Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine Annual, No. 3, 1973

Cordova stopped the glass halfway to his lips. He stood like a statue. Then he said carefully, “Shayne, if my employees choose to moonlight I couldn’t care less — unless it interfers with their employment here, of course.”

“Miss Deans made frequent plane trips, I’m told.”

“She traveled some,” Cordova nodded. “On her own time. She earned the time.”

“Un-huh.” Shayne yanked at his ear. “And I understand she lived in. I’d like to see her place.”

“Miss Deans had accomodations here, that’s true,” Cordova nodded. “We do that with some of our employees as a part of the consideration. But as to seeing the apartment, I’m sorry, Mr. Shayne, it already has another occupant. Miss Dean’s personal things were shipped to her family in Iowa yesterday.”

“Was that before or after McKeever got a look?” Shayne snapped.

Cordova smiled, drank water. “Sergeant McKeever okayed the shipment.”

Shayne snorted and looked at Max Wallace. The newspaperman was stonefaced, the goatee jutting slightly.

Shayne said, “See the both of you,” and walked out.

Wallace caught up with him on the sidewalk. “Hey?”

The town was bright now, flashing lights beckoning the suckers, and they were out, crowding the sidewalks. Shayne ignored both the lights and the suckers.

“How come you didn’t tell me McKeever is on their payroll, pal?”

“McKeever isn’t,” Wallace said bluntly. “He’s the straightest cop we’ve got.”

“Yeah?”

“You have to trust somebody, Shayne,” Wallace said, sounding sour. “You’re in strange territory. I’m telling you McKeever is straight like the good arrow.”

Shayne looked around. He didn’t like the tinsel or the smell of Las Vegas. He wasn’t even sure he liked Wallace.

“Where do I find Flora Ann Perkins?” he growled.

“We drive there. She’s got a place on the edge of town. You want to tell me about her, where she fits?”

“No.”

“Okay. I just thought I might be entitled.”

They got into the car. Wallace wheeled out of the hotel parking lot. Shayne sat low in the seat and glowered without seeing anything. He felt as if he was running in deep water. He wasn’t getting anywhere.

Then Wallace said, “You’re an impatient bastard, Shayne. You’ve been in town — what? A few hours. You’re acting like you should have this thing all wrapped up and be heading back to Miami. Man, what did you expect out of a smoothie like Cordova? The platter?”

Shayne slid the newspaperman an oblique look.

“We’re not cowboys out here. Big city private detectives don’t awe us. We’ve seen ’em before, and we’ll see ’em again. Incidently, we’ve got a tail. It’s probably McKeever, but we could have Benjie Rhodes, too. I doubt if I can shake him. I’m no expert at this sort of thing.”

Shayne said, “I’d be expected to visit Flora Ann Perkins sooner or later. She and Melody Deans were pals.”

Flora Ann Perkins lived in the first floor middle of a squat apartment building. She did not answer the summons produced by Shayne’s thumb against a small door button. He rapped hard. The door remained closed. The only sounds were muted voices that came from behind the door.

“Sounds like a television program,” Wallace said. He paused, then added. “She could be working.” He shot Shayne a side glance.

The redhead scowled. A crawly feeling in his gut made him shift his feet and open his coat so that he had quick access to the holstered .45. The last time he’d experienced the same feeling Melody Deans had come crashing down almost on top of him from a seventeenth floor hotel balcony.

“Something stinks,” Shayne said.

Wallace stroked his goatee and looked around. “What makes you say that?”

Shayne tried the door knob. It didn’t turn. “Let’s hustle a manager. I want to see inside.”

“Hey, hold it a sec,” Wallace said. “Flora Ann might not want to be disturbed. She could be—”

Shayne found the manager in a front apartment. He was a young guy with long sideburns and a bushy mustache. He wasn’t interested in opening Flora Ann Perkins’ apartment until Shayne edged back his coat and allowed him a glimpse of the holstered gun.

“Okay, okay,” he said.

He picked up a large ring of keys from a table near the door and went ahead of Shayne and Wallace down the corridor. At Flora Ann Perkins’ door, he said, “I’m going to open up, and then I’m going to fade, okay? I’ve got no beef with anyone.”

Shayne smelled death the instant the door swung open. He also heard the sound of shower water above the television voices.

He pounded into the small bath. The shower curtain was closed. He swept it aside and looked down on the naked crumpled figure of the woman who was curled in the bottom of the bathtub, luke warm shower water splattering her hip.

“If you figure McKeever is waiting outside, get him,” the redhead snapped.

VIII

McKeever was a lanky, loose-jointed man, coldly efficient. He called in help, supervised the preliminary investigation and then talked to the building manager before finally motioning Mike Shayne and Max Wallace outside. They stood at an unmarked police sedan under a street lamp light.