Shayne said, “I wish you would.”
He started on the third sidecar, and in less than a minute the waitress came back to report, “Mona hasn’t come yet. She phoned that she’d be late. I can get one of the other hostesses,” she offered with an obliging smile.
Shayne told her not to bother and attacked his steak after draining the third sidecar glass.
The orchestra tuned up again with swing music. A G-stringed girl and a man in top hat and evening clothes came onto the dance floor and got in the groove. In spite of the music, Shayne was interested in the eccentric dance.
He tossed off his fourth sidecar and came to the morose conclusion that he was getting old.
Dorothy Thrip came in between floor-show acts when the ceiling lights were on. Her black sequin dinner gown glittered and there were rhinestone clips in her hair. She stopped just inside the doorway and asked the headwaiter a question. He shook his head and said something, nodding toward Michael Shayne,
Dorothy turned her head slowly to look at him. Shayne had just sopped up the last drop of hot blood on a piece of bread. He waved it at her, then stuck it in his big mouth.
She didn’t return his greeting. She followed the head-waiter down the aisle to a vacant table which also commanded a view of the entrance, and sat down alone.
Shayne crooked a finger at his waitress, who appeared to have as many eyes as she had patrons for she glided to his table instantly. Shayne ordered a quart of 1932 Du Blanc Port and leaned back to light a cigarette. The lights dimmed again and a breathy female of large proportions gave a fair imitation of Sophie Tucker in a stepped-up version of Frankie and Johnnie.
Shayne didn’t like Sophie and he detested fat women who imitated her. The crowd liked it, though. By the dim lights at the tables he saw them whisper, laugh boisterously, and applaud noisily the more vulgar lines. The dining-room was filling up rapidly and the smoky air held an acrid bite of marijuana along with the sickening sweet of Turkish blends.
During the intermission, Shayne watched the close-packed dancers who swarmed onto the small square of polished floor. Many of them were obviously muggled with marijuana; Shayne guessed the cute little cigarette girls were peddling reefers openly among the patrons. That would account for the number of private rooms upstairs and the rumors that filtered out of the Tally-Ho.
Shayne could see Dorothy Thrip alone at her table, her cold round eyes fixed on the door. She showed no symptoms of nervousness nor any hint that she feared Carl Meldrum might not come.
Shayne’s waitress glided up and said, “Mona just got here. I told her a gentleman was asking for her and she’ll be right over.”
Shayne thanked her and slid a dollar bill into her palm. He kept faced away from the rear toward the door for fear Mona mightn’t come if she saw who had been asking for her, and he was rewarded after a time by hearing someone stop at his table and utter a smothered gasp of recognition.
He turned slowly, pushed his chair back, and stood up. Mona’s lips were twisted sullenly and there was a tight, hard look about her face. She looked as though she was on the point of turning away, then tossed her head and said, “It’s you. I might have known it would be.” Her voice was low, her body and manner as splendidly poised as when Shayne first saw her. Her copper hair gleamed, a becoming coiffure above an evening gown of purest white which gave her a deceptively virginal appearance.
Shayne nodded to the hovering waitress to bring another wineglass. He drew out a chair for Mona, and after a moment’s hesitation she sat down. He gave her a cigarette and lit it, then poured her a glass of the excellent port.
She drank the wine and made a face, complaining, “What kind of stuff is this for a redheaded he-man to be drinking?”
“I’m just a sissy,” Shayne admitted. “I suppose you don’t think much of my cigarettes, either.”
She grimaced and tapped her cigarette against the ash tray on the table. “They’ll do,” she said indifferently. “I don’t go for marijuana, if that’s what you mean.”
“It wouldn’t mix so well with absinthe,” Shayne told her. He gestured toward the crowded dance floor. “Plenty of floaters out there, though.”
“Sure. That’s one reason a hostess has a hard time being decent in this joint. Too much nonprofessional competition from the girls who get high.” Her voice held an undercurrent of discontent. It was as though she held back with an effort to keep from exploding.
Shayne studied her face with frank, wide eyes. “Seen Carl Meldrum today?” he asked after a little silence.
“Does it mean anything to you whether I have or not?”
“Not much. You haven’t,” he answered for her after a brief study of her eyes. “Are you expecting him here tonight?”
“I never expect him any more,” she said with some bitterness.
Shayne motioned toward Dorothy Thrip sitting alone several tables away. “Looks as if Miss Thrip was waiting for someone.”
Mona moved languid eyes in the girl’s direction. “Oh-her. She’s always getting in Carl’s hair.”
“She’ll soon have a lot of cash at her disposal,” Shayne murmured.
For a moment Mona’s defenses were down before a surge of emotions which seemed compounded of anger and fear. “She won’t have it long after Carl takes her over the hurdles.” Then, getting a firm grip on her emotions, she looked levelly at Shayne and said indifferently, “Why don’t you give up your crazy idea of hanging the old lady’s murder on someone else? Darnell’s already dead and buried. Why strain yourself to bring grief to anyone else?”
Shayne’s eyes grew stubborn before her pleading gaze. “I told you how I stood on that. I’d just as soon have you as Renslow or Meldrum.”
“That’s twice you’ve made that kind of a crack about me,” she slid out. “Where do you get that stuff?”
“You’re one of my best suspects,” he told her cheerfully. “You’ve got the physical strength for it-and a snootful of absinthe does funny things to people. Carl is covering up for somebody-maybe it’s you.” Shayne set his wineglass down and opened the fingers of his left hand, began touching them off with the forefinger of his right hand. “Now, Carl could have let you into the Thrip home last night; or you might have made an impression of his key.” He touched the third and middle finger, saying, “You have got some string on Meldrum that makes you certain he’ll come to you with any money he picks up-you might have got tired of waiting for his notes to have any effect on Leora Thrip-and you’re willing for him to play the girl for her money. Hell,” he added, brightening and picking up his wineglass, “I didn’t know it did fit so well. He didn’t know what you were planning on, so he went ahead and mailed that note that night.” He raised the glass to his lips and drank. “Nothing like talking things over to make them come clear.”
Mona’s eyes were wide upon him; in the dim light they seemed the exact color of her henna-colored hair. “What are these notes you’re talking about? First you accuse Buell Renslow of writing them-then Carl.”
Shayne looked at her with a sort of vague admiration in his gray eyes. “Upon those notes, my dear possible murderess, hangs the solution of as weird a crime as I’ve ever tackled.” He poured both wineglasses full from the quart bottle, emptying it. “Renslow would be glad enough to hang it on Carl,” he went on argumentatively. “I hope neither of you thought I was fooling this noon when I said I was going to throw somebody to the wolves.”
“And you don’t care whether it’s the guilty person or not,” Mona charged. “You’d frame any one of us if you saw a chance to do it.”
“Sure.” Shayne drank some wine. “I’d frame any one of you I thought was guilty,” he explained. “But you’re wrong about thinking I’d hang anything on a person I believed innocent.”
“Very generous of you,” Mona answered ironically, “but it would still be a frame.”
Shayne emptied his wineglass and raised ragged red brows in a cynical grin. “I might have to manufacture some evidence to convince the police,” he admitted. “Painter is so bullheaded he’s going to take a lot of convincing.” He paused, then added musingly, “I had a hunch Renslow would offer you enough to overcome your objections to our idea of fitting Carl for the trap when I left you two together today.”