Shayne’s answer was a shrug — there seemed nothing to say. The girl went on evenly with, “I decided to watch. You see, I knew who you were, though I didn’t expect to see you in New York. I used to spend some of my winters in Miami. I wondered why you were there, and I got afraid. Then I decided to keep an eye on the hall. There was another door from the hall to that bedroom. I saw them bring in the trunk. Then I saw them bring it out. A moment later, you followed. I followed you.”
Shayne sighed and shook his head. “I’m afraid your imagination has caused you to take a trip for nothing — not that I’m not grateful for a charming, if somewhat zany, companion.”
She shook her head, and her green eyes were like twin jewels — hard and cold. She said, “It won’t do, Mike Shayne. Tyndale kept watch like a bulldog all morning on that room.”
“If you were in there, you must know there wasn’t a body there,” the redhead told her with an air of patience. “Tyndale was waiting for me on a matter of business. As for the trunk, I’m taking some valuable papers back to Miami for him.”
“Mike Shayne playing nursemaid to a bunch of documents!”
“Why couldn’t your friend — Ben What’s-his-name — simply have ducked out of the bedroom into the hall and gone down in the elevator? He’s probably back at the hotel right now, wondering what happened to you.”
She shook her head. “Not Ben Felton,” she said firmly. “Ben wasn’t that kind of a character. He’d have called me — if he was able to.”
“Maybe he wasn’t able to.” The redhead was sparring desperately. The girl didn’t know the corpse was in the foot-locker — but as long as she was with him, she was intensely dangerous. If she blew the whistle on him before he had a chance to reclaim the trunk...
“Maybe he wasn’t,” she said. “He told me the deal he was on could be dangerous — so dangerous he’d been keeping out of sight for seventy-two hours.”
“Quite a story,” said Shayne, feigning amusement. “And just what was your role in this dangerous deal, Miss Hale? You’re not going to tell me your friend brought you along merely as window dressing — not that you wouldn’t dress a window damned attractively.”
“My role was — or is — very important,” she replied serenely. “Incidentally, believe it or not, it was not the sort of part I enjoy playing. But when you set out to destroy a rat, you can’t always name your poison.”
Shayne shook his head, puzzled. “Somewhere away back there, you lost me. But, now that you’re here, what’s on the docket?”
Her eyes studied him again. “That,” she said, “depends...”
It was exasperating. For the time being, there was nothing Shayne could do. He jerked his head toward the window.
“Hell of a beautiful sunset out there,” he said.
Carol Hale said, “Isn’t it lovely!”
They dined on excellent fried chicken, placed before them on trays by the inevitable trim hostess. They talked — about plane travel, about Miami, about New York, about a score of irrelevant things. But they never returned to the subject of the late Ben Felton, and she never revealed the least thing about herself.
Whatever element she represented in the deadly business, she knew he had the foot-locker aboard the plane and she probably suspected what it contained. If she had actually been with Ben Felton at Tyndale’s suite, it was unlikely she was working for what Shayne was beginning to think of as the other side. But he had only her word for all that.
There was no sense in trying to ditch her, once they landed, and walk away from the airport, leaving the trunk to be picked up later, He couldn’t risk checking a murdered corpse in a trunk in the airport luggage room, and he felt certain Carol Hale would keep watch and discover any pickup he arranged. A girl who had come along this doggedly on a mere hunch wouldn’t give up at that stage of the game.
There was only one thing to do — play out the string, bluff all the way, and keep the girl with him. He shifted his head to look at her covertly. She was lying back in her seat now, eyes closed. She looked harmless and innocent as a — well, baby was not quite the word he had in mind. Quite unexpectedly, the redhead felt a pang of genuine regret that they had met under such circumstances. Otherwise...
The distant barricade of Miami Beach was ablaze with jewel-lights as the big Super-Constellation circled and came in for its landing. A glance at his watch told Shayne they were on time. He stirred, and she yawned dimpling prettily. He said, “Someone meeting you?”
She shook her head, warily.
He added, “I suppose you’ll want to stand by while I claim the foot-locker?”
Her answer was, “What else? And if you make one false step, Mike Shayne, I’ll call the cops so fast you’ll never know what—”
“You will?” Something in his voice checked her.
They were standing, side by side, at the luggage-claiming counter, when Shayne, after a quick glance around said, in a low voice, “Looks as if you won’t have to call the cops after all, you double-crossing little...”
She said, “What are you...?” And then quick comprehension flashed into her alert green eyes. “It wasn’t me,” she whispered. Then, more loudly, “Thanks, Mike, but I can manage by myself. There are plenty of porters here. It was really very kind of you.” Deftly, she took the claim-check from his fingers. “Good night, Mike, it’s been fun. Hope I see you around.”
“Lots of fun,” he said grimly. “And more to come. ’Night, Carol.”
The redhead tipped his hat and walked away — almost into the arms of an enormous plainclothes-man, who was making his way slowly, purposefully, toward them through the small press of porters and passengers and their welcoming friends.
Mike said, “Hello, Len — what are you doing here?”
Len Sturgis, one of the ablest as well as the largest detectives on Chief Will Gentry’s Miami Police Force, eyed Shayne distrustfully. “How about you?” he asked. “Why don’t you tell your friends when you take a trip to New York? We miss you around here, fellow.”
Shayne was in no mood to endure heavy-handed humor. He said, “Two reasons, Len. One, I’m a licensed private detective, and my business is strictly between my clients and me. Two, I don’t need to tell you characters what I do — you seem to find it out quick enough anyway. What’s on your mind?”
“Nothing special,” said Sturgis, looking hurt. “How was the big city, Mike?”
Shayne wanted nothing more at the moment than to get rid of the man. Out of the corner of one eye, he could see Carol Hale sailing serenely toward the cab-stand outside, following a porter who was trundling a pile of bags of various shapes and sizes, among them the brown steel foot-locker that contained the mortal remains of Ben Felton.
But Shayne couldn’t break away now. He knew Len Sturgis was at the airport in response to a tip, and he knew the detective knew Shayne knew it. Cursing Harry Tyndale and the leak in his inner staff, Shayne tried to think of a way out.
Sturgis prompted him, “No luggage, Mike?”
Shayne took the cue. “Just a one-day trip. I went up on the one o’clock. Friend of mine needed a little help.”
Sturgis regarded Shayne with an oh-yeah? look, but said, “Well, I guess there’s nothing much doing here. Care for a lift to town?”
“Thanks, Len, but I left my own car in the parking lot outside.” Shayne headed for the exit the girl had used.
But he was too late.
She had vanished...