But it was too late to produce them now. He sat for a moment and silently cursed himself for having allowed Lucy to persuade him to conceal them in the first place, though, even as he did so, he knew that he would do the same thing under the same circumstances another time.
He left the bar and got in his car, drove on to his hotel garage and parked it, then walked around to the front and entered the lobby.
Dick was still at the desk and he looked up and made a hurried signal to the redhead as he walked in. Shayne paused and glanced around the lobby casually, saw a tall, bony woman get up quickly from a deep chair, half-concealed by a potted palm.
A series of bracelets rattled on both wrists as she hurried toward him with mannish strides.
He blinked doubtfully and then recognized her. She was one of Mrs. Martin’s bridge guests. The one who had come to the door to greet him when he arrived at the Martin house.
Chapter five
She moved up close to him, tilting her head coquettishly, and, when Shayne caught a whiff of her breath, he realized she’d had at least one more drink since his encounter with her at the Martins’.
“Mr. Shayne. Or may I call you Mike?”
“I’ll answer to either,” he told her equably. “And you’re…?”
“Kitty Heffner. I just don’t answer to anything but Kitty.” Her voice was brassy and somewhat loud, the words slightly blurred around the edges. “I’ve been waiting and waiting. I just felt I had to see you. I’ve got some very private information for you. Things I just wouldn’t tell that old policeman.”
Shayne said, “That’s fine,” drawing back a little from the impact of her flashing black eyes. She was a woman who must have been very beautiful fifteen or twenty years before, and a few drinks evidently made her forget those intervening years. He took her arm and started to turn her toward two chairs across the lobby. “We can sit here quietly and I’ll be glad to hear anything you can tell me.”
“Do we have to sit down here in public, Mike? It’s really terribly confidential. I don’t know whether I ought to tell it or not, but I do think maybe another little drink would give me more nerve.”
Shayne sighed and then indicated a waiting elevator, conscious of the amused attention of Dick at the desk and the uniformed operator. He said, “We can go up to my room if you like. Unless you’re afraid of being compromised,” he ended hopefully. “It is past midnight.”
Her gurgling laughter was unpleasantly remindful of the neigh of a horse. “I always say it’s never too late for a little drink. And I didn’t think you’d be Victorian, Mike. Not after all the things I’ve heard.”
He compressed his lips and got in the elevator with her. The operator stood very erect with his eyes front, avoiding Shayne’s face.
Out of the side of his mouth, Shayne said, “Be seeing you shortly,” as he got out, and reached in his pocket for a key-ring as they went down the hall.
He unlocked a door and reached inside to turn on the ceiling light, and then stepped back to let Kitty Heffner precede him into the square sitting room.
She uttered a little squeal of delight as she surveyed the room. “So this is where you grill your suspects?”
“Sometimes,” said Shayne, “I feed them enough liquor so they tell me all their secrets without being grilled. Particularly if they’re female… and pretty.” He passed her toward a wall liquor cabinet as he spoke.
“Oh, you.” Her voice lost some of its brassy quality and became flirtatious. “I’ve always understood you liked blondes.”
“And brunettes,” Shayne assured her. “What can I get you?”
“Anything.” She waved a large-boned hand vaguely and the bracelets rattled on her wrist. “Whatever you’re taking will be fine. It is nice and cozy here and I just love the thought of being plied with liquor. My, but the other girls would envy me if they even guessed where I am.”
Shayne took down a brandy bottle and two four-ounce glasses. He carried them into the kitchen and set them on a tray, ran warm water over a tray of ice cubes and put three cubes in each of two tall glasses. Filling the glasses with cold water, he carried the tray back and found Kitty ensconced on the shabby sofa, leaning back so that her matronly breasts were thrust out and her rather tight skirt was pulled up to her knees. She had nice legs and trim ankles and a neat waistline, and the redhead realized she wouldn’t be bad at all in a dim light and if she’d keep her mouth shut.
He set the tray on a low table in front of the sofa, and provided the dim light by switching on a floorlamp across the room and turning out the overhead light.
She patted the sofa beside her happily as he turned back. “I do feel lovely and sinful… and just a little bit terrified of you, Mike Shayne. You’re so big and masterful, I just know I shouldn’t trust myself here alone with you. I can’t help wondering what might happen if you should take it in your mind to seduce me.” A deeper note had crept into her voice and it vibrated through Shayne.
He sat down beside her and said, “I practically never seduce a witness until I’ve grilled her thoroughly first.” He poured brandy in both wine glasses and said, “Or would you rather have yours mixed?”
“I just love straight liquor… if it’s good. And I just know you wouldn’t have anything but the best.” She reached for her glass and contrived to have the back of her hand brush against his knuckles. He was pleased that he felt no answering tingle.
He lifted his own glass and said, “You’ve got some information about the murder?”
She took a dainty sip of the brandy, savored it, and then avidly drank half the glass. She set it down without a sputter and without reaching for the ice water.
“I think so. I think it’s important.” She was frowning a little and a tremor of self-doubt crept into her voice. “I don’t think I’m just being catty, and I don’t think I just decided it might be important, just because it gave me an excuse for coming up here and being with you. But I don’t know for sure. I do feel dreadfully disloyal and all. But it is a murder case, isn’t it? And, in a murder case, isn’t it against the law to withhold evidence?”
Shayne took a drink from his own glass and chased it with ice water. “It’s practically a felony,” he told her. “You can tell me in confidence.”
“I knew I could, Mike. That’s why I didn’t volunteer any information to that policeman. I told myself, Kitty Heffner, you just keep it for Mike Shayne. But now I don’t know whether it was just because in the back of my mind I thought it might turn out this way or not. You do know you’re dreadfully attractive, don’t you?”
Shayne said gruffly, “I’m supposed to be grilling you. Remember?”
“Of course I do. And you practically never seduce a witness until you’ve grilled her thoroughly first, do you?”
“That’s right. So the sooner we get on with it… Shayne’s voice trailed off into suggestive silence.
“It’s about Mr. Martin’s partner that you said was murdered, mostly. And something about Mr. Martin, too. As soon as I heard you say he was dead I couldn’t help thinking to myself, ‘So, he finally got what was coming to him.’ And I wasn’t surprised, not a bit. The way he was always pawing everybody at parties and making remarks with double meanings. Not me, you can bet. I wouldn’t have it. The mere thought of his kissing me in the kitchen makes my flesh crawl. But there were others that liked it, all right. I know I shouldn’t tell you this, but, I made up my mind, I was going to tell you the truth because it might be important.”