dry mouth to spit.
“Then I want you to take us to the body.”
Shayne moved his legs, flexed his fingers. He felt strong in spite of the beating and the chloroform. Anger was pumping life into his muscles. He knew he had been relieved of the .45. These boys weren’t rookies. But if he could somehow get his hands on the carbine held by Gold Shoes...
He looked up at Foxy. “Got a cigarette?”
“No.”
“I talk better when I smoke.”
“Smoke your own. You have cigarettes in your coat pocket.”
Shayne got out the crumpled pack, fished out a bent cigarette, stuck it in the comer of his mouth. “Got a light?”
“You have matches too.”
The detective got out the book of matches, yanked off a match, lit it — then touched the other matches in the book and pitched the flare at Gold Shoes.
He leaped to his feet and shot from a crouch toward Gold Shoes, who had recoiled. He stiffarmed Gold Shoes’ middle, sending the man reeling, the carbine suddenly held high as Gold Shoes stumbled backward off balance.
Gold Shoes tipped against the arm of a leather chair and went down with a yelp. Shayne launched himself in a flat dive and clamped huge hands on the carbine. He brought his knee up hard between Gold Shoes’ thighs. Gold Shoes howled and writhed as the detective wrenched the carbine from his grasp.
Shayne whirled into a sitting position, bringing the muzzle of the carbine down, his finger reflexively finding the trigger. Jack, the young hood, was in flight, coming down on Shayne in a dive. Shayne flicked the carbine muzzle against the exposed jaw, saw the skin split and blood spurt as Jack tumbled off to one side.
The detective rolled to his feet, went into a spread-legged crouch, the carbine tucked against his body now. He was prepared to pump slugs into Foxy, who surely would be drawing a gun.
But Foxy had disappeared.
Shayne whirled. Gold Shoes was struggling up. The detective slammed the butt of the carbine into Gold Shoes’ face, driving him back with a yowl. He saw Jack on one knee and he slashed with the carbine, sending the hood crashing into the front of the desk.
Shayne bolted, he had no intention of sticking around. The odds, three against one, were not conducive to questions and answers. Especially with Foxy out of sight and on the loose. Foxy could be off somewhere, gathering an arsenal.
Shayne shot out of the lit den into a black hallway. He had no idea where a door to the outside might be, but he savored the darkness. He bolted to his left, his eyes adjusting quickly to the shadows. He spotted a wide entry to his right and curved into it. Heavy, low shadows were scattered. He found a chair, squatted behind it in the blackness. Then, cautiously, he lifted his head and looked around. It suddenly was very still.