People ask me now if Mike and Lucy are likely to be married. I have to answer honestly that I simply do not know. I am sure they understand and respect each other, and that Mike loves her as much as his memories of Phyllis will allow him to love any woman. They are happy together in the companionship and intimacy of dangerous work and that appears to be enough for them at the moment. Moreover, they are back at Mike’s old hunting grounds in Miami now, and that town is beginning to be known as much for Mike as for its famous climate.
About the man himself... I have written most of what I know in my accounts of his cases. I think his most important attribute is absolute personal honesty. He not only does not lie to anyone else; what is more important, he does not lie to himself.
I think the characteristic most important in his spectacular success as a private detective is his ability to drive straight forward to the heart of the matter without deviating one iota for obstacles or confusing side issues. He has an absolutely logical mind which refuses to be sidetracked.
Shayne is just an average guy, with average education, intelligence and common-sense. He has no special knowledge which puts him ahead of the reader in solving a case. His method of solving a murder is to move right into the case on a line of absolute logic (disregarding the personal risk involved). In other words, he is never led aside by plot twists which require him to avoid questioning a suspect in the middle of the story just because that suspect knows the answers and thus would end the story. In doing this, Mike naturally makes mistakes. But if you’ll study the Shayne stories carefully, I think you’ll find he always does the thing that seems right at the time. It may well turn out to have been the wrong thing in the end. But it is the logical thing from the facts in his possession at the time he acts.
He acts on impulse sometimes, or on hunches; but always the impelling force is definite logic. While other detectives are wandering aimlessly about in a maze of conjecture and doubt, Mike selects a certain path and drives forward inexorably in one direction until he is proved right... or wrong. When he makes a mistake, he wastes no time in idle repining, but adjusts his sights and turns just as inexorably in another direction.
At various times readers have complained to me that in my stories about him Mike seems to seek danger needlessly; that he seems to take an almost masochistic pleasure in thrusting himself into a situation which inevitably results in physical pain to himself.
To those readers I can only say that I fear they have not followed the published accounts of his cases carefully. I have never heard Mike say, “Had I but known.” Invariably, I have seen him calculate the risk involved carefully, weighing the results that may be attained by a certain course of action against the probable lack of results if he chooses to move cautiously. Once convinced that a risk is worth taking, he pushes forward and accepts the consequences as a part of his job.
It is this driving urgency and lack of personal concern more than any other thing, I think, that serves to wind up most of Mike’s most difficult cases so swiftly. In time, few of his cases have consumed more than one or two days. Readers have complained that he doesn’t seem to eat or sleep on a case. He does, of course, but only if there is nothing more important to do at the time. He drinks more cognac than any other man I have ever known, but I have never seen Mike drunk. Actually, while relaxing between cases he is a very moderate drinker.
This sums up Michael Shayne as I know him. The hardest work I do in writing my accounts of his cases is attempting to make my readers see Mike as he is, to feel what Mike feels, to know the man himself as I know him. Insofar as I succeed in this, my stories are successful. Certainly no writer ever had a better subject with whom to work.
The Familiar Face
by C. V. Tench
Set a thief to catch a thief — or someone worse!
It happened fast. The door of the station wagon was jerked open and a man’s voice said, “Excuse me.” Edith Miller leaned forward. The man in the roadway gave her a violent shove. He moved in beside her, the door slammed and the car got under way again. As the revolver muzzle pressed into her knee, Edith heard the man say, “Scream and you lose a leg.”
At eight o’clock that night Reynolds made the phone call. His face was deadpan.
“Is that you, Miller? Okay, we’ve got news for you.” He grabbed Edith Miller’s arm and twisted it.
There was pain in her voice as she said into the mouthpiece, “I’m all right so far, dear. But you’d better obey their instructions. They’ll kill me if you don’t.”
“Watch her, Red.” Reynolds pushed her away. Into the phone he said, “Just because your wife has been snatched doesn’t mean you won’t be seeing her again. All you have to do is play along with us.”
“What do you want?” came Harold Miller’s unsteady voice.
“A hundred grand. We know you’ve got it. Are three cars and a swimming pool worth more to you than your wife?”
“Why you dir—”
“Don’t say it.” Reynolds gestured to Red Conlon to bring Edith within reach. He grabbed and twisted her arm. Edith cried out in pain.
“That was your wife again,” Reynolds said into the phone. “I must warn you that what you just heard could only be the beginning. Well — do we talk business?”
When the call was finished Reynolds said to Mrs. Miller, “He needs three days to raise the money. For your sake, I hope he gets it.”
Looking him full in the eyes, Edith said, “You’ll get the money. My husband knows how to make money fairly fast.”
On the evening of the second day Red Conlon reported back to Reynolds.
“No sign of a set-up, chief. Only routine callers. He hasn’t left the house.” He grinned at Edith. “The guy must be soft over you, baby. The light didn’t go out in his room all night.”
“All right. Enough of that.” Reynolds eyed Conlon searchingly. “There’s something else on your mind. What is it?”
Conlon scratched his head. “Somehow I feel I’ve seen this Miller character before. You know, a long time ago, before we planned this snatch.”
“Maybe,” Reynolds said. “But why should we let that worry us?”
The third evening Reynolds made the phone call. “Got the dough, Miller?” To Conlon he whispered, “Bring her close.”
Edith said into the phone, “Yes, honey, I’m fine. So far they haven’t touched me. If you pay up I don’t think they will.”
Pushing her away, Reynolds said into the phone, “Miller, put the money in a paper package. At ten o’clock start north on route fifteen. Go twenty miles straight north. Then you’ll come to a town called Creston. Turn right on the dirt road that’s just on the other side. Drive for six miles, then stop. And don’t forget, Miller — any tricks and you’ll see your wife, all right. But she won’t look pretty and she won’t be breathing.”
The car purred softly along in the driving rain. Harold Miller glanced at the clock on the dashboard. 10.20. Creston should be coming into view at any moment now.
Five minutes later, on the outskirts of the town, he stopped for a moment to check the mileage on the speedometer. Turning on to the lonely and untravelled dirt road he drove for exactly six miles, then parked at the edge of the road as he had been instructed to do.
He made certain the package of money was on the seat beside him. After three nights without sleep his eyes burned and ached intolerably.