“It seemed like it was foolproof when I made it up,” she sobbed. “Saul Henderson doesn’t deserve to keep on living. And it wouldn’t really have hurt the Graham girl any. She could easily deny knowing anything about it and refuse to pay the money I was promising in her name. And I bet she hates him too and would be glad to see him dead,” she added viciously. “Maybe he never did do to her what I dreamed up and told you, Mr. Wayne, but I bet he did plenty of other things just as bad. I’m not sorry I tried at all. I’m just sorry that I failed.”
“Yeh,” said Roy dismally. “And that Harry got impatient and went down and tried to shake him down on his own. If he’d only waited. We could have figured out something better between us. And no matter what you say,” he went on forcibly, “I don’t believe Harry ever went gunning for him. He hated his guts plenty, and figured he was due at least his share of the money Henderson ran off with, but ten years in prison was plenty for Harry and I swear I don’t believe he’d take a chance on ever getting sent back.”
Shayne looked at his watch and got up. He said, “After all this blows over, Roy, I suggest you take this wife of yours out to Hollywood. She’ll make your fortune for you.”
17
Shayne had time to make one telephone call from the Chicago airport before his jet flight took off. He made that call to Timothy Rourke in Miami, and as a result the reporter was at the airport to meet him when his plane landed at dusk.
“Everything set?” Shayne asked as they went toward the exit together.
Rourke nodded, his thin face serious and unhappy. “I came out in a taxi so we could talk in your car.” He lengthened his stride to match the detective’s as they went toward the car Shayne had parked there at noon. “Lucy has Mrs. Harry Gleason in tow and will meet us at Henderson’s house in half an hour. Will Gentry has persuaded Painter to meet him there, though Will is sore as hell because you jumped off to Chicago without telling him any more about those mysterious fingerprints you turned over to him in connection with the case. And that’s more than you told me about them,” Rourke added angrily as he got in the front seat beside his oldest friend.
Shayne started the motor and threaded his way out of the parking lot and into an eastbound stream of traffic. “What did Gentry tell you about the prints?”
“Just that Washington identifies them as belonging to a wanted man. Whose prints are they, Mike?”
“Saul Henderson’s of course. I’m willing to bet none of your newspaper contacts picked up any back trail of Henderson’s from New York. That should have tipped you off.”
“They didn’t,” Rourke admitted uncomfortably. “Is that what your sudden trip to Chicago was all about?”
Shayne said, “Yeh. Henderson is a worthless bastard, Tim. Harry Gleason took a rap for him twenty years ago and came to Miami to collect when he discovered Henderson was in the chips.”
“Instead, he collected a forty-five slug,” muttered Rourke. “With Henderson absolutely in the clear on that kill whether Gleason threatened him or not.”
Shayne said, “He still has to answer to that old charge.”
“No statute of limitations on it?”
“That’s one question I’ve been afraid to ask,” Shayne admitted irritably. “Arson and possible manslaughter. Are they subject to the statute?”
“Damned if I know. Some states, I guess. Hey! There’s something else, Mike, that bothers hell out of me. That girl. Muriel Graham. The one you said Henderson had brought in as a ringer to fool Painter.”
“What about her?”
“I’ll swear she isn’t, Mike. Isn’t a ringer, I mean. I interviewed her today after Painter put her through his personal ringer, and her fiance was right there with her. A chap named Paul Winterbottom, rather well known locally. She’s the real goods, all right. How could you have made such a mistake?”
Shayne said grimly, “It’s easy for me. How does she feel about her stepfather?”
“Exactly the opposite from the way you expected. Insists he’s a wonderful man, and can’t understand why anyone would have it in for him. The only way I can figure that deal, Mike, is that you had the wool pulled over your eyes by an impostor… Jane Smith.”
Shayne said, “You’re improving, Tim. One of these days I’m going to turn my license over to you.” They were on the Causeway now, leading to Miami Beach, and Shayne sighed deeply, glancing at his watch and then stepping harder on the gas as he realized they were due at Henderson’s in a few minutes.
Chief Will Gentry’s inconspicuously marked car was already parked in the circular driveway when they arrived, with Peter Painter’s official car standing close behind it, uniformed chauffeur lounging at the wheel. A Miami taxi turned into the driveway behind Shayne and stopped behind him when he pulled up under the porte-cochere.
Lucy Hamilton got out of the taxi first, and hurried up to him with both her hands outstretched, a look of uncertainty on her face. “I’ve got Mrs. Gleason, Michael.” She lowered her voice, glancing over her shoulder at the woman getting out of the taxi behind her.
“I couldn’t explain why you wanted her here, Michael… to confront the man who killed her husband. She’s… pretty near the breaking point.”
Shayne squeezed her hands tightly and pushed her toward Rourke. He went past her to Hilda, and linked his arm in hers while he leaned inside the cab and gave the driver two dollars. “I’ll take the ladies home, driver.” He stood for a moment and looked down into Hilda’s taut face and questioning eyes. He said, “I know this is going to be an ordeal, but it will soon be over and you can go home to Algonquin.”
“Accompanied by my husband in his coffin,” she said in a tight voice.
Shayne continued to look down into her upturned face without speaking. Then he turned her about firmly with his arm in hers, and they followed Timothy Rourke and Lucy Hamilton onto the porch where Harry Gleason’s bloodstains from the previous night had been cleanly washed away.
The same maid opened the door for them, and motioned them through the archway into the square room where the cocktail party had been held just twenty-four hours previously.
This time there were only four persons in the room: Henderson and his stepdaughter, and the two police officers from Miami and the Beach.
Muriel Graham sat at Henderson’s right, and gravely acknowledged the introductions made by Will Gentry, who stood in front of the fireplace with a half-smoked cigar in his hand, and as soon as the formalities were over and the others had seated themselves, Peter Painter addressed Shayne aggressively:
“Suppose you come to the point, Shayne; I understand it was your suggestion that we all come here.”
Shayne nodded and ruffled his red hair. He moved over to a position at the other end of the mantel from Gentry where he could look down at all the others. “I made a flying trip to Chicago today. To a little town called Denton, where I talked with a young couple named Mr. and Mrs. Roy Combs.”
Gentry and Henderson were the only two who reacted to the name. The police chief paused with his cigar halfway to his mouth, and turned to look at Shayne quizzically. Henderson sat bolt upright and opened his mouth twice as though to speak, but closed it both times.
“Your son, Henderson,” Shayne told him harshly. “Born twenty-two years ago when your wife died in a hospital as the result of burns she received when you and Harry Gleason burned down an empty warehouse to collect insurance on its non-existent contents.”
“No!” The exclamation was torn from Hilda Gleason’s lips. She wrung her hands together and her face twisted tragically. “Not Harry. I knew there was something, but…”
“Not Harry,” said Shayne, and his voice softened. “In fact, you can go right on being proud of Harry Gleason, Hilda. He was a hero twenty-two years ago even though he did serve a ten-year prison sentence for arson. It was he who went into the burning building and saved his partner’s wife from certain death while her own husband left her there to die with their unborn child still in her womb.”