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He got out a dollar bill and made it through the lobby, shaking his head wearily at Pete as he stumbled past the desk.

In his own apartment, he went straight through to the bedroom where he collapsed on the bed fully clothed, and sank dazedly into dreamless sleep.

CHAPTER NINE

The telephone awakened Michael Shayne from his deep and dreamless sleep. He lay with his eyes closed for a long time listening to it. Vaguely, he knew, ’way down deep in his subconscious mind, that it was the private line beside his bed that was ringing. That meant, in all probability, either Will Gentry, Miami Chief of Police, Lucy Hamilton, his secretary, or Timothy Rourke. A few other people had this unlisted number, but not very many. And, none… thought Shayne… who would have the audacity to call him at this ungodly hour of the night.

He opened his eyes for a moment, and then closed them quickly. Hell! It was broad daylight. The rays of the morning sun were streaming in through his window. There was a dull, continuing ache that permeated his head, and his left side felt as though it shouldn’t be there.

He reached out for the offending phone and lifted it and pulled it over across his chest. Into the mouthpiece, he grated, “Go away, Tim, for God’s sake. It’s still the middle of the night, and I…”

“Middle of the night, hell!” exploded Timothy Rourke’s unpleasantly cheerful voice in his ear. “It’s damn near eight o’clock in the morning, and all good citizens are up and at it.”

Shayne growled, “I’m not a good citizen, Tim. I never claimed to be a good citizen or wanted to be one. For Christ’s sake, Tim…”

“Thought you might want to meet us for breakfast,” effervesced the News reporter. “George Bayliss and me, that is. He’s got a story to tell, Michael. I think you’ll be interested.”

Shayne held the receiver away from his aching head for a moment while he thought back. George Bayliss! The News photographer. Complete recollection of all the things that had happened since eight o’clock the preceding evening flooded back over him. He lowered the mouthpiece and said, “Bring him over here, Tim. As a matter of fact, I’m making breakfast for myself right now, and I’d like nothing better than some company.”

He dropped the receiver on the prongs beside his pillow, and essayed to sit up in bed. To his amazement, he discovered that he was still fully dressed and lying under the top covers. To his further amazement, he discovered when he gingerly lifted his fingers to touch the painful lumps on his head that they were no longer the size of hens’ eggs. More the size of roosters’ eggs. He scowled at that point in his thinking, and asked himself whether roosters had eggs or not?

He decided the hell with it, and threw back the cover and tried to throw his legs over the side of the bed. His left side refused to move with his right side. He sank back with a convulsive groan, and then gritted his teeth and clenched his fists and slowly pulled himself over the side of the bed and forced himself to sit upright.

He sat there, breathing hard, and then unbuttoned his shirt and unbuckled his belt. He stood upright and let his pants slide down to the floor, painfully stripped down to socks and shoes. The entire left side of his body was an ugly bruise of deep blue, shading to lavender at the edges.

He walked out into the living room and paused beside the center table to scowl down morosely and questioningly at the cognac bottle and glass he’d left sitting there last night. It took him about thirty seconds to make up his mind that a drink was definitely what he needed. He drank deeply from the bottle and then went on into the kitchen where he put water on the stove to boil and filled the top of the big dripolator with coffee.

While the water heated, he went into the bathroom and got a wide roll of adhesive tape, tore off a dozen foot-long strips, and tightly taped up the bruised area where he was certain two or three ribs were cracked.

He felt a lot better able to face the world after that was accomplished, and he slid into a terry-cloth robe and went back to the kitchen to pour boiling water into the top of the dripolator.

Back in the living room, he was hesitating beside the cognac bottle again when there was a rap on the door. He went to it and pulled it open to admit Timothy Rourke and the News press photographer.

George Bayliss had a sleepy, sullen look on his lean young face, but Rourke appeared rested and effervescent. He stepped inside the door and cocked his head in astonishment at sight of the twin lumps on Shayne’s head and exclaimed, “What happened to you? I thought you were so hell-bent on getting back here to bed last night.”

Shayne said sourly, “I was. But three other guys had different ideas.” He shut the door and said crisply, “Tell you about it later, Tim. Right now I want some coffee and Bayliss’s story.”

They went to the kitchen and got mugs of strong coffee.

When they were settled in the living room, Rourke explained with a grin, “Don’t blame George if he isn’t his usual cheerful self this morning. I don’t think he got much sleep.”

“You know damn well I’d just got home to change clothes when you called at seven-thirty.” George sighed deeply and took a sip of hot coffee. “She was some hot number.”

Shayne said irritably, “We’re not interested in your sleeping arrangements. Just your extra-curricular activities with a camera.”

“There’s no law against my taking a picture on my own time, is there?” bristled the young man.

Rourke said, “Just tell Mike what you told me.”

“Well, I got this phone call at the paper just before I was leaving last evening… a little after six, I guess. A man’s voice. He didn’t say much. Just asked was I busy for the evening. I told him I had a late date, about eleven, but nothing else, so he asked did I want to make a fast fifty bucks.

“I told him, sure. What the hell? With what the lousy paper pays me I can use an extra buck any day. So he gave me this pitch. If he didn’t phone me at home before nine o’clock I was to go to the Seacliff Restaurant with a flash camera. He’d meet me outside. For one picture he’d pay fifty bucks.

“He didn’t phone, so I got to the Seacliff about nine-twenty and this guy stopped me outside and asked was I George Bayliss.”

“What did he look like?” Shayne asked when he paused.

“Young, sort of. Under thirty. Fat-faced and plump. He asked if I knew you by sight and I said sure, and he passed me twenty-five bucks and said you’d be coming along soon with another guy and would go inside and sit down together, and I was to wait a few minutes and then drift in with my camera out of sight, and there’d be another guy join you two, and then those two would trade envelopes. He wanted a shot of them when they did. He said I was to come out fast after shooting the pic and he’d meet me with the other twenty-five.

“It sounded okay to me, so I said all right, and he drifted off down the street a ways, and pretty quick I saw you and this fellow that Tim says was Doc Ambrose go in the restaurant together.

“I followed in after a few minutes, just in time to see you getting up from the booth and this other fellow sit opposite the doctor. I moved on down the bar close enough, and got my shot while they were putting their envelopes away. I ran out and he grabbed my arm outside the door and hurried me down the street and said for me to give him the plateholder and he paid my twenty-five bucks. I got in my car and pulled out fast and that’s every damned thing I know. I didn’t even know about the doctor getting shot until Tim told me awhile ago.”