“I will,” he said shortly. “And I’m listening.”
She puckered her eyes at him, unsure of herself before his bleak gaze and the deep trenches in his cheeks. “I was so terribly confused when I first came to in the hotel room and saw you and all those men. When I didn’t tell the truth then, I didn’t know what was best-later.” She appealed to him by timidly touching his arm with her hand. “You do believe me, don’t you? That I would have told the truth eventually if I became convinced it would help catch the murderer?”
Shayne took a long drink of cognac and chased it with ice water. “I’m not believing anything until I hear the whole story,” he said harshly.
She took her hand away. “Tell me-first-how did you guess?”
“A number of small things that added up only one way. When you speak of catching Miss Morton’s murderer-does that mean you’re convinced Ralph Morton didn’t do it?”
“No,” she said quickly. “I just don’t know. Did he?”
Shayne settled back and warmed half a tumbler of cognac between his palms. “I’d like to hear from you first.”
“It’s still like a horrible nightmare. I was so dumbfounded when I opened the door and saw Ralph Morton in that room instead of you. He was awfully drunk, Michael.” She spoke his first name tentatively and a little gasp of surprise or apology followed.
“Go back a little,” he ordered gruffly. “You went up to three-oh-nine, as you told Gentry, still thinking I had called you?”
“Of course. I had no reason to think otherwise. I knocked and a man’s voice said come in. The door wasn’t locked, and I opened it. He was sprawled out on the bed and I thought he looked surprised when he saw me. As though he expected someone else. I asked Ralph if you had got there yet and he didn’t even answer. He just leered at me. He got up and grabbed me and blew his foul whisky breath in my face and said insulting things. He was slimy and revolting, and I fought him as hard as I could. He tripped once and nearly fell. I started to run, but he caught my ankle and dragged me down to the floor and started cursing me. That’s when he struck me with his fist.” Her mouth primped up and she put her finger tips to the bandage. Tears covered her eyes, but she tightened her lips and the tears didn’t overflow.
“That’s when I was first really afraid. It was one of those things that just don’t happen to people. But it was happening to me. That’s when I saw the gun on the bedside table beside a bottle of whisky. He was puffing and out of breath and staggering, and I snatched the gun. I heard the whisky bottle fall to the floor, then everything turned sort of blurry and red.” She covered her face with her hands and shuddered. Shayne took a sip of cognac and waited. When she took her hands from her face she looked at him with imploring eyes. “I didn’t hear the gun go off. I wasn’t conscious of it, but suddenly I was standing over him and there was-a hole-in his head-and blood.” She fell against Shayne and sobbed uncontrollably.
Shayne held her until she was calm. “Finish your daiquiri,” he said gruffly, “then tell me how you came to lock yourself in the closet where you almost suffocated.”
The ice had melted, weakening the drink, and she finished it with a few swallows. “That’s too horrible to think of. And nerve-wracking. I hardly had time to realize what had happened when there was a knock on the door. I knew it was still unlocked, and that whoever it was could just turn the knob and catch me in there with him-dead.
“I was too frantic to think. I guess I acted automatically. The gun had dropped on the bed close to his hand. I grabbed it and wiped it clean and put it in his hand and curled his fingers around it. I was terrified for fear it would go off again.” She shuddered and sank weakly against the couch, her hands clenched tightly in her lap.
“The closet door was open,” she resumed after a moment. “The person at the door knocked again, impatiently. I stepped in the closet and shut the door quietly. I didn’t realize for several minutes that the door had latched and locked me in. There wasn’t even a doorknob inside. I hardly dared to breathe. I thought I could hear sounds in the room and kept expecting someone to open the door any minute. That’s when I made up the story I would tell whoever found me. The same story I told you and Chief Gentry. It was all I could think of.
“After a while everything was quiet. It was a strange silence-like my ears were all stopped up. Then I started hurting in my chest. I couldn’t get a good breath. I was sweating all over, and I knew I had to get out of there.
“That’s when I discovered there wasn’t a doorknob inside. The door was so tight I couldn’t even see a crack of light from outside. I went all to pieces and flung myself against the door time and time again, but it didn’t budge. I tried to scream, but not a sound came out. I kicked and pounded on the door until I was too weak to stand up. Then I fell to the floor and crawled around like a trapped animal looking for a place to get out. And that’s all I remember,” she ended, and expelled a breath in a series of jerky sighs.
Shayne took a long drink of cognac and an ice-water chaser. “It was a brutal experience,” he said quietly, “and you tell it very well. Now, let’s have the truth.”
She stiffened and squinted at his set features. “I’ve told you everything-just as it happened,” she said.
“You’ve told it the way you hope I’ll think it happened,” he corrected her harshly.
“Please, Mi-Michael,” she stammered. “I’m so tired. I can’t fence with you tonight.” She moved slowly as if to stand up, then whirled about and threw herself into his arms, clasping her arms around his neck and pressing against him.
He stiffened his neck when she tried to pull his head down. Her lips were parted and her sooty eyes were wide open and misty.
“It might be interesting to kiss a murderess,” he said in a calm, speculative tone, “but I think I’ll skip it if you don’t mind.”
She relaxed and closed her eyes, squeezing a tear from under each lid. “That’s a horrible word, Michael,” she said drearily. “Is it really murder-what I did?”
“It’s murder when you go to a man’s room of your own volition with a gun in your handbag and the determination to kill in your mind.”
“But I’ve told you-”
“A lot of lies mixed in with a few grains of truth,” he said brutally, pushing her away from him. He stood up and took his empty glass from the table, went to the desk and refilled it. Returning, he toed a light occasional chair along, stopped on the opposite side of the serving-table, and sat down.
“You had every intention of killing Morton when you went to the Ricardo Hotel,” he resumed, “after covering yourself carefully with a story about a fake telephone call.”
“But it wasn’t a fake. Lucy can tell you.” There was naked fear in her eyes.
“Lucy didn’t hear the phone ring at all,” he snapped. “You waited until she was under the shower and couldn’t know whether it rang or not. Then you called Morton to tell him you were coming over. When Lucy came out of the bathroom and caught the tag-end of the conversation you gave her the story about me calling.”
“Have you lost your mind, Michael? It wasn’t that way at all. Lucy will tell you-”
“I say it was,” he cut in sharply. “And so does the switchboard operator at the Ricardo,” he added untruthfully.
“That horrid old man-” She burst out angrily.
“Heard every word you said,” he supplied. “No call went out from three-oh-nine tonight, but your call came in about twelve-fifteen.”
“Suppose I did go over to see Ralph,” she jerked out viciously. “But the rest of it happened just as I told you. He misinterpreted my reason for going there at that time of night.”