The blonde cried murder Read online

  At night, even when there is a full moon, there is black darkness at the bottom of the narrow slit between the two tall buildings. On this night there was only a sickle moon in the sky.

  The running girl stumbled as she emerged suddenly from the blackness of the alley onto the lighted sidewalk. As she went down on both hands and one knee, she threw a terrified glance back into the alley behind her. She could see nothing, but she distinctly heard the running footsteps pursuing her.

  Absolute terror mingled with hysteria to distort her features in a grimace of horror. She was on her feet instantly, running wildly along the sidewalk away from the lighted hotel entrance, like any hunted thing instinctively seeking safety in the darker shadows.

  The headlights of a car on the street behind her picked up her fleeing figure. At the same moment a running man slid to a stop on the sidewalk at the spot where she had fallen. He looked quickly in both directions as the car drew abreast of him, saw her in flight half a block away and started in pursuit.

  She looked over her shoulder once, saw the onrushing

  car and the man just behind it. Her breath was coming in labored gasps and her heart was pumping wildly. She realized there was only one possible chance of escape. She whirled ojff the sidewalk directly in front of the fast-coming headlights, waving her arms frantically above her head, standing resolutely at a point where she would be run down if the driver did not stop.

  There was the blat of a horn and the angry scream of brakes. Fortunately the brakes were good and they held on the dry pavement. The car lurched to a stop with its bumper inches from the girl's knees.

  It was a taxi without the signal lights that would have indicated it was cruising empty. The uniformed driver leaned out angrily to shout at the frightened girl, but she darted around the left headlight to claw open the rear door, gasping, "Please go on—fast. Please, please."

  She was inside and slammed the door shut. The driver turned his head to argue with her, but her fist pounded on his shoulder as she sobbed out, "Go on! Before he gets here. Can't you see—?"

  The driver could see she was young and beautiful and terrified. He also saw through the rear window the figure of the running man on the sidewalk behind them. He grunted sourly and threw the taxi in second and stepped on the gas. When the car leaped forward it threw the girl back against the rear cushion. Only at that moment did she become aware of the other passenger in the right-hand corner beside her—a woman, sitting very erect and staring at her in complete bewilderment.

  "I'm—I'm terribly sorry," choked out the girl. "Please let me ride just a few blocks until I can think what to do. Please don't stop where he can get me."

  She was addressing both the driver and his passenger impartially, and the driver tossed back over his shoulder curtly, "It's all right with me, lady, long as my fare don't mind. That your old man chasing you back there?"

  They were two blocks from the hotel now, and he rounded a comer, letting the motor idle down while he half-turned his head interestedly.

  His original passenger said quietly, "It's all right, of course, driver." She had a young and throaty voice, and spoke as calmly as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world for her to share her taxi with strangers who came running desperately out of dark alleys practically gibbering with fright.

  "Oh, no," said the girl, still gasping for breath and jerking out the words between gasps. "Not my husband. He's— I don't know," she cried out tearfully. "I can't think. It's all so unreal—so horrible."

  "Well, look here. Miss. You want I should find us a cop and report it? They'll pick him up quick."

  "Oh, nol I don't think so. Not the police. They're— they won't believe me. They just won't. They'll ask all sorts of questions—" Her voice trailed off miserably.

  "What do you wanta do?" asked the driver patiently. "I got this other fare, see? She's paying her money—"

  "It's perfectly all right, driver," the placid young voice said again from the right corner of the rear seat. They were approaching Biscayne Boulevard now, and she suggested, "Just turn toward Flagler, why don't you, and I'll tell you where to drop me."

  "I don't know what I should do," sighed the other girl forlornly. "That horrible man—" She lapsed into silence for a moment, then seemed to realize she owed her benefactors some sort explanation for the scene they had witnessed.

  "If I go to the police, they'll say I'm crazy. I'm not, but I can't prove it."

  "I betcha can't, sister," muttered the driver under his breath as he swung left onto the Boulevard.

  "But somebody's got to help me," she went on desperately. "My brother—" She sucked in her breath, then

  exhaled it slowly and went on more calmly. "I'm a stranger in Miami. Perhaps you'd know, driver. Some private detective. An honest one. Who'd listen to me and not think I'm crazy, and help me."

  "You might try Mike Shayne, Miss. He always seems to be getting himself mixed up in screwy cases."

  "Is he—a good detective?"

  "Best in Miami. Best in the country, I guess," added the driver with civic pride. "You need somebody to handle that gink was chasing you with no questions asked, Shayne's your man."

  "It isn't exactly that. It's—but I can't waste time talking about it," burst out the girl distractedly. "Would there be any chance of contacting him at night like this?"

  "Lady," said the driver, "you picked out just the right cab when you jumped in front of me back there and like to got yourself killed. I always read the write-ups on Shayne's cases in the papers and I know exactly where he hangs out at night. And from what I read in the papers, I guess he does as much work at home at night as he does in his office." There was the faintest suggestion of a leer in the driver's voice, but the girl disregarded it.

  She said eagerly, "Could you take me there?" Her fingers nervously clutched a black suede handbag in her lap. "I can pay you—I'll be glad to pay."

  The driver said, "It's only a few blocks on ahead now. If the other lady don't really mind—?"

  "Go right ahead, driver." A crisply amused voice came from the girl's companion. "I honestly haven't decided yet where I want you to drop me."

  "Okay then." The driver passed brightly-lighted Flagler Street and turned right at the next corner. A few moments later he drew up in front of an apartment hotel on the north bank of the Miami River and reached back to unlatch the left door. "You go right in here. Miss, and ask at the desk for Michael Shayne. Nobody's going to bother

  you any in here."

  Starting to get out, the girl drew in a deep breath and told her companion, "I can't thank you enough. I—I just can't explain, but you've been wonderful to let me share your cab. I'll give the driver enough to cover wherever you want to go."

  "That's not necessary. It's been a real pleasure—and very exciting."

  As the girl slid out in front of the hotel, she pressed a five-dollar bill into the driver's hand. She breathed, "You've been wonderful."

  He looked at the bill and pushed his peaked cap back to scratch his forehead as he watched the girl hurry inside the lobby. "Screwy dames," he muttered. "It sure takes all kinds—" Then he shrugged and settled his cap down firmly, turned to ask formally, "Where to now, Miss?"

  THREE: 9:39 P.M.

  The running man slid angrily to a panting stop half a block north of the Hibiscus Hotel as the taxi ahead of him gathered speed and the red taillights grew dimmer and then disappeared around a comer.

  He gritted his teeth together hard and slammed one fist into an open palm in a gesture of frustrated anger. In the light from the street lamp at the comer ahead where the taxi had stopped to pick up its passenger, he had seen the name of the taxi company and the car's license number.

  He hesitated only a moment, then turned and strode back to the hotel behind him. Entering the lobby, empty except for the desk clerk and switchboard operator whispering together excitedly, he glanced around and went directly to a telephone booth near the door with a local directory on the shelf
outside.

  He looked up the street address of the taxi company he sought, made a notation of it and went out to a car parked at the curb just south of the entrance. He got in and drove to the address he had written down, on Northwest 8th Avenue, and found it to be a large garage with taxis filling all the parking spaces in front.

  He parked up the street and returned, found a large, lighted office on the ground level with drivers lounging about in front, half a dozen others seated in chairs against the wall inside.

  Beyond, there was a large desk with a burly, red-faced man seated behind it talking into a telephone. Beyond him, in a cubby-hole, a thin, faded blonde was talking in

  a bored voice into a microphone suspended from the wall in front of her.

  The lounging drivers looked at him curiously as he entered and went directly to the desk. The burly man put down the phone and called back over his shoulder, "Number two-oh-three, Gert. Pickup at one-forty-seven Brickell," and looked up to ask, "Want a taxi, Mister?"

  "Not exactly." The tall man with the scarred face frowned and leaned forward with his palms flat on the desk. "How much chance is there to get in touch with the driver of one of your cabs—if I can give you his license number?"

  "Not much. If you've got his name or the nimiber of his hack-"

  His telephone burred. He scooped it up and said, "Yeh?" listened a moment and said, "Right away," looked over at one of the seated drivers and said, "You better take it, Tom. The Starbright Club. He sounded tight enough for a good tip.

  In the meantime the man in front of the desk had gotten out his wallet. He drew out a ten, hesitated, and added another ten to it on the desk. He said, "You must have records showing the license number of each cab."

  "Sure we got records," grunted the burly man. "But helll It's late and there's only a skeleton staff in the office." He jerked his head to the left where an open door showed two girls working at desks inside.

  The man said, "It's really very important. Matter of life and death, you might say, for me to find about a fare this cab picked up near the Hibiscus Hotel about twenty minutes ago." He reached for a piece of paper and wrote down the license number he had memorized.

  The man at the desk shrugged and said, "That makes it easier. Hibiscus, twenty minutes ago." He pushed back his chair and went back to confer with the blonde radio dispatcher, and they consulted a chart together and he

  made some notations on the paper with the license number.

  Then he went into the other room and gave the paper to one of the girls with brief instructions, and returned to his desk, grunting, "Should have it in a few minutes."

  His phone continued to ring at intervals, while the man stood stiffly in front of the desk, waiting.

  It was almost ten minutes before the girl came in and put the paper in front of him. He glanced at it and said affably, "That's Archie. Number sixty-two. That what you wanted?" His thick fingers gathered up the two ten-dollar bills.

  "I want you to get him over his radio. Find out where he took the woman he picked up in the street near the Hibiscus half an hour ago."

  Blunt fingertips drummed thoughtfully on the desk. "That ain't regular, Mister. You want to wait around till Archie checks in. Then if he wants to bother going back over his trip schedule for you—"

  "I need it now—fast," the man said impatiently. "It's my sister, see? And she's in bad trouble. I've got to find her in a hurry. Isn't twenty enough for a small favor like that?"

  The big man shrugged. He put the twenty in his pocket and said coldly, "You paid that for Archie's name and cab number." He held out the slip and gestured toward a gate in the low railing beside his desk. "Go back and talk to Gertie if you want. None of my business what she puts over the mike."

  The man with the scarred face compressed his lips, picked up the paper and strode back to stand beside the dispatcher. She completed a message, pressed a button and looked up at him appraisingly.

  He asked, "Can you call Archie in number sixty-two on that thing?"

  She said, "That's what it's for."

  "Will you do it and ask him where he took the young

  lady he picked up in the street a block from the Hibiscus Hotel about half an hour ago?"

  "Gee, Mister. I dunno. We're not supposed to send any personal messages over the radio. That's company regulations."

  "But this is very important. I've got to locate my sister. She's—" He drew in a deep breath and went on, "Well, she's in real bad trouble. Danger, maybe. Might save her life if I get to her fast."

  The blonde screwed her face up in a troubled manner and turned to call past him to the man at the desk. "What you think, Bert?"

  He shrugged without turning his head. "You're on your own, kid. I never know what you say over that mike."

  The man was getting his wallet out again. The dispatcher watched him covertly as he reluctantly withdrew another ten.

  Then she punched a button and droned, "Calling car sixty-two. Sixty-two. Come in, Archie." She pressed another button and leaned back with her head-phones to wait.

  After thirty seconds, she said, "Archie. There's a man here wants to know where you took a lady fare you picked up a block from the Hibiscus half an hour ago."

  She listened and then asked her questioner: "Which way from the Hibiscus? North or south?"

  He thought quickly, closing his eyes to remember and orient himself. "Tell him north. Just the first block north."

  She told Archie that. Then her eyes rounded and she turned to say, "Archie wants to know if you're the guy that was chasing her. That she was so scared of."

  "Good God, no," he exclaimed impatiently. "I tell you she's my sister. That man chasing her—he's the one I'm afraid of. Tell the driver she's in danger and I must get to her before it's too late."

  She gave Archie this answer over the microphone and

  listened again. Then she reached out and tweaked the ten-dollar bill from his hand and told him:

  "Archie says he guesses it don't matter much either way whether you are the guy or not. Because he took her to see Michael Shayne, and if you feel like tangling with that redhead, he'd like to be around to see it."

  "Michael Shayne? Who's he?"

  "You must be a stranger here, Mister. He's that private eye that's always getting write-ups in the papers."

  "A private detective?" The man bit his underlip nervously, then said, "Well, she's probably safe enough then, but I'd still like to see her. Did this Archie say where Shayne is?"

  "Yeh." She gave him the address of the hotel Archie had relayed to her. He muttered, "Thanks—a lot," and ran out of the office to his car.

  FOUR: 9:48 PM.

  There was a faint moon overhead and the night air of early autumn had a sensuously somnolent feel about it. There was a strongly lingering warmth from the earth after the heat of the day's sun, rising to mingle languidly with a faint inshore breeze from the Atlantic.

  Driving southward at a moderate pace on the right-hand lane of Biscayne Boulevard as it entered the city, Michael Shayne glanced sideways and downward, approvingly, at the brown head of Lucy Hamilton pressed lightly against the shoulder of his white linen jacket.

  He was bare-headed, and his coarse red hair was ruffled pleasantly by the night breeze. His big hands were loosely on the wheel and a feeling of contentment and relaxation gripped him.

  This was the really good time of the year in Miami, he reflected. The worst heat of the summer had passed, yet the vanguard of sun-seekers from the North had not yet arrived to take over the Magic City. He hadn't a single case in his files, and probably wouldn't have for a month or more—until the quick-money boys and the suckers arrived in droves and his particular talents would become much in demand.

  Lucy rubbed her cheek unashamedly against his right bicep, and said in a muffled voice, "Wake me when we get home, Michael. I'm afraid that last glass of champagne knocked me for a loop."

  He chuckled indulgently. "I like you when you're looped, angel."
/>   "What a horrible thing to say." She lifted her head momentarily in order to be properly indignant, and then snuggled it back again.

  "Not at all," he protested cheerfully. "You sort of take your hair down and forget about being the prim and proper secretary."

  "As if I were ever that," she scoffed,

  "Of course you are. You never make a semblance of a pass at me during office hours. I have to take you out, buy you an expensive dinner and ply you with Pol Roger before you act properly human."

  "Pol Roger? You know darned well that champagne came from California."

  "Anyhow, it looped you. And we'll be home pretty soon and I'm going to take advantage of your condition and kiss you."

  "Why?"

  "Why what?"

  "Why bother?" Her voice remained muffled and sleepy, but an underlying note of intensity crept into it.

  "Why bother kissing you?" he asked in perplexity.

  "Exactly."

  He drove on down the Boulevard, maintaining the same steady, relaxed pace, as he pondered her question and his reply. Basically, he knew what she meant. And it was difficult to find an intelligent answer to her question. Because he liked kissing her, of course. But that wasn't enough. Not enough to really answer the question she had posed.

  What she was really asking was—where did it get them?

  And the only honest answer to that was—nowhere, really. She didn't ask that sort of question often. Mostly, she seemed perfectly content with "things as they were." To drift along through the days as a cheerful and most efficient secretary in his office—to accept without question as many evenings like this as he could contrive for her (or wanted

  to contrive for her).

  He stirred uneasily and lifted one hand in an unconscious gesture to tug at the lobe of his ear. Very quietly, he asked, "Would you change things if you could, Lucy?"

  She sat up then, and moved slightly away from him as though this tack in the discussion required a little more formality between them. "I don't know." Her voice was grave and honestly dubious. "I just don't know, Michael."

  They were below 79th Street now, rapidly approaching the side street that led to her apartment.