“You’re lying in your teeth,” Shayne told him. “There’s nothing mysterious about the phone call, as you well know. Elsie made it and met Green that night. Both you and Jenson know that. You covered up for her at the time… and now she’s dead. Get Jenson’s telephone number,” he went on harshly. “You’re going to call him and tell him exactly what I tell you to say.”
Lew Recker shrugged with an elaborate attempt at nonchalance and went to the telephone stand. He took out the Manhattan directory and thumbed through it, wetting his lips and turning to ask, “What do you want me to tell Dave if he’s home?”
“Tell him this.” Shayne moved forward to stand beside Recker. “That he’s to come here at once. That the alibi you and he fixed up for Elsie Murray on Green’s death three months ago is blowing up in your faces since her death last night and things look bad. Insist that he come here immediately. One single word of warning from you to him about what he’s walking into will get you the goddamnedest beating you ever wrote about in any of your lousy books.”
Lew Recker fearfully wet his lips again as he glanced back at the telephone book. Shayne leaned over his shoulder to check the number, and watched carefully while Recker dialed it. He stood ominously close with right fist doubled while Recker waited for an answer, and then said:
“Is that you, Lucy? Lew Recker. Is Dave there?” He turned his head to nod at Shayne, waited another few moments and then drew in a deep breath to say rapidly:
“Lew Recker, Dave. I suppose you know about Elsie Murray last night?”
He listened for a long moment, then broke in impatiently: “Let’s not discuss it over the phone. Come down to my place at once, Dave. It’s damned important. We’ve got to decide what to do. The police have been here and they’re digging into the old Green affair. Remember?”
He listened again, nodding his head slowly. “That’s right. They seem to think there’s a connection. I’ve got to talk with you quickly. Right. I’ll be right here waiting.”
He replaced the receiver and asked sullenly, “Was that what you wanted?”
“Exactly.” Shayne’s voice was uncompromising. “Go pour us a drink if you’ve got one in the joint while I make a call of my own.”
He took the receiver and dialed the MWA number while Recker stepped back and spoke briefly to Estelle and the two of them went out through a side door.
A woman’s voice answered the telephone and Shayne asked, “Is this Dorothy Gardiner?”
“Yes. Who is it?”
“Michael Shayne. Ed Radin and I…”
“Oh, Mr. Shayne. I’ve been sitting here beside the telephone waiting for you to call. They’ve found Brett Halliday. Ed just called in. He’s alive but unconscious and hurt badly, I’m afraid.”
18
Shayne said, “Where is Brett?”
“At some hospital, I think,” Miss Gardiner told him. “Ed called in a few minutes ago from the Berkshire Hotel. You’re to call him there at room three-oh-five.”
Shayne said, “Thanks. I’ll be at this number another half hour or so if anything comes up.” He looked down at Recker’s number on the dial of the phone and gave it to her, then replaced the receiver and hurriedly looked up the Berkshire number. He dialed it and asked for 305, and a gruff voice answered.
He asked for Radin and waited a moment until Ed’s voice came over. He said, “Mike Shayne, Ed. I just talked to Miss Gardiner.”
“They think Brett will recover,” Radin told him. “He’s unconscious and they rushed him to the Lenox Hill hospital for X-rays. May be concussion. He was supposed to be dead,” the crime writer went on angrily, “in this room right down the corridor from his suite. He was evidently slugged unconscious and then dragged down here and left bound and gagged with strips torn from a sheet. He evidently came to his senses enough to roll off the bed and knock the telephone off the bed table. The operator noticed it and sent a boy up. There was a DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door, but they opened up and found Brett unconscious on the floor.
“What else have you got?” Shayne asked evenly when Radin paused for breath.
“Too damned little. This room was rented at six-thirty this morning by a man who registered as Alan Dexter from Waco, Texas. He explained to the clerk that he’d just arrived by plane and his baggage had been held up. He paid cash for the room and requested one on the third floor with some vague sort of explanation about a phobia he had. It’s a slack time and there were several vacancies, so he managed to get three-oh-five near Brett. That’s all of it.”
“Description?”
“Hell, it’s like it always is. No one paid particular attention. He was well-dressed and medium all over. Desk clerk thinks he could identify him but isn’t at all sure.”
“I think we’ll be able to give him a chance to do that within an hour or so,” Shayne said crisply. “I’m here at Lew Recker’s apartment waiting for a visitor who should be able to clean things up for us. Where’ll you be?”
“Up to the hospital to check on Brett first. What has Lew to do with it, Mike?”
Shayne heard a clink of glasses behind him and turned his head to see his unwilling host re-enter the room with a tray of drinkables. He said loudly into the phone:
“Recker has enough to do with it that I’m going to beat his goddamned brains out if Brett doesn’t come out of it all right. He’s Ralph, Ed. And I’ve got Doris here, too.”
“Ralph and Doris?” Ed Radin’s voice was excited now. “You’re moving fast. Shall I call you from the hospital?”
“Please. The moment you know anything.” Shayne hung up and turned with a scowl to the couple who were standing side by side at the rear of the room, looking at him with frightened speculation.
“You heard me, Recker,” Shayne said grimly, moving toward them. “On account of the lie you told the police three months ago, Elsie Murray is dead and my best friend may be at any moment. Think that over while we’re waiting for Jenson to show up.”
He went deliberately to the low table where Recker had placed the tray containing an ice bucket, whiskey and glasses. He put three cubes of ice in a tall glass, filled it two-thirds full of whiskey and swirled the cubes slowly while Recker demanded in a shocked voice:
“Brett Halliday? He’s hurt?”
“Badly.” Shayne took a drink of whiskey, glaring over the top of his glass at Recker.
“What did you mean by saying I’m Ralph?” Recker asked weakly.
“And that someone named Doris was here?” put in Estelle. “I told you my name is Estelle Stevens.”
“It’s an idiosyncrasy of mine,” Shayne told them. “I get cryptic as all hell when I’m working on a case. I refer to my suspects by names I feel they should have instead of their real names.”
“Suspects?” Recker sounded half-shocked and half-amused. “Estelle and myself?”
“Someone murdered Elsie Murray last night. And someone tried to murder Brett Halliday early this morning because he knew too much.” Michael Shayne took a deep draught of the iced liquor. “I’m narrowing it down,” he went on quietly, “and neither of you, by God, is in the clear. Have a drink, you two,” he went on conversationally, “while I make another phone call.”
He turned toward the telephone, hesitated and asked Estelle, “What’s the name of the bar where I met you?”
“The Durbin.” She spelled it out for him while Lew Recker, his face tight and expressionless, carefully began mixing highballs for the two of them.
Shayne looked up the Durbin in the book and dialed the number. When a voice answered, he said, “I’d like to speak to Officer Grady, please.”
“Grady?” The voice sounded doubtful.
“The cop from the beat. If he happens to be around.”
“Oh, him? Hold it a minute.”
Shayne held it until Grady’s voice came over the wire, “Yeah? Who’s calling?”