He eyed Drinkley angrily. “How deeply are you involved with Lana?”
“I’m not. It’s all over. I swear it is. It’s been over since I met Katrin. Ask Lana. She’ll tell you.” Drinkley jerked in a breath between each statement and wet his dry lips when he finished.
Lana’s smile was contemptuous. “She’s dead now, Ted. You don’t have to keep on pretending you loved her.”
“But I did. You know I did. I told you I loved Katrin. My God, Lana, if I thought-”
“You do think it,” Shayne said harshly. “That’s what’s eating your guts, isn’t it, Drinkley? You think Lana told Katrin about you two. You’re afraid that’s why Katrin committed suicide.”
Drinkley winced as though a sharp whip struck him, but he said nothing.
“What kind of evidence did Lana have on you? A tape recording or something?” Shayne’s words lashed at the young lieutenant.
“Yes-that damned recording.” Drinkley cowered back. “She got me drunk up here once and I made a recording with her. And she wouldn’t give it back to me.”
“So you destroyed all the recordings last night?”
“I guess so,” he said wearily. “I destroyed all I could find. Katrin was terribly sensitive, Mr. Shayne. If she ever heard that awful recording-knew I’d been drunk-there’s no telling how she’d take it.” He covered his face with his hands.
Lana’s hands were folded in her lap and her tawny eyes were full of contempt for Drinkley. She said quietly to Shayne, “I didn’t believe he’d go through with it. I still don’t believe he would have. He was just infatuated with her.”
“You lied about getting in Thursday morning,” Shayne said to Drinkley. “You spent the night with Lana, didn’t you?”
Drinkley jerked himself from his slumped position and exclaimed, “No! That’s a lie! I was up here, all right-early in the evening. She wrote me that I had to see her before Thursday. I came to beg her to let Katrin and me have our happiness. I begged her to return the recording to me. She refused.”
“So you were here-in New Orleans-while Katrin was dying alone in her locked room,” said Shayne thoughtfully.
“Yes. That’s why it’s so terrible. I believe Lana did it to her, Mr. Shayne. And that makes it my fault. I believe Lana called her after I left here that night…”
“You fool!” Lana burst out. “I told you I wouldn’t lift a finger to keep you if you insisted on going through with it. I think your conscience is hurting you. Didn’t you call Katrin that night? Didn’t you finally realize you couldn’t live without me?”
Drinkley jumped up, his face livid and his fists doubled.
Shayne hastily intercepted him and pushed him back in his chair. “Stop accusing each other,” he growled. “None of this stuff can turn murder into suicide.”
Both of them stared at him fixedly.
“Don’t try to look shocked or surprised,” Shayne snapped. “I said last night Katrin was murdered. That’s when you couldn’t stand any more and hit me,” he told Drinkley. “Were you afraid of what I was going to find out?”
“I-don’t know,” he answered meekly. “I guess I went crazy when I heard you say Katrin-was murdered. Lana had called me from the Laurel Club and said she was going to bring you up here. I didn’t know what she would tell you.”
“And you didn’t want me to find out you had lied about the time you reached New Orleans.” Shayne’s angular jaw was set, his tone grim.
“I didn’t know what to think. I was-scared.”
“And you left me knocked out cold on the floor. Thought I was dead.”
“No. I knew you were all right. I was panic-stricken after I hit you. And then Lana kept on drinking until she passed out. She wouldn’t tell me anything.” Drinkley paused in his weak-voiced recital, then whispered, “It’s all like a terrible nightmare. I don’t know what to do.”
Shayne asked abruptly, “Did you know Katrin had been married before?”
The lieutenant was too stricken to look startled. He said, “She hadn’t been-of course.”
“She had a wedding ring,” Shayne told him curtly. “It fitted her finger and it had been worn quite a lot.”
Drinkley shuddered violently. “I don’t believe it. Not Katrin. She was pure-and innocent.”
Lana made a loud disparaging noise with pursed lips.
Shayne got up. He said dispassionately, “You’ve been a damned fool, Drinkley. You shouldn’t have come to me with half-truths. Katrin Moe was murdered. I don’t think you did it because I don’t see how you could have-yet. But if I can pin it on you I’m going to.”
He went out the front door and down to his car, drove directly to the Lomax mansion.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Going past the curve in the driveway leading to the front of the house Shayne drove on toward the double garage and parked on the solid concrete foundation in front of one of the closed garage doors.
Perfect quiet pervaded the Lomax house and grounds. He wondered, suddenly remembering the early hour of the morning which had started hours ago for him, whether the family would be up and around.
He sat for a long moment in thoughtful contemplation, then got out and walked to the rear basement door through which Eddie had taken him yesterday.
As he hesitated with his hand on the knob he heard the sound of pounding inside and went in and down the steps.
The basement was dark except for daylight coming through the windows of the workroom, and the other doors were closed. He sauntered toward the door which Eddie had pointed out as the furnace room. The pounding had stopped for the moment. He opened the door quietly, went in and closed it.
Stopping on the threshold, he looked around. A big squatty furnace occupied the center of the square room. It had just received a new suit of the asbestos insulating material Neal was working with the previous day. Behind it was a large boxlike structure of galvanized iron housing the electric fan and filters of the air-conditioning plant. A dozen or more big pipes rose like grotesque arms from the top of the furnace, twisting along the ceiling and disappearing upward to carry warm, washed air to each room. Some of these pipes wore the new insulating wrapping, while others were dingy and in their original uncovered state.
Neal Jordan was standing near the end of the room fitting a strip of insulation around one of the pipes over his head. He was stripped to the waist and his naked torso glistened with sweat in the warm room. Back and shoulder muscles writhed beneath the smooth skin as he stretched on tiptoe. He worked slowly and carefully, and was apparently absorbed in his work.
Shayne said, “Still dressing them up?” He walked toward Jordan.
Neal turned lithely on the balls of his feet, smiled recognition and said, “Just a minute until I get this wire fastened.”
He twisted a length of wire around the wrapping, pounded the twist flat with a hammer and turned to Shayne with a grimace. “I didn’t hire out to be a man-of-all-work, but it’s so hard to get anything done nowadays. I’m pinch-hitting,” he explained. “I hope you won’t report me to the union,” he added, smiling.
“I suppose you have a lot of time on your hands.” Shayne gave Neal a cigarette and lit one for himself at the same time, watching the chauffeur’s gaze flicker curiously over his face, but he didn’t mention the lump on Shayne’s head.
Shayne dragged smoke deep into his lungs and said, “I’ve thought of a couple of things. You’re the man to clear them up for me.”
Neal nodded, but said nothing.
“I’ve been wondering about the gas system in a house like this. I’m still thinking about Katrin Moe-trying to get away from the suicide theory. I’ve started wondering what happens if all the gas is turned off.”
The chauffeur listened attentively, shook his head and said, “I’m afraid I don’t understand what you’re getting at.”
“Suppose her grate had been burning in the night,” Shayne explained, “after she dropped off to sleep. I know the damned thing couldn’t blow out accidentally, but if something happened to the gas supply-if it went off long enough for the grate to go out, and then came back on again.” He paused thoughtfully, then asked, “As the room gradually filled with gas, might a sleeping person not wake up-at all?”