Frieda said, “What do we do with this one, leave him hanging?”
Pedro was quieter, the white orderly’s shirt falling around his shoulders. His face was already noticeably darker. His breath came in gasps.
“He can listen. Pray if you want to, Pete, but not out loud. You’re in trouble, you know that.”
Shayne shifted the pillows to the head of the bed. Rourke prowled around, keeping well away from the dangling man, but unable to hold still.
“Mike, say that again. Eighty thousand bucks. Two, three thousand every month. Are you telling us that book was a fake?”
“You saw it. What did you think?”
“We didn’t get too good a look. He just flashed it and riffled the pages. But I want to tell you, if you weren’t taking, you’re the exception. The union guy, that was real cash and I can prove it. Wanamaker, on the paper. That’s what I came over to tell you. Officially he’s still claiming those gifts were made out of pure friendship, but I got the story at dinner. How about that beating in the parking lot outside the stadium? You must have had some good reason for that.”
“I assume it happened,” Shayne said, “but I didn’t do it. Either the nurse is lying or Geary lied to the nurse. Painter saw a three-hundred-dollar check with the right date on it, and that makes it look as though Geary planted the story to cover the person who actually gave him the beating. But it wouldn’t mean anything much unless he was killed later. Then I’d look like the killer. But why? I had nothing against the man.”
“Why in God’s name didn’t you say so this morning?” Rourke demanded.
“I knew you wouldn’t believe me. What did you think, Frieda?”
She said quietly, “I thought you were paid the money, but not for any of the obvious reasons. I knew you’d tell me when you got around to it.”
“There’s a Pakistani doctor here. He’s the only one I’ve run into who didn’t automatically assume I was guilty. And I haven’t figured that out yet, because he doesn’t know me nearly as well as you guys.”
“If I’d known this, I might have written a different lead,” Rourke said. “I still don’t see why you didn’t-”
“All you could say was that Mike Shayne was yelling foul, like everybody else. Be honest, Tim. I’ve given you a flat denial. Do you believe me right now?”
Rourke reached for the cognac. “No, goddamn it. I think you’re trying to fake me. Not for the first time, either. I think you’ve got some surprise up your sleeve. You want me to put a slant on tomorrow’s story so it’ll have a certain effect on certain people unknown to me. I’m not complaining-what good would it do me? I know your pattern. I get to hear about it after everything’s all buttoned up.”
“I’m not that much of a mastermind,” Shayne said dryly. “I admit I wanted to get an effect with your piece today. I wanted people to think, ‘Hey, Tim Rourke, he’s been flacking for Shayne for years, and even Rourke thinks that this time his old buddy has been caught with his hand in the jam.’”
“I may be a little slow, but why would you want that?”
“Use some imagination. Imagine that when Painter sprang this on me, the whole thing was a total surprise. Imagine that I can’t explain it any more than you can. I tried telling Painter, but there was my name on the list, in Geary’s writing, in black and white. All right. There’s only one way to disprove that kind of thing, and that’s from inside. Obviously the real takers would talk more freely to a co-conspirator than to a detective trying to find out where the money really went. So I went out to the track tonight. I walked around, trying to look like the man Max Geary was paying three thousand a month for something or other, surely discreditable. Nobody seemed to find it hard to believe. It was a funny business-I tried every remark two ways before I said it. And I didn’t get much. The state tax guy, Liebler-and his name isn’t even on the list-was afraid I was going to take over and cut everybody else out. Linda Geary, the daughter, told me to behave or she’d tell everybody what I did for the money. That was a hard one to handle. I asked her to tell me, because I wanted to know myself, and then she was the one who refused to answer.”
The upside-down man began whimpering a little, and Shayne said, “I’ll be getting around to you in a minute, Pete.”
“Do you want him to hear all this?” Frieda said.
“Sure, it’ll scare him more. He’s through and he knows it. He won’t be reporting to anybody.”
The hanging body twisted and convulsed. A strangled voice said, “Put me down, man.”
“Are you going to talk to us?”
“I have to, you know man.” It was a lilting Caribbean accent, with a rising inflection.
“O.K., we have a realist here. Lower away, Tim. Stand by to fly him again if he gives us any trouble.” Rourke picked at the knot. It loosened all at once and Pedro came down in a heap. He sorted himself out and sat up with a long sigh.
“You know you people are bastards.”
“Are we?” Shayne said. “Maybe you’re feeling so sorry for yourself you didn’t hear what I said. I want you to understand it. This isn’t the ordinary hit. Usually when you go out to kill somebody, they know why. I don’t. And that changes things. You’ve tried twice. You lost both. I have to expect a third try, with new people, and they may be a little better at it. So I need some answers.”
“You were lucky.”
“I was lucky,” Shayne agreed. “But you were sloppy too, Pete. You should have taken a couple of days and researched it.”
Pedro’s moving glance stopped on the cognac bottle.
“Do you want a drink?” Shayne said. “Take one.” Pedro lowered the level of the cognac by a half inch. As he put the bottle back, Shayne caught his wrist and jerked him to his feet.
“Hold his arm, Tim. I don’t think he realizes we’re serious. Pedro, take hold of the top rail of the bed.” Rourke forced his hand down on the bed frame. Shayne reversed the. 45 and brought the butt down hard on his fingers. He yelled.
“This is the floor where they bring the accidents,” Shayne said, “so they’re probably used to yells in the middle of the night. You can’t go back with an alibi, Pedro. It’s time for you to look for a new career.”
Pedro was holding his mashed fingers, hopping. “You didn’t give me no chance, man. Tony Castle.”
“I was beginning to think it had that look,” Shayne said. “You probably need more cognac. Take as much as you like. We have another bottle.”
Pedro drank.
“Take a couple of days, man. Careful, careful. Get a shooter who knows how to shoot. Had to be tonight. Got it at noon.”
“From Castle himself?”
“His own hand. Enormous honor.”
“Now the price.”
“One thousand dollar. Not so much, you know, for so fast. You think this is the way I like? In Florida-very crazy, you know. But you not say no to Mr. C. You say yes.”
“Did he tell you where to find me?”
“At dog track, yes. He had pictures, envelope of pictures. Some younger than you are now. And he say to me this one thing. He was wanting to do it long time now. Now he has excuse.” He opened his hand. “I think fingers broken, Mr. S. Hurt.”
“We’ll have them set for you. But it’s too soon to stop talking.”
“Is all, I swear it on the name of the Holy Virgin.”
Rashid, the Pakistani doctor, stepped in. “Somebody heard a shout.”
“Yeah, we’ve got a man here who doesn’t know who he ought to be scared of most.”
Pedro said urgently, “Mr. S. Mr. C. in Nassau, you in Miami. I tell you, believe me. But is all I know.”
“Are you on his payroll full-time?”
“No. Now-and-then jobs.”
“Did you ever do anything else for him in Florida?”
“Once, I and Angelo, you know. We follow a man here one week and when everything is right, we beat the shit out of him.”
“A man named Max Geary?”
“I believe.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Rourke said.
“And you didn’t know what that one was all about either?”
“He make Mr. C. angry some way. My fingers.”